That '70s Show

That '70s Show
By Jonah Goldberg

You may have noticed that denouncing the "failed policies of the past" has become the official catechism of the Democratic Party.

Heck, it wouldn't surprise me if at DNC headquarters "gesundheit" is out as the polite response to a sneeze and tsk-tsking the rise in nose-tickling particulates thanks to the bankrupt policies of the Bush administration is in. So, you'd think if everything Bush has done is wrong, then a reversal of his position would be right.

Wrong again. We didn't hear applause from Democrats this week when President Bush "reversed" his "longstanding position" (in the words of The New York Times) on offshore drilling.

Nearly thirty years ago, Jimmy Carter's windfall-profits tax kicked in, making domestic oil exploration more difficult and expensive. In 1981, Congress passed a moratorium on offshore drilling that has stayed in place ever since. In 1990, the first President Bush signed an executive order reinforcing the ban on coastal oil exploration. And, until this week, the current President Bush supported the ban.

And yet, no cheers for Bush when he abandoned his failed policy of the last eight years. Instead, Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid sniffed that these were more of the same "old ideas." Odd.

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http://www.townhall.com/Columnists/JonahGoldberg/2008/06/20/that_70s_show