By Matt for the TIB Network:
Quite a few of my blogger friends are requiring attention today... :)Mahatma has a piece up where he proves he's a moderate centrist...he takes knocks at compassionate conservatives (which I will address here) and liberal Democrats (which I won't).
Here's my fisking of the relevent parts:
Compassionate Conservatism is liberal spending, and low taxation. Of course there is another word for that...we used to call it bankruptcy. The attempt to pretend that all is well fiscally, when clearly all is not terribly well, reminds me of another shell game that is being played. Social Security. The difference with the social security shell game is only that the party of fiscal irresponsibility is the Democrats.While amusing, I find Mahatma's definition of compassionate conservatism to be a bit off the mark. The idea behind compassionate conservatism is to address the needs of the people through a safety net that is actually a safety net and not a lifestyle. The goal is to maximize the efficiency of what is actually being spent for maximim effect. Is that what is happeneing in Washington DC these days? Nope. But that isn't a knock on compassionate conservatism, that's a knock on the guys who say they are engaging in it, but really are active in pandering for political gain.
The problem here isn't neccissarily the spending for programs. It's the pork. And now that the Republicans are running the table, we're seeing the chefs ordering up a lot of it. If there is going to be a divide in the GOP, this is what will be the cause of it. Forget abortion and Jesusland, out of control spending on nonsense is the issue.
A fiscal conservative is not going to sit around and watch a critical program bankrupt itself for political gain. Of course a fiscal conservative is also not going to watch a reduction in spending of certain social programs be sold as necessary fiscal medicine either. Lets be frank about the reduction...cutting taxes when the economy is in trouble is A OK by me. That encourages spending which will help the economy to recover. In contrast failing to provide sufficient funds to States who are operating Federally mandated programs so that you can continue a tax cut which has already helped the economy to recover is...financial suicide.The conservative part of compassionate conservatism is about reducing taxes on everybody all the time regardless of the state of the economy. I agree that reducing taxes when the economy ain't so hot is exactly the right move but just because we're in a recovery doesn't mean it is time to put the IRS back high on the hog. Quite frankly, I'm for reducing federal programs, not increasing them. If a program can't exist, even with "cuts" that usually represent an increase in actual dollars, then that's a program that isn't being run properly and needs to be shut down for the sake of the taxpayer.
Either the spending goes down or the revenue goes up. If the economy is going to be hurt by the federal spending CUT, lets think long and hard about making those tax cuts permanent...eh? The economic reality is that if you cut Federal support to the States, the economies in those States are going to take a hit. We need some balance here people...not political posturing.What Mahatma fails to account for here is that it takes time for federal revenue generated by the tax cuts to catch up. Go back and read up on the Reagan cuts. Clinton got his budget surplus because of Reagan's tax cuts and the dot-com boom occuring simultaneously. To expect revenues to increase immediately is not realistic. The counter is to cut spending in the mean time...Mahatma has a valid bone to pick on that issue.
Indifferent Liberalism is mouthing a conservative line while supporting wildly liberal spending and policies. That can be compared to Compassionate Conservatism which is mouthing a conservative line while supporting wildly liberal spending and conservative policies. The only difference between the two schools of thought, (if you can even dignify either as a school of thought) is that apparently the liberals want to raise more money from taxes to pay for their spending spree. So basically they are more fiscally conservative than...um the fiscal conservatives.Mahatma is being funny here, but it isn't fiscally conservative to want to raise taxes for anything. The key component is the spending. Reduce government spending and everything will be just fine.
