“The GOP Has A Lot Of Rotten People In It”: The Right’s Turn Away From Representative Government
Of all the unhealthy developments in this country, I think the following is the most depressing:
As partisan divisions solidify, the [Democratic] party’s electoral chances increasingly depend on turning out its core supporters—racial minorities, young voters and unmarried women, among others. That’s much of the reason for the big drop in the party’s recent performances in midterm cycles compared to presidential years.
It’s a reality the GOP understands just as well—hence the party’s efforts to make voting harder. As DNC spokesman Mo Elleithee put it while speaking to reporters in March, Republicans “know that when the electorate is large, they lose, when the electorate is smaller, they win.”
In announcing the Arbor Project, the Democrats are demonstrating their focus on increasing voter participation. This is certainly in their self-interest, but it’s also wholly consistent with traditional American values about both the right of everyone to vote and the importance of citizen involvement in politics. There is no corresponding effort to prevent likely Republican voters from registering to vote or to kick registered Republicans off the voter rolls.
The Republicans have concluded, as Mo Elleithee said, that the path to electoral victory isn’t to craft the better campaign or come up with the most broadly appealing policies, but to control the shape of the electorate by making it smaller. This puts their entire political party at odds with the cherished ideals of representative government. It also has an inevitable racial component, since the best visual predictor of how someone will vote is the color of their skin.
Part of this is explained by the fact that the GOP has a lot of rotten people in it, but I understand that if you are socially or fiscally conservative you want to have your views prevail, and if your views aren’t prevailing you’ll begin to devalue other objectives like determining the true will of the people. If everything I cared about was at risk because my party couldn’t win elections, I might start to waver on this whole democracy thing, too.
I understand that it’s easy to be for the broadest possible electorate when that clearly advances your political goals, and that it becomes hard when it doesn’t. But what’s so depressing about this is that this country has sorted itself into a political alignment where one party sees disenfranchisement and disengagement as their best hope.
I also see this as a consequence of the Conservative Movement’s fervent desire not to have to change their core beliefs about anything. They don’t want to moderate their positions on gay marriage or abortion or immigration, and as those positions become giant liabilities they feel that their only option is to turn against individual voters and try to keep them from casting their votes.
This is related to all the calls for secession, for example, in the rural areas of Colorado and California. It’s really taking on an ugly tone, with expressions of racism and xenophobia combined with a growing disdain for our democratic system of government. When you combine it with the libertarian strain in the GOP, it really begins to resemble fascism, because it’s nationalistic, race-based, often pro-corporate (although it has populist anti-corporate elements, too), anti-immigrant, and basically revolutionary in its opposition to the central government. Add in the attraction to pseudoscience and “creating their own facts,” its basic anti-intellectualism, its source of strength with the “job-creating” small entrepreneurs (anti-communist bourgeoisie) and you begin to see too many parallels with the fascists of old.
Admittedly, it more closely resembles the fascism of Franco or Mussolini than the death-camp fascism of the Nazis, but it’s a strain of politics that had to be destroyed once at great cost. And it’s growing right here in our neighborhoods and metastasizing throughout our legislatures.
By: Martin Longman, Washington Monthly Political Animal, June 8, 2014
“Joni Ernst Fights For Dirty Water In Iowa”: Shows How Far Republican Candidates Have Drifted From The Party’s Old Moorings
Joni Ernst, the winner of the Iowa Senate Republican primary on Tuesday, has a briefcase full of the usual shopworn, hard-right policies: no same-sex marriage, no reform of immigration, no federal minimum wage, no Education Department, no progressive tax code. She still clings to the idea of private accounts for Social Security.
But one of her positions, expressed at a recent debate, demonstrates a particularly pernicious and little-known crusade of the modern Republican Party: she opposes the Clean Water Act. She called it one of the most damaging laws for business.
That a Senate nominee could take this position, even more than the others, shows how far Republican candidates have drifted from the party’s old moorings. In 1972, the Clean Water Act passed with full bipartisan support, and is widely regarded as one of the most successful environmental acts ever passed. It doubled the number of rivers, streams and lakes suitable for fishing and swimming. It drastically reduced the amount of chemicals in drinking water, and substantially increased the size of protected wetlands. Rivers no longer catch fire.
