NOT "FREE MARKET." JUST PRO-(REPUBLICAN DONOR) BUSINESS. It's always useful when an issue comes along that causes a conflict between the GOP's nominal "free market" principles and its more frequently evident "pro business who give us lots of money" principles. Just as "pro-lifers" will virtually always choose the regulation of female sexuality over the protection of fetal life, such conflicts are almost always resolved in favor of the latter. Rick Perlstein provides a particularly striking example of this, noting that "The Bush administration said Tuesday it will fight to keep meatpackers from testing all their animals for mad cow disease." In other words, in a case where market incentives are actually working to increase consumer safety, the administration wants to actively prevent small businesses from threatening the profits (and, horrors, increasing the safety records) of big business. Your modern Republican Party:as Rick sums it up, "state socialism in defense of Mad Cow." (See also the fact that a statist with a jones for arbitrary executive power can be called the GOP's "libertarian" candidate as long as they're nominally pro-choice.) --Scott Lemieux
