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Amtrak and Liberalism.

The Volokh Conpiracy makes an interesting point on criticism from the left against President Bush's budget.

Essentially, the left has responded, on cue, to the President's budget, which cuts certain programs and freezes funding for others, by proclaiming Bush is out to get the poor, that he is "gutting" essential programs and so forth.

One program the President targeted was Amtrak, which caused much gnashing of teeth from liberals.

This, to David Bernstein, shows an

...inability to distinguish between government spending that actually serves liberalism's purported goals, and wasteful government boondoggles that receive reflexive support because they exist outside the market is an endemic problem that modern liberalism has yet to adequately address.

Good point. Some Republicans and conservatives sometimes do this, too, but liberals are all too eager to jump on any slowdown in entitlement growth as a "cut," and any actual cut as some kind of sinister and coldhearted act. Democrats have been complaining about deficits for the past couple of years, but when pressed on which programs they would trim from the budget, they divert attention to tax cuts (although tax relief often generates more government revenues).

Posted by Will Franklin · 28 March 2005 04:08 PM

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