| About Us | Contact | Donate | User Blogs | Login |
Strike One, Bobby
Submitted by Matthew Gagnon on Tue, 02/24/2009 - 23:44
in
Bobby Jindal gave his rebuttal to the President tonight in what was widely being billed as his "coming out party" - unfortunately for him, his debut was extremely underwhelming.
Barack Obama is a hard man to follow, no doubt about it. Message aside, he is a gifted orator who is compelling and interesting to listen to on his worst days. Add in the backdrop of a Congressional speech, massive applause and the adulation of the network anchors and you obviously have a rather difficult task. But by all measures, Jindal failed, and he failed for a number of reasons.
He Chose Folksy Populism Over A Serious Address
Bobby Jindal is a Rhodes Scholar. Among the Republcians left in governmental leadership, he is unquestionably one of its more brilliant minds. He is a policy wonk, and seems extremely interested in policy details, often times rattling off his ideas so quickly his audience gets lost. Tonight was his chance to showcase that brainpower, and that factory of ideas.
What did we see instead? Jindal intentionally spoke with more simplistic, provocative language meant to appeal to rural (conservative) America. His accent seemed just a little bit thicker, and his rhetoric focused on what was upsetting voters, rather than why the Republican agenda is a better choice.
But worse, after Obama's lofty appeals to big plans, and creative dreams, Jindal talked about... himself, and a Sherriff. Be still my heart.
Jindal knows that he will run for president someday, and he has a choice. He can present himself as the intelligent, wonkish conservative technocratic brain, or he can go for the down country, aw shucks, "real America" garbage. Tonight - it appears he has chosen the latter. While this may be acceptable for angry conservatives, for a country embracing the very "adult" attitude of Obama, this simply does not work.
And honestly, if Michelle Malkin is right and Jindal would have been beaten up by the media no matter what he did, than doesn't it stand to reason he should just say "screw it" and show off how much of a brain he is? Honestly, with the perception that the GOP lacks any heavy hitting intellectuals, if there was ever a time to show off your "wonkishness", now was the time.
He Had A Chance To Counter The Idea Of "The Party Of No" - But Didn't
Jindal primarly painted a picture of Democrats being wrong on things.
They spend too much money. They tolerate waste. They will have to raise your taxes. They believe in government over individuals.
Notice a trend? Me too - Democrats are wrong, and that is where the sentence ends.
Republicans need to do more than criticize what is wrong with the Democratic agenda. Not only is it irritating to the undecided voter to hear nothing but negativity, it also fails to offer the American people any hope or vision of what America would look like under your philosophy.
This is especially toxic after the Bush years, which have (unfairly) soured the reputation of a limited government agenda.
What is required is to briefly express disagreement, but then offer real solutions that are alternatives. This was something Jindal was uniquely positioned to do, being such an intelligent, wonkish Republican. But rather than a New Gingrich style "idea factory" speech - we got nothing but "no".
That may work when you playcate to your base, but after Obama's lofty rhetoric it will not win any converts, and it only further entrenches the idea that the GOP is the party of no.
His Rhetoric Sounded Childish
I have seen it referred to multiple times as "Kenneth the Page" from 30 Rock. Personally I felt more like he was tucking in a child.
Everything from his tone of voice, to the vocabulary he used sounded dumbed down, and borderline childish.
You do not combat a highly intelligent, loqcuatious president by going after the lowest common denominator of the American voting public. "American's can do ANYTHING!" is a wonderful sentiment, but it sounds more like something I would tell my two year old son as I read him a story book than a serious national address to the country.
I don't know if Jindal intentionally talked to me like I was in pre-school or not, but I do know it irritated more than just me, and turned me off to anything he was saying. And I'm a Republican.
It Sounded Like A Campaign Commercial For Him
It sure was nice to hear the life story of Bobby Jindal - but it was hardly effective as a response to the president.
Barack Obama called for investment in education, transportation and infrastructure. He called upon Congress to cut the deficit in half in four years, and reform healthcare.
Bobby Jindal told me his mom got pregnant, then moved to America, and gave birth to him, setting in motion a great American story.
His story really is fascinating, but I think I'd like to wait until 2010 at least before I start getting this stuff beaten in my head. What was called for tonight was an alternative to the president's agenda, not a personal appeal to Jindal-cult.
His Message Was Disjointed and Unclear
Do any of us really know anything new about Jindal, or the GOP agenda after hearing him speak? Do we even know what the thesis of his speech was? I recall some generic "big government is bad" comments, but overall I have already forgotten what he said.
