Bartlett fired from Conservative Research Group

[CatWoman]

gee, all this blood on the floor is getting really, really messy :D

In Sign of Conservative Split, a Commentator Is Dismissed


By RICHARD W. STEVENSON
Published: October 18, 2005

WASHINGTON, Oct. 17 - In the latest sign of the deepening split among conservatives over how far to go in challenging President Bush, Bruce Bartlett, a Republican commentator who has been increasingly critical of the White House, was dismissed on Monday as a senior fellow at the National Center for Policy Analysis, a conservative research group based in Dallas.

In a statement, the organization said the decision was made after Mr. Bartlett supplied its president, John C. Goodman, with the manuscript of his forthcoming book, "The Impostor: How George W. Bush Bankrupted America and Betrayed the Reagan Legacy."

Mr. Bartlett, who was a domestic policy aide at the White House in the Reagan administration and a deputy assistant Treasury secretary under the first President Bush, confirmed that he had been dismissed after 10 years with the center but declined to make any further comment.

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/10/18/politics/18bartlett.html?adxnnl=1&adxnnlx=1129648692-uI2wh0RjeNGpe492BzhrVw

[crispini]

1. Damn!

I'll buy THAT book!

[WatchWhatISay]

2. Probably cant comment per his employment contract

Those guys think of everything

[central scrutinizer]

3. Purges

more like the Stalin regime every day

[progressivebydesign]

4. We WILL NOT tolerate dissent!!!

Tough time to be a republican with a brain.

[SteppingRazor]

5. Soon, they will drown in the blood of the fallen...

Bwahahahaha!

[Seansky]

6. well, at least published books about a rep criticizing B won't be

dismissed so easily...This is actually good news, although rather late, wouldn't you think???

[Straight Shooter]

7. "The Impostor"?

Personally, I would prefer "The Great Pretender" :P

This Bruce Bartlett, is he related to Dan Bartlett?

[charlie]

8. Bartlett hasn't just gone off the reservation

He's joined the other side. This was inevitable. From his testimony before the Senate Democratic Policy Committee:

I used to believe that the Republican Party was the party of small government. That’s why I became a Republican. I don’t believe that the federal government has the right to one penny more than absolutely necessary to fulfill its essential functions as spelled out in the Constitution. I think government is over-intrusive and could do what it has to do far more efficiently and at lower cost, which means with lower taxes.

...

I remain convinced that given the total lack of fiscal responsibility demonstrated by the Republican Party that very large tax increases are inevitable. I believe that the fiscal hole is now so large that it is unrealistic to think that we can just tinker with the tax system, as we did so often in the 1980’s, and raise enough revenue to pay for spending commitments that have been made. And under the circumstances, I have no faith whatsoever that spending will be significantly restrained—at least not by my side. They would first have to admit error and beg for forgiveness from people like me, something I don’t expect to be forthcoming any time soon.

...and here's the money shot:

Therefore, like it or not, we must travel the same route taken by the Europeans, who long before us made peace with the welfare state and tried to figure out how to pay for it with the least negative impact on economic growth and incentives. They all imposed a broad-based consumption tax called the value-added tax as an add-on tax to all the others. I think it is only a matter of time before we are forced to do the same thing and the longer we wait the more painful it will be when it is finally done. Unfortunately, we are more than likely going to have to be forced into it by a financial crisis of some sort. It would be better to avoid that cost and deal with our fiscal situation rationally. But I see no leadership on either side that would allow that to happen.

...

It’s dirty work, but someone has to do it. Since my party won’t do it, yours is going to have to. If it’s done right, your party will gain at the expense of mine and you will deserve the benefits and my party will deserve the electorate’s disdain.

[Just Me]

9. WOWIE!!!

:wow: Sheesh. They fired him over a book? What kinda' think-tank is NCPA, anyway? I will definitely buy his book!!!

It's really quite amazing, if you think about it, how many Republicans have written Bush-bashing books!

[madrchsod]

10. "the night of the long knives"?

i guess the neocons figure all of reagan`s base is dead by now. i`ll have to start a vigil at his home here in dixon to see if his statue starts to weep...

[Mayberry Machiavelli]

11. You'd think they'd actually like having a token "against shrubbie" guy,

but no.

It is in Dallas, where shrubya is more of a religion than high school football.

[rocktivity]

12. Pass the popcorn

It looks like the Repub Implosion has begun, and it will make the Terri Schiavo Jesus Freak Show look like an amateur act!

:popcorn:
rocknation

[Supersedeas]

13. No room for critics

[question everything]

14. And his commentary in the Wash Times: An illusion ripped wide open

An illusion ripped wide open

By Bruce Bartlett
Published October 12, 2005

The White House appears to have been truly blindsided by the vehemently negative response from conservative intellectuals to Harriet Miers' nomination to the Supreme Court. This revolt has been long in the making. What is surprising is that took so long to come into the open.

The truth is now dawning on many movement conservatives that George W. Bush is not one of them and never has been. They were allies for a long time, to be sure, and conservatives used Mr. Bush just as he used them. But it now appears they are headed for divorce.

(snip)

• It is the rare conservative who has a kind word for President Bush's immigration policy. Most conservatives think he has been woefully weak on protecting our borders. Among the Republican grass roots, there is active hostility to administration plans to give illegal immigrants guest-worker status. Most see this as a form of amnesty that will further encourage illegal immigration.
• Even leaving aside national defense and homeland security, government spending has exploded during the Bush years. Although most attention has focused on the vast proliferation of pork barrel spending, which Mr. Bush steadfastly refuses to veto, far more worrisome has been entitlements expansion, especially the extraordinarily ill-conceived Medicare drug benefit. In future years, Republicans will rue the day they passed this legislation, because they eventually will have to cut it, thereby losing all the political benefits they thought they would get among the elderly.

(snip)

I could go on, but the point is that George W. Bush has never demonstrated any interest in shrinking the government. And on many occasions, he has increased government significantly. Yet if there is anything that defines conservatism in America, it is hostility to government expansion. The idea of big-government conservatism, often used to describe Mr. Bush's philosophy, is a contradiction in terms.

(snip)

The Miers nomination has led to some long overdue soul-searching among conservative intellectuals. For many, the hope of finally turning around the judiciary was worth putting up with all the big government stuff. Thus Mr. Bush's pick of a patently unqualified crony for a critical position on the Supreme Court was the final straw.
Had George W. Bush demonstrated more fealty to conservative principles over the last five years, he might have gotten a pass on Miss Miers. But coming on top of all the big government initiatives he has supported, few in the conservative movement are inclined to give him the benefit of the doubt any longer.

Bruce Bartlett is a nationally syndicated columnist.

http://washingtontimes.com/commentary/bbartlett.htm