They Never Learn

As much as we have griped lately about the GOP not learning it’s lessons (Doug has been especially effective on this front), the Democrats show no propensity to learn from their victory. They did not win because the hard core left of the Democratic Party carried them to party. They won because the small government Republicans were sick of “Compassionate Conservativism” and the centrists were sick of the war. Now, we have Hillary and Barack Obama, John Kerry and John Edwards vying for the Democratic nomination. Yet, none of them will appeal to small government Republicans or centrists.

You doubt me? David Boaz at Cato reminds us of Hillary’s record:

For more than 15 years now, Hillary has been the incarnation of Big Government. She votes with taxpayers only 9 percent of the time, according to the National Taxpayers Union. She calls herself a “government junkie.” She says, “There is no such thing as other people’s children” and calls for ”a consensus of values and a common vision” for 300 million people. She was best known in her White House years for heading a team of 500 bureaucrats organized into 15 committees and 34 working groups to recreate in 100 days one-seventh of the American economy. After health care, she told the New York Times, her next project would be “redefining who we are as human beings in the post-modern age.” Or, as the Times put it, “She wants to make things right.”

She just might be the scariest collectivist this side of Al Gore.

Except that Kerry, Edwards and Obama all have records as bad, or worse. As Boaz points out.

The best hope we have is for Ron Paul, as a spoiler, to shift the debate. And he may just be able to. Better yet, a surprise upset in the ’08 primaries as all the Republicans who are not “Compassionate Conservatives” realize he is their dream candidate now that Reagan and Goldwater are no longer among the living.

Heaven forbid we see McCain vs. Hillary, because the outcome is bad, period. Either a First Amendment hating big government conservative or a Bill of Rights hating big government progressive gets elected. Think on that for a minute if you hated the last 6 Bush years.