About

Sunday, October 4, 2015

The Other Foot

("Seeking President, No Experience Necessary)


After years of filibusters, after focusing not on what could be accomplished but what could be shut down, after spending all their political energy on destroying the legacy of a sitting President, the Republicans had no answers when they were thrust into a position of power in both Houses in the last election cycle.

What is it that makes the likes of Trump, Carson and Fiorina so attractive in this bizarre alternate universe? It is merely that they have not been party to the failure to dismantle all that the President accomplished during the first six years of his term in office.

Mr. Wehner would suggest the core issue is one of tone that can be corrected by putting a better foot forward. But there is no better foot. This is what being a Republican looks like in 2016, with obscenely conservative stances parroted not only by the "newcomers" but those long on the political scene. 

The Democrats suffered through years of having the trappings of power but not its reality. Too many victories eluded their grasp. Too often they seemed on the defensive. It is a now all too familiar scenario only being played out on the other side of the aisle. The party faithful on the right turn their gaze away from those who, whether they were any part of it or not, are perceived as being unable to undo the intransigence and obstruction they in fact birthed. Government, once and still the problem. Only now it is their own.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

What legacy? Which accomplishments?

The weakest recovery from recession is U.S. history? Real middle class income down 9%? Or Al Qaeda is "on a path to defeat." Bashar Assad's "days are numbered." "If you like your current insurance, you can keep that insurance. Period, end of story." The Russian reset. Yemen is an example of a counterterrorist strategy "we have successfully pursued...for years." ISIS is a "jayvee team." Red lines in Syria, An Iranian nuke deal that basically guarantees Iran gets nuclear weapons. And on and on. A record of prediction as striking for the boldness of its initial claims as it is for the consistency of its failures.
This president has the swagger and arrogance of a man who has never encountered a contrary point of view he respected, or come to grips with the limits of his own intelligence, or figured out that facile arguments are weak ones, if for no other reason that the world is a complicated place, information is never complete and truth is rarely more than partial.

Robert said...

So to what then do you attribute the love affair with Trump, Carson and Fiorina? And are you considered one of those who have attached themselves to this trio? And if so, what positions have they articulated that you find most attractive? Don' t give me fiction.

Anonymous said...

Don't pay attention to the above comments. Those three stooges, Ben, Carly and Donald have no chance to win anything. Despite Obama most likely being the most incompetent and worst president in U.S. history we're Democrats, overwhelmingly the party of minorities, the poor, the uneducated and uninformed, and thanks to our support from teachers unions, those on welfare, and all those government dependent people we have no worries. As long as we keep giving them free stuff and teachers across America keep them ignorant and indoctrinated the hapless and evil Republicans have no chance at the WH. Look at NYC, they elected in a landslide the most incredibly stupid progressive moron in America! We have Hillary, Bernie and hopefully Joe. We're invincible because only right wing crazies care about Hillary being a criminal and Bernie a communist and Joe an idiot!!!!!

Robert said...

Wrong on guns, on taxes, on health care, on voter "fraud" on same sex marriage. Wrong on immigration, on the climate, on continuing aggression abroad.

I can see why you won't answer my inquiry. The best defense, huh?