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CaliforniaPeggy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 02:44 PM
Original message
GOP--Into Thin Air...today's LA Times
By Harold Meyerson

March 5, 2009

Those of us who practice or analyze California politics share an enduring conviction about the state. There's coastal California, stretching from the Oregon border to the southern boundaries of Los Angeles, which is liberal and Democratic. And there's inland California -- the Central Valley, the Sierra, the exurbs of Los Angeles and the desert -- which (along with Orange and San Diego counties) remains a bastion of right-wing Republicanism.

~snip~

In the mid- and late '90s, the once solidly Republican inner suburbs of Los Angeles -- Burbank, Glendale, northern Orange County among them -- began sending Democrats to Washington and Sacramento as their demographics changed. They are now solidly Democratic. What the 2008 election results signify is that L.A.'s far-flung exurbs will soon be poised for a similar makeover. It may take several elections, some incumbent retirements and the carefully targeted intervention of Obama's volunteer legions to realize such a transformation. But Democrats have a potent if inadvertent ally in speeding this change: California's right-wing Republican establishment.

State Republicans have made it clear that any of their members of Congress or legislators in Sacramento who vote, say, for an Obama stimulus package or a state budget that dares to raise taxes on the rich rather than close down schools will be cast into the outer darkness. So Republicans representing the districts that Obama carried -- and that's 40% of the state's GOP districts -- will go on opposing policies that increasing numbers of their own constituents support.

At some point, these Republican legislators may have their Wile E. Coyote moment -- looking down and realizing that they've run off a cliff. But Wile E. Coyote moments always come too late.

More at link:
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/opinion/la-oe-meyerson5-2009mar05,0,404961.story
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villager Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 02:48 PM
Response to Original message
1. Indeed! From your lips, Harold to God's ears! ;-)
n/t
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CaliforniaPeggy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 02:49 PM
Response to Reply #1
2. I am hoping so as well! Thanks...n/t
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wryter2000 Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 02:50 PM
Response to Original message
3. Well put!
I think you could say this of the Republic party in general. I love the Wile E. Coyote analogy.
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CaliforniaPeggy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 02:55 PM
Response to Reply #3
4. Thanks! I wish I had written this!
Yeah, the Wile E. Coyote analogy seemed VERY appropriate to me too!

:hi:
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old mark Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 04:55 PM
Response to Reply #4
5. I have been thinking and posting that this (disintegration of the GOPs)
Edited on Thu Mar-05-09 04:55 PM by old mark
would happen, but now that is seems to actually be happening I'm very happy to be seeing it.

They have carried the seeds of their own destruction for a long time, and it's possible this is the beginning of the end for the old GOP.

I think at least 2 patries will come out of it, neither large enough to actually do anything alone, but hating each other too much to work together.

mark :headbang:
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CaliforniaPeggy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 05:55 PM
Response to Reply #5
7. I would never have expected the GOP to self-destruct!
But, like you, I am very happy!

I think your outcome would be very desirable...

Two parties, both of them regional... And helpless!

:hi:
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musiclawyer Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 05:12 PM
Response to Original message
6. Harold Meyerson is great
I wish he had stayed in LA, but it looks like he stays up to speed. The entire central valley, except far north around Shasta County will be all blue in no mare than 6 years. Even the once blood red Sierra Foothills, where I am will be blue in a generation ( though it doesn't really matter because the population will remain so small).
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CaliforniaPeggy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 05:57 PM
Response to Reply #6
8. I am unfamiliar with his voice...
But no longer!

He is right on the money.

Thanks for stopping by!

:hi:
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TahitiNut Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 06:00 PM
Response to Original message
9. GEeee...Ohhhh... Peeeeee........
Edited on Thu Mar-05-09 06:10 PM by TahitiNut
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CaliforniaPeggy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 06:04 PM
Response to Reply #9
10. Alas...your picture is not showing! (nt)
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TahitiNut Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 06:06 PM
Response to Reply #10
11. Gravitas?


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CaliforniaPeggy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 06:09 PM
Response to Reply #11
12. Thank you, my dear TahitiNut!
Now it's showing, and it's perfect!

Indeed...gravitas...


:rofl:
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TahitiNut Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 06:11 PM
Response to Reply #12
13. Now... both are showing.
:rofl: :rofl:
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CaliforniaPeggy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 06:13 PM
Response to Reply #13
14. Indeed they are, lol!
Thank you so much!

Excellent choices, both of them!

:rofl: :rofl:
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Lionel Mandrake Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 11:07 PM
Response to Original message
15. Republicanes in terram cadunt.
(Republicans are biting the dust.)

That's good to know. It couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of people.
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CaliforniaPeggy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Thu Mar-05-09 11:25 PM
Response to Reply #15
16. Ah, Latin!
You do write like a scholar, methinks!

It certainly could not happen to a more deserving bunch...

Thank you.
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Lionel Mandrake Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-06-09 02:27 AM
Response to Reply #16
17. Actually, I am taking a beginning Latin class.
I had to coin a Latinate word for "republican". Rather than build something on "respublica", I thought it more appropriate in this context to assume a third-declension noun "republicanis", which would be a type of "canis" (dog).

This just shows how my attitude toward republicans has deteriorated recently.
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EFerrari Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-06-09 02:33 AM
Response to Reply #17
18. Not to mention your attitude toward dogs.
:)
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Lionel Mandrake Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-06-09 02:43 AM
Response to Reply #18
20. Mea culpa
I apologize to all dogs for comparing them to republicans.

It won't happen again (unless I forget).
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CaliforniaPeggy Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-06-09 02:38 AM
Response to Reply #17
19. Only beginning?
You seem to know a lot...

Anyway, many of us have found our attitudes deteriorating towards the Republicans...

The past 8 years have certainly given us plenty of reasons!
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Lionel Mandrake Donating Member (1000+ posts) Send PM | Profile | Ignore Fri Mar-06-09 02:53 AM
Response to Reply #19
21. I'm a slow learner.
Or maybe, like W. v. Braun, I'm apolitical.

This is my second time around for Latin. It's been several years since I first tried to learn the language, and I forgot all the declensions and conjugations, as well as most of the vocabulary.
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