Republicans return to fiscal conservativism: blatant hypocrisy? A good thing?

[bascule]

Jon Stewart has probably done the best job of pointing this out that I've seen so far with some pretty hilarious juxtaposition of "before and after" clips showing Republicans staunchly defending spending under Bush, talking about how invaluable Iraqi democracy is that we really can't put a price on it (of billions), then turning around and ranting and raving about the stimulus bill and the multigenerational debt we're engendering:

 

http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes/index.jhtml?episodeId=217691

 

I think it's clear Republicans are opposed to deficit spending, but only when Democrats are in power.

 

McCain, who suspended his campaign to spend a day lollygagging around before returning to Washington under the auspices of solving the financial crisis, was more than happy to help push through a similarly priced bailout bill which seems to have done an incredible job lining the pockets of Wall Street executives, but calls Obama's stimulus plan "generational theft"

 

I'm not a big fan of deficit spending and long for a return to a balanced budget. As an American I look to our neighbors to the north, who are running budget surpluses, and go "Canada can figure this out... why can't we?"

 

Yet I can't help but feel that in the present situation, with skyrocketing unemployment rates, New Dealesque spending might be in order.

 

I find it hilarious that in the wake of a situation where I find myself coming around to potentially supporting deficit spending, the Republicans are doing just the opposite.

 

Deficit spending is all well and good when it's going towards rebuilding Iraq, but as soon as we need to do it to rebuild America, it's "generational theft". Zuh?

 

I'm glad to see Republicans returning to fiscal conservativism, but they sure picked a hell of a time to do it...

[ParanoiA]

Deficit spending is all well and good when it's going towards rebuilding Iraq, but as soon as we need to do it to rebuild America, it's "generational theft". Zuh?

 

That's a good way to put it too. This whole war on terror and the pretense of an Iraq connection has been used to excuse their total shift in conservative fiscal philosophy. I would only buy it if the threat matched the rhetoric. It never did. I'm fairly convinced it's more about prioritizing PNAC over any aversion to deficit spending.

[ecoli]

Yet I can't help but feel that in the present situation, with skyrocketing unemployment rates, New Dealesque spending might be in order.

The problem is, the ones doing the deficit spending can't justify it any better than you did in this sentence here. This is obviously a huge problem.

 

Also, the republicans are hypocrits here, but its about time (too little too late... they can't stop these deficit spending bills, if they were in power i wonder what they would be saying. They could just be being negative to hedge their bets just in case (dare I say when in case) the stimulus fails).

[iNow]

I'm going with blatant hypocrisy and over dramatic grandstanding.

 

Let's see just how fiscally conservative they all are when budgets for military come up. How much you wanna bet they argue in favor of cold war era weaponry and huge spending allocations for technology which is not going to protect us in this new age of fighting.

 

 

 

I can't help but agree with Representative Frank as he argued yesterday on MTP:

 

 

f-g0tmsA0JM

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Jon Stewart has probably done the best job of pointing this out that I've seen so far with some pretty hilarious juxtaposition of "before and after" clips showing Republicans staunchly defending spending under Bush, talking about how invaluable Iraqi democracy is that we really can't put a price on it (of billions), then turning around and ranting and raving about the stimulus bill and the multigenerational debt we're engendering:

 

http://www.thedailyshow.com/full-episodes/index.jhtml?episodeId=217691

 

I think it's clear Republicans are opposed to deficit spending, but only when Democrats are in power.

 

Absolutely. The section between 4:30 and 8:30 into the video is spot on.

[Mr Skeptic]

Republicans return to fiscal conservativism: blatant hypocrisy? A good thing?

 

I reject your premise. Republicans have not returned to fiscal conservatism, they have returned to talking about fiscal conservatism, and, as always, to opposing the Democrats. When they start worrying about their spending when they are in power, or about spending on their favorite stuff, then I'll be impressed.

[DrDNA]

I think that they are both hypocrites.

 

I was worried about the trillion, or so, dollar stimulus package until I read this........

 

U.S. Taxpayers Risk $9.7 Trillion on Bailout Programs

By Mark Pittman and Bob Ivry

 

Feb. 9 (Bloomberg) -- The stimulus package the U.S. Congress is completing would raise the government’s commitment to solving the financial crisis to $9.7 trillion, enough to pay off more than 90 percent of the nation’s home mortgages.

The Federal Reserve, Treasury Department and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation have lent or spent almost $3 trillion over the past two years and pledged up to $5.7 trillion more. The Senate is to vote this week on an economic-stimulus measure of at least $780 billion. It would need to be reconciled with an $819 billion plan the House approved last month.

