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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsRobert Reich: The GOP Crackup: How Obama is Unraveling Reagan Republicanism
Soon after President Obamas second inaugural address, John Boehner said the White House would try to annihilate the Republican Party and shove us into the dustbin of history.
Actually, the GOP is doing a pretty good job annihilating itself...All President Obama has done is finally found ways to exploit these inconsistencies.
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Ronald Reagan papered over these differences with a happy anti-big-government nationalism. His patriotic imagery inspired the nativists and social conservatives...But Reagans coalition remained fragile. It depended fundamentally on creating a common enemy: communists and terrorists abroad, liberals and people of color at home...Reagans GOP celebrated Norman Rockwells traditional, white middle-class, small-town America. Below the surface it stoked fires of fear and hate of others who threatened this idealized portrait.
In his first term Barack Obama seemed the perfect foil: A black man, a big- spending liberal, perhaps (they hissed) not even an American...Right-wing TV and radio snarled he secretly wanted to take over America, suspend our rights. Mitch McConnell declared that unseating him was his partys first priority...it didnt work...The 2012 election exposed something else about the GOP: its utter lack of touch with reality, its bizarre incapacity to see and understand what was happening in the country.
All of which has given Obama the perfect opening..Obamas focus in his second inaugural and, by inference, in his second term on equal opportunity is hardly a radical agenda. But it aggravates all the tensions inside the GOP...In hammering home the need for the rich to contribute a fair share in order to ensure equal opportunity, and for anyone in America be they poor, black, gay, immigrant, women, or average working person to be able to make the most of themselves, Obama advances the founding ideals of America in such way that the Republican Party is incapable of opposing yet also incapable of uniting behind.
- more -
http://robertreich.org/post/41456134467
President of the Whole Country
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022237431
Obama Reboot
http://www.democraticunderground.com/10022250933
ProSense
(116,464 posts)mindwalker_i
(4,407 posts)It lays out a lot of things that are, by and large, obvious, but brings them all together. the efforts to change the electoral college indicate that perhaps the Republicans understand all of this, and are hoping that they can focus on issues that unite a smaller (minded) base, and still win elections.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)"President of the Whole Country" is also a good read.
amuse bouche
(3,657 posts)the White House would try to annihilate the Republican Party and shove us into the dustbin of history.
He says that like it would be a bad thing.
Cha
(297,655 posts)silly wabbit.
vlyons
(10,252 posts)k&r
Cha
(297,655 posts)Who are also Global Climate Change Deniers.
Now, There's no Denying Climate Change
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/chase-guttman/now-theres-no-denying-cli_b_2069032.html
http://www.renewableenergyworld.com/rea/news/article/2012/12/koch-brothers-fund-bogus-studies-to-kill-renewable-energy
Thanks Pro Sense
pampango
(24,692 posts)social conservatives..."
Reich hits the nail on the head as usual.
love_katz
(2,584 posts)it is long overdue.
And I hope Boehner's worst nightmare comes true.
sellitman
(11,607 posts)They have no choice.
ProSense
(116,464 posts)try to rig the actually election:
If it is not stopped, the Republican war on democracy will tear this nation apart
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/01/27/1182006/-If-it-is-not-stopped-the-Republican-war-on-democracy-will-tear-this-nation-apart
zappaman
(20,606 posts)KICK
ProSense
(116,464 posts)kentuck
(111,110 posts)And the Democrats will do all they can to help them pass immigration reform that is favorable to the Republican Party. The death of the two-Party system is highly exaggerated, imo.
"Immigration legislation will save them...And the Democrats will do all they can to help them pass immigration reform that is favorable to the Republican Party."
...like health care reform saved them. They thought it would for a while, and then 2012 smacked them in the face.
They're not serious about anything, and this too will smack them in the face down the road.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/01/28/16736295-bipartisan-group-of-senators-complete-immigration-reform-package
That's what Republicans do: Clog up the process and then bail when the time for action comes.
rgbecker
(4,834 posts)When did you notice the difference if not in the fall of 2011?