It’s just a flesh wound!

November 17, 2006

Guest Post by Anonymous Liberal

I realize the media likes nothing better than covering Democratic in-fighting (hence all the breathless op-eds and news articles this morning discussing the “fiasco” that is the Democratic leadership race), but maybe, just maybe, we should now devote some attention to the fact that, despite being resoundingly rebuked by voters, the Republicans in the House have just re-elected the same people who have steered their ship into one iceberg after another over the last few years. As John notes below, by electing Boehner and Blunt, the Republicans in the House are basically extending their middle fingers to the voting public.

It’s remarkable really. While the Democratic party has been in a more or less continuous–and often paralyzing–state of introspection for what seems like decades now, the Republicans in Congress seem intent on proceeding as if they weren’t just booted out of the majority in disgrace. They seem to think this election was just a hiccup, a temporary setback in the GOP’s inexorable rise toward permanent majority status. It reminds me of the scene with the black knight in Monte Python and the Holy Grail:

ARTHUR:
Now stand aside, worthy adversary.
BLACK KNIGHT:
‘Tis but a scratch.
ARTHUR:
A scratch? Your arm’s off!
BLACK KNIGHT:
No, it isn’t.
ARTHUR:
Well, what’s that, then?
BLACK KNIGHT:
I’ve had worse.

[Arthur cuts off other arm]
BLACK KNIGHT:
Have at you!
[kick]
ARTHUR:
Eh. You are indeed brave, Sir Knight, but the fight is mine.
BLACK KNIGHT:
Oh, had enough, eh?
ARTHUR:
Look, you stupid bastard. You’ve got no arms left.
BLACK KNIGHT:
Yes, I have.
ARTHUR:
Look!
BLACK KNIGHT:
Just a flesh wound.
[kick]
ARTHUR:
Look, stop that.
BLACK KNIGHT:
Chicken!
[kick]
Chickennn!

Look, all teasing aside, I don’t mean to imply that this election was some sort of mortal blow to the Republican Party. But, at the very least, it should have been a mortal blow to their Congressional leadership. When the Democrats take over the House in January, their majority will be as big as any majority that the GOP has enjoyed over their entire 12 years in power. The “revolution” is over, folks. This isn’t just a flesh wound. It’s well past time for some serious introspection to begin. If you’re looking for a good place to start, may I recommend this observation from David Brooks in an interview on Newshour last year:

I think Republicans have in their minds we are the anti-government party. We came to shrink government. So they say that out on the campaign trail. But when you are the majority party actually governing, it doesn’t work. People want the problem solved. So instead of having a governing philosophy that will tell them I’m going to spend it here but not there, they have a governing philosophy that is irrelevant to actually governing. So they take that anti-governing philosophy and they just toss it out the window and when they get here and spend like sailors. So what you have is a governing philosophy that doesn’t apply to the real world . . . .

And it’s not just the voodoo tax policy and inability to cut spending. The programs the GOP has actually tried to implement over the last few years are, almost without exception, exceedingly ill-advised. Indeed the Republicans are fortunate that they weren’t successful in their attempts to privatize social security or create health savings accounts, etc. These are classic examples of ideas that were conceived of and championed because they conformed to pre-conceived ideologies and not because they made any policy sense. They would not have solved the problems they were intended to solve (indeed they would have made them much worse) and they would have grown increasingly unpopular over time. They’re just really bad ideas. And you can’t build a lasting majority on really bad ideas.

Republicans are quite good at campaigning and sloganeering. But to build a lasting majority you need to be good at governing too. The Republican party, at least in its present form, has shown absolutely no ability to do this. And until they do, they’re never going to have anything more than narrow and short-lived majorities.

The media have a simplistic, stereotypical image of what Ds are and represent — thanks in no small part to years of unanswered D-bashing by Rs. When something comes up that fits the media’s preconceived notion, it sets of a knee-jerk reaction — and reinforces the stereotype.

Ds should have more of a voice in the coming year (“should,” because it’s not guaranteed that the media will give them the voice they deserve), and they ought to use it to define Rs from their perspective — while acting to disprove what the right says about them.

The right launched its war on the left on many fronts, and they need to be confronted on each one.

  • But to build a lasting majority you need to be good at governing too.

    Exactly. The fact is, the current crop of leaders suck at it like few have every sucked at it before.

    And if they’re not stopped, death will greet all with big, nasty, pointy teeth …

  • Any one else see the similarity of the MSM to the troubador for brave, brave Sir Robin?
    Fatuous, idiotic fools.
    One day, we will have to consume them, and there will be great joy.

