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Title: The Kumbaya Temptation–This Is No Time For The GOP To “Work Together” With Obama!
Source:
VDare
URL Source: http://www.vdare.com/articles/the-k ... op-to-work-together-with-obama
Published: Nov 6, 2014
Author: Pat Buchanan
Post Date: 2014-11-06 20:39:45 by nativist nationalist
Keywords: None
Views: 7866
Comments: 24
Had a British prime minister received a vote like this, he would have resigned by now. The one issue on which all Republicans agreimage[1]ed, and all ran, was the rejection of Obama. And by fleeing from him, some even refusing to admit they voted for him, Democrats, too, were conceding that this election was about Obama, and that they were not to blame for his failures. Yet, though this was a referendum on Obama and his policies, and though both were repudiated, some pundits are claiming that America voted for an “end to gridlock” and a new era of compromise and conciliation. How so? If the American people were truly saying that, why did they vote to turn the Senate over to Mitch McConnell? Why did they vote to send more Republicans to strengthen the hand of John Boehner and those in the House who had “shut down” the government? Did America vote for the GOP to go back to Washington and work with Obama? Or did America reward the GOP for promising to return and continue to oppose Obama’s policies? Is the answer not obvious? What Republicans are hearing now is the siren song of a Beltway elite that just got its clock cleaned, an elite that revels in Republican defeats, but is ever at hand to give guidance and counsel to Republicans when they win. And that counsel is always the same: Time to put the acrimony behind us. Time to reach out and take the extended hand of the defeated. Time come together to end gridlock and move forward. And invariably this means move in the same old direction, if a bit more slowly. Consider several areas where the kumbaya temptation is strongest. The first is the rising clamor from Corporate America for the newly empowered Republicans to grant Obama fast track authority and support his Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement. Fast track would be a unilateral surrender of Congressional authority, yielding all power to amend trade treaties to Obama, and leaving Congress with a yes or no vote on whatever treaty he brings home. This would be a Republican ratification of the policies of Bush I and II that produced $10 trillion in trade deficits, hollowed out our manufacturing base, and sent abroad the jobs of millions of Reagan Democrats. Globalization carpet-bombed Middle America and killed the Nixon-Reagan coalition that used to give the GOP 49-state landslides. Why would Republicans return to that Bush-Clinton-Obama policy that ended the economic independence of Eisenhower’s America? The party should re-embrace economic patriotism, stand up to Japanese protectionists and Chinese currency manipulators, and put American workers first, ahead of corporate outsourcers. Immigration reform is a second area where the GOP is being urged, even by some of its own, to compromise. In return for Obama agreeing to improve border security, Republicans will be asked to go along with amnesty for millions here illegally. But did any Republican run on amnesty? Is the nation demanding amnesty? If not, then who is? Answer: Corporate America, Obama, La Raza and the editorial pages of newspapers that routinely brand Republicans as xenophobic bigots. Republicans should pass a stand-alone border-security bill, and then dare Senate Democrats to filibuster it and dare the president to veto it. If Obama declares an executive amnesty for five million illegals, as he threatens, he can credibly be charged will defying the manifest will of the nation and usurping Congressional power. The GOP would then be within its rights to declare all-out political warfare. Let voters decide in 2016 whether invaders should be rewarded with paths to citizenship or whether presidents should be duty-bound to defend the border. A third temptation will be Obama’s request for Congress to formally authorize the war he has begun in Syria and Iraq. If the GOP signs on, the party will own that war going into 2016, as it owned the Iraq war going into 2006, when it lost both houses of Congress. That the Islamic State is brutal, barbaric and anti-American is undeniable. But its occupation of northern Syria and western Iraq is the problem primarily of Syria and Iraq, and their neighbors in Lebanon, Turkey, Iran, Kurdistan, Saudi Arabia and Jordan. This is, first and foremost, their war, not ours. As Army Chief of Staff Ray Odierno said last week, “The long-term war against [the Islamic State] needs to be fought by the indigenous capability there. It needs to be fought by Iraqis. It needs to be fought by Syrians. It needs to be fought by other Arabs, because it’s their country and they need to win that back.” Before succumbing to the kumbaya temptation, Republicans should ask themselves not how to find common ground with Barack, but how to get America out of this Slough of Despond. And anyone who thinks last Tuesday was a call to compromise with Obama has either an ax to grind or a serious hearing problem.
