Promises, Promises By Laurence M. Vance
(2010-11-02 at 20:13:09 )

Promises, Promises By Laurence M. Vance

How hard is it to position yourself to the right of Barack Obama,
Harry Reid, and Nancy Pelosi?

This is all the House Republicans did recently when they released their
"Pledge to America" at a Virginia hardware store on September 23.

Mimicking their 1994 "Contract with America," this new Republican
proposal sets forth their legislative agenda should the American people
so choose to give the Republican Party a majority in the House of
Representatives in the upcoming election.

Promises, Promises.

Do Republicans think that we are stupid? Do they think we have forgotten
the eight-year presidency of Republican George W. Bush? Do they think
we have forgotten that Republicans had an absolute majority in both
houses of Congress for over four years of the Bush administration? Do
they think that we have forgotten that the Republican Party controlled
the Congress during the last six years of Clintons presidency?

The empty promises, grandiose claims, vain assurances, and blatant lies
in the Republican "Pledge to America" mean that it is not worth the paper
and toner it would take to print out a copy. Republicans are clearly
trying to capitalize on voter discontent with the Democratic Party,
garner the support of the Tea Party movement, and sucker Americans
into voting them back into power.

Promises, Promises.

Before even examining the text of the "Pledge to America," I would like
to point out two major practical problems. First, like the "Contract with
America," this is a House Republican document. And like what happened
with the "Contract with American," there is no guarantee that Senate
Republicans will pass legislation proposed by the House - assuming that
Republicans even regain control of the Senate. The second problem is,
like what happened with the "Contract with America," we have a Democratic
president with veto power. So, even if the Pledge is a good thing (it
is not), and even if the Republicans are sincere (they are not), there is
no guarantee that Republicans will accomplish anything even if they do
win back control of the House. And as it was pointed back out in 2000:
"The combined budgets of the 95 major programs that the Contract with
America promised to eliminate have increased by 13 percent." Is there
any doubt that things will turn out any different this time?

But what about the text of the Pledge itself? Well, the preface is a lie.
The foreword is a lie. All five of the plans introduced are a lie. All
six chapters are a lie. All forty-five pages are a lie. Even the cover
is a lie.

Surely, Mr. Vance, you are exaggerating. You are being too hard on the
Republicans. You are making baseless accusations. You could not possibly
have carefully read the Republicans Pledge.

Is that so? We need to look no further than the cover. It says that the
"Pledge to America" is "a new governing agenda built on the priorities of
our nation, the principles we stand for and Americas founding values."
Among other things, Americas founding values certainly include liberty
and limited government. Is this Pledge or any other Republican agenda
built on these things?

Jacob Hornberger, the founder and president of the Future of Freedom
Foundation, has described American society when it was based on the
"founding values" of liberty and limited government:

Let us talk about the economic system that existed in the United States
from the inception of the nation to the latter part of the 19th century.
The principles are simple to enumerate: No income taxation (except
during the Civil War), Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, welfare,
economic regulations, licensure laws, drug laws, immigration controls,
or coercive transfer programs, such as farm subsidies and education
grants.

There was no federal department of labor, agriculture, commerce,
education, energy, health and human services, or homeland security.
There was no SEC, DEA, FEMA, OSHA, or EPA.

There was no Federal Reserve System and no paper money or legal-tender
laws (except during the Civil War). People used gold and silver coins
as money.

There were no foreign military bases and no involvement in foreign wars.
The size of the military was small.

Now, I ask you a simple question: Does that way of life resemble even in
the remotest way the way of life under which Americans live today? Of
course it does not, because the way of life under which we live today is
precisely opposite to that under which our American ancestors lived.
Todays Americans do live under all those programs, departments, and
agencies, and principles that were absent during the first 125 years or
so of American history.

Oh, the "Pledge to America" talks about Republican plans to "advance
policies that promote greater liberty" and about how their plan "stands
on the principles of smaller, more accountable government," but then the
Republicans propose, not to cease funding any of the abovementioned
programs, agencies, and policies, but - are you ready - "to roll back
government spending to pre-stimulus, pre-bailout levels." My, what an
ambitious plan to promote liberty and limited government!

