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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Mar '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
One does not need to know much to know the liberals/progressives/democrats are full of wind. For the over 110 years from our founding until the first progressive president, Teddy Roosevelt, the classical liberals dominated the American scene. During the 19th century it has been estimated that our GDP grew at an annual rate of 26%. Since Teddy Roosevelt became the 1st progressive president has also been a little over 110 years. Compare the classical liberal performance to the progressive party's performance -- just look at the mess we are in. Frankly, I glory in their calling me an outlier. I bask in the knowledge that they can find no comparison between their party and ours. Who needs success like theirs? Who needs their advice on anything -- even how to conduct a one car funeral procession. When thinking of their performance inept is the only word that will describe them.
Ron
Sep '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Leslie, do not overlook the entertainment value of their bleatings: its one of the few fun things not yet taxed by Liberals.
Jan '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Joseph Eagar
How can you believe that?
I want to believe it because it it's not true we're doomed.
Sep '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Charlotte: Norm Ornstein.
Barf.
He often appears onThe 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. · 2 minutes ago
He's the Kangaroo on the court with the smallest pouch.
Dec '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Holy projection disorder batman.
Jun '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
There's nothing new here. James Burnham, formerly a man of the left and Bill Buckley's great collaborator in creating National Review, wrote this in 1964 in Suicide of the West:
I wish I knew who said this, but it does say it all about liberals:
Edited on April 29, 2012 at 12:20amRe: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Mendel
Peter Robinson:
I think this opening statement explains everything that follows in the article.
· 41 minutes ago
Cruel, Mendel. Very, very...delightfully...cruel.
Nov '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Augh, there's a link to Chris Mooney on Ricochet? I voluntarily stick my head into the sewers where that type of dreck flows several times a week, please don't tempt my masochism any further.
Dec '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Its stuff like this that makes compromise and serious government impossible.
The Ryan Plan is an inadequate joke. Its the biggest olive branch the left is ever going to get, and its spurned as a dystopian gutting of the poor.
The right cant offer a compromise ever, because it will mark the rightward poll of acceptable conversation.
If the left wants the right to compromise stop being unreasonable.
Edited on April 29, 2012 at 2:34amNov '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
This was quoted on my Facebook feed by several friends, very smugly. Even Norman Ornstein of AEI says it's all the Republicans. Can someone tell me why on earth he chooses to work at AEI, and why AEI chooses to employ him? I always thought they were on our side.
Edited on April 29, 2012 at 12:39amAug '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
tabula rasa: There's nothing new here. James Burnham, formerly a man of the left and Bill Buckley's great collaborator in creatingNational Review, wrote this in 1964 inSuicide of the West:
I wish I knew who said this, but it does say it all about liberals:
Edited 16 minutes ago
17 minutes ago
One of the best illustrations of the liberal mind that I have ever read.
Oct '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Ok, I read the article, and found it a fascinating display of regressive primate dung-flinging. Jonathan Haidt, call your secretary - there's been an unexpected delivery of research material.
I gargled twice and made a martini. (Plymouth, lightly threatened with M&R. Stirred, you philistines.) I'm ok now.
Among all those glimpses into the liberal mind, a few shiny things caught my attention. First the Allen West reference. Good writing, to put the big picture front and center: these roaches are suddenly in the light, and they do not like it.
Assigning Congressional gridlock the blame for our credit downgrades was a welcome bit of comic relief. The article could have used more of that.
I note they singled out Newt Gingrich, not Mitt Romney, for special approbation - don't y'all Romulans feel left out? Dr. Rahe, you are spot on as usual.
Repeat after me: the progressive project is and always has been the transfer of wealth and power from those who work at productive pursuits to those who do not. Mann and Ornstein are two very frightened primates. I feel all warm inside about that. Or is that just the gin?
Sep '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
The Liberal Utopia is built on a hyperinflationary stack of other people's money in the upper anteroom of the Tower of Babel.
May '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Holy [horsefeathers]. Anyone who believes that the modern Republican Party is full of extremists or outliers doesn't have the sense to comment on politics. The idea that Republicans are dismissive of the legitimacy of their opposition is a shameless projection of these writers' own elitist biases. I'm afraid to imagine what the shrill wailing of these leftist pseudointellectuals will sound like the morning after the election...
Jun '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Lucy Pevensie: This was quoted on my Facebook feed by several friends, very smugly. Even Norman Ornstein of AEI says it's all the Republicans. Can someone tell me why on earth he chooses to work at AEI, and why AEI chooses to employ him? I always thought they were on our side. · 6 minutes ago
Edited 6 minutes ago
I think AEI is institutionally on our side (Exhibit A: John Bolton, Jonah Goldberg). But just like the NY Times feels it must have a couple of pet Republicans (David Brooks and Ross Douthat), the AEI apparently feels it must have a pet liberal or two.
Does anyone else share my view that people who can paint Paul Ryan as a wild-eyed extremist have lost touch with the reality of America outside the beltway?
Edited on April 29, 2012 at 12:51amMay '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
That quote jumps the shark with it's reference to climate change.
Peter Robinson, do you understand, now?
Jun '10
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Pseudodionysius
2 hours ago
Pseudo, I'm not sure I like the new icon... Instead of the nice kitty, it's now what I can only assume is a sinister Canadian with dim lighting...
I'm scared....
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Joseph Eagar
How can you believe that? · 1 hour ago
I was around in November, 2010. Where were you?
Oct '11
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
tabula rasa
Does anyone else share my view that people who can paint Paul Ryan as a wild-eyed extremist have lost touch with the reality of America outside the beltway?
Lost touch with reality, period. That's fundamentally what it means to be an individual of the left.
We should use this gift of theirs to reflect on what it means to be like Mann and Ornstein - because few of us here are anything like them. We on the right err most frequently in our dealings with the left when we assume they share our motives and outlook. They do not.
Appreciate that Mann and Ornstein truly believe the things they write. The mind is a model, not a reasoning machine. Reason is among the highest facilities, one so difficult that we employ it only sparingly and with great effort. Most of the time, we - all of us - model. We are defined by what we choose to include.
A person of the left chooses to model things that make them feel good; whether those are fact or fantasy is irrelevant to them. That is the sub-conscious moral choice that commits one to the left.
Re: The GOP, Evil Empire. (Tee Hee.)
Lucy Pevensie: This was quoted on my Facebook feed by several friends, very smugly. Even Norman Ornstein of AEI says it's all the Republicans. Can someone tell me why on earth he chooses to work at AEI, and why AEI chooses to employ him? I always thought they were on our side. · 31 minutes ago
Edited 30 minutes ago
He chooses to work there because they are willing to pay him, and they are willing to pay him because it proves that they are bipartisan.