Republican intramural blame game begins

[AdamSmith]

This should be entertaining.

http://mobile.politico.com/iphone/story/1013/98426.html

[lookin]

This should be entertaining.

http://mobile.politico.com/iphone/story/1013/98426.html

If it's entertainment you're after, check out The Borowitz Report.

A few recent favorites:

OCTOBER 16, 2013

CRUZ: “THE DREAM OF KEEPING POOR PEOPLE FROM SEEING A DOCTOR MUST NEVER DIE”

POSTED BY ANDY BOROWITZ

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—Acknowledging that the government shutdown was coming to an end, an emotional Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) took to the Senate floor today to make an impassioned speech, telling his colleagues, “The dream of keeping poor people from seeing a doctor must never die.”

...CONTINUE READING >>

OCTOBER 9, 2013

REPUBLICANS SHUT DOWN PREFRONTAL CORTEX

POSTED BY ANDY BOROWITZ

WASHINGTON (The Borowitz Report)—In an escalation of the stalemate gripping Washington, House Republicans voted today to shut down the prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain that controls reasoning and impulses.

The resolution, which passed with heavy Tea Party support, calls for a partial shutdown of the brain, leaving the medulla and cerebellum, sometimes referred to as the “reptilian brain,” up and running.

...CONTINUE READING >>

OCTOBER 1, 2013

MILLIONS FLEE OBAMACARE

POSTED BY ANDY BOROWITZ

UNITED STATES (The Borowitz Report)—Millions of Tea Party loyalists fled the United States in the early morning hours today, seeking what one of them called “the American dream of liberty from health care.”

Harland Dorrinson, 47, a tire salesman from Lexington, Kentucky, packed up his family and whatever belongings he could fit into his Chevy Suburban just hours before the health-insurance exchanges opened, joining the Tea Party’s Freedom Caravan with one goal in mind: escape from Obamacare.

“My father didn’t have health care and neither did my father’s father before him,” he said. “I’ll be damned if I’m going to let my children have it.”

...CONTINUE READING >>

[Guest EXPAT]

[RA1]

Interesting analysis. Somehow I do not see refusing to negotiate as a plus for a pol. It there is one good thing I can say about pols it is they find a way to make it happen. Then it is up to the voters to decide if what they made happen is appropriate.

Obviously both sides and especially BO fit into the refuse to negotiate category on the recent issues. AND, they are not over by a long shot.

Best regards,

RA1

[Guest EXPAT]

You don't negotiate when your are being held for ransom. That's not leadership. That's street thug bully behavior. .

[RA1]

I hope Obamacare and other programs turn out as you apparently expect them to turn out.

In the meantime the US owes between 17 and 100 trillion dollars and has little hope to pay those debts without serious reform.

Who is holding who for ransom?

Best regards,

RA1

[Guest EXPAT]

I guess you were out of the country during the latest 16 day attempt at hostage taking.

[lookin]

We're just as happy as can be!

Say Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee.

We shut it down for two whole weeks,

And screwed the bums who called us freaks.

If Boehner thinks he'll stop our rave,

He must be living in a cave.

We'll turn the Party into scum!

Say Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum.

[RA1]

Actually I was wishing I was on another planet.

Best regards,

RA1

[TampaYankee]

Back in the summer of 2009 when the Tea Party emerged with all those gawd-awful town meetings the GOP establishment embraced them along with Faux News, and Big Money. Back then I posted somewhere in a thread here that the GOP would rue the day they embraced the Tea Party.

Well, since then the Tea Party has cost the GOP control of the Senate twice and taken them down to the lowest level in polling ever.

In all honesty, I thought the GOP eventually would have to cut them loose after a very bitter divorce but that they would do so after three or four years. I'm less certain that can happen now.

Again, acting short sightedly to what they thought was to their benefit, they pushed Citizens United and other measures to weaken election contribution laws. That gave individuals and PACs with anonymous contributors the independence to contribute around the Party directly to candidates with essentially unlimited amounts of money. This has weakened the Party (read establishment) control over GOP candidates and policies. Hence the Tea Party Senate candidates which have been a disaster. The GOP supported the gerrymandering of Congressional Districts to make GOP seats safe which ultimately turned out making Tea Party Districts safe.

