The Party of HELL, No! Republicans are, bizarrely, running on the inability — actually, unwillingness — of the present, Democratically-controlled Congress to get anything done, because of the unthinking, militant obstructionism of the Republican Party, and there is a sentiment abroad in the land — pure emotion, with not one iota of sense to it — that we need to "clean house" and "send them all home". Since there are only two electoral parties at the national level in the United States, that means that every Democrat would have to be replaced by a Republican, and every Republican replaced by a Democrat. (The only exceptions are incumbents displaced by a member of their own party in a primary election, but there are few of them.) If that were to happen, the relative positions of Republicans and Democrats in Congress would flip. But the White House — and the entire governmental apparatus of the Executive Branch — would remain under Democratic control.
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Democrats need to make plain that were that to happen, Congressional Democrats would do EXACTLY as the Republicans have done, and become a strident, uncompromising "Party of No" — on steroids! With a Democratic President and a super-militant Democratic Congressional opposition, Government would come grinding to a COMPLETE halt. Lest Republicans try to run on the idea that the Government SHOULD come grinding to a halt, Democrats should make plain that NO budget will pass that the President did not himself submit, and NO popular programs would be funded. No repairs will be made to Interstate highways, so when a tire-destroying pothole develops in a roadway on which people are driving at 83mph (standard in many places), the Federal Government will just let it be, and if that kills people, tuf. That's what Republicans want: small government; and small government cannot repair 65,000 miles of Interstate highways. Tell voters that if Republicans win control of Congress, Democrats will permit NO funding for the military above a bedrock minimum. Reduction of the armed forces from 1.2 million to 100,000. A complete end to all aid to Israel, which could save American taxpayers $3 BILLION a year. Indeed, we should present a bill to Israel for the $100 billion or more that was given as loans but never repaid. Closure of 95% of all military bases, with all the economic hardship that that would entail for communities and states in which they are located, including ALL bases in Red States! The President should make plain that there is no obligation of the Federal Government to disperse Federal agencies or moneys evenly among the states, so the President will give the Republicans what they want, less Federal money being spent — in RED States. All Federal agencies headquartered in Red States will be removed, back to the dark-blue District of Columbia. Moving the Pentagon and CIA out of Virginia might be hard to do, but it could surely be done. (We could actually disassemble the Pentagon building and reconstruct it in DC. We have disassembled and reassembled European castles in the United States. We could, in truth, move "the Pentagon" as such if we didn't want merely to disperse the military's functions among rented spaces in DC office buildings.)
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How could Republicans argue against centralizing Federal activities in the Federal capital? You wanted smaller government. We're giving you smaller government. Enjoy!
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As if it were not bad enuf that the Republicans have spent the entire nearly two years of Obama's term thus far (as at the November 2 election) in rabidly pursuing a policy of radical obstructionism ("The Party of No", indeed), the Republicans have let it be known that if they regain control of Congress, they will launch hearing after hearing and investigation after investigation into the behavior of the Obama Administration, absolutely paralyzing Government and setting Liberals and Reactionaries almost literally at each other's throat, with rhetoric so extreme that it risks inciting an actual civil war.
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Unlike the last Civil War produced by Reactionaries, however, this one would not be geographical alone — tho it would largely reproduce the geographical split of the (evil) South against the (righteous) North — but would be generalized, with Rightwingers and Liberals literally fiting to the death in every part of the Nation. Big city, small town, rural areas would see families set upon by their enemies in the middle of the nite, their houses burned while they sleep, and people who wake in time and try to escape from the flames being shot dead by their ambushers. Politics, religion, sexual orientation, economic status would all serve as dividers and inciters to deadly violence. No one would be safe, anywhere in the country.
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And what do you think our enemies abroad will do if we start tearing ourselves to shreds? Sit back and luxuriate in the spectacle? Some would, to be sure. But others would launch attacks upon all U.S. interests everywhere, as to produce mass death to Americans living and working overseas (including Peace Corps volunteers), and massive sabotage to all property of the U.S. Government (embassies, military bases) and U.S.-based corporations.
