Before social conservatives bite my head off, yes President George W. Bush is socially conservative in his views against abortion and saving the life of a brain dead lady by the name of Terri Schiavo in Florida a couple of years ago. However, when it comes to the issues that most people consider to be conservative - President Bush is no conservative and his ideas and view points are more closely aligned to those of Senator Edward Kennedy than to the late President Ronald Reagan.
After September 11, 2001 - President Bush moved quickly to change US law to allow the government to invade our privacy by listening to our phone calls and even read our mail without a warrant from a court of law. Now, in 2008 - President Bush is still rushing headlong toward socialism with his almost one trillion dollar bailout of some of the largest companies on Wall Street. In recent weeks, I have started to believe that President Bush is no conservative at all, but a liberal dressed up in conservative cloths.
The person that will be hurt the most by President Bush's decision to bailout Wall Street for their sins against investors and put the price of those failures on all American taxpayers will be Senator John McCain. There has never been any real love between GOP conservatives and John McCain. The only reason most conservatives might support John McCain in November is because the thought of a Barack Obama presidency was just too much for them to stomach. However, now that President Bush has sold the GOP out to socialism - it is less objectionable to vote for Obama because if this great county is going to become a socialist nation - we might as well have leaders that believe it that way of life guiding us forward.
Title: Liberal President Bush Leads GOP Toward Socialism
Written: September 20 2008
2005-2008 © Hutch Report
Saturday, September 20, 2008
Liberal President Bush Leads GOP Toward Socialism
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Hi Mark--
You read my mind today! I was in the office today to work on my company's annual report and I was so upset that I spent the afternoon writing a screed. I'm not a political or financial expert, but I used to be a reporter and this came pouring out of me. We just hosted the Republican National Convention here and the air is sizzling with politics. This blow-up should take care of the Republican's grip on the White House.
Here is my rant...
The GOP ideology playbook was actually meant to be ironic – now we find out!
The Republican (a.k.a. fiscal conservative) government just stole our nation’s credit card and went on a spending spree with its buddies. Their spin-phrase: “Doing nothing would be worse”… than doubling the national debt by buying up toxic mortgages.
Ironically the credit crash happened because “do nothing” must have been on the job description of the executives and government officials in charge of overseeing the United States’ financial well-being.
This will all trickle down to us in taxes and world market volatility for years…a Republican president did invent the “trickle down theory” after all. Many of us would laugh at the additional irony of the party of “fiscal conservatives” robbing Peter to pay Paul, if we weren’t in a state of shock after learning that for a low-low $80 billion “we” just bought 80% of a giant corporation (AIG) holding bad debt as far as the eye can see. I tried to call the Federal Reserve and tell them we never ordered AIG, but they put me on hold and then I was disconnected. The government collection agency will soon be dunning us for that trillion dollar overdraft on “our” account.
Judgment Crisis Fun Fact: Someone from the current administration is going to assign oversight of this new AIG acquisition on our behalf to get it back up and running smoothly. I think Brownie’s available (former FEMA director Michael Brown), and he has handled disasters before.
So what about that “free market/get government off our back” recording the Republicans played over and over in their speeches at the national convention in St. Paul? Turns out that no one was actually following the fabled “Republican fiscal conservative” playbook. We’ve been punked about what the Republican Party actually stands for today. Contrast the White House reality show we’re watching right now with the overview of the GOP doctrine (on Wikipedia):
“Republicans emphasize the role of corporate and personal decision making in fostering economic prosperity. They support the idea of individuals being economically responsible for their own actions and decisions.”
“Personal decision-making in fostering economic prosperity” is tricky. It requires vigilance and courage to do the right thing. And that part about “being economically responsible for your own actions and decisions” is not ringing a bell with any of the good fellas at AIG, Lehman, Merrill, Bear Stearns, the last two Fed Chairmen, the heads of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac; or even St. Paul native and current SEC Chairman Christopher Cox. There will be no court-ordered lien with the sheriff’s eviction notice at the front door to seize their assets. ”Just walk away like nothing happened” seems to be working for these dine-and-dash executives and board members like a scene out of “Animal House.” And Chris, what the heck happened--were you too Minnesota nice to call the cops on the Wall Street shoplifters? We are so disowning you as one of our own.
“They (Republicans) favor a free market, policies supporting business, economic liberalism, and fiscal conservatism….”
(Ha-ha, there was a secret Free Market Exception Clause for when the get-rich-quick scheme goes bad. Bonus twist: The people who stripped the regulations away and promoted the shaky loans got richer, and we’re funding the bailout for generations to come. Clarification for laymen: Job descriptions of high-ranking executive and governmental positions of financial responsibility described as “oversight” actually are referring to the second definition of the word in the dictionary, “an inadvertent error or omission.”)
“The party opposes a single-payer universal health care system, believing such a system constitutes "socialized medicine" and is in favor of a personal or employer-based system of insurance, supplemented by Medicare for the elderly and Medicaid for the poor.”
(Clarification: Socialism is bad, but not for corporation executives and speculators who need a trillion-dollar bailout from taxpayers. Not to worry though, we’re not gonna actually become Socialists…we’ll just be living like peasants under Socialism, but without healthcare or the inconvenience of going to a foreign country.)