He jumped around in his points, nothing he said was really flowing naturally from one point to another, and it sounded more like extemporanious thoughts in his head than anything else.
Conclusions
Bobby Jindal is one of the GOP's "rising stars" - its hard to deny that. But he has already fallen into the trap that so many politicians in this party have fallen into over the last decade. He has become a black hole of ideas who came off as dedicated to little more than opposing the Democratic agenda out of some kind of Hatfield/McCoy type rivalry, and he did it by appealing to the lowest common denominators of both our society, and our culture.
Gone were the big ideas. Gone was the serious conversation about this country's future. Gone was communicating like an adult.
Things like this are about political instincts. People like Barack Obama smell a vaccuum, realize what is missing in their own party, and then proceed to fill that vaccuum with the force of their personality.
Jindal had the chance to do that tonight, but did not.
He'll have another chance, but the bar will be set even higher for him next time.
(5 votes)
- Matthew Gagnon's blog
- Login or register to post comments
Promos
Recent blog posts
lgm
0 comments
Skip MacLure
1 comments
Einzige
2 comments
John Smith
0 comments
Einzige
3 comments
Skip MacLure
3 comments
RedMango
2 comments
lgm
2 comments
Skip MacLure
0 comments
In between
0 comments
Recent comments
-
John Smith
-
lgm
-
mlindroo
-
classicliberal2
-
TomGrey
Search
Links
The American Scene
Conservablogs
Election Projection
FiveThirtyEight.com
Jonathan Martin
Marc Ambinder
Megan McArdle
Patrick Ruffini
Pollster.com
The Foundry
Government Bytes
Race 4 2008
Real Clear Politics
RedState
Ross Douthat
Soren Dayton
Infrastructure
America's Future Foundation
Americans for Prosperity
Americans for Tax Reform
American Majority
Club for Growth
Election Journal
Heritage Foundation
ATR Blog
Leadership Institute
NewsBusters
Sam Adams Alliance
Republican National Lawyers Association
Republican Liberty Caucus
Washington Watch
National Taxpayers Union
NetRight Nation
Good Lefty Blogs
MyDD
Open Left
Swing State Project
Comments
Actually haven't seen his response yet
so I'll make my own judgment when I check it on YouTube. But if what you said is true, then that tells you something about the contemporary conservative movement. If someone as brilliant as Bobby Jindal, probably the brainiest Republican politician out there right now, feels that he has to thicken up his accent and spend more time criticizing Dems than laying out new policy ideas, then it will illustrate the process by which promising upcoming conservatives are "taken over" by what the base wants to hear as opposed to shaking things up somewhat.
Considering how dumbed down the political process is these days, its going to be hard to explain complex policy ideas in a 10-15 response speech. It appeared that Jindal would be the absolute ideal choice to make our ideas come across the best. Again, I'll check it for myself, hoping he comes off better when I watch it.
Upon viewing
I wasn't that impressed. He begins the speech like he's a kindergarten teacher ready to read to 5 year olds about Cinderella. Whoever said he sounded like the Indian version of Mike Huckabee nailed it.
The "Americans can do anything" line was grating. Say it once upfront, and then get to specifics (if he should say something so simplistic at all). Saying it six or seven times made the speech seem silly and it would be easy to mock the speech due to it.
I was disappointed he didn't break free of the "tax cut and pork" model that has been a failure for Republicans in recent years. He didn't play up his strengths nearly as much as he could have. He could've talked health care much more, something he is well versed in and something that everyone at home cared about. But instead he called for more income tax cuts, in a nation where 80% pay more in payroll taxes than income taxes.
Seriously, you're Bobby Jindal. Come out and show us a new direction, not the boilerplate we've heard for the past few years.
What exactly were you expecting?
Were you expecting a Perot-style menagerie of charts? This is the first time most people have heard of Bobby Jindal so I thought it was entirely appropriate to talk about his unique and interesting life story for a little bit. And I agree that the speech wasn't very well delivered especially when contrasted with Obama's. But he did hit on true conservative ideas: expanded charter schools and vouchers, energy independence including more domestic drilling, patient-centric health care instead of government-centric health care. He wasn't just saying no for no's sake.
I was expecting...
...for the Republican response to be... you know... a response to the President's agenda.
Jindal has 2010-2012 to "introduce" himself to us. Talking about ones self, and what a great job he has done in his state is basically using an opportunity to whore himself, not tell us what the "loyal opposition" would do differently.
Look, its simple - this should have been an address that drew distinctions, and provided alternatives, and with a Rhodes Scholar giving the address, I would have expected it to be an idea factory, or at least SOMETHING that uses some brain power.
