Senate Democrat Leader Harry Reid has yet to offer a plan and instead almost seems as though he’s hoping for a government shutdown to occur for political gain.
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor
Almost?
The Obama-Reid game plan is to re-run 1995: shut down the government, blame the Republicans, have the MSM show pictures of weeping old ladies who are not getting their checks. Then undo the results of 2010. Then reelect Obama in 2012. Everything is proceeding according to schedule. Count on it.
It ain’t no almost.
Cantor should not be so polite.
The public is not yet prepared for a government showdown. Most people do not know it is coming. The GOP is not warning the public, getting the word out, and assigning blame early.
The GOP is prepping the battlefield badly.
“It’s not 1995 anymore. Things are different now.”
But are things different enough?
I don’t like the way this is shaping up.
Republican’s in D.C. are operating according to a notion of courtesy. The problem is that courtesy is only appropriate in the political arena if it’s reciprocal, and there is nothing even remotely resembling courtesy coming from Democrats and other Leftists, whether politicians, union bosses and thugs, or propaganda agents (sometimes satirically referred to as “journalists”). As a result, no one in D.C. is willing to call Reid out as a manipulative liar, or to call out the media for deliberately concealing and distorting events and positions.
Cantor is a disappointment. His rhetorical hedging telegraphs weakness and lack of principle. A voter or member of the Democratic leadership could listen to him and conclude that 1) the Republican leadership still doesn’t get it and 2) even if they get it they don’t have the balls adequately to defend the interests of taxpayers against the looters. He is not much better than Dan Quayle, who after correctly pointing out that the media were wrong to promote single motherhood would mince around in interviews (Q: “Who is promoting Murphy Brown as a model?” A: “You know who.”) rather than defend his argument straightforwardly.
The Republicans are not going to succeed in substantially cutting govt as long as they are afraid of the media and the Left (this assumes that Republicans want to cut govt). Maybe the current Republican leadership will have to be swept out before there is progress. It’s too bad Cantor can’t be replaced by someone like Allen West.
Lex, it doesn’t matter what the Congressional GOP says or does concerning MSM reporting of what the Congressional GOP says or does. The MSM makes things up and claims those are true. They lie.
The only battlefield preparation the Congressional GOP can do is practice getting its message out via channels other than the MSM.
“The MSM makes things up …”
Sure, but Cantor botched a chance to jam them on this. Why say “almost.” Say, Harry Reid and President Obama are going to shut down the government. It is their responsibility.
“… practice getting its message out via channels other than the MSM.”
Are they doing this?
Cantor missed that opportunity because it’s outside his frame of reference. He does not believe that the Democrats would be so irresponsible as to force a shutdown of the federal government, let alone that they intend to do so no matter what he or the Congressional GOP do or don’t do.
No, they are not practicing how to reach the public by means other the MSM, because that too is outside their frame of reference. They don’t think of the MSM as the propaganda arm of the Democratic Party, and definitely do not regard it as the enemy.
Sometimes you have to fight. The GOP base understands this, but very few GOP officeholders do.
I think the problem here is that most of the Washington Republicans at the top really aren’t down with the whole Tea Party revolution. Instead, I think they see themselves as triangulating between the Democrats and the Tea Party. They see the Democrats as not allies, but enemies who can be of use fighting the enemy insurgents in their own party.
I think they are trying to position themselves as the “voice of reason” between the Democrats and the Tea Party because they want to preserve the dominance of the Big Government Republican wing of the party. As such they have little interest in getting into a knife fight to advance the Tea Party agenda.
2010 was just the first battle for the ideological soul of the Republican party. There is a lot more fighting to be done.
“… really aren’t down with the whole Tea Party revolution.”
Exactly.
The Tea Party is a nuisance to the GOP. It’s job is to be the nastiest nuisance possible, all day long, otherwise the GOP will always be an inert mass.
It is similar to the Pro-Choice Movement for the Democrats. No Democrats dares to get an inch out of line on abortion, or he is doomed. I am sure the Democrats don’t like it. They would rather have flexibility on that issue. But they don’t.
The Tea Party needs to impose the same relentless external discipline on the GOP on issues of taxing and spending.
One way they could prepare is by passing multiple continuing resolutions in the House. Those could fund essential functions and leave the less essential to be shut down. If the Democrats refused to pass and sign those essentials, it would be obvious to the public. The GOP seems to lack long term planning with a few exceptions like Reagan and Jack Kemp.
Jonathan wrote: “The Republicans are not going to succeed in substantially cutting govt as long as they are afraid of the media.”
The GOP are correct to be “afraid” of the MSM, who are by and large the official propaganda wing of the Left. What’s needed here is to flank them, not run directly into their cannons.
The GOP needs to run a PR effort through sympathetic media like Fox and WSJ. Further, Boehner could agree to one or two large audience, Sunday morning interviews with the hostile media, but only if he’s properly prepped and prepared to get his message across.
it’s like you guys have never seen the GOP in “action”. really only need to report if they ever do something that isn’t spineless and self-defeating.
Well, the Republican Party isn’t termed the stupid party for nothing.
The Nixonian wing, or “Rockefeller Republican” wing, of the Repubs is a statist group that has always been in conflict with the Goldwater wing of the party every bit as much, if not more, than it has with the dems.
The Goldwater-Reagan-Tea Party lineage is in the ascendency now, so the statist group tries to co-opt it and use it as a vote/money gathering machine, but hates the idea of having to actually carry out any of the ideas that the small government side professes.
Shannon is correct that this is only the opening phase of a long, complex struggle to get control of the runaway state, and then begin to reduce its power and ability to extract money from the population.
In much the same way, the current showdown in Wisconsin is only the opening round of a multi-part confrontation that will soon imvolve many more stats and the federal government as well. A major part of the strong reaction from the unions and their dem partners is the realization on their part that this is a dagger thrust to the heart of their funding and manpower scheme.
If the tea party elected pols can decertify the public employee unions, a major source of power and money for the collectivist dems will be eliminated.
If the tea party pols can push the statist elements in the repub party to actually begin to reduce federal/state/local expenditures and programs, a major element of that group’s treasure box of largesse and spoils would also be eliminated.
The hostility towards the “small government” forces does not only come from one side, or one party. The political structures in this country, at all levels, have developed a self-perpetuating ethos which makes any attempt to bring them under control, and especially any attempt to reduce their money and power, quickly become a fight to the death.
We are facing an entity much like the computer in “I ROBOT”, i.e., something that has developed its own consciousness and priorities, and which views ordinary people as factors in its operations, not the source of its authority or legitimacy.
The basic ideas of the tea party are the “nanomites” which would have the impact of disrupting the entities’ programming, which is based on the continuous acquisition of more power and more of society’s (read productive people’s) wealth.
Of course, the entity will fight back. I have been watching the Wisconsin situation and pondering the similarity to the robot swarms in the movie for a few weeks now. I find that analogy much more compelling than the forced and phony egyptian one.