In the preface to the Pledge, the Republicans have the audacity to
complain about "an unchecked executive" as if the presidency of George W.
Bush never occurred. They pledge to "honor the Constitution as
constructed by its framers," and in particular "the Tenth Amendment." I
have got to hand it to the Republicans. They know the right words to use
to sucker conservative advocates of the government strictly following the
Constitution to vote for them. Of course, if Republicans really believed
in the Constitution and the Tenth Amendment, they would introduce
legislation to eliminate 95 percent of what the federal government does.

The foreword to the Pledge introduces the five Republican plans:

* A plan to create jobs, end economic uncertainty, and make America
more competitive
* A plan to stop out-of control spending and reduce the size of
government
* A plan to repeal and replace the government takeover of health care
* A plan to reform Congress and restore trust
* A plan to keep our nation secure at home and abroad

One thing in particular in the foreword that stands out is the
Republicans claim that they want to "protect our entitlement programs
for seniors and future generations." This shows without a doubt that
Republicans do not have the slightest intention of honoring the
Constitution, following the Tenth Amendment, stopping "out-of-control
spending," and reducing "the size of government."

I want to focus in particular on the first and last of the Republican
plans in the "Pledge to America." I will, however, not neglect the lies
in plans two, three, and four.

The Republican plan "to create jobs, end economic uncertainty, and make
America more competitive" sounds good on the surface. It blasts Keynesian
economics, Obamas stimulus, tax increases, federal regulations, job-
killing policies, and small business mandates while promising to create
jobs, end economic uncertainty, and make America more competitive by
permanently stopping all job-killing tax hikes, giving small businesses a
tax deduction, reining in the red tape factory in Washington, DC, and
repealing job-killing small business mandates. Do not be deceived: Even
Republicans sometimes look good when compared with Democrats. However,
alongside the standards of liberty, limited government, and strict
constitutionalism, Republican economic policies are not much better than
those of Democrats. This Republican plan mentions how a Republican
Congress enacted the child tax credit in the 1990s. This is a good thing,
as are all tax credits. However, why is this tax credit progressive; that
is, why does this tax credit begin to phase out above a certain income
level and end completely at another? And even worse, if the amount of the
tax credit exceeds the tax liability, the unused portion is refundable in
the form of an "additional child tax credit." This means it is an income
transfer program, as is the Republican-instituted earned income tax
credit.

Another troubling thing about the Republican economic plan is its
attitude toward business regulation:

Small businesses must have certainly that the rules will not change every
few months so they can get back on their feet.

Excessive federal regulation is a de facto tax on employers and consumers
that stifles job creation, hampers innovation and postpones investment
in the economy.

The Republicans seem to be saying that as long as federal regulations are
relatively constant and not excessive then they are okay. In fact, they
give their threshold as $100 million: "To provide stability, we will
require congressional approval of any new federal regulation that has an
annual cost to our economy of $100 million or more." But if Republicans
really wanted to "honor the Constitution," then they would require
congressional approval of any new federal regulation that has an annual
cost to our economy of $100 or more not $100 million or more.

The last section of this economic plan mentions a "job-killing small
business mandate." Since when are Republicans against these? Is there a
greater "job-killing small business mandate" than the minimum wage? Did
not even Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell say a few years ago
that "raising the minimum wage" was a good idea? Outside of Ron Paul,
would a Republican member of Congress ever publicly question the concept
of a federal minimum wage? What it all comes down to is this: Democratic
mandates are bad; Republican mandates (or Democratic mandates they
accept) are good.

The promise in plan 2 "to stop out-of control spending and reduce the
size of government" is laughingly pathetic when you realize that the
national debt increased under the Republicans from $5,727,776,738,304.64
at the time of Bushs first inauguration in 2001 to $10,626,877,048,913.08
on the last day of Bushs second term in 2009. Republicans speak
negatively in this plan about "the bailouts of businesses and entities
that force responsible taxpayers to subsidize irresponsible behavior.
" Yet, this is the same Republican Party that helped the Democratic Party
pass the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008
(the first bailout bill).

The Republican plan "to repeal and replace the government takeover of
health care" is only being proposed because it is a Democratic takeover
of health care and not a Republican one, as I have written about here and
will write more about in the future. I would like to point out, however,
that the proposal to "establish a government-wide prohibition on taxpayer
funding of abortion and subsidies for insurance coverage that includes
abortion" is a little overdue. What were all the pro-life Republicans in
the House doing when the Republican Party had an absolute majority in the
House and Senate for over four years under a Republican president? They
were funding Planned Parenthood, that is what.