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#1. To: nativist nationalist (#0)
America voted to get the 400 House Bills off of Reid's desk, debate them and vote on them and send them to the Grand Gridlock king.
But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name (John 1:12)
But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name (John 1:12)
That is a truly awesome map!
Amen! One of the pure delights is watching Harry Reid lose power. Sadly, 4 of the new kids on the block are already coming out for immigration reform. Ernst, Tillis, Gardner...I can't remember the last name. Sad that we have to get on them already! When they meet with President Obama Friday, Speaker Boehner and Senator McConnell should have the interests of Americans in mind, not illegal aliens. Friday's meeting could well determine the next steps for immigration policy. Your voice could be the difference between another S. 744 and restoration of the rule of law. They need to hear from their constituents pronto! Boehner and McConnell also need to be held to account: House Speaker John Boehner: (202) 225-0600 Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell: (202) 224-2541 We didn't elect these people to see them "compromise" on any issue.
Yes it was. It makes me sick to watch them come out with that straw-man! We need to tell them loud and clear that we didn't elect them to reach across the aisle but to destroy the Democrats and their agenda. I don't want to see a single caucus with any Democrat. I've been listening to this "end to gridlock" message all day! It makes me sick! I knew we'd have to hold feet to the fire, but I didn't expect it to be day 1 after the election.
The Republican Party is, and always has been since the Administration of Ulysses S Grant, the party of crony capitalism. The country club owns and operates the GOP, and will continue to do so. With their majority, they will fast track trade, and they will make sure that the cheap exploitable labor coming across the Mexican Border is not stopped and not deported. You can take it to the bank. The country club wants those things, and the country club will get them. So if you're thinking that the Republicans are going to put a wrench in free trade or the flow of cheap exploitable labor, you've simply ignored the last 145 years of Republican political history. Knowing, therefore, that the Republicans will enact the crony capitalist agenda - that is a certitude - what, then, can we really expect? Fast track on trade. The Keystone Pipeline approval. Symbolic gestures on Border Security, but no deportation or insistence upon it. The status quo is great for employers. Rolling back the aspects of Obamacare that impact businesses, but leaving the edifice intact. After all, Obamacare forces Americans to give money to large financial firms. The Republicans are going to leave that part of it intact. They'll unburden the corporate piece of it. Heavy support for arms manufacturing to go against ISIL. To Republicans, the key to war is that it's profitable for the big American firms. That's what you're going to GET. And you're going to hear the Republicans say, very disingenuously, that they WOULD do more for the PEOPLE, but they can't because Obama blocks them. So they'll just do what's good for their crony capitalists, and leave everything else in place. Just like they ALWAYS DO. Lucy is going to move the football, Charlie Brown. When has she ever not?
Amen, also they need to have the interests of Americans in mind, not the billionaires. The biggest liberals in America today are the billionaires, it is because of them that we have the illegal aliens. A party that puts America first will of necessity put American labor first. And stop undermining American labor with illegal aliens, sharply reduce legal immigration (and end it from places like Somalia) and stop undermining American labor with free trade that has crippled America workers, families and communities. The income tax on wages can be ended, with lost revenues made up for with tariffs on all the imports for billionaires like the Walton family, taxing capital gains as normal income rather than granting privilege to the speculative gains of billionaires like George Soros, and let the billionaires pay a higher tax rate to pay for the social problems caused by pandering to them on illegal aliens. A party that worships billionaires is a party that will put Americans last.
A party that worships billionaires is a party that will put Americans last. Ok. Now, when the GOP don't do any of those things. When they continue to put billionaires first, as they have since 1868, what then? Historically, the Republicans have been aces at getting people they're screwing to vote for them, while enacting the agenda of the Country Club. That will continue.
