Last week, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) complained that the Obama administration intends to "annihilate the Republican Party. And let me tell you, I do believe that is their goal -- to just shove us in the dustbin of history."
House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) joined the pity party over the weekend.
On "Meet the Press" yesterday, Ryan told David Gregory that he believes President Obama is "thinking more of a political conquest than political compromise."
And on Saturday, Paul spoke at the National Review Institute Summit in Washington and told attendees that the president is committed to trying to "delegitimize the Republican Party -- and House Republicans, in particular."
It may be a coincidence, but the fact that prominent Republican leaders are stressing this same point at the same time suggests it may be a new GOP talking point, which wasn't heard much at all in Obama's first term: the president the right sees as weak and lacking in fundamental toughness is now a brute intent on defeating and destroying entire Republican Party.
And the more I hear prominent GOP voices saying this, the less sense it makes.
To reiterate what we discussed last week, President Obama is many things, but a partisan hitman, hell bent on "conquest," "annihilation," and "delegitimizing" his rivals contradicts just about everything we know about the man.
Whether you love Barack Obama, hate him, or occasionally change your mind about him, the guy is an even-keeled, technocratic Democrat, who's spent four years pursuing a fairly moderate agenda, endorsing and utilizing Republican ideas, appointing Republicans to his cabinet, and expressing a willingness to compromise on practically everything.
If "conquest" is on the president's to-do list, he's hidden it extremely well.
Indeed, the inescapable reaction to the Boehner/Ryan pity party is that they're engaging in projection -- it's Republicans who've tried to delegitimize Obama. It's the right that wants to annihilate its rivals. It's the GOP that's rejected compromise at every turn, launching a scorched-earth campaign to destroy Obama's presidency as best they can.
John Boehner and Paul Ryan aren't describing the folks they see in the White House, they're describing the folks they see at their own caucus meetings.
Obviously, Obama has a policy platform he hopes to implement, and to the extent Republicans stand in the way, he hopes to defeat them -- not victory for victory's sake, but as a means to an end. But it takes real paranoia to think this desire to govern is evidence of a president committed to "annihilation."
As I argued the other day, in most respects, the Boehner/Ryan line has it backwards -- the president would be quite pleased, actually, if the radicalized Republican Party was brought back to the American mainstream, and stood ready to work constructively with other policymakers (i.e., Democrats) on finding solutions to public policy challenges.
That's not an agenda based on conquest; it's the opposite. Republicans would probably be better positioned with the public if the party took Obama's advice and met him halfway.
But at this point, GOP officials refuse, suggesting they might very well belong in "the dustbin of history."
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Their policies are de-legitimizing the party, not the democrats. Time has passed this party by, and their extinction is imminent.
One can only hope of course.
Sad but true. It's difficult to match the appeal of a free stuff party. Responsibility, work, and prudence don't sell/poll well.
Responsibility, work, and prudence don'tFree stuff for rich people doesn't sell/poll well.Fixed that for you.
I can't see how they think this will play to anyone other than there rabid base. Even their moderates would be saying "well then fight back you pansy's" no one is going to be like ooh well I was on the fence about Obama before but since the GOP feels like he doesn't like them I guess I'm a Republican now.
One thing that is very hard to do as a Liberal is perceive how messages like this will be viewed by the right and center right. I know how I see it but I always am annoyed thinking that the media puts this out there and the public just mops it up as true (i.e. well I guess Obama is a bully). I think the GOP overreached here though, I doubt many people will have sympathy for a political party. Leaving aside that it's been the GOP that has tried to annihilate (explicitly) Obama, I just think most people are going to hear this, chuckle, and move on.
Responsibility, work, and prudenceWars, theft, racism, election rigging and the policy of "@!$%# you got mine" don't sell/poll well.People want to see a benefit from their tax dollars, not to see them used to line the pockets of another already wealthy person like the republicans keep demanding. One of those benefits is things like not being expected to roll over and die from a toothache, and having a civilized nation that they don't have to worry about being shot for having their radio too loud in their car or their kids being murdered in school.