 

Only the stimulus bill to be approved this week, the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program passed four months ago and $168 billion in tax cuts and rebates enacted in 2008 have been voted on by lawmakers. The remaining $8 trillion is in lending programs and guarantees, almost all under the Fed and FDIC. Recipients’ names have not been disclosed.

......................

The pledges, amounting to almost two-thirds of the value of everything produced in the U.S. last year, are intended to rescue the financial system after the credit markets seized up about 18 months ago. The promises are composed of about $1 trillion in stimulus packages, around $3 trillion in lending and spending and $5.7 trillion in agreements to provide aid. ........

........

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=washingtonstory&sid=aGq2B3XeGKok

Edited February 10, 2009 by DrDNA

[iNow]

Republicans have not returned to fiscal conservatism, they have returned to talking about fiscal conservatism, and, as always, to opposing the Democrats. When they start worrying about their spending when they are in power, or about spending on their favorite stuff, then I'll be impressed.

 

I quite agree with Mr Skeptic here. This is why I chose "blatant hypocrisy" in my response, but the above is quite on point.

 

 

 

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line[/hr]

From a week ago on THIS WEEK, Representive Frank again makes strong points (if you want to see Part 1, click the first link... however, it's Part 2 which supports the issue here most directly, so I've embedded that one):

 

Part 1 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDsnhr9MEu4

 

 

Part 2 -

uVYgCEVtbwU

 

 

 

Now, don't get me wrong... I'm not some Barney Frank band wagoneer, but any pragmatist can see that he is making the best arguments across the board on these points.

Edited February 10, 2009 by iNow

[padren]

I think it's clear Republicans are opposed to deficit spending, but only when Democrats are in power.

 

And the Yankees are opposed to the ball touching the bat, but only when they are pitching.

 

To be fair though, many Democrats railed against Bush spending when he was in power and decried the dangers of deficit spending, so now they are hypocrites too for being pro deficit.

 

 

What's hypocritical is not that they are opposing the money the Dems want to spend when they didn't oppose Bush's deficits - the hypocritical part is they don't come straight out and say they don't like liberal styled programs.

 

They claim it's because of deficits, when historical precedent says it has more to do with whether bombs or condoms appear on the check memo than the dollar figure.

Of course, it could be something else: it could be that they are afraid of spending this much on top of what we already spent under Bush, which I suppose could be fair, but then they'd have to admit that spending for an unpopular war is hurting our ability to spend now, and I don't think they want to do that.

 

 

Personally I find a lot of what is coming out from many conservatives on this to be rather full of hot air, tiresome and straight up hypocritical. However, what would be really scary is if they didn't oppose Dem spending at all - what would be in that bill now if the Dems knew they would have no criticism or opposition?

[Pangloss]

Now if we can just get Barney Frank to stop threatening salary caps on all US businesses top to bottom, he may actually start to sound like a pro-business Democrat. Almost.

[DrDNA]

Personally I find a lot of what is coming out from many conservatives on this to be rather full of hot air, tiresome and straight up hypocritical. However, what would be really scary is if they didn't oppose Dem spending at all - what would be in that bill now if the Dems knew they would have no criticism or opposition?

 

I absolutely agree with you.

The pork in those bills would be more out of control than it already is.

But that doesn't make it un-hypocritical.

It IS.

 

In addition, as intelligent, yet imperfect beings, most of us have first hand experience how exponentially easier and safer it is to sit up in a high chair, pointing out what someone is doing wrong rather than actually taking the reins and doing something about it ourselves.

 

So, looking back, I think that the real hypocrisy lies in, where were the heck were the REAL conservative politicians, and most of the popular, so-called conservative pundits (sans a few like Mike Savage) when Bush was writing billion dollar checks like an addict in a cocaine store?

 

Perhaps they were overly optimistic and misguided; wanting desperately to believe that Ronald Reagan would descend from the heavens and take complete control over Bush's mind and his body.

 

But, I suspect that it is much more likely that they were/are simply small, weak men, afraid that Cheney would force them to go bird hunting and then shoot them in the face, or worse.

Edited February 10, 2009 by Sisyphus
fixed quote attribution

[ParanoiA]

Heh, the Sopranos used fishing trips, Cheney uses bird hunting. I knew the government was really just the alpha criminal organization in America.

[bascule]

The Daily Show made a great point last night: the Republicans are only paying lip service to fiscal conservativism.

 

The Republicans are advocating tax cuts as an alternative. "Tax cuts" are little more than a euphemism for "paying for things with debt instead of tax revenue".

