They Is Us
By Randall Nunn (11/26/03)
The Senate is scheduled to vote Monday on the Medicare bill, the most prominent feature of which is the prescription drug benefit for seniors. While the fact that Senator Kennedy vehemently opposes the bill makes me think it must be good, the support of the AARP makes me nervous since they have consistently supported liberal candidates and causes over the years.
After listening to the arguments pro and con, it becomes clear that the main purpose of this bill is to secure political benefit for the Republicans and the real reason behind the Democratic opposition is the desire to prevent the Republicans from taking credit for a new entitlement program benefiting seniors, a voting group the Democrats desperately need to hold on to if they are to be successful in the 2004 elections.
There is a real danger lurking in the Medicare bill for the Republican Party. While the Republicans may gain some senior citizens’ votes and obtain the ability to show their compassion and take credit for a vast new social program, they may in the process be blurring the philosophical differences between Republicans and Democrats so much that the Republican Party will split into liberal and conservative factions. Such factionalization will lead to a weakening of the focus in the upcoming 2004 elections.
If there is not a clear cut difference on social issues, it becomes easier for many undecided voters to vote Democratic. The political benefit some see being created by the Republican positioning on the Medicare bill may well be offset by the disillusionment of conservatives seeing their party become the sponsor of a social entitlement program that is not necessary or in demand by its potential beneficiaries.
If this bill is so good, why the rush to ram it through with so little time for analysis and informed debate? Clearly, many of the liberal supporters of the bill look at it as a small first step and openly talk of expansion and extension as soon as possible. There are some very good features in the legislation such as the Health Savings Accounts that allow would allow all Americans to save tax-free health dollars that can be used for tax-free spending on qualified health expenses. Surely this could be provided without the need to attach it to a $400 billion (over 10 years) entitlement program for prescription drugs that some polls show is not a burning issue with a majority of seniors. Why do this now, in this fashion, other than for political advantage in the upcoming elections? Like many conservatives—who are more pragmatic than Newt Gingrich gives them credit for—I could possibly accept such a bill if I really thought it constituted a significant reform and could be administered and controlled without mushrooming into a perpetually expanding social program that will, in time, be taken over by liberal bureaucrats aided by politicians seeking seniors’ votes.
Newt Gingrich, former speaker of the House, says that every conservative member of Congress should vote for the Medicare prescription drug legislation. Gingrich argues that voting against the bill by “obstructionist conservatives” will lead to minority status for conservatives, and presumably for Republicans. But what profit is there in becoming a majority party if, in the process, you give up the very principles that distinguish you from the opposition? The Republican Party is very close to strengthening its control in both houses of Congress in 2004 but Newt Gingrich is so focused on ushering in a new age of Republicanism that he cannot wait to do it in a sound way. Gingrich wants to steal the Democrats’ thunder by transforming the Republican Party into an advocate for new giveaway social programs because “a Medicare drug benefit is inevitable.” There are often times when certain results seem inevitable yet a stand on principle turns out to be the right thing in the long run.
It will become increasingly difficult for Republicans, other than those few ideologically committed members, to oppose future government spending on expensive social programs once they become intoxicated with the ease with which they can earn the gratitude of various blocs of voters simply by “outdoing” the Democrats and claiming credit for new entitlement programs. True majority status will be secured by winning the hearts and minds of the voters, not by buying their gratitude with money taken from “obstructionist conservatives” and given to those who increasingly expect the government to take care of them in their old age.
If Republicans seek to claim social entitlement programs as their own, can further splits in the party and third parties be far behind? Welcoming in a Republican millennium won’t mean much if the party surrenders major principles in the process. As the comic strip character Pogo would say, “We have met the enemy and they is us.”
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