Frankly it's no wonder the republican party is dying, the real shock is it didn't start sooner. Good riddance, maybe the next thing that springs up won't be run by horrible people and we could have a real choice for progress.
People want to see a benefit from their tax dollars, not to see them used to line the pockets of another already wealthy person like the republicans keep demanding.
Just to make sure... what wealthy person's pocket's are you referring to?
Oh my god, am I going to agree with Shooter?!?!
Aha, there he is... Whew, almost fell for the troll...
Answer: certainly not your broke @ss, blanks.
Given our ubiquitous marksperson and his/her/its trollish comments, I hope you'll permit a link to a truly helpful article about blog evolution -- that is, evolution in quality and quantity of comments, as an explanation for why I've pretty much given up on reading and commenting here at MaddowBlog. Not down to you, Steve, or Rachel, or Summer, Laura, Will, or Kent: I'm just very weary of wading through the trolls and yall's conscientious efforts to respond to them as if they care what you think.
And all are welcome to shout, "Good riddance!". I don't mind. There are too many very, very thoughtful and articulate people here without my blather lowering the curve.
From Scientific American online: A Blog Around the Clock. Commenting Threads: Good, Bad, or Not at All
Ciao, y'all.
Helena, so goes silent one more rational voice?
If Ryan is the future of the party then they're in big trouble. Geez, man, ever look in the mirror? Or listen to yourself?
Again, I'm offended by the message here. Either (1) He's lying on purpose for the political sound bite, or (2) he believes what he's saying. Either way, if's very disturbing that someone in his position is still sitting on the lunatic fringe.
Isn't this EXACTLY the lunatic nonsense that Jindal and Christie talked about? And it's coming from their so-called "future."
Can we please have a fiscally conservative party that isn't full of idiots? This is when I wish Libertarians could succeed more.
This is how the wingers win...bullying, intimidation, and most of all a mindless dedication to lies...
In the GOP, the lunatics are RUNNING the circus!
Shooter: Mitt Romney's.
Shooter 242
People want to see a benefit from their tax dollars, not to see them used to line the pockets of another already wealthy person like the republicans keep demanding.
This statement is absolutely true. Just to clarify who we are talking about.
The Koch brothers, Karl Rove and anyone else looking to take advantage of Citizens United to attempt to buy an election come to mind.
Anyone promoting voter suppression efforts.
Anyone in that Boca Raton fundraiser who did not speak up when Mr. Romney spoke of the 47%.
the president is committed to trying to "delegitimize the Republican Party -- and House Republicans, in particular."
All he has to do to accomplish that is stand aside.
largenose
Extra vote for this one... :-)
Methinks this is a result of their little pow wow last week .
What a brain trust .
They all got together and agreed that this was the line they would use.
All the people inside the bubble agreed . Why Brilliant ! this will change everything .
Perspective:
“Why, sometimes I've believed as many as six impossible things before breakfast.”
― Lewis Carroll, Alice in Wonderland
The "Dustbin" image is an interesting one. It implies that the GOP is just lying around, business as usual, when all of a sudden, the big bad Dems get all up in their face with radical reforms, whipping up the icky poor people to grab their ill-gotten gains.
The reality is that the GOP is running so fast down the rabbit hole that by the time their message echos up to the surface, it makes even less sense than when it left their mouth.
The Red Queen: You're right, Stayne. It is far better to be feared than loved.
The truly ironic part of all of this is that the repubs are constantly going on and on about how Americans in general, and dems in particular, are always acting as if they are victims, and that repubs want to change the whole victimhood meme. How do they do that? By adopting the very same victimhood meme!!! Yes, they are victims...of their own stupidity, racism, sexism and anti-factual mindset.
Good point, Uff. And so I would add "hypocrisy" to your list of particulars...
