Reihan Salam has an
interesting column in Forbes wondering if Mark
Sanford represents the return of Goldwaterism on the American
right:
When Barry Goldwater ran for president in 1964, conservatism
was a rigorous and demanding creed. Rather than promise tax
cuts, Goldwater insisted on balanced budgets and sound money.
After promising to get rid of any number of New Deal social
programs, and after pledging to privatize the Tennessee Value
Authority and other cherished infrastructure projects,
Goldwater didn't promise anything material in return. No manna
would fall from the sky in Goldwater's America. He simply
argued that shrinking the federal government and reducing its
power would encourage self-reliance, and that self-reliance
would encourage the virtues of thrift and industry.
It is easy to see why the supply-siders later derided
Goldwater's old-fashioned worldview as "root-canal economics,"
as it promised a lot more pain, at least in the short term. But
Goldwaterism had the virtue of coherence and consistency.
It also will soon acquire the virtue of being necessary. There
was a brief window when a viable economic conservatism could cut
high marginal tax rates while leaving the federal government's
spending commitments largely intact, although even during the
Reagan years bigger spending cuts could have prevented tax
increases later. But there simply isn't as big a revenue reflow
effect from cutting a 35 percent or even 39.6 percent tax rate as
there is from cutting tax rates that exceed 50 percent. And the
federal government is in a more precarious financial position
than it was in the 1980s, in no small part because both parties
have failed to control spending.
Spending cuts -- especially anything that reduces entitlements
for the middle class and wealthy -- aren't any more popular than
they were when Goldwater was running in 1964. But they are
currently justified by more than fidelity to the Constitution.
Sanford's political creed isn't sunny and it remains to be seen
if it can be sold to the electorate. Nevertheless, the days of
tax cuts without spending cuts are over. In the absence of
Sanford's Goldwaterism, Republicans aren't going to have much to
say about fiscal policy.
