This article is part of TPM Cafe, TPM’s home for opinion and news analysis.
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1346483
This is a companion discussion topic for the original entry at https://talkingpointsmemo.com/?p=1346483
Yes, Republicans have one ball between them.
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No negotiation with terrorists. Period.
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Cooperation? What the hell are you talking about, Mitch McConnell will make his first priority to make Biden a one term president.
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The problem with the modern Republican party is it lacks any organizing first principles. Worse their politicians pay more attention to media consultants steeped in reality TV than to policy wonks. They simply don’t have any visionary goals. There is nothing to talk to them about.
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But they don’t know they have no fresh ideas and have no mechanisms remaining for adversely evaluating their ideas regardless.
But that point is largely moot because, as Ornstein and Mann exhaustively document, Republicans are not only obliged to retain a certain set of ideas, they must regard governance by their opposition as illegitimate which means they are also obliged to avoid even the appearance of bipartisanship or risk political extinction.
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Two words summarize the next two years of GOP behavior: Austerity and Vulgarity.
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Today’s GOP is the Tom Brady of ball-handling.
Limp and deflated…
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Bipartisanship?..
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Wisconsin is a textbook case for no bipartisanship. In 2020, the Republican led Legislature hasn’t even met since March or April. They and their allies have sued to prevent Governor Evers from implementing prudent health care Executive Orders - and didn’t even meet with him until last week when they finally “had some ideas” for how to halt the spread of the virus.
Until their is political punishment for this behavior by voters, nothing will change. And outside of the Presidency, the Republicans mostly won their elections, so there is no political punishment forthcoming. How to change that? I don’t know, but it won’t be by practicing unity politics, though it is worth the try.
(WI resident here)
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Republicans are going to be on a total war footing. NOTHING is getting done. Nothing at all. And the pain, misery and wreckage will be pinned on Democrats.
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Guaranteed
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Until they pay a price for harming America, Republicans will continue their cynical goal of power for themselves at the expense of all else.
Or to put another way as I said other posts, Republicans will only rejoin any “normal” American governance if their is a price to be paid for both their past crimes and any future crimes. That is without justice for what Republicans have done the last 5 years, there will be no cooperation because it is in Republicans self-interest not to cooperate.
Trump used the justice department to prosecute enemies and reward friends. Biden needs to use the justice department to prosecute criminals regardless if those criminals are also major Republicans. Because if America does not prosecute criminals, they will do it again.
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Will Republicans bow to reality and help remove all the administrative obstacles to voting — like voter ID laws and voting roll purges — that were premised on the purported fraud threat?
If they did that they’d never win again, so I’m guessing no.
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Look at Nebraska for example of good government. The Legislature is in session every year. A session lasts 60 legislative days in even-numbered years and 90 legislative days in odd-numbered years. And when I lived there there was a big fight because the Governor wanted to call a special session to deal with the aftermath of multiple tornados, session never happened. There is also a limit to the number of bills allowed. Both session limits and bill limits, I have read recently, are an ongoing desire coming from REPUGS and is backed by idiots such as Koch and ALEC for much of the country.
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Trump has owned Congressional Republicans from February 5, 2020, the day they voted to acquit him.That will be just as true once Biden is inaugurated as it is today. This supine and cowardly group had no problem with supporting Trump’s attempt to overthrow our democracy, it’s ludicrous to think that they will suddenly develop the will to oppose him.
Trump does not want bipartisanship, he wants personal redemption. From his perspective, this can only be achieved by his winning reelection in 2024, and that can only happen if the Biden administration fails. Nothing else is relevant to him, and his agenda will drive Republican policy.
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When the enemy of your enemy is something resembling a friend??? Good news:
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Until they lose enough votes to fully endanger them, they won’t do anything different. They can’t. They’ve run out of ideas and switched to entertainment. That’s all they do now, play to the cheap seats. It’s all performance art.
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The pain and suffering will be pinned on Democrats because the media owners don’t want Democrats to succeed. Democrats have to find ways to reach out to Americans that bi-pass the traditional media, all of it.
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Pretty much. I hope a President Biden doesn’t start his first term by negotiating with himself in an attempt to get Republican buy-in as President Obama did for six years since all indications are that the result will be the same as back then, unrestricted obstructionism from Republicans. Biden seems to be aware that times have changed but I fear his instincts will cause him to reach for a hand that isn’t there. Republicans have gone all in on painting Democrats as anarchic mask-wearing election-stealing baby-killing “socialist” pedophiles so I’m not holding out much hope that compromise is in the future.
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