The Tea party is no friend of Wall St who with The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and other like organizations are the base of the GOP Establishment. They just found out that the Tea Party has no problem destroying the Full Faith and Credit of the United States and with that the national and world economy in order to get their way. That means leaving Business and Wall St in a shambles. I do not think the Party Establishment can live with that.

The question now is: What can the GOP establishment do about it? Rational persuasion about shared goals isn't going to work. Bribes won't work and with that threats. The Tea Party is independently funded thanks to Citizens United etc.

As far as I can see what's left is open warfare. The GOP establishment has to find and fund, to all necessary levels, less extreme candidates that take on the TP candidates. While they have the money and can get the candidates can they get the votes? Those gerrymandered districts won't work in their favor.

The outlook seems to me to be 1) a weakened GOP in an ongoing internecine battle that cannot compete effectively for the Presidency or govern rationally in one house of Congress, or 2) fracturing into two parties, neither being able to compete nationally, or 3) Business and Wall St. recruiting and supporting fiscally responsible Republicans and Democrats to forge a Congressional Middle Road group that can wield the balance of power in Congress and maybe for the Executive.

1) is not practical because it is too unstable with high risk potential. 2) is iffy as to which group would control the GOP party credentials and brand. Whoever does has the upper hand big time even if for a smaller national party. A 'third' party has an uphill battle getting recognized in all 50 states and establishing name recognition among the unplugged-in voter. 3) and 2) are not mutually exclusive if the Fiscal GOP keeps control of the brand and credentials. It is not clear at all how this will be resolved.

[RA1]

One reason the Tea Party has met with whatever success they have is that the Republican Party was becoming largely indistinguishable from the Democrat Party. Too much agreement on tax and spend with very little room for "real" conservatives. Now the R's have gone too far with a concurrent result that the D's have also gone too far but less noticed especially in the MSM.

The parties becoming so similar has led me to disdain by far most pols. Where I can mostly identify is somewhere between the Libertarians and "true" conservatives.

The US has certainly had more than two parties in the past and different ones than currently exist. Together the D's and R's have created laws, local and national, that favor the two party system but that does not mean other solutions cannot exist.

Best regards,

RA1

[TampaYankee]

The US has certainly had more than two parties in the past and different ones than currently exist. Together the D's and R's have created laws, local and national, that favor the two party system but that does not mean other solutions cannot exist.

Best regards,

RA1

True but whatever they are they either have to be congruent with the established structures or go over them some how. The latter not an easy task whether talking for the left or the right.

What is true is that the right wackos are facing some very disturbing facts that amount to a steep grade to climb. By right-wackos I mean the extremists on social and fiscal issues. Time is against them -- the changing demographics are a time bomb they refuse to accommodate because they just do not want to.

Afro Americans remain alienated by larger numbers than ever. They see the relentless extreme attacks on Obama's legitimacy as an attack on their race. The Hispanics too are alienated in the biggest numbers ever that just keep growing -- as they do in voting numbers -- by the wackos who seem unable to get past their anti-immigration stance.

Then there is this anti-women stance. Call it a war on women or just being misunderstood, but women do not like the wacko attacks on contraception support in health plans and on abortion rights. They don't like 'small government' mandating transvaginal probes as a condition for anything, even consulting to obtain an abortion. Many women oppose abortion but they also oppose outlawing it because of the real life consequences that result. They certainly do not like 'small government' taking control of their bodies or imposing restrictions or banishment on women's health care caused by closing Planned Parenthood clinics, 98% of their efforts going to contraceptive and women's basic health issues. Where is the logic in outlawing abortion and also making contraception more difficult to obtain, especially for the poor? Younger women are becoming less complacent about accepting the status quo of less pay for the same work.

Then there is Evangelical Problem. Most of this wacko social agenda is tied to the Evangelicals. However, the younger Evangelicals tend to be concerned with fiscal conservatism only. They are NOT in favor of this extreme anti-gay, anti-women social agenda. . They are not in favor of killing (dismantling by slight of hand -- Voucher Care) Medicare or Social Security but they are in favor of controlling spending much better. This is a rising tide of Evangelicals against the social and fiscal wackos.

