Reply #12: Take them at their word [View All]

[TayTay]

The Repugs do not believe that government should be funding higher education. The extreme conservatives who won leadership roles in the last election have publicly stated that they do not believe that this is a proper function of government. This is a fundamental difference between the extreme brand of conservatism that is ensconsed in Congress today and liberal philosophy of the prior 50 years (or so.)

These folks mean what they say. Grover Norquist famously said that he wanted to reduce government to the size where he could drown it in the bathtub. What part of that is coded or difficult to understand? Drowning government means drowning out every part of what could be called 'the welfare state.' To these folks, this is a part of the evil welfare state and needs to go away. They have systematically begun to dismantle everything they do not believe in and have publicly stated that they will not stop until government works only for absolute necessities and does nothing to impede business.

At what point do we begin to take them at their word? The only way to frame a proper response is to know what you are fighting in the first place. They don't believe in this, they don't believe in helping out people who are in the bottom half of the economy, they don't believe in social programs. At all. Ever. That is what we are up against. Again, take them at their stated word.