But instead, I got basically an Indian version of Mike Huckabee.
Any conservative who wants to make excuses for drivel like this just because its coming form our side, hasn't learned anything from the last eight years or so.
webb did a better job of a response to the state of the union
... then again, he took the speech they had written for him, tore it up, and wrote a new one himself (writers be temperamental folk)
I disagree
He came off as wooden and spoke in a manner of someone speaking to a child. He came off as negative and mentioned Democrats as being bad when Obama never mentioned Republicans as being bad...and if your watching TV today or reading the net, people noticed.
He did himself no favors.
Not Jindal's fault
The Republicans had a choice. They could oppose Obama's specific proposals -- more spending on bailouts etc. -- or they could just offer vague sniping. They chose not to oppose Obama's very popular (above 60%) proposals. It's not Jindal's fault that this comes off as shallow.
In the same way, many Bush failures are consequences of Republican strategy, not Bush shortcomings.
Jindal needs to go away
Gov. Jindal had a chance to convince everyone he was the next hope for Republicans and he spent his chance making himself look like the next George Bus.
Didn't his staff warn him of the problems that would occur if he did what he did? Can't the Repubilcans ever bother to fact check the speeches that they give? Is there no good speech writers left in the Republican party.
If Jindal is the best hope for the Republicans, then the Repubicans would be better off not running a candidate in 2012 instead of losing in a 50 state rout while running someone who seems unable to communicate with anyone who graduated from high school.
Jindal still captured by Rove playbook?
My biggest concern after watching Gov. Jindal's performance is that he seemed too focused on a capture the base approach. That's the Rove playbook of 50% + 1 and I think its moment has passed. The next GOP president, in my view, will emerge with a message, platform and organization that is ready to contest for the middle of the American electorate and will bring the base along because his ideas will be at their core conservative. Jindal's message was not designed to appeal to faint-hearted Obama supporters from what I heard.
After seeing his presentation last night, I found myself hoping that Gov. Jindal who is a very talented guy will not be running in 2012 because I don't think he is strategically ready to win yet.
Excellent comments! "That's
Excellent comments!
"That's the Rove playbook of 50% + 1 and I think its moment has passed. "
In fact, I would argue that its moment never was. The metaphor of winning the immediate tactical battle but losing the war (and the country) comes to mind. The tragedy of the "Rove Playbook" is that it was a concoction formulated by the peculiar, rather desperate, perspectives of two men (Bush and Rove) that were based on past experiences coupled with innate personal insecurities. Rove became obsessed with the concept of animating conservatives (especially evangelical religious conservatives) because he was not one and was rather paranoid with regards to them. In a similar vein, W had become "Born Again" and believed that his father lost in '92 because he did not animate the evangelical conservative base, and of course there was W's oedipal issues with his father. Both (Bush and Rove) were constantly trying to prove themselves as legitimate precisely because they were not. It would be useful if present and future GOP candidates and campaign strategists would look at the Rove Playbook for what it really was and how it came into being. It was unique to two individuals for a brief moment in time. But longer-term it was bad strategery indeed.
Rove was successful
The Rove playbook was successful in 2000 and 2004. 2000 was certainly closer than they wanted it to be and they adjusted GOTV in 2004 to compensate.
The suggestion that the GOP base is exclusively made up of evangelicals is mistaken, in my view. But whatever its constituents, it not big enough to reach 50% + 1 anymore.
Piyush was a dumb move.
Whose idea was it to give Jindal this no-win situation? Are there no strategists left in the GOP? Are there no decent speech writers now that Frum and Noonan are in exile?
Last night was the time for one of the old hands to take one for the team. Orin Hatch would have been appropriate.
Sending out a young, largely unknown, governor against a rock star president still in his honeymoon period is a recipe for disaster, even if Piyush did everything right. And he pretty much did everything wrong. Glad to see that FOX and MSNBC have finally agreed on something.
You never get a second chance to make a first impression. Somewhere in a very cold place, a cry of "You betcha!" pierces the night sky.
Jindal was bad move
You nailed it. I thought the same thing. Our brilliant congressional leaders Boehner and McConnell chose Jindal. They should have put one of their own out there. Question, when did Bill Clinton give the democratic response to Ronald Reagan. When did George W. Bush give the republican esponse to Bill Clinton. When did Barak Obama give the democratic response to George W. Bush.
No-win situation--lol
When the whole town is on fire, and the same people who set it on fire are the ones running around yelling that the firemen are using to much water to put the fire out----yes you are in a no win situation!!! Gezzzzzzzzz..... talk about standing around in a circle and firing at one another.
