Empty stage for empty suits at CPAC 2014
Dispatches from the 2014 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) are coming in, and they’re not pretty. The CPAC conference is being held at the Gaylord Hotel (oh, the irony) in Maryland, and thus far has been a showcase for the Republican Party’s cultural symbols of God (love ‘im), Guns (love ’em) and Gays (hate ’em).
The Republican Party has a theme for 2014. We saw it in Bill O’Reilly‘s prosecution of President Obama in the form of an interview during the recent Super Bowl. The Republican 2014 election theme is: Attack Democrats on the Affordable Care Act, Benghazi and the I.R.S.
Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey speaking at an event hosted by The McCain Institute in Phoenix, Arizona. Photo by Gage Skidmore, used under Creative Commons license. http://www.flickr.com/photos/gageskidmore/10999009153/
New Jersey Governor Chris Christie‘s “Bridgegate” scandal has cemented Christie’s reputation as a bully. However, some folks are wondering whether being known as a bully could actually help Christie secure the 2016 Republican Party nomination for President, should Christie decide to run.
According to her campaign website today, Liz Cheney, daughter of former U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney, has ended her bid for U.S. Senate from Wyoming. Cheney’s withdrawal comes as a relief to Senator Mike Enzi, the Wyoming Republican incumbent who Cheney was challenging from the right. Enzi was one of a number of Republican U.S. Senators who are or were facing primary challenges from fellow Republicans aligned with the right wing Tea Party.
Amid their electoral defeats at the hands of women during their War on Women, Republicans are now being sent to school for “messaging against women.” This type of Republican message outreach hasn’t worked so well for the GOP in the past.
Pig at the barrel, West Palm Beach, FL
“The modern conservative is engaged in one of man’s oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness.”
—John Kenneth Galbraith
The one-word definition of conservatism is “selfishness.” How else to explain conservatives’ (and most Republicans’) opposition to the Affordable Care Act, which will allow millions more Americans to obtain health insurance? How else to explain the Republicans’ opposition to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (“SNAP“), which feeds millions of poor children in America? Or to raising the federal minimum wage, which now sits at just half the poverty level? How else to explain Republican opposition to the extension of long-term unemployment benefits, or the GOPs zeal to cut benefits for Social Security and Medicare, which keep millions of seniors barely out of poverty? How else to explain the Repubilcans’ love affair with the draconian sequestration cuts, except when it comes to military spending?
This holiday season, as many privileged Republicans gorge themselves on a bounty of food, tax cuts and high-flying stock market investments, and many of their followers inexplicably back them up, ask them why they support such selfish conservative policies.
“If one candidate is appealing to your fears, and the other one’s appealing to your hopes, you’d better vote for the person who wants you to think and hope!”
― Bill Clinton
The Republican Party is acting a lot like the zombie “walkers” in the tv series “The Walking Dead.” Check out the similarities:
Republicans have already revealed their strategy in the GOP shutdown: take America hostage by shutting down the federal government, and then criticize President Obama and Congressional Democrats for not “negotiating” major concessions, including defunding the Affordable Care Act, in return for Republicans reopening the government. Republicans skillfully repeat this word “negotiate,” but their definition of the term is absurdly narrow. In this context, Republicans only mean that President Obama should negotiate away popular Democratic principles and new laws while he has the GOP shutdown gun pointed at his head.
Republicans just got caught red-handed putting the interests of the Republican party over those of the country during their GOP government shutdown. First, as the video above indicates, Republican Senator Rand Paul was caught on a hot mic telling his colleague, GOP Senator Mitch McConnell:
I just did CNN and I just go over and over again, ‘we’re willing to compromise, we’re willing to negotiate.’ I don’t think they poll tested ‘we won’t negotiate,’ I think it’s awful for them to say that over and over again. … I think if we keep saying, ‘we wanted to defund it, we fought for that, but now we’re willing to compromise on this,’ we’re gonna win.
Then today, Republican Congressman Eric Cantor passed a memo to his colleagues urging a similar strategy to that expressed by Rand Paul, i.e., to say that President Obama and Democrats in Congress are “refusing to negotiate” during the GOP shutdown, and that Republicans are willing to negotiate. Cantor further urges his House colleagues to push for piecemeal bills to fund only parts of the federal government which are popular with the American people, such as reopening our national parks and funding veterans benefits.
Alas, the Republicans’ cynical strategy is now laid bare with evidence on video and on paper: take the United States hostage by shutting down the government, ask for ransom (defunding or delaying the Affordable Care Act that is the law of the land), then criticize Democrats for rightfully refusing to negotiate with the hostage takers. Are there any regular folks left in America who think the Republicans give a damn about them?
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