First the video:
Thinkprogress has a transcript:
But they’re doing some serious damage. If you think of what we’ve witnessed in just the last 18 months or so, serial bailouts of failing companies, nationalizing whole industries, spending money on a scale we’ve never seen before, deficits and debts that are completely unsustainable, you add in cap and trade, card check, government-run health care, is it any wonder we haven’t had an economic recovery? Is it any wonder we don’t have job growth? How hard is this to figure out? [emphasis in original]The difficulty, as thinkprogress points out, is that some of that legislation hasn't been passed yet.
“Government-run health care” presumably refers to the health law passed this past spring by Congress, but the legislation that Toomey is referring to as “cap and trade” and “card check” haven’t even gotten close to getting the votes they need to be made into law. “Cap and trade” refers to the American Clean Energy and Security Act, which, while narrowly passing the House of Representatives in 2009, is widely considered to be dead in the U.S. Senate. “Card check” refers to a provision in the Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) that would allow workers to form a union if they could get half the workers to sign a card stating their intention to organize.Pat Toomey - on top of things. Really.
2 comments:
Dayvoe, Republicans now have these little shibboleths: "out of control spending", "Cap and trade", "bailout", "more spent on stimulus than on Iraq" and more. The ones I just mentioned are either not true or not really something Obama did (well, car company bailout yes). There are things Obama could be criticized on, like being too cozy with Wall Street, or continuing programs of imprisonment and wiretapping, but those things are things Republicans are in favor of, so instead they make up stuff. And then they repeat it and repeat it, in lieu of real discussion. Because ordinary people, who don't pay attention to politics and policy, believe the person who shouts the loudest and scares them the most. Not to sound or be condescending, but the average person had, at most, econ 101 in college however many years ago, and does not have an in depth understanding of Keynes or even economics in general. Nor does the average person read academic economists when they comment in the paper. And even if they do, in the time it takes to read a detailed discussion of how a stimulus works and whether this one did, a Pat Toomey will have repeated "spent more on stimulus than on Iraq" hundreds of times. As well as "cap and trade", "out of control spending" and more.
You have to admit the Tea Party was smart. Although they claim to hate the Republicans as much as they hate Democrats, all the Tea Party candidates are Republican, not a third party or write in. And the Tea Party has stepped up their rhetoric. I am sure they absolutely love the "Ground Zero Mosque" (two block away civic center that would probably be a strip club in a couple of months if the Muslims hadn't stepped in). Independent voters and conservative Democrats have been suspicious of centerist Democrats for thirty years, and most republicans will go where ever the "R" button on the touch sreen leads them. So the Tea Party is using fear and repetition to bully America into going where the Tea Party wants it to go
I have a blog with a link to this post.
http://csiwodeadbodies.blogspot.com/2010/10/pat-toomey-in-more-than-30-second-ad.html
Hiding behind catchphrases like "liberal." Prevents any real discussion of issues.
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