You do realize that if the economy does turn around because of this these programs or just dumb luck that republicans are history. If normal historical economic cycles play out after all this stimulus spending takes hold----the economy and markets should be doing good over the next 4 or 5 years. Basically the republicans have to pray that the economy goes into a major depression and unemployment goes thru 25%---that is pretty sad!!!!
Conservatives do have things to talk about
If there was still a fiscal conservative wing of the Repubican Party, they could talk about how high taxes are going to have to go to pay off the stimulus package. They can also talk about how the Democrats failed to fix the schools, failed to do anything about immigration, failed to lower crimes (crime is heading up now and a very high level will be tolerated by the Democrats). Small government fiscal conservatives can also talk about the probabilty of a jobless recovery (new environmental, labor, racial, and financial laws will probably destroy jobs faster than any stimulus can create them).
The only success the Democrats have had for decades was when Clinton left the economy alone for six years and no new government programs could get started. If in seven years, the Obama Administraiton has added 15 trillion to the national debt and is running deficits greater than 1 trillion per year, the Repubicans will have a lot to talk about. There position would be stronger is not for the incompetence of the Bush Administration and the big spending Republicans in Congress.
I don't find Jindal at fault
I fault his speech writers and whoever he is getting advice from as to how to proceed. He did not make the decisions regarding last night on his own.
He needs to fire his speech writers and stop listening to whoever he is listening too. They apparently adhere to the school of thinking someone like Sarah Palin can save us so they push someone intelligent to behave as Palin did and it failed....just as it failed in the 2008 election.
The 30% base of the Republican party who in my opinion are nothing short of nut jobs, will continue to cost us elections if we, the sane part of the party, continue to allow them to lead.
I mean we have Steele acting like we are some party of hip hop and calling reporters in the MSM "Baby".....we have Palin who will never crawl our from under the rock of stupidty regardless of what she does now, in the publics mind? She's too dumb to ever be President and now? We are toasting Bobby Jindal one of the few hopes we have left.
Jindal can be a great leader but unless someone steps up and stops what is happening he will never reach the Presidency.
Nate nails the best line.
Nate Silver on 538:
"The reason Jindal sounds like he is talking to a bunch of fourth graders is because that is the next group that could possibly vote in a Republican victory."
Palin/Jindal in 2020!
Palin Power!!!
If Bobby Jindal did a bad job that can only help Sarahcuda!!!
That's not a good thing
Her rhetoric is even more dumbed down and "real america" inspired than Jindals was...
Somebody wake me up when this party has some politicians that will take public policy seriously, stop stoking the fire of urban vs. folksy rural, and actually come up with an idea factory of solutions to America's issues, based in efficient market based answers...
... they want to keep up this bullshit, they'll just keep losing, and deservedly so. Palin is not the answer, and its lookign more like Jindal isn't either.
I'd give it a B minus, but that's no reason to panic.
I heard most of the speech on youtube. I'd say the text was...not bad. For those expecting a contract with America in ten minutes: get over it, cause it's not gonna happen. What could Jindal say, intelligently, about healthcare in ten minutes? Did Obama say anything intelligent about healthcare aside from "we'll cover everyone! Because I say so!" These responses tend to be boiler-plate, the speech was OK as boiler-plate, and I actually personally thought the story about the boats was an effective anecdote.
His delivery was terrible.
I'm not terribly worried about this long-term. I think, in general, the GOP recognizes that they can't touch Obama until he fails dramatically enough for sycophantic white college students and bored middle Americans to notice. Which will happen probably within the next three months. Until then, the GOP is a sideshow, and putting out a comprehensive agenda at this early stage in the game would be unhelpful. And let's say Jindal did use the speech as an "idea factory". That would be stepping on the congressional Republicans in a major way. We need to let a thousand republican flowers bloom, as someone said on this board, not have someone propose solutions that the house, senate and other governors may not have bought into.
I'm more concerned about Jindal's delivery issues here. He'll never burn down any barns, but I think I agree he talked like he was dumbing down. Even if you are, in fact, dumbing stuff down, you can't talk down to people. He needs to fix that. After four (or eight, I'd rather see him run in 16) years of Obama promising the world and delivering peanuts, after the gallons and gallons of hot air we're likely to see from Obama, the country might be ready for a wonk. And if Jindal wants to look for a model which might fit his style better, Canadian PM Stephen Harper might do.
Did anybody else think Obama massively over-promised last night? He's raised the bar so frigging high for his administration it's ridiculous. He's talking about paying for universal healthcare when the country's in a recession? Does he honestly believe this stimulous is going to long-term fix our economy. Even the New Deal didn't "work" for almost ten years, and there was a global war toward the end of that period which dramatically altered the landscape.
