Choice and Accountability: "Bush has redefined conservatism." (Barone)

U.S. News & World Report | 12/15/03 | Michael Barone

[bdeaner]

Nation & World 12/15/03
By Michael Barone
Choice and accountability

Browse through an archive of columns by Michael Barone.

Many conservatives are complaining that George W. Bush is a big-government conservative--or not a conservative at all. They complain about the Medicare prescription drug law he and the House and Senate Republican leadership pushed through, the first major expansion of Medicare since 1965. They call him a big spender, noting that discretionary spending has been rising more rapidly than under Bill Clinton. They complain that he pushed through the first education bill giving the federal government a role in setting standards. They complain about the farm bill he signed in 2002 and the energy bill he championed this year.

All those complaints have some substance. But for the most part Bush did not really campaign as a small-government conservative. A different theme runs through the major policies he advocated in the campaign and the major policy changes he has pushed through as president, a theme that can be summed up in two words: choice and accountability. The Bush tax cuts let you have the choice of how to spend more of your money, and you are, as always, accountable for the results. The education law forces the states to hold students and teachers accountable and gives them some choice in deciding how to do so. The Medicare prescription drug bill contains health savings accounts and competition experiments in 2010, which are attempts at providing more choice and more accountability.

Cold decisions. To be sure, Bush has made compromises. Congress was unwilling to vote for all of the tax cuts he proposed; he and the Republican leadership made cold decisions and got what they could. (House Majority Leader Tom DeLay and Ways and Means Committee Chairman Bill Thomas like to say that if you pass a bill by more than one vote, you have given away too much.) Bush gave up early on school vouchers, and it's unclear how strong the state standards will be. The Medicare prescription drug bill contains much less provision for competition than Bush wanted; DeLay at one point excluded Thomas from the conference committee to whittle the provision down. It's not clear that the bill will lead to the choice-and-accountability healthcare system that conservatives like Thomas and former Speaker Newt Gingrich want.

Bush has redefined conservatism. It is now not the process of cutting government and devolving powers; it is the process of installing choice and accountability into government even at the cost of allowing it to grow. This is an attempt to move government in the same direction as the private sector, which now offers much more in the way of choice and accountability than it did in the 1950s and 1960s, when big corporations and big unions established wage rates, when you worked for one company until age 65 and then depended on that one company and Social Security for your retirement income.

What is next on Bush's list? Social Security. In the past quarter century the private sector has moved from defined-benefit pensions to defined-contribution pensions. Defined-benefit pensions gave you little choice and no accountability: If the LTV Steel pension fund or the United Mine Workers hospital fund went belly up, you were out of luck (or lobbying Congress for a federal bailout). With defined-contribution pensions, you make the choice of how to invest the money in your 401(k), and you are accountable for the results.

Bush campaigned for Social Security individual investment accounts in 2000 but, with many congressional Republicans queasy, has not mentioned them much since. I think he is going to return to the issue next month and make Social Security a major issue in the campaign. Most proposals have talked of letting you invest 2 percent of your 12.4 percent Social Security tax in the market. But the nonpartisan chief actuary of the Social Security Administration has just costed out a proposal to let you invest 6.4 percent and concluded that it would leave the system sound "through 2077 and beyond." Bush's Social Security appointees have been keeping in close touch with the leaders of the AARP, whose support was critical in passing the Medicare bill. Individual investment accounts would move America toward more choice and accountability, away from dependence on big institutions and toward more independence and self-reliance. That is Bush's brand of conservatism, and it is in line with changes in the character of the country.

[Kay Soze]

Should read:

Choice and Accountability: "Bush has defies conservatism."

Will he next remove the abortion issue from the democrats by supporting it?

After all is said and done its the only remaing party paltform issue that seperates repuplicans from democrats.

The country has changed so most are now for it.

How about support for NAMBLA?

Will the next republican be in favor of their agenda?

[bdeaner]

I haven't seen any terrorist attacks lately, so they must be doing something right.

[FirstPrinciple]

Are you joking? Every single executive decision - from stem-cell research to CFR to Sarbanes-Oxley to steel tariffs to the farm bill to affirmative action to prescription drugs - everything was based on polls.

[Kay Soze]

Should read:

Choice and Accountability: "Bush defies conservatism."

Will he next remove the abortion issue from the democrats by supporting it?

After all is said and done its the only remaing party paltform issue that seperates repuplicans from democrats.

The country has changed so most are now for it.

How about support for NAMBLA?

Will the next republican be in favor of their agenda?

[onemoreday]

....
....bdeaner.....

you say:

"...We're also fighting a different kind of war at home, these days...."

