Will the Republicans or the Democrats be the 'Party of Growth'?

How did private sector job growth do under eight years of Bush/Cheney? (Pi ss Poor)

How did the stock market do under eight years of Bush/Cheney? (Pi ss Poor)

How did the budget deficit do? the trade deficit?

Every sign so far since Obama was elected shows that the Democrats will be the party of growth. One reason is that the GOP will not junk the social conservatism. The other is that resisting a new energy policy, opposing health reform, and an insistence on an inappropriate economic policy for the kind of times we are in will make it clear that the GOP is out of step with the needs of the country. The present danger is that the deficit spending is too small to turn things around, not that it is too big. The kind of thinking that created the current depression needs to be rejected by a party of growth.

At the very least, the GOP needs to:

*Stop pretending that the market place will solve health care issues.

*Stop pretending that all government sponsored health care programs are disasters. There are plenty out there to model successful aspects.

*Stop pretending that the "trickle down" theory of economics will ever work. Tax cuts for corporations and the wealthy must have strings attached that will move the money past fat bonuses, yacht dealers, and off-shore bank accounts, and to jobs and growth.

*Un-couple from the religious right. Completely. Finally. How many newspapers must one read to understand that the combination is highly toxic!

*Get back to practical, reality-based, economic policies, which used to be a strength, and avoid the knee-jerk, doctrinaire chanting that has stood in place of policy for too long.

*Get the government out of our homes and bedrooms. "Too much government" is not just about spending. The GOP has become the "Big Brother" party. Thank the religious right for that.

*Banish the Cheney/Limbaugh lunatic ravings that make the party little more than a laughing stock.

Lester Mazor -- good posting.

Sorry, but that (social conservatism, etc.) is all that is left of the Republicans. Everyone else left. Perhaps it is time for another party.

The idea of the GOP as the POG (Part Of Growth) isn't bad... However, listening to Amity Shlaes won't quite do the trick. A few quotes from "Republicans Should Blow Up Party, Not Marriages: Amity Shlaes" (http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601039&sid=aEdjk7naC.zY)

"So is improving the relative competitiveness of U.S. firms abroad, rather than undermining it, as the proposed changes to regulations on deferrals would do."

and

"One such policy is a commitment to a stable dollar."

So a tax system that massively favors foreign investment over investment in the U.S. and an overvalued currency will somehow improve the U.S. economy.

Perhaps Ms. Shlaes should be best thought of as a DNC plant.

The Republicans would never win another election again if they ditched the social conservatives. This is why the party continues to string along the social conservatives on abortion. The Republicans will never really do anything about abortion because if they "solved" it they'd lose a huge wedge issue. They continue to play the social conservatives on the issue because if they don't, they'll never be elected again.

Thus, the GOP exists on two issues: Abortion, which we've just discussed, and (alleged) fiscal responsibility. But the past 8 years under Republican administration has demonstrated that the latter is a complete façade; and Americans have started to realize it. If the social conservatives ever wake up to the fact that they're being played, the Republican Party is finished.

The GOP is too busy being the party of No to become the party of growth. Instead of coming up with anything constructive on their own, they just wait till the Dems make a proposal and then oppose it. They have to learn how to play nice and work with the other representatives. The Dems added 83 Republican changes to the energy bill which weakened it considerably in an attempt at bipartisanship, and received 8 Republican votes for the effort. Those 8 are now being ostracized by the rest of the Republicans. By rejecting moderation and by maintaining hardline opposition to any populist measures, the GOP will soon become a minor third rate party.

The idea of trashing the current GOP platform in favor of one that focuses on something other than the religious right is a great idea. For those Americans who say that fiscal conservatism wasn't practiced under Bush/Cheney in the last eight years: NO JOKE!?!? It is possible to elect a leader from a party who does not perform in accordance with party values. The Bush/Cheney fiscal performance does not mean that it's a "façade" of the GOP to maintain sound fiscal policy now and forever. No, what the Bush/Cheney fiscal endgame shows is that the Bush/Cheney administration performed with less than stellar results with respect to fiscal policy. To say otherwise is to commit the fallacy of composition. Obama is keeping us in Iraq, no? Perhaps that's just a façade of the Democratic party as well, perhaps they're all warmongers? Now I'm just being...facetious.

The transition from social conservatism to sound fiscal policy pushing will be a natural party platform change for the GOP as its religious right base fades into obscurity. The two parties in the US have a history of evolving platforms to match ideas and ideas counter to them popular in their time. Obama's heavy spending with regard to the stimulus packages and possible massive healthcare reforms is setting up the obvious counter stance for the GOP: that this spending might not be sustainable. For those who say the religious right will leave the GOP, I ask: "where will they go"? The demographic will still have a HUGE overlap in leanings towards policy with a fiscally-oriented republican party.