I think either one of two things happen: the recession proves not as deep as people feared and the tax-payers get pist at the price-tag of this stuff or the recession is as deep as it appears, the stimulous bearly causes any change, the Democrats come back with another multi-hundred-billion dollar package next year and they get kicked around hard in 10.
Obama massively over-promised last night?
To answer a few of your questions:
I agree that he has set the bar high. It is a risky play but he is clearly going for a big payoff. It is going to be interesting to see how it plays out.
As his budget director said at the "fiscal responsibility" summit, Obama sees health care costs as the single greatest fiscal challenge that we as a nation face. Given that, they clearly see health care reform as a big win. They deliver health care to millions, they reduce costs to consumers and businesses, and they win politically. Again, we'll see how it goes down. But given their June 2009 target for legislation, the congressional GOP must hurry up and develop something better to say than merely "no".
No, he doesn't and he has never said that it will. Obama has been very careful to say as he did again last night that the stimulus is only going to make a bad situation less worse which is in line with the economists. He's promised it will save or create 4 million jobs. We've already lost 3.5 million with no end in sight. That's one reason why early in the process they had so much spending out in 2011 and 2012. They know unemployment is not going to recover in a couple of years. Expect Obama to continue to lower short-term expectations on this every chance he gets.
His long-term "fix" for the economy is all that stuff about energy, health care reform, education, sustainable this and that. I'm afraid we've only seen the beginning of the Obama economic program. On thing I have been struck by is that by now every single proposal he makes has an economic component. Again, he is planning to use the financial and economic crises as levers to achieve his agenda.
If he ever did, he no longer sees these crises as roadblocks to his most ambitious agenda. Indeed, he sees them as agenda multipliers or boosters. The congressional GOP has to recognize this and figure out how to counter it effectively.
So one of two things will happen
Things will get better, and people will be mad because it cost money, or things won't get better, and people will be mad because things aren't better. *rolling eyes*
health care is revenue positive.
that's what all my financial friends say... and they're not exactly lefties.
If the stimulus barely causes any change, the Democrats will kill everything in sight in 10, because the Republicans will not have any money nor people willing to vote for them anymore. Or haven't you been doing a cost-benefit on the new state budgets?
Seemed right to me.
I think Jindal did a perfect job of representing the thoughts and idea's of the regionalized (Southeastern) party that Republicans have shrunk to represent. The only thing that made him any different than the mainstream of the Republican Party whatsoever is that he's not a white male. I can't understand how you fail to realize that your policy ideas have failed repeatedly, and have been roundly rejected by the voters. Newsflash: if you want to become relevant, you'll need to abandon your tired, failed ideas and come up with something both fresh, accurate and sustainable. I very much wish you the best, because a thoughtful and effective alternative is what a loyal opposition needs to represent. So far you're continuing to fail.
Edit to add: This about nails it:
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/02/25/what-should-government-do-a-jindal-meditation/?scp=3&sq=jindal&st=cse
Well...
"I can't understand how you fail to realize that your policy ideas have failed repeatedly,"
I don't realize that because they haven't. Republican policy ideas have not EXISTED in the last decade. Really since impeachment.
You can't say a traditional grassroots republican agenda was what failed the American people. We're even more mad at Bush than the liberals are, because he gave our agenda a bad name, without actually implimenting it.
There was nothing "limited government" or "government reform" minded about Bush - not from DAY ONE of his presidency. He expanded entitlements, grew spending to a huge degree, and engaged in economic populism.
Republican LEADERS may have failed ideas, but those ideas aren't what the grassroots of the party had any interest in. We hate everything they've done, its a rape of the legacy of this party - spending, bailouts, entitlemetns and government growth.
The funny thing is that it is more like YOUR agenda, just implimented by the other party. Expanding entitlements and spending like drunken pirates is the DEMOCRATIC model for governance. Deficit spending is a Democratic hallmark when they are in control of Congress, mostly used to pay for government programs and pet projects.
The republicans simply said "fuck you" to what the republican agenda is supposed to be about, and tried to out democrat the democrats, and THAT is what "failed repeatedly". So you using it as some kind of wedge for why this country should elect democrats is absolutely insane.
The Republican leadership should be tossed out, and the party should be shamed and embarassed - but that doesn't mean we should repeat the same mistakes and then spend MORE time and MORE money doing the exact same bullshit.... which is exactly what electing Democrats to congress is doing.
