I heard very little pissing and moaning from the right side of the blogosphere while George Bush was expanding health care entitlements.
Now that Obama wants his turn, it's the 'end of democracy'.
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9 comments:
Well, I was pissing and moaning, but I didn't have a blog yet. And what happened yesterday isn't the end of democracy; this thing ain't over by a long shot.
Point taken, but I think the dynamic was, "we need someone who will be steadfast in taking on terrorism. The donkeys aren't interested in winning so we'll content ourselves with Bush in spite of his lack of veto pen."
However, now we've got a guy who seems little interested in winning in Iraq and Afghanistan, but he's got a hard-on for growing the government. That's worth complaining about.
and the govt grew under bush,too. even more than is has under obama.
so thats the recipe? get yerself a war to lull the neocons into complacency, then start growing the govt.
obama's sin seems to be that he didnt have a new war to fight,
The government grew more under Bush than under Obama? I'd want to see some numbers to back that up. In any case, he had eight years to do it and Obama has managed his little growth spurt in 9 months.
In any case, I'm not interested in defending Bush. I am, however, very interested in holding Obama accountable for his actions. Especially since he's so happy to pass the buck.
There is, of course, more than one way to measure the growth of government. I don't know that we can make any direct comparisons between Bush and Obama's fiscal profligacy until the Obama administration is a couple of years old, but Bush's spending was unprecedented.
(Source: noted left-wing apologists The Ludwig von Mises Institute)
i think what obama is attempting to do is deserving of all these hundreds of tea parties.
but...
why couldnt there be just maybe... one or two...maybe half dozen... during the bush years? just to be fair?
Actually, we can compare Obama to Bush; both increased spending by about half. The trick is that for Bush, it took eight years and two wars to get there. For Obama, about eight weeks and no new wars.
Gino's point about Bush is well taken; count me as an opponent of Medicare prescription drug coverage as well who didn't have a blog yet. (and who also has some very negative things to say about Bush)
I believe (IIRC) that a good chunk of the bump in the budget shortly after Obama took office was due to a change in accounting practices, specifically in defense spending. The Iraq and Afghan campaigns under Bush had been funded almost exclusively through emergency appropriations, which aren't counted as part of the "regular" budget. Now they are being funded through the DoD (as they should have been all along), but on paper this looks like a bigger spending increase than it actually is.
All of that said, I would not bet against Obama outdoing Bush in the budget department (for real) before all is said and done.
The biggest perk of having a Democratic president (at least in recent history) is that it seems to be the only time congressional Republicans bother to act vaguely like fiscal conservatives. I think the Tea Party events and their like have probably been counterproductive in terms of winning over moderate voters, but I am happy to see the right appearing to spend more time and energy on fiscal policy and less on social issues.
Brian, agreed that one perk of a Democratic president seems to be that the GOP finally remembers fiscal conservatism.
Regarding Bush's deficits, you can map them out honestly via the national debt. The overall difference is just (just?) a couple hundred billion bucks or so.
Obama still wins this one by a mile. Hopefully people will wake up and stop him before he clinches the deal mightily.
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