1 Boring Old Man

Even Republicans don’t like Republican leaders:
^{"The approval rating of GOP leaders among Republicans has plummeted 12 points in a month"}
AMERICAblog
By Joe Sudbay
03/16/2009

Greg Sargent took a look at the latest Pew Poll and found what two other recent polls, from Rasmussen and DailyKos, have also shown. Republicans don’t like their Republican leaders:

The approval rating of GOP leaders among Republicans has plummeted 12 points in a month, down from 55% in February to a minority of 43% now. That’s striking. Not only that, but approval of GOP leaders overall has dropped to 28% overall — the lowest rating for GOP leaders in 12 years of Pew polling. In fact, approval of Republican congressional leaders has fallen from 34% in February to 28% currently, the lowest rating for GOP leaders in nearly 14 years of Pew Research surveys.
Why is this happening? Is it general lack of morale among Republicans? Is it that GOP voters are frustrated that their leaders haven’t succeeded in blocking Obama’s agenda? Or could it be that the Dem strategy of using Rush Limbaugh to drive a wedge between die-hard partisan Republicans and those who want to see Obama succeed is working? Something is turning Republicans against their own leadership — in big numbers.

Maybe even Republicans think taking money for nothing but talk is wrong. And, probably a few of them know that if Obama fails, the nation fails.

While I think I finally somewhat understand the roots of the financial crisis, I don’t think most of us, really comprehend it’s magnitude or its complexity. But at least we know we’re having one. The things the Republicans and their leaders loudest people have been saying are not so aggregious in and of themselves. But they make absolutely no sense in the context of our current circumstances. Conservative should be an adjective – like a "conservative Congressman." But it has become a noun – a Conservative. They’ve forgotten "Congressman." Says House Minority Leader John Boehner: "‘As I told my colleagues, we don’t have enough votes to legislate,’ Boehner said, according to Saturday’s New York Times. ‘We are not in the majority. We are not kind-of in the minority; we are in a hole. They ought to get the idea out of their minds that they are legislators. But what they can be is communicators’" ["we" and "they" being Republican Congressmen].

Looking at the top figure, except for a couple of two year stints, the Republican Party has been the Minority Congressional Party since the Great Depression – until Newt Gingrich’s Contract with America in 1994. Then for twelve years, the Republicans controlled both Houses of Congress, and for six of those years, they controlled Congress and the Presidency [the recent history is shown in the lower figures].

When I read what John Boehner said, I waited to respond because I wanted to think about it. It’s an absurd premise from the outset. To equate Minority Status with not being able to "legislate" makes no sense to me at all. The only way it makes any sense is if the whole point of being in Congress is to vote as a Party Bloc – and then only if you’re in power and guaranteed to win. The actual meaning of being a "legislator" is to represent the people who elected you – all of them. It’s not to pout because your Political Party isn’t in the Majority. I guess after 60+ years, the Republicans forgot that during their twelve years controlling Congress. From what Boehner says, the only point is to get back in charge again.