Jack & Jill Politics

From the “You Can’t Make This Stuff Up” category.  I can’t stand David Frum for obvious reasons (mainly, writing the idiocy that passed for G.W.’s speeches) but man, is it refreshing to hear a ReThug call out and B-Slap teabaggers, wingnuts and those who were hollering “N–gger” and “F–got” at CBC members like John Lewis and Emmanuel Clever or Barney Frank (Hat Tip John Aravosis at AmericaBlog):

No illusions please: This bill will not be repealed. Even if Republicans scored a 1994 style landslide in November, how many votes could we muster to re-open the “doughnut hole” and charge seniors more for prescription drugs? How many votes to re-allow insurers to rescind policies when they discover a pre-existing condition? How many votes to banish 25 year olds from their parents’ insurance coverage? And even if the votes were there – would President Obama sign such a repeal?

We followed the most radical voices in the party and the movement, and they led us to abject and irreversible defeat.(Emphasis mine)

There were leaders who knew better, who would have liked to deal. But they were trapped. Conservative talkers on Fox and talk radio had whipped the Republican voting base into such a frenzy that deal-making was rendered impossible. How do you negotiate with somebody who wants to murder your grandmother? Or – more exactly – with somebody whom your voters have been persuaded to believe wants to murder their grandmother?

I’ve been on a soapbox for months now about the harm that our overheated talk is doing to us. Yes it mobilizes supporters – but by mobilizing them with hysterical accusations and pseudo-information, overheated talk has made it impossible for representatives to represent and elected leaders to lead.

Let’s not forget that some of those elected officials willingly dove in head first with the fear-mongering (paging Michelle Bachmann, Peter King and other ReThug congresscritters).

The real leaders are on TV and radio, and they have very different imperatives from people in government. Talk radio thrives on confrontation and recrimination. When Rush Limbaugh said that he wanted President Obama to fail, he was intelligently explaining his own interests. What he omitted to say – but what is equally true – is that he also wants Republicans to fail. (Emphasis mine) If Republicans succeed – if they govern successfully in office and negotiate attractive compromises out of office – Rush’s listeners get less angry. And if they are less angry, they listen to the radio less, and hear fewer ads for Sleepnumber beds.(Emphasis mine)

Finally, a ReThug speaks truth.  If El Rushbo can’t fire up his base and get them angry, they have no reason to listen to him on the radio.  As Bill Maher said in his latest HBO concert “…The only audience Rush Limbaugh has are those white guys who get into their pickup trucks at lunchtime and listen to him so they can be frightened…they have fear of a BLACK PLANET…”

So today’s defeat for free-market economics and Republican values is a huge win for the conservative entertainment industry. Their listeners and viewers will now be even more enraged, even more frustrated, even more disappointed in everybody except the responsibility-free talkers on television and radio. For them, it’s mission accomplished. For the cause they purport to represent, it’s Waterloo all right: ours.

While I still haven’t forgiven Nancy Pelosi for taking impeachment of Bush and Cheney off the table and kneecapping John Conyers while she did it, I have to give her some props for getting this done.  Make no mistake – this bill isn’t perfect; there’s a timeframe before it goes into effect, with its own doughnut hole in coverage between now and its enactment that will have to be addressed before implementation.  But given the sausage-making process that is bill passage in the United States Congress, I will give Pelosi a prop for her own version of “Let’s Make A Deal”.  She is, after all, the daughter of old-time Baltimore-style politicos from back in the day, and if she learned nothing else, she learned how to wheel and deal at the knee of her daddy, Big Tommy D’Alessandro, who was a long-time mayor of Baltimore.

For now, I will enjoy watching Rush Limbaugh lie about why he won’t keep his word and raise up out of the States since this legislation passed; not to mention watching the early 4th of July fireworks known as the exploding heads of all of Teabagger/Goober Nation…..