The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
In the Washington Post, Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein have just published a comprehensive attack on the Republican Party. A sample:
We have been studying Washington politics and Congress for more than 40 years, and never have we seen them this dysfunctional. In our past writings, we have criticized both parties when we believed it was warranted. Today, however, we have no choice but to acknowledge that the core of the problem lies with the Republican Party.
The GOP has become an insurgent outlier in American politics. It is ideologically extreme; scornful of compromise; unmoved by conventional understanding of facts, evidence and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition....
On financial stabilization and economic recovery, on deficits and debt, on climate change and health-care reform, Republicans have been the force behind the widening ideological gaps and the strategic use of partisanship. In the presidential campaign and in Congress, GOP leaders have embraced fanciful policies on taxes and spending, kowtowing to their party’s most strident voices.
For decades, Mann (pictured on the left) and Ornstein (to the right), both attached to Washington think tanks, have passed themselves off as above-the-fray, utterly impartial, interested not in ideology but in getting things done. Which is to say, of course, that they reflect, without the smallest flaw or distortion, the conventional wisdom of the mainstream media and the Democratic Party, both of which believe that ever-expanding government is simply the result of responsible governance.
Now here's what's interesting. During the very period Mann and Ornstein deride, the supposed crackpot and marginal GOP has captured the House of Representatives in one of the biggest electoral swings in congressional history, picked up seven seats in the Senate, and chosen to nominate Mitt Romney, who, even though in many ways a remarkably weak candidate, nevertheless is already virtually even with the Democratic incumbent in national polls.
Mann and Ornstein don't have a problem with the GOP, in other words, they have a problem with the American people. "Shut up, sit down, and let people like us run the country." That's what Mann and Ornstein--and, again, the media and Democratic Party--have convinced themselves is the message, the responsible message, to carry into this election year.
Beautiful. Just beautiful.
Romney may yet win in a landslide.
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Comments:
May '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
I don't know about you but I like being an insurgent...
Dec '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
They've accepted every premise of American leftist political doctrine and policy. Of course they see the GOP as evil and wrong. We're still trying to argue for a different set of premises. Just as the science is settled on AGW, the left wants move beyond establishing basic facts about things like the size and scope of government.
May '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Maybe I am wrong to feel as good as I do, Peter, but I was thinking as I listened to the Pod Cast: The Swing people do not even know Romney yet. They know Obama, and he and his ilk are pretty unlikeable when it comes to their attitudes.
Maybe we can get a landslide yet.
Of course, Romney will do something as POTUS to make us unhappy. Such is life.
Oct '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Yeah, I like how they phrase it as "no choice but to acknowledge" in order to appear as if they are impartial observers.
And I like seeing Peter write things like, "Romney may yet win in a landslide." It's heart-warming.
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
If Romney tacks to the middle, this will be a close election. If he runs as a conservative, he will win a landslide. The American people want a choice, not Obama-lite. Mann and Ornstein must be living in a bubble. In 2010, we had a referendum on "healthcare reform" and on their notions about how we should handle the deficit, and they lost . . . bigtime.
Jul '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Impartial? Well it would appear they've jumped the snark.
Dec '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Guess that makes us "Rebels With A Cause".
++ Romney in a landslide
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Oooh. Sly of you, DocJay. I love it.
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
As usual, Paul, you speak wisdom.
Sep '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
May '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
I've nothing to add to your post, Peter, except maybe an "oh, yes" at the end of every paragraph.
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Pseudodionysius
1 minute ago
Exactly!
Oct '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Not me EJ, I want to be in the exact middle of the American political spectrum, with the number of conservatives on the one side of me equal to the number of libertarians on the other. I want to be the new squish.
Where does that leave the left? In Europe, I hope.
Sep '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Peter Robinson
Pseudodionysius
1 minute ago
Exactly! · 2 minutes ago
The two gentlemen in question have more than a passing resemblance to David Gergen eating a cookie at his desk and muttering "this is very complicated" under his breath during a commercial break. I've long admired Mr. Gergen's ability to pass off bewilderment and imcomprehension as contemplative wisdom.
Aug '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Sounds like we're really getting to them - absent logic they respond with a hissy fit. "But, but we're so smart! How come they're not listening to us?"
They had their chance - it took exactly two years for them to nearly blow up the entire country. We're busy trying to deal with the crater they created while they lament the fact that we've taken away their keys to the munitions closet.
Take 'em to the woodshed, Peter.
Mar '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Peter Robinson:
I think this opening statement explains everything that follows in the article.
Two phenomena were occurring when these two gentlemen came to Washington: 1) the US was just finishing an unprecedented 40-year leap toward social democracy, and 2) the political parties had not yet sorted themselves out among ideological lines. In other words, when Mann and Orstein came of age politically, it was not unusual that a Republican would impose wage and price controls.
The shift in politics since the early 70's has been little more than a slow, natural reversion to the American tradition. Of course Republicans have often been aggressors in that time: they are fighting the current status quo. But Ornstein and Mann have mistaken the political situation of 1972, a time which was anything but normal, for "the way things always were."
Edited on April 28, 2012 at 11:39pmOct '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
How can you believe that? The American people love their goodies from the government, just look at our tax code! They've been subsidized for decades: by government spending, by the overvalued dollar (and the unsustainable high wages it created), by our trading partner's tendency to subsidize their exports, giving us the illusion of a higher standard of living, etc.
Sep '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Sickening. Just sickening.
Aug '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Severely Ltd.
I want to be in the exact middle of the American political spectrum, with the number of conservatives on the one side of me equal to the number of libertarians on the other. I want to be the new squish.
I am so stealing this line.
Apr '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Norm Ornstein.
Barf.
He often appears on The Diane Rehm Show ("in the studio we have Norman Ornstein from the American Enterprise Institute...") as the right-most guest. Which means that with Diane and the two other lefty guests, the score is 4-0, left.