I have been very conflicted with the great stories of the past few days. As I wrote earlier, we deserve no better than what we're getting, because our votes created what we have. That said, there are a few things I'd like to get off my chest.
1. A the start of this mess, I believed 1) the GOP had no endgame strategy in mind, least not one that was attainable and 2) that they would wind up on the short end of the stick as a result of their stance. As time goes on, I find myself rather counter-intuitively beginning to become more sympathetic to the arguments made on the GOP side and more supportive thereof. In the beginning, I looked at the Democrat stronghold on the Presidency and the Senate as presumptive; that this would dictate the outcome. As time goes on, I realize that this idea still holds, but that it doesn't mean they get everything they want, that they do not have to negotiate. John Boehner won in 2012 too. He remains the Speaker of the House and the House remains Republican. The system is constructed in a manner in which compromise is necessary. Obamacare was passed without a single Republican vote, and the Democrats are now reaping that whirlwind. The Republicans in the House have compromised from their initial position several times already--the Democrats--especially the President--have done nothing of the sort.
2. I am amused by the reaction of some of my friends to the situation we are in. There is a spectacular amount of political naivete coming from people I normally look to for searing insight and intelligence. They simply don't even ATTEMPT to try and understand "the other side of the issue"--in this case, my side. They have bought the DNC and Media (but I repeat myself) talking points and have decided that beyond the shadow of a doubt, one half of one third of the federal government was responsible for shutting it down. It takes two to tango, yet they believe only one side is dancing.
3. Folks on the left, including the President, seem to be very quick to associate policy disagreements with racism. I'm gonna play that game if you'll allow me, but I'll play "placism". That's right. My squishy, left-of-center friends who consistently bemoan the tactics of the Republican Party are placists. They sneer through their teeth at flyover country and the people who live there; they consider folks who don't commute on public transportation or rely on government funded healthcare or receive free birth control to be rural bumpkins. They look at an America where men (and women) drive pickup trucks, own guns, and fly the flag as backward and Neanderthal. If it ain't urban and hip, it's rural and extra-chromosomed. And those who represent this benighted sector of our country? They are beyond contempt. That they would actually represent the will of those who elect them strikes the left-squishes as beyond the pale. Placists. That's what they are.
4. The President and his minions have instituted over two dozen separate delays and exceptions to the Obamacare law passed in 2009. That Congress might ask for the same consideration strikes me as reasonable.
5. The news of the launch of Obamacare has been delicious, but Republicans cannot get too giddy. The bugs will work themselves out of the websites eventually. Where we CAN get giddy is in the continuing stories of middle class Americans--many of whom 1) believed that they would be able to "keep their health care" and 2) thought Obamacare was a good thing--being confronted with the costs associated with their new "options" under Obamacare, including the option of not having your prior insurance. This was never going to be a good deal for middle class Americans. They are quickly realizing that it is they who will carry the burden of extending coverage to more poor Americans. This is a wave that will grow, and grow, and grow. Before, someone could purchase individual policies geared to catastrophic ends. The risk pool was full of other healthy people, because the insurance companies were allowed to refuse people. They cannot any longer, and there is a laundry list of minimum features that they are now required to offer. Hence, more expensive.
6. Lots of criticism of the GOP that "they are going to make the country default over ideology". I suppose I had some sympathy for this line ten days ago. I don't anymore. I've come to realize that it seems to take this kind of brinksmanship in order to get the other side to wake up and realize that we are in an entitlements nightmare that will ULTIMATELY default and bankrupt the country.
7. Again, about my squishy lefty friends. For some reason, they dismiss the fact that Senator Obama voted against raising the debt ceiling along with EVERY SINGLE ONE OF HIS DEMOCRAT COLLEAGUES in 2007 as "politics". The fact that he was (at best) disingenuous and (at worst) lying doesn't even seem to make it into their consciousness. I don't think we should accept that kind of BS from our legislators and I hope that I would feel the same way about a Republican. Again--we're not talking about garden-variety inconsistency. We're talking about straight up deceit.
My you have fashionable friends. Just kidding, what you've really got there is a bunch of dickheads who can't or won't think for themselves. They're the present day "Gosh, I don't know ANYBODY who voted for Nixon" crowd from 1972.
ReplyDeleteBut these people are Obama's real constituency, not the middle class. They've been making money hand over fist in the market while the rest of America lives off Food Stamps. They live in those prosperous bedroom communities around DC flying first class with borrowed Chinese and "quantitative easing" money, and it seems to be never ending. So their thinking is "What's the problem"? The fact is nothing will change their minds until THEIR lifestyles are affected. They're just what passes for American aristocracy and I've always said statism has more in common with feudalism than any other ideology. And besides if worse comes to worse, they'll just get a waiver.
Well said CW.
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