John Harwood has an article in today’s New York Times with the headline: Shut Out of White House, G.O.P. Looks to Democrats of 1992. What’s not clear is whom the headline writer means by G.O.P. As best as I can tell, the subject here isn’t any of the likely candidates or any kind of consensus from the party base. It’s these people:
“A lot of work to do,” said Kate O’Beirne, a veteran conservative commentator. Pete Wehner, who was an aide to President George W. Bush, fears that Republican gains expected in the midterm elections this fall will offer another “false dawn,” as they did in 2010.
Kate O’Beirne and Peter Wehner are not representative of the Republican Party. They are Washington insiders who are well paid to spin the party’s message. But they aren’t so much spinning at the moment as hoping for a miracle.
A nominee’s power to recast the party’s image on high-profile issues offers a safety valve for Republicans in 2016, whatever they do now on immigration or other issues. At least, they hope so.
As Ms. O’Beirne, the conservative commentator, observed hopefully, “A talented politician can turn things around pretty handily, right?”
Mr. Wehner and Ms. O’Beirne are in no way representative of their party, but they are both savvy political observers who realize that the direction the Republican Party is headed is destined for political ruin. Their salvation idea is that a candidate will win the nomination and then turn sharply to the middle, thereby bringing the party faithful back to positions that have national viability.
A parallel is offered by Harwood:
But Mr. Clinton, then governor of Arkansas, used discretion in targeting Democratic constituencies such as labor unions. He embraced ratification of the North American Free Trade Agreement, for instance — but not until he had secured the Democratic nomination.
So, what we are supposed to expect is a Republican nominee who embraces gay marriage and immigration reform, but not until they have secured the Republican nomination. The thing is, this is a seemingly impossible task. To pull it off, the GOP would need to find a candidate like Dwight D. Eisenhower who could be embraced for reasons entirely separated from political ideology. A consensus bipartisan national hero could conceivably win the Republican nomination and then feel free to forge a completely independent stance on the issues, resulting in a remolded party that isn’t wedded 100% to the conservative movement, particularly on social issues.
It’s a pleasant thought, even for Democrats, but there are no Eisenhowers in contemporary American culture. In 2012, we saw a version of what Wehner and O’Beirne are looking for in the candidacy of former Utah governor and ambassador to China, Jon Huntsman. In the end, Huntsman earned two delegates to the Republican National Convention and .04 percent of the primary vote.
So far, the only evidence that any entity that can be termed the “GOP” is looking to emulate the 1992 Democrats led by Clinton and the Democratic Leadership Council is the autopsy report that RNC Chairman Reince Priebus solicited after the 2012 election. That report said that Republicans must pass comprehensive immigration reform and embrace gay equality or they’ll be unable to even get a hearing from young voters or Latinos. Assuming that analysis was valid, and I think it was, there has been little progress so far and there are no reasons to think that a nominee running on those issues would have snowball’s chance in hell of winning the Republican nomination.
The only sign of heterodoxy I can detect is Rand Paul’s uneven willingness to buck the status quo on foreign policy, privacy rights, and voting rights. But let’s not forget that Rand Paul is on the record as believing that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 is unconstitutional because it forces private businessmen to serve blacks in their restaurants.
That’s not exactly a Sister Souljah moment. And I don’t think dissing Sister Souljah was key to Clinton’s success in any case.
Dissing Sister Soulja was indeed key in that it sent a crystal clear message that Clinton was a member of #TeamWhiteMen – that gave the progeny of the White Citizen Councils permission to consider voting for him. The parallel today would be for a GOP nominee to rhetorically take the Duck Dynasty guys to the woodshed or to lambaste Limbaugh for saying something stupid (the options are limitless). If the GOP is to have any hope of winning the presidency then they’ll need to have such a moment that will allow people who are vehemently opposed to the GOP to reconsider that particular nominee even if they don’t like his (her?) party as a whole.
I will concede that H. Ross Perot had more to do with Clinton winning than anything else, but dissing Sister Souljah was a key to Clinton’s success.
Embracing NAFTA was a far more important and less symbolic F-U to the party base.
So, too, running on welfare reform, which was a much more substantive way of creating distance from the “minority party” than some offhand comment on a rapper.
There was an entire list of substantive F-U’s to the party base, to be sure, but my point is that this offhand comment allowed the target demographic to give Clinton an earnest hearing and to take those substantive F-U’s seriously – it showed a consistency in his perspectives.
I just don’t think it mattered much at all.
Or, if it mattered, it mattered because it buttressed more substantive breaks with Jesse Jackson.
That would be more like it actually.
Bill Clinton ran in the middle of the Conservative ascendancy, the only reason he won was because a substantial number of reliable Republican voters opted out for Ross Perot that year.The only reason that happened was because Newt Gingrich and Pat Buchanan essentially stabbed Bush in the back for not being “conservative” enough.
He was never supposed to be President, much less be re-elected.
Democrats loved (and still love) the guy for it. And they have never gotten over the fact that some liberals gave the party a response with a well deserved FU in 2000 and contrary to all factual information, continue to blame liberals for the installation of Bush/Cheney.
