 "Photo: Illustration by Ginger Pugh")
The healthcare town hall meetings certainly make for entertaining TV. When it’s not an election year, policy debates are usually drab affairs, taking place in forgotten corners of Capitol Hill with no television networks in sight, save for the lonely CSPAN cameraman. But this summer, whenever a Democratic congressman hosted a town hall on healthcare reform, thousands showed up, and it was almost always must-see TV.
In Michigan, a man stood in Democratic Rep. John Dingell’s face and accused the Michigan politician of plotting the death of his son, who used a wheelchair. Another gentleman, this time in Pennsylvania, told Sen. Arlen Specter, D-Pa., that “someday he was going to stand before God” and then would get the judgment he deserved. A town hall in Missouri was disrupted when two women had to be escorted out the door for physically assaulting one another. A man carried an AK-47 around outside President Barack Obama’s town hall just because he could.
High-profile Republicans have almost universally endorsed the town hall calamity because they see it as a means to the end of stopping the Democrats’ healthcare reforms. But encouraging such craziness will only hinder the GOP in the long term. Republicans have been flirting with their right-wing cousins ever since losing power last November — and not just in the healthcare debate.
Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., claimed that the AmeriCorps, the domestic arm of the Peace Corps, could eventually utilize “re-education camps” (ironically, Bachmann’s son recently volunteered for AmeriCorps). And don’t forget the conspiracy theory that just won’t die: the one that says Obama was actually born in Kenya and is thus ineligible to be President. Never mind that this particular theory has been proven false by all forms of logic and investigation; the tinfoil hat-wearers will not give it up.
Actually, there’s a reason Obama has made only the feeblest of efforts to debunk these crazy claims. Independent voters are the kingmakers of American politics. Roughly the same number of Democrats and Republicans will vote and cancel each other out. But the candidate that can capture the most people in the middle of the political spectrum usually wins.
Centrist voters are naturally turned off by conspiracy theories of all kinds, and the more the Democrats can associate Republicans with the far-right wingnuts, the better they will do in the next election. Gravitating to the fringe is natural when your party is in the minority and searching for direction. The Democrats did it while Bush was President with persistent rumors that somehow Bush and Cheney planned and executed the 9/11 attacks. But even though one poll in 2004 showed that nearly one-third of Democrats believed such nonsense, no party leaders added this to their stump speeches. Barack Obama would not be president if he had campaigned on the “Bush and Cheney planned 9/11” platform.
The healthcare bill is a bad one, but it needs to be defeated with reasoned debate instead of shouting matches. The former will help rebuild the Republican Party, but the latter will doom it to more years of irrelevance.
10 comments
I have a feeling you were probably once a Republican (and supported many of their policies), but they fell out of favor with you, because Bush was just that bad. For many, I suppose it was just embarrassing to say they supported what was ostensibly a brain damaged man for president.
You say Dems are losing favor. The poll you quote is from Rasmussen, which pollsters know always has a right lean to it. Check other polls and you'll see that although the Dems haven't been making big gains, neither has the Republicans. And the Dems have the majority of people that identify as Dems in all but a few states.This might shock you.
www.gallup.com/poll/114016/state-states-political-party-affiliation.aspx
And this has improved since the election.Of course, there are many people that say they are Democrats, but would vote Republican for president or senator, etc.
But overall, it looks way worse for the Republicans. And since their epic failure, almost matching their behavior prior the Great Depression (another great Rep. accomplishment), they have not showed any willingness that they want to change their ways. In fact, I feel many of them feel they have not messed up anything, and should not apologize for anything, whether it was torture, the Iraq war lack of planning, the huge deficits, and inept cabinet, Katrina, supporting low wages while having tax cuts for the rich, deregulation of Wall Street.etc..I could go on.And believe me, the Dems have to deliver and be better stewards of our government than the Republicans were. Otherwise they won't deserve to be elected. But I suspect independents like you were willing to give the Bush regime at least 6 years before you started turning on him. It seems many are only giving the Dems and Obama 6 months, and in the midst of the worst financial crises since the Great Depression. It hardly seems fair, but really, I think it's just exemplifies where people's true political philosophy lies despite the fact the may be fed up with their usual party.Anyway, if you think the Dems need independents, the Republicans need them more. The only thing you have to ask yourself, which of their policies matter more to you. Personally, I can't find anything appealing about Republicans.
Do I think the Iraq war was good? Seriously? Do I think it is good that Saddam Hussein is currently 6 feet under? Yes. Do I think it's good that a lot of innocent people are dead? No. There is no basic "yes" "No" answer for something like that. The same goes for the rest of your questions, minus the 6,000 years evolution business. Quite frankly I couldn't care less how old the earth is or where we evolved from. That's much more a personal decision, and if someone wants to believe we came from Australopithecus: fine. If they wants to believe we were made in 6 days. Fine. Not my business, not my concern.Your idea that "anyone can conclude the dems are better right now" is false, as is the premise of the article.
As I posted originally, the Democratic Party is losing favor, and has been once again overtaken by the Republicans. so, apparently, not everyone can conclude they are better.
On a purely objective level, anyone could conclude that Dems are the better party right now.Please give me any reason why someone should consider the Republicans.(Believe me, I wish we had more parties. But as it is for us, the Dems make the Republicans look like retards.)
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