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THE CHOICE |
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Written by Gov. Rick Perry
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Wednesday, 11 January 2012 |
This election -- including the Republican primary contest -- is about a
fundamental question in American politics: We have an opportunity to decisively
turn away from big government in Washington. Do we want to take it?
Conservatives across the country are fed up with President Obama's
Washington approach to governance. Massive, budget-busting, deficit spending
(except on defense, where he proposes cuts that are downright dangerous).
Bailouts. An ever-mounting national debt.
A federal government that has reached its tentacles further into Americans'
lives, by virtue of Obamacare with its noxious individual mandate to purchase
health insurance. Excessive, bureaucratically dictated, job-killing
environmental regulation. Dodd-Frank.
The actions of the National Labor Relations Board, the Federal
Communications Commission, and countless other agencies. A President who has
engaged in offensive recess appointments to pay back his political allies ahead
of a race he could well lose. And so on.
Almost universally, Republicans hold in contempt the real-life "ends" of the
Obama administration's policies, though admittedly there are those
self-described conservatives who have favored (and even authored)
Obamacare-like approaches to health care and policies like cap-and-trade. To
us, those ends look decidedly liberal and reminiscent of European social
democracies, and out of step with our vision for America.
Yet some conservatives, while rejecting the "ends" have not yet fully
rejected the means, despite the fact that many Americans-and not just
conservatives or libertarians- have reached the conclusion that the federal
government has just become too big and has its fingers in too many pies, with
the predictable negative real-world consequences for the rest of us.
These "big government conservatives" argue that a big intrusive government
is fine, desirable even, so long as it pursues "conservative" goals, which
frequently when scrutinized are neither conservative nor worthy.
Earmarks are okay, as long as they are directed by "conservatives."
Expansions of government like Medicare Part D and No Child Left Behind were
acceptable because they represented "Republican" policy. Congress spending all
its time in Washington, DC, and legislating madly is fine, so long as the
congressmen are Republicans and they are pursuing something that the
Washington, DC, establishment has deemed "conservative."
It's okay to have a government so big, so unaccountable and playing with so
much money that serving Members of Congress can get rich while on the job, and
once off the job, they can get even richer by becoming high-powered corporate
consultants before skipping over to K Street itself, to try to grow government
and spend even more of your money.
To paraphrase Ronald Reagan, we have reached a critical juncture at which
government is not the solution to our problems; government is the problem.
Big government conservatives will never truly overhaul Washington because
they need the status quo in place to accomplish their objectives. They don't
want to rebuild the machine; they simply want to change the people pulling the
levers.
But that is not what the American people want. There is such deep and
widespread discontent that nothing short of a complete overhaul will satisfy
their justifiable demands.
The American people expect changes equal to their concern, which is the
highest it's been in at least a generation, and I am the only candidate with a
vision that is as strong and sweeping as the public is angry.
While others promise to tinker with the status quo, I am the outsider who
will overhaul Washington. Others talk about trimming the bureaucracy; I will eliminate the Departments of
Commerce, Energy and Education, gut the activist EPA, freeze bureaucrat
salaries and make Congress part-time.
Others talk about cleaning up the tax code; I say let Americans throw the whole thing out and pay a simple flat
tax instead. Others talk about creating jobs; I alone have worked with the private sector to create more than 1
million jobs while the rest of the country lost 2 million jobs.
This is what the 2012 election is about with the Republican primary process
ongoing, and it is what the 2012 general election should be about, too.
Do we want to stick with a big government approach that may, if
self-described "conservatives" are in power, deliver up conservative ends, even
though that same big government will be used by liberals to advance
progressivism the second they get their hands on the reins of power?
Or do we want to try something different-making Washington, DC, as
inconsequential as possible in our lives and scaling back the federal
government to focus on legitimate national priorities like defense and border
security, and leaving other matters like education, for example, to the states
and localities?
This is the choice that I believe faces us, as more primaries approach and
as Republicans select a nominee. Our answer to the question will determine the
outcome of the nomination battle, and it will also determine whether this
choice is ultimately presented to the American people in November.
I, for one, hope it will be. America cannot abide another four years of big,
intrusive government, no matter its philosophical goals. It's time for a
change. That entails Americans getting a choice.
Rick Perry
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