[Peace-discuss] Vote Democratic, says Reaganite/Cato Fellow (fwd)

[C. G. Estabrook]

[This is from the May 3, 2004 issue of Fortune. Doug Bandow is a senior
fellow at the Cato Institute and a former visiting fellow at the Heritage
Foundation; he was a special assistant to President Reagan.  The important
thing is not what it says but that it's being said.  H. L. Mencken once
remarked, "Under democracy one party always devotes its chief energies to
trying to prove that the other party is unfit to rule -- and both commonly
succeed, and are right" --and that's not an accident. --CGE]

	A Conservative Case for Voting Democratic
	Give either party complete control of government,
	and the vaults are quickly emptied.
	By Doug Bandow

Republicans have long claimed to be fiscal tightwads and railed against
deficit spending. But this year big-spending George W. Bush and the GOP
Congress turned a budget surplus into a $477 billion deficit. There are
few programs at which they have not thrown money: massive farm subsidies,
an expensive new Medicare drug benefit, thousands of pork-barrel projects,
dubious homeland-security grants, expansion of Bill Clinton's AmeriCorps,
even new foreign-aid programs. Brian Riedl of the Heritage Foundation
reports that in 2003 "government spending exceeded $20,000 per household
for the first time since World War II."

Complaints about Republican profligacy have led the White House to promise
to mend its ways. But Bush's latest budget combines accounting flim-flam
with unenforceable promises. So how do we put Uncle Sam on a sounder
fiscal basis?

Vote Democratic.

Democrats obviously are no pikers when it comes to spending. But the
biggest impetus for higher spending is partisan uniformity, not partisan
identity. Give either party complete control of government, and the
Treasury vaults are quickly emptied. Neither Congress nor the President
wants to tell the other no. Both are desperate to prove they can "govern"
-- which means creating new programs and spending more money. But share
power between parties, and out of principle or malice they check each
other. Even if a President Kerry proposed more spending than would a
President Bush, a GOP Congress would appropriate less. That's one reason
the Founders believed in the separation of powers.

Consider the record. William Niskanen, former acting chairman of the
Council of Economic Advisors, has put together a fascinating analysis of
government spending since 1953. Real federal outlays grew fastest, 4.8%
annually, in the Kennedy-Johnson years, with Congress under Democratic
control. The second-fastest rise, 4.4%, occurred with George W. Bush
during Republican rule. The third-biggest spending explosion, 3.7%, was
during the Carter administration, a time of Democratic control. In
contrast, the greatest fiscal stringency, 0.4%, occurred during the
Eisenhower years. The second-best period of fiscal restraint, 0.9%, was in
the Clinton era. Next came the Nixon-Ford years, at 2.5%, and Ronald
Reagan's presidency, at 3.3%. All were years of shared partisan control.

Bush officials argue that it is unfair to count military spending, but
Dwight Eisenhower, Lyndon Johnson, and Ronald Reagan also faced
international challenges that impeded their domestic plans. Moreover, if
you do strip out military spending and consider only the domestic record,
GOP chief executives emerge in an even worse light. In terms of real
domestic discretionary outlays, which are most easily controlled, the
biggest spender in the past 40 years is George W. Bush, with expenditure
racing ahead 8.2% annually, according to Stephen Moore of the Club for
Growth. No. 2 on the list is Gerald Ford, at 8%. No. 3 is Richard Nixon.
At least the latter two, in contrast to Bush, faced hostile Congresses.

Given the generally woeful record of Republican Presidents, the best
combination may be a Democratic chief executive and Republican
legislature. It may also be the only combination that's feasible, since in
2004 at least, it will be difficult to overturn Republican congressional
control: Redistricting has encouraged electoral stasis in the House, while
far more Democrats face reelection in the Senate. Thus, the only way we
can realistically keep Congress and the President in separate political
hands is to vote for John Kerry in November.

Returning to divided government would yield another benefit as well:
Greater opportunity for reform, whether of the budget process, tort
liability, Medicare, Social Security, taxes, or almost anything else.
Niskanen has observed that the prospects for change "will be dependent on
more bipartisan support than now seems likely in a united Republican
government." He points out that tax reform occurred in 1986, and
agriculture, telecommunications, and welfare reform a decade later, all
under divided government. The deficit can be cut in half if Congress "is
willing to make tough choices," says President Bush. But GOP legislators
are likely to make tough choices only if he is replaced by a Democrat.
History teaches us that divided government equals fiscal probity, so vote
Democratic for President if you want responsible budgeting in Washington.


http://www.fortune.com/fortune/investing/articles/0,15114,611869,00.html