Fox News commentator Bill O'Reilly recently asked Mitt Romney if President Obama is a "socialist." "I consider him a big government Liberal Democrat," Romney replied, reinforcing the mantra that Republicans are the party of limited government.
But are they?
Romney, who shamelessly courts the ultra-Right GOP base by claiming in speech after disingenuous speech that "conservative principles of smaller government are what I am fighting for," has a long history as a "champion of big government." And he's promised to increase the size of the Federal government in a number of ways, should he worm his way into the Oval Office.
Let's take two:
1. Defense spending. Romney wants to add around 100,000 active duty military personnel and build lots of expensive new ships and aircraft. How does he justify this massive spending spree? He'll eliminate waste! (Consider this: if Super-Mitt really rolls up his sleeves and goes after "fraud and abuse," he could presumably add enough new troops and equipment to wage three wars at a time instead of just two.)
2. Immigration. Romney denies that he wants to deport millions of undocumented Americans, many of whom have been solid, tax paying members of society for decades. But that doesn't square with his insistence that they "get in line" behind millions of other potential citizens, which would, one way or another, involve astronomical costs. And what about that triple fence along the Mexican border, not to mention all those new patrol officers to stop itinerant farmworkers from, um, itinerating?
The Mittsterizer claims he'll save billions by running government like a business. But what kind of business? He pledges to decrease government employment by 10 percent, eliminating hundreds of thousands of jobs -- the kind of cookie cutter cost-cutting that made him mega-rich at Bain Capital, the vulture capital firm he ran for many years. Bain's penchant for buying companies, "downsizing" and then "flipping" them for huge profits is documented here and here. The Wall Street Journal reports that "22% of the companies bought under Romney's leadership either filed for bankruptcy reorganization or closed their doors by the end of the eighth year after Bain first invested, sometimes with substantial job losses. An additional 8% ran into so much trouble that all of the money Bain invested was lost." (Politico calls the accumulation of these revelations "The Bain Bomb.")
Romney's campaign to brand himself a limited government hero veers from the implausible to the absurd when he argues that the mandated health insurance he instituted as governor of Massachusetts is based on a "conservative principle," while a similar plan at the Federal level is an unconstitutional catastrophe. Influential conservative blogger Erick Erickson notes, "If Romneycare is built on such inviolable conservative principles; if Romneycare has been such an auspicious healthcare reform plan, then what is so terribly offensive about Obamacare?"
But wait, you say. Romney isn't an authentic "movement conservative" like Rick Santorum, the latest would-be non-Romney. (The half life of the non-Romney is such that the so-called "Santorum surge" went from headline to footnote in the time it took to type this sentence.) Santorum, an unabashed earmarker when he was in Congress, is itching to expand government in so many ways it's hard to keep track; for starters, check out Erickson's helpful laundry list.
If that's not enough big government for you, Santorum is panting to attack Iran and favors a government-run industrial policy. (In fairness, we must admit that the man they call Rooster has a plan to pay for his plans that rivals Romney's roadmap: "Eliminate outdated, ineffective and wasteful programs"!)
Leave it to Rush Limbaugh to tell the Right how to pontificate about the virtues of small government while pushing for its opposite. When government does stuff conservatives like, Rush instructs, it's not big government at all. It's "responsible government."
Both major parties support big government. The question isn't whether government should be big, but whom big government is for.
Next time: what about that other "core conservative principle" -- individual liberty versus what the Right calls the nanny state? Hint: Rick Santorum wants to take away your birth control and Mitt Romney "absolutely" supports a "personhood" Constitutional Amendment.
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Obama was in favor of it, of course.
If Obama came out if favor of good weather for the opening game of the World Series, these guys would pray for a blizzard, even if they had tickets for the best seats in the ballpark.
Both conservatives and liberals will both agree that defense and immigration are two basic functions that government should provide. You can debate about the HOW and the HOW MUCH, but the fact is that these are both fundamental government functions.
What conservatives depict as big government is not the amount spent on basic functions.
And NO, I’m not conservative nor do I support their argument. But what I, and everyone else, should expect from both sides is intellectual honesty about what subject being discussed is, not making up arguments that in the end look like silly nonsense because someone is subjectively parsing words.
To claim Romney supports “big government” because he wants to spend more in these areas – agree with him or not – is a most specious claim.
Size of government (as 1000s of Federal government nonmilitary employees)
D-Carter (4 yrs) 2883 -> 2876 ( -7k per year)
R-Reagan (8 yrs) 2876 -> 3113 ( 237k per year)
R-Bush I (4 yrs) 3113 -> 3083 ( -30k per year)
D-Clinton(8 yrs) 3083 -> 2702 (-381k per year)
R-Bush II(8 yrs) 2702 -> 2756 ( 54k per year)
D-Obama (2 yrs) 2756 -> 2840 ( 84k per year, may change by end of office)
Avg change in size of gov't per year under REP: Grows by 87,000
Avg change in size of gov't per year under DEM: Shrinks by 101,000
[Source: U.S. Office of Personnel Management, www.opm.gov/feddata/HistoricalTables/TotalGovernmentSince1962.asp]
Think about the use of "small government" when neocons use it while they support putting Uncle Sam into the most aspects of the little people's lives and tell me that Orwellian doublespeak is not the first thing that comes to mind. To sum it up, conservatives want small government when it comes to defending We the People's freedom and security, but conservatives want Orwellian sized government when it comes to defending corrupt elitists, defending draconian and prejudicial oppression of the masses.
Anything new to share?
Truly Fox News you are not doing yourself any favours by trying
to push Ron Paul out of your media coverage or at the very least
make it appear as if he is not really of much importance; whatever
you feel about a candidate if you do not treat him fairly it will come
back on you. I have always thought Fox News as a fair plateform
but sadly now I am beginning to wonder what else is being spun?
Republicans are for small government in their dreams! Same thing is their conservatism. I left this bunch of phonies in 80s seeing their lying during election campain and then doing completely different thing. Regan was not a conservative, he put this country on deficit and borrowing binge. What true conservative would open a big hole in the budget and brag about that? In the next election cycle the "conservative" candidate does everything possible to lie about GOP record, blame deficit on the other party, and if economy is in a tank, wins the elections.
That's how it works in this country. Are Dems any better? With American ignorant electorate they also learned that lying works.
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Isn't "government-run industrial policy" the very definition of Socialism?
lol...I hope you do not attribute a causal effect to the CwA.