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In the speech that's since been mined for out-of-context attack ads, President Obama reminded supporters about the American tradition of aiming high. "That's how we created the middle class," he said. "That's how we built the Golden Gate Bridge or the Hoover Dam. That's how we invented the Internet. That's how we sent a man to the moon."
I was reminded of Obama's comments when I saw this item from Robert Schlesinger about a House Republican leader who wants the nation to think much smaller.
Don't hold your breath on Congress passing a comprehensive immigration bill any time soon -- Congress just isn't capable right now of tackling anything of that scope, according to House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy.
McCarthy, a lawmaker from California, was speaking to reporters at the regular press breakfast sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor. Asked about the chances of Congress passing an immigration bill, he immediately said that anything passed would require bipartisan support and allowed that the issue "is a big challenge for both parties and a big challenge for the nation as a whole."
But then he took a rhetorical step back. "If you take that issue away and you look at Congress as a whole, I'm not sure that Congress regardless of the issue can take big massive bills because I don't believe ... the American people like big massive bills," he said.
I won't claim to know "the American people like" when it comes to legislative ambition -- though there's ample evidence voters like the idea of a comprehensive immigration reform bill -- but what's unsatisfying about McCarthy's perspective is its restraint. Policymakers shouldn't even try to tackle major problems, he says, "regardless of the issue," because Congress just isn't up to the task.
Schlesinger added lawmakers fail to address issues like immigration, not because of "voter antipathy toward big solutions," but because of "partisan recalcitrance." He went to scold McCarthy for a "'we can't do big things' attitude."
It's an important point. The passive vision McCarthy espouses -- legislative baby steps, nibbling around the edges of major national challenges -- is underwhelming because our traditions point in the opposite direction.
I know I mention this regularly, but Rachel's "Lean Forward" promo in front of the Hoover Dam continues to ring true.
"When you are this close to Hoover Dam, it makes you realize how small a human is in relation to this as a human project. You can't be the guy who builds this. You can't be the town who builds this. You can't even be the state who builds this. You have to be the country that builds something like this. This is a national project. This is a project of national significance. We've got those projects on the menu right now. And we've got to figure out whether or not we are still a country that can think this big."
It's against this backdrop that the House Majority Whip appears eager to answer the question: we're no longer a country that can think big.
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"Yes, we can," vs. "No, we can't". What a ridiculous vision for the nation.
this, by the way, should be the main theme for a big section of the election homestretch -- if not in the Presidential, than the DCCC campaign, using Boehner's "hell no we won't!" meltdown on the House floor.
And as Rachael also point out "this is why we can't have nice things"! McCarthy says ", I'm not sure that Congress regardless of the issue can take big massive bills because I don't believe..." raising that false equivalence as though both sides of the aisle are being unreasonable when it's his party being obstructionist......
FIRE THE GOTP IN NOVEMBER!
The USA is becoming a mere shadow of its former self. We used to do things like travel to the moon and beyond, build great projects (TVA, BPA, Hoover, etc) that supported long-term growth and prosperity, develop technologies and inventions that put us ahead of the curve, and did it largely through an educational system that was second to none.
Now, we can't even pass a bill to address immigration. And why not? Because the idiots we elect to represent us in Washington can't even talk to each other. One side refuses to compromise in any way on an ideology that wants to reverse course by isolating, thinking small, and cutting back on the very things (education, infrastructure, equality, and the power of the people) that made us great.
Why anybody would vote Republican these days is beyond my comprehension.
Without those great American achievements and the unified cooperation they required, we'd probably be a third world country. And apparently that's what some want us to become.
It's not that Congress can't do big things, it's that the Republicans in Congress can't do anything.
You mean the Republicans don't want to do anything. They would rather cannibalize our country's infrastructure and domestic programs so that the rich can have more money.
Seems like a campaign ad for the DNC. "The GOP does not believe in doing big things anymore. [List of big things in the past/Big things to do in the future]. We do." Tag line for each campaign.
This is absurd. The Hoover Dam could never be built today. It took just a year to build the Empire state building. It took three years just to fix the 200 yard long Humpback bridge in DC. Permitting and lawsuits alone can consume a decade, for just about anything.
No, the days of big building is over. The "big dig" in Boston may have been the last hurrah.
Shooter,
You really ARE shooting blanks!!! Do you know WHY the Humpback bridge (btw it IS NOT in DC) took so long to build? Do you think it had something to do with the inability to close down the GW Parkway to traffic because it is a major transportation artery in Arlington???? Where was the traffic supposed to go? How were people going to get to Washington Reagan? The Empire State Building and the Hoover Dam didn't have that issue.
As for the "Big Dig" - you really NEED to go back and learn something about that project, like what happens when you allow companies to do what they want without proper oversight!
The reason this country can't do anything big anymore is because we have people like you who think of "me" rather than "we". All you are concerned with is MONEY and how to get more of it for yourself. You could give a damn about what happens in this country as long as "you get yours". You would sell this country's future out just so long as you could pay $1000 less taxes a year. Who cares what happens to this country in 10 years or 20 years, just as long as YOU get what YOU want NOW!!
Right now, we should be thinking about paying MORE taxes to help our country and to keep our children from paying for our "sins", but instead, we have politicians catering to the Tea Party and the selfish instead of thinking about this country's future.
Bush started it when he decided he could have two wars AND a tax decrease and just pass the cost down to our children. When we really DID need the money to help the country, it wasn't there anymore - but hey, who cares? People like you just want what you want and you want it NOW - the hell with the future of the country!!!
