If anyone still looks to the Republican party of
President George W. Bush for limits on government power,
it’s long past time to look elsewhere.
They certainly won’t be found among the Democrats
either. But this is no reason for Pollyannaish rhapsodies
about the Republicans, who are more offensive than the
other guys because they still pay lip service to limits.
That is, they insult our intelligence more than the
Democrats.
To his sterling government-bloating record — that
includes a larger role for Washington in education,
ballooning farm subsidies, steel tariffs (since removed),
a bigger Medicare, more domestic spying, weakening of
habeas corpus, and a doctrine of preventive war —
President Bush has now proposed spending a couple of
hundred billion dollars for a manned base on the moon and
to explore Mars, and a billion and a half dollars to
promote marriage here on earth, or at least in the United
States. Given his global focus, why limit marriage
counseling to this country?
Considering that the choice in November will be between
two men who both want bigger government (it won’t
matter who the Democrat is), one wonders how a serious
candidate would be received if he actually proposed to
scale back the monstrosity we currently labor under.
Limitations on power — what a concept!
Popular political debate has been reduced to
trivialities. The contenders discuss how the United
States should manage the world, not whether it should.
They argue about how big Medicare should be, not whether
the taxpayers should be compelled to provide medical care
to retirees. They bicker over how bureaucrats should
manage our economic affairs, not whether they should be
doing it at all.
We shouldn’t be surprised by Bush’s record. He
gave us early warning. It was his supporters inside the
GOP establishment who were intent on removing from the
party platform the long unkept promise to abolish the
Department of Education. When renegades tried to save
that plank, the Bush juggernaut crushed them. The old
pledge to get rid of the Department of Energy suffered a
similar fate.
Bush from the start was determined not to be identified
with Ronald Reagan’s anti-government rhetoric (even
if he never really meant it). No one would ever accuse
Bush of believing “government is the problem not the
solution.”
Oh sure, he sometimes refers to tax revenues as the
people’s, not the government’s, money when
he’s pushing a modest tax-rate reduction. But you
know his heart’s not in it. How do we know? Because
his tax cuts are small and because spending is
skyrocketing. Tax revenues do not give a full picture of
the burden of government. Spending is a far more complete
measure. If taxes go down but spending goes up — as
it has been doing dramatically — the people still
have to pay for it. They will pay for it in indirect,
less visible ways, such as inflation and government
borrowing. Bush’s tax cuts are no bargain.
This president has been presiding over the largest
spending increases since Lyndon Johnson. Domestic and
military spending are on the rise. He’s been in
office three years and he hasn’t yet figured out
where they keep the veto pen. In 36 months he has yet to
reject a single bill. Does that sound like a commitment
to smaller government?
The Bushes are political creatures and big-government
men. George I promised a “kinder, gentler
government,” which could only have meant that he did
not believe the anti-government things his patron Reagan
had said. George II continued the Bush tradition with his
talk about “compassionate conservatism.” This
was his subtle way of saying that restrained government
was cruel.
There’s no deep philosophy here, just power lust.
George W. Bush wants a second term, and nothing is going
to stop him. Hence, the “vision thing.”
So he’ll send men to the moon and Mars, and
he’ll promote marriage at a colossal waste of
taxpayer money. Government cannot grow without liberty
and self-responsibility shrinking. That will be the Bush
legacy.