I’m currently trying to figure out why a Democratic Congress and President passed a bill titled “Religious Freedom Restoration Act” in 1993. (Introduced in the House by Chuck Schumer.) Talk about overkill to a minor issue. Sandra Day O’Connor pointed out how the matter could be resolved at the state level. At the federal level, a 1994 amendment to the 1978 American Indian Religious Freedom Act fixed it. Now RFRA is biting the PPACA’s contraception mandate in the butt big time. And SCOTUS is likely not done using this bad bill to inflict more damage.
Passed 97-3 in the Senate. That’s a whole lot of people being wrong, some of them anointed then, and retrospectively, as liberal lions and true progressives.
Why did Schumer in particular do it? Constituency service — lots of Orthodox Jews in his district.
Because Orthodox Jews weren’t allowed to freely practice their religion by the US government? Or was it to in the future protect cults such as the Branch Davidians? Are polygamous Mormons communities protected under the RFRA?
They have their concerns.
That’s from 1998. Smith was addressed directly at the federal level in 1994. As it concerned the use of peyote in Native American religious ceremonies (technically, Smith was denied unemployment compensation after his employer fired him for having used peyote). Is there some Orthodox Jewish religious practice that that the government infringes upon?
Land use policies as Kelo v. New London, CT affirmed are a local matter.
All the religious wackos in this country are nuts.
Embracing NAFTA was a far more important and less symbolic F-U to the party base.
So, too, running on welfare reform, which was a much more substantive way of creating distance from the “minority party” than some offhand comment on a rapper.
How do we know this had anything to do with Clinton winning? Because there were no blogs at the time, and no Google, we didn’t know it was Clinton telling the business community that he was bought and paid for. What do you think the DLC was/is? It wasn’t an attempt to moderate the party. After all, the DFH’s never really controlled the party.
A true DFH doesn’t belong to any party. It limits your freedom of action, and constrains the positions you can take.
The GOP is careening out of control. Every day there’s multiple bits of evidence, big and small, that display that the TEA Party has captured the conservative movement, and the conservative movement has captured the Republican Party.
This week, we’ve got a Federal Senator from the GOP who has filed a lawsuit meant to respond to the lowest conservative Internet trolls:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/ron-johnson-obamacare-lawsuit
The alternative is that Ron Johnson has exactly the same views, hermetically sealed from truthfulness, that the lowest conservative Internet trolls do.
Even Johnson’s lawyer is unwilling to explain to him that the Supreme Court has adjudicated the constitutionality of Obamacare, and have found the ACA to be securely lawful. Unfortunately, the conservative movement placed lots of Federalist Society-supported radicals into Federal and State Judiciaries. Some of these judges seem to have become even more radical recently in response to Black President, so maybe Johnson’s attorney’s are banking on getting a Federalist-crazed Judge to give them a finding.
This movement should be careful what they wish for. Getting the SCOTUS and other GOP-associated Judges to hurt people badly as they have in their judgments in recent years will get more and more voters to associate this horse hockey with the Republican Party. It’s another factor which will make it harder and harder for their GOP to compete, particularly in races involving large electorates.
I love his reasoning – his reelection is a fundamental human right! as if!! it’s the opie and anthony reasoning
Yes, that is among the many magical fundamental presumptions Johnson makes in this lawsuit.
You write:
But Booman…despite the “uneven” qualifier (and he has been exceedingly consistent in these positions for a national politician with eyes on the presidency), those three issues are quite likely to be the hot button topics of the 2016 election.
Of course as another qualifier…good Dem functionary that you are… you add:
This is bullshit. Yes he opposes federal laws that mandate local behavior and yes that was one of the results of the passage of that law but he does not oppose it “because” it forced businesses to serve minorities, he opposes it because he is opposed to big government across the board. Why? Because he thinks that it does not work very well, especially when applied to social and moral issues. Proof of this particular pudding? Sure. On the cumulative evidence of 50 years the Civil Rights Act has not made much difference in either the attitudes of many white people or in the functional “rights” of minorities. Not really. Black people and Latinos remain on the lowest rung of the economic ladder after 50 years. It is true that…at least by law…they can go into any restaurant they want in areas where that was forbidden before the passage of that act, but a huge percentage of the members of those minorities can still not afford to patronize any establishment that does not deal in the worst kinds of goods available. Poisonous foods and cheap furniture. Bet on it. I live in a working class Bronx neighborhood with a number of housing projects that is probably somewhere around 50% Hispanic, 30% black and 20% white. Our main drag…Broadway from W. 225th St. up to say 234th…contains quite possibly the highest percentage of “dollar stores” in the city. Stores that sell worthless goods at low prices. Economically enforced housing segregation is still rampant in every city in the U.S. De facto educational segregation…the primary tool that has been used to keep people of color on the bottom end of the workforce…is actually worse than it was in the pre-Civil Rights era, because at least during those times many all-minority schools were well-functioning systems that were producing a nascent and growing black middle class despite the depredations of social segregation. Now? I and a number of my friends teach in the thoroughly segregated NYC area school system, and I’m here to tell you that the more segregated any may be, the worse the education that it offers. One hundred percent, up and down the line.
