Interesting dissection of Republican political tactics

[thesamwise4]

Someone I know linked to this on Facebook. I found it to be insightful and persuasive (as well as infuriating, disgusting, etc).

He even gets Ayn Rand in there! Footnote 5 explores at an interesting (but apparently unimportant to most) contradiction.

http://www.truth-out.org/goodbye-all-re ... 1314907779

[ruckman101]

Nailed it.


neal

[pj]

"Over the last four decades, the Republican Party has transformed from a loyal opposition into an insurrectionary party that flouts the law when it is in the majority and threatens disorder when it is the minority."

This sentence pretty much sums up in a nutshell what this author and those he quotes expect of the Republicans. Well dipshit we voted those assholes out, those who were happy on the edges taking the handouts that Tip O'Neill, Jim Wright, et al threw them. You know the kind, those that show up, get a bridge built in their district/state then clock out at 1700 and let others set the agenda for the country at large.

Yep those days are over and from here on out, I don't see us laying down by our bowl and taking that day's ration of slop anymore.

[ruckman101]

lol, Slop, you can afford slop? Lucky.

neal

[Velokid1]

Is that really what happened the last election cycle? It was the poser-Republicans being voted out by the true ones?

[ruckman101]

No no no Velo, pj was referencing the dems. I initially jumped to that conclusion too.

Beyond that, I'm not quite grasping the short hand style of prose offered but can only assume it's kind of "dog whistle" for those in the fold.

Myself, I would love to be enlightened with a clearer explanation of what those in the fold are hearing and resonating with.


neal

[thesamwise4]

This sentence pretty much sums up in a nutshell what this author and those he quotes expect of the Republicans. Well dipshit we voted those assholes out, those who were happy on the edges taking the handouts that Tip O'Neill, Jim Wright, et al threw them. You know the kind, those that show up, get a bridge built in their district/state then clock out at 1700 and let others set the agenda for the country at large.

Yep those days are over and from here on out, I don't see us laying down by our bowl and taking that day's ration of slop anymore.

It's interesting to me, PJ, that your argument and its reliance on "enemies" is a rhetorical strategy that Lofgren highlights in his discussion of Republican tactics.

Among the GOP base, there is constant harping about somebody else, some "other," who is deliberately, assiduously and with malice aforethought subverting the Good, the True and the Beautiful: Subversives. Commies. Socialists. Ragheads. Secular humanists. Blacks. Fags. Feminazis. The list may change with the political needs of the moment, but they always seem to need a scapegoat to hate and fear.

Anyway, if you wish to continue the discussion, I'd be a little more interested in knowing how you respond to the actual claims that the author makes. For example:

The party has built a whole catechism on the protection and further enrichment of America's plutocracy. Their caterwauling about deficit and debt is so much eyewash to con the public. Whatever else President Obama has accomplished (and many of his purported accomplishments are highly suspect), his $4-trillion deficit reduction package did perform the useful service of smoking out Republican hypocrisy. The GOP refused, because it could not abide so much as a one-tenth of one percent increase on the tax rates of the Walton family or the Koch brothers, much less a repeal of the carried interest rule that permits billionaire hedge fund managers to pay income tax at a lower effective rate than cops or nurses.

and

A couple of years ago, a Republican committee staff director told me candidly (and proudly) what the method was to all this obstruction and disruption. Should Republicans succeed in obstructing the Senate from doing its job, it would further lower Congress's generic favorability rating among the American people. By sabotaging the reputation of an institution of government, the party that is programmatically against government would come out the relative winner.

If you don't wish to, of course that's cool, but I'm not sure that your post was actually responding to the author's work and not just making a vague claim about government.

Like Neal, I'd be interested to hear the views of someone who disagrees with the author (I assume it's obvious that I agree with most of his points), especially on the two points posted above.

Best,

Dave

[Bleyseng]

("Crickets chirping in the background")
I saw that article and happen to agree with it....hits the nail on the head of what's happened. Its going to be difficult to change politics in the USA because as soon as you "throw out a bastard" the new guy gets bought out by the "big money" as he needs it to stay elected and is corrupted by the "big money interests".

[pj]

Thesamwiswe4 I give you two examples that happened today.

First Mr James Hoffa Jr warming up the crowd in Detroit for Mr. Obama:

"We got to keep an eye on the battle that we face: The war on workers. And you see it everywhere, it is the Tea Party. And you know, there is only one way to beat and win that war. The one thing about working people is we like a good fight. And you know what? They've got a war, they got a war with us and there's only going to be one winner. It's going to be the workers of Michigan, and America. We're going to win that war," Jimmy Hoffa Jr. said to a heavily union crowd.

