Note to GOP: Stop Playing Their Game
By Wes Keene | February 8, 2010 | In Category: Health Care, Political Parties
Have Republicans ever heard or used the word “no”? Maybe its about time. For a full year, Obama, his surrogates, and Democrats in Congress have done everything in their power to belittle the GOP, and anyone else who agrees with the Constitution.
As the ruling class with a super majority and the White House under their control, the Dems wanted to have their cake and eat it too, and they could have. They wanted to pass the health care bill, and be able to call the GOP obstructionists. Thankfully, they weren’t even able to get their own house in order. So much time was spent bad mouthing the GOP for not working with them (which was a lie, too), and the whole time they had a super majority. Why didn’t they pass it? Is it because they wanted someone to share the blame with when it all blows up? It sure seems like it.
Now, in the Scott Brown era, the President has scheduled a number of media friendly events aimed at pretending the left wants to work with the right. Republicans beware: Obama’s premise is wrong. Most Americans do not want the health bill, they do not want cap and tax, and they don’t want virtually any of the Democrat priorities. The best thing Republicans can do is to clearly and publicly articulate that they do not want to talk to Obama, Pelosi, Reid or anyone else in the Democrat party about their left wing plans. If the “media is the message”, then even sitting down to discuss the ideas grants them certain credibility as potentially being good ideas…and they aren’t.
If Obama’s wildest dreams came true and Republicans were won over in these meetings, it would be a banner moment for “bipartisanship”, but Republicans would be dooming themselves by working with leftists on leftist policies. There is no way for the GOP to win by working with Democrats, not with their current lineup of proposals.
People elect their party’s candidates to fight the ideas from the opposing party, not to water those ideas down to where they are acceptable. The GOP had a plan to deal with this, but it’s irrelevant, because the premise is wrong. Health care is not broken and that’s why for all the years of Bush and the GOP in Congress nothing was done on this issue, the GOP didn’t feel it’s important. It still doesn’t.
Republicans can win big in November but only when they learn how to say: “No, I don’t want to sit down and talk with you because my constituents do not believe that your agenda is a priority and I’m not going to play your game”.
If the GOP continues to work with the Dems and try to come to consensus they are doomed to repeat the mistakes that have cost the GOP so much already.
Comments are closed.