Editorials

In many ways, it’s a new Contract For America. But this time, it’s not Newt Gingrich at the helm, it’s Congressman Jeb Hensarling, the Republican who represents the East Texas counties of Anderson, Cherokee, Henderson, Van Zandt and Wood.

The Republican Study Committee, chaired by Hensarling, has presented its action plan to House Republican leadership. The party of Reagan should take note.

“There’s nothing like getting hit over the head with a two-by-four,” Hensarling has said of recent Republican electoral losses. “We’ve got to be bigger and bolder than the other guys.”

The action plan is bold, indeed. It calls for:

An end to pork-barrel spending.

— Cutting taxes, eliminating the alternative minimum tax, and amending the U.S. Constitution to limit the growth of federal government.

Simplifying the tax code and allowing taxpayers to file under either the current graduated system or a flat-tax system.

— Tax credits for buying health insurance and opening up state insurance markets.

— Increase domestic drilling, while developing cleaner coal and alternative fuels technologies.

— Allowing warrantless wiretaps for terrorism suspects outside the United States.

The plan also touches on parental rights and welfare reform, but it’s the economic proposals that make it different from past Republican initiatives.

“We will not wait on the Democratic majority to end ‘bridges to nowhere’ and ‘monuments to me,’” the plan reads. “We declare an immediate earmark moratorium and pledge to reform the system.”

The promise goes even further: “We also pledge to uphold any future veto of a spending bill that is pork-laden and does not lead to a balanced budget.”

The plan calls for specific policy objects, reminiscent of 1994’s Contract. On health care, for example the federal government should “provide a refundable tax credit to every American to purchase affordable health care coverage,” and “broaden the array of choices for health insurance plans.”

On energy independence, the plan calls for “allowing energy exploration in Alaska and the Outer Continental Shelf.”

These go far beyond simplistic slogans about fixing the health care crisis or giving consumers relief from spiraling fuel prices.

But Hensarling faces an uphill battle to get consensus within his own party.

The “bridge to nowhere,” for example, cited in the RSC Action Plan, was a Republican project. The $328 million project to link the Alaskan mainland to an island with 50 inhabitants, was the pet project of Sen. Ted Stevens and Rep. Don Young, both Alaska Republicans.

The bridge project was finally killed in 2007 by the governor of Alaska.

Even more recently, Republicans were key to the passage of the pork-heavy $288 billion Farm Bill, and to the override of President Bush’s veto of the legislation.

And when Hensarling and his RSC met with Republican leadership last week, their reception was reportedly cool.

“It is healthy and good for our members to weigh in and put forward ideas,” a spokesperson for House Minority Whip Roy Blunt told the press in a decidedly tepid response. “That’s how we get the energy leading into November.”

That won’t be enough, Hensarling fears, citing “the massive cash advantage that Democrats have to get their message out” in the months leading up to the election.

“We have to get back to our core identity,” he says of the GOP. “There is work to be done.”

The Republican Party leadership should embrace Hensarling’s plan and unite behind it.

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