Walter E. Williams Quotes
Elect me to office. I will protect and defend the U.S. Constitution. Because there's no constitutional authority for Congress spending on the objects of benevolence, don't expect for me to vote for prescription drugs for the elderly, handouts to farmers and food stamps for the poor. Instead, I'll fight these and other unconstitutional congressional expenditures”? I'll tell you how many votes he'll get: It will be Williams' vote, and that's it.
Williams, Walter E. "Political Pandering." Creators Syndicate, 2002.
There was a small conservative wing of the then Republican Party that was committed to rolling back the New Deal. In the early part of the 21st century this wing had grown in size and was very influential in the party. They tried, with President George W. Bush leading the effort, to privatize Social Security but most of the public was having none of it, and it didn’t get very far. It was a very good thing that it did not, as in the 2009 Economic Meltdown, the Stock Market value was cut in half.
Goldwater was the first Republican Presidential Candidate since the end of WWII who had campaigned for smaller government and reduced government spending. He actually started the modern Republican trend toward campaigning on this theme. Ronald Reagan did a much better job of campaigning on this theme, and all Republican Candidates since have campaigned on these two themes. It is not clear whether the Republicans were actually serious about this or just ran on the themes to please the political wing that Goldwater had started or meant it but were not good enough at running the government to fulfill this promise. Every Republican President from Reagan through George W. Bush increased the government spending and increased the number of government employees—more so than most Democrats ironically. Democratic President Bill Clinton was the only post WWII president to cut spending, produce a surplus and diminish the size of the government bureaucracy. Goldwater was so intellectually honest that had he won, he probably would have done everything he could to implement the policy of smaller government and less spending.
Walter Edward Williams was an American economist, commentator, and academic.
