Okay, here's a heavy-handed analogy, followed by a brief quiz:
So, some guys burn a house down.
Then they walk away.
Another guy comes along, sees the charred remains and wants to rebuild. He tries to gather materials but is thwarted by the friends of the guys who burned the house down.
Having little choice, he tries to get money to buy materials from those same guys.
They take the money, give him some materials to rebuild, but when he tries to use them, they knock the materials out of his hands. He bends down to pick them up and they knock them out of his hands again.
Sometimes they trip him.
Sometimes they make up scary stories about him.
They force him to give time and energy towards things that make no sense instead of toward rebuilding the house they burned.
And they never really let him get started with the rebuilding of the house they burned down.
Question: is the whole thing the new guy's fault?
Answer: if you are a Republican, then yes.
It's perverse, isn't it? It's an approach that echoes the arguably impotent "Just say no" anti-drug campaign that squeezed its way out from under a big Republican's behind. It's a way to say "Hey! I'm taking action!" when, really, you aren't doing anything except making a loud noise.
In this case though, denying any culpability despite having committed the aforementioned fictional analogous act in broad daylight is the height of sociopathy.
That is, unless it's a tactic. In which case it is a premeditated strategy based on studies of power and human behavior which probably rival similar studies as researched by academics connected to historically oppressive political movements enamored with such a manipulative and disingenuous endgame.
It's weird that such insensitivities seem to regularly spring from the right wing's well. After a while, you'd have to think that the welfare of American citizens isn't something they're really interested in at all.
And there's other stuff, too.
Like allowing the fringe to swamp the middle and looking the other way as chaos replaces order. This is clearly delineated every single day in the deeds and words issued from the right wing (or the GOP and Fox News by extension. No, wait... the other way around. No, wait...)
Another broad analogy would be to say that they are basically committing a perpetual hit and run on America. They have decided that the old ways of playing by sets of rules that apply to all ideological persuasions are obsolete, that the purposeful alignment with forces which resist any regulatory mechanisms and that almost by definition will most certainly become juggernauts of instability may net the newly ruthless right wing sponsors a quick return.
Given what the world witnesses every day, that would seem to be a reasonably accurate description of Things Right Wing. For they have decided that there's gold in them there hicks. And by obstructing almost all attempts to rebuild the country which was purposely effed-up by their own dastardly deceptions, by owning the means to disseminate their misdirected messages of mayhem, by owning all the tools which would facilitate a steady and necessary recovery, they retain the right to taunt, torture and otherwise ruin whoever comes along to fix it.
The problem is that such an approach will just as certainly burn the ground out from under them and all the unknowing, unseeing enablers that comprise their fringe infantry.
And when their own house burns, will there be anyone to help them rebuild?
Follow Steven Weber on Twitter: www.twitter.com/@TheStevenWeber
...sooo, how's that a problem? heheheh x)
The problem is the new guy is incompetent and has never run anything or rebuilt anything before. He doesn't know what he's doing so he brings in a bunch of other incompetent people. Instead of actually rebuilding the burned down house they just take the (borrowed) money and spread it among their friends. They finally do get around to the house. They work on the flowerbeds instead of building a strong foundation and framing the structure.
Eventually the homeowner comes back to check on how his borrowed money is being spent and how his burned down home is progressing. He sees a bunch of incompetent people dithering around and doing nothing to improve his home.
The homeowner throws a fit and after eventually demands change.
The new guy, his friends and they other recipients of the borrowed cash all decide that they know best and the anger is all due to racism instead of a piss poor half ass job that was expected after seeing the blueprints for the repairs.
Why do Liberals always scream, "Bush did it" in regards to everything happening today. Bush is gone. Unless his dog drops a duece on your lawn while out for a walk George Bush has done all the harm to this nation that he can do.
On the other hand, Obama is the President. If his policies are ineffective or simply a failure then it's HIS fault. Screaming, "Bush did it!!!" doesn't negate that. Everything Obama has proposed has been shown to fail. His "New New Deal" isn't working. The "New Deal" didn't pull America out of the Great Depression and everyone (except the cronies and blindly loyal) agreed it wouldn't work this time. Obama's infrastructure projects were tried in Japan and failed. There was no reason to believe they would work in the US as it takes years to plan and build roads, bridges and highways.
Face it. Obama is a failure and will be a one termer if the Republicans can find anyone decent to run in 2012.
Screaming "Bush did it" doesn't excuse Obama's failures. Only the stupid and blindly loyal consider "Bush did it" as a valid argument in defending Obama's policies.
