Back in the summer of 2000, when the Bush-Gore presidential race was gathering steam, syndicated columnist Charley Reese painted a very complimentary picture of candidate Bush. The choice facing voters, he opined in one column, was between “saving the country” (voting for Bush) and “committing national suicide” (voting for Gore). Continued Reese, “my Dad used to say that whenever America got into trouble, somehow the right person always came along. I believe that George W. Bush is that right person at the right time.” In a separate column, Reese enthused that Bush was “the only candidate with a chance to win who hasn’t indicated that he views the Bill of Rights with utter contempt.”

Unfortunately for America, Charley Reese’s rosy appraisal of the younger Bush was way off the mark, which a contrite Reese now acknowledges. Bush’s latest State of the Union address — one part stirring rhetoric, five parts socialist vaporings — is a case in point. On topics ranging from the environment to health care, President Bush sounded positively Clinton-esque, calling for more than $400 billion worth of new government spending on initiatives ranging from the quaintly oxymoronic (USA Freedom Corps) to the downright silly (hydrogen-powered cars).

By continuing the grand bipartisan tradition of taxing and spending, Bush has already destroyed any lingering doubts about his devotion to Big Government. But the burgeoning deficits and reckless spending embraced by Bush and his congressional toadies aren’t the biggest worry. The real problem is a pair of fatal ideas that have become orthodoxy in official Washington. The first is the conceit, entertained by big-government enthusiasts of every hue, including the current president, that any problem can be solved, or at least greatly mitigated, by the creative application of centralized state power. Ascribing to the federal government near-messianic attributes, President Bush assured Congress in his address that the federal government has the power to give us “healthy forests” (whatever that means), clear our skies, shower on our senior citizenry still more medical benefits, cure drug addiction, and even, by subsidizing religion and philanthropy, “transform America, one heart and soul at a time.”

Nor does Bush’s coercive compassion stop at the water’s edge. According to the president, our convictions oblige “us” — meaning our government — to go “into the world to help the afflicted, and defend the peace, and confound the designs of evil men.” Thanks largely to the “war on terrorism,” Bush has managed to commit America to a policy of permanent worldwide interventionism, even though our own country has many legitimate defensive needs — such as a secure southern border — that the federal government ought to address, but refuses to do so.

As dangerous as our leaders’ misplaced faith in Big Government may be, still more harmful is another fatal idea, the almost universal belief among members of the political set in Arbitrary — that is, lawless — Government. Long gone in Washington are most constitutional restraints on federal power. Instead, our elected leaders — including our current president — believe that benevolence, not lawfulness, is the only litmus test for good government policy. Once upon a time, the American Founders, as well as certain of their European counterparts, believed in the importance of having a “fundamental law” superior to the rulers and ruled alike. The Founders intended the Constitution to be such a fundamental law, and designed it to be both easy to interpret and difficult to change. The president, far from having the sweeping executive prerogative of a monarch, was limited to the few well-defined tasks enumerated in the Constitution. America’s political leaders, and an overwhelming majority of the citizenry, once understood this.

But no more. Like his recent predecessors, President Bush is poised and eager to apply the power of the federal government anywhere he deems necessary, from intrusive new powers of surveillance over America’s citizenry to foreign aid for AIDS-stricken African nations, regardless of constitutional restraints. His myrmidons in Congress quibble over policy details, but they too favor arbitrary, lawless government in principle.

Consider, as just one example of President Bush’s disregard for the Constitution, his comment on presidential war powers near the end of his address: “Sending Americans into battle,” Bush intoned, “is the most profound decision a President can make.” Since when has the “decision” to go to war become a presidential prerogative? Congress is given the power to declare war in Article 1, section 8, whereas the president, in Article 2, section 2, is empowered only to be the commander in chief of the military “when called into actual service of the United States.”

Irrespective of Mr. Bush’s merits as a person, he must be held accountable for his professional conduct as long as he occupies the Oval Office. His pleasant demeanor and engaging style cannot compensate for his ignorance both of constitutional limits on presidential power and of the principles of freedom and limited government. Until Americans begin to hold their leaders accountable for such deficiencies, however, the twin dogmas of Big and Arbitrary Government will continue to determine federal policymaking — no matter which party controls Congress and the White House.

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