In Friday’s Wall Street Journal, Kimberley Strassel claims that the Democrats are offering a "stealth liberalism" (in the words of her headline writer). According to Ms. Strassel, the Democrats are proposing one of the largest tax increases in history but calling it a tax cut for the middle class. While proposing a near universal health insurance plan, Obama’s website emphasizes that no one would be forced to join his plan. Obama says he believes in free trade (now that he has won the nomination), while Democrats in Congress still refuse to vote on free trade deals with strong allies like Colombia and South Korea, I understand Ms. Strassel’s frustration, but then I feel we have been living through a form of "stealth liberalism" for the past eight years. President Bush did cut taxes, but in other areas we have had the functional equivalent of big government liberalism presented as "compassionate conservatism." While Obama’s health insurance plan may be the biggest new government entitlement program since Medicare, Bush’s drug program for seniors is plenty big on its own, and it has significantly increased deficit projections for the future. Bush dramatically increased federal spending for primary and secondary education. By cloaking this increase in the clothes of No Child Left Behind, Bush tried to present this as "compassionate conservatism." The opposition of teachers unions, and therefore the Democrats in Congress, to the testing requirements distracted many people from what was really happening: a huge increase in both federal government spending and federal government regulation in an area traditionally, and appropriately, left to the states. And then there was government spending in general. Overall government spending during the first six years of Bush’s presidency, while Republicans controlled Congress, did not increase "conservatively". While they were not the biggest part of the increase, the explosion the number of earmarks is a perfect example of how a Republican Congress gave us a big government administration clothed in conservative rhetoric. Which brings me to the absolute genius of the Sarah Palin selection. In Sarah Palin, John McCain has found a running mate who fought against the very kind of thing that went wrong during the Bush administration. Sarah Palin fought against the Ted Stevens/Don Young/"Bridge to nowhere" branch of the Republican Party in Alaska. Ms. Palin’s selection gives conservatives in the Republican Party hope that we will be able to reclaim what can make us different from Democrats. Instead of buying votes with earmarks and government spending, we can earn votes by sticking to our principles. Ms. Palin’s selection has the potential to excite the conservative base of the Republican Party in a way that none of the other possible vice presidential candidates could have. And this will be important not just in votes but in workers. Elections are won with volunteers. Ms. Palin’s selection should re-energize the Republican volunteers. With them, it will be a tough race. Without them, it would have been impossible.
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