To ensure conservative principles, vote Democrat
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Rami Saffarini
Published: September 27, 2008
“I am a conservative. I could never vote for the most liberal Democrat in Congress.” I’ve heard this said over and again. Let me show you why it is precisely the liberal Democrat you need to vote for if you
truly espouse conservative principles.
Let’s take the idea of small government and free markets, a truly conservative value. Free markets consistently outperform centrally planned economies, and everybody ends up better off. The problem is
that the “conservatives” running Washington for the last eight years mistook “little intervention” for “no intervention” and successfully pushed for deregulation and less government oversight of our financial
markets. Where has that gotten us? To a world in which the federal government now essentially owns four of our largest financial institutions.
Should the federal government be in the business of running Wall Street? Is that a conservative value? The answer is no. Overnight, we dramatically jumped from no regulation to government control. We
now have the very government intervention that would have Milton Friedman turn in his grave.
The thing is, with prudent foresight and well-managed regulation, the current crisis could have been avoided. But what has the “conservative” candidate, who is now pledging to “clean up Wall Street,” done
in the last 26 years? He has consistently sided with his party in pushing for deregulation.
If years ago we had listened to “liberal” calls for caution, we would now live in a world where the markets were regulated AND working. If you are in favor of free markets and little government intervention,
you need to wake up to the fact that “liberal” and “conservative” are misleading labels created as smoke screens by the political parties. Nowadays “conservatives” are not pro-market. They are pro-
business and have allowed special interests to lobby them for measures that imperil the very foundation of our free markets.
Why put a person in the White House just because he calls himself a “conservative?” If you’re voting for free markets, you need to vote for the man who has plans for their survival, no matter what label
anyone tries to stick on him.
RAMI SAFFARINI
Fairfax
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Posted by ( Rami Saffarini ) on September 29, 2008 at 9:07 pm
The point is that we need to set aside “labels” and Rovean politics, and raise the level of discussion, from knee-jerk reaction to buzz words, to a substantive dialog.
What did the county learn, for instance, from the fall out earlier this decade, consequent to the federal deregulation of the wholesale electricity markets; AKA the Enron scandal? (Ok “Calliffornia” got rid of their governor and brought Mr. Body builder to office). We saw massive blackouts, retirement savings disappearing and jobs lost. The power plant construction project I worked on was suspended. I had to switch over to building cell sites in the BOOMING telecommunication industry (You remember what happened to that one).
The discussion should not be the simplistic distinction between “conservative” and “liberal” or “BIG GOVERNMENT” and “small government”. It should be about what makes sense and benefits the vast majority of us.
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Posted by ( gwenandgary ) on September 29, 2008 at 4:23 pm
I applaud your effort, Mr. Saffarini. There’s certainly food for thought in what you say. Unfortunately, your call may be “too little, too late” in light of the country’s current circumstances.
No matter which person you vote for, no matter which side or person attacks the problem, no matter how talented or correct he or she may be, the truth is that it will take years—possibly decades—to set things right as outlined in your letter.
I suppose there’s no time like the present to begin, but your vision is going to take time to appear in any tangeable form.
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Posted by ( BTAR ) on September 29, 2008 at 12:31 pm
Please! I doubt any of you have had a conservative thought in the “Hole” of your life.
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Posted by ( dailyprophet ) on September 29, 2008 at 12:18 pm
Godsaveus: Somehow your comment riddled with mistakes and typos does not convince me. One train of thought I was able to discern was that Democrats and Republicans alike have contributed to the crisis, by all wanting to lower the bar on first homeowners and if handing out risky mortgages to them was the way to increase home ownership, then so be it. You are right on that one.
To say that Obama flip-flopped on the bailout plan is just ridiculous. He just didn’t rush to judgment and flaunt a flavor of the day like McCain did, and mainly tried to stay out of the way as Congress went to work. McCain managed to interrupt progress by swooping down on Washington, but then realized that missing the debate might not be so good for his campaign, so then he announced he had done his job, although no agreement had been found, and left again.
The point Rami makes is well taken. The Republicans claim to be the keepers of “conservative values”, but they are not. They have become the party of big government, except they don’t want to use that government to help the middle class, to develop infrastructure, or to invest in education and research, as Democrats in the past have tried to do when they were accused of having big government ideals. Republicans want to use the government to give favors to business, and to play cowboy on the world stage. Haven’t the last 8 years sufficiently shown that? Does this economic crisis not prove that enough? If the current bailout plan is not socialism at its best, then I don’t know what is.
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Posted by ( Godsaveus ) on September 29, 2008 at 11:58 am
If years ago we had listened to “liberal” calls for caution, we would now live in a world where the markets were regulated AND working. If you are in favor of free markets and little government intervention.
