“The nine most terrifying words in the English language are, ‘I’m from the government and I’m here to help.’” With that famous phrase, uttered by Ronald Reagan on August 12, 1986, during his second term as president, the GOP mantra born for decades to come.
In fact, this philosophy later even found a home in the Democratic Party. President Bill Clinton stated in his 1996 State of the Union address, “The era of the great government is over,” explaining that “We have worked to give the American people a smaller, less bureaucratic government in Washington.”
And during an October 2000 presidential debate between Al Gore and George W. Bush, experts at the time noted that the two appeared to be vying for the title of “the candidate of a smaller government.” Gore even bragged that his “reinventing the government” campaign as vice president under Clinton had brought the government back to its lowest level in terms of jobs since 1960.
Fortunately, those days are over – at least for now. Even a large portion of Republicans recognize that during this pandemic, the federal government’s offer to help is not “terrifying”. Rather, it can be a life saver, both in terms of health and finances.
In fact, shortly after President Biden ended his national speech on Thursday, a year since the virus was declared a pandemic, Trump enthusiasts Sean Hannity, Mike Huckabee and others were lamenting that Biden did not thank Trump for launching “Operation.” Warp Speed ”- the $ 18 billion federal government program designed to” accelerate the testing, supply, development, and distribution of safe and effective vaccines. ” Even these staunch conservatives implicitly admitted that this federal government program was effectively helping the Americans.
Another hard blow to Reagan’s philosophy that government is inherently bad can be seen in the remarkable level of support for the massive COVID aid packages. Last March, when the $ 2.2 trillion CARES bill – the first emergency relief bill – was signed by Trump, it was backed by 77 percent of Americans, including a staggering 76 percent of Republicans.
By December 2020, two-thirds of Americans believed the federal government had not done enough to “provide economic relief during the coronavirus pandemic,” including 46 percent of Republicans, according to a PBS / Marist poll. This was comparable to the 70 percent support for Biden’s $ 1.9 trillion support package he signed into law on Thursday that will provide direct stimulus controls, school reopening funds, extended unemployment benefits, aid to state and local governments, and more – where Texas is receiving the second highest state aid in the nation with $ 27 billion.
Yes, this is a unique time for our nation facing a deadly pandemic that is still killing nearly 1,500 lives a day; as of last week, more than 20 million Americans are still receiving some form of unemployment benefits. Had it not been for the pandemic, we are unlikely to have seen this level of broad support for large government spending and new programs – especially among Republicans.
But this is still the perfect time for Democrats to usher in more programs that help Americans on a range of issues from minimum wage to health care. In fact, both issues see widespread support among voters. For example, a majority of Americans support raising the minimum wage to $ 15, and even 51 percent of Republicans support a minimum wage increase of a certain amount, but not to $ 15. Regarding health care, 63 percent of Americans in a Pew poll in September believes the federal government is “ responsible ” for ensuring that all Americans have health care insurance, up from 59 percent in 2019.
The pandemic has made it clear that Reagan’s philosophy that the federal government is inherently “terrifying” no longer resonates with most Americans.
The hardest part is how to pursue policies that are backed by a majority of Americans, even when the Democrats are in control of the House, Senate, and White House? It’s not just the Senate filibuster that gets in the way, but possibly the spirit of the Democrats’ last major government program, the ACA, that was seen by many as a reason why Democrats took control of the House in the United States. 2010 interim.
In fact, Chuck Schumer, when the Democrat’s third-ranking in the Senate, in 2014 directly blamed the ACA’s passage for hurting Democrats in the meantime, saying that the party “took the chance that the US people gave them, pulverized ”. He then added a phrase that may still be in his thought process: “After passing the stimulus, the Democrats should have continued to propose middle-class programs and build on the partial success of the stimulus.”
Of course, Schumer knows that the ACA was an albatross around the Democrats’ necks in the 2010 and 2014 mid-term sessions, and its protection was one of the main reasons the Democrats won the House in 2018. In fact, the ACA’s approval is up from 38 percent in the mid-2010s to the mid-1950s today. That could very well be seen as an indicator of how public opinion has evolved over the past decade, with Americans now seeing the government as helpful.
The Democrats in Congress know they have to deliver. Like Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-WA), president of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, explained to me that if Democrats don’t meet minimum wage issues, “people will no longer trust us.” Jayapal has vowed to push for a broad progressive agenda, and I hope the Democrats will grab the victories where they can, even if it means compromise given the filibuster.
The pandemic has made it clear that Reagan’s philosophy that the federal government is inherently “terrifying” no longer resonates with most Americans. Now is the time for the Democratic Party to boldly defend programs that show our fellow Americans that the federal government can help them past times of dire need – because it can.