Historically, the Republicans have been aces at getting people they're screwing to vote for them, while enacting the agenda of the Country Club. That will continue. Agreed. I fully expect them to betray us, I think most conservatives on this forum have the same expectation. Your analogy of Lucy and the football is very accurate. I think most of us here take far more comfort in the defeat of the Democrats than we do in the victory for the Republicans. Pat laid out three items, with all of them related to globalization in one form or another: !. Free trade I expect the GOP to go for the trifecta and betray us on all three issues. The relationship between the GOP and the bulk of its voters has been dysfunctional for many years. The Democrats deserved to lose, the Republicans did not deserve to win. With the robber barons we at least had a tangible product that came from their acquisition of wealth, and they built many industries. Henry Clay Frick was one of the worst, but he did contribute towards building our steel industry. Our present crop of billionaires has much more in common with Daniel Drew, Jim Fisk and Jay Gould who used the Erie Railroad as an instrument of theft. Looters. The GOP will argue that we need to give preferential treatment to the capital gains resulting from the speculation and fraud of Daniel Drew, Jim Fisk and Jay Gould, that somehow this is preferable to honest labor which they will tax at a higher rate. And they'll bailout Daniel Drew, Jim Fisk and Jay Gould when their bets go wrong. In return Daniel Drew, Jim Fisk and Jay Gould will finance their elections to the parliament of whores. When you express your disgust with the GOP, please do not feel like you are a voice n the wilderness. Take heart, there are "seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal." You are not alone.
We differ, Vicomte. I'm a Breitbarter all the way, "First we take out the Democrats, then we go after the Rinos." (That's accurate, but not a direct quote.) This thing won't change over night. It will be a long struggle to take out the GOPe. Third parties just can't win. Percentages should tell you that. They can't compete. It's a simple fact. TEA people are the only group making headway in high offices. We've changed the rhetoric. We've added to numbers. We know full well that the fight has only just begun. No one underestimates the job ahead. Feet to the fire right out of the block! We knew that.
The Republican Party was a third party once. But then suddenly the big old Whig Party flew to pieces over a fundamental issue. Then it was slavery. Illegal immigration is not half as dire as slavery, but it's dire enough to effect a permanent schism in the Republican Party. In any case, the GOP brand is tainted beyond repair for me. I will never ever vote for them again, no matter what. I imagine that's sort of like some Christians are with anything labelled "Catholic": that well is too poisoned - the name itself evokes such hatred that it is IMPOSSIBLE ton reconcile. So, I don't think you can win. The current is set and insistent: America will be Hispanic, and Hispanics are poor and will therefore vote heavily Democrat. The Republicans are the Party of the Rich, and THAT is not going to change. The poor are not going to vote for the Party of the Rich, and Hispanics are mostly poor. They are not wedded to the Democrat Party, but they're not going to vote for the Plutocrat Party: it's against their interests. So, a third party could collect Hispanic votes over time, but the Republicans never well. So, that one current means that the Republicans lose over time, as the demographics of the country shift. The change comes much quicker, though, because of people like me who WERE Republicans, but for whom the name is toxic waste. More and more people will NEVER vote Republican again. The GOP is the Party of the Rich, that's who owns it. It can't be taken from them, and folks like me are not going to lift a finger anymore to try. When you add people like me, who used to be reliable voters but who now are gone for good to the Hispanics, what you have is a prescription for perpetual defeat. You say a third party can never win. But I say the Republicans started as a third party and won, but the Whigs never won again. I think that the Republican Party is the Whigs. You won't join a third party, and people like me will never come back to the GOP. That means no third party AND no GOP victory. So, we will have Hillary Clinton. That's a shame, but it's not enough of a shame to vote Republican again. We survived Obama. We'll survive Hillary. In fact, we'll survive perpetual Democrat rule. I don't like that idea at all, but I hate Republicans worse. So you may be right, that there's no hope for me because people like you will never leave the GOP. But I'm pretty sure that I'm right too, that neither Hispanics nor me will ever come back. Which means that there's no hope for you either. Hillary will be the next President. And Cuomo will probably succeed her.