[iNow]

Agreed. That was pretty great, and worth the 5 minute watch:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/video/index.jhtml?videoId=217704&title=clusterf#@k-to-the-poor-house

Edited February 11, 2009 by iNow

[bob000555]

The republicans are just being ridiculously overdramatic; saying there going to try to kick out senators after years of work they agree with over one vote? I hope they get a Connecticut-Democrats-defeating-Lieberman-in-the-primary-esque defeat. if they try to get rid of Specter, he could just run as an independent splitting the republican vote and giving it to the democrat(unless Pennsylvania election law prescribes a runoff, I’m not knowledgeable about Pennsylvania election law)

 

The link I’m ranting about: http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/10/stimulus.gop.pac/index.html

 

Summery: republicans are threatening to give massive funding to primary challengers of any republican who breaks line with republicans on the bailout.

[Pangloss]

I agree with this thread entirely.

 

And I for one welcome our new Democratic overlords, the great defenders of fiscal responsibility who will save us from our spendy selves. Oh wait, you say they need to throw another trillion at the economy? Okay! Pfft, fiscal responsibility. So overrated!

[tvp45]

The republicans are just being ridiculously overdramatic; saying there going to try to kick out senators after years of work they agree with over one vote? I hope they get a Connecticut-Democrats-defeating-Lieberman-in-the-primary-esque defeat. if they try to get rid of Specter, he could just run as an independent splitting the republican vote and giving it to the democrat(unless Pennsylvania election law prescribes a runoff, I’m not knowledgeable about Pennsylvania election law)

 

The link I’m ranting about: http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/02/10/stimulus.gop.pac/index.html

 

Summery: republicans are threatening to give massive funding to primary challengers of any republican who breaks line with republicans on the bailout.

 

So, let them kick Arlen out of the party. He's close enough to being a weird conservative Democrat that he could switch. Many of us Democrats vote for him now; we'd probably continue after a switch. But, he might salvage the situation by voting an "Isle of Guernsey Maybe" on the final bill ; nobody'll ever figure out what the heck he means. The hard-line conservatives want him out of the way for the 2010 primary.

[iNow]

This is just mindless... The new republican approach is, "Do whatever we can to blame this on Obama in 2010 even if it means completely destroying our country and economy."

 

 

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[bascule]

This is just mindless... The new republican approach is, "Do whatever we can to blame this on Obama in 2010 even if it means completely destroying our country and economy."

 

I think they realize they have no real power anymore so they're just trying to be contrarian, just in case Obama's plan does go sour they can be there to yell "I CALLED IT!" never mind how harebrained the approach they advocated actually is.

 

If Obama's scheme works, the public will be soon forget the Republican opposition, and perhaps in the future when the Republicans are in power again they can take credit for the schemes they opposed like they did with a balanced budget under Clinton.

[ecoli]

I think they realize they have no real power anymore so they're just trying to be contrarian, just in case Obama's plan does go sour they can be there to yell "I CALLED IT!" never mind how harebrained the approach they advocated actually is.

Or intelligent (for once)

 

If Obama's scheme works, the public will be soon forget the Republican opposition, and perhaps in the future when the Republicans are in power again they can take credit for the schemes they opposed like they did with a balanced budget under Clinton.

 

Which they shouldn't have done, considering that it was mostly due to the tech bubble (a point I've made before).

 

The problem here is that, I fully believe that Obama's plan will reinflate the economy on the short term. The Dems will claim victory and use that as an excuse to promote more socialist-like policies. When it becomes apparent that all the policies where doing were re-inflating old or new bubbles, they'll claim that not enough money was spent the first time around. We'll destroy the currency "fixing" the problems of "the free market."

 

My hope is that, if GOP can keep their heads out of their asses, they can stop the second round of nationalization before its too late!

 

[/prophecy]

[bascule]

Or intelligent (for once)

 

Do you think a "spending freeze" is seriously a good idea right now?

[padren]

The problem here is that, I fully believe that Obama's plan will reinflate the economy on the short term. The Dems will claim victory and use that as an excuse to promote more socialist-like policies. When it becomes apparent that all the policies where doing were re-inflating old or new bubbles, they'll claim that not enough money was spent the first time around.

 

Do you really think the current market is simply a reflection of "corrected" post-bubble numbers? It seems to me that we are in the trough of the correction, and that we may not be at the bottom. When you have an over inflated market bubble pop, the market first over corrects to a non-stable low and comes back up to a stable middle value. It does not look like we are at the bottom of that low yet in the natural correction swing, which is the whole reason we are trying to artificially lessen the degree of the continuing negative dive.

 

How do you extrapolate from there that the dems are just inflating equally volatile bubbles?