But kudos anyway, Booman. The worm turns, even here.
Watch.
I don’t know if Rand Paul will win the Republican nomination in 2016…I doubt it, but his chances are rising every time a Cruz-type gets his big foot stuck up his ass while trying to pander to a vocal white supremacist republican minority. A coalition of dissatisfied Republicans, Democrats and independents could put him in the White House despite the best efforts of the government media complex.
Watch.
AG
While talking with Fox News’ Neil Cavuto on “Your World with Neil Cavuto” following the prisoner trade of five Guantanamo Bay detainees for Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl, Senator Paul said, “there would be a drone with their name on it.”
http://www.politico.com/story/2014/07/rand-paul-israeli-teens-kidnapped-response-national-review-108
517.html
That would be a special ‘freedom drone’, though.
This is a good place to provide this even more extreme reminder of Rand Paul’s charlatanism on civil rights, due process and the MIC:
“”Here’s the distinction: I have never argued against any technology being used when you have an imminent threat, an act of crime going on,” Paul said on Fox Business Network. “If someone comes out of a liquor store with a weapon and $50 in cash, I don’t care if a drone kills him or a policeman kills him.”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/23/rand-paul-drones_n_3140850.html
Rand’s only question is, “Just how fleet-footed would that [criminal] need to be to escape the drone strike?”
And who can forget his other smash hit, “A Drone With Their Name on it”?
Arthur won’t concede that Brown v. Board, the CRA and VRA have improved things for Americans. In fact, he supports Rand Paul’s opposition to the Civil Rights Act.
Arthur lacks the ability to recognize the simple and vital step forward for all non-racist Americans which came when businesses were legally prevented from refusing to serve people based on their race, regardless of their economic status. There’s an inhumanity at the base of AG’s very rigid ideology.
Arthur believes businesses in the United States should be legally allowed to refuse to serve people based on the color of their skin. THINK ABOUT IT. Let that sink in for a while, and remember that every time you read one of his posts, or choose to ignore one of his posts.
Finally, I wish we had Thurgood Marshall and his legal team around to respond to this astonishing claim:
“…educational segregation…the primary tool that has been used to keep people of color on the bottom end of the workforce…is actually worse than it was in the pre-Civil Rights era…”.
Arthur would benefit from reading the history of Brown v. Board. Among other things, the plaintiffs spoke of the essential, powerful feelings of shame and inferiority which full legal segregation placed upon very young black children. Arthur’s smug view fails to respond to this, at all.
With his approval, in fact PREFERENCE, for the pre-Brown system of complete, vicious school segregation in many portions of the U.S., it appears that Arthur approves of the Plessey v. Ferguson decision. I encourage everyone here to think about THAT as well.
also too, the current state of the NYC school system has to do with Bloomberg’s efforts at privitazation [i.e. ascendance of charter schools] and his failed attempts to put .1% ers in charge of NY Public School education. Mayor De Blasio has his work cut out for him.
No, the NYC school system has been broken since at least the 1970s, when I first encountered it up close and personal. Bloomberg didn’t help, but it was fucked well before he got his Wall St. friends involved in profiting from the problem.
AG
Dude, the Pauls are the white supremacist Republican minority. I know you’re not a racist, so it’s strange that you’re so blind to this, but there it is. Just look at His Awesomeness’s positions on immigration.
Well, of course you won’t see any xenophobia there, since the Son of Ron speaks only words of Truth, but trust me, a lot of us do. And I mean a lot of us.
(By the way, how is he going to militarize the border without violating anyone’s civil liberties?)
I don’t know how many times or how many ways he can say that he is not a racist nor do I think that many blindly partisan DemRats will either believe what he is saying or in certain cases believe it but continue to attack him as a racist for purely political reasons.
Below, from that Washingtoon Post article that Booman linked in his original post as some kind of proof that Rand Paul is a bad, bad man…a number of very plain statements of his position regarding both race and the Civil Rights Act. (Underlining mine):
Sigh.
As Senator Paul states, I think a great deal of this “The Pauls are racists!!!” bullshit is politically motivated. Pure, cynical power in action. The American way, sadly. Then come the dummies that clomp clomp clomp behind the bullshit, of which there are any number here on this centrist website.
Which are you, S.S.? Dummy or cynical hustler?
Or do you even know the difference?
AG
Oh, come ON. All these words, spent to deceive.
A couple of hours ago, Arthur joined Rand in telling us that Federal laws outlawing overtly discriminatory business practices were unwise, and that local governments should be empowered to allow businesses to refuse services to Americans with the “wrong” skin color. Pretty pathetic, jazz man.
Here’s one of the centers of the virulent bullshit not just of Arthur’s beloved Paul movement, but the entire conservative movement at this point.
“Should we limit speech from people we find abhorrent? Should we limit racists from speaking?”
Freedom of speech: FINE.
Freedom from any and all consequences of extremely offensive speech or actions: SORRY, NO.
Freedom to take actions which are illegal or are intended to thwart the intent of laws: HELL NO.