That's the thing, we are a two party system, but that does not mean it will always be the same two parties. The Federalists and the Whigs are proof of that. A third party that wins by appealing to those who used to vote Republican will no longer be third party, it will be one of the two parties, and the GOP will go the way of the Whigs. The GOP has been skating on thin ice for quite a while, and as the interests of the donor class and the electorate grow further apart the ice will start to crack. The Whigs reached a point where they no longer served their electorate, and the GOP is doing the same.
Yes -- the Rockefeller Wing has been doing that. Fortunately the entire GOP isn't overrun by those types. It's the GOP's other factions who've also represented for the most part represented and supported Pro-Life, Pro-Gun, anti-socialism, and anti-Insanity. That will continue. Most likely....However, it's better than the alternative: Democrats, aka Commie-Fascists.
Yes. But a huge illegal voting demo didn't immediately side with the opposition party at the time, did they? You're comparing apples to oranges. We survived Obama. We'll survive Hillary. In fact, we'll survive perpetual Democrat rule. Which means WHAT exactly? The USSR also "survived" Stalin. And Germany "survived" Hitler. From now until 2016, America is at its seminal moment in history where the US Constitution and individual sovereignty are either respected OR discarded altogether.
Exactamundo. This trend must be reversed, which means RINO sell-outs Boehner, McConnell, and McCarthy desperately need to be ousted as respective "leaders" of the GOP.
No it isn't. The Country Club wants to privatize Social Security, and that would be a first rate disaster for most Americans.
So, Americans who think that way had better be out there now organizing a third party to replace the Republicans, because if this is a seminal moment, and the choice is the Democrats or the Republicans, the fruit that will come out of it all is Democrat rule. Republicans are unacceptable. Their economic concepts don't work for anybody but the crony capitalists. So, if this is really and truly IT, then the organizers of a third party need to be beating the bushes now.
It's too late to organize a Third Party that would both supplant the GOP while beating Democrats. would We ought to have been continuing to organize that 3rd Party since Perot, when he'd convinced a good 20% to vote with him. As a seminal moment, IF the GOPe allows 0bola to enact his EO and ignore the legislative process it's worse than you think; won't be governed under "Democrat" rule, we'll be lorded over under a Totalitarian dictatorship. Republicans are unacceptable. Their economic concepts don't work for anybody but the crony capitalists. Yet only factions of Republicans (conservatives) are left to defend the Constitution and Pro-Life/Pro-Gun issues. Ergo, Republicanism and a coup within that party remains the most viable political alternative at this point, don't you think?
No it isn't. It sure is even in it's toofless, effete, corrupt state. By leaps and bounds. The Country Club wants to privatize Social Security, and that would be a first rate disaster for most Americans. Yes -- IOW, the Rockefeller/GOPe faction. It'll be far easier to tear that subverted faction out of power from within rather than establish an entire cohesive viable Third Party at THIS point.
No, I don't. I think that's pure wishful thinking, a fantasy. I think that in the minds of most Right Wingers of whatever genre, money talks and bullshit walks. I think that most conservatives have an unhealthy fixation on money, and think that financial status is the primary measure of success, and that those who have the gold should make the rules, because they are "proven successes". I think that where a man's treasure is, there also is his heart, and that men who have devoted their lives to piling up money and power almost universally place money and power over people. And I think that most conservatives who don't have money and power are nevertheless enticed by it, and are like people with their noses pressed up against the glass at Tiffany's - they don't question why diamonds are even desirable, they just dream of the day they will have some. So, I think that from the outset, conservative capitalists have an unhealthy moral weakness when it comes to matters of money. They give money too much authority and too much status and deference. That's a general weakness of the right. When it comes to the Republican Party, for the first few years it was an anti-slavery party, but from U.S. Grant onward, it was a party of wealth accumulation and using control of the government to stockjob. It never ceased to be that. The men who fund the Republican Party at the levels that matter - at the levels that give them direct access to Republican politicians whenever they want it - those men firmly believe that their money is the proof of their intelligence and success, and entitles them to rule. They believe that what is good for them, is ultimately good for America. And the politicians, who are mostly men with their noses pressed up against the glass, think so too. The politicians also know which side of their bread is buttered, who gives them the massive contributions, and who will give them the half-million a year sinecure