Many like to say that this country is center-right in its political perspective. Maybe so. However, what it is not is center-wacko!!

In the past, each party has managed to come back from severe downturns in fortune and ordinarily I would expect it again this time. However, those times were occasioned by each party making itself relevant again to the national discussion and the voters. This time we have one party that swallowed a 'pill' antithetical to the party establishment and capitalist power centers that have traditionally supported the party, while making itself not only not relevant, but antithetical, to large swaths of the American demography.

The question remains: Will this GOP survive in the future as a viable national party?

[RA1]

Nothing worth doing is ever easy, is it? Personally I am against all of those things you mention about Blacks, Hispanics and women but that does not make me a Democrat. Nor does being a fiscal conservative make me a Republican. If I HAVE to be anything, I suppose it is an independent with Libertarian leanings. As such, I am willing to listen to most anything but it has to be persuasive, not just sound good.

The US government wastes a tremendous amount of money and is going deeper into the hole every day. What does it mean that "non-essential" government employees were laid off? One thing it could mean is that they might be nice to have IF we can afford them, but, alas, we cannot. Of course, it is a conundrum when we have so much un and under employment to lay off permanently workers but no government worker produces any product. The government may provide needed services but it only costs, not produces.

Best regards,

RA1

[lookin]

I too miss the days when we had a Republican Party that stood for more than a single issue. I think a healthy democracy depends on having at least two good choices when we go to the polls, one that is a little better for some folks, and one that is a little better for other folks. But the Republicans have so polarized the choice around the single poorly defined issue of "big government" that anyone who has more than a single functioning brain cell feels left out.

Is there anyone who can even say what "big government" means? Does it mean the percentage of GDP that the government spends? We're nowhere near the top. Does it mean the percentage of GDP that we pay in taxes? We're nowhere near the top. Does it mean the percentage of GDP that we spend on safety nets for our citizens? Again, we're nowhere near the top. Does it mean the percentage of GDP that we spend on wars? Well, there we are near the top. But do you hear the Republicans campaigning for big reductions in the "defense" budget? Or higher taxes to pay for our wars? Not a chance. In fact, it was our last Republican administration that took us into two wars in the Middle East while actually lowering taxes. Was there so much as a peep from Republicans about the national debt then?

The only time "big government" becomes an issue these days is when there's a discussion about spending some of our tax money on taking care of the poor, the elderly, and the sick. Even though Social Security is a self-funded program which has always run a surplus, and has been used as a piggy bank for war and to keep other taxes low, the Republicans are hell-bent on raising the retirement age and cutting cost-of-living increases.

Republicans are increasingly identifying themselves as a party that doesn't give a shit about most of the average folks in the United States. They'd rather let someone lose their home than get health insurance. They'd prefer another billionaire to someone who is finally able to send a child to college.

I apologize for lumping all Republicans under a single banner. There are plenty of Republicans who do not want to see their party highjacked by a fringe group that is probably the most blatantly selfish group of individuals since before the French aristocracy learned how to ride a tumbrel.

I'd have more respect for the Tea Party if they would actually stand up in the light of day and admit they want a nation of haves and have-nots. Or if they would agree to a tax that would pay down the trillion dollar debt for even one of our Middle East wars. Or if they would stop hollering for an "alternative" to Obamacare and actually present one. But they are too self-serving to do it. They'd rather see the poor folks in this country get poorer, all the while telling them that they are merely providing them with a 'path' to become as rich as they are. As if there's a chance in hell.

While I won't lump all Republicans under this banner, as I am sure many are not, I do hold them liable for not taking the actions necessary to get rid of this selfish bunch of malcontents while they still have a chance. I understand that it will take some courage to do it, and they may take a step backward by doing so. But they're on course to lose the viability of the Party for a long time to come if they don't.

And I'll hold the Democrats and Independents liable too. I think the sooner they start educating the voting public that a feel-good campaign against "big government" is little more than a campaign to dismantle the safety net that keeps many of us out of the soup kitchens, the better.

/rant