The promise in plan 4 to "reform Congress and restore trust" is more
smoke and mirrors. The Republicans lament that "for too long, Congress
has ignored the proper limits imposed by the Constitution on the federal
government." Their solution is to "require each bill moving through
Congress to include a clause citing the specific constitutional authority
upon which the bill is justified." The real truth is that Congress has
sought to circumvent the Constitution almost since the day it took effect
in 1789. Citing specific constitutional authority for a bill is an empty
gesture. Just as Nancy Pelosi cited the Constitutions "commerce clause"
in defense of the health care bill so Republicans will cite the phrase
"to provide for the common defense" in the Constitution’s preamble to
justify funding drone attacks in Pakistan.

The Republican plan "to keep our nation secure at home and abroad" is the
most objectionable part of the "Pledge to America." It can be summarized
as: xenophobia, war, empire: vote Republican. It consists of one lie
after another followed by one bad policy after another. It promises to
keep terrorists out of America by keeping foreigners locked up in
Guantanamo - as if there were any connection between the two. What this
really means, of course, is that Republicans are in favor of the U.S.
military picking up anyone anywhere in the world and holding them
indefinitely without charge or trial - or until they are killed and
their deaths reported as suicides.

This plan "to keep our nation secure at home and abroad" is sure to
create more terrorists, further erode civil liberties in the name of
national security and fighting the war on drugs, line the pockets of the
military-industrial and security-industrial complexes, further blacken
the name of the United States throughout the world, provoke a war with
Iran, further bankrupt the treasury, senselessly cause more U.S. troops
to die in vain, and unjustly kill more foreigners.

What is tragically ironic is that a liberal group earlier this year
placed an ad in the New York Review of Books condemning Obamas actions
"to keep our nation secure at home and abroad" as in some respects
"worse than Bush":

First, because Obama has claimed the right to assassinate American
citizens whom he suspects of "terrorism," merely on the grounds of his
own suspicion or that of the CIA, something Bush never claimed publicly.
Second, Obama says that the government can detain you indefinitely,
even if you have been exonerated in a trial, and he has publicly
floated the idea of "preventive detention." Third, the Obama
administration, in expanding the use of unmanned drone attacks, argues
that the U.S. has the authority under international law to use
extrajudicial killing in sovereign countries with which it is not at
war.

Such measures by Bush were widely considered by liberals and progressives
to be outrages and were roundly, and correctly, protested. But those acts
which may have been construed (wishfully or not) as anomalies under the
Bush regime have now been consecrated into "standard operating procedure"
by Obama, who claims, as did Bush, executive privilege and state secrecy
in defending the crime of aggressive war.

The most wretched lie in this fifth Republican plan is the statement that
"the threat from Iranian intercontinental ballistic missiles could
materialize as early as 2015." This is political fearmongering at its
worse that is designed to sucker Americans into voting Republican and
justify funding of provocative boondoggles like missile defense. U.S.
foreign policy is already aggressive, reckless, and belligerent enough
without the Republican plan "to keep our nation secure at home and
abroad" making it even more so.

Promises, promises - that is all the Republican Party is good for.
Promises to cut spending. Promises to cut the deficit. Promises to cut
the debt. Promises to reduce federal regulations. Promises to reduce the
size of government. Promises to reduce the scope of government. Promises
to do better than the Democrats. Promises to follow the Constitution.

But not only does the Republican Party never deliver, it can always be
counted on to increase spending, increase the deficit, increase the debt,
expand federal regulations, expand the size of government, expand the
scope of government, do worse than the Democrats, and make a mockery of
the Constitution.

The Republican "Pledge to America" is not, as Bob Barr says, a "good and
sound document." It is political propaganda, pure and simple, from a
party desperate to regain power.

Promises, Pledges, Lies: Vote Republican.

Never, Ever, Under Any Circumstances, For Any Reason, Trust In, Rely
On, Or Put Any Hope In Republican Promises. As Night Follows Day,
Disappointment, Vexation, And Anger Are Sure To Follow.

October 19, 2010

Laurence M. Vance writes from Pensacola, FL. He is the author of
Christianity and War and Other Essays Against the Warfare State and The
Revolution that Was not. His newest book is Rethinking the Good War.

Copyright © 2010 by LewRockwell.com. Permission to reprint in whole or
in part is gladly granted, provided full credit is given.