A liberal friend asked me to read an article entitled “Insanity” by DarkSyde at The Daily Kos and pointed out that he thinks it pretty much sums up how most liberals feel about the past 8 years and what this election is about. I found the article cleverly written and coming from an unusual angle. It made me stop and think because on a foundational level I actually agree with a some of the broad assessments made in this article even though many of them are grossly exaggerated.
Republicans are often blamed for all the nation’s problems of the past 8 years. I concur that the GOP has been part of the problem for 4 of the past 8 years; however, remember, the Senate was evenly divided when Bush was elected and then 1 GOP member switched to Independent and caucassed with the Democrats so the GOP didn’t control both houses until 2003 and then lost in 2007 after the 2006 election cycle. In fairness to Republicans though, during the 4 years of complete GOP control, Democrats have blocked and/or watered-down virtually all Republican proposed solutions to the problems this article blames them for.
However, in spite of the problems, the overall issue is bigger than simply who controls Washington. The underlying problem in Washington, as I see it, is systemic and part of human nature. It’s something our Founding Fathers were aware of and repeatedly divided government in an attempt to mitigate. It’s simply this: Power corrupts. It doesn’t take a rocket scientists to see that both parties are now corrupt. That doesn’t mean that all members in both parties are corrupt but that the system is corrupt with power. There’s a creeping loss of individual rights and personal liberty every year regardless of which party is in power.
So that brings me to my next point. Since both parties are corrupt and there’s no third party that stands a chance at winning this election cycle, what am I to do as a voter? I feel I must take the path of less damage and that’s why I am going with the Republican Party. Most everything listed in the “Insanity” article would have occurred regardless of who was in power — 9/11, the mortgage crisis, a weak economy, Wall Street corruption, etc.; however, each party responds to these problems differently. While both parties continue to pass legislation that reduces my individual liberties and erodes my rights, I feel the Democrats are more restrictive and erode them faster. For example, I’m a business owner and employer. Democrats want to tell me how to hire and fire and what kind of pay and benefits I have to offer my employees. Republicans restrict my ownership rights in these areas also but not as much. Democrats go so far as to try to require faith-based organizations like churches to hire people who hold beliefs contrary to the positions the church espouses (imagine being forced to hire an atheist for a church outreach program).
Both parties take huge amounts of taxes, but Democrats are more greedy with my money than Republicans. Both parties create ridiculous “entitlement” programs but Democrats create more and bigger ones. And on issues of national security, do you really think the defense-cutting Democrats would do a better job protecting us from the “fundamentalist Sunni Monarchs and the communist Chinese” as the “Insanity” article blames Republicans for turning our national economic future over to? (I have an answer for dealing with the Sunni Monarchs: Drill Here! Drill Now! but that’s for another article.)
The shipping of jobs oversees has been going on for decades and didn’t slow down under Democratic Presidents Carter or Clinton. If the Democrats succeed in taxing corporations for “excessive profits” that will force them to leave our borders — it’s like killing the goose who lays the golden egg. The result would be reduced overall tax revenues and a weaker economy as more jobs are lost.
The article concludes with “Conservatives are worried that Democrats might do the same astonishingly lousy job Republicans have done for the last eight years.” Actually, I’m concerned that the Democrats’ overall job performance would be far worse than the poor one performed by recent Republicans. This constant concern is one reason why I actually have some excitement about the McCain/Palin ticket since both have proven records of taking on corrupt government and private interests including ones in their own party. Can the Obama/Biden ticket demonstrate taking on their own party ever for anything?
I think there will be less government growth under a McCain administration than an Obama administration. We don’t need more and bigger government and so I will vote against its expansion whenever I can.
Note: In this post I’m ignoring a host of social issues that also put me more in line with the Republican Party. That’s for another article and another day.