The law’s value is so obvious that it shouldn’t even be necessary to defend it. But in Iowa, it remains a divisive issue, and Ms. Ernst’s offhand remark was a clear signal to the state’s big agricultural interests of which side she is on.
Iowa’s waterways are notoriously dirty, the result of runoffs from vast livestock operations and crop fertilizer. The problem has become worse in recent years with a sharp increase in the global demand for pork, leading to enormous hog farms that pack tens of thousands of pigs into small spaces. Last year, the Des Moines water utility had to turn on, for the first time, the world’s largest nitrate-removal plant to get the chemical — the result of manure and fertilizer pollution — out of people’s taps. (Excessive nitrates can cause cancer and miscarriages, and are linked to “blue baby syndrome,” in which infants suffocate.)
“The issue is the quality of the water in the Raccoon and the Des Moines” rivers, Bill Stowe, the waterworks manager, told the Des Moines Register last year. “This trend is absolutely off the scale. It’s like having serial tornadoes. You can deal with one, you can deal with two, but you can’t deal with them every day.”
For years, the state’s Department of Natural Resources, which is in the pocket of big agriculture, didn’t deal with the runoff problems. And two years ago, the Environmental Protection Agency told the state that it was violating the Clean Water Act and must immediately do a better job. State farm operations and politicians have bridled at the moderate increase in regulation that resulted, and last year House Republicans passed a bill that would undermine enforcement of the Clean Water Act, giving the states much more power to set their own rules. (Fortunately the bill was never taken up in the Senate.)
Ms. Ernst wants to take the seat of Senator Tom Harkin, who is retiring after compiling a strong liberal and pro-environmental record. For Iowans who worry about what’s coming out of their faucets, she has a great deal of explaining to do.
By: David Firestone, Editors Blog, The New York Times, June 4, 2014
“Gutlessness And Disingenuous”: While Our Planet Melts, GOP Pleads Ignorance”:
It is irreversible now.
And there’s a word that should get everybody’s attention. Last month, two groups of scientists, publishing separately in the journals Science and Geophysical Research Letters, issued reports that came to alarmingly similar conclusions: The melting of the West Antarctic ice sheet has reached a point of no return. If greenhouse gases stopped spewing forth tomorrow, we’d still face the grim prospect of steadily rising seas from this unstoppable melt.
So it would be a good idea to save what ice we still can. Or else condemn our grandchildren to vie for beachfront property in St. Louis on a planet of shrinking land, diminishing resources, and growing population.
This week, thankfully, the Obama administration — once noteworthy chiefly for its disinterested torpor where climate change is concerned — proposed politically risky new Environmental Protection Agency standards requiring deep cuts in carbon pollution levels at U.S. power plants by 2030. And the opposition party? Their attitude is summed up by the headline of a recent story on Politico: “Republicans on climate science: Don’t ask us.”
Writer Darren Goode reports that the GOP has adopted a new global warming “talking point.” Which is that they are not equipped to talk about it. As in Speaker John Boehner telling reporters, “Listen, I’m not qualified to debate the science over climate change.” And Florida governor Rick Scott demurring that, “I am not a scientist.” And a spokeswoman for the billionaire Koch brothers, the deep pockets of the right wing, saying, “We are not experts on climate change.”
The gutlessness, disingenuousness and sheer cynicism of this new tack are difficult to overstate.
For the record, most of us are not experts on climate science. But most of us have the good sense to listen to those who are.
The right, however, prefers to pretend there is some sort of “debate” in the scientific community over whether human activity is raising the temperature of our one and only planet. There isn’t. Indeed, that finding is accepted by 97 percent of climate scientists. This, according to the American Association for the Advancement of Science that, with 121,000 members, is the world’s largest general science group.
So the GOP’s “debate” is three scientists out of a hundred. Heck, you could probably find three scientists out of a hundred who think smoking is good for you.
