Debunking progressive myths: Where were all the conservatives when Bush was spending

Like many other myths that progressives and Democrats like to run up the flag pole and march behind, this one is easy to debunk.

There where a lot of things Bush did that pleased conservatives and earned him some praise, but his progressive spending plans where warned against.

Let’s see what Peter Shiff was talking about in 2005: “Hurricane Katrina struck the economy at a particularly vulnerable time. If we can not pay to rebuild the lost infrastructure out of accumulated savings, the only legitimate method is to reduce current consumption. Therefore, if President Bush wants to divert scarce resources to rebuild the Gulf Coast, he either needs to raise taxes or reduce other expenditures to pay for it. However, the President wants to pretend that the Gulf Coast can be rebuilt without anyone sacrificing anything, and without any adverse consequences for the over-all economy.”

As you can see, in the middle of President Bush’s presidency, a prominent conservative was speaking out against him. Specifically against Bush’s plan to spend money without identifying where the money will come from, much like the Obama stimulus plan.

There was even an article in the Washington Post about conservatives pointing out bad legislation from Bush, from 2003: “Last month’s passage of a Medicare prescription drug benefit that could cost $2 trillion over 20 years, after three years of sharp increases in federal spending, has provoked an unusual barrage of criticism of President Bush from conservative leaders.”

So this myth goes to the fact that progressives only attack Republicans, so they only see conservatives as being able to attack Democrats when in fact conservatives speak out against anyone that is going about things the wrong way. This happens a lot with progressives, they accuse others of having the faults that they themselves have in order to mask their own shortcomings.

Like William F Buckley’s liberals, Progressives “claim to want to give a hearing to other views, but then are shocked and offended to discover that there are other views.”

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