AG’s remedies in defense of the idea of “local control” are perverse, to say the least. If Mississippi makes it, in all practical ways, impossible for women to exercise the rights inherent in Federal law to self-determine their family planning? MISSISSIPPI WOMEN SHOULD MOVE TO VERMONT, he wrote recently.
What an appalling, small man, defending an appalling, small-minded movement.
Each and every post Arthur places here is meant to empower the modern conservative movement. I don’t care if Arthur, or Rand Paul, are personally racist or sexist. Their statements are intended to empower racists and sexists.
What’s especially funny is that someone whose main hobby is typing WTFU is so blindly devoted to such a transparent fraud.
Yes, pay no attention to the man in the Confederate flag mask. We know Rand Paul isn’t a racist because he said so himself!
” You had to ask me the “but.” I don’t like the idea of telling private business owners –I abhor racism. I think it’s a bad business decision to exclude anybody from your restaurant — but, at the same time, I do believe in private ownership. But I absolutely think there should be no discrimination in anything that gets any public funding, and that’s most of what I think the Civil Rights Act was about in my mind. “
Code words in the defense of racism. Southerners said things like this for decades.
Oh, one other thing I’m curious about. How is Rand Paul going to convince a popular majority to Wake the Fuck Up and realize what the country really needs is a fetal personhood amendment?
(baby paul)
at self promoting, little else.
Name a successful politician who isn’t.
I dare ya.
AG
Touched a nerve, eh?
No…just calling another idiot statement. No nerves involved. I’m immune. Multiple exposures breed immunity. I’ve been dealing with this same kind of slack-jawed leftiness clomp clomp clomp since the good ol’ days on dKos.
AG
No leftiness, just have watched baby paul fail miserably at honestly representing his actual constituents, you know my neighbours, at the same time seeking face time on the tv machine like the self serving narcissist he is.
Too bad for you you buy his self serving bullshit babble.
Well, if you were trying to enable the modern conservative movement with your every post over at dKos like you do here, I can certainly understand why they grew weary of you, Arthur. You appear to dig the troll life.
Even with that, your dishonesty is a greater barrier for Frog Ponders’ attempts to have reasoned, respectful discussions with you than your ideology.
At the dKos of that time…2004/2005…”reasoned, respectful discussions” meant agreeing with the neoliberal party line as promulgated by Mr. Kos himself and his little helpers.
You resemble that remark.
AG
Every post Arthur Gilroy makes is meant to enable the modern right-wing movement.
No. Every post I make is meant to enable the modern American reform movement. The terms left-wing and right-wing no longer have any real meaning in the U.S. when applied to national politics. They are both simply wings of the Centrist UniParty. There is only the Center Party and opposition to it from various directions. All of the media’s Republican/Democrat chaff is just disinformation meant to disguise this one salient fact. You have fallen for it. Don’t feel bad, though. You’re not alone.
AG
More word games. And this is where Arthur’s ongoing, relentless dishonesty has finally become unbearable.
Look at his posts on this blog. They oppose, both (very) personally and on all policy issues, President Obama and the Democratic Party, with a heaping helping of racially coded rhetoric when he wants to insult. In the meanwhile, Arthur offers NO specific critique of the right-wing movement and is on board with the entirety of the Paul Movement’s policy agenda, which IS today’s right-wing movement even though he wishes to deny it:
And more. All these things the Paul movement wishes to do in the names of increased profit and FREEDOM. And, in stubborn defiance of Arthur’s PermaGov frame, today’s Democratic Party and the left-wing movement are not in united pursuit of these policy goals.
Own your hateful movement, Arthur. For the sake of a good-faith dialogue, stop being dishonest about our differences.
“…racially coded rhetoric…???”
Show me what you mean.
AG
Obama is “hustling us”. Obama is “arrogant.” All the derisive photos of Obama, targeted toward specific racial stereotypes. We know what you’re saying, Arthur.
All of your game playing around the Civil Rights Act is heavy racial code, and is incredibly disrespectful. “Local control.” “States’ rights.” I’m not the only one who’s commented on all of these. You are not that dense.
You have the right to post these things. I have the right to call them morally low. I do not care if you are a racist. I am beyond disappointed that your rhetoric intends to enable racists.
No. They have nothing to do with race. That’s in your head, Bubba. Not mine. When I post photos of other pols, are they racially aimed too? Is a photo of Dick Cheney snarling or Butch II playing the fool racist? Of course not. Should I give Obama a pass because he has some African ancestry? How about giving Jamie Dimon a pass because he’s Jewish? Ted Cruz because he’s got a Spanish surname? HRC a pass because she’s female?
Get real.
I’m an equal opportunity satirist.
You have a right to be a fool, and I have a right to call you on it. At least I can’t be accused of picking on a minority.
Fools rule here in the U.S.
At least you’ll never be lonely.
In fact…you have a good chance of becoming preznit yourself.
Bet on it.
AG.
Please proceed, Arthur.
Please white mansplain to us why you believe the ethnicities of Barack Obama, Jamie Dimon or Ted Cruz, or the gender of Hillary Clinton, is relevant when offering critiques of them.
