Pictured Above Norman Thomas
"The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism. But under the name of 'liberalism' they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program, until one day America will be a Socialist nation, without knowing how it happened."
If only our messiah Barack Hussein Obama was this honest!
I am less concerned about socalisim in the federal govt than I am in the local govt. A prez gets changed every 4 or 8 years, congress gets changed every two, Local politicos are in for ever and THAT is where we get hit with socalist polocies. Just look at 10% sales tax and 50% increase in state income tax.
ReplyDeleteI don't disagree with you, I just think your point is misplaced on the wrong group of poloticians.
Coming from Chicago / Cook County / Illinois, I fully agree with you that local government can be absolutely awful and socialist. And in prior posts I have addressed this. That being said, you should consider the following:
ReplyDelete1. Local government is bound by some fiscal restraint, because (unlike the federal government) they cannot print money and their power to ammass debt is limited.
2. In times of revenue contractions, even Daley is forced to cut back on patronage jobs, but the growth of the federal government only accelerates.
3. Even though the president and congress can get voted out of office, the new bureacracies and programs that they create almost never go away. Roosevelt enacted farm subsidies over 70 years ago that economists of the left and the right uniformly agree are little more than subsidies to the largest agro-corporate interests, yet they continue.
4. Perhaps most importantly, the damage that a Daley or Stroger does is largely confined to the localities that they govern, but the poor policies of the federal government effect the entire nation.
5. People can vote with their feet against bad local governance as seen with the millions of people who have left Illinois and California. But, we cannot run away from Obama's horrible policies.
PS - thanks for keeping me on my toes.