It looks like they are still working through the grief of losing the election, and they still don't get it; they are not victims of "Hussein", they are victims of Akin and Mourdock, of Rush, Sean and Sarah, all pushing them too far to the fringe. I think we are starting to see some moderation, some pushback against the nutwing of their party; time will tell if rationality kicks in..
Yes, these Republicans are claiming genocide, when it's actually suicide.
Dear Congressman Ryan,
It's called projection.
3. Projection is a form of defense in which unwanted feelings are displaced onto another person, where they then appear as a threat from the external world. A common form of projection occurs when an individual, threatened by his own angry feelings, accuses another of harbouring hostile thoughts.
http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/478472/projection
Projection without evidence.
Never interfer with your opponent when he's in the process of destroying himself.
Just like any addict, hooked on alcohol, cocaine, heroin, pain pills, cutting or whatever, they believe getting everyone 'hooked' on the same addiction will solve their problems...
They fail to see, what they are doing is making their own problems worse...
It's slow-motion suicide...
And the time spent trying to argue them down off the political ledge could be better utilized on say, running a reality based government?
Agreed. Except for the voter rigging. I think that one deserves interference.
I saw Ryan on Meet the Press and Gregory allowed Ryan to shovel BS, avoid questions and keep repeating talking points without any challenge to Ryan's assertions. It makes me wonder if Gregory should be taken serious as a news commentator/ journalist. Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert do a better job in 10 minutes than Gregory did with a lot more time. Who would have thought Comedy Network does a better job of reporting news than a traditional network? Truth is stranger than fiction.
Really!!!!????
I'm shocked !
Usually Gregory is an inquisitive harsh interviewer. That's why Meet the Village is my favorite .
/snark
You really have to question whether Gregory is to be taken seriously? Still? Who can watch that garbage without throwing up?
There's a reason why Charlie Pierce calls him "the dancing master."
"Who can watch that garbage without throwing up?"
For starters, the corporate whores and moral cowards outside the MSM.
As distinct from the ones inside the MSM.
I'm sorry but this is EXACTLY the way that the Republicans 'get their whine out in the public'. They dream something up, they talk and talk and talk about it, the media is complicit in their 'victimhood' and then when it comes to fruition they pounce and say 'SEE I TOLD YOU' even though it is THEIR policies that make it 'true'. We've seen it with the economy, guns and now 'victimhood'. It was really rich watching that putz Ryan talk about 'civility' and how 'Obama lacks it'...uh huh.
It ain't Obama doing it. As Radiohead might say:
You do it to yourself, just you
you and no-one else
You do it to yourself
You do it to yourself
AHA! It seems that Obama is indeed a socialist/communist/whatever:
"we will sell you the rope to hang yourself"-Vladimir Ilyich Lenin
Billyf
Please don't try to preach personal responsibility on this blog. It falls on deaf ears.
"I see"...
... said the blind man...
... to his deaf son...
... He then picked up his hammer and saw...
Recognizing one has a problem is the first step toward solving it. Here's the Democrat's wakeup call....
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/4764841/Why-work.html?OTC-RSS&ATTR=News
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2013/01/28/national/welfare-payments-to-be-slashed-%C2%A574-billion-to-root-out-the-comfortably-poor/#.UQaf2Gf4bnv
The UK and Japan have universal health care systems are run by their respective governments. If you truly believe your argument, then you should have no problem with Obamacare and expansion to cover all citizens. OK?
Sorry, not interested in death panels....
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2255054/60-000-patients-death-pathway-told-minister-says-controversial-end-life-plan-fantastic.html
Death panels! Really? The Lie of the Year? What a tool you are.
Who's proposing punishing people on health matters? Hmm, let's look at Jan Brewer's latest screwball idea. Oh no it's the republican bacon police.
http://abcnews.go.com/Health/arizona-gov-jan-brewer-proposes-medicare-fat-fine/story?id=13274368
Oh the irony!
Maybe you should look into those death panels because you sure seem to be brain dead, blanks. Time to pull the plug.
Just sayin.
