Bush's crony capitalism shows G.O.P.'s true face

[Guest guest]

S

Fri, 16 Sep 2005 11:59:59 -0700 (PDT)

Bush's crony capitalism shows G.O.P.'s true face

 

 

 

Bush's crony capitalism shows G.O.P.'s true face

Joe Conason - The New York Observer

 

09.14.05 - Politically as well as physically, the

destructive force of nature can rip away surfaces and

expose layers of decay. With the floodwaters of

Katrina receding, we can see beneath the veneer of

modern conservatism and gaze upon its rotten center.

 

For in the nation's capital, at least, that

traditional philosophy of society and statecraft

appears to have degenerated into a public-relations

scam.

 

The obvious fact is that Republicans are the party of

big spending, big deficits and big government, no

matter how indignantly their leaders profess to

despise all those terrible things. Yet the history of

the Bush administration and the G.O.P. Congress makes

it equally obvious that they're also incompetent at

governing. So the question that Americans now confront

is why these fakers should be allowed to waste

hundreds of billions of dollars, adding to the

hundreds of billions they have already squandered,

when the results of their exertions are so

unsatisfactory -- and so self-serving.

 

Although George W. Bush is universally acknowledged to

be the most conservative President in recent memory,

he is now doing exactly what he and his ideological

allies have always mocked liberals for doing. In the

classic right-wing cliché (which isn't heard much

these days), he is " throwing money at the problem " of

the hurricane's aftermath.

 

According to journalists familiar with the panicky

deliberations inside the White House, the President

and his aides are ready to jettison their cherished

principles of federal frugality and limited

government, with little ceremony and few regrets. Time

magazine reports that they will pursue a simple

approach in hopes of reviving the Bush Presidency:

" Spend freely, and worry about the tab and the

consequences later. "

 

There probably isn't any other way to relieve

suffering and restore civilization down there. But

knowing what we know about this administration, there

can be little confidence that those billions will be

spent wisely and competently.

 

In fact, there is every reason to worry that far too

much will be wasted on partisan patronage and no-bid

contracts. The flaming right-wingers who have

controlled Congress since 1995 long ago proved eager

to grease their friends with federal money. Their

excesses make the old-line Democratic pols who used to

run Congress look stingy.

 

The money quote on this topic was uttered by former

House Majority Leader Dick Armey. Asked once why his

revolutionary Republican comrades were consuming so

much more federal pork than the Democrats ever did,

the Texas conservative replied smugly: " To the victors

go the spoils. " (He now leads Freedomworks, a national

organization advocating limited government and lower

taxes.)

 

The Bush conservatives resolve the contradiction

between their ideology and their compulsion to spend

by channeling public funds to their corporate cronies.

Such corrupt logrolling hardly qualifies as

traditional conservatism, but that is what currently

defines governance in the White House, the Capitol and

along K Street.

 

The Medicare prescription-drug benefit, designed to

entice elderly voters, disguised a massive subsidy to

the pharmaceutical industry -- which returns many

millions to Republican causes and conservative

institutions. The energy bill provided still more

enormous subsidies to the oil and utility industries,

which likewise recycle millions to right-wing

candidates and think tanks. Thanks to Republican tax

policies, the money to grease these highly profitable

corporations comes increasingly from middle-income

families, redistributing national income upward.

 

All the boodling might be less troubling if they were

using public money to accomplish an important public

purpose. Waste and corruption accompany almost every

major enterprise. But crony capitalism -- the

governing philosophy of the Bush family -- is a

notoriously inefficient way to run a government.

 

Enormous sums have simply disappeared in Iraq, where

Halliburton has battened on its cozy relationship with

the White House and the Pentagon by billing for

hundreds of millions of dollars in " questioned " and

" unsupported " expenses. How has the Bush

administration punished its favorite firm for those

abuses? By almost instantly awarding Halliburton new

contracts for cleaning up the Gulf Coast destruction,

with the prospect of much more to come.

 

Emphasizing the Halliburton embarrassment was the

presence in New Orleans of the company's " consultant, "

Joe Allbaugh, a longtime Bush staffer and friend who

also happens to be the former director of the Federal

Emergency Management Agency. He is the man responsible

for the elevation of Michael D. (Brownie) Brown, the

unqualified pretender who just resigned in disgrace

from that same FEMA post.

 

The story of the FEMA buddies offers a paradigm of

public service in the Bush era. Behind their

anti-government rhetoric, the Republicans have learned

how to make government work for them, by employing the

unemployable and enriching the super-rich. Critical

needs are left unmet, and gigantic deficits are left

to posterity.

 

This isn't conservatism, but a con -- and they're

taking us all for suckers.

 

COPYRIGHT © 2005 THE NEW YORK OBSERVER

 

 

URL:

http://www.workingforchange.com/article.cfm?itemid=19613