As you all already know, I grew up in a different era. I’m 65 years old, and I’ve been highly active in following, and sometimes volunteering in politics for just about 50 years now. And it was never like this.

From my earliest days of political activism, the Republican party was always the enemy. But they weren’t inherently evil, just misguided. Democrats believe that everybody in the country deserves a fair shot at the good life, even the least of them among us, and once in a while they may need a leg up. And that meant that the federal government might need to step up and give them that hand.

The GOP on the other hand was the party of rugged individualism. Their motto regarding poor people was Let them lift themselves up by the bootstraps. And if they didn’t have boots? Then it was the job of state, county, local, and charitable organizations to pick up the slack. The federal government had no role to play.

But even with those massive differences, both parties had plans, policies, and agendas, and they were argued in the public square for elections. But no matter how the elections turned out, both sides went to Washington knowing that they had been elected to Do the peoples’ business. That was their only job. And that meant compromise. Because winner or loser, nobody gets everything they want, but if the people don’t get what they want, then you’ll likely be the next loser. And by and large, despite the piteous whining and histrionics, that system largely worked.

But not anymore. Because one party, the Republican party has decided to forego any attempts whatsoever at governance, and doing the peoples’ will, and concentrate instead on raw political power. They have wholeheartedly eschewed any attempt to actually participate in governing, or to serve the people who elected then to represent them.

And believe it or not, I don’t blame Trump. Trump was nothing more than an overstuffed, pompous, populait buffoon. He never had his hands on the actual levers, switches, and gears of the federal government. He couldn’t be bothered, he had Executive Orders to sign to canned applause. Like Reagan before him, he was a stupid figurehead that made a certain portion of the population feel good about itself. nothing more, nothing less.

No, the actual villain here is Mitch McConnell, and he far proceeded Donald Trump. On inauguration night of 2009, McConnell told a secret gathering of his closest advisors that the GOP would no longer make any attempt of actual governance. Instead they would become purely obstructionist, in a fevered attempt to make Obama a one term President. It didn’t work.

But n the other hand, for McConnell, it didn’t fail either. He regained control of the US Senate, and basically hamstrung almost all of Obama’s agenda. The phoenix being holding a SCOTUS seat empty for more than 300 days to wait for the next election. Which Trump won and gave him a pickup seat on the court.

But the Trump era changed nothing for McConnell. He instinctively understood that Trump was a total moron, incapable of actually governing, so he whispered in Trump’s ear while he consolidated his power. That’s all it was ever about for McConnell, personal political power. He used Trump as a vessel to ram through massive tax cuts for his rich shitpoke donors, and to stuff the SCOTUS with conservative justices that would overturn Roe v Wade. In 4 years of Trump rule, 2 of them with total government control, there isn’t a single example of a GOP attempt at actual governance. Just the expansion of GOP power.

There’s an old saying on Wall Street, Trees don’t grow all the way to the sky. And today, Americans are concerned with real life issues like inflation and rising gas and retail store prices. And the GOP, especially McConnell, steadfastly refuse to announce a single plan as to what they would do to deal with these issues if returned to power. Nothing is about the constituents, it’s all about the power.

In the halcyon glory days of Versailles, Louis XIV’s mistress, Marie Antoinette became ensconced in history when she said, in response to mass starvation in Paris among the peasants, Let them eat cake! Cake being a cheap bread readily available in Paris stalls. But when you don’t have a cent in your pocket, it kind of tends to ring hollow. And we all saw how that turned out.

These are not good times in America. We are no longer at war, but inflation and massive corporate price gouging of Americans are making us all feel the pinch.
Voters want answers, and solutions, and right now the GOP is giving them nothing other than platitudes and Trumpism. The Democrats need to concentrate on kitchen table issues, and demand that GOP opponents provide actual solutions. Good luck with that.

 

Help keep the site running, consider supporting.

9 COMMENTS

  1. Rick Scott, Nazi-FL, has an 11 pt plan that involves taxing the poor, sunsetting Medicare and Social Security in 5 yrs. We need to stress the one plan a rethug has actually put forward and hang it around all their necks.

    17
  2. gop does not govern, have not for a long time and in the states it is getting even worse as they almost seam to anti govern in states like Texas, Georgia, Arizona and Florida.

    I agree with nearly everything except your point that we are not at war. Yes, the troops are out of afghanistan and Iraq for the most part, but we are in the war in Ukraine even without troops on the ground.

    Biden is systematically destroying putin with sanctions and weapons. What he has done would have been Reagans wet dream if they would still have him in the Republican party. The inflation, oil prices, shortages, this is all due to the ongoing war.

    The cold war was supposed to end in the 1990’s. The cold war is ending now as putin destroys his army attacking superior forces. Yes, Ukraine now has superior forces. putins economy is a shambles, even the russian bloggers are beginning to speak out about how badly the war has gone.

    • Not just the war, Covid has a foot in this room. But, having said that, one has to wonder what the big corporates have pre planned with their profits in the stratosphere

  3. Oh dear Murfster – Marie Antoinette was the WIFE of Louis XVI – not the mistress of his great-grandfather, who was the one who built Versailles (he’s also the one who claimed ”L’Etat c’est moi – I am the State).

    ‘Qu’ils mangent de la brioche’ (let them eat brioche) was from Rousseau who wrote it in his ‘Confessions’ while Marie Antoinette was still a child and he attributed it to ‘a great princess’. That year she was a 12 year old living in Vienna and didn’t marry Louis until 1770.

    It’s as accurate a quote as ‘I have the data’ that certain pillow stuffers come out with

  4. I’d argue that McConnell was as much a symptom rather than the cause as Trump was. Yes, until recently, he was the closest thing Republicans had to a national leader (which Trump never truly was on his best day). But I repeat myself here when I say he was never better than a middle manager. His power has been slipping since John McCain torpedoed his attempt at the ACA and now he’s got nowhere near the pull he once had. Worse yet for the GQP, there’s no real replacement coming anytime soon. I tout Liz Cheney constantly but she’s currently in exile. The crazies will have to be purged or at least quelled first.

  5. Let’s pull democracy off the edge of the cliff this election then propose sweeping changes once the mandate is secure. The far left needs to realize that incremental changes appeal to the voters in the middle. They can have their wish list if they are patient like Moscow Mitch that will take years of careful planning and wooing or they could end up with nothing. Their ideas are great but need to be paused until the rest of the country catches up to the fundamentals. Half my community’s hair is on fire because they think the far left are commies. Put that fire out first then move on to policies. Biden won for a reason because he is moderate and some crossed over.

  6. If the magats succeed in changing our constitutional republic into an autocracy, they won’t have to give a shit. It will be game over and they….”won”. Of course they’re too effing stupid to realize that prize will be no good thing but by the time they do realize it, it will be a bit too late. It’s very easy to lose your agency. It is damned difficult to get it back once you’ve lost it.

  7. Concentrate on kitchen table issues, and demand that GOP opponents provide actual solutions.
    And Bob’s yer uncle!

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

The maximum upload file size: 128 MB. You can upload: image, audio, video, document, spreadsheet, interactive, text, archive, code, other. Links to YouTube, Facebook, Twitter and other services inserted in the comment text will be automatically embedded. Drop files here