in industry once they're done with politics. Given this, the notion that a bunch of lay people, rubes, giving $100 bucks here and there, and going out and voting, is going to actually take over the Republican Party is a fairy tale. It's a desperate fantasy of powerless men who have no voice and no say, and who probably never will, but who learned their civics and who really want to believe that they count. Can you give a $500,000 a year job to a politicians once he loses or leaves office? No. Therefore, you are not ever going to be as important to the politician as the man who can and will. That's the way it is, and it isn't going to change. The Republican Party has ALWAYS been the party of crony capitalists, and crony capitalists all have the same worldview: they stack themselves up based on relative wealth, the consider themselves worthy of power because of money, and they consider that money talks and bullshit walks. These men write the checks that provides most of the funding for the operations of the GOP, so the GOP is staffed with their men, and always will be. That cannot be changed by a bunch of poor middle class guys getting together in some election. The money power at the top of the PARTY of money power is not going to be dislodged by mere VOTES. So no, there is absolutely no hope whatsoever of anything you want ever coming out of the Republican Party. There is also no hope whatsoever of the rank and file "rising up" to take over the party. It cannot happen. So, stick with the GOP if what you WANT is the immigration policy we've got: free flow of persons, who are not regularized, then that's what you're going to get from the GOP. They don't want the Hispanics to VOTE, because that means loss of power, but they don't want to Border closed, because that means that they will have to hire people like YOU, and you are expensive. You are a commodity, and they want the cheapest price. Stick with the GOP if you WANT "free" trade that allows the top dogs to get tax breaks for building factories abroad and hiring people there, and that allows them to ship goods into the country at will, putting Americans out of work. Stick with the GOP if you want to make sure that Roe stays legal and that gay marriage gradually becomes the law of the land. Stick with the GOP if you like foreign military engagements that require buying lots of gear and lots of contractors. If you don't like those things, don't vote GOP, because those are key economic policies of the GOP, and they will never change.
It will be as easy to take over the GOP as it would be to take over the Kremlin.
You're totally ignoring the Rockefeller faction's grip on the GOPe. But also discounting the millions of conservatives and patriot who are willing to put principle before money and fortune (yes, kinda like the Founders.) stick with the GOP if what you WANT is the immigration policy we've got: free flow of persons, who are not regularized, then that's what you're going to get from the GOP. They don't want the Hispanics to VOTE, because that means loss of power, but they don't want to Border closed, because that means that they will have to hire people like YOU, and you are expensive. You are a commodity, and they want the cheapest price. Stick with the GOP if you WANT "free" trade that allows the top dogs to get tax breaks for building factories abroad and hiring people there, and that allows them to ship goods into the country at will, putting Americans out of work. Stick with the GOP if you want to make sure that Roe stays legal and that gay marriage gradually becomes the law of the land. Stick with the GOP if you like foreign military engagements that require buying lots of gear and lots of contractors. If you don't like those things, don't vote GOP, because those are key economic policies of the GOP, and they will never change. Yeah, we GET all that; But again, true conservatives and patriots OPPOSE crony capitalism, abortion, illegal hiring & Amnesty and the rest of the GOPe's compromises. The Republican Party indeed is actually TWO Parties. And until the Rockefeller/GOPe ally of the Democrat Party is ousted, the status qou WILL remain more or less. Your Third Party scenario is a pipe dream. Why don't YOU take it upon yourself to devote your energies to establishing it from the ground up in your area?
Your point is well taken; Albeit, slightly hyperbolic. I'd estimate the Republican Party as 25% GOPe, 25% conservative, and 50% as on the fence awaiting the direction of the wind and their marching orders. Boehner or McConnell MUST go. And then the Rockefeller coup can be quelled man by man.
I've tried to launch the idea here and elsewhere to a wide politically interested audience. The general consensus of my fellow Americans is: "Nope". So, there won't be a third party unless some billionaire comes forward to do it. Ross Perot was one of a kind. I don't think we'll see his like again. Which means that we're stuck with the Republicans and the Democrats. Both disgust me. Given that there's no hope at all for this country ever going in a good direction, what I probably should do is stop writing about or thinking about politics and use this time for some other productive activity of meaning to me. I think I'm going to take my own advice. It's been good talking with you. I'm done with politics for awhile.
#2. To: nativist nationalist (#0)
Yet, though this was a referendum on Obama and his policies, and though both were repudiated, some pundits are claiming that America voted for an “end to gridlock” and a new era of compromise and conciliation.
#3. To: redleghunter (#2)
#4. To: redleghunter (#1)
America voted to get the 400 House Bills off of Reid's desk, debate them and vote on them and send them to the Grand Gridlock king.
#5. To: nativist nationalist (#0)
Yet, though this was a referendum on Obama and his policies, and though both were repudiated, some pundits are claiming that America voted for an “end to gridlock” and a new era of compromise and conciliation
#6. To: nativist nationalist (#0)
#7. To: out damned spot (#4)
When they meet with President Obama Friday, Speaker Boehner and Senator McConnell should have the interests of Americans in mind, not illegal aliens.
#8. To: nativist nationalist (#7)
Amen, also they need to have the interests of Americans in mind, not the billionaires. The biggest liberals in America today are the billionaires, it is because of them that we have the illegal aliens. A party that puts America first will of necessity put American labor first. And stop undermining American labor with illegal aliens, sharply reduce legal immigration (and end it from places like Somalia) and stop undermining American labor with free trade that has crippled America workers, families and communities. The income tax on wages can be ended, with lost revenues made up for with tariffs on all the imports for billionaires like the Walton family, taxing capital gains as normal income rather than granting privilege to the speculative gains of billionaires like George Soros, and let the billionaires pay a higher tax rate to pay for the social problems caused by pandering to them on illegal aliens.
#9. To: Vicomte13 (#8)
Now, when the GOP don't do any of those things. When they continue to put billionaires first, as they have since 1868, what then?
2. Amnesty for illegal aliens
3. War against Syria
#10. To: Vicomte13 (#8)
#11. To: out damned spot (#10)
(Edited)
#12. To: Vicomte13 (#11)
You say a third party can never win. But I say the Republicans started as a third party and won, but the Whigs never won again.
#13. To: Vicomte13, out damned spot (#8)
Historically, the Republicans have been aces at getting people they're screwing to vote for them, while enacting the agenda of the Country Club.
#14. To: Vicomte13 (#11)
But I say the Republicans started as a third party and won, but the Whigs never won again.
#15. To: nativist nationalist, Vicomte13, out damned spot (#12)
The Whigs reached a point where they no longer served their electorate, and the GOP is doing the same.
#16. To: Liberator (#13)
Most likely....However, it's better than the alternative: Democrats, aka Commie-Fascists.
#17. To: Liberator (#14)
From now until 2016, America is at its seminal moment in history where the US Constitution and individual sovereignty are either respected OR discarded altogether.
#18. To: Vicomte13 (#17)
So, Americans who think that way had better be out there now organizing a third party to replace the Republicans, because if this is a seminal moment, and the choice is the Democrats or the Republicans, the fruit that will come out of it all is Democrat rule.
#19. To: Vicomte13 (#16)
Most likely....However, it's [GOP] better than the alternative: Democrats, aka Commie-Fascists.
M
#20. To: Liberator (#18)
Yet only factions of Republicans (conservatives) are left to defend the Constitution and Pro-Life/Pro-Gun issues. Ergo, Republicanism and a coup within that party remains the most viable political alternative at this point, don't you think?
#21. To: Liberator (#19)
Yes -- IOW, the Rockefeller/GOPe faction. It'll be far easier to tear that subverted faction out of power from within rather than establish an entire cohesive viable Third Party at THIS point.
#22. To: Vicomte13 (#20)
I think that from the outset, conservative capitalists have an unhealthy moral weakness when it comes to matters of money. They give money too much authority and too much status and deference.
#23. To: Vicomte13 (#21)
It will be as easy to take over the GOP as it would be to take over the Kremlin.
#24. To: Liberator (#22)
Your Third Party scenario is a pipe dream. Why don't YOU take it upon yourself to devote your energies to establishing it from the ground up in your area?
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