“A leading economic theory advocated by modern Republicans is supply-side economics. Some fiscal policies influenced by this theory were popularly known as "Reaganomics," a term popularized during the Presidential administrations of Ronald Reagan. This theory holds that reduced income tax rates increase GDP growth and thereby generate the same or more revenue for the government from the smaller tax on the extra growth. This belief is reflected, in part, by the party's long-term advocacy of tax cuts, a major Republican theme since the 1920s. Republicans believe that a series of income tax cuts since 2001 have bolstered the economy.[6] Many Republicans consider the income tax system to be inherently inefficient and oppose graduated tax rates, which they believe are unfairly targeted at those who create jobs and wealth. They believe private spending is usually more efficient than government spending.”
(Exception: “Private spending is usually more efficient than government spending” unless it’s an unsightly financial crash rivaling the Great Depression during a Republican White House in an election year. So before, tax cuts were good. But get ready for the speeches telling us that tax cuts are now bad. Who wrote this economic doctrine stuff? It hurts to laugh.)
“Most Republicans agree there should be a "safety net" to assist the less fortunate; however, they tend to believe the private sector is more effective in helping the poor than government is; as a result, Republicans support giving government grants to faith-based and other private charitable organizations to supplant welfare spending. Members of the GOP also believe that limits on eligibility and benefits must be in place to ensure the safety net is not abused.”
(Guess the Republican hierarchy forgot about going to the “private sector to supplant welfare spending!” So the American people have to start being very “faith”-based since we’re now apparently a giant charitable organization in what’s grown into a global economic crisis. Good thing there was a special corporate VIP safety net…those CEOs and board members were under a lot of stress. We wouldn’t want them to fall through the free market cracks and be brought to justice for their malfeasance and raw greed, for example.)
“Republicans generally oppose increases in the minimum wage, believing that minimum wage increases hurt many businesses by forcing them to cut jobs and services as well as raise the prices of goods to compensate for the decrease in profit. This hits the poor the hardest, who have the least number of options when prices rise, and/or when jobs and services are cut.”
(I guess we all know now what can really “hurt many businesses” a trillion times more than minimum wage increases, don’t we? Clue #1: Republican deregulation rants about the financial industry to win votes and corporatize government. Oh, no…Enron flashbacks…room starting to spin…no college fund for kids…no way to retire.)
This is where I stopped reading the overview of Republican fiscal stewardship as even more questions swirled around in my mind: Since financial experts around the world have already concluded that John McCain doesn’t understand economics, would his financial experts Carly Fiorina (failed/fired CEO) and Phil Gramm (the guy who snuck the amendment into an appropriations bill in 2000 that forbade federal agencies from regulating financial derivatives), have key roles in what’s potentially the next administration? Will Phil have a snappy comeback about “reregulation” that will crack up the financial press and the voters --Lipstick on an appropriations bill? One trillion dollars more in national debt—get over it! And that guaranteed gag-reflex punch line dragged out whenever true white collar criminal activity is plain as day: “Let’s not play the blame-game.”
We’ve seen this terrible no-star movie before haven’t we, viewers? Bush Part I, the Savings and Loan Bailout, total production cost to taxpayers: $1.4 trillion, with many bad guys heading for the hills (one being the mysteriously invisible Neil Bush—he whose name must not be spoken--who must be in a Witness Protection program somewhere. Neil was a board member of the failed Silverado S&L, and cost to taxpayers on this collapse alone: $1 billion).
And now Bush Part Deux, the 2008 Credit Bailout, production cost to taxpayers: A possible $1 trillion as George, Jr. is about to ride into the Texas sunset. We already know that the bad guys responsible will never pay up…heck, even getting back a few billion would help knock down our payments!
America’s workforce probably needs a generation to work off the war debt and now the Credit Bailout. We already know how this movie will end, just like Bush Part I. Maybe a couple of the people who were either inept or who looked the other way will be brought to justice, but it will take even more taxpayer money to corner them with a phalanx of lawyers and prosecutors. Yet another “old school” reporter will write an investigative Pulitzer-Prize-winning book with light sales about the debacle in which he/she which lifts up the rock and shows us the players--the government officials, boards of directors and executives who participated in the deconstruction of safeguards and those who were asleep at the wheel of duty and shareholder/citizen trust.
At the very least, I propose that a monument be erected on Capitol Hill and engraved with the names of the well-heeled culprits so our great3 grandchildren and future voters can understand what happened to our country in 2008, who was responsible, and how it affected their lives. And also why not all government regulation is bad any more than all Republicans are arrogant radicals who would drain the Treasury and subvert the Constitution by creating an imperial presidency that scorns the law and diminishes the USA’s world standing and esteem.
The phrase we heard a lot at the Republican National Convention from McCain and Palin was that “Congress is broken,” yet another Republican faux campaign diversion when contrasted with recent events headed up by Wall Street and revelations about the White House’s justifications for the war in Iraq. Quoting what now seems to be the “out-of-order” Republican Doctrine, we all have to be responsible for our “own actions and decisions.” The olde Republican party doctrines are faded beyond their original recognition or intention. And we’ve just seen an eight-year enactment of “The Emperor’s New Clothes” during which no one had the courage to tell the truth.
They say that McCain and Obama are now tied, even that McCain is ahead. It seems inconceivable that the American people are really going to cheer on another Republican emperor after what’s happened on the GOP watch for the last eight years.
Right now a new animal is materializing that symbolizes Republican policies which have brought us to several serious brinks at home and abroad, and it’s not a pig or an elephant. It’s an albatross.
JAF
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