  • “Can’t I just have a little peril?”

    “No, too perilous!”

    The Dems maybe waflling, but it is better to debate and argue in the planning stages rather than charging headlong without thinking into a wedding party with your sword out and killing everyone in your path like Sir Lancelot did.

  • Monty Python also serves as a useful foil for describing how the right-wing favoring MSM sounds these days when talking about the Dems:

    Frenchman at the castle – ” I don’t want to talk to you, no more, you empty-headed animal, food trough wiper. I fart in your general direction. You mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries.”

  • Introspection?

    Now there’s a joke. You actually have to know how to think to be introspective. Republican’ts just do it without realizing that there is a process involved.

    It’s the difference between scratching with a back scratcher versus with your nails. Republican’ts don’t even realize there’s a tool available.

  • I think the longer the republic-thugs act as though nothing happened on November 8, the better it is for the Dems. Clearly the people voted for a change and the republi-thugs are not getting it. Period. Talk about tired, stale, liberal ideas, wait until we see this new minority in action. They are going to try to resurect Nixon again and they will be foiled. The smartest thing for them to do is regroup, and try to decide when and how they went wrong. If they don’t, it is at their peril, not the Democrats. Clearly that is not what they are doing. The definition of insanity is. . .

  • Monty Python has been a frequent point of reference at this blog. A Google search turned up 38 hits here four of which were to the Black Knight scene in the Holy Grail.

    While we laugh about the Republican’s failure to recognize their own defeat, we should also be wary of this. I think it signifies more than a denial of reality. It is an indicator of their determination to move on, pick up the pieces and eventually return victorious. Recall that their movement was built on the ashes of Goldwater’s defeat in 1964. So unlike the Black Knight who was rendered limbless and unable to fight, the Republicans still have a fight left in them. Democrats must do all that they can to keep these dangerous radical down.

  • Health Savings Accounts were established. I have an oportunity to establish one for next year as part of my insurance arrangements. They are kind of like IRA’s that you can spend on health care.

  • Health Savings Accounts were established.

    I should have been clearer. I’m not talking about the pre-tax money you can set aside to pay for health-related things. I’m talking about the high-deductable insurance plans the Bush administrations wanted to set up on the theory that people are “too insulated” from the costs of health care. That plan, like Social Security privatization, never made it anywhere.

  • In the spirit of the thread, Bush’s “mandate” just came flying over the wall like a huge wooden rabbit.

    Run away!

    But seriously, this year was the perfect storm, and I doubt we’ll ever be so lucky again. We have a totally incompetent and unpopular president, a war that no one likes anymore, and a one-party congress that protected a pedophile and took bribes from a lobbyist in a black hat. The chances of that kind of star alignment in the future are slim to none. So enjoy it, but don’t take it as a vote of confidence in the Dems, especially with people like Hastings and Murtha getting promoted.

    “Republicans are quite good at campaigning and sloganeering”. And way too many Americans are quite bad at thinking. The Republicans will be back, like the zombies in Dawn of the Dead. Chop off their arms, they won’t care. To them, it really is just a flesh wound.

  • Looks like the Rethuglicans need:
    “A spanking!”
    “Oh yes, a spanking!”

    I agree that this works well for the Democrats. It just makes it more obvious that the ReFuglicans are nothing more than a bunch of thugs hopped up on angel dust. They may believe they’re invincible to harm, they may have done a lot of damage on their rampage, but the cops are on their way with the shark nets.

    I don’t care if Boner and his cronies never know what hit them, I just want them to get hit. A lot.

  • As Keith Olbermann pointed out, Democrats exercise democracy and the press screams internal problems/decay/implosion. The Republicans reelect Trent Lott by ONE VOTE and it’s business as usual.

    And this website is acting like the press in general. I think most of us have not fully accepted the election and are looking, actively looking, for the tragic flaw. It’s only there if you think it is.

  • The Republicans impeached Clinton over a blowjob. George Bush selected Harriet Myers for the Supreme Court. Every major jobin DC has been filled with no-nothing partisans. And now somebody is worred about Pelosi’s power in the Senate?

    Just like the MSM to ignore huge huge outrages by the Repubs and worry about Pelosi’s clothing. They put the “s” in inanity.

  • You bring up an interesting point, namely–the Republicans should seriously consider how much *worse* they would have done in the recent elections, had they *succeeded* in privatizing Social Security.

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