I was born a Democrat, or may as well have been. My parents and grandparents are blue-collar Catholics, descended from Italian and Portuguese immigrant dairy farmers.
But the older I got, my blue-state beliefs tended to bounce between party lines: I landed somewhere in the middle. Still, over the last couple of weeks, I’ve really started to see it: Republicans are going certifiably crazy! Although the evidence for this is abundant — thanks, Glenn Beck — I’ll focus on a tiny piece of it here: the economy and market regulation.
Last week the GOP had its Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), where they bravely announced that their most important goals are defeating President Obama in 2012 (never mind that this isn’t actually a real political platform) and cutting the crap out of federal spending.
Also last week, I learned in an hour and 15 minutes in an intermediate macroeconomics class more than it seems all of Congress knows about how the economy works. If you cut spending during a recession, it will deepen the recession. This is due to the multiplier effect in the economy, which states that if the government spends $1 million, it will cause nationwide output to increase by more than $1 million. The effect happens because the economy has a circular flow; if you pay someone $10 for lunch, it becomes income for that person, and they spend it. In essence, money grows. Conversely, then, if you cut spending, there will be much more money lost in the economy. Cutting spending isn’t crazy in itself, but we should wait until the economy is stronger to do so.
Newt Gingrich also announced at CPAC that he wants to eliminate the Environmental Protection Agency. The EPA is the agency that makes sure that our drinking water is clean and farmers aren’t spraying our produce with DDT, among other things. This brings me to my next point: Even staunch free-market economists understand that sometimes the market fails, and we want the government to regulate the market to some extent. For example, the health department makes sure your favorite restaurant uses proper sanitation measures so you don’t get food poisoning, and the EPA makes sure manufacturing plants don’t fill the air with so much pollution we can’t breathe. Most economists now agree that unregulated markets led to, or at least worsened, the economic crisis of 2009.
The idea of a world with very small government and little regulation — which many “tea-party” Republicans want — would mean smog pumping into the skies, carcinogenic pesticides flowing into our water and the ocean and the economy in a free-fall with no Social Security or unemployment benefits. I don’t understand the appeal, but then again, I don’t have big corporations lobbying in my office on a daily basis.
Other cuts proposed by the GOP include more than a billion from WIC, which ensures nutritional aid for pregnant women and children, $1.2 billion from FEMA and $900 million from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Apparently to the GOP, malnourishment, starvation, natural disasters and contagious diseases are poor people problems that the government shouldn’t worry about.
The only thing that brings me some comfort in this terrifying time is that the Republican Party seems to be extremely divided and lacking leadership. The “tea-party movement” is way too extreme for most American voters, and when it comes time for the 2012 election, it’s unlikely moderates will vote for a “tea-party” candidate.
I used to believe the swing of the two parties kept the country in a sane place; that the tension between opposing sides will lead to some reasonable middle ground. It’s becoming increasingly difficult to believe, but I sure hope it’s true.
Alexandra Baird is a senior journalism major and the editor in chief of the Daily 49er.
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