I am speechless. Reading comprehension 101. Take it again. Keep taking it until you can understand complicated syntax.
AG
I got yer “racially coded rhetoric,” right here. (Excerpts from. the linked hit article on Rand Paul above. A totally failed hit article at that.):
You are the one who is looking for code. Dogwhistle code. You don’t need a code talker to understand what Rand Paul is saying here, yet you insist on applying your own “code” to it. Your key? If it’s from anybody other than a centrist Dem, it’s a lie.
Idiotic on the face of it.
AG
Rand Paul was unwilling to say he would have voted for the Civil Rights Act. He was given 9 minutes on that subject alone to make an unequivocal statement, and chose not to.
Rand Paul essentially said that he would have voted against the Civil Rights Act if made to vote on the private business accommodation section. He lacked the guts to say it, but it is the only reasonable conclusion that can be reached.
He said these things during his 2010 Senate campaign.
So, Rand became willing to say he would have voted for the CRA. Well, he received plenty of criticism for his previous equivocal statements, so he ran for a bit of cover. But I want you to look at the extremely careful language in one of the quotes you posted, bizarrely, in an attempt to defend Rand.
“I have never wavered in my support for civil rights and the Civil Rights Act,” he said in his speech. “The dispute, if there is one, has always been about how much of the remedy should come under federal or state or private purview.”
Rand is a Federal Senator. He almost certainly will be running for President, a Federal office. The only relevant “dispute” for him is whether the Federal law that is the CRA should be maintained in whole; he openly questions that in your quote, and even describes the issue as a “dispute”. I feel very confident that, despite the unequivocal statement he finally gave to Wolf, that if we asked Rand TODAY specifically about the section of the CRA which regulates private businesses, we’d get more weaselly equivocations.
There are Republicans (a few) who support the CRA with integrity. Rand Paul is not one of them. This is even more deeply exemplified by Rand’s support for Voter ID laws and opposition to creating updated legislation which addresses the Supreme Court’s evisceration of the Voting Rights Act.
Rand’s support for restoring voting rights to convicted criminals who have paid their debt to society is notable. I wonder if he will lead effectively on this effort when these is actually a chance to pass a bill into law. The current House leadership would never bring such a bill up for a vote.
The other candidates are whores.
Rand Paul is a sex worker.
See the difference?
I’d be willing to wager that attitudes among whites regarding race have changed rather considerably over the course of the last half century. Of course, that would require one to be willing to look at data collected by social scientists. Regrettably, you have already precluded this possibility (after all, data collection is only done by “permagov” as I seem to recall from your previous statements). It is true that merely giving people legal rights is not a guarantee that they will actually have the power to enjoy those rights. That’s why I think it is crucial that we consider both social justice and economic justice together, rather than separately, and why I consider it crucial that we accept that it would take a strong central government presence to make both happen together. We tried the “states rights” approach before and it was an abysmal failure, largely because doing so left in place the material conditions for not only continued economic injustice but also legal social injustice.
Exactly. States’ rights enabled Jim Crow laws. Rand Paul wants to reinvigorate Jim Crow, and Arthur supports him.
We don’t have to prove Rand Paul or Arthur are racist or sexist in their personal views. Arthur admits that some States, if allowed by Federal laws, would create local policies which would allow the denial of services based on racist and sexist viewpoints.
His remedy? Economic and social models would compete with each other, and “things would sort themselves out.”
He forgets that we already had these fights.
“The Civil War.”
“The Women’s Rights Movement.”
“The Civil Rights Movement.”
“Access to Modern Medicine.”
We’ll be damned if we’re going backwards. Arthur can fight to take our country backwards if he wants. He should just stop being so dishonest about his agenda, and stop pretending that backward is forward.
He should also answer to Rand Paul’s pure fakery when it comes to due process and military-industrial complex issues, Arthur’s favorite hobby horse. By his own words, Rand Paul has said he would use drones even more aggressively than Obama if he were President. Rand has said explicitly that he supports the use of drones to kill petty robbery suspects domestically and terrorism suspects in other countries.
You pretend that “forward”…by your own definition, of course…is really forward.
Is the U.S. overall better off than it was before say Clinton, Bush II and Obama got their hands on it?
No, it is not.
Not socially, not racialy and not economically.
The definition of insanity as “Continuing to take the same actions even when they have been proven not to work” comes to mind here.
“Forward.”
“Backward.”
Both presume a two-dimensional way of thinking.
I want three dimensions.
Up.
Down.
Sideways.
Whatever.
Whatever actually works.
We have to try something new, because what has been happening here since the JFK coup is simply not working. But you want more of the same. Your approach will simply bring back the other side of the UniParty system, which I will gladly admit is worse than the Dem side. But neither is good enough. That side will fail again, to be replaced by yet another leftiness, neo-liberal, fluff-talking “good cop.” And the downward spiral of the U.S. will continue apace.
Good work, centerfielddj. Be careful what you wish for. You may get it.
AG
This post offers us nothing but word games. All other points on this thread, left unaddressed.
