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After attending a 2001 convention for alternative newsweeklies in Madison, Wis., John Saltas wrote a scathing editorial comparing the lack of decent civic amenities in Salt Lake City to Madison’s superb civic scene. Having lived in Madison for four years, I knew just what he was talking about. Madison, with its terrible winter weather, is nevertheless a far better place to live than anywhere in Utah.
Utah is governed by conservatives. Madison is governed by liberals, and liberals (and Democrats) always, everywhere, do a better job of running government that do conservatives and Republicans.
The superiority of liberals/Democrats in running government is not confined to cities. It holds across the board. Consider these events:
Conservative Republican-managed CIA: “Saddam has WMDs.” That was an incompetent lie. Liberal-Democrat managed CIA: “We know where Osama is.” Yes, they did.
For eight years, the top priority of the George W. Bush conservative Republican government was to get Osama, dead or alive. For eight years, conservatives and Republicans failed and failed again.
In a 2008 campaign speech, Obama said, “We will get Osama,” and despite continued obstructionism from conservatives and Republicans, he did. In two years.
History proves that the economy grows faster when liberal Democrats control the federal government than when conservative Republicans do.
Since Nixon, every Republican president has added massive debt to the nation’s balance sheet. G.W. Bush and his congressional conservative Republican toadies alone increased the debt by $3.5 trillion, about one quarter of all the national debt created since 1776. Reagan almost tripled the national debt. Bush I almost doubled the debt, and Bush II more than doubled the debt. The only president since Johnson to create a budget surplus was the Democrat Bill Clinton.
Now the two-faced conservative Republicans have turned their back on their history of profligate spending and want to reduce the debt by cutting taxes on the rich while killing Medicare and Social Security.
Clearly, only zillionaires or fools vote Republican, and Utah is not a ship of zillionaires.
Keith Baker
Heber City
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