This 'death pathway' is the Liverpool Care Pathway and it is used in the last 3-4 days of life in terminally ill patients. It involves categorising all the symtpoms the patient has ie pain, breathlessness, respiratory secretions, agitation. And putting in place an anticipatory plan to deal with those symptoms in the last few days of life. It is solely used in terminal care in patients where death is expected iminently. And it is one of the best tools to come into palliative care in my medical experience.
It's not deciding who should die, it only applies to people who are about to die, (it is initiated on average 29 hours before death) and to try to ease their last symtpoms. It grew out of hospice care, where it was developed.
That idiotic article (the Daily Mail, really?) tries to state the pathway is the cause of death, no, you initiate the pathway because the patient is about to die.
So no, biggest straw-man you have pulled out yet Shooter, you do know there are some of us UK-ers on here? I stand ready to answer this bullsh*t claim and lament the HORRENDOUS state of health care in the US. I've worked as a doctor all over the world and it still astounds me that your country can be so dysfunctional in the way it care's for it's sick.
http://www.liv.ac.uk/mcpcil/liverpool-care-pathway/
Tweed.girl, you do realize that bringing facts into one of these discussions is considered rude and generally unfair, don't you?
the shooter gop are officially dumbed down below the point of sarah palin now , even she is not buying that line any more , congratulations once again on your irrelevances gop
americans pay billions more for healthcare that is on the bottom of all the list of all industrialized nations , and the gop still are upset about americans wanting to fix it , we are actually battling a citizenry of trolls
Even those in his own party speaks to the unbridled arrogance of Hussein...SOMEBODY must be lying...and the "victims" are the American people. Having Legislation shoved down their throats or imposed by a "Benevolent dictator" that knows MUCH better than the Serfs and Peasant's what they really need....
Well he's our King and we are very loyal subjects .
You guys crack me up .
"Shoved down your throat" Don''t you just hate democracy.
Do y'all smell something burning?
Oh, nevermind, it's just troll hair.
Isn't it amazing how often they revert to phallic imagery?
I wonder why that is.
The only answer the Republicans have is Obama-hate, and the fact that a leader like the boy wonder Ryan pivots the pitch from community organizer to outright bully is pure enjoyment.
There... Fixed it for you...
Of course! It's just like Obama's anti-gun agenda. You KNOW he wants to destroy the Republican party exactly BECAUSE he hasn't done or said anything about it so far! It's so clear now!
There is something that smells in this story. Does Ryan need his diaper changed????
I think so, it's full of sour grapes.
Nah. All you guys got it wrong. It isn't pity and it isn't some kind of grand conspiracy (at least no more than normal) it is simply the inability of a set class of people to distinguish STRATEGY from TACTICS. Simply put: TACTICS is how you win whatever battle you are in, STRATEGY is how you win the war you are in.
The R's have no long-term goals. They have no overridding intelligence. They are not anticipating, they are reacting. They are simply moving from one battle to the next, using any piece of propaganda that seems to them to make a difference.
This "Poor R Party" meme is not going to work any more than any of the other short term messages have worked in the past 3 months. Because they are unconnected.
Wow, just to deconstruct the whining would take too many shrinks!
Talk about sophists extraordinaire - oh, my, President Obama is a Boogie man hell bent on destroying us! What a bunch of namby-pamby hooliganism!
Ever meet that school yard dolt who wants to be in on everything, but mucks things up without any help from others, and pushes his mealy-mouthed myopia upon others, while insisting he's the only one who knows what's going on?
You know, the wimps and posers among us who insist they need to be listened to when they have nothing relevant or pertinent to offer? You know, our 2013 Republican brand that spent the better part of the past 4 years trying their damnedest to make Pres. Obama a one term president!
Now that the American electorate has spoken, the Republicans got nothing else but pure and raw projection! Poor Ryan - he's a marked man (at least in the canyon of his own mind)!
Tomorrow's Frank Luntz tested talking point for the likes of Ryan and the cry-babies over in the Republican tent is, "President Obama is a meany!"
