America For Purchase

Every American actively or passively engaged in U.S. politics have witnessed that Republicans have been embarking on an aggressive obstructionist agenda, determined to block any progress the Democratic majority has tried to make on health care, jobs, or even approving presidential nominees essential to keep the government running, since Americans overwhelmingly elected Barack Obama as President.

Republicans form of leadership has been to use obstruction tactics in the Senate as the GOP has set a filibuster record of 152 times since Pres. Obama took office.  Republican senators are on pace to more than triple the previous record for uses of a filibuster in a Congress. In 2009, there were a record 112 cloture votes (the number of cloture votes is how you measure the use of filibusters). So far in 2010, there have already been more than 40 cloture votes.  It is easy for them to draw their huge salaries and not do any work or heavy lifting for Americans.  What would happen if the average worker simply said no to the people paying their salary yet expect to receive a paycheck – they would be fired!Conversely, the House of Representatives released a list in February 2010, of 290 bills passed in the House and now waiting for Senate action which include some major bills as the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, the American Clean Energy and Security Act and the U.S. Postal Service Financial Relief Act legislation and touches on everything from security, health care and food safety to naming post offices.  Say what you will about Nancy Pelosi, she is demonstrating true leadership and this is how a political party should lead.

Every educated American knows Republicans have turned their backs on Americans as the U.S. experienced the worst economic recession in history.  The GOP’s response to the current crisis in including health care reform, financial regulation and everything else has been little more than a repetition of worn out talking points; the ‘Party of No’ with no ideas.  This do-nothing Party resorts to what they do best, fear-monger against those very ideals which would ease the burden placed on American families from decades of GOP fiscal mismanagement for Middle America.

Republicans today simply have no interest in serious governance, of actually trying to accomplish something for the nation. They do want power; however they have no particular interest in using that power to make the lives of the American people better, other than protecting a few super-wealthy elites from having to pay a few dollars in estate taxes or increasing taxes on the rich to help out ailing families.

As an example, the National Republican Congressional Committee “Code Red” project, which according to its website is devoted to “alerting Americans to the Democrats’ health care takeover.” That site contains the hyperbolic attack lines that the right has been relentlessly pounding as their form of leadership as Republicans shout “be afraid” regarding health care reform citing that Democrats will Radically Increase Government Spending, Raise Taxes on Families and Small Businesses, Destroy Jobs, Cut Medicare for Seniors,  Force You Out of Coverage You Like, Allow for Taxpayer Funding of Abortion; all of which is totally false.

The Republican health care reform play book has several right-wing pundits who carry the water bucket of fear for the GOP.  Sean Hannity “Will the Democrats turn to reconciliation and try and JAM this health care bill right down your throat” and Democrats will “Ram it down America’s throat”; Glenn Beck “Jam it down their throat”; “force it down”;Cram this thing down America’s throat”; Bill O’Reilly “ram through” and George W Bush’s lap dog Karl Rove screams to Americans “Jam it together and by God shove it down your throat”. Given that GOP philosophy one could say Republicans used the budget reconciliation process to “JAM” and “RAM” down Americas’ throats President George W. Bush’s 2001 and 2003 tax cuts, as well as the 2005 Tax Increase Prevention and Reconciliation Act. In fact, Republicans used the reconciliation process no fewer than 16 times (a point made by MSNBC’s Joe Scarborough, a former GOP congressman. Sarah Palin “

These statements of course, have been rebutted time and time again, yet Republicans keep uttering them. And, as the Republican Party ramps up for the 2010 congressional races, they are not hesitating to plunk down the fear card to rile up the “reactionary” masses with fear and inciting violence.

Interestingly enough, in 2006, FactCheck.org compared political campaign ads from the two parties and concluded that while Democrats “generally attack Republican candidates on policy issues or their performance in office,” Republican ads “are much more likely to demean an opponent’s character. That’s the very definition of political mudslinging.”  This is the basis of Republican politics in this country and these same Republican politics of personal destruction has ruined our government.

