The federal government isn’t simply bleeding money. Because of its addiction to red ink, it’s bleeding power, which is starting to flow away from the nation’s capital and out to the states. This is the little-recognized reality behind the remarkable political upheaval being seen in state capitals.
Republican governors such as Wisconsin’s Scott Walker, New Jersey’s Chris Christie and Indiana’s Mitch Daniels are pursuing their own controversial fiscal policies out of what they consider financial necessity; they have budgets to balance, and little time and few options to do the job. But governors of both parties also have less reason to wait and hope for help from a federal government that, with overwhelming budget deficits, is losing its ability to offer financial goodies to the states.
For decades, the implicit deal between Washington and state capitals has been that the feds would offer chunks of cash, and in return would get commensurate influence over the states’ social policies. Now that flow of federal goodies has begun what figures to be a long-term decline, as the money Washington has available to pass around to the states is squeezed. Already the funds the federal government offered states as part of the 2009 economic stimulus package have nearly run out, and the budget-cutting that has begun in Washington is curtailing the other money available to dole out.
A loss of federal largess means a loss of influence in state capitals—particularly if states succeed in winning more autonomy in running the Medicaid health program for the poor, one area where money from Washington continues to grow.
It was telling that when the nation’s governors gathered in Washington for their annual meeting last weekend, state chief executives from both parties were asking for more freedom from Washington’s rules in order to shape education and Medicaid programs, which are funded jointly by states and the federal government. More than half have asked for an exemption from federal Medicaid rules.
“South Carolina is not going to wait on D.C. anymore,” says the state’s new governor, Republican Nikki Haley. “We’re going to strike out on our own.”
Indeed, polling suggests that the federal government is slipping in its standing with voters, who express declining confidence that Washington’s politicians can come together to solve problems. Citizens show more confidence in state governments.
— if I may interject, this is all well and good. The problem, however, is that we’re dealing with actual leftists — not simply liberal Democrats — and so they won’t accept no as an answer, and they certainly won’t accept a walkback of their power without a (dirty) fight. Already, Obama is using bureaucratic agencies and the courts strategically to implement policies he can’t get passed into law. Cap and trade is being implemented through the EPA and “activist” court challenges by environmentalists (who have special standing to file suits on “our” behalf). And his latest move — to grant states the “flexibility” to implement their own health care reform (provided it meets all the criteria of ObamaCare, and so will be ObamaCare, under different names) — may be part of longterm strategy to move the country to a single payer system: if Vermont and a couple of other deep blue states, eg., adopt a single payer system, the next step will be for activists to bring suit against states that don’t provide “free comprehensive” care, in an attempt to get the courts to rule that all states must offer comprehensive care for “free.”
And post Civil War — where the threat of secession was taken from the states — the states haven’t much bargaining power left.
So the problem is a structural one.
If you’ll pardon the digression.
[…] there seems little doubt that the outburst of freelancing by governors is both reflecting and furthering a shift in the balance of power. Standing at the governors’ meeting in Washington over the weekend, Mr. Luntz mused: “The battle right now in New Jersey and Wisconsin has a greater potential to affect the future of the country than anything happening here.”
It’s a start, certainly . But it’s largely window dressing.
What is needed is the defunding and dissolution of the regulatory agencies that have worked in compliance with the Courts and the Executive to cripple the power of the states to resist the federal Leviathon.
I don’t think this captures what the voters are expressing. Declining confidence that Washington’s politicians can come together to solve problems?
Nooo, voters are deciding politicians coming together to solve problems is the problem. Especially when they always come up with the same solution to every problem. Tighter control and more money. Lots and lots of money.
Politicians as a species tend to have trouble finding their asses with both hands, a map, a compass, a flashlight, GPS and a troop of Boy Scouts to guide them.
Solve problems? It depends on what the meaning of “is” is.
“No man’s life, liberty or property is safe while Congress is in session.”
And maybe we are walking back toward where the Republic was supposed to be… a Federal Government to provide a common defense, run the Patent Office, deliver the mail and stay the bleep out of the way of the States.
Because of its addiction to red ink, it’s bleeding power, which is starting to flow away from the nation’s capital and out to the states.
This is only part of the problem; the feds are finding a dwindling supply of arrows in their quiver. The other part of the problem is that ObamaCo is such a feckless, brainless, spineless group of losers that they can’t get the governors to play along any more than they can your average third-world despot. Obama is the weak horse, and that lack of respect hurts him every bit as much as the gravy train drying up.
The problem, however, is that we’re dealing with actual leftists — not simply liberal Democrats — and so they won’t accept no as an answer, and they certainly won’t accept a walkback of their power without a (dirty) fight. Already, Obama is using bureaucratic agencies and the courts strategically to implement policies he can’t get passed into law.
Tough shit. I really don’t think it’s going to be long before the states look at mandates from Congress, EPA, HHS, DHS, or OMGWTFBBQ, and say, “You can’t make me.” We’ve already seen governors tell the feds to keep their toy train money, because they don’t want to be saddled with the construction overruns and the perpetual operating deficits. Why couldn’t they do the same thing when it comes to all the other partially-funded mandates we get saddled with? What’s to stop Gov Parnell from saying, “We’re drilling in the Alaska wilderness, and we don’t care what Interior has to say about it.”
Trying to force something like socialized medicine on the Midwest through the courts is going to take time, and for as much as we complain that time is running out before the whole house of cards comes crashing down, in this case it means that these jokers will be learning subsistence farming long before they get their day in court. Never mind the fact that the hospitals will be burnt-out husks, and medical care will consist primarily of field medicine/first aid.
Leftism is running headlong into something called basic arithmetic, and if there’s anything I’ve learned from my years in school, it’s that Math Always Wins.
Leftism is running headlong into something called basic arithmetic, and if there’s anything I’ve learned from my years in school, it’s that Math Always Wins.
The gods of the copybook headings with terror and slaughter return.