So what is a grassroots republican to do when his party behaves like the opposition party, and in so doing dirties the policies they are supposed to represent as a result - and the other choice is EVEN WORSE?
Answer? We say screw 'em both and don't participate. Which actually makes the problem worse.
unlike you, I can read.
fiscal discipline needed to be crammed down the democrats' throats, but it's there now, and they will show you how much they can out Republican the Republicans.
Watch out for the ghost towns that we urbanites can't afford to pay for. Kiss goodbye to your white-ass 'safe' schools, too. Oh, and watch out, you may just lose police protection too.
Do the words YOU CAN'T AFFORD TO LIVE THERE mean something to ya?
White flight caused the housing bubble? LOL.
You can't believe that. Not when you bitch about a lack of Republican sympathy for minorities hurt by the housing bubble.
Stop it with the million dollar water fountains, then you can call yourselves the party of fiscal discipline. Very few people want to live in the exurbs & commute 5 hours every day to work. But they do so anyway because urbanites "need" to steal money from the working class in order to fund the arts.
Pick your poison: sprawl or high density population. High density living isn't better for the environment. Where do you think you get the electricity to run those commuter trains? Not wind power.
I did NOT say that white flight caused the housing bubble
NOR do I really believe that minorities were hurt all that bad by it. I just think the Republicans need to demonize SOMEONE, and minorities are a convenient target. The people who got hurt hardest are the speculators, the people who poured all their wealth into "it will go up."
Urbanites are the folks paying for your police protection, etc. They pay their own way for "money for the arts" and other city beautification projects. Personally, I LOVE murals. Makes my poor ol' steel city look prettier.
High density living absolutely is better for the environment. Count your sheep: 1 commuter bus versus 20 cars. It would take absolutely awful pollution per bus engine to equal 20 cars.
But my point is that high density living is SUSTAINABLE, and exurbs are NOT.
The budget crisis has hit, and politicians know where the votes are -- they'll save the high density cities first, and leave the rest of yinz out to hang.
We also saw cronyism, free
We also saw cronyism, free trade and not fair trade as we lose the middle class, the attempt of putting religion in government, the attack on science, militarism, and corporate fascism. Yes, just like welfare on the left, we saw how far right this country could go. And that maybe more scary than european socialism. Maybe a third party is needed, many tried. Still a whipsaw two party system.
So when is...
...your party actually going to implement its ideals? Each time you're elected you fail to implement 1/2 your agenda, and the 1/2 that does get implemented drives our economy into the ground and our deficit into the sky. Don't give me the "if we could just implement it all" bullshit, because it's bullshit. The greatest sustained economic growth across all sectors of the economy and all sectors of the population have occured in periods of higher taxes and government spending overall. And as for the deficit: http://braddelong.posterous.com/debt-to-gdp-since-the-1920s Read it and weep. Deficits continually decline under Democratic Presidencies, and sky rocket under every Republican Presidency since Nixon. Your party, whether it's implementing the ideals of Matthew Gagnon or not, fails. Every. Time. The data is plain for all to see.
Can Republicans face up to the truth?
The old guard of the Republican Party is currently trying to build unity on a foundation of hypocrisy, and it is crumbling before their very eyes, and they just don't seem to get it!!! Until they face the truth and fess up that they screwed things up over the last 8 years, how can anything good come out of the Republican Party.
Perfect example; during Bush's first 6 years along with a republican congress, he added 3 trillion dollars to the national debt ( the biggest debt in the history of the world for a single period of time). Where were all the republicans running around talking about passing on this debt to future generations?????
The Republican Party is not only morally bankrupt, it has a terminal case of hypocrisy. It is no mystery why the Republican Party is in the state it is!!!! QUIT BLAMING THE DEMOCRATES FOR YOUR OWN PROBLEMS AND GET BUSSY FIXING THEM!!! You can start by getting off your high horse and quit trying to fix everything with GOD and tax cuts!!!
that arguments makes as much sense as
the crackhead son complaining his mom drank beer; so he should be excused for his conduct. .
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vue6M5m-LDk
Much better delivery, much clearer articulation of conservatism.
Ah, yes, the Republican party is dead, it has terminal cancer, it's regionalized...
Kinda like, ya know, the Democrats circa 2004? The only, and I repeat only difference is that Republicans haven't worked up a good hate for Obama like your lot did for Bush (and hopefully we won't become that pathological either).
America's a two-party system, and always has been accept for a ten year period in the early nineteenth century and a five year period after the passage of the constitution. And Democrats are going to find that massively expanding welfare as we know it is just as hard as ending it. Single payer healthcare? Not gonna happen. You've been trying unsuccessfully since Truman. And you think it'll get passed during a recession?
