THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Volume VI, Issue # 30, February 11, 2004
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
Government Committed to & Acting in Accord with Conservative Principles
Ensures a Nation's Strength, Progress, & Prosperity
IS BUSH A CONSERVATIVE?
By Tom DeWeese
The great problem affecting Americans these days is a mixture of apathy and anger over the growing realization that nothing they say
or do matters. It is a growing sense of hopelessness as government spirals out of control and beyond their reach.
What they see is a White House that --
Wants to loan $1.2 billion to the United Nations to renovate its headquarters
in New York;
Signed agreements with India to accelerate the export of jobs from the U.S.A.;
Has proposed that Mexicans, here illegally, who take jobs from Americans, be
granted a status that will lead to amnesty;
Has signed off on a prescription drug plan that greatly balloons the costs of
the Medicare program;
Offered a budget so packed with pork it promises an ever-growing deficit;
Thinks it is the federal government’s job to encourage marriage.
Has totally taken control of education from states, cities, and communities;
Is requesting more than $1.3 billion — up $22.6 million than last year --- to
underwrite still further efforts to “conserve” more land, taking the power
of communities and owners of private property to determine what to do
with their land.
It is a White House so seriously out of tune with its political base one wonders how it can think it will be re-elected.
These are just a few examples of how totally off the rails the Republican train has become in the eyes of its own Party members. Many
of its leaders, meeting in Philadelphia in early February, spent a behind-doors session grilling Karl Rove, President Bush’s political
advisor, telling him “our constituents are upset.” At an earlier gathering of GOP big whigs, the former chairman of the Party, Haley
Barbour, warned them that the November election was going to be close. Just to make sure they understood what he was telling them,
he repeated himself.
A President and a Party get elected and reelected based as much on what they are for as what they are against. A lot of Republicans
and independents who lean in their direction are against Big Government and Big Spending. Since 2000, that is all the Bush
administration has given them, and many are in a state of insurrection, desperately trying to get the White House to understand this
is not what they voted for.
Does the White House need to be reminded how narrow their last victory was? Do they need to be reminded that they are in office
only because the U.S. Supreme Court gave them an Electoral College victory, not a victory by the popular vote?
Instead, the entire tone of the White House since taking office has been one of hubris and secrecy. Were it not for 9-11, this President
would have long since been abandoned by his constituency and, even with that awful event and all it portends for national security,
it may not be enough for a second term.
Still, the White House argues that the economy is on the rebound and, if one looks at events on Wall Street, housing sales and other
economic indicators, such a case can be made, but what is being ignored is the huge debt Americans, old and young, have
individually as they struggle to --
Pay rising property taxes;
Meet the demands of an income tax that takes more than forty percent of their earnings;
Pay the countless hidden taxes on everything that affects their daily lives.
Also being ignored are the difficulties Americans face as --
Jobs disappear to nations where wages are so much lower than ours;
Our manufacturing base decreases;
Our agricultural interests reap more government financial support;
More and more jobs in America become “service” jobs, i.e., low-pay Mac-jobs;
The most important segment of our economy, entrepreneurs and small retailers, are
strangled with endless government regulations and mandates.
Ordinary people who vote are asking themselves if this White House understands or cares about their problems.
If the economy, despite all the talk of its health and growth, isn’t enough to still the fears of Americans, the sorry condition of the nation’s
educational system and misguided, ineffective policies and programs intended to improve the system hit every home where there are
children passing through the educational system. The Bush administration signed off on “Leave No Child Behind,” a huge Statist plan for
centralized control of the public schools by the national government -- a program designed by arch-Liberal, U.S. Senator Teddy Kennedy,
a program which is now being criticized for its one-size-fits-all mandate that requires the same tests for urban or rural schools, large or small.
Most school administrators and teachers, joined by a growing chorus of citizens saddled with huge property taxes, do not deem this
program appropriate to the need for reforming an educational system that fails to provide adequate instruction in even the most basic
skills.
Worse yet, the Bush administration is now sponsoring a United Nations curriculum designed to deny the sovereignty of the United
States of America, teaching a “citizen of the world” philosophy. In another social area, schools continue to ignore an “abstinence”
message in favor of lessons in sexuality that grant equality to all forms of sex, normal and abnormal, inside and outside of marriage. The
use of drugs like Ritalin to control children continues unabated. Schools are no longer safe zones, and even the daily pledge of
allegiance is disputed in the courts.
While most Americans grasp the need to fight the worldwide Islamic Jihad threatening our nation and the West, concerns about
unrealistic schemes for "nation-building" in Afghanistan and Iraq will continue to worry them, despite our evident successes in regime
change in those countries..
In a nation that remains sharply divided, the Republican Party and the White House, however, have abandoned the very principles
that drew people increasingly to its ranks. Half or more of all Americans no longer even bother to vote and, if disaffected Republicans
and Independents stay home on Election Day in November, George W. Bush will become, as his father before him, a one-term President.
Are there any differences between the Republican Party and the Democratic Party? Yes, but the line has been so blurred by the policies
and actions of the White House, and a rising tide of distress is being expressed from within the Republican Party and may well be reflected
in a new administration in January, 2005, one that will win because too many are asking: “Is Bush listening? Is Bush a Conservative?”
More on Americaln Politics & Political Competition
More on American Government & the U.S. Presidency
Tom DeWeese is the Publisher and Editor of The DeWeese Report and President of the American Policy Center, a grassroots
activist think tank. Headquartered in Warrenton, Virginia, the Center maintains an Internet site at
www.americanpolicy.org. Mailing Address: American Policy Center, 50-A South Third St.
(#1), Warrenton, VA 20186. Telephone: (540) 341-8911.
Copyright 2004 Tom DeWeese
Published with Permission of Alan Caruba
ACaruba@AOL.Com
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THE PROGRESSIVE CONSERVATIVE, USA
An Online Journal of Political Commentary & Analysis
Dr. Almon Leroy Way, Jr., Editor
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