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The Republicans are now in control of the House and made gains in the Senate. While Obama is still President (at least until the Republicans impeach him), the Republicans seem to be ready to set the tone of how the federal government will operate. I am assuming that they will be rocking out to the beats of Business As Usual and Money Talks. As the saying goes, “no matter who you vote for a politician gets elected.” I do wonder, though, whether Boehner will hand out checks on the floor of the House, or do so in the privacy of the offices (as the Democrats presumably did).
On a more serious note, it is worth considering what the Republicans will do and what they might actually change.
In some ways, the Republicans are now in an excellent strategic position even if they simply do little or nothing. If the policies of the Democrats end up working, most people will credit the Republicans with the improvement. After all, folks tend to “reason” that whoever is in power at the moment is causally responsible for what is happening at that moment. In reality, of course, what is happening now is usually the result of what was happening before. Now, if the policies of the Democrats turn out to be as horrible in their consequences as the Republicans and their Tea Party fellows claim, then the Republicans can blame the Democrats that remain in Congress (especially the Senate) and Obama. From a purely selfish standpoint, they are in an ideal situation to benefit from maintaining the status quo (including keeping the Bush tax cuts in place).
If the Republicans try to actually do things, then they run a political risk: if things go badly, they might end up unable to put the blame on the Democrats (after all, as the Democrats found, you can only blame the other party for so long before people stop responding). If things go well, they have to worry that Obama will get some credit and thus have a better chance of winning in 2012. As such, it would seem to make the most sense (in terms of holding onto power, which is what politicians are all about) to spend the next two years wrangling with the surviving Democrats over existing policies (such as health care) and pushing through the sort of bills that stay beneath the public’s radar.
Of course, the “stall 4 012” strategy is not without risk. While Sarah Palin and others were able to ably fold the Tea Party into the Republican party, there is still a great deal of dissatisfaction with Congress in the abstract. That is, many people are sick of business as usual and how the government operates regardless of which scoundrels are at the wheel of the car bus. The Republicans got tossed out because people were sick of Congress and only had the option to replace them with Democrats. This did not seem to make people any happier, so this time around the Democrats got the boot and the Republicans (and some Tea Party Republicans) slithered in as the Democrats were cast out.
Unless the Republicans are able to do some amazing things (which I am sure they will not) or are damn lucky (the economy surges, for example), then they will certainly get the boot again. Then the Democrats will slither back in and the boot-slither cycle will continue forever. While the Republicans might think they have a mandate (as the Democrats did) and that America has voted against Obama, the truth seems to be that America mostly voted not so much a love for Republicans, but out of disgust of how things are.
It is, however, worth considering that the Republican win might be good for the country (and not just for the Republicans and those they serve). Now that the Republicans have a hand on the wheel of the federal car bus, they might just decide to accomplish some things that benefit Americans in general-after all, we can now see them sharing the driver’s seat. Or they might just go back to the ways of the past.
As I have mentioned in previous blogs, I had hoped that the Tea Party would generate a viable alternative to the Republicans and Democrats. However, the Tea Party folks seemed to mainly just pull the party to the right (or into a wacky land of witches and horse porn). I suspect that the Tea Party folks who were elected will soon be properly assimilated by the system, thus ensuring that business as usual continues.
Historically, America has seen parties come and go. However, the Republicans and Democrats seem to have cemented themselves into place. Of course, even if they were overcome by a new party or parties, we would probably end up with the same old two party system-only with different names.
I guess the honeymoon was over before it even began.
Hey, are you psychic, or are you reading my emails?
😉
The republican party will destroy this country. 24 hours after the election they told Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan not to enforce the Volker Law. This means banks can resume riskly investments and once again the american public will have to bail them out to save our country. If Republican supporters think they are going to help you, don’t be fooled. They will help people like Goldman Sachs and JP morgan, so they can buy more yachts, airplanes and take expensive vacations. What about jobs? They are more interested in taking down the President than they are in creating jobs. Don’t be fooled, they want to put money in their own pockets, it’s the only thing they care about. They don’t care about the American people! Republicans got us into this mess, now they want to blame Obama. In 2008 te economy was like the Titanic, and when Obama took over it was already sinking. Now they want to blame everything on Obama, when it was Bush & Cheney who screwed up our country, because of their special interest crap. Republicans also want us to continue our dependancy on foriegn oil, it’s where they get all theiir money. This will also sdestroy our country. With the latest election, they will not allow anything to get accomplished because thewy are going to block everything. So if you want progress, you should have voted Democrat. republicans will scre4w us over and over again! Thanks for electing these jerkk offs! now, it’s ALL your fault!!!!
