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September 25, 2010
The GOP Pledge to America
Here is the video introducing the Pledge to America unveiled by House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH-8) at Tart Lumber Company in Sterling VA.
You can read the whole thing at the Pledge to America website.
I really do not have time for an exhaustive analysis, so all I'll offer is a few excerpts from the pledge and some comments. Bottom line: I think it's a winning formula and a great plan. It goes much further than Newt Gingrich's 2004 "Contract with America," and if implemented would be very good for the country.
At 48 pages, the Pledge is an impressively detailed document, much more so than Gingrich's relatively short Contract with America. It also promises more. While the Contract simply pledged to bring certain bills to the House floor for a vote, the Pledge commits Republicans to implement a wide variety of popular conservative goals.
We will launch a sustained effort to stem the relentless growth in government that has occurred over the past decade.
In other words, we're not going to tinker around the edges.
The difference, of course, between 2004 and 2010 is that voters are much more cynical now and as a result are much more demanding. Lightweight promises won't cut it anymore. Few if any Tea Party folks will vote Democrat, but you can bet your last dollar that when they say they won't vote for Republicans if they don't hold true to their promises they mean it.
The Pledge outlines specific policy proposals in six key areas; jobs and the economy, reducing federal spending the size of government, repealing and replacing the Democrat's health care legislation, reforming and restoring trust in Congress, keeping our nation secure at home and abroad, and establishing checks and balances in government.
I was going to go through the pledge section by section, but I just don't have time. What I have read in it sounds pretty good, though. Hopefully this week I'll have a chance to post more.
Posted by Tom at September 25, 2010 9:00 PM
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Comments
I was going to go through the pledge section by section, but I just don't have time.
Same here.
I just hope that the length of this pledge isn't part of the problem with implementing it.
Posted by: Always On Watch 
at October 3, 2010 7:50 AM
Gentlemen,
I too have read the pledge and it is nothing more than the usual suspects by which I mean the usual Republican talking points about cutting taxes, reducing spending, catering to their base, and playing the fear card, early and often.
It contains only one real concrete proposal--repeal the health care act. Everything else is non specific. Where will spending be cut? How will the size of government be reduced? Whose jobs are he GOP going to cut?
Look, no sane person would take the position that the current state of our economy inspires confidence. In addition, it is a tough position, politically, to sell the truth, which is w/o the bailouts and the stimulus we would be experiencing a world wide depression even more profound than that of the 1920s and 1930s.
But that is the truth.
I expect the GOP to make gains, probably substantial ones, in the mid term elections. But for all the talking points, in past two decades, the GOP has by and large failed utterly to govern competently when given the opportunity.
The Pledge to America is just telling some Americans what they want to hear in the interests of getting elected. If that were to occur, we can expect the usual fruits of GOP governance: the preservation of the interests of the wealthiest 1% of Americans; catering to corporate interests at the expense of the environment and common citizens; and policies designed to continue the rash of personal bankruptcies caused by people's inability to pay their medical bills even when they have insurance.
TLGK
TLGK
Posted by: The Loop Garoo Kid at October 3, 2010 4:17 PM
Yes, well, we shall see, Loop. It might interest you to know that most conservatives and Republicans (not always the same thing) are wary too. We recall the mid-part of this decade, when GWB, Denny Haskert, and others went hog-wild in federal spending. Conservatives lost faith in Republicans, which is partially what led to the Tea Party movement.
As for the so-called stimulus, it has had nothing to do with stimulating the economy because that was never it's purpose. It was designed 1) as a payoff to liberal interest groups and 2) as a means to permanently increase the size of government by creating dependence on government.
Posted by: Tom the Redhunter at October 5, 2010 8:36 PM
Tom,
"As for the so-called stimulus, it has had nothing to do with stimulating the economy because that was never it's purpose. It was designed it was designed 1) as a payoff to liberal interest groups and 2) as a means to permanently increase the size of government by creating dependence on government."
Please tell me you not really believe that statement. B/c if you do, you have just relocated next door to Santiago in Crazyland.
TLGK
Posted by: The Loop Garoo Kid at October 9, 2010 5:26 PM
I'll revise my statement to "it had very little to do with stimulating the economy." I went over why that is true here, among other places.
Posted by: Tom the Redhunter at October 12, 2010 7:36 PM
