Excerpt:

A few weeks ago, I wrote a column about a paper that decimated the conservative worldview. The study, by William Niskanen of the Cato Institute, found that the conservative “starve the beast” strategy does not work. Indeed, since 1981, he found that tax cuts tend to produce more spending, while tax hikes produce less.

I wrote that it would be interesting to see how conservatives reacted to having the factual basis for their entire domestic strategy exposed as a fraud. And it is interesting because “starve the beast” is so central to the GOP approach to governing and because the reaction is a case study in how the conservative movement reacts when its views are disproved.

Well, the right has had sufficient time to formulate its response. The results aren’t very impressive.

Ah, the excellent Iraq adventure. This is from a Congressional Research Service report. They found a few billion in diverted funds, increases that don’t track to outlays and general messiness in the accounting. Not so good.

Cause, you know, I think we’ve had it all wrong these past few decades…