THIS NEEDS TO GO VIRAL!

[ourbluenation]

The GOP vs Fiscal Conservatism

Charlie Cook and others are predicting a sea-change in public mood, with support for the GOP rising because of deficits. This strikes me as an amazing thing. It makes Charlie Brown, the football and Lucy look like the model of intelligent interaction. If you believe in fiscal conservatism, the last place on earth you should look for salvation is the GOP. They have single-handedly destroyed America's finances since the 1980s, with the sole exception of George H W Bush, who was rejected by his own party precisely because of his fiscal sobriety. The current debt is overwhelmingly inherited by Obama, and it would have been nuts to enter office in the downdraft of the sharp recession and set about cutting spending. Bush had eight years to restrain it and he didn't. He let it rip. Think of the GOP's phony concerns about the cost of the current healthcare bill and compare it with the GOP's prescription drug entitlement that Rove rammed through the Congress when the GOP held total power. The costs then were about eight times as great as the proposed costs now. But that was a Republican measure and so it doesn't somehow count as evidence of fiscal irresponsibility. But Nancy Pelosi only has to raise an eye-brow and the alarms go off.

Somehow - thanks in part to dishonest partisan hacks like Glenn Reynolds and Sean Hannity - the Bush-Cheney debt is all Obama's fault and you need to get Republicans back to fix it. A commenter on Bruce Bartlett's Forbes column has the best response to that:

The last Republican who left the office of the presidency with the federal public debt as a percentage of GDP less than when he entered was Richard Nixon (FY 1975). The last Republican who left the office of the presidency with a federal deficit less than 2.7% of GDP was Dwight Eisenhower (FY 1961). Since WW II no Democratic president has ever left office with the federal public debt as a percentage of GDP more than when he entered. And since WW II no Democratic president has ever left office with a federal deficit more than 2.6% of GDP.

We already have at least one party of fiscal responsibility. It's called the Democratic Party.

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/09/the-gop-vs-fiscal-conservatism.html

[BrklynLiberal]

1. HAH! So much for the repuke's main reason for existing.....

[Jackpine Radical]

4. Well, not exactly. That's only their purported reason for existing.

The real reason is to shovel the contents of the public treasury into the gaping maws of the capitalists.

[BrklynLiberal]

21. I stand corrected!

:thumbsup: :hi:

[valerief]

2. It's the Contract On America, Part Deux. nt

[ourbluenation]

3. email it to everyone, post it on facebook, etc.

go team!

[ixion]

5. bouncing back and forth between Scylla and Charybdis

we move ever closer to the cliff.

[Soylent Brice]

10. does that make Obama Odysseus?

[ourbluenation]

11. Focus people, focus.

:evilgrin:

[ixion]

15. no, it makes him Scylla or Charybdis

take your pick.

[Soylent Brice]

20. after last night, i have no argument for that.

[Christa]

6. I wish I could give you a 100 rec's

Off to the greatest page you go!

[ourbluenation]

7. you know those emails we all get from our rightie associates. SLING THIS BACK!

and tell them to send it on to 5 people.

Go Team!

[liberal N proud]

8. You can put this in their face and repeat the facts over and over

but they have been so brainwashed, they will deny facts.

Their delusion will not allow them to comprehend a little thing called fact.

[ourbluenation]

9. There will always be the wing nuttery. I want this before the fence sitters.

Go Team!

[BadgerKid]

12. Hate Media serves up hate, fear, and ghosts of conservatism

to keep as many people as possible from thinking about reality.

[ourbluenation]

13. and so....??????

[BadgerKid]

17. It just struck me anew how

rightwing media aims to maintain an illusion (read: delusion) of reality. That is, some people will believe anything if you shout long enough. I wasn't being clear, but my thought was that as the economy and standard of living decline, the saner righties will have to start noticing how the rightwing mantra doesn't match reality.

With Rep. Joe Wilson's outburst from last night, I'd like to think the country got an sudden insight into the GOP insanity that's out there.

[JaneQPublic]

14. A graphical representation...

[Turborama]

18. And another...

[redqueen]

24. ...

:kick:

[Wounded Bear]

16. Won't work....I know what they will do...

They will just shrug and say, "Well, they are not real conservatives." I've been hearing this about Dubya for months, as they blame Obama for everything.

They won't offer any other response, just a claim that we need more "real" conservatives in government, and vote for Republicans again and again and again.

Good luck, though.

[and-justice-for-all]

19. Added to my facebook...nt

[ourbluenation]

22. friday bump

bump

[redqueen]

23. Thank you!

I might have missed it.

Brilliant stuff... thank you again for posting it.

[redqueen]

25. For any who've missed it so far...

:kick: