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Entries for the 'National Republicans ' Category
Gary Pearce posted on March 08, 2010 08:51
The Tea Party crowd is in a frenzy over rising deficits and the national debt.
In Asheville Friday, Republican candidates fell all over themselves at a Tea Party meeting that featured a clock tracking the debt.
Do these people have any memory cells whatsoever?
Obviously not, so let me remind them that, just 10 years ago, the budget deficit was heading toward zero. The debate in Washington was whether to spend the coming surplus on Social Security, tax cuts or paying down the debt.
That’s right: paying down the debt.
That was during the administration of a Democratic President named Bill Clinton. Before George Bush and a Republican Congress wrecked the budget.
And the Tea Party wants to return that crowd to power?
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Gary Pearce posted on March 04, 2010 10:23
A supporter of the new Wake school board held up a sign at this week’s hearing: “Elections matter.”
At the health-care summit President Obama told John McCain: “The election is over.”
They’re right. And Obama should ram through health-care reform just like the new school board majority is ramming through its new policies.
Obama needs to get something – anything – passed. Then move on to jobs and the economy.
And he’s better off being strong and wrong than weak and right.
Few people will understand what’s in his bill – or whether it makes things better or worse.
The Republicans will have a devil of a time overturning it, no matter how November turns out.
Similarly, in WakeCounty, there’s talk of a recall election of the new majority.
Two problems: How do you do a recall in North Carolina? And what makes you think it would turn out any different?
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Carter Wrenn posted on February 25, 2010 13:06
Up in Washington last weekend at the Conservative Political Action Conference every time Scott Brown’s name was mentioned the conservative hordes let out a bellow of approval – but, then, two days later Brown voted with the Democrats in the Senate to end a filibuster against President Obama’s latest ‘Stimulus Bill’ and Democratic leader Harry Reid purred, “I believe this is the beginning of a new day in the Senate.”
Scott Brown’s election has been heralded as a conservative triumph but, in fact, it’s not. Instead, Brown’s win is a triumph of Washington Republican pragmatism. The Washington Republicans – whose goal is Republican majorities regardless of ideological persuasion – have succeeded in electing a crucial 41st Republican vote and, in the process, probably dealt a fatal blow to Obamacare. So, they can argue, credibly, that even if Brown strays on Obama’s Stimulus Bills the game was worth the candle and adding up the pro’s and con’s, no matter how Brown votes, Senate Republicans come out way ahead.
But, at the same time, they have created – for themselves – a pair of problems: First, they didn’t elect Brown by saying he was another Olympia Snow – instead they waved flags of ideological purity all over the Internet persuading Republican faithful across the nation to pour millions into Brown’s campaign.
Result: The Washington Republican Establishment fooled the core activists in their own party, once again, and a lot of people who oppose Obama’s Stimulus Bills, abortion, and gay marriage contributed to a Massachusetts Republican who supports all three – which leads straight to the second problem.
The Independents who voted Republican last fall didn’t do it out of love for the Grand Old Party – they did it because they’re mad as blazes at President Obama. They want changes in Washington. A lot of changes – which Senator Brown voting with Democrats won’t deliver.
It sure looks like Independent voters are going to stick with Republicans through this fall election but if they wake up after the election to find Washington politics rolling along as usual – guess who they’re going be mad at next?
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Gary Pearce posted on February 25, 2010 08:38
President Obama may be setting up Republicans for a classic one-two punch.
First, the left jab: an open, public “discussion” where he challenges Republicans to put their ideas on the table. That’s what they said they wanted, isn’t it?
Then, the right uppercut: ramming a health-care bill through using something called “reconciliation.”
I don’t know what “reconciliation” means, but it is apparently a parliamentary term for “steamroller.”
Republicans will howl about the process. But who cares?
Obama needs a win – no matter how bloody. He needs to look strong. Then he can spend the rest of the year blaming Republicans for not doing more. And Republicans can blame him for doing too much.
And we’ll get a verdict in November.
Either way, Obama’s chances to pass a bill won’t get better.
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Gary Pearce posted on February 22, 2010 08:16
The best message in politics is always: “It’s Time for a Change.”
That worked like a charm for Democrats in 2006 and 2008. Voters were anxious, angry and ready to throw out the bums in power in Washington.
Nothing has changed this year – except Democrats are now the bums in power.
Democratic governors – many of them up for election this year – worried this weekend that President Obama’s message hasn’t connected.
It hasn’t. People still like Obama. But he’s reduced to arguing that his stimulus bill saved jobs and the economy.
Unlike Ronald Reagan, who also took office in tough economic times, Obama isn’t selling a popular cure. Reagan was selling lower taxes. Obama, when you get down to it, is selling more spending.
Republicans believe they’re on the right side of the winning message this year. So why should they do anything responsible – like solving the debt crisis or protecting millions of Americans from ruinous medical bills?
