United States Senator Olympia Snowe is the last of a dying breed of moderate-liberal Republicans . Claiming to despise the "dysfunction and political polarization in the institution," Snowe believes that the upper Congressional house "is not living up to what the Founding Fathers envisioned."
In reality, her wavering stance on conservative issues was costing her prestige in the national caucus and in her home state, where a Tea Party stalwart made off with the governorship by a small margin out of a field of five major candidates. Snowe's cool camaraderie has done nothing to stop the surging of spending and self-defeating deficits which have dragged our country into the worst fiscal crises of its relatively short history. Though the departure of this semi-reliable vote in the Senate is problematic for the party, it is also emblematic of a nation which has repudiated the bipartisanship of pork-barrel spending, entitlement bankruptcy, and business-as-usual legislating which spends tax dollars without end.
Rather than cutting spending outright, Snowe and her immodest moderate ilk (i.e. former Senator Arlen Specter and Maine colleague Susan Collins) just nibbled off the top, like an obese diabetic ordering five hundred donuts for breakfast, but foregoing the sugar-free coke to save calories. When it came to Big Government, moderates like Snowe were immoderate, though not quite as spendthrift as the Democrats whom they joined. Snowe supported TARP, convinced that the rapid injection of capital was necessary to forestall another Great Depression, a hysterical notion which only perpetuated the Great Recession for four years, and at taxpayer’s expense. Her vote for the 2009 stimulus helped push this country further into the red without fostering job growth. These immoderate forays into the finance sector displayed crude political calculation, not caring for the welfare of the country.
The voluntary dismissal of immoderately "moderate" legislators like Snowe is not one a loss that the country should mourn. Centrists such as she were in fact mere opportunists looking for any way to broker individual power by moving a little to the right or to the left of the majority party, thus playing off of a crucial tie-breaker advantage.
In contrast, Congressman David Dreier of California is more a commendable legislature for his stance on fiscal issues, yet also blameworthy for his leadership role in wasteful legislation in Congress.
For those who stand by the GOP standards, whether candidates uphold the same or not, Congressman Dreier wielded considerable power in the House of Representatives. A self-described "little l" libertarian, outgoing Dreier ruled the Ways and Means Committee from 1999 until this term, with two-term demotion to ranking member following the GOP repudiation of 2006, resulting in large part from During the heady, spendthrift days of George W. Bush, burned-through surpluses and pork-laden transportation bills.
Despite the vain and vapid attempt of a recent editorial to lump Dreier and Snowe in the same category, Dreier is stepping down because he cannot compete effectively in the newly-drawn Southern California Congressional Districts, which have diluted the Republican majority which carried him for thirty years. Yet unlike his counterpart in the Senate, Dreier demonstrated a consistent attachment by vote and by rote to the GOP party platform, especially fiscal conservatism and solvency, a consistent characteristic conspicuously absent from Snowe's claim record of accomplishments. Dreier Supporting reforms for Social Security, yet unwilling to support the Federal Defense of Marriage Amendment, citing that family matters should be resolved by the states.
Olympia Snowe was a meandering moderate. Dreier demonstrated a lean and mean libertarian legacy, one which no one should despise. His candor and consistency in the House of Representatives will be missed, and his attention to fiscal conservatism above all else may signal the soul searching which many California GOP operatives must consider if they wish to remain viable in the Golden State, from the South Bay to the Bay Area.
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