Didn't you just love Boehner's pivot to put the blame for American job loss on this administration. But why, pray tell, aren't more Democrats reminding people of the time lines here....sad though it may be that a reminder is necessary.
This was a very weak column. Check. That was ok.
The new guy might be qualified to hang curtains in one corner of a house but isn't qualified to rebuild a home. Check. That one was ok.
Bush is gone. The new guy owns the construction project and if he can't fix the problem then it's his fault. Check. Still good.
Nope. I don't regret anything I said. Apparently a moderator has different political views however.
Instead of prescribing the correct treatment for the patient e.g. chemotherapy, and upon the advice of his staff, he instead tells the patient to take vitamins, eat raw cabbage, wear a silver bracelet and become a Muslim and pray for a cure, five times day.
When Dr. Bush's staff and other doctors try to advise him and his staff, of the foolishness of his treatment protocols, and do everything they can to prevent this doctor, from applying this ill advised treatment to the patient, he acts like a baby and keeps making ad hominem attacks and against the first doctor and ignores their pleas to start chemotherapy immediately.
As the patient's health declines, he sends out his assistant Dr. Biden who tells the patient and his family that the patient is 'recovering' even though those without a medical degree can see the the patients declining health.
The Hospital has brought Dr. Obama and his staff up on charges of malpractice, and has scheduled a vote this November to determine if his staff should be replaced.
maybe its like that?
The problem is the guy trying to rebuild the house knows absolutely nothing about construction and just assumes that because he is so smart that if he buys a bunch of material and a bunch of tools the house will just come together.
The other guys know he cant rebuild the house and are knocking things out of his hands and telling him to get out of the way because there are extreme home makeover teams standing all around watching him just waiting for him to get out of the way so they can come in build the house correctly and build it better than it ever was.
ok, great.
The people who are waiting to rebuild it are you, me, small business, small and large banks, etc. etc.etc.
The free market will fix itself if Gov would get out of the way and stop creating so much uncertainty.
Health care bill that only helps insurance companies? Check.
Wall street bailout and Main street bankrupt? Check.
Tens of thousands of troops still unwelcome in Iraq and Afghanistan? Check.
Civil liberties still being violated? Check.
Funny how "Change we can believe in" looks so much like "More of the same."
When Fannie and Freddie failed it spread to every part of the financial sector and while it might be fun to trash Wall Street and the banks for getting bailed out, without our financial institutions our economy would be destroyed. Rich and poor.
The Tarp program has been largely repaid. see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troubled_Asset_Relief_Program with the exceptions of AIG and GMAC. The Tarp program was far from perfect, but it ultimately worked. It was proposed by Treasury Sec Paulson (Bush) and NY Fed Gov Tim Geitner (Obama)
In a nutshell, both parties are to blame and both parties get credit for cleaning it up. The republicans are not the devil and the democrats are not all idiots.
I am labeled a Liberal yet:
I want to “conserve” the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, ensuring equal protection under the law for all of our citizens.
I want to “conserve” our economy by restoring strong Corporate regulations that ensure healthy economic activity.
I want to “conserve” a safe and secure standard of living for elderly Americans by NOT messing around with Social Security and Medicare.
I want to “conserve” our labor force by preventing greedy corporate interests from shipping jobs overseas in order to save 10 cents on some nameless widget.
I want to “conserve” our environment from reckless destruction brought on by our industrial carelessness.
While those who call themselves Conservative:
Applaud Liberal interpretations of the Constitution that give corporations almost unlimited power to influence elections.
Applaud Liberal interpretations of the Constitution that allows for the Government to spy on Americans.
Applaud Liberal interpretations of the Geneva Conventions that allows for the torture of prisoners.
Applaud a Liberal redistribution of wealth by supporting policies that help the richest 1% get richer, while the other 99% struggle to get by.
Applaud a Liberal reinterpretation if not repeal of portions of the bill of rights they don’t like.
Applaud laws that allow for “liberal” deregulation of business, enabling the worst financial disaster in history and quite possibly the destruction of the planet.
Applaud Liberal interpretations of history that suggest America is a Christian Nation.
Your list speaks to my conservative liberal side. Bravo for a job well done.
mmh
Pogo
Somebody has spilled coffee in the kitchen of your office. You walk in and begin to clean it up. Five people walk in and each one assumes and says outright how clumsy you are for spilling the coffee. None listen to you when you say you didn't spill it. No one thanks you for cleaning it up.
Do you clean up somebody else's spill the next time you walk into the kitchen?
I like a clean kitchen.
Would you clean up spill after spill if all you received for your trouble was criticism? Never thanks.