Debaser
October 2, 2013, 3:28pm
251
A quick search just of this year in GD…
I find it fascinating, really, I do, that people think the government is wasteful and self-serving. What does the Postal Office get out Saturday delivery? What does the National Weather Service get out of flying airplanes into the eye of hurricanes? What does the USDA get out of regulating nutrition labels? I could go on and on. I sincerely believe that the people who decry about the waste of government are likely the ones using most rely on their services (e.g. “Keep your hands off my Medicare”).
Repeatedly. Booms and busts were far worse then. Recall the Great Depression?
They don’t want to curtail it, except for the other guy. “Get your government hands off my Medicare!” The anti-government movement is fundamentally in denial of reality.
Yep. They screamed it when Social Security was implemented back in the 1930s. When Medicare was proposed in the 1960s, Ronald Reagan himself said that he was happy with Social Security but Medicare was a step too far and would bring about the collapse of America. Now we get people screaming for the government to get its hands off their Medicare, but Obamacare is Marxist communist fascism gone mad.
Excuse me if I don’t run panicking into the streets.
I think the problem is that we are delaying natural consequences. As long as the blue states subsidize the red states, conservatives are not having to live with the results of their policies.
It happens on all fronts. The obvious one being that more money pours into conservative states than comes out, but there are also more subtle ones. The gay children of conservatives just move to the coast where they can live productive lives free from harassment while their parents in Dogpatchville go to church and talk about their son who “never found the right girl”. Conservatives can rant and rave about prohibiting abortion knowing that it is still safe and legal in case their little girl gets knocked up. States can underfund their education systems and then use tax breaks to attract companies that were started in areas of the country that had the foresight to place a value in top notch universities. Parents can lament the fact that “we removed God from the classroom” without the worry that their Mormon children will be proselytized by Baptist teachers who want to convert them to proper Christians. Tea Partiers can demand that the government keep their hands out of healthcare secure in the knowledge that Medicare provides them with affordable coverage. If we would let Florida pay for it’s own hurricane recovery, or Louisiana pay for it’s own levees, or Arizona live without the spending from all the retirees on Social Security maybe they would shut the fuck up for a moment.
Of course it’s hyperbolic to say literally every thread. But you can’t deny that this is a meme that is widespread on this board and elsewhere. Obama’s even repeated it himself. It’s amazing they were all talking about Matthew Continetti, isn’t it?