Bailing Out The Bush Legacy: Wither Conservatism?
The first round in the bail-out battle has ended – it was voted down 228 – 205, with significant defections on both sides of the aisle. We can talk about the inept leadership of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, or why the administration has appeared to line up with Democrats more over the last year than it has Republicans, but I’d rather commiserate over the spectacle of our nation’s leaders attacking the foundations of our economic system. It didn’t start three weeks ago. It started long ago with progressive tax rates, onerous regulation and the seductive politics of envy. By a hundred thousand cuts we have allowed our leaders to hobble the most successful economic system the world has ever known. Now we sit around wondering how we got where we are? The conversation is meaningless if no one is willing to talk openly about the collusion of big business and big government. The question now ought to be whether corruption or democracy is the problem. When it comes to corruption, we can jail the offenders. When it comes to politicians taking orders from constituents who have no economic understanding, we may rue the day we made influencing our politicians so easy.
But I know this for sure – I will celebrate the day that George W. Bush turns in the keys to the White House. I commend him for his focus on the War On Terror – it is the defining issue of this generation. But in so many other ways he has inflicted long term damage on conservatism. Spending. Immigration. Energy. Foreign policy. Entitlements. The bail-out. He assumed the mantle and allowed its enemies to define conservatism. For a term and a half he never raised his veto pen to control spending, when these are the times that eyes and ears are focused on the president and a lesson in theory and principle can be taught. He tried to ram through an immigration plan that rewarded law breakers and dismissed first priorities. We have all seen the energy issue as a large part of the war on terror, but we watched our president begging the Saudis to safeguard our economy instead of working twice as hard to wean us off of the tit of oil selling despotism. The administration’s approach to North Korea, Iran, Russia, Palestine and China have robbed the Bush Doctrine of any meaning. He threw his political capital at reforming Social Security and controlling our out of control entitlement spending, but quickly disappeared when the going got tough. And then there’s the bail-out. They tell us terrible things will happen if we don’t hand over our money, but which is worse – a Wall Street that realizes that government will underwrite risk and subsidize failure, or the flagging capitalist ethos being reinforced for the first time in a hundred years? George Bush’s stewardship of conservatism has been a debacle, and it may take decades for true conservatives to clear its name of the distortions it has endured.
There is one person who has proven as politically incompetent as the two clowns running the Democratic Congress – his name is George W. Bush. Looking to the future, I wish I could say things would get better once he left, but in January we’ll either be fighting John McCain to save the Republican brand or battling Barack Obama to save the American Dream. Either way you look at it, Conservatives will still be fighting for at least the next eight years. There is no rest for us.
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2 Responses to “Bailing Out The Bush Legacy: Wither Conservatism?”
September 29th, 2008 at 3:55 pm
[...] Bailing Out The Bush Legacy: Wither Conservatism? | Political Vindication [...]
October 1st, 2008 at 9:42 am
[...] and read it. I’ll not place it on this blog yet. For a more beneficial read, take a trip to Political Vindication: The first round in the bail-out battle has ended – it was voted down 228 – 205, with significant [...]
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