The Lament of Larry

A recent email I sent to Andrew Sullivan about this post on his blog this morning:

Andrew,

I think your gradual sobriety about an Obama presidency is puzzling to me now that the primaries are over. In your response to Larry Hunter's "lament" about accepting a "little economic suffering today" from Obama rather than an "immoral suicide mission around the world" from McCain, you equate "higher taxes and a nod to redistributionism" with attacks on habeas corpus, a refusal to withdraw from Iraq and "some fiscal responsibility."

Excuse me, but in terms of higher taxes, what Obama wants to do at the very least is to let the Bush tax cuts expire without making them permanent. Those tax cuts did nothing, not one thing, to stimulate this moribund economy; if anything it probably acclerated the bursting of the real estate bubble by giving investors an excuse to pay insanely high prices for real estate. Obama also wants to cut middle-class taxes. Not a huge deal, since the lion's share of taxes are paid by the upper income earners (as it should be).

I don't see what, if anything, McCain proposes to do that is fiscally responsible, as we all know he has limited comfort with areas of domestic policy. If, however, his plan is to put into play the proposals of the lame duck, then I would say McCain has plans to be more irresponsible.

And finally, if conservatives truly wished to punish the Republican party for its betrayal of conservatism and contempt for the Constitution, one way to do that is to abandon the party to the Christianists, who seem unable to muster up the courage to hang up their own shingle. Conservatives should say: "Fine, you don't want to leave the Republican brand that you've so thoroughly trashed? OK, then we'll leave. Watch out for that Obama guy, though; he's got more moral fiber than you guys ever imagined you had."

Love the blog!