Hi, we’re with the federal government and we’re here to help.

There is probably a much higher percentage of Bob Barr voter at CATO than the electorate at large.

Two of the biggest proponents of voting for divided government to restrain the growth of the state are at CATO, William Niskanen and <a href=”http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/2007/08/23/finally-some-not-so-bad-news-on-the-budget/” Stephen Slivinski.

Let’s not forget to notice that when it comes to fiscal conservatism, places like CATO are talking about ideological fealty to a certain constellation of policies.

But there’s another everyday joe version of ‘fiscal conservatism” that says you spend within your means and do what you need to do to balance income and expenditures, even if the actions are painful. In that light, I’m wondering whether Alaska simply needed the money.

I’ll cheerfully agree that McCain and Palin are hammering pretty hard on the doctrinaire version of fincon, so they deserve to be held to that standard. But personally, I’m untroubled to discover evidence that Palin might, if necessary, raise taxes on thriving industries as one part of a strategy to bring spending back in line with income. They’re so apart right now for the fed budget that the gap can’t be bridged without both spending cuts and carefully tax increases.

Here’s the thing. Tax rates are in many cases lower than they used to be where the GOP has been able to make changes. And that has had some beneficial effects on the economy. Are we near a point where the benefits will diminsh?Contrary to the doctrinnaire fincon view where every tax cut is desirable, there’s actually an indeterminate sweet spot where tax policy balances out. Unless we want to cut all taxes and disband the government, we have to balance out the health of the economy with the need for government to collect taxes to provide desirable gov’t services.

So my personal evaluation of the behavior of candidates goes to the joe-bag-of-donuts notion of financial conservatism, of being ready to make the adjustments needed, and of being realistic about the available government means to fund the sorts of things many folks wish the government would provide.

Like free universal healthcare on top of social security and medicare. Remember, if we get universal healthcare, it won’t really be free. Someone will be paying for it. Most of us, probably.

Also people would do well to look at Obama’s actual record on thomas as opposed to simply propagating the perceived wisdom. Looking at 2007, compared to McCain, Obama has consistently gotten more support from across the aisle on more bills than McCain. Going back to previous congresses is much more difficult to do because of the nature of the system but i dont expect it to be such a big change.

Unlike McCain, Obama has not run away from his past efforts with the other side. How much of his vaunted bi-partisan legislation does McCain stand behind today?

As far as the tax issues go Palin can’t come clean. The GOP at a leadership level is all about moving lockstep with a core number of issues. Taxes are evil is one of those issues. Asking her to do something other than go with the flow would undercut the GOP’s argument. There is no flexibility

However, to the point at hand, Palin claims that she is a fiscal conservative. CATO disagrees. That’s significant, don’t you think?

And mw, agreed that the tax and give will be popular with the American people. In fact, I’m not arguing against that. I actually favor an idea like that. However, it’s definitely not fiscally conservative, right?

So, to state again, I want Palin and the McCain camp to just be honest about this stuff. And I want her to submit to the same public vetting that everybody else has. Otherwise she’s just a publicity stunt.

On that note lets think.. would you rather have 4 years of 95% of bush’s broken policies, or 4 years of 96% of the OTHER policies.. i know my answer.

Fair enough Justin. Now how about Obama stop acting like he is bipartisan when is record is not. 96% voting with your party is not bipartisanship. -BBQ

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Good luck explaining to the American people why standing up to big oil, slapping an additional tax on them, and returning the money to the people is a bad thing. -mw

Both you guys stole my thunder. None-the-less, your statements deserve repeating anyway!

Most people could care less if Alaska taxed or didn’t tax oil because it doesn’t impact them–but they do care when people lie to them over and over again.

People don’t like to be played for fools and that is what the GOP is doing with Palin.

“Palin supported and signed into law a $1.5 billion tax increase on oil companies in the form of higher severance taxes… There are good reasons for an oil-rich state to tax oil production… She did propose sending $1.2 billion of state oil revenues to individuals and utility companies in the form of monthly payments to reduce energy bills”

Justin,
Good luck explaining to the American people why standing up to big oil, slapping an additional tax on them, and returning the money to the people is a bad thing. Keep up the good work.

I listened to a religious/social conservative leader (tuned in halfway through so I missed his name) positively crowing about how his people had forced McCain to jettison Lieberman because of their cries of outrage. They’re thrilled with the Palin choice.

She may not be consistent on economic issues - and might even be at odds with McCain on some of it - but I’m not sure it’ll make a big difference in the way she’s seen by conservatives.