Text 1362, 107 rader
Skriven 2004-08-19 13:57:04 av Alan Hess
Ärende: President ignores GOP values?
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So opines this columnist:
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http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/opinion/bal-op.republicans19aug19,1,1949165.s
tory?coll=bal-pe-opinion
President ignores core GOP values


By Stephen D. Hayes

August 19, 2004

WASHINGTON -- Politics is full of irony. This year it is that George W. Bush is
campaigning on a carefully and narrowly selected set of cultural values while
moving steadily away from a second set of values to which the Republican Party
has traditionally adhered.

Consider the three old-line bedrock Republican values: fiscal discipline,
limited government and individual accountability. GOP old-timers can remember
the days when Republicans stood for and worked for spending restraint and
balanced budgets. Ironically, the only balanced federal budgets in the past 30
years were produced under a Democratic president.

Ronald Reagan got caught up in the heady forecasts of his supply-side advisers,
a severe revenue-reducing recession and a Congress bent on appropriating too
much money. But at least he tried to limit government spending, vetoing 39
bills while in office.

In nearly four years in office, President Bush has not vetoed a single spending
bill. This fiscal year, the federal deficit will top $400 billion, and in the
last three years the national debt has mushroomed by more than $800 billion.

Yes, the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq have contributed to the red ink. But the
large majority of the deficit is due to runaway domestic spending. Whatever
happened to that fiscal discipline value?

With the exception of Arizona Sen. John McCain's perpetual carping about pork
barrel spending, it just seems to have been vaporized out of the Republican
lexicon.

There was also a time -- seems like a long time ago now -- when Republicans
cared deeply about limited government and pushing more responsibility to the
state and local levels. But, to cite one example, the president's No Child Left
Behind program represents a concentration of power and control at the federal
level in an area -- education -- that for 200 years has been largely left to
the states.

The Patriot Act, elements of which are sound responses to the modern terrorist
threat, nevertheless significantly extends the reach of the feds into our
private lives. Likewise with marriage, the definition and control of which Mr.
Bush wants to federalize.

Limited government? This Republican administration is moving the nation the
other way with more federal employees, more federal spending and more intrusion
into our privacy.

Finally, Republicans have historically placed a high value on the individual:
supporting self-reliance, holding people responsible for their actions and
extolling those who "work hard and play by the rules." This philosophy is
reflected in the GOP's long-standing support of entrepreneurship, tough
prosecution of corporate criminals and efforts to move the poor off welfare and
into self-sustaining lifestyles.

Yet the Bush administration's immigration reform policy, which fortunately will
not pass Congress anytime soon, embodies a diametrically opposed set of values:
To the millions of illegal aliens now in the United States, Mr. Bush is, in
effect, saying: "I know you broke our laws by illegally entering our country,
avoided paying your fair share of taxes (thereby adding to the burden of our
honest citizens) and have taken unfair advantage of our social services
networks. But all is forgiven. No punishment. Welcome aboard!"

What was that again about working hard and playing by the rules? I guess
sometimes when big voting blocs are at stake, politicians just have to rise
above their own values.

And what of personal responsibility and accountability in the White House?
Harry Truman said, "The buck stops here." John F. Kennedy took responsibility
for the Bay of Pigs fiasco. Mr. Reagan shouldered the burden of the Marines
killed in Lebanon and for the Iran-contra episode. But who today is responsible
for the prewar intelligence failures and current mess in Iraq? Not Mr. Bush,
apparently. In this administration, the proverbial buck is more like a hot
potato.

The GOP now embraces millions of movement conservatives, neoconservatives,
religious righters. But it also includes a huge, although relatively less
active, group of traditional Republicans.

Republicans who, when they vote for president in November, may conclude that
their old-fashioned, good government values -- such as fiscal discipline,
limited government and individual responsibility -- are more important than the
modern cultural values.

If they do, they just might disconnect from power a Republican administration
that has itself become disconnected from its own Republican philosophical
roots. And that would be the final irony.

Stephen D. Hayes was a political appointee in the Reagan and George H.W. Bush
administrations.

Columnist Linda Chavez is on vacation.

Copyright + 2004, The Baltimore Sun

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