The ‘Starve the Beast’ theory

I was talking with my friend Brad yesterday, while waiting to go to the airport in Durango. He told me about something called the ‘Starve the Beast’ theory being applied by the Republican party, when it comes to their tax-and-spend implementation — a practice which is oddly opposed to everything their party is supposed to represent.

The idea is this: Government, and in particular Social Security, is a beast that they want to go away. Nobody in their right mind would make killing Social Security part of their campaign platform, so if you want to kill Social Security, the only way to do it is to ‘Starve the Beast’.

You lower taxes. You increase spending. (Wars are a very good way to do the latter.) You blow the budget. You let the economy falter. Eventually it becomes painfully obvious that you have to kill large government programs like Social Security.

Now I’m not in a position to say that this is what Bush was planning on doing, but so far it fits very well with what’s actually been done. I’ll leave it up to you to decide what you think. Just please vote this November.

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