Continental Drift
While at last night’s Boo Hoo Rambler’s show, my friend Beth said something about “The country getting more conservative” which I wonder about. She was grouping the politics and the society but the general thought can be either true or false. More Republican certainly, but by what measure is the country getting more conservative? I thought I’d make a list:
Top moves to the left
- Massive Federal Spending
- Wars for Democracy (this has been adopted by the Republicans, but the idea has been on the left for quite some time)
- Gay marriage on horizon
- Government involvement all aspects of the medical system
- Abortion available for minors without parental consent, paid for by the feds in some cases. This is something that has stayed the same, but it’s a huge red flag for a lot of the right.
- Central planning for education under the guise of No Child Left Behind.
- The income tax actually becoming more progressive under Bush
- Campaign Finance “Reform”
Top moves to the right
- A push for Social Security privatization
- A move to end the death tax
- Assault Weapons ban NOT being renewed
- Higher defense spending (Bush was proposing this before 9-11 so I’ll include it here)
- Over 55 speed limits remain in effect
- 3 rounds of tax cuts
I’m sure I’ve missed a lot but that is something of a gist. Certainly the Republicans have been doing much of the above (on both sides) but where is the country actually drifting? IMHO the Democrats have not been following an Evolutionary Stable Strategy for quite a while which allows the Republicans play both sides of the street.