"President Obama, this is your army. We are ready to march. Let's take these son of bitches out and give America back to an America where we belong," Hoffa added.

Now where does this fit in the writers piece on enemies?

Two the Vice President speaking in Cincinnati today:

http://www.hapblog.com/2011/09/biden-at ... -only.html

This twit of course is being paid by everyone in this country, not just his labor buddies.

[ruckman101]

There's a difference pj, the attacks cited in the quotes you posted are real, vs a vilified minority scapegoated perceived enemy to divide and lead the uninformed but easily stoked to fear of the "other" to perpetuate corporate and elite interests while shooting themselves in the foot.


neal

[Bleyseng]

I thought the workers of America were the backbone of the country. Who build all this "stuff" we have here, roads, freeways, bridges, buildings etc, not the Chinese. But the GOP wants to break the Unions as they are the "enemy" for some reason....

[Velokid1]

Our country is a big ol' piece of shit without a robust, huge middle-class. What other redeeming quality does America have? I mean other than our incredible wild places and vast expanses of heartbending beauty. Which are also doomed if the corporations corrupting our democracy have their way.

[Velokid1]

I thought the workers of America were the backbone of the country. Who build all this "stuff" we have here, roads, freeways, bridges, buildings etc, not the Chinese. But the GOP wants to break the Unions as they are the "enemy" for some reason....

To the GOP (and it's millions of supporters), everybody is the enemy. Everything is the enemy except profit an wealth and protecting what's yers. Everyone poses a threat when it's Team Me vs Everything Outside of Me.

[thesamwise4]

Thesamwiswe4 I give you two examples that happened today.

PJ,

If the point of your post is to point out that both sides use the old "barbarians at the gate" tactic, you need not provide even one link to prove your point to me--I agree with you that they both use it.

Neil's right, though. The difference in this case is that some Repubs are actively going after unions, while I doubt very much that there is some evil homosexual couple sitting around trying to figure out how to fuck with your quality of life/marriage. The lack of the latter doesn't prevent homosexuality from being used as evil in all kinds of ways by most of the Republican presidential frontrunners.

In most cases, I think that the Repubs conjure monsters while the Dems (as the article points out) are too slow in their tactics and can merely react to the actual threats (hence the pro-Union rallies after the situation in Wisconsin).

The birther debate is another example of this: Obama is really a secret Muslim, born in the Heart of Darkness, be afraid of him. I can't think of a Democratic equivalent, because there isn't one. Perhaps you can come up with one.

I responded directly to your post. Care to do the same for mine?

Anyway, if you wish to continue the discussion, I'd be a little more interested in knowing how you respond to the actual claims that the author makes. For example:

Mike Lofgren wrote:
The party has built a whole catechism on the protection and further enrichment of America's plutocracy. Their caterwauling about deficit and debt is so much eyewash to con the public. Whatever else President Obama has accomplished (and many of his purported accomplishments are highly suspect), his $4-trillion deficit reduction package did perform the useful service of smoking out Republican hypocrisy. The GOP refused, because it could not abide so much as a one-tenth of one percent increase on the tax rates of the Walton family or the Koch brothers, much less a repeal of the carried interest rule that permits billionaire hedge fund managers to pay income tax at a lower effective rate than cops or nurses.



and

Mike Lofgren wrote:
A couple of years ago, a Republican committee staff director told me candidly (and proudly) what the method was to all this obstruction and disruption. Should Republicans succeed in obstructing the Senate from doing its job, it would further lower Congress's generic favorability rating among the American people. By sabotaging the reputation of an institution of government, the party that is programmatically against government would come out the relative winner.

[pj]

Point # 2 first: Heresay. Facts begin with a Republican staffer named Bob Jones said, yada yada.

Point #1
Ah the wonderful Mr Buffet claim of his tax rates versus his help's tax rate. Well we all know he lives off his investment income which only becomes investment income after being taxed as earned income somewhere down the line. In other words one cannot have investment income without first having to earn the nest egg which was taxed at a different rate. Also Mr Buffett according to news stories is currently fighting over a billion dollars in back taxes from I believe 2004 on his investments. This puts him in a difficult spot to lecture anyone on paying one's fair share.

One other thing the writer forgets is that for 22 months Mr Obama held both houses of Congress with a filibuster proof majority in the Senate and they did nothing to "equal" out the tax code.

So tell me again who in Washington is a friend of the common man and has the middle classes back? I believe that neither side is a friend of the common folks, so you just have to lay your bet on which side appeals to you most and hope for the best.