Discussion for article #231868
Please, Republicans, DO THIS… Especially while most of you are whining and hand-wringing over the recent attacks in Paris…
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Yes, GOP please move forward on this issue; I mean it’s not like having a former white supremacist shutting down Homeland Security in a hissy fit over immigration will have no effect on the political affiliation of future Hispanic voters.
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Maybe Republicans could negotiate with the President and congressional democrats and pass a real immigration reform bill.
Nah, that is how a democracy works. Can’t have that.
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Since you have the choice of what photograph you use to accompany your text, I wonder why you would pick one of the most unflattering pictures available. I do not ascribe motive, but this is a choice and it leaves a bad taste.
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Since when would the GOP care whether government workers get screwed by having to work without pay? Sounds like a plutocrat’s paradise. Never cared about working people. Never will.
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“We will cut security to our nation unless you let us do whatever we want. So there!” said with a foot stomp.
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Republicans: “If you don’t do what we want, we’ll shoot!..We’re not kidding!”
(They take careful aim at their foot.)
https://ircimg.net/boston-globe-union-shoots-self-in-foot.jpg
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Good grief. Steve King is making sense.
What is the GOP coming to?
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And THAT’S an event as rare as a Sasquatch sighting.
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King’s lucidity is the thing that compels the conclusion that he’s not insane or box-of-rocks stupid, like so many of his colleagues, but rather, just actively, willfully malevolent.
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Yeah, yeah, yeah – but don’t underestimate the extent to which the GOP’s case could be strengthened if more than a few Democrats join them. (And I’m particularly referring to Democratic senators from red states who are planning on running for governor in 2016.)
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Scary isn’t it!
Honestly, it probably won’t. The one real lesson Republicans have learned over the last two decades is that they can do absolutely anything they want–shut down the government, try to cut Social Security, take the world to the brink of economic catastrophe, engage in open hate speech, endorse terrorists, conduct cannibalistic rituals on the floor of the House, you name it–during the first year after an election and suffer no consequences whatsoever next election as long as the behave during that second year.
The first year orgy of crazy will mobilize their base, but it will neither mobilize ours nor damage them with the tiny percent of indies who pay no fucking attention to anything in the news but still feel like they must vote and then do so based on how the commercials make them feel.
And, at this point, all evidence indicates that Hispanic voters who don’t already regularly vote will also sit out an election if the Republicans refrain from conspicuously shitting on them during the second year, no matter what they do during the first. They’ll turn out and reward Democrats for doing something for them during that second year, but at that point, the substantial number of members of Congress who come from districts or states with a highly fearful white population and a small Hispanic citizen population will kill off any efforts to do that.
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I think this misses how it will be played in the sound bite/twitterverse. Republican politicians don’t give a flying #$% about securing the border or finding and deporting noncitizens who shouldn’t be in the US. What they care about is beating up on a democratic administration for failing to do these things.
The fact that DHS will be less effective because the republicans have deliberately made it so is one of those “don’t bother me with the facts” footnotes that gets a paragraph or two in the New York Times and an ironic story on NPR.
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NC Steve, would you mind taking a stab at writing a “furlough letter” from the GOP to the employees of the US Border Patrol and all of the other citizens who would be affected by a shut down? The fact is that unless this is spelled out, literally, your observations about the Teflon nature of Republican shut-downs will be evident again. Maybe, just maybe, such a letter would be the grounds for a sliver of talking points that Chris Van Hollen and Steny Hoyer could use to instruct their caucus to use in the event that the GOP prevails in this madness.
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Yep, that is the pattern of late. BUT….it doesn’t have to be that way this time. Sometimes history repeats itself, sometimes it spirals. I’m going to go full blown glass half full here and say, nah….they’ll be just as crazy if not worse the second year as they will go so over the top the first year they will be flapping about like fish out of water trying to regain composure, message and convince people they are not bat shit and bad for the country.
The bell weather to watch, at least for me, will be McConnell. The more he lets slip the stress he’ll certainly be under with Cruz et all, the more his wrath will focus on them for not falling in line and making him look good. That’s when the shit is going to get really interesting.
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I don’t disagree. I do think however is that the missing piece in all of this is the Dems ability to point to what the GOP is doing and bring it to light. IF(!) they can do this, it will help to galvanize voters (in the same way that social security “reform” is likely to prompt senior citizens to the polls).
But, if no hue and cry is raised, then you are quite correct.
Maybe its time for the Dems to get mad.
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The reason that the bad behavior of Republicans in the first year after an election does not persist into the second is that Democrats have failed to put forward an effective narrative framework that explains and amplifies Republican actions.
Ask anyone what the Republican rap on Democrats is, and you’ll get a clear answer: Democrats weaken America and reward laziness. Ask the reverse question and instead of a clear answer you’re likely to get a list of issues that the Republicans have unpopular stances on. A list does not have the same staying power as a story. All the Republicans need to do to blunt the effectiveness of the Democrats’ message is to, as you say, behave somewhat reasonably for a period of time.
What is the Democratic rap on Republicans, in seven words or fewer?
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Maybe it’s time for the Dem base to get mad AND get smart as opposed to getting distracted and stupid. Maybe it’s time to not have to rely on Dem leadership getting out a message and just see what’s in their g*ddamn faces.
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