Far be it from me to pass along e-mail forwards, but my mother sent me this hilarious one. It showed video clips of President Bush’s public blunders. (“Fool me once; shame on you. Fool me twice…Uh, uh...”) I forwarded the video to my good friend, and stick-in-the-mud conservative, Karen, assuming she would at least find it laughable. Wrong. Instead, I got a phone call. Karen defended the president with the fierceness of a mother lioness, decrying the video “biased liberal media spin.”I should have foreseen this reaction. It’s called party politics; praising the party at all cost. Republicans do it. Dems do it. While they recite the party line, I visualize myself throttling them while shouting, “Think for yourselves!”
But today, I say, you cannot be a Bush supporter and a true blue conservative.
Bush and this Congress are behaving unlike conservatives. The beliefs in smaller government and limited spending have been the main unifying factors for conservatives since Reagan. However, during Bush's reign, government spending has increased at rates unseen since the days of Lyndon Johnson (Washington Post). The federal government’s footprint has also grown in the areas of education and entitlement spending, with the creation of the No Child Left Behind Act and the new prescription drug benefit for Medicare recipients. In the wake of the recent immigration debate, conservatives seem to support stricter border security, whereas, the Bush Administration has been slow to even enforce existing immigration laws. Moreover, in recent weeks, Gallop has reported that Bush’s approval ratings among staunch Republicans have reached record lows.
I will be the first one to admit, in a two party system, you must play center field to get votes. Just look at Hillary Clinton. What I am not saying is that the Administration and the Congress are wrong. The last six years have seen drastic issues that require some rule-bending. Frankly, I am pleased that we have a system that allows them that kind of leverage. It’s not called party politics; it’s called getting things done—and good for ‘em.
-The Saucy Sister
