Thread: Pox Americana Republicans believe Obama's stimulus plan

Pox Americana

Republicans believe Obama's stimulus plan will lead to financial calamity. But they can't stop his economic agenda

Jeremy Lott guardian.co.uk,
Monday 8 June 2009 21.00 BST

South Carolina governor Mark Sanford's press scrum Thursday morning at the Washington DC headquarters of Americans for Tax Reform was heavy with the stench of defeat. The governor told the crowd of right-leaning journalists and activists he had "learned in the most concrete and emasculating terms" the limits of his office to enact conservative reforms.

The mop-headed cerebral southern pol admitted that he'd "made mistakes", that "you can't fight every fight", that there is no "silver bullet" and that there is, in fact, a real "value to losing". He lingered on that last point for a bit, saying: "It's only in that crystallising moment that people say 'What does this mean? What just happened here?'"

What just happened is that Sanford lost the fight over how to deal with federal stimulus funds – and that with Sanford went the last serious opposition to President Barack Obama's economic agenda.

Sanford asked the federal government to allow South Carolina to put about $700m toward retiring his state's debts. That request was denied. He then threatened that he wouldn't request the money on behalf of his state, as required by the federal legislation, unless the state legislature first agreed to repurpose state funds to debt reduction.

The Republican-controlled legislature balked. It passed a bill ordering the governor to request the money and overrode his veto. He filed suit in federal court to prevent this. The case was kicked back to South Carolina's supreme court, which ruled against him last week.

This came as a kick in the gut to conservatives in South Carolina and nationally. Several Republican governors, from Louisiana's Bobby Jindal to Alaska's Sarah Palin to Indiana's Mitch Daniels, had made noises about turning down federal funds, but the stubborn Sanford had been the real star. He spoke out often and loudly about why temporary stimulus funds would prove a disaster for future state budgets. He cut an anti-stimulus television ad. An anti-spending presidential run was widely rumoured.

Now all the renegade governors, including Sanford, have backed down and taken the money with all the federal strings attached. They'd almost feel like suckers not to at this point. The federal government is currently the single largest revenue source for state governments.

Sanford praised the Republicans in the House of Representatives who all voted against the stimulus package. He expressed hope that his party would ultimately right itself and the nation and he saw in the many grassroots anti-government "tea party" demonstrations some signs for hope. But that was small comfort for most of those at the presser (organised by my former employer, the American Spectator).

Worse, Sanford resisted most suggestions that things would get any better any time soon. He said inflation, "that giant robber of the middle class", was set to strike soon and hard. He worried that America was on the verge of becoming a "banana republic" and at one point said "I'm not calling South Carolina or the South Carolina supreme court a banana republic" when that was exactly what he was implying.

Sanford brushed past a suggestion that he might run for president and declined to take anything more than a perfunctory stand against Obama's US supreme court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor. He stumbled a few times, referring to Ronald Reagan's "13th commandment" and mispronouncing "pax Americana" like so: "This ain't the fifties and sixties where it's pox Americana."

Maybe it was a Freudian slip. Sanford prefers the language of business – "fiduciary" is a favourite buzzword – but he represents a strain of conservatism that thinks the stimulus not just misguided but wicked. They have tried to keep America from going down the wrong path, which leads only to financial calamity and heartbreak, and now they've failed. The coming inflation, Sanford said, will steal "from all the people who have saved or done the virtuous things that we would want." Pox Americana sounds about right.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... rk-sanford

Looking at the past fifty years and the huge increases of government at all levels of American society, I have to say the Republicans are a bunch of losers. The track record speaks for itself. They accomplished none of their goals to limit the federal government all so they could profit personally. In the moments they could have enacted real and serious change, they lost their nerve and decided to act like Democrats.

Bush was a Democrat in Republican clothing! The last two years of the Bush fiasco administration the House and Senate were dominated by Democrats. It was Bush and the Democrats against the American people. Obama makes Bush's terrible policy look like a walk in the park! Scary!

Take a look at Senate.org to find our how the politicians are voting on important issues. Also watch C-Span and see for yourself which party is representing the American people................if you are against Amnesty, didn't want the Stimulus bill or the tarp bill and/or bank bails out's, don't want Universal ( Socialist) health care...... then the Republican party is on your side. Check it out for yourself!

The Democrats want the illegals to be given Amnesty so that the Democrats will in essence be creating a one-party system. The American people must fight back and vote Republican if they continue to be against Amnesty and Big Spending.