He DOES Have a Point...

I enjoy reading E.J. Dionne from time to time, and my liberal friends never tire of sending me links to his columns. The man, rarely insightful but always ideological, makes at least one good point today whilst whistling past the graveyard. To wit:

Supply-siders asserted that cutting taxes on the wealthy -- and especially on savings and investment -- would help everyone, including the poor, by promoting economic growth. Tax cuts would produce so much growth that they would pay for themselves. Since government programs were flawed, private investment was always more productive than government spending. And deficits, if they did come, need not worry us very much.

and

As a result, the Republican Party is fracturing before our eyes. Moderate Republicans know these cuts in programs for the poor are unsustainable. Very conservative Republicans want to cut spending far more than the rest of the party (or its voters) will allow. Republican leaders tilt this way and that, juggling this tax cut with that spending cut. In the process, they alienate just about everybody. The old faith is dying.

Well, E.J., the tax cuts are working. The economy is incredibly healthy, booming even. And Republicans, at least some of us, are irritated at the rate government spending is growing under Mr. Bush.

Like Mark Twain, however, the reports of our death are greatly exaggerated. Keep whistling, Buddy.