The resolution to the fiscal cliff crisis was fittingly
perverse, containing the very prodigal spending and denial of
looming deficits that caused it. Washington never fails to use a
crisis to compound the underlying elements of the crisis.
This is what passes for bipartisanship in a demagogic age. Pols
calculate that the full effects of a crisis won’t be felt until
they’re safely out of office. So they don’t mind making it worse
while pretending to solve it.
Obama’s easy triumph — he only had to shave a few days off his
Hawaii vacation — illustrates that tax-and-spend liberalism has
become the norm and only “unrealistic” Republicans now dissent from
it. For all the blather about philosophical polarization, no real
debate occurred, as the media whittled it down to a fatuous
lesser-of-two-evils choice: bad liberal idea A versus bad liberal
idea B. Either accept one of the bad ideas or catastrophe will
result.
Scaring Republicans into bad policy through such hectoring is
the left’s forte and Republicans simply don’t have the courage or
conviction to call the left’s bluff. Both America’s economy and
politics look European at this point, as the debate narrows down to
two parties quibbling over the size of a crumbling nation’s tax
hikes and spending increases, not whether they should occur. A Rand
Paul may stand up and point out the obvious — that the catastrophe
has already arrived and that such negotiations amount to
rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic—but he is quickly drowned
out by more “balanced” GOP voices.
Bad policy is good politics and good policy is bad politics —
that’s the reigning mindset of establishment Republicans. But it is
very myopic. Parties that seek to retain power at the expense of
principle usually end up with neither. And in the meantime they
damage the country by colluding in the errors of their
opponents.
The media constantly propagandizes Americans in the idea that
the absence of bipartisanship and compromise lie at the root of
crises when the truth is that bipartisanship and compromise drive
them. It is the bipartisan cooperation in a corrupt conception of
the federal government that explains the mushrooming debt. The
middle distance between two bad ideas is still a bad idea and thus
is never a “compromise” that benefits the country.
This bipartisan herd was led appropriately enough by the
buffoonish Joe Biden, whose smug smile on Tuesday night captured
the emptiness and delusion of American politics. The sales pitch
for the bill was a lie on every level. Instead of erasing debt, it
adds trillions to it over a decade, according to the Congressional
Budget Office. Instead of encouraging economic growth, it punishes
job creation and investment. Instead of ending congressional
boondoggles, it became an occasion to indulge them.
No more Solyndras, vowed Republicans during the presidential
campaign. But Boehner-led Republicans just voted for a bill that
contains billions of dollars in subsidies for the
“renewable-energy” industry.
And so much for their vow never to pass hastily assembled bills
stitched together by lobbyists. Like Nancy Pelosi, they believe in
passing a bill to find out what is in it. Plenty of pork, as it
turns out,
according to the Washington Post: “The owners of
auto-racing tracks got one that will cost $78 million. A $1 million
break will help coal-mining operations on Indian lands. Another
oddball provision dealt with excise taxes on imported rum, which
the U.S. government mainly funnels to the territorial governments
of Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.”
So once again a problem caused by frivolous spending is “solved”
by more of it. Obama’s euphemism for pork is “investment,” which he
sternly promised to protect in his Tuesday speech. He feels cramped
by the debt ceiling and demanded that Republicans raise it without
impinging upon his new spending plans. He is investing in
everything from wind farms to electric cars to now even electric
scooters with two or three wheels, according to the
Post.
The bipartisan herd also made sure to help the dairy industry by
continuing milk and cheese subsidies. Nor did they forget the
filmmakers of Hollywood, who will receive subsidies for making
movies in the U.S.
What a sham. Last year Wolf Blitzer asked Republican
presidential candidates during a debate if they would accept one
dollar in tax increases in exchange for ten dollars in spending
cuts. He asked the wrong question. It turns out that the GOP will
accept almost no spending cuts for billions in new taxes.
