Bidness Ties

The party of big business is no longer so, they have recast themselves as the party of small business, and admittedly, their policy proposals are much better for small businesses, but still economically ruinous as a whole. I'm talking, of course, about Republicans, the party of bidness in America, although bidness ain't so good for Republicans right now.

The inspiration for today's post comes from a New York Times article about Republicans and their business ties, ties that are fraying as Republicans prove that they aren't actually the party of business after all. In an attempt to gain support for his policies, the President has enlisted the leaders of "big business" to lobby Republicans for higher tax rates for the sake of deficit reduction and to avoid holding the nation's credit hostage again. It says a lot when the people whose tax rates you are trying to protect are lobbying you to raise them, but as I've mentioned time and time again, Republicans don't seem to care much for reality when they have ideology to fall back on.

Back in August of 2012, I blogged about Ted Cruz, or the next great conservative intellectual hope. This same Ted Cruz, who is anything but an intellectual, now seems to be leading the charge as Republicans to rebrand themselves as the party of small business. Certainly Republican priorities do more to help small businesses than big businesses. For example, perhaps a small business owner making $275,000 a year would reinvest in his business if his taxes were lower whereas it's ludicrous to imagine that lowering Bill Gates' tax rates will have any great economic effect. And small businesses are also less equipped to deal with regulations than big businesses which have huge legal and compliance departments. So perhaps Republicans are the party of small business, at least in their minds, although small businesses still rely on infrastructure and educated employees and Republicans have shown no interest in ensuring America has either of those things.

But regardless of whether Republicans see themselves as the party of big business, small business, or just business in general, their polices are not going to do anyone in the global business community any favors. Republicans may now eschew their former big business ties - although given their willingness to accept campaign contributions, I hardly think their public posturing is anything but that - but they still purport to be the party of job growth and fiscal responsibility. So then why are they refusing to heed the calls of business leaders who are begging them not to do anything to throw the economy back into turmoil like forcing a default or pushing immediate and ruinous spending cuts?

The answer is quite simple. For all of their bidness ties, Republicans understanding of the economy is actually fairly limited. They're right that low taxes are good, but we have long passed the tipping point of when low taxes help spur growth. The whole "You Built It" campaign rolled out by Republicans at their convention last fall further revealed their fragile understanding of how the economy works. Yes, an entrepreneur had an idea, took a risk by acting on it, and hopefully succeeded, but he or she did it using communally available resources and infrastructure paid for by everyone to help facilitate success that we hope will lead to better lives for all of us. Furthermore, the good ideas Republicans bring to the table - low taxes, sensible rather than copious regulation, smaller and more efficient government - have been hijacked and taken to the extreme by a new breed of Republicans who view themselves as the protectors of small business, but want to undermine the very infrastructure on which those small businesses rely.

As long as the inmates are still running the asylum, we're not going to make any progress. It's indicative of the state of the party that they are unwilling to listen to business leaders who are telling them that their policies are bad for business, bad for growth, bad for the economy, and bad for America. But this should not surprise us, Republicans have created an alternative reality and wrapped themselves in the cloak of ideology. Until they show themselves to be willing to accept facts we will have to rely solely on Democrats to govern, and alas, Democrats have proven that they are good by comparative measures, not by absolute ones.