George Bush’s fusion of “conservative” and “liberal” borrow-and-spend principles is leading the US to a 9 trillion dollar debt. He has pursued spending on entitlements that would have gladdened the hearts of Democrats had only they not been so complicated. (My take on the complexity is that it is intended to prevent the truly needy who vote Democratic from sharing in the entitlement) But he has also championed the foolish idea that a growing economy can pay for these benefits without any need to tax for the entitlements today.
This policy suits today’s faith based Republican Party very well with its simple minded, scriptural, admonision: “No new taxes!” This infantile faith has taken hold in all 50 states.
In Minnesota it forced Republican Tim Pawlenty to pledge that he would not raise any taxes in order to win the Party’s gubenatorial endorsement. When Pawlenty finally had to govern without “taxes” he raised “fees” astronomically in order to finance the state.
On the national level Bush is imitating LBJ’s ruinous policy of “guns and butter” (financing Vietnam and the war-on-poverty simultaneously) which subsequently knocked the US economy into a ten-year cycle of “stagflation. “
