THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Wednesday, November 1, 1995 TAG: 9511010041
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Larry Maddry
LENGTH: Medium: 73 lines
WHEN THE cold war ended and the Berlin Wall came crashing down, our intense hatred for the communists had to be re-directed.
Meetings were held until late in the night on Capitol Hill to find a genuine villain that the public could be taught to hate. Castro's name came up, and Jane Fonda, Beavis, Butthead and Louis Farrakhan.
But they seemed small potatoes.
And, although the astronomical national debt was the greatest threat to the country's stability, it was too complicated.
``We need something big, really big, to just scare the hell out of people,'' a senator said.
And it was then, although everyone present wanted to take credit for the idea, that someone said: ``What about big government? We'll blame big government for creating our huge national debt.''
It had a nice hypocritical ring to it, since Congress had created the big government that its members, Artful Dodgers all, now found to be a bogeyman.
Soon the out-of-control federal bureaucracy was made as sinister as a night monster in a Maurice Sendak book.
Big government, we were told, had too many regulations, sprawled all over the country, grew faster than kudzu, and was both inefficient and wasteful of public money. And a lot of what we were told was true.
But what we were not told was how all those federal buildings filled with bureaucrats came about. Voters had demanded that the national government address problems ranging from health to school lunches to social security because state governments were too negligent, indifferent, inefficient, poor or corrupt to do the job.
No matter. Congress put on a butcher's apron, laid the carcass of big government on the block and began carving on departments, bureaus, programs and entitlements. And when they had finished, it wasn't big government anymore.
``Uh-oh,'' a congressional leader said. ``We just destroyed the national bogeyman. When people realize they depended on big government for a lot of goodies they enjoyed, they are going to blame us.''
``No sweat,'' the speaker of the House said. ``We'll tell them we are not in the programs and entitlements business any more. ``We'll just wrap those programs and entitlements up with a bow and send them to the states. We'll give the states less money to fund them than before, natch. But that will be the states' problems. Not ours.'' He smiled at his cleverness.
The congressionals gave the speaker a standing ovation, praising him for knowing more than anybody and having better hair than Don King or Dennis Rodman.
Then a voice from the rear asked how Congress could abdicate its responsibility for the poor, the sick and the elderly. ``No problem, amigo,'' the speaker replied. ``We will tell them the states are better able to deal with those problems and will find creative solutions for them while keeping a watchful eye on public money.''
Governors like Gov. David Beasley of South Carolina, perhaps? Consider this report from the Associated Press:
COLUMBIA, S.C. - Gov. David Beasley cost taxpayers at least $60,000 through his use of South Carolina's airplanes and helicopter during his first nine months in office, records show.
State flight records show Beasley made at least 69 trips on the state's Lear jet, King Air turboprop and helicopter since taking office in January.
The flights included trips to state football games, flying his family to Hilton Head Island for a golf tournament and a 30-mile helicopter trip from Columbia to Camden to attend a town meeting. . . . Beasley's other trips include flying to Washington to address the Christian Coalition and to Virginia to appear on Pat Robertson's television show ``The 700 Club.''
Hey, is that guv a chip off the old cutting block or whut? by CNB