Rick Perry may be right and America may once again choose conservatism" as long as it is presented by the proper candidate. It may also be true that Barack Obama has more fundamentally altered the fabric of America than anybody cares to admit.
The popular media narrative is that this country has shifted away from conservative ideals as evidenced by the last two presidential elections. Thats what they think. That might be true if Republicans had actually nominated conservative candidates in 2008 and 2012."
Governor Rick Perry (R-Texas) drew applause with that line as he spoke at last weeks Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC") in Maryland. And if theres any sure-fire way to draw applause from a conservative audience in 2013 taking a swipe at both the media and the Republican Party is probably a good strategy.
Yet if there is somehow a false narrative in the media" about America abandoning conservative ideals it may also be true that the notion of America adhering to some set of conservative ideals is perhaps a bit of a false narrative as well. Implicit in Perrys message is the assumption that if only a truly conservative" presidential candidate had appeared at the top of the ballot in the 2012 presidential election then the outcome of the election would have been quite different and our nations public policy would therefore look very different. And there is no doubt some grain of truth to his claim neither fiscal conservatives nor social conservatives had any particular affinity for Mitt Romney and this was probably part of what led to the lackluster voter turnout.
Yet evidence suggests that even in heavily Republican regions of the country very left-leaning socialistic Obama-styled public policy ideas are nonetheless thriving. Voters in these regions may give lots of lip service to things like the sanctity of life and traditional marriage but the ideals of limited government and fiscal conservatism seem to have been abandoned in favor of President Obamas explosive growth of social welfare programs. This would seem to refute Governor Perrys assumptions about our country and it should be alarming to all Americans.
Consider for example the predominantly Republican state of Arkansas (a state that Romney won in 2012). The states Governor Mike Beebe and U.S. Senator Mark Pryor are both Democrats. But Lieutenant Governor Mark Darr U.S. Senator John Boozman all four of the states U.S. House members and the majorities in both the state House of Representatives and State Senate all belong in the Republican category.
Yet despite all the Rs" that abound in the state Arkansas has nonetheless gone full-tilt with the implementation of Obamacare. This is to say that the state has implemented a government-run health insurance exchange (26 states in the country have thus far refused to do this) and they have also voluntarily chosen to lower eligibility standards for Medicaid and thus to expand the number of Medicaid recipients.
Jay Bradford Commissioner of the Arkansas Department of insurance openly admits that the implementation of the insurance exchange will actually raise the price of insurance that cash-paying consumers have to face but notes that the federal government is currently offering so much money in subsidies so insurance companies can offer either free or reduced-rate coverage (to those who qualify) that the opportunity was too good to pass-up. One can imagine that the decision to expand Medicaid in Arkansas was also based on another one of the Presidents too good to pass up" offers in as much as the Obama Administration is currently offering to pay 100 of a states Medicaid expansion costs (the offer expires at the end of this year).
In case that isnt sufficiently eye-opening consider Idaho (yet another state that Mr. Romney won last year). Every one of Idahos statewide elective offices including the office of Governor Lieutenant Governor Attorney General Superintendent of Education Controller Treasurer and Secretary of State is occupied by a Republican. The states two U.S. Senators and its two U.S. House of Representatives members are all Republicans. And the Republican Party holds super-majorities in both the state House of Representatives and the state Senate.
Yet despite Idaho being an extremely red" state a majority of Republicans in the state House and Senate have nonetheless sided with the minority of Democrats in the legislature and have voted to implement an Obamacare insurance exchange in the state (Republican Governor C.L. Butch" Otter has been pushing his party to do this since last December). Estimates are that despite the states tiny population of less than 1.8 million insurance companies that operate in the state will take in upwards of $200 - $300 million in federal subsidies once the insurance exchange is put in place.
Both Arkansas and Idaho have historically qualified as pro life" states. Socially conservative Protestantism reigns supreme in Arkansas while both Mormonism and Protestant Evangelicalism are predominate among the Idaho electorate. And three weeks ago Arkansas adopted the toughest statewide abortion restriction in the country. Yet these two states have both embraced Obamacare despite the fact that the Obamacare insurance exchanges promise to provide funding for abortion-inducing drugs and likely for the procedure of mechanical abortion" itself.
The point of all this is obvious: in regions of the country where voters still profess to be conservative" pro life" and Republican" they are nonetheless empowering state and local leaders who are bringing about very liberal socialistic public policy and who are expanding government dependency. Ideas about competitive private enterprise private sector charity and personal self-sufficiency are giving way to the promises of government welfare even as the rhetoric of traditional marriage" and the sanctity of life" remains intact.
Rick Perry may be right and America may once again choose conservatism" as long as it is presented by the proper candidate.
It may also be true that Barack Obama has more fundamentally altered the fabric of America than anybody cares to admit.