Likely as not, Republicans will win big enough this fall to once again become part of the bums in power in Washington.
Once they do, they’ll have a choice the next two years: Do something responsible – or just try to beat Obama in 2012. They’ll pick the latter.
Once Obama wins reelection against Mitt Romney or Tim Pawlenty or whatever loser the GOP nominates (it won’t be Sarah Palin, though she or Ron Paul may be the Ross Perot of 2012), maybe something will get done.
Until then, Americans apparently will just have to hang on and hope for the best.
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Gary Pearce posted on February 19, 2010 10:17
Has there ever been a more arrogant crowd than the new WakeCounty school board majority?
Judging from their comments yesterday, any sign of dissent or disagreement from Superintendent Del Burns is “insubordination” – and a firing offense.
Their attitude reminds me of an old political adage: “The lower the office, the bigger the ego.”
There’s a Tea Party flavor to all this.
The new powers-that-be remind me of Sarah Palin complaining about smarty-pants elitists who keep asking her questions about factual matters. Who needs facts and knowledge when you’re on the side of God and Right?
Teacher-bashing has long been a staple of right wing Republicans. Russell Capps thinks the superintendent should be a businessman, not an educator.
Maybe he could get Ken Lewis from Bank of America.
Pardon me, but I’d like the person running the schools to know something about teaching kids.
People of good will who care about education had better get organized. Or this crowd is going to wreck the WakeCounty schools – and do incalculable damage to the Triangle’s dynamic economic climate.
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Gary Pearce posted on February 17, 2010 14:00
Politico has an excellent overview of what’s happening to once-Republican states that went Democratic in 2008 – including North Carolina.
One reason it’s excellent, of course, is that it quotes me. Click here to read the analysis.
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Gary Pearce posted on February 17, 2010 08:29
Can Erskine Bowles save America? Can history repeat itself?
I was about halfway through the book The Clinton Tapes: Wrestling History With the President, by Taylor Branch, when I heard that President Obama will name Erskine and another Great Compromiser, former Senator Alan Simpson, to lead a national commission on the budget deficit.
You will remember that, in 1997, Bowles brokered a deal with Newt Gingrich and congressional Republicans that balanced the federal budget.
You will remember that, when George Bush 43 took office, the budget was running surpluses as far as the eye could see.
And you will remember, if President Obama is successful in reminding you, that Bush and the Republicans promptly wrecked the car and in just eight years gave us budget deficits that – all the smart people say – will wreck America.
Even before I heard the news about Erskine, I was struck by the parallels in Branch’s book between Clinton’s first term and Washington today.
Then, as now, congressional Republicans staunchly opposed anything and everything a Democratic President supported. “The hell with the country! We need to destroy this President!”
Then, as now, Republicans opposed serious deficit reduction – until their stubbornness reelected Clinton and forced them to compromise.
(Question: Why do congressional Democrats compromise with Republican Presidents – tax cuts with Reagan, deficit reduction with Reagan and Daddy Bush, education and drug benefits with Baby Bush, etc. – even though Republicans refuse to reciprocate? Answer: Democrats are more responsible.)
Then, as now, a Democratic President struggled to pass health-care reform that was and is, in Clinton’s apt description, “hard to explain and easy to criticize.”
Maybe now, as then, Bowles can navigate Washington’s stormy seas and bring the ship of state safely to port.
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Gary Pearce posted on February 16, 2010 08:26
So how’s that sassy, flirty thing working out for ya?
Pretty well, judging from the way the media has swooned for Sarah Palin, including even the sober dean of the Washington press corps, David Broder.
It must be about sex.
How else does a nitwit like Palin get taken seriously as a potential President?
Sex appeal obviously doesn’t hurt in politics. See JFK.
But something more is required. See John Edwards.
Like brains.
So don’t underestimate the intelligence of the American public. A recent poll showed that 71 percent of Americans believe Palin isn’t qualified to be President. Even 52 percent of Republicans agree.
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Gary Pearce posted on February 12, 2010 09:30
Several readers pounced on my blog about Obama’s favorable ratings in North Carolina:
“Hope that kool-aid tastes good,” one posted. Another: “Wow. Keep spinning, Gary.”
“At a time of deepening political disaffection and intensified distress about the economy, President Obama enjoys an edge over Republicans in the battle for public support….
“While the president is showing signs of vulnerability on his handling of the economy — a majority of respondents say he has yet to offer a clear plan for creating jobs — Americans blame former President George W. Bush, Wall Street and Congress much more than they do Mr. Obama for the nation’s economic problems and the budget deficit, the poll found.
“They credit Mr. Obama more than Republicans with making an effort at bipartisanship, and they back the White House’s policies on a variety of disputed issues, including allowing gay men and lesbians to serve openly in the military and repealing the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy."
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