During his State of the Union address Wednesday, President Barack Obama asked Congress to pass pay-as-you-go legislation, which would require all government expenditures to be balanced by either tax increases or budget cuts, as opposed to using borrowed funds.
A “paygo” rule was in place during the Clinton administration and contributed to America’s first budget surplus in decades, but was allowed to expire in 2002.
Reinstating paygo would be an important first step to reigning in out-of-control spending and reducing the deficit.
Given the Republican Party’s continued railing against fiscal recklessness, this should have been a measure they supported.
However, in a vote on paygo requirements the day after the president’s speech, Republicans dropped all pretenses of fiscal responsibility and universally opposed the measure, which passed on a 60-40 party-line vote.
Dana Milbank wrote in his Washington Post column, Friday, that before a vote to increase the statutory debt limit Thursday, Republican Sen. Judd Gregg, a ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, rose in opposition, saying, “It is not responsible to raise the debt ceiling in this manner if you’re not going to put in place any responsible activity to bring under control the rising debt.”
That’s right; the Republican Party’s most senior member on the Budget Committee spoke out against raising the debt limit without taking measures to reign in the debt mere hours after his party voted unanimously against doing just that.
This is yet another in a long line of events demonstrating that the Republicans have abandoned any sense of responsibility to act as a loyal opposition in favor of blatant obstructionism.
They feel that it’s more important to prevent the Democrats from accomplishing anything (failures they can then use to their advantage in campaigns) than it is to work with the Democrats constructively to help the American people.
It is understandable that members of an opposition party would not agree with everything the majority party desires, but there used to be a time where the majority and minority parties would come together with good intentions and work out compromises to benefit the American people.
Though Republicans still claim to be willing to work with Democrats, their actions show otherwise as the latest vote on paygo.
Similar obstructionism is evident on every issue Congress has faced in the last year and Senate Republicans are threatening filibusters on everything.
A loyal opposition is vital to the functioning of any democracy. It is needed to keep the ambitions of the majority party in check and to make sure the interests of all Americans are represented in legislation.
The minority party has a duty to work with the majority constructively to solve the many issues our nation faces.
Republicans have abandoned this duty; they’ve demonstrated that they are unfit to hold office, period.
Their obstructionism threatens the needed influence of conservative ideas in our political discourse and they are effectively destroying conservatism. It is time for them to go.
We need a new conservative party with ideas about how to address the problems our country faces today that is willing to work with others for the benefit of the American people.
David Brooks is a communication senior and may be reached at [email protected]