Your prescriptions for “something new” are much, much worse than what we are experiencing now. Policy matters. A Rand Paul Presidency would badly hurt those schoolchildren you claim to care about.
All posts of yours here are attempts to enable the modern right-wing movement. We aren’t interested in doing that here. You are not changing minds at the Frog Pond. Given that you oppose, in whole, the policies our community supports, that is to be expected.
Yes. I oppose the policies that most people on this site support. Not all of those people, though. I do not, however, oppose the results that most of us here want to see from those policies. I simply think that the policies themselves are wrong.
Why do I believe that?
I believe it on the evidence of the continuing decline of this society on every level for over 50 years..
I also believe it on the further evidence of the essential similarity…couched in different spin, of course…of the policies of most mainstream national Democratic and Republican politicians, especially in terms of foreign relations (the World Cop version thereof), so-called “Homeland security (also known as the security state) and support for the machinations of corporate-controlled Big Money.
You think that the policies of the current administration are OK? Great. You are in the majority here. I am trying to open well-meaning minds to the possibility that they are not OK.
We all want essentially the same things…peace, justice, an adequate standard of living and equal opportunities for all people. Why do we not have those things now? (And we do not. Bet on it.)
Over the last 36 years we have had two Democrats and one Republican in the White House. If that whole 36 years is taken on average, have things gotten any better w/the Dems? No. They have not. Our streets and countrysides are still filled with gangbangers and white supremacists. Our public spaces are now more dangerous than ever. Children are being shot in school and in neighborhoods, and often it is other children who are doing the shooting. Our educational system is in tatters. Our cities…with the exception of a very few…are in total disrepair. Our foreign policy is a disaster. Our physical and social infrastructures are breaking down. We’re playing whack-a-mole instead of healing enmities. Our healthcare system is a world-wide joke. People would rather go to Cuba than to the U.S. for medical treatment, and with good reason. We are in debt up to our proverbial assholes and beyond. It is almost impossible for all but the very wealthy to get a college education without going into debt to the point that the prime of their working lives will be taken up paying off that debt…if indeed they can find a well-paying job…rather than doing the kind of work that leads to a solid, accomplished life. They are simply well-educated, indentured servants. Our non-white minorities are by and large still stuck at the very bottom of the economic food chain, just as they have always been.
And you want more of the same policies that have taken us to this point? Espoused the same people? You object to being told to wake the fuck up!!!??? Well…all’s I can say wake the fuck up and smell the decay, centerfielddj!!!
It’s everywhere now.
Wake the fuck up before it’s too late.
AG
Arthur, here’s why you’re an idiot. You keep repeating the most basic, fundamental stuff as if it’s an earth-shaking revelation to anyone here. The media lies, the government lies, the Republicans lie, the Democrats lie. This is not news. You don’t get a Nobel Prize for discovering this.
So feel free to keep typing your admonitions, but don’t expect to be taken seriously around here. If you want to be an effective writer you need to know your audience, and you’ve shown again and again the you know fuck all about the people who read this site.
Has Arthur had a stroke of something?
“Over the last 36 years we have had two Democrats and one Republican in the White House.”
In the last 36 years, there’s been three Republican Presidents. Republicans have held the Executive for more years during that time than Democrats.
In the last 36 years, the radical conservative movement has had its way through Executive, Legislative and Judicial actions. Through full control of the Republican Party. Through infiltration of portions of the Democratic Party. Through mass control of the media. Though unprecedented obstruction of any governmental branch they do not control at any given time.
They now wish to maintain enough power to ram through their unpopular agenda, THE SAME AGENDA ARTHUR FAVORS, through complete evisceration of campaign laws, greater denials of the right to vote, and other actions all intended to deny the will of the governed.
All of the bill of particulars he names off are caused by the conservative movement Arthur supports. In fact, all of his listed particulars are the desired outcomes of conservative hegemony, as long as they are accompanied with ever larger profits and power for the powerful. His paragraphs of horribles have helped the powerful maintain and increase their power.
Man, Arthur is deteriorating.
I’m dysnumeric. Always have been. Should’ve been 24 years. Sue me.
AG
What nonsense. If you want to prove that Civil Rights did no good, you would have to consider what things would be like now if there had been no federal Civil Rights laws. It’s not about comparing where we are now to where we ought to be. Of course there’s more to do.
And what is your “something new” anyway? It’s to give up. Just say fuck it and put Rand Paul in charge. What exactly does he have to offer that’s in any way constructive? A fetal personhood amendment? A fucking fetal personhood amendment? We may all be deluded about Rand Paul, but you are heavily and seriously deluded if you think any liberals are going to Wake The Fuck Up and come out in favor of forced pregnancy for rape victims.
Nor is anyone who cares about the planet going to Wake The Fuck Up and realize we need to repeal all environmental laws and pump even more filth into the atmosphere.
Nor is anyone who isn’t a racist going to Wake The Fuck Up and support someone who would have anything whatsoever to do with a turd like the Southern Avenger. That’s something both he and his father fail to realize, that it’s not up to them to decide when they’ve lived this shit down.
