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[Secret_Agent_Man]

. . . it would be better than the vigorous rogering the Democrats have been taking for the past 3+ years.

Speaking of the WSJ -- a recent column by Pete DuPont:

OUTSIDE THE BOX

The Bush Paradox
Wasn't the era of big government supposed to be over?

BY PETE DU PONT
Wednesday, February 18, 2004 12:01 a.m.

"'We know big government does not have all the answers. We know there's not a program for every problem. We have worked to give the American people a smaller, less bureaucratic government in Washington. And we have to give the American people one that lives within its means. The era of big government is over.'

--Bill Clinton, State of the Union, 1996
President Clinton was wrong, of course; big government is alive and well and stronger than ever.

"President Bush would agree with Mr. Clinton's first two sentences, but he has not worked to achieve the last three, a less bureaucratic government with reduced costs. He hasn't vetoed a single spending bill (or any other bill). Meanwhile he has advocated larger and more intrusive government through steel tariffs (since repealed), increased farm subsidies, a $540 billion Medicare expansion, a 70% increase in education spending, and most recently an omnibus spending bill that funds 8,000 pork-barrel projects around the country.

"Total federal government spending in the final year of the Clinton administration was $1.864 trillion. The budget President Bush just proposed for the coming fiscal year is $2.4 trillion. That is an annual federal spending increase of 6.5% a year on Mr. Bush's watch while inflation has been running at 1.9%.

"Yes, a lot of Mr. Bush's spending is for the war and domestic security, but the increase in nondefense discretionary spending--spending on things that the Congress and the president do not have to do but have chosen do anyhow--has exploded: 9% a year in the Bush administration, the fastest such spending growth of any president in the lifetime of the majority of Americans.

"And therein lies the Bush Paradox. On the one hand, his administration is committed to expanding the freedom and resources of individuals to make their own choices. The president believes that parents should have the power to select the best schools for their children, and that workers should be able to manage their own Social Security retirement accounts and health savings accounts.

"On the other hand, Mr. Bush is rapidly growing the size and reach of the federal government. The Medicare expansion will add $8 trillion to a program that is already $38 trillion in debt, as the government begins paying for senior citizens' (probably price-controlled) prescription drugs. The Bush administration and Congress decided in 2001 that although farmers get one-third of their income from government subsidies they need more, and so enacted an $85 billion increase in the farm subsidy program. Cotton, soybeans, livestock, apples, mohair, wool and honey all get increased subsidies, and a monster new national dairy price-regulation and subsidy scheme was created. And an additional $500 million sugar subsidy while the administration continues to protect producers from less expensive imported sugar.

"Then there are the 8,000 earmarked appropriations in the recent $820 billion omnibus spending bill, things like the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, blackbird control in Kansas, a sidewalk in Thomaston, Maine, and a nice floodwall mural in Cape Girardeau, Mo. Shouldn't the governments of Ohio, Kansas, Maine and Missouri handle these matters? Local responsibility for such things would have saved the federal government about $11 billion.

"Last week the Senate passed its $318 billion highway and mass transit bill, a 47% increase over current spending, rejecting the president's $256 billion request, which would still have raised spending by 21%. It then voted 72-24 against requiring the bill's spending to fall within the congressionally approved budget for the year. The Republican House wants more--$375 billion and a gasoline tax increase. The president's spokesman pleaded for Congress "to hold the line on spending." But shouting at the deaf doesn't work; only a veto will change congressional behavior.

"Granted, the Democratic Party wants to spend even more. Mr. Bush proposed a $400 billion Medicare bill; the Democrats wanted $800 billion. Mr. Bush may have increased federal education spending by 70%, but John Kerry says it should be $11 billion higher. Mr. Kerry also wants to send $50 billion to the states to help them with their budget deficits, something they--not the federal government--created and are responsible for. The Democratic Party is not the party of spending reductions; it is the party of tax increases to expand the spending, power, scope and reach of centralized Washington government.

"Yet being slightly less reckless with the taxpayer's money isn't a responsible strategy for the GOP. The president must resolve the Bush Paradox by beginning the fight against growing government and making a passionate case for an ownership society.

"A veto of whatever inflated compromise highway bill comes out of Congress would begin a serious debate about government spending. Then make the case for a constitutional amendment requiring a three-fifths vote of both houses of Congress to spend more than last year's spending adjusted for population growth and inflation. And the amendment should also give the president a line-item veto and spending reduction power to help control congressional appetites.

"Then the president should expand his school choice program beyond the District of Columbia to other low-quality urban school districts. Introduce legislation to create individually owned retirement accounts that would create wealth among and bring resources to lower income Americans. Vigorously make the argument that having the resources to buy drugs through one's own health savings account is better than having the government tell us what drugs we may use and at what price.

"These are not easy things to do; the two constitutional amendments may be impossible to enact. But having the arguments is the only way to resolve the Bush Paradox.

"The era of big government is surely not over. But there is not a government program for every problem, and bureaucratic control of prices, markets, trade and incomes is worth fighting against. Especially since a Bush loss in November would accelerate government control of all of them."

S_A_M