And why oh why are people incapable of telling the difference between three trillion dollars over years, if not decades, and just about one trillion dollars in, I dunno, two weeks? And when Obama substantially maintains the foreign policy and war on terror apparatus the left's been complaining about for the past years without so much as a whimper from congressional Democrats, you lick-spittle liberals will doubtless be rather mum about hypocrisy. Rendition anyone? Anyone?
"Well, uh, I'll lead an administration where we don't torture."
"We're maintaining Bush administration practices about rendition...oh, look, we're closing Gitmo! In a year. Maybe. If we can find a place for all the terorists...pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!!"
you are an illiterate tool
who isn't watching where our money is being systematically devalued.
Fiscal discipline is coming, and your freedom is leaving. that means universal health care, by default.
Better hope it don't mean you lose your police or your roads.
BUT THEY'RE INFRASTRUCTURE my exurban friends cry -- and thus "good" while welfare and other things that help the poor you tucked tail and ran away from, are "bad"
Don't matter. if they're unsustainable, they get cut. And maintaining roads is getting more and more unsustainable.
And what's so wrong with being the party of "no" anyway?
I mean, it worked for the Democrats in 06 didn't it? If I could boil down the historic realigning Democratic congressional election campaign of 2006 into three words it would be "We're not Bush!"
Now, I don't think the GOP ***should*** be the party of no, but it does work at times. Occasionally the American people decide that one party has too much power and replaces them. Recall that, during the Democratic period of house and senate dominance, the Republicans exercised a like dominance on the executive (50 to 58, 68-76, 80-92). I'd call the presidency of Roosevelt an outlier (depression plus a war plus no term limits screwing up the game), so the Democrats had 48-52, 60-68, 76-80). That's 28 years of Republican to 16 years of Democrat executives. Also, in that time, no Democrat won a second term by election (Johnson inherited the end of Kennedy's term), whereas the only Republican incumbent to lose, Gerald Ford, was unelected. Basically, the American people like gridlock. This isn't a guarantee that the GOP will retake congress, not by a longshot. But, all you libs thinking you're sitting in the catbird seat should probably actually take a look at that one thing you despise above all others, history.
oh, you damn well better believe me and my fucking
ammo stockpile have looked at history, you poultroon.
Problem is, looking at history says fascism in five years...
No, I'm not in a good mood-- why do you ask?
False
It did not work for the Democrats in 06. They wre brought to power DESPITE their negative, hate fill garbage, not BECAUSE of it. The public was simply THAT fed up with Bush and the GOP that they "threw the bums out", and the "no" democrats were the only other option.
They did not get elected BECAUSE of their being the party of no... they got elected despite it.
If you want to turn the GOP around and get people to trust it again, the best (and only) way to really do that is to quit the bullshit, stop the finger pointing, stop the grandstanding, and actually talk to people about what the hell is going on, and present to them some good, fresh ideas that are in line with your ideology that can fix them, and most importantly people can ENVISION fixing them.
Simply repeating "growing government" and "big spending" over and over is beating a dead horse, and does nothing to convince anyone to join the movement.
People need to tie in rhetoric with something quantifiable, something genuine, and something down to earth that people can see having a real impact on them.
Its great and all to talk about how the Democrats growth of government will saddle my kid with a mountain of debt - but you aren't inspiring me to get behind the GOP unless you can offer something else that make sense that I think will work better.
Sure, we can sit back and feed into the party of no, playing the obstructionist until the cows come home, and MAYBE sometime down the line it might pay off if the America people get pissed off at the Democrats (but I wouldn't count on any Iraqs or Katrinas coming to the GOPs rescue)... but unless they really screw up, we'll be in the minority for a decade or more.
Either get serious about relating to the American people - ALL of them, rural and urban, north and south - and coming up with free market solutions to problems, or just shut up. Simply saying "no" without offering a credible alternative just allows Democrats to usurp the "problem solver" mantra, and say "at least we're trying SOMETHING!!!"
I guarantee that each and every single democrat
ran on more than no. even duckworth. Tester ran on sensibile estate taxes, for instance, as it's his state that has large family farms that NEED an exemption from the stupid thing.
thing is, democrats diversified. what worked for tester didn't work for Ford. so they talked different, and then you republicans think all they said was "no" - that ain't true.
A decent point
Which only reinforces my argument that being the party of "no" is simply insufficient if you want to be taken seriously.
Anti-Jindal agenda?