Like the racist newsletters, we are to understand that Ron Paul didn’t write the screeds in question, nor did he endorse their views. OK fine. But if we accept that, then let’s be clear that his defense is that he’s so grotesquely incompetent that he would accidentally allow racist screed to be published under his name.
I could go on and on and on, and what have you got? Chest thumping. Name calling. Pictures of chickens.
Clomp clomp clomp, motherfucker.
Yes. The Pauls are flawed. As are all humans. I await a better set of ideas with ‘bated breath. Got any, other than continuing on the same destructive path with yet another UniParty preznit? I haven’t heard any.
Not a one.
AG
I don’t recall any GOP struggling to make the much-dreaded “pivot to the middle.” Dole, McCain and Romney just pretended they had never said what they had said, and no effort to ‘hold them accountable’ by the Dems or the press had much affect. Not sure why this time is different, especially since it looks like Jeb, who can pretend and lie with the best of them. Think he’s just about a shoe-in at this point (due to HRC’s dis-lik-ability)…
I read that whistling-through-the-graveyard piece by Harwood, and followed it with the Times’ July 4th story on the Mississippi Senate Primary clusterf**k. I started laughing at O’Beirne’s desperation. No, Kate, the conservative pig is squealing and angry, and won’t take the lipstick.
Just imagine what would happen if the 2016 Republican nominee were to move to the middle on immigration after he gains the nomination. He’d accrue no benefit because the screaming from the base would be so toxic and unyielding that the racism of the Republican Party would be laid bare right in the middle of the Presidential campaign.
No, the Southern Strategy worked for a while, but the Party establishment’s coddling of virulent racists has poisoned the GOP bloodstream. They’ll just have to wait until enough racists die for them to have an even chance at the Presidency again.
The consolation prize while they wait will be control of both Houses of Congress, the Supreme Court, and a majority of statehouses.
I think they’ll cope.
If the GOP can’t win the Presidency, they won’t control the Supreme Court for very long. Based on coming Senate incumbent term conclusions and their current insane ideology, they stand almost no chance of controlling the Senate in future years, either. There’s reason to be concerned about Senate control in 2014, but no need to believe it’s lost. The Republicans need to win just about every single race which is polling closely right now.
Stasis, as far as the eye can see, in other words.
And people watching this for a generation are going to conclude what, exactly, about the utility of using government to get anything accomplished besides killing people?
No, not stasis. All of the SCOTUS’ most radical, far-reaching cases are squeaking by 5-4. That will go away when one of the 5 conservatives dies/retires.
By then the Supreme Court will have pissed away all of its perceived legitimacy. It’ll be considered just another partisan tool.
Oh, the current Supreme Court already has heavily damaged the Court’s legitimacy. That is irrelevant.
The Court’s decisions on our Nation’s laws and their effects on Americans are unchanged, and would continue to remain unchanged even if public support for the SCOTUS drops to Congressional levels. The single-digit % approval levels Congress currently “enjoys” does not change the effect of its (very few) legislative decisions.
This would also apply to the upcoming overturing of Griswold, and NLRB v. Jones and Laughlin, I guess. Lopez points the way — the Court just has to follow.
They have to get challenges to those laws through the District and other Federal Courts first. It’s not plausible that they could get those heard in 2015. But yes, I agree that they are setting the groundwork for setting aside even larger, more far-reaching Court precedents if they are able to hang onto their current razor-thin majority long enough.
Given this circumstance, the conservative movement’s decision to fantasize itself into throwing away a reasonable chance for the Presidency in upcoming elections is extremely foolish. One of Aesop’s fables comes to mind for me here:
http://www.aesopfables.com/cgi/aesop1.cgi?1&TheDogandtheShadow2
Scalia has no intention of retiring or dying. The GOP has no intention of confirming any nominee to replace one of the conservative five made by a DEM POTUS.
Scalia will never die. LOLOLOL! Pessimism finds a new standard!
Even The (Other) Man Who Sold Out Liberalism Forevermore, Harry Reid, worked with his majority to successfully reform Senate filibuster rules; a bunch of important Federal Judiciary appointments have been pushed through afterwards, with more to come. If a GOP minority tries to prevent a Dem President from making a qualified SCOTUS appointment, Reid will have the juice he and his majority needs to change the rules again.
Provided Reid has a majority in the first place.
You’re whistling past the graveyard.
I just do not get the extreme pessimism about our prospects for the Senate in 2014. I am concerned; we have to win one or more of the races which are polling closely. The GOP, on the other hand, practically has to win all those close campaigns. With the national GOP and its base acting the fool as they are, they’re working very effectively to piss away a third straight massive Senate campaign advantage.
All those who are worried at the Frog Pond? Well, hell, go out and campaign, and help inform/motivate voters to get out to the polls.
I’m working for Shenna Bellows.
She will lose, 60-40 or worse, to Susan Collins.
Collins will win a majority of women’s votes.
Collins will also receive the votes of 15-20% of our registered Democrats.
And that’s the problem right there.
If that outcome happens, that would be unjust. If, as a campaign worker, you’ve already surrendered to that conclusion, you must be very frustrated. Given that I want Bellows to win, I’d encourage you to not surrender to your current conclusion, but that’s easy for me to say. You’re doing the right thing (thanks!), and politics can be unpredictable sometimes.
