New at Reason

Julian Sanchez | March 17, 2006

Jeff Taylor gets a little misty eyed recalling those long-lost days when "fiscal responsibility" was a Republican clarion call.

Comments

|3.17.06 @ 1:53PM|#

All that was easy to say before Iraq and Iran got nuclear weapons. Iran still has them. We can get to budget talk after we deal with that. Right now I'm too scared!

You talk like someone who would cut military spending and I am afraid that is just not an option in today's dangerous world.

|3.17.06 @ 1:53PM|#

Uproar over George Bush I's violation of his "no new taxes" pledge had brought bomb-throwers like Newt Gingrich to the fore, and they were not inclined to continue the permanent minority status of Democrat Lite.

There might have been something about Perot in there somewhere, but what a great piece!

...In my dreams, the LP plays the role Perot did before the Gingrich Revolution, but Perot was the product of grass roots--I don't think it works the other way around.

|3.17.06 @ 2:05PM|#

Dave,

How is that typical of an H&R reader?

|3.17.06 @ 2:06PM|#

I'm starting to miss the Cold War.

|3.17.06 @ 2:08PM|#

Typical HnR Reader, are you fucking high?

|3.17.06 @ 2:10PM|#

"those long-lost days when "fiscal responsibility" was a Republican clarion call."

More like empty promise.

|3.17.06 @ 2:11PM|#

Okay, let's cut the military then. You guys talked me into it. I propose a 25% cut across the board, even if it means we have to do the old "cut and run" in Iraq. Should we cut more, d'you guys think?

That TQM stuf works awesome on weapons programs I hear!

|3.17.06 @ 2:12PM|#

"but Perot was the product of grass roots"

And spending $60 million of his own money. If a billionaire ran as the LP candidate and threw down that kind of cash, he probably could at least break 10%.

Mike|3.17.06 @ 2:22PM|#

those long-lost days when "fiscal responsibility" was a Republican clarion call.

I never noticed that. I was too busy hearing the even louder chant of "SEX DRUGS COMMIES!" Which sounds an awful lot like what I hear today from the Republicans.

|3.17.06 @ 2:28PM|#

What's wrong with hating commies? I hate commies.

COMMIE SCUM DIE!

|3.17.06 @ 2:48PM|#

You don't need a big, ruinously expensive military if you don't want an empire. We seem to be at that point empires always get in when the overstrech and spending starts the decline.

Re Perot: any billionare libertarian out there who can somehow connect with the yahoos like he did?

|3.17.06 @ 3:06PM|#

We start unbombing in 5 minutes.

|3.17.06 @ 3:09PM|#

If Taylor eyes weren't so misty, he might not have made so many sloppy/partisan errors in this piece.

1. Rather than there being no resurrection of fiscal responsibility on the horizon, Congress is about to be taken over by the party that introduced budget sanity in the early 90s, and just voted unanimously to re-introduce it.

2. Funding levels were only tangential to the "dangerously incomentant" presentation made by Debbie Stabenow (Corrupt, Evil, Stupid Non-Republican - Michigan).

3. Most people would point to the gigantic national debt left over from the Reagan years as a lasting contribution. Then again, most people would notice that there was a recession that resulted from those deficits in the middle of the supposed "unabated economic boom" allegedly brought about by Reagan's fiscal policies.

4. Hillary Clinton's Health Care Task Force didn't recommend government-supplied health care. Actually, they bent over backwards to make sure that the government wasn't going to be the supplier of health care.

5. The incorporation of TQM concepts into the operations of the federal government came to pass through the Reinventing Government initiative imposed through executive orders by the Clinton/Gore administration.

6. The Welfare Reform Act spent more money on welfare, not less.

|3.17.06 @ 5:25PM|#

those long-lost days when "fiscal responsibility" was a Republican clarion call.

To find a time when it was anything more than empty rhetoric, you have to go back to Calvin Coolidge. The last great American president.

|3.17.06 @ 6:04PM|#

Rather than there being no resurrection of fiscal responsibility on the horizon, Congress is about to be taken over by the party that introduced budget sanity in the early 90s, and just voted unanimously to re-introduce it.

Considering that the Republicans have spent our money like a drunken sailor since, I suppose someone might think of the Democrats circa the early nineties as being the party of budget sanity. ...but that's only in relation to others--you're not arguin' that congressional Democrats were inherently, stand alone, on their own, budget sanitary, are you?

P.S. Go GW!

|3.18.06 @ 2:30PM|#

Ken,

Go Buff and Blue! Man, that sounds pathetic.

Anyway, I'd say that back in the grunge era, the majority of Congressional Democrats were dragged kicking and screaming by Old Bush and Clinton into being budget hawks. Stand along Democratic budget hawks like John Kerry were fairly rare.

But it worked, like what used to be called "workfare," and I think a large number of Democrats have evolved their positions, to the extend that yes, I would say a majority of the modern Democratic Congressional caucus can fairly be described as principled budged hawks.

|3.18.06 @ 8:56PM|#

Typical HnR Reader,
Your impression of us has us pretty well nailed. Way to go!

Anyone wanting to go on a RINO-hunting (Republican in Name Only) safari, let me know. I can help them subscribe to the WhistleBlower (from right here in Sinincincinnati)

Anybody else here ever drink a can of AU20?

|3.19.06 @ 4:08PM|#

"Fiscal responsibility" is nice to talk about when you are the minority party and can afford to have principles

Once you get power, you have to hold it, and what better way than using the pork barrel to reward your followers?

Just remember a Representative only answers to the people of his district. When he taxes, he taxes everybody and the pain spreads around. When he spends, it goes right to his district... you do the math...

The one thing is that Democrats knew about "honest graft" that is, when to stop. Republicans spend like drunken cowboys.