Negotiating With the Party of No
Negotiating With the Party of No
Negotiating With the Party of No
"Our #1 priority is to make President Obama a one term president" Mitch McConnell [1]
(For anyone who does not know, Mitch McConnell is the current Senate Minority Leader, meaning that he has a lot of power over Republicans. Once this current session of Congress ends and the Republicans take over the house, he will have even more power. Basically, he is one of the main leaders of the Republican party.)
I ask you here and now: How is it possible to work with someone who hates your guts? It isn't. If your number one goal is to get rid of that person, then you will do everything in your power to make sure that it comes about. The Republicans, especially Mitch McConnell, want Obama out of office. Mitch McConnell is certainly not alone either. Republicans are demanding that President Obama change the course of his leadership to accommodate THEM. THEY will not negotiate. Republican Sen. John Cornyn of Texas said that "it is up to Obama to change, not Republicans." [2] Mitch McConnell then said yet another brilliant remark "The surest way to achieve all of [the changes Republicans want] is to elect a president who won't veto any of them" [3] It sure seems like the Republicans are out to get President Obama at any cost.
Throughout all of this, President Obama has said that he is willing to compromise on issues. Specifically, President Obama said that he is "willing to work with Republicans on taxes, education, energy and a moratorium in earmarks" but the Republicans will not have any of it. [4] McConnell's response "If the administration wants cooperation, it will have to begin to move in our direction" [4]. Wow. If this is not Republican partisan bickering, then I do not know what is. The Republicans are refusing to even TRY to make the lives of Americans better. They care more about their own political agenda than the will and well being of the American people. A sensible and "connected" party would at least sit down to negotiations and try to work something out. This happened under Bill Clinton, there is no reason why it can't work now. But NO, the Republicans would rather kick Obama out of office than create jobs. This is evident in the quotes of Republican leaders; if they have some other private agenda of cooperation, it is certainly not clear.
A huge part of the problem is that Republicans are misinterpreting their win during the midterms. The party seems to think that the American people are "tired" of President Obama's policies, which is far from the truth. The truth is that few people know that Obama's actions saved this country from a depression. [5] One contribution of Obama's Stimulus was that it saved and created millions of jobs. We would be much worse off today if the stimulus had not passed. [5] The unfortunate thing is that you can't really take credit for averting disaster, only success once the disaster is created. President Obama kept this financial disaster from ever coming, but as Barney Frank said, "It's like wearing dark pants and pissing down your leg; it gives you a warm feeling, but no one knows you did it." [6] I hardly think that the American people are tired of job creation. The problem is that no one knows what President Obama and his administration actually did. That is partly his fault, but I will touch on that another time. If the voters knew of the things that Obama's administration accomplished, then the midterms would have certainly ended differently. In short, the Republicans are misguided.
The Republicans however are using everything they can to gain a few political points. If they can spin something to their advantage, then they will. I do not particularly blame them as this kind of business defines politics, but they are spreading a false truth. This makes negotiating with them even more difficult as they believe that Americans totally oppose Obama. History shows that during economic hardship, the party in power always gets voted out, unless they have something to show for themselves. The big exception is obviously FDR, but that is because he cut unemployment by a substantial amount. This happens every time, but the difference is that now the Republicans are not willing to compromise in order to improve the economy. They have made it very clear how their party will act. However, opposing President Obama will only get them so far. If the Republicans really care about the American people, then they will find a common ground with Democrats and negotiate. Compromise is how we get things done in America, not by refusing to listen. It happened when Bill Clinton was president, it can happen again. Republicans just need to stop saying NO.
Read this original article at http://www.newpolity.com/2010/11/14/negotiating-with-the-party-of-no/
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________________________________________________________________________________________ [1] http://thinkprogress.org/2010/10/25/mcconnell-obama-one-term/ [2] http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/10/17/post.election.bipartisanship/index.html [3] http://www.latimes.com/sns-ap-us-changing-of-the-guard,0,7494210.story [4] http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2010/11/04/mcconnell-no-mood-for-compromise/ [5] http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/17/business/economy/17leonhardt.html [6] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/10/pelosi-jobless-who-spurne_n_781580.html
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