All the same, we don’t need to take Collins’ seat to keep control of the Senate. And, based on your posts here describing Maine politics, you concede that Maine politics are not typical of the United States in whole.
Yeah, but that’s Maine, not the rest of the country. Mainers are extraordinarily hesitant to toss out their incumbent senators.
Reports from other important state races aren’t, at least at this stage, as pessimistic. Besides, even if Republicans take the Senate this fall, have you checked what seats are on the ballot in 2016? Barring a complete economic collapse on the scale of 2008, even if Republicans take the Senate in 2015, they’ll lose it in 2017.
Has there been any polling done on this race? Have you actually talked to supposed Democrats who intend to pull the lever, or whatever, for Collins? I’m curious of the reasons they give. Do they really want Yertle the Turtle to be Majority Leader? Do they really want someone who is campaigning for LePage?
Portland Press Herald poll last month: Collins 72%, Bellows 17%, undecided 10%.
Maine is a small state where voters tend to have met their elected officials. The history is that an incumbent senator generally only loses under extraordinary circumstances.
Please try to read what others write. I didn’t say that Scalia will never die. I said that he has no intention of retiring or dying. He could easily be with us another twenty years.
Sorry for the misunderstanding.
Scalia is 78 years old.
Even if he believes his God is promising him an exemption from mortality, you and I can have more realistic expectations. We were all talking about the prospects of upcoming SCOTUS openings, not Tony’s possible delusions. Should we believe Scalia will maintain his spot on the Court until he is 98?
I think it’s far more likely he’ll be the next Justice to fall to illness. It’s not like staying healthy and motivated enough to serve on the Court is entirely a matter of will.
The miracle of modern medicine — particularly for those that can afford it all — will give him more time than wouldn’t have been thought possible a decade or two ago. Look at Cheney. First heart attack at age 37 and several since then. At 73, with his new heart, he’s back on his lifelong warpath to destroy democracy in the US.
Yet, rich people still die at 78 every day. Scaife just died at 82; he only announced his illness a few months ago. We can agree that Scaife was able to access the best health care available.
Cheney has been fortunate in his access to unlimited health services; he’s also been a lucky motherfucker. Few with Dick’s medical history survive to his age, even if they’re as rich as Croesus. Democracy is safely out of his range; he escapes the hatred of very few Americans.
We have no way of knowing who will fall first and who will fall last among the Justices. I have no desire to hang my hat on the most optimistic or pessimistic view. Don’t know where that gets us.
Steve Jobs died at age 56, but he lived years longer than (almost?) all those with pancreatic cancer. Neither the form of his cancer nor the length of time he was treated were disclosed wrt Schaif.
My only point is that Scalia, absent the arrival of the grim reaper, isn’t going to leave anytime soon. Ga-ga and hooked up to machines that keep him going and he’ll still be sitting in his seat.
John Paul Stevens is 94 and remains sharp as a tack.
Yes, and Stevens retired. Being “sharp as a tack” might sometimes cause a person to decide that they want to enjoy some retirement years.
Even Scalia contemplates retirement in this interview from a couple of year ago. He’s far from claiming that he’ll work until he dies:
http://nymag.com/news/features/antonin-scalia-2013-10/index6.html
Death, for Scalia as for the rest of us, doesn’t care much what our intentions are. Just Scalia could be with us for another 20 years…but not easily.
Life expectancy for the average 78 year old is about 11 more years. But Scalia’s not an average 78 year old. To his advantage, he does interesting work. To his disadvantage, he’s male and overweight.
he’s become a vampire already? Highlander Returns IV with Dick Cheney and Tony Scalia
I would vote for Huntsman if it would return the GOP to sanity. But we all know that isn’t happening. Do these folks have any ideas that might actually work?
Jon Huntsman is a far right lunatic all the same as these nut jobs. He just wouldn’t destroy the country. But don’t let anyone think for a minute he’s a moderate.
If there are Republican strategists looking for the next Ike, they should probably be heavily medicated and quarantined for their own good. Today’s Republican party is on the crazy train trying to out-crazy the other crazies in the craziest fashion possible.
There is simply no way any candidate is going to get through the Republican primary season without catering to the lunatics, and serving up at least five whoppers that will disqualify him in the general election. The Republican electorate has gotten so deep into insanity, that some people are actually able to persuade themselves that Rand Paul could be a viable candidate. Which is by turns risible and utterly sad.
Proof the individual is certifiable,
even if their name is poppa or baby paul
The problem with all of this analysis is the state of the economy. The middle class has had a substantial pay cut since 2000, and in 2016 enough time will have passed for the party not to be able to blame Bush.
It is the Democrats who should be more worried about 2016 than the Republicans. The Obama agenda, while miles better than the GOP, is simply not big enough to address the underlying systemic problems which have lead to economic uncertainty and insecurity. We need a year of job reports like the one last week – for people to actually feel good about the economy.
Failing that this the GOP will enter 2016 on the offensive.