Posted on 10/13/2015 5:35:23 AM PDT by Kaslin
Important parts of our two great political parties seem bent on demonstrating that their parties are incapable of governing coherently.
House Republican rebels have pushed Speaker John Boehner out the door without advancing a plausible successor and have risked leaving the speaker's chair vacant. Hillary Clinton has backpedaled and flip-flopped to fortify her flagging campaign so much that she risks making herself a figure of fun.
The House rebels are understandably frustrated after five years in the House majority without as many accomplishments as they'd like. They overlook the four-year flat-lining of federal spending obtained by their acceptance of the clumsy sequester limits.
T hey overlook as well the public response to the impasse over the budget -- invariably dubbed a "government shutdown" -- in October 2013. Republicans, as the party of less government and one despised by mainstream media, are invariably blamed for shutdowns. Polling showed the Republicans losing their House majority until they ended the shutdown and the woes of healthcare.gov became apparent.
Nonetheless frustration grew. The rebels have not only voted against the leadership on key measures (a common occurrence in history) but sought to oust the speaker in mid-term (very uncommon).
Kevin McCarthy's surprise withdrawal from the speaker's race seems to have left no one who wants the job capable of winning majority support. It's possible that Boehner will stay until January 2017, after which the House will no longer face a Democratic president lacking the inclination and ability to compromise and an unusually obdurate Senate Democratic leader.
It's also possible that the House Republicans might settle on a new leader acceptable enough to the rebels that their majority -- their largest since the 1920s -- may hold together on key issues.
In that case the current disarray may be as forgotten as the October 2013 shutdown turned out to be in November 2014. But the combination of an unruly field of presidential candidates -- with the three who have never held elective office outpolling the 12 who have -- and internal turmoil in the House may discredit the party as a governing force.
Unless Democrats discredit themselves even more in the interim. Which may be happening.
Hillary Clinton was expected to enjoy a stately progress back to the White House where she worked as First Lady or conferred as Secretary of State for a dozen years. But the leftward lurch of Democratic voters -- at least as pronounced and arguably more politically perilous than the rightward lurch among Republicans -- has made the march much less stately.
Behind in polls in New Hampshire, beleaguered in Iowa, effectively matched in fundraising in the last quarter, Clinton has obviously concluded that she must respond to what initially seemed the quixotic challenge of the 73-year-old socialist Bernie Sanders.
And as her poll numbers fall, the chances increase of a threat from the 72-year-old Vice President Joe Biden. Her response has been to skitter as rapidly as possible to the left on multiple issues from her previous positions and from those of her husband.
The problem is that there is no entirely dignified way to change your clothes in public. Democratic primary voters may not be fazed by her leftward lurches on gun control, illegal immigrants and the Keystone XL pipeline, though each might hurt her in November.
More startling is her switch on the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement just negotiated by the Obama administration. Clinton praised TPP, then being seriously negotiated, 45 times when she was secretary of state, as CNN's Jake Tapper has documented.
Just last year she praised TPP as the "gold standard" of trade agreements. In your probably-not-dog-eared copy of her 2014 memoir "Hard Choices" you can read her describing it as "the signature economic pillar of our strategy in Asia."
Her flip-flop on the issue now comes even as she admits to not knowing the details. "As of today, I am not in favor of what I have learned about it," she told PBS. This is so intellectually threadbare that even the liberal analyst Ezra Klein says she "is again looking like the kind of candidate who puts polls in front of policy."
The political calculation is obvious: preempt attacks from Sanders on the left and isolate Biden, who is supporting TPP, on the right. But it's not the sort of thing that will generate enthusiasm and gin up turnout for a candidacy currently in disarray or respect for a candidate who seems increasingly unserious about governing.
I think the whole government is in one accord leading us to their idea of globalism/new world order. Their actions are totally against the people...
The UNIPARTY is very capable of looting…
15. Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States.
http://www.uhuh.com/nwo/communism/comgoals.htm
Socialism Is Legal Plunder
Socialists, like all other monopolists, desire to make the law their own weapon. And when once the law is on the side of socialism, how can it be used against socialism? For when plunder is abetted by the law, it does not fear your courts, your gendarmes, and your prisons. Rather, it may call upon them for help.
Above all, if you wish to be strong, begin by rooting out every particle of socialism that may have crept into your legislation. This will be no light task.
/Bastiat
$18,404,876,363,082
I’ll be brief. Yes. America is currently a rudderless ship and is taking on water.
Answer: Yes.
Comment: Not only are the political parties filled with the bungled and inept but the electorate is out of shape as well. Look who the electorate put into office as President-TWICE!
I will argue to the contrary
the world knows that Obama is not only an American disaster but a world disaster. The world is battening down and weathering the stormy absence of leadership while wondering why Obama is still alive.
the boisterous voice of Donald Trump and the quiet force of DR Ben radiate out into the world and assure there is America
We shall see. :)
What alignments do is force people to prioritize and decide which SET of values is overall more in line with them. In that context conservatism wins every time, even with the "social issues." I am confident if there was a Cruz-Sanders election, Cruz would win huge. Trump too, although while I favor Trump, I think Cruz is the more "pure" conservative and would be a better contrast to Sanders. But we won't get either. It will be Trump/Hillary or Trump/Biden.
I wish that were so, but if you get a chance to listen to any lib/progressive/rat they will all tell you how well things are going, and if not how it's the fault of everyone else but them.
And there are a LOT of these people......
Barone is wrong about the Democrats being incapable of governing. Just give them a majority in either house and watch.
It is only the Republicans that cannot govern.
Brings to mind the quote attributed to Lincoln;
“You can please all of the people some of the time,
some of the People all the time,
But you cannot please all the people all the time.”
Democrats know this. Republicans, especially the squishy center do not.
There is no BOTH parties there is the Progressive Liberal Democrat/Rino Communist UniParty.
The UniParty is stronger more deeply entrenched and more dictatorial than any Labor Union has ever hoped to be, we have an election coming up, this uniparty will not let go of their power and control easily, they have spent decades corrupting the election process for just such a time as this when there rule is challenged, they will stop at nothing to retain their reign, no laws will stand in their way, it’s going to bloody before they will lose the tight long fought for grip on we the people.
There are three political parties.
The Conservatives
The Socialists
The Crony Capitalists or Fascists who the socialists caucus with.
The thought of a “rightward lurch” isn’t happening. Those on the right have been there since the founding fathers. Anything that deviates from that is radical.
Bernie Sanders is Socialist. Question that should be asked of Hillary is where does she differ from Sanders? Fact is she doesn’t which also makes her a socialist.
There should be no parties, no caucuses, no lobby groups or contact, no campaign cash but equal amounts from a sole govt source. Each elected individual is elected based solely on the metrics of their positions on issues.
There is no need for Governance. Things usually work out on their own. Nobody for Speaker!
During the Carter years, one OpEd writer said "The Ship of State is awash in a sea of fiat currency and the Captain is using the rudder as a paddle."
Deja Vu.
A voice of sanity. Pleased to meet your acquaintance.
Do you have to be so danged right? I know, you didn’t do anything special, all you had to do was open your eyes. I thought the use of maritime metaphor was reserved to us Navy vets.
You better study the constitution first before you make such an ridiculous remark "Nobody for Speaker"
The Speaker of the House is the presiding officer of the United States House of Representatives. The office was established in 1789 by Article I, Section 2 of the United States Constitution, which states in part, "The House of Representatives shall choose their Speaker..." Source
Well, we, ‘Ground Pounders’ get it right ONCE in a while, LOL!
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