Our planet is at a point of crisis. The ice is melting, the sea levels are rising, the oceans are acidifying, drought patterns are changing, precipitation is increasing, extreme weather is growing ever more common. Yet for Boehner, the salient issue is that “every proposal that has come out of this administration to deal with climate change involves hurting our economy and killing American jobs.”
Not to be glib about unemployment and recession, but if asked to choose between dinging the U.S. economy and killing the planet on which that economy depends — assuming that were even a real choice — it’s hard to imagine most of us would prioritize the former. And if the Democrats’ ideas are so bad, fine. Where are the Republican proposals? As was the case with health care, why are they once again late in their discovery of a critical problem and bereft of serious solutions therefor?
Here is an idea. The two parties should work together as if they were composed of adults to find a way to save our planet. Instead, the GOP is buck passing with an eye on the midterms. Ninety-seven percent of experts say we don’t have time for these shenanigans, yet Boehner and company pretend there’s still some kind of “debate” going on. Ninety-seven percent.
Maybe the GOP isn’t good at science, but surely they understand basic math.
By: Leonard Pitts, Jr., Columnist for The Miami, Herald; The National Memo, June 4, 2014
“Undermining Their Own Priorities”: When GOP Obstructionism Becomes Self-Defeating
The point of congressional Republicans’ obstructionism, which has reached unprecedented levels in the Obama era, is obviously to block Democratic priorities. GOP lawmakers could, in theory, negotiate with Democrats and work on bipartisan compromises, but in recent years, Republicans deliberately chose an unyielding strategy: no concessions, no cooperation, no tolerance for progressive goals.
On several key issues, most notably economic growth and job creation, the GOP tactic has proven to be quite effective. But what if the plan has quietly backfired? What if, by simply blocking attempts at governing, Republicans have undermined their own priorities?
On combatting the climate crisis, for example, GOP officials are obviously outraged by the Obama administration’s decision to use the Clean Air Act to impose new rules to reduce carbon pollution. But Jamelle Bouie raises an underappreciated point: “If Republicans are outraged by the announcement, they only have themselves to blame.”
In 2009, President Obama threw his support behind climate legislation in the House, and the following year, a group of Senate Democrats – including Kerry – began work with Republicans to craft a bipartisan climate bill. The process fell apart…. It’s not that EPA action wasn’t possible, but that the administration wanted legislation and would make key concessions to get it. In the absence of a law, however, the White House was prepared to act alone. […]
With a little cooperation, Republicans could have won a better outcome for their priorities. They could have exempted coal from more stringent spectrum of regulations, enriched their constituencies with new subsidies and benefits, and diluted a key Democratic priority. Instead, they’ll now pay a steep substantive price for their obstruction, in the form of rules that are tougher – and more liberal – than anything that could have passed Congress.
Congressional Republicans, through filibusters and obstinacy, can stop much of the governing process, but not all of it. When a policy runs into a choke point, its proponents begin looking for an alternative route to implementation.
In the case of climate policy, GOP lawmakers assumed they’d win by simply folding their arms and refusing to do anything. In practice, this often-mindless obstructionism simply forced the administration to begin to work on its own – without any regard for whether Republicans on Capitol Hill would like it or not, since the White House didn’t need their approval.
In other words, Republican tactics were self-defeating – GOP officials would have produced a more favorable policy, from their own perspective, if they’d only agreed to work a little with Democrats.
This keeps happening.
On judicial nominees, for example, Senate Democrats were reluctant to pull the trigger on the so-called “nuclear option.” Instead of leveraging that reluctance, Republicans did the opposite, vowing to block a series of nominees they found unobjectionable in order to force the issue.
Had the GOP minority been a little less ridiculous, Dems wouldn’t have pursued the nuclear option and Republicans would probably still be blocking a variety of judicial nominees right now.
The Affordable Care Act offers an even more striking example. President Obama and his team were desperate to strike a bipartisan deal on health care – they started with a Republican-friendly reform blueprint; they were prepared to bargain away progressive priorities, and they even signaled a willingness to incorporate conservative goals like “tort reform” into the legislation.
GOP lawmakers, under strict orders from party leaders, balked anyway, refusing any and all offers. No matter what the White House offered, Republicans said, the GOP would reject any attempts at reform.
