It looks now as if this really, maybe, could be the end — Ted Cruz willing and the creek don’t rise.
And what was it all for — the government shutdown, the default cliff dance, the farcical dysfunction? Of course, it was about nothing, as we said from the beginning. And the Tea Partiers, who wanted to defund, delay and destroy Obamacare, are getting a worse deal than they could have had if they hadn’t put us here in the first place.
But don’t think the Tea Partiers lost. Among other things, they don’t accept conventional definitions of winning and losing, just like they’re a little confused on warming and cooling. Yes, the GOP brand is in full self-destruct mode. Yes, the polls are historically bad. Yes, John Boehner has cemented his place in whatever is the opposite of the speaker version of Mount Rushmore. Yes, the Tea Partiers really thought they’d get the worthless, except for its cruelty to low-paid staff workers, Vitter amendment into law — a new low in random small mindedness. Yes, it seems the phony baloney crisis will end the way everyone predicted weeks ago — with Boehner caving and Nancy Pelosi calling in the troops to save the day. And, yes, it has been a reckless course leading to a humiliating defeat, in which even the business community has to wonder if it has a trustworthy partner in House Republicans.
But you know who’s not humiliated. That’s right, those Tea Partiers who think the shutdown was a victory, that stepping right up to the default abyss was a hoot, that government is for losers and causing chaos is the reason they were called to Washington.
Chaos we had. Chaos we’ll have, it seems, forever.
We might even have some more before this one is all over, with default day tomorrow and the suicide caucus still dressed for battle.
If it really is over, though, and the Republic is saved for another day, we’ll see you in about three months and we can do this all over again.
When people vote for Tea Partiers to run the government, it’s like voting to put criminals in charge of the police force. These “new Republicans” do not believe in the institution they are in charge of running. Is it any wonder they try to run it into the ground?
There was a day when the left wing war protesters were the anarchists. Now the right wing “patriots” are out to destroy law, order, fiscal integrity, and civil government. Wow.
It doesn’t matter what you call the right wing buttery, Tea Party, John Birch Society, or the KKK for that matter. Their ideology, if we can call it that, is grounded in the rock solid belief that “our rights come from God”. They promote the fairy tale that the Constitution is based upon the Bible and the Founding Fathers were staunch Christians who intended this to be a “Christian Nation”.
When you think about it this is a philosophy rooted in fear and ignorance. The extreme right personified in the “Tea Party” espouses freedom and liberty when nothing could be further from the truth. If anything they would deny the rights of anyone who rejected their twisted belief “our rights come from God”. Under that concept they would deny anything that fell outside their narrow concepts of the Biblical belief.
The extreme right has demonstrated it time and again by supporting slavery and opposing the civil rights of women and minorities. Their fears are racial in nature cloaked in this absurd notion they are victims suppressed by the perceived evils inherent in a strong central government. They would take us back to the “Articles of Confederation and slavery when men and women we’re branded and shunned by the religious zealots of the time.
Tea Partiers are not patriots. They are narrow minded fools who’s agenda is to suppress the right to think and reason. No matter how you cut it. The Tea Party lives in fear the white race is endangered and they are on a mission from God to return us to the Dark Ages of history.
Why is this size of the type in this comment section so big? Oh and welcome back Mike
Both Tom Newsom and Ryecatcher are right. The Founding Fathers were not naive in their understanding of the fragility of Democracy. Democratic government was designed as the armor of the only idea yet more delicate than itself, Freedom. The process and time invested in the development of our representative form of government is evidence to that fact. They were mindful of the responsibilities ascribed to the representatives and their responsibility to their constituents. ALL constituents. The elected Tea Party reps either don’t care or don’t believe that have a responsibility to those constituents that didn’t vote for them and thereby circumvent a basic tenet of the democratic representation of all of their constituency. In addition, they completely ignore what is best for the Country as a whole. Cloaked in a veil of false patriotism, so aptly described in Ryecatcher”s comment, they propound fear on every level.
The ideas of Freedom and Democracy need to be loved, protected and defended as much as the written documents proclaiming independence and outlining the mechanics of our government. Not twisted and abused to benefit a self described few like the Koch Bros whose idea of freedom and democracy is the definition of aristocracy.
Just like the aristocracy of old, the elected, elite Tea Party aristocrats are not interested in the welfare of the people at large. They have learned the Republican lesson of the use of fear well. The Republican Party has used every avenue that fear can provide to strengthen their position and deserves to benefit from that which it has sown.
Ever since this Country has been blessed with the first Black American President Republicans, not just Tea Party types, have used racism, rejection, Obamacare (AFFORDABLE Health Care Act), women’s rights, (abortion) and every other social issue available as a tool of avoidance designed to keep Congress otherwise engaged than on the real issues like Immigration or the Jobs Bill that has been before the House for more than two years now. They are more interested in manipulating their political situation than the disaster facing millions of Americans each night at the dinner table if, at this point, they are fortunate enough to have dinner… The Grand Old Party of “NO” and the Party of FEAR!