I have followed the national political debates for a great many years. These discussions have a rhythm of their own, indeed a script that gets followed with only slight rewrites over time. Nevertheless, it still amazes me to see the repetition and amplification which the mainstream media emits like some volcano constantly spewing trite lava that lacks insight into reality.
This feeling of amazement came to me once again this morning when I read a column by Al Hunt of Bloomberg discussing the first 100 days of the new Republican Congress. Hunt put forward the agreed script that media outlets like Bloomberg have followed for years. From the Hunt column I "learned" that the Republicans in Congress are completely "on the defensive" and their only path to success is to work with president Obama to reach compromises that closely resemble Obama's preferred course of action. Should the Republicans say no to Obama's policy choices, they will be consigned to total "failure" according to Hunt.
Now I really did not expect anything different from Al Hunt. After all, he is a relic of the days when the liberal media could set the national conversation without anyone else having the ability to reach the public. Still, after the results of the elections in November in which Obama and his policies were roundly defeated by the public, Hunt still acts as if the only question is what slight modifications might be made to Obama's plans before they go into effect. Sometimes I wonder if a hack like Hunt actually believes this stuff or if he has enough intelligence to realize that he just spews propaganda designed to tell his fellow liberals that "all is well" even though it isn't.
Starting tomorrow, the GOP Congress needs to move forward with its own proposals and plans. If president Obama wants to negotiate actual compromises, that would be great. On the other hand, however, if the Obama plan is to follow the previous script and just talk about the need for compromise while insisting that the Obama plan for this or that be completely followed, then Congress ought to just ignore him and do what they were elected to do. We can have two years of Obama saying no or the Senate Democrats filibustering legislation. The "party of more spending" can become the true "party of no".
I only hope that the GOP in Washington does not get too caught up in the main stream media effort to convince them that they have to cater to Obama and the Democrats even though the Republicans won.
This feeling of amazement came to me once again this morning when I read a column by Al Hunt of Bloomberg discussing the first 100 days of the new Republican Congress. Hunt put forward the agreed script that media outlets like Bloomberg have followed for years. From the Hunt column I "learned" that the Republicans in Congress are completely "on the defensive" and their only path to success is to work with president Obama to reach compromises that closely resemble Obama's preferred course of action. Should the Republicans say no to Obama's policy choices, they will be consigned to total "failure" according to Hunt.
Now I really did not expect anything different from Al Hunt. After all, he is a relic of the days when the liberal media could set the national conversation without anyone else having the ability to reach the public. Still, after the results of the elections in November in which Obama and his policies were roundly defeated by the public, Hunt still acts as if the only question is what slight modifications might be made to Obama's plans before they go into effect. Sometimes I wonder if a hack like Hunt actually believes this stuff or if he has enough intelligence to realize that he just spews propaganda designed to tell his fellow liberals that "all is well" even though it isn't.
Starting tomorrow, the GOP Congress needs to move forward with its own proposals and plans. If president Obama wants to negotiate actual compromises, that would be great. On the other hand, however, if the Obama plan is to follow the previous script and just talk about the need for compromise while insisting that the Obama plan for this or that be completely followed, then Congress ought to just ignore him and do what they were elected to do. We can have two years of Obama saying no or the Senate Democrats filibustering legislation. The "party of more spending" can become the true "party of no".
I only hope that the GOP in Washington does not get too caught up in the main stream media effort to convince them that they have to cater to Obama and the Democrats even though the Republicans won.
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