The media are going to discover in short order that nothing ever really changes with the Republicans, unless it is that their behavior grows worse. But there’s one thing in the following that I have to strongly dispute:
Republican anger is however masking a serious problem the party has yet to resolve : how to hit back at what it sees a presidential power grab.
Other than warning that Obama would “poison the well” for future cooperation, GOP leaders won’t say whether they will use pending federal funding bills as leverage.
That route led to a damaging government shutdown for which the GOP paid a heavy political price last year.
Tell me, please, exactly how the GOP paid “a heavy political price” for shutting down the government and hurting our credit rating. They just had a huge victory in the Senate elections, the exact kind of statewide elections where politicians are supposed to be punished for pandering to the worst extremists in their party. They paid no political price and were, in fact, richly rewarded for their irresponsible behavior.
And if there is one single dominant reason for why the GOP got away with acting like five year-old bullies, it is because the media never mentioned their behavior in the 60 days leading up to the elections. If a tree falls in the forest and the only sound heard is about the Ebola virus and ISIS, then no one knows that a tree fell in the forest.
If the media had actually had a discussion about how a Republican-led Congress was likely to behave, then what’s coming wouldn’t be such a surprise to people.
It’s not going to be a surprise to me or my readers because I didn’t write about Ebola and ISIS. I wrote about things that Congress might actually do or not do.
House Republicans could also chose to expand the lawsuit they have already lodged against Obama alleging he usurped his authority in implementing Obamcare. Conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer stirred buzz on Friday by declaring executive action on immigration would even be an “impeachable” offense.
GOP leaders are already braced for pressure from the right for a tangible and not merely symbolic reflex when the president acts.
“If the president moves forward and does his executive action, the Republicans have no choice but to respond,” said Dan Holler, communications director of Heritage Action for America, a conservative non profit group.
“That response needs to be legislative. The vehicle that makes most sense is denying funding for the activity that they say is unconstitutional and inappropriate.”
Holler’s point reflects a secondary benefit some Democrats see in Obama’s strategy — it will cause a big political headache for Republican bosses.
Obama’s immigration move is certain to ignite a firestorm of grass roots conservative anger. That will in turn pile pressure on rank-and-file Republican House members who campaigned for office slamming what they see as an imperial president.
A big mistake people make over and over again is to think that the Republicans act badly in response to provocation. But they do not need provocation because they consider the left’s very existence to be all the provocation that they need. They poison the well every morning before they draw water for their coffee. Their Mighty Wurlitzer plays the Outrage Dirge 24/7. If it’s a slow news day, they’ll talk about bike paths undermining our national sovereignty and the differences between short- and long-form birth certificates. It doesn’t matter what we do, we will be accused of all manner of bad intentions and heinous crimes.
And when they lash out and shut down the government and hurt real people for no good reason, the media act offended for a week or so and then let the American people forget all about it come election time.
So, we’re going to get a bunch of really despicable, deplorable behavior from this Republican Congress that is going to make all decent people feel ashamed, but it will only be a surprise because the media is the chief enabler of our national amnesia and our eroding sense of civic duty.
