They Shoulda Used The Kitchen Sink, Too

Last night the unions threw everything they had but the kitchen sink at Walker.

And lost.

Big.

The delicious, stupendous, awesome, outrageous, we-are-dancing-on-their-graves kind of lost. Yes...that kind of lost. We're talking BIG.

They lost because they are wrong. Their policies are wrong. The ideas that create those policies are wrong. And we are finally reaching the point in America where everyone can see it. For years we had so much that we really could (and DID) have our cake and eat it, too. Now we are rapidly running out of cake. Some of us are saying, "Hey, look...the cake is almost gone. We should stop stuffing our faces like pigs and figure out what to do."

Others are still stuffing their faces and petulantly demanding that someone just make another cake. Someone ELSE, of course. They are busy eating.

For most of the post-World War II era, Cost argues, our debates over taxing and spending have taken place in an atmosphere of surplus. The operative question has been how best to divide a growing pie, which has enabled politicians in both parties to practice a kind of ideologically-flexible profligacy. Republicans from Dwight Eisenhower to George W. Bush have increased spending, Democrats from John F. Kennedy to Bill Clinton have found ways to cut taxes, and the great American growth machine has largely kept the toughest choices off the table.

It's as if this country has just gone through an extended, fairy-tale childhood and adolescence, lasting from the end of WWII to the turn of this century, and now it's time to grow up. The reality of adulthood is pressing in.

But not anymore. Between our slowing growth and our unsustainable spending commitments, “the days when lawmakers could give to some Americans without shortchanging others are over; the politics of deciding who loses what, and when and how, is upon us.” In this era, debates will be increasingly zero-sum, bipartisan compromise will be increasingly difficult, and “the rules and norms of our politics that several generations have taken for granted” will fade away into irrelevance.

The conversation is turning from those who benefit to those who lose. We've reached the point where we all must say, "Who's going to pay for this?"

But the unions and Democrats are screaming, "We don't care! Just get more money because we'd better not run out of cake!"

The assurance we've heard for decades from Democrats that their vision was solely one of benevolence and altruism to "spread the wealth around" is finally being exposed for its naked opportunism. When you reach the inevitable point in all socialist schemes where, as Maggie Thatcher said, "You run out of other people's money," you see socialism for what it is. A political power game to steal another person's wealth for one's own benefit.

It's pretty simple really. And it is always ugly. Let's just hope the ugliness stays within the bounds of the political process as we struggle through the next few years. Despite the assertions of the author of the article, the Scott Walker recall attempt with its EPIC FAIL is a bellwether in American politics. It clearly showed that the silent majority in this country is awake and ready for the fight.

I know I am.  In fact, I'm feeling really good about life this morning.

I like Scott Walker!