Look on the bright side, my Tea Party friends: At least this debunks Ted Cruz's accusation of Mitch McConnell being a "liar":
“We just don’t have the votes to get the outcome that we’d like,” McConnell said. “I would remind all of your viewers: The way you make a law in this country, the Congress has to pass it and the president has to sign it. The president has made it very clear he’s not going to sign any bill that includes defunding of Planned Parenthood, so that’s another issue that awaits a new president hopefully with a different point of view about Planned Parenthood.”
And McConnell said that in order to really make the changes he envisions on regulations, Republicans need a nominee at the top of the ticket who can win purple states — rattling off a list of places where he also needs Republicans to win Senate contests to continue as majority leader in 2017.
“Whoever our nominee is is going to have to appeal in places like Ohio, Pennsylvania, New Hampshire, Florida, Colorado, Nevada — those States that tend to go back and forth,” McConnell said. “Looking at the polling data in those key States, I think people are ready to go in a different direction. We just have to nominate somebody that they find appealing.”
You're not going to want to hear this, TPers, but Mitchie The Kid is right - as far as it goes. Barack Obama will never sign a bill that defunds Planned Parenthood, and McConnell does indeed not have the votes he would need to override the inevitable Obama veto of it. Neither would John Boehner on the other side of the Capitol. And The One cannot be bullied or intimidated into doing so, and couldn't be even if the media wasn't in the back pocket of his mom jeans. Why? Because he's a radical, rigid, extremist ideologue. A revolutionary, in other words. He will "fight! fight! fight!" regardless of the odds and circumstances. And, of course, the odds are always stacked in his favor. So in terms of actual legislative passage, the GOP needs at least thirteen more senators and a pro-life president.
Besides, McConnell doesn't even have the votes to reach cloture on the bill, which Democrats would undoubtedly filibuster, so a PP-defunding bill would never reach O's desk in the first place, just like the last one didn't. The only way it would get that far only to be stuffed in turn is by "nuking" the filibuster, and you all should remember what happened the last time Senate 'Pubbies tried to do that. And Mitchie has never been and will never be anything like that chippy.
Which leaves the government shutdown option. And McConnell ruled that out a month ago. TPers don't like that either, but before you all reflexively go postal (again) on the Elderly Campbell's Soup Kid, remember how the last government shutdown turned out: Tea Partiers demanded a showdown over ObamaCare defunding, John Boehner gave it to them, it went on for several weeks, the public rally behind the effort that Ted Cruz promised would be forthcoming never materialized, GOP poll numbers crashed, Obama and then-Senate Majority Chisler Harry (G)Reid didn't so much as twitch, Boehner caved, and that was that. The Republican congressional leadership fought - and lost humiliatingly. Tell me again why y'all want to see an encore over Planned Parenthood? I must be missing the "logic" of your argument. Unless you're into empty, symbolic gestures that actually lose us ground (as in the Dems demanding more than a "clean" bill, but, say, ending sequestration as well). A futility fetish, in other words. In which case, your argument is idiotic.
And by the way, here's something else TPers are not going to want to see:
Planned Parenthood's overall public support isn't overwhelming, but it is "above-water" (43-38). Every demographic is net-positive except Republicans (13-68), geezers (38-40) and white men (37-46) - or, in other words, not exactly a majority platform. Ditto defunding PP (41-51), where the only demographics in favor are Republicans (66-25) and white guys (50-43).
Bottom line is, Planned Parenthood is popular (public affinity which is bulletproof if the Center For Medical Progress's herculean efforts haven't put a dent in it) and government shutdowns are not. The bright side of the latter is that history shows the polling fallout is always short-term and transitory, so GOP skittishness is unjustified. The dark side is that government shutdowns never get us what we want. It's a losing tactic. So why keep employing it? Pugilistic artifice? Blind faith? Remember what Albert Einstein once said about insanity being defined as "doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results".
That's not defeatism, folks; that's simply the bleak reality.
Exit quote: "Here’s your general telling you he doesn’t believe we can win this war. Even if you disagree, do you still welcome that war knowing that he’s in charge of it?"
No comments:
Post a Comment