New
Conservatives are Different
Conservatives
have always agreed that some of us should have many freedoms and
opportunities. But they have excluded
others as being less worthy. They have
supported government protecting the freedoms and opportunities of the former,
but opposed the same for the latter.
They used biblical arguments to support slave owners’ rights to own
slaves. Since the late 1800’s, they have
used Social Darwinist arguments to support the rights of wealthy and powerful
people and businesses against the rights of the rest of us.
They have
opposed government actions to protect people from abuse by the wealthy and
powerful and compassionate programs for people with less rights and freedoms
than the rest of us. They have argued
for limited government, limited regulation of business, and limited taxes. This hasn’t changed much, from Robert Taft,
Barry Goldwater, Ronald Reagan and Newt Gingrich to George Bush.
Political Strategy instead of
Public Policy
Far more
than previous administrations of either party, Bush’s administration makes
decisions based upon obtaining and maintaining political power, instead upon
what is good for the American people.
Their basic strategies are to:
·
use
the War on Terror to scare people into electing them and accepting their
decisions,
·
obtain
campaign funds by rewarding their wealthy and powerful campaign contributors
with public policies and subsidies, and
·
satisfy
their conservative Christian supporters, who can get out the vote.
Aggressive Foreign Policy
After
World War II, conservatives changed from wanting to avoid foreign involvements
(Robert Taft) to strongly supporting our Cold War military competition with the
Soviet Union (Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan), including the growth of our
military-industrial complex. With the
1989 collapse of the
Privacy for Government, Not for
People
Conservatives
– especially libertarians – have protected private rights from government
intrusion. But our new conservatives
have used their War on Terror to justify gathering Americans’ private
information. As religious conservatives,
they have attempted to regulate Americans’ private behavior.
Increased Presidential Power
Far more
than any previous president, Bush has increased executive power. His administration operates secretly,
classifying much more information as secret, pleading a need to keep
information from terrorists and saying his advisors need secrecy to speak
honestly. He has evaded both congressional and judicial
checks upon his power. His Republican
congressional colleagues have blocked investigations.
Huge Federal Deficits
Republicans
traditionally supported balanced government budgets, with cuts in taxes and
social programs, but Ronald Reagan’s tax cuts, military buildup and inability
to make drastic cuts in social programs led to the largest federal peace-time
deficits in history, continued by our former President Bush, reversed by
President Clinton and then greatly accelerated by our President Bush. The philosophy of the new Republicans is to
increase deficits to starve social programs.
They increase deficits by unnecessary military expenditures, unregulated
no-bid private contracts, huge subsidies to reward campaign contributors and
much pork to get re-elected.
Crony Incompetence
Bush has
appointed political cronies to public jobs and given them contracts, for which
they were incompetent to perform. This
incompetence has been particularly obvious in the failed responses to chaos and
attempted reconstruction in
Increased Federal Corruption
Federal
corruption has correlated with the extent to which business executives have
brought their low ethical standards into government, especially during the
Harding, Reagan and Bush administrations.
This has been brought to a new high by Congressman Delay and his
colleagues who pass or block legislation depending upon campaign contributions.
Religion in Government
Barry
Goldwater strongly supported the separation of church and state. He disagreed with allowing government to
support intrusion of conservative religious doctrine into people’s private
lives. Christian Conservatives
traditionally avoided political involvement, but this began to change during
Ronald Reagan’s presidency.
Since
then, Christian Conservatives have grown in numbers and in their political
involvement. President Bush and a
majority of our Republican congress persons are Christian Conservatives. Many Bush initiatives have been based upon
Christian Conservative doctrines. They
have also used their religious doctrines to deny people many choices about
medicines, sex and death. Karl Rove has
used them effectively to get out the Republican vote.
In Summary
Subjugating
public policy to political strategy, New Conservatives have proclaimed a War on
Terrorism. Ideological cronies have been
hired, with enormous resulting incompetence and waste. To raise campaign funds, corruption has
soared to new levels. Tax cuts and
government subsidies have caused soaring debt.
Religious doctrine has supplanted science and restricted our choices.
The Bush administration is
extremely different from any previous conservative administration.
Many Conservatives view New Conservatives as betraying traditional
Conservative principles. It is no wonder
that many life-long Republicans have become disgruntled. Many Liberals view New Conservatives as
simply more conservative than previous Conservatives.