That 80s Show

To follow up on an item from last week, there’s something about the Republican agenda that has a certain “Groundhog Day” quality to it. Despite all the talk that the GOP is the party of new and innovative ideas, Republican lawmakers keep unveiling agenda items that tend to generate a haven’t-we-already-done-this response.

Two weeks ago, John Thune started pushing a constitutional amendment on flag-burning (which already has 90 co-sponsors in the House). Last week, House Republicans started throwing their weight behind legislation to make English the nation’s official language (which now has 73 co-sponsors).

This week, it’s a school-prayer amendment to the Constitution.

[Rep. Ernest Istook’s office told the Washington Times this week] that the congressman is preparing to introduce a single amendment to the Constitution that, by itself, would protect the Pledge of Allegiance, school prayer, the public display of the Ten Commandments and any other expressions of religious heritage and private beliefs that have come under attack of late in the court system.

“The issue will not go away, nor will the constant attacks,” says Mr. Istook, who is a lawyer. “They must be addressed together in a way that avoids official religion while protecting our religious expressions and freedom.”

If memory serves, this will be the fifth time Istook has proposed amending the Constitution to empower the government to promote religion. The other four didn’t go well, but Istook’s a slow learner.

But also consider this in a historical context. Conservatives have been trying to undercut the First Amendment with a flag-burning amendment for about 20 years. They’ve been working on making English the official language for nearly as long. The drive for government-sponsored religion written into constitutional stone goes back almost 40 years. Hell, even Social Security privatization goes back to the early ’80s.

The right isn’t generating new policy ideas; it’s just recycling old items from their wish list that never worked out.

What’s next? Clinging to an unworkable Strategic Defense Initiative as envisioned by Reagan? Oh wait, bad example.