I just think "we" must ask who the "we" is that is fighting this new kind of war....."AT HOME, THESE DAYS....."

and against whom it is being fought.

Forget this ......"is it really Conservative"....issue.

WE....the people
need new terms...especially for
WE....the government

A lot more is being "redefined" than the already over-blown lib/con dichotomy...........and far in excess of what 911 warranted......and in a far less open manner than needed.

And we should perhaps, "step on it".....soon it may be too late to ask these questions of self-definition

[the gillman@blacklagoon.com]

The American public is moving left, following the cloud on the horizon made by the Democrats in their flight to total socialism.

The Republicans have charged ahead of the herd, in order to declare themselves leaders.

[bdeaner]

After all is said and done its the only remaing party paltform issue that seperates repuplicans from democrats.

C'mon, you really think so? Really?

What about the tax cuts? Iraq? Israel? Policy regarding the UN? Demanding standards for our schools? Affirmative Action? Etc.

Let's be honest here. Abortion is not the only issue separating Bush from the looney Left. Far from it.

[FirstPrinciple]

False comparison. Terrorist attacks don't happen everyday, at least not in this country. The only way we can stop terrorism is to go out where they are and take them out in their own soil. I would like to see the war on terrorism expand internationally, but not by vehemoth govt programs here at home. The best we can do at home is set up safe-guards. Why is the Brady Bill still in the books after 9/11? What has Bush done to repeal the Brady Bill?

[witnesstothefall]

A more realistic way to look at government spending is as a percent of GDP, and there things are not quite so depressing.

Why is that more realistic than looking at real numbers? False premise in your argument. If 9/11 had had an even more destructive effect on 2001's GDP, than it did, government discretionary spending would have churned right along at the same levels despite the distorted ratio.

[the gillman@blacklagoon.com]

The speed at which both parties are moving left, makes the public appear to be moving right, but they are just slower than the government in their drift to socialism.

[FirstPrinciple]

You have pointed out the sad story about lack of leadership. A proper steward would be able to convince the American public to move to the right, not to the left. Bush is simply sticking his finger to the wind and doing what the public wants to stay in office. As Churchill said, "Lack of consensus is not an excuse for lack of leadership."

[bdeaner]

I'm not so sure we can do without protections at home, when it comes to terrorism. The enemy is in our midst. It is not a country, it is a radical religious movement, that we are up against. Who else is going to protect the home front, if not the government?

[Trust but Verify]

How would the repeal of the Brady Bill make us more secure?

[mountainfolk]

Most of us can do little about the abortion issue, tho the killing of unborn babies leaves me sad on a number of levels. This does not preclude us from providing shelter to stray animals who wander our way. Our animals have always sought us out and in adopting them we have been provided with years of companionship and joy. I, also, would encourage others to be kind to God's creatures and help as best they can those animals who wander their way. It will make you a better person.

[FirstPrinciple]

If you are asking that question, you are with the wrong team.

[Pelham]

Let's just call it "Lyndon Johnson conservatism". That should just about capture the absurdity.

[Tamzee]

Great column.... too bad it attracted a goodly share of Bush-bashers.

I admire Bush for what he has managed to accomplish given that he walked into a recession and got slammed with an attack on our soil of epic proportions.

Thanks for the post!

[FirstPrinciple]

If that is the case, then we are clearly screwed. The govt has done nothing to stop immigration from Islamic countries and leaves a porous border from where anyone can enter. If you ask Tom Ridge to shut the border down, I am sure you will get a earful.

[CGTRWK]

When you say non-defense spending, does that include Homeland Security? We're also fighting a different kind of war at home, these days.

Homeland Security spending falls under non-defense spending in the Tax Foundation's numbers, which are my source.

The FY2004 Homeland Security budget is somewhere between 31.3 and 37.4 billion federal dollars.

If you want to call this defense related spending, that leaves federal non defense related spending at 15.9% of the GDP which is still the highest it has ever been.

Leave out the homeland security money, and Bush's spending has been going DOWN.

Largest farm subsidy bill ever. Largest energy subsidy bill ever. Largest education bill ever, written by Ted Kennedy. Largest new entitlement program since 1965. Largest AIDS spending bill ever.

The only federal departments that have reduced budgets in FY2004 relative to the last year of Clinton's budget are the Army Corps of Engineers (-600M) and the Dept of Transportation (-400M).

Spending increases: 366 billion dollars a year and climbing.

Spending cuts: 1 billion dollars a year and shrinking.

The numbers are right there on the whitehouse.gov site for anyone to look at. Page 79.

[The Other Harry]

If big spending and more government defines conservatism, the Bush has it down pat.