Posted on 02/12/2004 11:28:55 PM PST by JohnHuang2
Will Bush survive attacks from the right?
© 2004 Newspaper Enterprise Assn.
The disgruntled mutterings about President Bush in conservative circles are getting too loud to ignore. From National Review to The Heritage Foundation, not to mention such libertarian redoubts as The Cato Institute, the grumbling is reaching impressive levels. It doesn't (yet) amount to outright rebellion. The protesters are still on board for November; few of them are seriously threatening to stay home on Election Day and let John Kerry waltz into the White House. But it is fair to say that, in the opinion of many serious people, the integrity of the conservative movement as we've known it is at stake.
Just how far has President Bush strayed from the conservative mainstream? Last September in the National Review, Ramesh Ponnuru counted the ways:
"Bush has increased the federal role in education, imposed tariffs on steel and lumber, increased farm subsidies, OK'd federal regulations on campaign finance and corporate accounting and expanded the national-service program President Clinton began. Since Sept. 11, he has also raised defense spending, given new powers to law enforcement, federalized airport security and created a new Cabinet department for homeland security. No federal programs have been eliminated, nor has Bush sought any such thing. More people are working for the federal government than at any point since the end of the Cold War."
And that was even before Bush pushed through Congress a Medicare reform law that is the greatest new entitlement in several decades.
Bush's defenders have just about given up pretending that he is implementing traditional conservative principles. Instead, some of them, like Daniel Casse in the February issue of Commentary, have begun arguing that Bush has offered "a very bold, and very ambitious, reordering of conservative priorities." He cites Michael Barone's contention that Bush has replaced "the conservative touchstones of small government and spending cuts with the bolder, more inspirational ideas of choice and accountability" – to which Casse would add support "not for big government but for strong government."
All this may well be true, and it is only fair to add that many of Bush's steps in the direction of bigger government (notably the Medicare and education bills) include reforms that, if they can be built upon, should greatly improve the performance of those programs. In addition, the federal deficit at the end of 2003, though dollar-wise the largest in history, represented only 4.2 percent of GDP – by no means a record.
Still, a widely circulated Office of Management and Budget chart showing the percentage increases in discretionary domestic spending reveals just how far President Bush has wandered from fiscal discipline:
– Lyndon Johnson, 1965-69, 4.3 percent
– Richard Nixon, 1970-75, 6.8 percent
– Gerald Ford, 1976-77, 8.0 percent
– Jimmy Carter, 1978-81, 2.0 percent
– Ronald Reagan, 1982-89, 1.3 percent
– George Bush, Sr., 1990-93, 4.0 percent
– Bill Clinton, 1994-2001, 2.5 percent
– George W. Bush, 2002-04, 8.2 percent
Historically, one of the chief things the Republican party and the conservative movement have had going for them is the public belief that they are financially more responsible than their opponents and less inclined to expand government. If Bush squanders those assets in pursuit of "bolder, more inspirational ideas," he will bear a heavy responsibility for the future fates of the party and the movement.
No wonder many conservatives are ill at ease. There is probably still time – though just barely – for Bush to make policy corrections that will signal his continued allegiance to the basic principles of traditional conservatism. Unless he does, he may win the next election at the price of presiding over the political destruction of the conservative movement.
It is a fact that boomers of the left and right are getting older, as are the younger generations. There is some solid historical precedent to support my contention that their voting habits and policy decisions will be drastically different, and more conservative, than we have seen in recent decades.
Personally, I like the idea of leaving our children a more conservative society than the one we have lived through, and there is good reason to believe that it will be.
Nope. As the Gen-Xrs leave home and start their families they will become less and less beguiled by the social Darwinism of their youth. The Gen-Xrs are already crying for government to stop companies outsourcing their "jobs" and as their kids mature they will be applying for student loans and as they retire they will be demanding all they have paid into social security be paid back to them and their kids will be decrying the selfishness of the Gen-xrs.
Oh, so ONLY California has deficit problems and it ONLY because of the dot.coms ? REALLY? You'd better go do some research on that one.
And have you noticed just how assiduously he has ignored ALL of my points and queries ?
Churchill said, "The farther one looks back into history, the farther they can see into the future."
Your kids may be somewhat like their parents, but on the grand scale the generational trends that have shaped history have run in cycles of four generations each, much farther back than any of us can remember.
Kerry, who may or not be the Dem presidential candidate,is obviously someone you know very little, if anything at all about. Otherwise, you couldn't possibly state what you have regarding a Kerry presidency! Go read the threads concerning where is stands on everything.
There have always been laws against prostitution, in this nation, and during Colonial times. The FFs would NOT agree with your and the LP position on this.
You don't have the ability to comprehend the drug problem and the consequences of your position and the LP's as well, on this topic. HELLO " LORD OF THE FLIES"........Libertarian UTOPIA personified!
You aren't very good at this. Pity that. :-)
You do NOT need " permission " to travel.
Privacy is NOT " dead " .
You are spewing lefty propaganda about the Patriot Act, which I doubt you've read, you don't understand, and the lies haves been refuted, 100s of times already!
Yada, yada, yada re why the LP is getting nowhere fast. Pathetic.....this is a waste of my time, since this is all old garbage, banal, inanes, and boring.
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