Posted on 03/08/2006 7:08:13 AM PST by beeler
If the ancient political wisdom is correct that a charge unanswered is a charge agreed to, the Bush White House pleaded guilty yesterday at the Cato Institute to some extraordinary allegations.
"We did ask a few members of the Bush economic team to come," explained David Boaz, the think tank's executive vice president, as he moderated a discussion between two prominent conservatives about President Bush. "We didn't get that."
Now why would the administration pass up such an invitation?
Well, it could have been because of the first speaker, former Reagan aide Bruce Bartlett. Author of the new book "Impostor: How George W. Bush Bankrupted America and Betrayed the Reagan Legacy," Bartlett called the administration "unconscionable," "irresponsible," "vindictive" and "inept."
It might also have had something to do with speaker No. 2, conservative blogger Andrew Sullivan. Author of the forthcoming "The Conservative Soul: How We Lost It; How to Get It Back," Sullivan called Bush "reckless" and "a socialist," and accused him of betraying "almost every principle conservatism has ever stood for."
Nor was moderator Boaz a voice of moderation. He blamed Bush for "a 48 percent increase in spending in just six years," a "federalization of public schools" and "the biggest entitlement since LBJ."
True, the small-government libertarians represented by Cato have always been the odd men out of the Bush coalition. But the standing-room-only forum yesterday, where just a single questioner offered even a tepid defense of the president, underscored some deep disillusionment among conservatives over Bush's big-spending answer to Medicare and Hurricane Katrina, his vast claims of executive power, and his handling of postwar Iraq.
Bartlett, who lost his job at the free-market National Center for Policy Analysis because of his book, said that if conservatives were honest, more would join his complaint.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
The drug bill was proposed and signed by who again???????
He promised it in his campaign, and he delivered it. I suppose you would rather have had Al Gore's drug plan?
How utterly childish. More often, a charge unanswered is a charge too moronic to waste time on.
Exactly. The MSM thinks itself the judge and jury Wishful that they could be the executioner too.
Irrelevant. The mere circumstantial fact that the nation as a whole becomes more prosperous does not automatically entitle the government to spend more of our money, any more than the fact that I get a pay raise automatically entitles everyone else to charge me more for the same goods and services.
Is that your advice then to conservatives who do not like the big government, socialist GOP?
The president is the leader of the party. It's his duty to get congress to fall in line, which he has done. However, his line has been one of big-government, capitulation, weakness, and betrayal.
Great, socialism small or socialism big.
Amen. We need checks and balances on legislation.
Libertarians are Anarchists who want the government to protect their property once they've defrauded it away from other people.
I believe most of the decreases you mention would have come from welfare reform by the Republican Congress that Clinton signed on too. Other than that the only thing that was cut during Clintons tenure was the military. That budget was actually cut, not just limited increases.
If you look at the figures from JFK forward, I believe you will find that spending is up over the nineties, but not much, and certainly within modern norms.
My point is that there certainly have been no "massive" increases in the federal budget or government spending other than the military,
Just saying what you consider conservative is not what the rest of the nation considers conservative.
In politics you have to go with the candidate with views the closest to you that can get elected. That's just the way it is.
To constantly try to destroy GWB because he is not conservative enough just gives the Dems an opening.
The Pill Bill???????????????
Rudy Bump!
On the contrary, with Medicare Prescription Drugs he vastly expanded entitlements.
On the contrary, with Medicare Prescription Drugs he vastly expanded entitlements.
You do remember that Congress has exceeded his requests for budgets every year.
And please don't say he should have vetoed the budgets. He has had recession, 9/11, wars, and disasters to deal with since he took office.
Fighting with his own party over a budget could not make sense.
Um, Alito & Roberts are "yet to prove themselves" because that chance hasn't presented itself yet. You have little doubt they'll overturn Roe? Well, thankfully, your opinion doesn't change anything -- and they need another vote to do so, anyway. You should wait & make that statement after the partial-birth abortion decision comes out this term. Don't be a downer without any proof. They are some serious complainers on FR...
He would not have been elected without a Prescription plan, and I have parents in their eighties that benefit from it.
You do remember the claims of the elderly choosing food or medicine because of the expense?
His plan at least is cheaper than the opposition's plan would have been. The country was getting a drug plan one way or another.
I cannot deny that it increased entitlements. I wish it had not been an issue. But it was...
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