So much of the reporting not only assumes good faith on the part of Republicans, it ignores McConnell’s explicit policy of rejecting any major Biden initiative (as the GOP did with Obama), no matter how necessary or popular. The faux naiveté is maddening. /1
Here’s a good example: a passage taking as fact “the fiscal austerity….emerging within her own [Capito’s] party.” As Joe Biden might say, “Come on, Man!” /2
And then there is this passage, in which Capito’s complete inversion of recent history is quoted at length, with no context whatsoever—say about how Obama wasted six months for Republican moderates to sign onto the ACA which they, predictably, rejected as a bloc. /3
What’s this? The GOP’s infrastructure “counter-offer” is insufficient, unserious, and funded by “vague plans”—kind of like the Republican “alternatives” to the ACA. Get me my smelling salts./4
This passage inaccurately makes Biden’s supposed refusal to “incorporate their input,” rather than the GOP policy of total obstructionism—which McConnell has not been shy about trumpeting since the first Obama administration—the issue. /5
Throughout the Trump presidency, it wasn’t just his allies but the media that obsessively highlighted Trump’s mood and anger level. /1 washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/…
Here’s an example about Trump being angry after losing the election. /2
When this piece came out, I tweeted that I hoped it would be the last article I would ever have to read about Trump’s mood. Was I ever wrong./3 washingtonpost.com/politics/trump…
I find the zero-sum framing in the first two paragraphs of this column problematic. To say that many white workers felt that they "were left face alone the brunt of the long process of deindustrialization" is not to say that this is true./1 nytimes.com/2021/05/05/opi…
It is doubtless the case that "many white Americans — who had taken their own centrality for granted — felt that they were being shouldered aside." But many other groups also bore the brunt of de-industrialization.../2
particularly since they had, until recently, been excluded from well-paying, unionized manufacturing jobs and began to gain a foothold just as that sector began, for a variety of reasons, to implode./ 3
I question the framing and significant omissions in this profile of Kristi Noem, which doesn't even mention the misleading, deceitful story she told about the "death tax" that led to her rise to national prominence./1 nytimes.com/2021/05/02/us/…
Her story about how the estate tax adversely affected her family did not add up, although she and others continue to refer to it as justification for eliminating it./2 huffpost.com/entry/the-real…
Here's a portion of 2019 article by Noem in which she refers to to the impact of the "death tax" on her family./3
In my book, I argued that though the language of free enterprise "hung in a state of suspended animation," it became increasingly effective as the New Deal order weakened. Scott's speech suggests that this language may finally be past its sell-by date./1 usnews.com/news/politics/…
As I wrote, the free enterprise text remained remarkably stable from the 1930s onward, but the context did not. Whereas such language, though not new, seemed bold and exciting in the Age of Reagan, it seems stale and ineffectual in the current political moment./2
Free enterprise conservatism won out for a time by claiming the mantle of "common sense." Scott invoked common sense (twice) in his rebuttal, but what he offered was a litany free enterprise cliches: "big government waste," "job-killing tax hikes," "Washington schemes." /3
Running for Governor of CA as a Republican in 1966, as Lisa McGirr shows in SUBURBAN WARRIORS, Ronald Reagan supported the right "to discriminate against Negroes," "refused to repudiate the John Birch Society," used "coded language" and "profited by playing to white racism."
Even before that, in 1963, Joe Alsop wrote that “a Goldwater candidacy will automatically make the Republican Party into the ‘white man’s party.”/2
In his book, The AGONY OF THE GOP, 1964, Robert Novak used the same words as Alsop in describing the dangerous direction of the Republican Party: White Man’s Party.”/3
One dynamic very easy to foresee is that the GOP Caucus will unanimously (or nearly) oppose every significant Biden legislative initiative, as they did under Obama, no matter its merits. Negotiations are important but the GOP endgame is clear. /1 washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2021…
I’m skeptical that the reason why Republicans won’t go along is explainable along these lines. Under Trump, they supported expanding the power of the federal government in many instances, increased the size of the debt, and passed a tax cut that did not help the “U.S economy.”/2
It strikes me that total opposition to Democratic legislative proposals has become a far more deep-rooted principle for the GOP than, say, “traditional Republican concerns about the debt and deficit,” or “worries about the side of the federal government.” /3