“This means banks can resume riskly investments and once again the american public will have to bail them out to save our country.”
No, Jeff, we don’t have to bail them out. We could not bail them out so they learn something. You guys had your chance and you failed; in fact, everything got worse.
And I don’t but in to Mike’s “Well, they all do it” mentality. That’s always the argument when the Dems fail. It was the same thing when Clinton stuck a cigar where it’s not supposed to go.
Over my lifetime, I look at how well America has done under both Republcan and Democrat rule. I at least know which side the economy prefers. How do you explain, Jeff, that for 8 years the unemployemnt was under or around 5% under Bush, and now the legendary need of Dems to tinker with it seems to have made things worse than I’ve ever seen in my life? Were people really not working under Bush? Was it all fake. Did they not make real monety to buy real food? Was everyone working for the housing industry that lost their jobs?
Stability and predictability, and minimal regulation always work.
Oh–and the president admitted he needs to do a better job. Apparently it’s you who doesn’t care about people, because many have no work and yet you still want to point fingers in hopes your side wins. Who cares what the numbers show, right?
What will you say if we have Republican rule again and the economy gets better again?
Jeff will use the classic Dem comeback of ” See it is getting better now from what the Dems did. there was just a delay for the effects. ” They are the party of Re-defining everything.
Well, if things get better before the Republicans pass any legislation, then the Democrats would seem to be entitled to some credit. Of course, sorting out all the causal chains can be tricky.
lol, well if the Republican party of ‘No’ can stop all of the money sucking policies of this administration then things WILL get batter eventually. I’m not sure anything has to be passed to make ‘things’ better. Seriously, why would you think something has to be passed? Where is the logic there?
Well, one of the biggest suckers is defense. Corporate support is also a major sucker. Will they desuck those?
The Republicans talk vaguely about reducing the deficit, but I am still waiting for some concrete plans. I do agree with the general view that spending needs to be reduced, but I suspect that the Republicans lack the will to cut what should be cut and are beholden to the interests that want certain things uncut. So, I predict a few token cuts with the deficit left escalating.
As George Will recently pointed out, Democrats are trying to come up with a lot of very creative reasons for why they lost. None of those reasons they’ve come up with say that their policies don’t work.
As far as the loss goes, a primary contributing factor seems to be that the Democrats did not convince enough voters that they were doing things that would make life better for Americans. While the Republicans did take positive steps to beat the Democrats, the Democrats contributed significantly to their own defeat.
Of course, it seems likely that the Republicans will also fail to convince people that they are doing things that will make life better for Americans and then the Democrats will be voted back in.
Well, Bush served his two terms. it’s a person thing more than a party thing.
http://www.bls.gov/cps/prev_yrs.htm
Per the BLS, the unemployment rate from 2001-2009
2000 4.0
2001 4.7
2002 5.8
2003 6.0
2004 5.5
2005 5.1
2006 4.6
2007 4.6
2008 5.8
2009 9.3
The simple average 6.6%, excluding 2009. I didn’t blame Bush for the first bad Obama year.
I’m assuming you’ll suggest that 9/11 caused the high rate in 2002-2004.
So, let’s assume that. If we average 2005-2008 we get 5.02%
I’m guessing you may assert democrats in Congress in 2007-2008. If so, the average is 4.85%.
Income stats in the Bush administration years are worse overall.
Obama to this point can’t any more than claim lamely that things would be worse, and there’s no way to show that. But point to Bush economic record with pride requires at least as much making excuses.
Not sure what you mean by “simple average”, but if I simply take the average of the numbers you quote for years ’01-’08 I get 5.26%, not 6.6%. Even if you have an exotic dismal-science definition of “simple average”, I’m curious how such an average can exceed the highest quoted input number by a factor of 10%.
you haver to go back farther than 2000 to show the real difference. Go back 50 years.
“But point to Bush economic record with pride requires at least as much making excuses.”
Well, he did have one of the longest streaks of such low unemployment in history. This does mean something, right?
WTP,
You have the math right.
My apology.
np. honest mistake.