There is a quote from the Doug Liman movie Go that stuck with me over the years. To paraphrase the quote, the character said that in the old days you got ahead by being better than the guy ahead of you. Now people get to the top by being so incompetent that the guy ahead of them can’t do his job and falls on his ass. And congratulations, you’re the boss. This sums up modern politics pretty well. While President Obama has far from failed, it’s undeniable that his job is infinitely more complex as a result of Republican incompetence and outright bitterness. It’s not in their best interest to compromise and work towards solutions because solving issues would be a win for the President.
One of the Republicans’ favorite tunes is how President Obama is so far left that he doesn’t believe in bipartisanship and compromise, and that he’s the most liberal president of all time. I wish. The truth behind this accusation is that it doesn’t matter what President Obama puts on the table because there isn’t a bill that they would support. You can give Republicans everything they are asking for, which has happened, and they still won’t support it. They are trying to sabotage their way to victory.
The pointless debt ceiling fight that has lead to the pending issue of sequestration is a great example. The debt ceiling was going to be raised. It was truly not an option, but it led to a long and bloody political battle, which is what the Republicans wanted. The unintended consequence is sequestration, the pending financial cuts across the board that kick in next year. Democrats and Republicans don’t want this because it means automatic massive cuts to domestic and defense programs. But who cares, it’s a Tea Party win and Obama is bruised.
This hijacking of the system has actually lead to Republican Senators Olympia Snowe and Jeff Bingaman to retire because anyone in the party who isn’t extremely far right can’t get bills or even a conversation passed the political grinder that they’ve created. Mitt Romney’s entire campaign is based on this political climate. He’s not running on his great ideas; he’s running against an atmosphere of political drudgery. If you waste an hour and read through his 59-point plan you’ll see very few new ideas, but little quips against Obama and how he will correct this air of uncertainty that Obama has created.
Make no mistake; this is a top-down effort to gut Democrats at all cost. Whether it’s Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker destroying unions, Republicans in Texas discriminating against minorities by redrawing district maps, or voter discrimination in Pennsylvania and Ohio, Republicans are rigging the entire political system at our expense. And don’t buy into the argument that this effort is working both ways, because it’s absolutely not true. Democrats are under the impression that if they put the best ideas on the table to actually help people that they’ll be somehow be rewarded. But it’s for hard for people to notice anything good produced by the government in the midst of political warfare.
