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Edited on Tue Jan-18-05 10:32 AM by tasteblind
I originally posted this in response to the "Tom DeLay's Challenge" thread. The quote is below:
"The Democrat Party <sic> was once an idealistic, forward-looking policy colossus. The New Deal, the Marshall Plan, the Great Society, the space program, civil rights. And yet, today, one is hard-pressed to find a single positive, substantive idea on the left."
- Rep. Tom Delay, R-TX. Jan. 6, 2005
I think Tom DeLay is effectively rubbing our noses in it.
A major incentive for Republican deficit spending is that it prevents the Democratic Party from introducing costly new reforms...as long as we are in the red, Democrats don't see how we can afford universal blah blah blah.
DeLay knows this, and is pretty much saying, "Nyah nyah nyah, we gave away all the money you guys would have spent on health insurance, and then borrowed so much money, you'll never make another government program again!"
Clinton almost singlehandedly made up for Reagan, and Gore would have fixed it, but Bush has continued the fiscal insanity with renewed vigor.
We need to fix the budget in the short term, but in the long term, the important question to address should be:
How to make paying for government seem responsible and worthwhile again?
Because as long as it is a choice between the party of taxes and the party of tax cuts, we have a huge near-insurmountable disadvantage.
We need to be the party of responsibility again. The Republicans like to think of themselves as the Party of personal responsibility, but they don't think anyone should pay their taxes in an ideal world.
We need to make sure that people know that personal responsibility means paying for government.
We concurrently need to make sure that the government is worth paying for.
That's a big part of the Democratic Party's folly over the last twenty-five years...they have effectively tied our hands, making us incapable of providing the kinds of social programs and worker-friendly policies that make us Democrats.
To summarize, fix the deficit, propose new programs, push responsible, useful government.
Those should be our goals for the next twenty-five years.
edited for clarity
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