I would love to be proven wrong. I would be absolutely thrilled if the "Tea Party Revolution" and the new Republican majority in the House of Representatives came to mean something. I would love if, rather than simply do Mitch McConnell's will and lay traps for President Obama in 2012, the new Republican House of Representatives managed to effect substantive spending reform. If, rather than grandstand and abuse the power of subpoena, the new Republican Speaker focused his party's collective will on actually doing something about reducing wasteful spending.
The problem is, to borrow from the Democratic campaign advertising, I remember the realities. This is the same House Majority leader who kicked off the runaway spending that the current congress and president extended and expanded. This is the same Majority leader who was the 3rd most powerful Representative in 1995 when the Republican Congress shut down the Federal Government in a fit of spite.
To effectively reduce the deficit, Congress will have to cut entitlement programs and/or the defense budget and/or raise taxes from their current rates. To date nothing John Boehner has done suggests to me that he is willing to face the political ramifications of such actions. Nor has Harry Reid demonstrated that he would be willing to reach across the aisle in a manner that would facilitate such cuts to the budget.
I'm not saying I don't want them to do what they said they would do. I'm not saying I don't want them to succeed should they defy my expectations and try. But I don't believe that it will happen.
I'd just love to be proven wrong.
Posted by Vengeful Cynic at November 5, 2010 10:56 PM | TrackBack