PLEDGE > More Praise for Pledge

 

More Praise for the GOP Pledge to America
 
With Americans looking for leadership and solutions to the nation’s foremost challenges, House Republicans last week offered a Pledge to America.  This new governing agenda is focused on the top priorities of the American people – creating jobs, reducing spending, and changing Washington.  From coast to coast, editorials and commentators continue to praise the agenda’s focus and solutions rooted in principles of smaller, more accountable government.
 
New York Post Editorial
 
Taking the pledge
 
After two years of battling a trillion-dollarspending spree and a radical over haul of the American health-care system, Republicans yesterday offered an alternative: "A Pledge to America."
 
It's a simple document, reminiscent of the GOP's 1994 Contract With America -- but it's more than that, too.  While the Pledge discusses many issues, its basic prescription is economic.
 
To wit:
  •  To restore certainty to the private sector and generate jobs, the GOP promises to extend all Bush tax cuts, make them permanent and oppose any other tax hikes.

  • Republicans pledge to cut government spending to 2008 levels -- pre-bailouts and pre-stimulus. They'd also cap discretionary spending and cut Congress' budget to boot.

  •  Full implementation of ObamaCare means bigger government and higher taxes. While pledging to repeal the law -- or block funding of its elements -- where possible, Republicans will also pursue alternatives to reduce health-care costs while expanding availability. That includes medical-malpractice reform, letting Americans buy health insurance across state lines and expanded health savings accounts.
 
Overly simplistic? Perhaps.  But its clarity resonates…
 
 
Debra Saunders (San Francisco Chronicle)
 
GOP pledge beats Democrats' delays
 
The House Republicans' "Pledge to America" calls for an extension of the Bush tax cuts for all; a rollback of government spending to pre-stimulus, pre-bailout levels; "strict budget caps"; an end to the Troubled Asset Relief Program and the rest of the Obama stimulus package. What's not to like?
 
Having been asked what they would do differently if they ran the House, the Republicans came up with an answer.
 
Meanwhile, the Democrats run the House, but they are not acting as if they are in charge. They haven't passed a budget. They're putting off a vote to extend all or some of the Bush tax cuts until after the Nov. 2 election. They're acting like lame ducks before they become lame ducks.
 
They can't seem to get much of anything done, except deflect attention from their fecklessness to gaps in the GOP pledge...
 
 
Michael Barone (Washington Examiner)
 
Pledge Is Good Policy And Strategy
 
The interesting thing is that this year’s Pledge to America concentrates more on substantive issues of governance than the Contract with America did 16 years ago.

Yes, the Pledge does include some procedural reforms (any House member can get a vote on an amendment cutting spending), as did the Contract (cutting the number of committees and committee staff).

But the Pledge to America also addresses two central economic issues and makes commitments that will embarrass House Republicans if they gain a majority but fail to deliver.

One is to roll back non-defense discretionary spending to 2008 levels. The other is to repeal — not revise or amend or embroider, but repeal — the health-care bill signed by President Barack Obama exactly six months before the shirt-sleeved House Republicans made their pledge.

The rollback to 2008 strikes me as good policy and politics — or, at least, good conservative policy and good Republican politics…
 
 
Cal Thomas (Syndicated Columnist)
 
The Republican Philosophy
 
All public policy is founded on an underlying philosophy about humanity and the world. Some call it a "worldview," but whatever it is called, everything government does (or does not do) derives from a philosophical foundation on which it is constructed.
 
While the usual suspects have criticized the Republican's "A Pledge to America" document, I find it a refreshing reminder of the founding philosophy that "brought forth on this continent a new nation," in Lincoln's words, 234 years ago…
 
 
Phyllis Schlafly
 
Republicans Pledge to Change Our Direction
 
Republicans in Congress issued "A Pledge to America" setting forth their goals. The principal thrust is to reassure Americans that Republicans will, indeed, offer "a clear and clearly different approach" to Barack Obama's policies.
 
The Pledge properly recognizes that "joblessness is the single most important challenge facing America today" and that, therefore, it's time to end the "liberal Keynesian experiment" -- i.e., trying to spend our way to prosperity. We've been waiting for smart politicians to make a forthright denunciation of Keynesianism ever since it was originally inflicted on Americans by Franklin D. Roosevelt and then given political credence by Richard Nixon's famous comment (proving he was not a conservative), "We are all Keynesians now."
 
Republicans solemnly promise not to allow any tax increases. Unless the Reid-Pelosi Democrats come to their senses, they will allow a $3.8 trillion tax hike to take effect the first of the year…