Now how's such an attitude gonna win future elections, boys? -Kevo
I am so sick of David Gregory being a megaphone for the right wing...Its high time that you Rachel, host MTP
I'd love to see Rachel on Meet the Press instead of Mr. Softball.
As the olde saying goes 'you see life through a mirror' and in the case of the GOTP, it is a rear-view mirror.
What wimps.
I think the reason they're saying Obama is out to destroy them is that the GOP is tearing itself apart from the inside out and they figured they could blame him because, why not?
The glaring lack of reality in the thinking on the right is disappointing and dangerous. Essentially, the repubs are creating a one-party system because they are racing into irrelevance at warp speed. This nation cannot be properly served when there is no logical discourse on where we are and where we need to go. You can't solve problems if one side is constantly insisting that the problem either doesn't exist, or that the solution is to make the problem worse. For example, entitlement reform. The right says there is a fiscal problem, which there is, but their solution is to essentially ignore the problem by envisioning a system that magically provides an improved level of care by making huge cuts in spending on those entitlements. Anyone here think they can buy a better car or house by making a big cut in the money you are willing to spend on them? All that will do is make the problem worse, and they simply don't care, as long as they get credit for cutting spending. Those millions of elderly won't suddenly be better able to afford food and housing if their social security checks are slashed. The millions of sick won't miraculously heal themselves if they are cut off from medical care. Not funding solutions to a problem doesn't suddenly make it go away. If it did, we could eliminate funding for road and bridge repairs. They'll magically fix themselves!
And of course do not cut a new nuclear sub or an aircraft carrier or a bomber designed to carry a nuclear bomb from Nebraska to Moscow without refueling. Those programs of course create jobs; so what if the Soviet Union self-destructed twenty years ago or the aircraft carrier would be a sitting duck in a war against China or any other nation with a missile.
Ryan has stated over the weekend that he sees the sequester as inevitable. I can't say that breaks me up much at all. While the cuts to social programs may hurt, I also see it as the only realistic way to make meaningful cuts in defense spending. The DoD has become everything that Eisenhower warned of, and more. If American consumers had products foisted on them that were as overpriced and shoddy as the stuff that comes from defense contractors, they'd not only stop buying them, they'd sue the manufacturer for fraud. Case in point---the F-35 fighter program has been going on for many years now, cost $396 BILLION so far, and has fielded exactly ZERO operational aircraft. As a matter of fact, one of the variants, the -B model, has just been grounded because of a major issue revolving around fuel leaks. Of course, it also has had problems due to cracks in the fuselage, and a report out last week says the program is technologically immature. And that is just ONE program. There are many more out there. If we had fought WWII that way, we'd be speaking German or Japanese! Defense contractors don't care, because they know that no matter how bad their work is, there are no alternative providers, so they give the Pentagon and the taxpayer the finger, and keep raking in the money. Congress doesn't have the guts to cut big waste in the Pentagon, for fear of looking "soft" on defense to voters, and losing big campaign contributions from defense contractors, so the sequester is about the only way to give the spineless varmints a way to semi-gracefully cut wasteful defense spending.
Jay Leno had the best take on Boehner's assertion that Obama is trying to annihilate the Republican Party. It was something like: "really, the Republicans are doing a great job at that themselves."
If only that were true. Unfortunately for us and the world, Obama is still moving right, steady as she goes. Lest some Villager think him unreasonable to negotiate with the asswholes, you know. Of course they already do, but that won't stop President "Reverse Reagan" -- sarcasm intended -- from trying to please them.
I think that, as a rule, when Republicans accuse Democrats of something they are both projecting and informing everyone of their own intentions.
All the repubs do well is bait and switch. Their "word" counts for crap; they say they're the defenders of freedom, yet they stifle democratic voting; they claim that a slim win is a mandate, don't acknowledge a real mandate ... and on and on. They won't provide opportunities for the next generation, but scream pro-life. I'm waiting for them to turn on the myth they've written about Reagan.
Pity the poor republican who's mouth can hold more lies than my belly can!