Why are most fiscal conservatives ignoring Paul Ryan’s actual record?

By David McElroy · August 13, 2012

In the last 48 hours, Paul Ryan has been crowned the great hope of fiscal conservatives. If they honestly believe that, they’re more desperate than I thought, because the only way to see Ryan as fiscally conservative is to completely ignore his record.

It seems that the presumptive GOP vice presidential nominee is seen as a fiscal conservative simply because of his budget proposal in the House. His proposal would have balanced the budget without raising taxes, but it was an absolute fairy tale of a proposal, partly because it would have required decades of future presidents and Congresses to stick to it as laid out. Is there anybody in the world stupid enough to believe that’s even remotely possible?

Mainstream political reporters are painting the selection of Ryan as a turn to the “radical right” to placate the Tea Party’s supporters. A writer for Time magazine even said that Ryan was the choice of the “libertarians on the Wall Street Journal editorial board….” (I haven’t run into any actual libertarians yet who are excited about Ryan.)

There’s only one little problem with this narrative building him up as a fiscal conservative or even libertarian. Ryan’s voting record is full of support for things that no fiscal conservative could support, much less a libertarian. Anybody who believes that his candidacy is a win for libertarians or fiscal conservatives isn’t paying attention.

One of the most egregiously irresponsible spending measures of the last few years was the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), which forced U.S. taxpayers to purchase the so-called “toxic assets” of big banks. Pure and simple, it was a bailout for banks to allow them to get loans off their books. Ryan not only voted for TARP, but he enthusiastically supported it. Take a look at the video from the House floor (at the end of this article) of Ryan begging the House to pass TARP and warning of dire consequences if it didn’t pass. Is that a fiscal conservative?

Ryan voted for the auto bailout of General Motors and Chrysler. Is that a fiscal conservative?

He’s voted for Medicare expansion, housing subsidies and extension of federal unemployment benefits. Are those things that actual fiscal conservative support?

In addition, he’s voted in favor of a national ID, making the PATRIOT Act permanent, surveillance without a warrant and No Child Left Behind. He favored keeping troops in Iraq indefinitely. Maybe worst of all, he voted for the so-called “stimulus” plan of 2008. That’s right. Ryan believes in the voodoo economics of John Maynard Keynes. Is any of this the mark of a fiscal conservative, much less a libertarian?

The idea that Ryan is a fiscal conservative or libertarian is puzzling. The facts don’t support the contention. (Read more about his record here.) So why are so many people saying it anyway?

For those on the progressive left, anybody who isn’t on their side is on the “radical right,” so their statements at least make a little bit of sense, even if paying attention to the record would force them to modify their statements. As for conservatives, though, I think it’s purely wishful thinking combined with the irrational belief that they have to support anything and anyone who they see as their only hope against Barack Obama.

Frankly, I don’t see a lot of difference between an Obama presidency and a Romney presidency. Obama has no interest in cutting any spending and Republicans are more interested in talking about it than doing it. Let’s be honest. Federal spending is not going to be cut. Period. It doesn’t matter who’s elected president in November. The runaway train of federal spending is impossible to stop. There’s not enough political support for the painful choices that would have to be made. It’s not going to happen.

Paul Ryan is marginally more fiscal conservative than the big spenders of the Obama administration, but I can’t see that he’s honestly any more responsible than Mitt Romney would be. All of the mainstream candidates support massive spending. There’s a tidal wave of debt that’s crashing its way toward us — and the Democrats and Republicans are arguing over whether stopping a gallon or two of spending is too draconian.

There’s no serious national discussion of anything approaching what’s necessary to stop the runaway train of debt. Any fiscal conservative or libertarian who tries to put any hope in Ryan as their savior on this issue is going to be badly disappointed, even if the Republicans win this year.

Note: This article has been edited to correct an error. The original article stated that Ryan supported the 2009 “stimulus” bill, but that’s incorrect. He voted for the 2008 “stimulus” bill, but not the one the following year.

Share on Social Networks

On a live awards show Sunday night, one man made a joke about a female celebrity. The husband of the celebrity was offended and hit the man who made the joke. Or maybe it was staged for entertainment. Who knows? Who cares? Social media is full of discussion — and even arguments — about this idiocy today. This baffles me. Let’s assume for a moment that the event happened as reported. People have been having such idiotic fights ever since there have been humans. Half the bars in the world see such brief dustups regularly. It simply doesn’t matter. The fact that so many people believe they need to talk about this — or even need to have opinions about it — is more evidence of the bizarre media brainwashing that convinces many to care passionately about brain-dead trivia. Your life will be happier and saner if you focus on yourself, your family and your friends, not on whatever scripted (or spontaneous) bilge that the media wants to pipe into your home.

I’m in the middle of migrating this website to new servers this week. This means you might encounter some unexpected behavior until I get all the bugs worked out. Clicking on my links (including this one) might cause your browser to give you the message that it’s a site without a current security certificate. It’s not actually unsafe, but there’s something which isn’t yet set up for the security certificate. I apologize for any such errors you might encounter while the process is going on. If you notice any problems with content which didn’t migrate properly, I would appreciate you letting me know the details at davidmcelroy@mac.com. Thanks for your patience.

I often wonder what animals think when they look at us and consider the society we’ve created. Yes, I know this is fanciful and unrealistic, but what if they could? Would they be astounded at how we treat each other? Would they be disgusted by the ugliness and pettiness which fill so many of our daily interactions? The truth is that I’m feeling pretty disgusted with humanity tonight. I made the mistake of reading some online interactions that I should have avoided — and it sickened me. The people involved appeared to be vile and stupid and arrogant. I wish I could pretend they’re a tiny minority, but I know better. It’s times such as this when I most need to escape much of “civilization” and disconnect from their world. If humans are going to be worthy of “ruling this planet,” we have a lot of growth to do. And I fear that growth is nowhere in sight. So my buddy Thomas, above, and all of his friends would be right to judge us harshly — and to think, “Why do you folks get to be in charge?”

I should have expected this, but I honestly didn’t. The article I wrote last week about disagreements over treatment for autistic children brought me angry emails. You could almost call it “hate mail.” Of the five emails about it so far, two have been to tell me that I’m wrong to even listen to critics of the most popular therapy for autistic children — and the other three tell me I’m wrong for not condemning the treatment as the “obvious” abuse it is. If you read the article, you know I didn’t take a position on the issue, because I simply don’t know enough to have an opinion. But by talking about the issue, I stepped into a heated controversy. The emails from the two sides convinced me of nothing. But they did give me even more empathy for the unfortunate parents who have to figure out for themselves where the truth lies for their children.

Have you ever had what you thought was a new idea — and then discovered that “old you” had the same idea years ago? I had that experience tonight. And it’s been wonderful. I came up with an idea tonight for a very short satirical film that would be a promotion for a fictitious college. The point is to make the college promote — as good things — everything which is actually terrible about most modern colleges. Then I remembered a fake college that I invented back when I was in college. I had created student recruitment brochures and various newsletters back then, so I decided to call my “new” college by the same name I’d invented years ago: Ochita College. As I searched my computer for any old material I might still have about Ochita from the past, I discovered an email I sent to someone in 2009 — outlining essentially the same idea which I came up with tonight. Since I didn’t remember writing that, it felt like magic. So my next film project just might be this one instead. If all goes well, you might soon see “Ochita College: Your Future Starts Here.” This should be fun.

Related Posts