GOPideas... ideas done right

Over the past couple years I have attended a few events (local GOP gatherings, political Meetups, Solutions Day) and invariably people are asked to share their thoughts about the current state of political affairs. When the chance was passed to me, my discontent revolved around one issue: the intellectual dishonesty of both parties.

Specifically, “intellectual dishonesty” is the practice of defending a position that has proven to be bad policy or that is logically or morally inconsistent. More importantly, the person espousing those beliefs knows this is the case and proceeds ahead without acknowledging the obvious contradiction. As Republicans, we have to admit that our Congressional leaders are guilty, by any measure, of this --- and that our electoral fortunes will not change until this is acknowledged.

This is necessary because the general public is not nearly as uneducated as politicians and the media would like for you to believe. They know Republicans held unprecedented power from 2000-2006 and they know what the Republican Party claimed to stand for: fiscal restraint, social conservatism, reluctance to use power in distant lands and the rule of law. In this post, we will see how responsibly elected Republican leaders carried the banner of fiscal conservatism. In those years, the three largest budget deficits in U.S. history (to that point) occurred, the national grew approximately $3.2 trillion dollars, from approximately $5.8T to $8.9T (end of 2001 to end of 2007, because of the lag time in the budget appropriations process) --- an annual growth rate of 7.6% per year. By way of contrast, during LBJ’s presidency (1963-1969), with Great Society spending and the Vietnam War, LBJ managed to increase the debt by only 2.78% per year.

In spite of managing to grow the debt at almost triple the rate of LBJ --- and triple the rate of inflation --- many Congressional Republicans voted for the largest expansion in the history of entitlements. In this context, “fiscal conservatives” demanded that the plan only increase spending by $400 billion, but now it turns out that the total debt load that will be passed on to the next generations will be closer to $1.2 trillion.

One can find many adjectives to describe a person that is willing to vote to spend $400 billion dollars while running a huge budget deficit in a country already possessing a multi-trillion dollar debt and tens of trillions of future obligations.

“Fiscally conservative” is not among the options.

The notion that the same Congressional leaders, ranking members and ex-Bush White House appointees can go in front of the American people and attempt to claim the mantle of fiscal conservatism is laughable because of the obvious intellectual dishonesty that such a leader must possess. What would such people propose as the new GOP campaign slogan? “We’re fiscal conservatives, really, we mean it this time. Not like last time when we claimed to be and spent at record levels. Seriously. Not kidding. Promise.”

We can, and must, provide the American people with a better rationale for voting for Republicans. In the coming months, this site will explore that rationale --- and the policies that come from it. However, first must come admission --- that Republicans had their chance to remake government and failed. Only the can we plausibly go in front of the American people and ask them for their trust once again.

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