My dear Rami , you need to go back and do your homework. Three years ago, democrats oppose to impose regulations to Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac, supported for their biggest recipients Chris Dodd and Bernie Frank included the freshman Senator from Illinois. Liberals never call for caution. Liberals lower the bar to promote loans to low income people, loans that they could never afford, under the fantasy of the American dream. I think you are expose too much to Washington Post and now you are “ brain washed”.
<under the mantra free market” are demanding public money to save themselves - without any accountability to the people paying the taxes. This is the reality of Conservative governance.>
Conservatives in congress in opposition to President Bush, Nancy Pelosi , Obama and other leaders democratic are against the bailout, a blank check without accountability.$700 billions to a goverment that bring us to to this crisis.
Obama flip-flop again in this issue (lack of experience). The first day President Bush ask for $ 700 billions he oppose and blame President Bush for the failure economy , now along with Pelosi call unpatriotic to conservatives republicans, for oppose this legislation.
<Fortunately, Barack Obama offers conservatives a reasonable alternative. Senator Obama wants to embark on a 10-year plan to develop alternative energy >.———What?
Obama wants to embark to the current plan, nothing new. right now we have thousand of wind turbines, 70 miles away, solar panels producing electricity, hybrid cars and more. Nevertheless, he opposes nuclear and clean coal for “environmental reasons”. However, those effort are not enough to provide clean energy independent although McCain in a more realistic approach he support more national oil and less import oil, nuclear plants, clean coal all together
http://www.windturbine.net/
http://www.wholesalesolar.com/solar-panels.html
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Posted by ( rafaelva ) on September 29, 2008 at 9:12 am
Obama made an interesting statement during the debates. I cannot give an exact quote, but basically he said
“I only appear to be so liberal, because I have actively opposed George Bush”.
We tend to label a politician based on his “social posture”, as opposed to his “fiscal posture”. Democrats, I believe have be historically “Socially Liberal, and Fiscally Conservative”.
Republicans are just the opposite.
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Posted by ( RonCharest ) on September 28, 2008 at 10:36 am
Well Said Mr. Saffarini,
The Republican party has been quite successful in demonizing liberal values. By successfully demonizing liberals they have hid the true conservative agenda of wholesale wealth transfer from the middle-class (income based on work) to the upper-class (income based on wealth accumulation). We are now living with the results: low-income and middle-class families (95% of US population) have not received real income raises in almost 30 years, cannot afford to see a doctor, have little to no saving, whatever personal pension plans they may have are now worthless, declining property values, foreclosures on their only home, and unable to afford a college education.
Meanwhile, the upper five percent of US citizens have accumulated about 80% of all wealth in the US. They do not worry about health care as they can afford to pay whatever a doctor will charge. They can afford colleges, and even have an advantage in getting accepted due to “dynesties” of a family name. Pension plans, golden parachute clauses that insulate them from running business into the ground, corporate perks that effectively absorb the costs of owning property, and enjoy a favorable tax structure that in many cases allows a high-income earner to pay less actual tax than someone earning one-tenth as much.
Now, the very people that ran our economy into the ground under the mantra of “free market” are demanding public money to save themselves - without any accountability to the people paying the taxes. This is the reality of Conservative governance.
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Posted by ( QuestionAuthority ) on September 28, 2008 at 10:21 am
Nor is it a conservative value to inherit a budget surplus and give back, eight years later, the largest debt in US history (and that was BEFORE the bailout).
Conservatives also value law and order, the rule of law. Is it a conservative value for the president to ignore the law by simply issuing signing statements? This administration, supported by Republican loyalists in Congress certainly believes so. When the GAO picked 19 of 160 presidential signing statements to examine they found that the government had failed to obey the law in one third of them.
Is torture a conservative value? In 1988 the conservative’s hero Ronald Reagan said, “The United States participated actively and effectively in the negotiations of the Convention [Against Torture]. It marks a significant step in the development during this century of international measures against torture and other inhuman treatment or punishment. Ratification of the Convention by the United States will clearly express United States opposition to torture, an abhorrent practice unfortunately still prevalent in the world today.“
The administration, again fully supported by Republicans in congress, has taken this country down a dark and depraved road of black site prisons, extraordinary rendition, and specific acts of torture conceived of in meetings in the White House according to a statement by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in a September 12 statement to Senate investigators.
Unfortunately, extremists have hijacked the Republican party, and thoughtful conservatives with a conscience have a difficult decision to make this November.
Fortunately, Barack Obama offers conservatives a reasonable alternative. Senator Obama wants to embark on a 10 year plan to develop alternative energy. This is not only a HUGE opportunity to create a whole new industrial base (at a time when all are manufacturing jobs are headed to China), create jobs, restore America’s technological leadership, begin to secure America’s energy independence and begin to combat global warming.
Conservatives should take off their Republican hats and put on their America hats and vote for the candidate of hope, new ideas and responsibility and give the Republicans a message that this neo-conservative radicalism does not reflect true conservative values!
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