'Twas The Week Before Christmas

From AEI:

ARTICLES & COMMENTARY 'Twas the Week before Christmas By Karlyn Bowman, Christopher DeMuth

AEI Press

Friday, December 17, 2010

(with apologies to Clement Clarke Moore)











'Twas the week before Christmas on Capitol Hill

Where exhausted lame ducks had to pass a tax bill

While Pelosi in kerchief and Harry in cap

Put the spurs to the solons for a last liberal lap.

But their chances were slim--it was time to concede

That the writ had run out on their mandate to lead.

The one-hundred-eleventh had been most productive

Of pages of laws--but had that been constructive?

As the Dems in November had had a shellacking,

Now the GOP stalwarts were grinning and cracking

That the New Year would bring a big change in direction--

So why compromise now, pending full resurrection?



Then out on the lawn there arose such a clatter

That they sprang from their desks to see what was the matter.

Away to the window they flew like a flash

Tore open the shutters--'twas a Tea Party bash!

Boehner and Cantor and Ryan they came

The new coursers were dashing and not at all lame,

And they came bearing Christmas lists straight from the voters:

No more credit from China! Sell “Government Motors”!

No more Christmas tree spending! Fill stockings with coal!

Tell the Federal Reserve to remove that punch bowl!

On health care they vowed to repeal and replace;

NPR to defund; the free market embrace.



Yet the new guys weren’t Grinchs or Scrooges at all,

Merely true to the voters’ intent in the fall.

The Teas aren’t party poopers--they just want a feast

Of their own, not compelled by the tax-and-spend beast.

They want sugar plums cooked with a private finesse,

Doubt that jobs are created by public largesse.

They are generous and caring, just like old St. Nick,

But think Uncle Sam’s bailouts a profligate trick.

And their best gift’s deferred: though we’ve now hit the skids

We must not leave a mountain of debt to our kids.

All right think tanks agree: there the learned profess

Opportunity, freedom, and well-earned success!



The new Speaker seems sober and keenly alive

To the lessons he learned back in Newt’s ninety-five.

Although Tea Party-true he’ll eschew Revolution.

Be Accountable Now! is his fiery locution.

 

Yet as dry leaves before the wild hurricane fly

Resolutions of New Years oft scatter and die.

Sacred cows are stout beasts--have they all really vanished?

Will those earmarks and pork-barrels really be banished?

Will the voters, presented with fiscal restraint,

Say the Spirit of Ten was not real, just a feint?



Now add two complications to heighten the drama.

To begin: the enigma of Barack Obama.

He’s a man of great energy, skill, and resource

And the one, in a crisis, who’s still on the horse.

He has had a bad year and seems sullen and fraught:

Guantanamo’s open, Afghanistan’s hot,

Cap-and-trade was defeated, the economy’s slow,

There are those on the left saying he’s got to go.

Yet our Presidents do have a way of rebounding,

And this basketball buff could recover his grounding.

A break to the center risks primary fights

But could win independents and reclaim the heights.



Furthermore, some new crisis is sure to arise,

To confound all our planning, no matter how wise.

In Iran, mullahs soon will wield missiles with nukes.

North Korea is run by committable kooks.

Euroland is in turmoil re: how much to lend--

What can’t go on forever is certain to end.

Today’s world is too dangerous, the tremors too scary

To place all of our faith in TV’s thrust-and-parry

Or to think that election results specify

What a government does when disaster is nigh.



But perhaps, just perhaps, we’ll resolve foreign trouble

While we dig ourselves out from our deficit rubble.

Maybe 'Bama and Boehner will smoke peace pipes instead

Of those foul-smelling weeds they can’t kick (so 'tis said).

Maybe statesmanship yet will emerge from our schism--

Thus renewing our lease on Exceptionalism.



The American spirit is strong and contagious;

Our freedom is precious; our people, courageous.

With help from each other this slump we’ll withstand

And give thanks to the soldiers defending our land.

So during this season of faith, hope, and light:

Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night!



--Jim Bowman, Karlyn Bowman and Chris DeMuth



Karlyn Bowman is a senior fellow at AEI. Chris DeMuth is the D.C. Searle Senior Fellow at AEI.