I am a bit taken aback by the incredibly hostile response to Jindal's speech. I don't think anyone disagrees that it paled in comparison to Obama's, but please, "throw him under the bus"? It's almost as if there's an anti-Jindal agenda going on.
it's so warm and comfy in the cocoon!
The problem with the majority of analysis in some of the above comments is the starting point. The starting point is not "I don't like Obama, I've voted Republican all of my life and always will"-- the real starting point is "Obama has high approval ratings, Republicans do not." The former only covers about 20% of the population, and as behavior indicates, that is already a solid voting block for the right.
Obama has been saying more or less the same thing for the past two years...people are not surprised by what he says. A more appropriate response from Jindal would have included new ideas, or at least a new approach to criticizing Obama's stimulus...not the same talking points we have heard over the past 2 weeks. What could have been an opportunity to show off an alternative viewpoint with real-world solutions for a scared population became a poorly delivered repetition of ideas Americans have already heard.
As for Jindal himself, not the best first impression but he is smart and will have plenty of chances to re-introduce himself and craft policy going forward.
Jindal should have looked forward instead of backward...
Even better, Jindal could have skipped the stimulus, which is after all a done deal, and tried to get in front of Obama on health care reform where Jindal has done some patient-centric stuff in LA.
And it goes from bad to worse for Jindal
Not only was his delivery in the style of Kenneth the Page from "30 Rock", he's now been caught in a lie. Here is what he said last night:
Nice story. However, does not agree at all with Lee's much earlier account of the story. Here is what Lee said in 2005 on "Larry King" (emphasis mine):
Phone call story was obviously bull hockey.
Anyone from the South could tell Jindal's Katrina story was made up. No well bred Southerner would ever one interrupt another person while on a phone call. It's simply not good manners.
And besides the context of the story made it clear the sheriff was mad as a hornet at the other person on the phone. And Jindal picks that moment to ask, "What's wrong sheriff?"
Add to that the point of the story seemed to be that during the second biggest cluster**ck of the past decade, a Democrat sheriff was trying to get around a flunky Republican bureaucrat. And that is the reason we the public should trust Republican's again?
But my favorite part was where Jindal ridiculed funds for volcano monitoring. I'm sure the governor of Louisiana can in no way see how better forcasting of natural disasters might actually be a good thing. Typical Republican thought process, I don't live near a volcano, so screw those of you who do. But when the hurricane hits my house, please come help me rebuild.
The volcano monitoring talking point has been on the RNC fax sheet for over two weeks now. But Jindal was the first one stupid enough to actually try to use it.
burn!
man, you guys really do have Manners down there! Up north we ain't so uptight ;-)
the Sarah Palin syndrome
In French political discourse one often hears the expression, "Le ridicule tue." which roughly translates as "Ridicule is mortal." The Sarah Palin phenomenon is revealing in this regard. Once she became fodder for the comics, she was "dead" in the water. This didn't happen right away as Palin enjoyed considerable success in the earlier phase of the campaign. As the comedians piled on, however, her fate was sealed.
Poor Bobby Jindal was dead in the water after just one ill-fated speech. There's no way he can recover from this. The anticipation was so great and the reality so disappointing. The two-day reaction to his fiasco has already produced sufficient ridicule to kill a dozen GOP wanna-be presidents.
Somewhat overstated, but with a grain of truth
I can't agree that ALL ridicule is mortal - I remember some pretty tough hits on Bill Clinton on SNL in 1992, with Phil Hartman portraying him.
However, I do agree that there are situations when ridicule is devastating. "I can see Russia from my house" pretty much undid Sarah Palin.
The best is yet to come
Jindal is a viral joke all across the Net. And Jon Stewart, Stephen Colbert, and SNL have not even weighed in yet.
Not to mention all the late night talk show monolouges.
Three seconds in and MSNBC had the scoop of the night when Matthews said, "Oh my God!" That's pretty much been the universal reaction. Who says MSNBC can't break a story?
And Rush has already warned all Republicans to lay off his golden boy or suffer his wrath.
Just when you think it can't get any funnier, it does.
Well, I got news for you bozos...
ex animo
davidfarrar
speaking down to us just like Jindal and with the same success
The problem with your $13 talking point is that it is designed to suck in the gullible. Now let's multiply that $13 by ten of millions and apply that to the notion of "stimulus." When you do this, you call attention to the intent of the bill and it doesn't seem ridiculous at all, does it?
It's so childish to see Obama's detractors talk about volcano monitoring and trains levitating (that's exactly what the high-speed trains do in a country like France), Yup, the pundits are right when they say that stupid (a la Bush) is out and smart is in. When are the Steeles, the Palins, the Jindals and the Limbaughs going to realize this?