Lee’s approach is good policy because corporate welfare distorts the economy, creating inefficiencies. It’s also good politics because it aligns the GOP against crony capitalism and forces Democrats to defend their corporatism. More importantly, battling cronyism allows the Right to make the moral case for free enterprise.

“The more power government amasses,” Lee said, “the more privileges are bestowed on the government’s friends, the more businesses invest in influence instead of innovation, the more advantages accrue to the biggest special interests with the most to spend on politics and the most to lose from fair competition.”

Lee marked off other battlegrounds on which an anti-cronyist GOP could fight in coming months.

Democrats’ 2010 financial reform didn’t end “Too Big to Fail.” It may have codified it. Conservative Sens. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., and John Cornyn, R-Texas, have proposed changes to the bankruptcy code so that failed big banks are wound down in an apolitical manner. Lee even gave an approving nod to Brown-Vitter, a bill that would effectively break up big banks.