The 2011 rebels are to the right of their 1995 antecedents in any case. That?s why this battle, ostensibly over the deficit, is so much larger than the sum of its line-item parts. The highest priority of America?s current political radicals is not to balance government budgets but to wage ideological warfare in Washington and state capitals alike. The relatively few dollars that would be saved by the proposed slashing of federal spending on Planned Parenthood and Head Start don?t dent the deficit; the cuts merely savage programs the right abhors. In Wisconsin, where state workers capitulated to Gov. Scott Walker?s demands for financial concessions, the radical Republicans? only remaining task is to destroy labor?s right to collective bargaining.
we need to pay attention...