It's pretty obvious where all of this is going. Politicians and their parties are pragmatic. They have to be. It's how they stay in business.

The Democrats today added Al Franken, we/they now have a clear majority for procedural votes in the Senate. We still have conservative Democratic members to deal with that will have its pluses and problems because the Congress is being given the real lead for now on the economy.

I see the extra money’s that have been added over the last six months by the Fed and Treasury gaining some real business traction out over the next year. Then Obama’s stimulus will really start a push on the economy. The Democrats will control any return to business as usual over the next three years.

The Democrats should have control of there own future, and business only wants a structure that will work. And remember in the office of every CEO, you want returns and profits to come with a return in business. If your opposition only obstructs that return in business for your business sector you don’t remain employed.

Now tomorrow in California if the bank accounts for welfare and disability recipients are all a quart short and the State is having to push IOU’s to State employees, local cities, national businesses and international banks. We will see if Republican Conservative obstruction will carry the State into social unrest because a fifth of the State Budget is not anywhere to be seen. A crash and social unrest in California will slow any growth. We know who is not the party of paying any tax and the Republican view is a quick crash is the way for the State to go.

Combined federal, state, and local government is over 40% of GDP and growing rapidly. Both the Democrats and the Republicans are the party of growth......government growth.

The fact that the "Republican brand" needs rethinking says a lot about the brand itself. The party of NO is the most appropriate brand name they've ever had. No to healthcare, No to global warming, No to abortions, No to gay marriage, No to anything Obama. Enough is enough.

Considering that fiscal conservatism has not won an election alone; it is funny that fiscal conservatives are now claiming that is the way to victory. It is the combination of fiscal and social conservatism that put Regan in office and re-elected him in a landslide.

Social conservatives (religious Christians) are tired of being pandered too about social issues. Hence, they didn't show up for McCain. So if the GOP wants to win, they better actually do what they claim to be for... Fiscal and social conservative values, which have been absent for 8 years. Otherwise the GOP is back to a 50 year run of 2nd place.

In a choice between my religious and economic values, I will choose my religion each and every time.

OMG! Isn't Obama the greatest...we need more government if we want to fix our problems. Everyone without insurance DESERVES coverage at the expense of others. And another thing...only rednecks think that guns are useful for self defense, instead of shooting the armed burglar to save yourself or your family you should give them a hug and a little money to help them out--they're obviously hurting due to Bush's economy.

I get tired of hearing of Reagan's fiscal conservatism: I read somewhere that his bailout of the SNL crisis was bigger than the current TARP in inflation-adjusted dollars!

How far back do you have to go to find real fiscal conservatism? Sadly, Clinton was a better example than most of the presidents before and after on that score.

And yes, at least half of those who vote for the Republicans that I know do so because of the social conservatism, not for the economic philosophy they haven't delivered on in generations.

"How did private sector job growth do under eight years of Bush/Cheney? (Pi ss Poor)

How did the stock market do under eight years of Bush/Cheney? (Pi ss Poor)

How did the budget deficit do? the trade deficit?"

Except until the last year none of this was true, and when disussing where we are we easily recover to year 2 or 3 of Bush 4-6 are a little longer term The last few years of Bush they actually reduced the deficit.
Enter Obama, using Bush as an excuse proposes to double the (already doubled) debt faster than Bush in a negative growth economy. We need to stop looking back 1 year and look at now and tomorrow.

"How did private sector job growth do under eight years of Bush/Cheney? (Pi ss Poor)

How did the stock market do under eight years of Bush/Cheney? (Pi ss Poor)

How did the budget deficit do? the trade deficit?"

Except until the last year none of this was true, and when disussing where we are we easily recover to year 2 or 3 of Bush 4-6 are a little longer term The last few years of Bush they actually reduced the deficit.
Enter Obama, using Bush as an excuse proposes to double the (already doubled) debt faster than Bush in a negative growth economy. We need to stop looking back 1 year and look at now and tomorrow.

(disclaimer: I am of the left)

The thing that always confuses me about the, say, "Club For Growth" set is that their stated aim always seems to be "growth" at the expense of working people. While a certain small group of entrepreneurs acquire great wealth by having a "better idea" most seem to acquire wealth by maximizing the margin between revenue and labor costs -- and do everything they can to ensure that they can continue doing just that.

The problem with that approach -- as we have most recently seen -- is that before long you flat run out of customers. It is self-limiting by definition.