In his 2010 State of the Union address, President Obama chided Senate Republicans, saying that “just saying no to everything may be good short-term politics, but it’s not leadership. We were sent here to serve our citizens not our ambitions.  So let’s show the American people that we can do it together.”

Democrats, Progressives and Independents are smart enough to recognize the lies and distortions that permeate through and from the Republican Party. Many have become discouraged through the year-long battle over health care reform and the obstruction from Blue Dog Democrats siding with the opposition against the best for our families. Some are justifiably angry about President Bush’s bank bailouts along with the escalation of the war in Afghanistan and other decisions from President Obama and the Democrat leadership.

However we must realize that any inaction, passivity or degrading of our President or our Party will only serve to hurt the American people if we fail to continue to seize this opportunity which so many historically voted for in 2008.

Voicing criticism of the Obama administration is one thing, but taking self-defeating stances is quite another. Are there really any Democrats, Progressives and Independents who honestly believe there is no difference between the Obama Administration and the Bush administration or who believe an imperfect health care reform bill is no better than none at all?

Barack Obama campaigned to reverse the course of the Bush Cheney years, which put politics and America’s richest people and Corporations above hardworking, taxpaying American families.  His message resonated to people hungry for something better all over this country.

If we believe we are powerless in today’s political climate then our passivity becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, a habit of mind that is harder and harder to shake. If we decide we can do nothing about key common issues, large or small and withdraw from the task and challenges before us, then we withdraw from public discourse and if enough of us withdraw, we actually hand power over to the greediest people on the planet, the Republican Party.

Do we as Americans really want Wall Street banks and corporations like Exxon, Goldman Sachs, UnitedHealth and Well Point to continue to deform our public discourse and govern public policy for ourselves and our families?

It is a natural course to realize bad times occur, they have throughout America’s rich history but we also must have hope that bad times are not inevitable.

We must not give up hope and settle for disillusionment.  We must continue the work to ‘fix’ our greed-driven economy, health care system and Wall Street and address the institutional arrogance and how the Republican Party has damaged the lives, neighborhood and communities of millions of Americans and put aside the qualms that divide us.

Republicans have worked very hard these last few decades to destroy the American middle class and to hammer the working class and poor and if Democrats, Progressives and Independents do not continue to stand up and be counted, this great divide will continue.  Americans would do well to remember that while Republicans gripe about having to pay any taxes, they leech off the labor and work of low and middle income workers and pocket the profits gained on the backs of the very people they despise.

While Republicans work on putting Ronald Reagan’s picture on the $50 bill, we must continue to work and to fight for all Americans and to continue to support those Democratic candidates who support our progressive values and we must defeat those Blue Dog wolves who wear the clothes of Democrats but stand against the basic values of the Democratic Party.

The author Thomas Paine wrote:  “Society in every state is a blessing, but government even in its best state is but a necessary evil in its worst state an intolerable one; for when we suffer, or are exposed to the same miseries by a government, which we might expect in a country without government, our calamities is heightened by reflecting that we furnish the means by which we suffer! Government, like dress, is the badge of lost innocence; the palaces of kings are built on the ruins of the bowers of paradise.”

America needs our strength, our vision, our demonstration of unity for a common purpose.  We will never always agree however that is the blessing of a Democratic Party which exhibits our diversity.  We can agree that in a unified manner for the common good Democrats can move this country forward with our vote, with our voices and continued support of our President and those leaders who champion our values and the causes of the American people.

Hope is what motives us, to do better, to plan for a better tomorrow for our families, friends and our nation.  It takes work, it takes resources and time, but the payoff will be a better country which will sustain us and make us more competitive and just in world.  Working together for a common and just purpose is simply the right thing to do.

While we live, let us have a country, a free country restored to the full meaning and intent of the U.S. Constitution and a Democratic Party that leads the way.

Tags Activism Barack Obama Congress Cynicism Democratic Party Democrats gridlock health care reform House news politics Party of No Republican filibuster republican obstructionism Senate Social Change

Filed under: Democrats