Obama is reaching across the aisle for bipartisanship and there’s a lot of fake argument about how bipartisan the Republicans should be in return. I say fake argument because the Republicans have already signed on.
Two Parties, One Ideology: Big Government
Obama is pretty much an FDR Democrat and has never pretended otherwise. He believes in centralized government, big government programs, and massive federal spending.
And this is supposed to conflict with what Republican belief? After 8 years of Bush led RINOism (that’s “Republican In Name Only,” RINO) what were the Republican ideals?
Republicans were for:
- Centralized government power as exemplified by the No Child Left Behind bill
- Big government programs like No Child Left Behind and the Medicare Drug Benefit
- Massive federal spending increases, regardless of deficits, across the board
. . . and lets not forget about TARP. George Bush and the Republicans led the charge to socialize the banking industry. No US President has ever advanced the cause of socialism in the US more than Republican George Bush and Republicans backed him while he did it. Even FDR didn’t dare nationalize the banking system.
We have two parties, but we have one ideology: Big Government with unlimited power. How unlimited? Well, Obama joked about the need for a national college football playoff but it was a Texas Republican who decided that, with a recession in full force and the country fighting two wars, now was the time for a Federal take over of the NCAA with a law to force a playoff system. That was Joe Barton (RINO, TX) who got my first RINO of the week award for it.
A Battle Of Ideas Or Just Partisan Sniping?
There is a standard line from Democrats and assorted liberals now, it goes like this: “If you spent $800B to bail out the banks how can you not spend [insert $ figure] to bail out the [insert city / county / state / company / industry of your choice]?”
What can the Republicans say in response? Any Republican push back now looks like petty partisan sniping and, with a few exceptions from actual conservative Republicans, it is petty partisan sniping.
How can Republicans stand up and say AIG spending bail out money on spa treatments at a luxury hotel is OK but re-sodding the capital mall or Pelosi’s birth control money is something the taxpayers can’t afford? Republicans have no moral high ground to attack from, so they snipe and snark and run their bankrupt brand even farther into the ground.
How can Republicans say that blowing the first $800B in bailouts was a good idea but blowing the second $800B is somehow a terrible idea?
I’ve quoted this before, but here is Hot Air’s brilliant quote in response to Joe Knollenberg (RINO, MI) saying, on tape, that tax money doesn’t come from taxpayers. “It’s not your money,” he tells Neil Cavuto. It belongs to Congress, and they’ll do whatever they want with it and what Knollenberg wanted were auto industry bailouts.
This is nothing more or less than Republican redistributionism. We criticized Barack Obama for this during the campaign, but we see here the GOP version of the same kind of flabby, European-style Social Democrat policies of government intervention in markets. The only difference is the beneficiaries. Obama wants to take money from those who succeed and give it to those who don’t on a class basis, while Knollenberg and his ilk want to take money from everyone and subsidize corporate failure.
Small wonder that voters chose Obama’s version of redistributionism over Knollenberg’s in the last election.
The Path Forward Not Taken
The path forward is a simple one, the one that men and women of integrity, and sometimes of just clever expediency, have always taken: admit the mistake, apologize, and then move forward with purpose.
If the Republicans wish to be taken seriously they should start with apologizing for their profligate spending, over reaching programs, and hubris. They should apologize for calling Obama and liberals socialists while actively practicing socialism themselves and they should articulate clear conservative principles of how they are going to be different in the future.
Update: Does the house Republicans block voting against the stimulus package mean I’m wrong? I don’t think so.
The conventional view seems to be that the Republicans have finally gotten some spine. There are variants of this theme on Hot Air, on Michelle Malkin, and Sister Toldjah. I disagree.
The idea that this group of Republicans who were all for out of control government and out of control spending for 8 years, and up to a month ago, is suddenly worried about government spending is ridiculous. A good chunk of this voting is just obstructionism; a chunk of it is a cynical bet that Obama’s stimulus package will fail. I think that’s the way a lot of voters will perceive it and the bill passed overwhelmingly anyway, so what has been accomplished?
Because the Republicans have no history of leading on keeping spending and government under control, and because they have not admitted this, I think all we’re seeing is childish “I’ll take my ball and go home” behavior. The Skepticrats seem to be with me on this.
My question is, would the leadership move have been to bargain for a few key changes in the bill, knowing that it was going to pass anyway?
One disclaimer: there are a minority of Republicans who stood up and were against Bush’s TARP and other crazy spending bills. I don’t mean to include them in my criticism.
Update by Nettie:
Why is it that the only time the Republicans get a backbone and act like conservatives is when it won’t make a difference? Qando thinks the House Republicans did the right thing but argues that the Senate Rs will cave because they buy into this whole stupid idea that only government can save us.
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