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The Republicans and Tea Partiers have been threatening violence for a long time. Note those crazy commercials by a Tea Partier running in a Republican primary in which a costumed "George Washington" tells people,"Gather your armies". Thousands of threats of violence, just barely concealed, have entered the public discourse in the past year and a half, as Rightwingers refuse to accept the results of the election that ousted them and installed Democrats (including a n*). They even took guns to areas outside places where the President was speaking! — and were allowed to get away with that in this insane country.
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When the Federal Government is solidly under the control of a Democratic Congress and Democratic President who control the entire apparatus of Government, including the military, such threats are kept to lunatic fantasies. But if the Federal Government is divided? and Republicans in Congress are daily inciting resistance to the President? How much violent fantasy will remain fantasy, and how much will explode into reality? Rhetoric need not remain rhetoric alone.
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Democrats need to tell the voters, NOW, that Democrats have thus far refused to stir up racial, religious, ethnic, economic, sexual, and other passions; refused to incite violence by anyone against anyone; and tried to take the high road, not launching even ONE investigation into the behavior of the previous Administration or holding even one hearing into the crimes of Bush-Cheney-Rumsfeld-et al. But if the Republicans gain control of either house of Congress, they have promised to launch hearing after hearing after hearing, and Democrats will not lie down and take abuse but will fite back with all the force necessary to end Republican misbehavior, dredging up ALL the crimes of the Bush White House, and working with foreign governments and the United Nations to set up an international war crimes tribunal in, say, the Hague,Geneva, or Brussels, and have the Obama Justice Department arrest George Bush, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Alberto Gonzales, and every other Republican responsible for the unprovoked attack upon Iraq, and for Guantanamo, and for waterboarding, and extradite them to stand trial abroad.
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Democrats should as well warn Republicans that the Obama Justice Department will finally indict every Bush Administration criminal for domestic eavesdropping without warrant, for the culture of corruption in the Abramoff scandal, and for every other misdeed of every kind committed by Republicans.
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Democrats should make plain that the Obama Justice Department and the Democratic Party will as well scour the record of every Republican in Congress, with special attention to any Republican who attempts to impeach the President, to expose to public scrutiny every personal scandal, every lie, every adulterous affair, every sexual peccadillo, every financial transaction of questionable propriety, every 'error' on every tax return, every ill-chosen word or bit of plagiarism uttered by every Republican in Congress and every state and local government across the Nation. That the Obama Justice Department will drive all the corruption out of hiding, and send dozens or hundreds or thousands of national, state, and local Republican misusers of any public trust to PRISON.
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I am really tired of Democrats being a bunch of pussies. They've got to scare the sh*t out of Republicans who know full well that they have skeletons in the closet that nobody has yet found, but could BE found if the resources of the Justice Department or even just the national and state Democratic Committees are devoted to exposing the real record of Republicans to the electorate.
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No one respects the Democratic "high road", when the low road wins the day. Democrats must make plain to the voters that they are highminded not of necessity but from choice — but that choice can change, and that Democrats can be TWICE as vicious as Republicans, and "rip" every one of them "a new one". Americans respect strength, and the willingness to fite for principle. Democrats have NOT seemed willing to fite for the right. Republicans have ever evinced willingness to fite for the Right. Between two parties, one of which is willing to fite and the other of which refuses to fite, who do you think will win? Between two parties, both of whom are willing to fite for their convictions, and one of which represents 63+ percent of the Nation's population, which do you think will win?
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Let the Republicans realize that in a war of extermination, in which scorched earth is the only earth left, there are no winners. But between the losers, the Republicans will lose worse.
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(The current U.S. military death toll in Iraq, according to the website "Iraq Coalition Casualties", is 4,416 — for Israel.)
- posted by L. Craig Schoonmaker @ 1:23 AM