The presidents conservative critics

Illustration by Bob AulDoug Bandow is a senior fellow at the Cato Institute and a former special assistant to President Ronald Reagan. The following is excerpted from his article "The Conservative Case Against George W. Bush," which ran in the Dec. 1, 2003, issue ofThe American Conservative.

This is the Republican Party that has embraced as its own every liberal initiative, from Lyndon Johnson's Medicare to Jimmy Carter's Department of Education to Bill Clinton's AmeriCorps. This is the Republican Party preparing to enact a Medicare drug benefit that would represent the largest expansion of the welfare state in 40 years. This is the Republican Party that is increasing federal education spending as if doing so had something to do with the quality of local schools. This is the Republican Party that is increasing spending faster than during the Clinton years. . . . [D]espite occasional exceptions, the Bush administration, backed by the Republican-controlled Congress, has been promoting larger government at almost every turn.