[ecoli]

Do you really think the current market is simply a reflection of "corrected" post-bubble numbers? It seems to me that we are in the trough of the correction, and that we may not be at the bottom. When you have an over inflated market bubble pop, the market first over corrects to a non-stable low and comes back up to a stable middle value. It does not look like we are at the bottom of that low yet in the natural correction swing, which is the whole reason we are trying to artificially lessen the degree of the continuing negative dive.

its certainly possible, but the problem is, once again, one of central planning.

 

How do we know where the 'unnatural' market low is and how much money do we need to pump into the economy to sustain stability?

 

We, of course, don't. So, how is pumping some arbitrary amount better than not pumping anything at all?

 

If we don't pump enough into the economy (according the Keynesians) then, not only we we fail to achieve stability of output, we'll also lose all the money we pumped in.

 

If the recession is over exuberance of market correction, at least doing nothing is just as good as pumping too little (and less expensive on the taxpayers, in the short run).

 

How do you extrapolate from there that the dems are just inflating equally volatile bubbles?

Because they're supplying credit to banks and homeowners that made big mistakes. The only way to repay all those debts is to return to the bubble conditions (which was inflated with bad credit).

 

The only possible way to pay off that credit it to create new sectors of productive growth. Which is, almost impossible, for the government to predict.

 

The best strategy, IMO, is to decentralize the decision making to that politicians don't waste a lot of taxpayer money in some misguided attempt at stabilization.

 

As I said, its the classic 'central planning' problem. No one person has enough information about markets to make this all work the way we'd like it to.

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Do you think a "spending freeze" is seriously a good idea right now?

 

I tend to take the position that major changes in spending during a recession is a bad idea.

 

So obviously, people who are living on welfare when times are good aren't going be able to cope better without welfare when times are bad.

 

What I'd like to see, is tax and spend policies roughly staying the same (perhaps more being spent on oversight - a big problem that precipitated the crises.)

 

Also, spending on infrastructure isn't a bad way to go, (esp. if the govt normally does that anyway) as long as we restrict to things that are actually useful. In general, getting people working is better than handing them a redistribution check. I don't think this will rebuild the economy or even affect unemployment that much. But, its better than changing the game completely all at once.

 

I think the general policy of the Obama admin. "Use the crises to get things done that you normally wouldn't do" is not a great idea - whether your on the right or left. People need to psychologically adjust to changing conditions, and the changing of government signals to markets (in any direction) tends to increase volatility (the only difference is that freeing markets tend to increase short term, while socializing them tends to increase long term volatility).

 

I certainly agree with free market theory, but most of these policy recomendations ignores the real psychology of reaction to policy during a crises.

 

I feel that generally, the economy will do better without welfare, but people on welfare will not do better if its systematically taken away during a recession. Similarly, an institution that isn't used to getting bailed out will not perform better if it starts getting all this free money from the government (habits are hard to change).

 

We have to grit our teeth and bare it, but think about policy changes when the market corrects itself.

 

In summation, volatile markets don't handle new information well.

[Sisyphus]

As I said, its the classic 'central planning' problem. No one person has enough information about markets to make this all work the way we'd like it to.

 

That's true, of course, but "one person" is an exaggeration. It's probably the most impressive team of economists ever assembled. Not to say that that makes you wrong - I'm not saying a "best team of people" can really predict the market, either. But that's precisely the problem. That particular strict contrast between government intervention and "market forces" seems like a false one, because in reality the big fluctuations we see day to day are not caused by consumer behavior (like long term trends are), but by the hurried predictions of an over-excitable mob in a room on Wall Street and a handful of financial institution executives, which is kind of a de facto centralization.

[ecoli]

That's true, of course, but "one person" is an exaggeration. It's probably the most impressive team of economists ever assembled. Not to say that that makes you wrong - I'm not saying a "best team of people" can really predict the market, either. But that's precisely the problem. That particular strict contrast between government intervention and "market forces" seems like a false one, because in reality the big fluctuations we see day to day are not caused by consumer behavior (like long term trends are), but by the hurried predictions of an over-excitable mob in a room on Wall Street and a handful of financial institution executives, which is kind of a de facto centralization.

You bring up a good point, but wall street is a market too. The fact that they are so excitable, makes them even more difficult to predict and out economic models even more useless.

 

Therefore, saying "hmm... if we spending x, aggregate demand will be boosted by y" is particularly useless, esp. since a lot of that information gets feeded through these volatile stock markets.

 

A highly suggested book on this (well not this exactly, but on statistical models of financials) is "The Black Swan" by Nassim Taleb.

[Pangloss]

Republicans blocking all initiatives is almost as intelligent as spotting Republican political trends by watching Rachel Madoff.