The Presidential Veto

I was driving to work this morning listening to President Bush defend his policies on the radio on everything from Iraq to his lack of the use of the veto. My ears perked up when he mentioned the criticism from many conservatives on the veto.

Mr. Bush gave as his excuse for never having vetoed a single spending bill passed on to him from congress the fact that under current law, the president does not have the ability to use a line item veto. He actually said that many times he agrees with the size of the pie, but he just does not agree with the slices. So he is basically saying that he only has disagreed with the types of pork barrel projects contained within past appropriations bills, not that total amounts of the bills. This proves from his own mouth that he cares nothing about limited government conservatism.

Of-course he espoused the usual rhetoric about his tax cuts, and the great things they have done so all of the uneducated Republicans in the audience will feel good about having voted for him. He failed to mention that with his out of control spending habits his tax cuts mean nonthing, because we will still have to pay for all of these new government ventures through inflation.

I'm thinking about buying the book Getting America Right by Edward J. Feulner and Doug Wilson, which measures the performance of Washington politicians based on true libertarian, conservative values.