Consider the difference between the records of the last two administrations. In the first, a period of technological expansion (even if we take the dot com bubble/bust out of the equation) there was a huge expansion of employment; real median income even eclipsed the 1973 highs (albeit for about ten minutes, or so it seems). The more recent administration, on the other hand, after a recession exacerbated by exogenous events, saw a primarily jobless recovery, declining real median wages and a huge concentration of wealth at the very tippity-top of the income range; pretty much *all* the growth (since dissipated) can be attributed to an illusory increase in asset values.

And yet, the policies they preach remain the same. They seem to dream of expanding aggregates by creating a third world economy. No thanks.

I finally understand this. The issue is how we measure growth.

To Republicans, in their current incarnation, growth is measured by the stock market -- if it's going steadily upward, then we have growth. GDP matters, too, but all you have to do is have 2 parties doing a transaction, and you've added to the GDP, so it is easy and not the primary focus. Privately held business is completely off the radar. If real wages are declining, it doesn't matter, as long as the stock market goes up, no matter who are the stockholders, no matter if stockholders are all foreign sovereign wealth funds.

To Democrats, growth is what you have when the population's income is going up faster than inflation, and a high proportion participate. Growth for Democrats requires a system and infrastructure that enables people, even empowers people, to be innovative and productive. They expect that GDP and stock market growth to naturally respond.

It is as though Republicans are strictly technical investors, and Democrats are strictly fundamental investors. They are the exploiters and the builders, respectively, and your point of view defines which constitutes growth in your eyes. Media ownership has become a major factor in how we see, but perhaps less so as we grow accustomed to spin and hype. You can fool some of the people some of the time, ....

It is possible that other measures of growth may be more important than any of these extremes -- but that is for another discussion.

LAO, interesting perspective, and one I can't really argue with. I'd love to see more elaboration on that point of view. A whole book could be written about it.

The Democratic party has not been consistently immune from the same formulaic approach to the economy as Republicans, since they also need money from the corporations that have been served by it. The money has to come from somewhere.

A really striking difference is that the very American concept of the economic engine seems to have faded from the Republican lexicon. Democrats want the role of government to be stoking the engine, but there is no proven formula and it is much harder work that could simply deliver to Republicans a somewhat renewed economy to exploit. In that case, people would not be unhappy to see their 401K's go up again.

The Fed consistently ignores Republican deficit spending and raises alarms about Democratic deficit spending (even when Democrats reverse it), making it seem as though the Fed might be the original authors of the Republican economic formula. Wish I knew -- that would make a good book.

There is no real party of growth, that's like expecting wolves to create a party for the advancement of sheep. The difference is that the Republicans are less anti-growth than the Democrats but nobody wants to tackle the real problem, spending. The Democrats want to raise spending to the moon, which is the real drag on growth considering how that money is wasted. Whether they want to raise taxes to match is irrelevant, particularly considering how cheap the debt from govt deficits is to finance. The Republicans talk about spending without doing much, they simply use politically popular tax cuts to create deficits, so that they can claim that the deficits will shame the spending into decline someday. Magically, nobody ever tackles spending however. The coming tech boom will put all this information online in detail, so that the populace can take back control from the wolves of govt.

It's interesting that the government is spoken of as if it were a separate entity from the people of America. The government is "us", isn't it? Or is this not a democracy? Maybe we really are the oligarchy we deny being?

Brandon W

The Government see’s itself as a separate entity that is totally protected by sovereign immunity against any action, except those it allows to be taken against it. It operates under the rules and intent of Congress and from the Directives established by the Executive. And any conflict with or within the Government is reviewed and decided by the Judicial Branch.

A Federal Attorney can make it real clear to you why we are not the government.

@ Brandon W: No, the USA is not a democracy, it is a republic (or at least it's supposed to be). Just think of the Pledge of Allegiance: "I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands, one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all." The 2 are dissimilar forms of government. Democracy is rule by the all powerful majority where minorities have no protection against the power of the majority. A Republic, on the other hand, has the purpose of protecting the individual’s God-given, unalienable rights, and therefore for the protection of all...including minorities.

@Mike - Perhaps, then, we don't live in a country ruled "We the People"... Sounds like the oligarchy argument is true. Personally, I think a lot of the problem come from the 14th Amendment.

@James - Technically, it's a democratic republic, or rather, it's supposed to be. Those elected are done so democratically (for the most part), and they are to represent the interests and issues of their electorate. Thus, it should be democratic by proxy. I agree that the Founders intended that the government have checks-and-balances for the purpose of protecting minorities from the will of the majority, but I disagree that a republic serves that purpose in-and-of itself. It is the job of the courts and the Rule of Law.

Have any of you seen this crap about the PASS Act (S.1261) and Real ID? This is about as "Big Brother" as it gets...anybody who supports this doesn't deserve any degree of freedom.