Bravo, @oncearepublican,
Not only did Bush wage two wars while deliberately decreasing revenue, this was, to my knowledge the first time ever, in all human history, that war + tax cut was done BY ANYBODY. All made possible by the "Worldwide Pool of Money" of untold trillions of dollars looking for a nice, comfy and above all safe investment--US Treasury securities. The WPOM is itself a product of worldwide income inequality. A lot of people go hungry so a few can invest. And their investment allows our military to go clamp a lid on the restive places, especially when there's oil nearby.
Shooter
Both Hoover Dam and the Golden Gate Bridge were built at the height of the Great Depression.
Actually the authorization, design and financing for both was completed before the crash and only the Dam was a Federal project.
bannedagain
Still both project (whether Federal of not) were done during an economically desperate time (worse than now). The people who built these monumental projects could have thrown up their hands and said "I'm sorry we just don't have the funds to do this let's stop these projects". But they didn't. And the country is better for it.
Sure is nice work if you can get it, Schlesinger - collect a decent paycheck on the taxpayer dime for doing nothing and accomplishing exactly jack-all.
Meanwhile in China-
Democrats build Hoover dams. Republicans stick their finger in the dike, and claim there is "no need for infrastructure repair."
No, republicans do not stick fingers in dikes. They set up a bait and tackle shop next to their "waterfront property" real estate busines downstream and pray for rain.
Actually it was Republicans who built Hoover Dam. President Coolidge who signed the bill to be exact.
Bannedagain (hmmm why were you banned?)
Hoover Dam may have started under a Republican administration but it was completed under a Democratic one. As I said in an earlier post FDR could have thrown in the towel and stopped the project.
Incandescent bulbs, birth control, tort reform, gay marriage, speaking english...These ARE the (perceived) big issues...These are the molehills from which the GOP has fabricated mountains.
If the big issues are more than their minds can handle; maybe they ought to stick with little words like "jobs, jobs, jobs".
Mind if I wander astray and think what Poe might say as I sit here reading once more what appears to have been read before?
"In one case out of a hundred a point is excessively discussed because
it is obscure; in the ninety-nine remaining it is obscure because it is
excessively discussed."
"He went to scold McCarthy for a "'we can't do big things' attitude."
It's an important point. The passive vision McCarthy espouses -- legislative baby steps, nibbling around the edges of major national challenges -- is underwhelming because our traditions point in the opposite direction."
Maybe you think Chuck Schumer is a better judge?
“Given the political realities, particularly in this election year, I’m afraid the Fed’s the only game in town,” Schumer said at Bernanke's semiannual monetary-policy testimony, as reported by CNBC.
“I would urge you to take whatever actions you think would be most helpful in supporting a stronger economic recovery.“
Also the Golden Gate Bridge, Hoover Dam and Empire State Building projects were all designed and financed BEFORE the crash under Republican presidents, in the 1920's not 30s. Such projects are always undertaken in flush economic times as a symbol of our success, never during bad economic times such as we are currently experiencing.
Finally, both the internet and the original plans for the space program were an outgrowth of our ongoing Cold War with the Soviets, not an attempt to create civilan big things.
Actually bannedagain,
You need to check YOUR facts. The Hoover Dam was approved and financed before the crash, the Golden Gate Bridge was approved before the crash, but financed AFTER the crash. BTW the Golden Gate Bridge WASN'T a Federal Government project, but a STATE project!
The Panama Canal Zone was a HUGE project at the time and it was approved during a recession.
The Manhattan Project was a HUGE thing to accomplish, and we did it during a war, when we really DIDN'T have money for HUGE projects.
The Space Program was a HUGE accomplishment and it really doesn't matter WHY it was started, just that we believed we could do it.
The Interstate Highway System was a HUGE project, proposed during a recession.
The point WASN'T WHEN the US does great things - just that it believes in itself to DO these things.
The point is that NOW the Republicans are more interest in MONEY for their "buddy" corporations (who BTW DON'T do HUGE things - really is the Empire State Building a HUGE thing compared to the Interstate System or the Hoover Dam????) that having the country do HUGE things any more!
Both the Insterstate Highway system and the Space program began under Republican presidents. The Panama canal was also a Republican project.
You point about the Manhattan Project is bizarre to the point of stupidity.
You really need to stop hitting yourself. You're not actually helping your side of the argument.
Don't you get it? Republicans of the past have NOTHING in common with the NeoCons of today! Eisenhower wouldn't have been accepted into today's Republican party and frankly, I consider myself an Eisenhower Republican, but I have NOTHING but disgust for the NeoCon Republican Party of today.
Obviously you don't know anything about the Manhattan Project, how huge it was, or what it contributed to today's nuclear industry, so your statement is TRULY the bizarre one!!
I wonder if YOU understand what my "argument" is?
I was pointing to his stattement about the Manhattan Project being done during wartime when there is no money, when of course the exact opposite is true and the amount of money available is huge on a comparative basis.
I'm not even a Republican myself, but I find in most cases as in this one Americans have no idea about their history, who did what when and spout off the most ridiculous associations of people and events as Benen and many posters here above do.
When in Grad School learning about psychiatry I remember reading that hysteria had been in ancient times attributed to a wandering womb. Nowadays with all the male centered hysteria about women being able to receive birth control finally at no cost to themselves, is there such a thing as a wondering prostate? A. F,
Don't the Republicans think America is exceptional? why do they hate America?