But again, the obstructionism worked against Republicans – they didn’t stop the legislation; they simply blocked their own opportunity to easily move the legislation to the right.
We may yet see a similar dynamic unfold on immigration policy. House Republicans refuse to consider a bipartisan solution with broad support, pushing the president to consider unilateral action. If GOP lawmakers worked with the White House, they’d get a package that reflected their priorities, but by refusing to govern, they’re likely to end up with a presidential directive that gives Republicans nothing.
Bouie concluded, “[A]fter five years of relentless obstruction in the name of small government, Republicans may have helped set the stage for a world where government is much bigger – and expansive – than it is now. And if it happens, we should remember to thank Republicans for helping to make it possible.”
By: Steve Benen, The Maddow Blog, June 4, 2014
“Chicken Hawks”: The Despicable Republican Attack On An American Prisoner Of War
It is hard to fathom. Major elements of the once-proud Republican Party have stooped so low that they are systematically attacking an American prisoner of war because they believe it discredits their political adversaries.
Only one word serves to properly describe such behavior: despicable. And the mainstream media outlets that have enabled this attack by taking it seriously are not much better.
Here are the facts:
On Friday, President Obama announced the release of the last American POW in Afghanistan — Bowe Bergdahl. In exchange, five Taliban prisoners were released from Guantanamo Prison into the custody of the Qatari government that had helped broker the prisoner exchange. The Qataris agreed to prevent the Taliban prisoners from returning to Afghanistan for a year, by which time America’s combat role in Afghanistan will have ceased.
Almost immediately, the deal was attacked by Republicans as “negotiating with terrorists” — an act that they say would encourage more “hostage taking.”
In fact, of course the deal was a traditional prisoner exchange — the kind that combatants do regularly at the end of — and often during — wars. Both sides released prisoners of war that were taken by the other on an active battlefield.
The president negotiated the exchange because his overwhelming responsibility was to fulfill his commitment not to leave any American soldier behind when America’s combat role in Afghanistan ends later this year. What would the Republicans have done — let him live out his life in the hands of the Taliban?
You bet this exchange was in the national security interests of the United States, because it sent a message to all of the men and women in the American military — people who have volunteered to risk their lives for their fellow Americans — that our country has their back — that we will not forget them and leave them to die in some far off place once a conflict is over.
In fact many of the critics of the exchange never saw a day of combat in their lives. They stayed safely at home — having dinners at their favorite restaurants, enjoying a round of golf on the weekends — while they demanded that other Americans go to war in the Middle East. And now they have the audacity to question whether it is worth it to exchanging some Taliban prisoners to free one of the people who actually went to fight in their wars?
Many of the loudest critics are precisely the same “chicken hawks” who were the architects of the Iraq War — the greatest security and foreign policy disaster of recent history — premised entirely on intentional lies to the American people. In fact, many of them should have lost the right to be taken seriously on any matter of foreign policy, much less the right to be taken seriously when they — in effect — advocate that an American soldier be left as a POW for the rest of his life.
But the right wing’s attacks did not end with assaults on the prisoner exchange itself. Now they have turned to attack the character of the POW himself and the circumstances in which he was captured.
The bottom line is simple. If Bergdahl’s violation of a rule made him an easier target for capture by the Taliban, it is up to the American military to decide the facts of the case — not the right-wing pundits. And if he should have been disciplined, that’s up to the American military as well — not the Taliban.
Whatever the circumstances, Bergdahl suffered five years of deprivation and hopelessness that is unimaginable to the sanctimonious “chicken hawks” who sat safely by state-side while others fought and died in Iraq and Afghanistan.
In fact their attacks are reminiscent of the shameful way America treated returning Viet Nam veterans almost half a century ago.
This time, the “Obama derangement syndrome” that infects the right-wing pundit class has led them into a dark place that is simply over the top — even for them. Their Republican colleagues who are not so deeply infected by this disorder should restrain and silence them for their own good — and to protect what is left of the reputation of what was once a respectable political party.
By: Robert Creamer, The Huffington Post Blog, June 3, 2014
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