View From the Sky

Kos links to a study from the libertarian/conservative think tank The CATO Institute. The study, which points out that spending under W has gone up from 18.5% of GDP to 20.3. The real issue, as Kos points out, is that Bush has also cut taxes, leaving no way to pay for his shopping spree.

If they want to drown the government, then drown it already. Or raise taxes and pay for popular government programs. Those are the two honest options, the two options that don't drown the nation in red ink and endless record deficits.

Back in the Goldwater days, a conservative Republican was about cutting government to cut taxes. Then came Ronnie Dearest with (as George HW Bush put it) "Voodoo Economics" which proved that it was feasible, from a political perspective to have your tax cuts and spend them too. After Bill Clinton sacrificed his party's majority for deficit reduction in 1993, the tide clearly turned. Notwithstanding the Contract on America, the Democrats became the party of fiscal sanity. What Shrub has done has only served to intensify this difference.

It will be interesting to see if, in 2006, the Dems use a Contract-style campaign to emphasize the way the GOP has deserted the fiscal interests of the voters.