Well, it didn’t take long for the pols, pundits and poobahs to trot out and frontpage a word missing from their collective vocabulary the past six or so years — bipartisanship.
All of a sudden, it is THE buzzword of the day, week and year.
The Democrats now control the House and the Senate and President Bush remains holed up in the White House so apparently the Dems must now cooperate with Bush–or so it is explained ad naseum. That’s something the Dems have been attempting to do since Bill Clinton’s election in 1992. The GOP, back in the reign of G. H. W. Bush, also made the effort to reach across the aisle and be inclusive. But in this case, the apple fell as far from the tree as possible with G.W. Bush getting off at thumbing his nose at those who won’t unquestioningly fall into his lockstep.
One question: why was this five-syllable word not so delicately placed in cold storage by the press for so long?
Where were the articles about Bush’s iron-fisted style and the outgrowth of such? How he could care less if the other party cooperated or was even allowed to participate.
Is this missing coverage simply because the GOP ruled everywhere in D.C.? If that’s the best ‘cover’ that can offered, it doesn’t cut it.
Where were the articles about Bush frequently calling Demo leader Tom Daschle up to the point of the successful military rout of the Taliban in Afghanistan and then apparently losing Daschle’s phone number after that?
So much for frontpaging bipartisanship.
Where were the articles about unanswered letters and queries, covering multiple important subjects, sent from many different Democrats to Bush?
So much for frontpaging bipartisanship.
Where were the articles about non-existent GOP oversight regarding the behavior of congressional members. the awarding of no-bid contracts, the buying of a number of journalists, et al?
So much for frontpaging bipartisanship.
Where were the articles about Democrats being excluded from participating in the drafting and discussion of proposed legislation?
So much for frontpaging bipartisanship.
Where was any sense of Republican outrage, let alone even minimal concern, when an undercover national security agent of United States, one who was working on Iranian nuclear issues at the time, was publicly outed?
So much for frontpaging bipartisanship and so much for frontpaging the previous buzzword phrase ‘national security.’
Apparently, it’s somehow more incumbent for the Democrats to enter into bipartisanship than the GOP.