More evidence it could be a bad year at the polls for the Republicans:
In Pennsylvania, Sen. Rick Santorum (R) has been running behind his challenger for months. In Montana, Sen. Conrad Burns (R), linked to the Jack Abramoff scandal, is on the defensive. In Ohio, Sen. Mike DeWine (R) is struggling to overcome a toxic environment of scandals that have tarnished the state Republican Party.
Not since 1994 has the party in power — in this case the Republicans — faced such a discouraging landscape in a midterm election. President Bush is weaker than he was just a year ago, a majority of voters in recent polls have signaled their desire for a change in direction, and Democrats outpoll Republicans on which party voters think is more capable of handling the country’s biggest problems.
Might get ugly in 2006.
muddy
Uglier than the pack running Washington right now? Impossible.
Fruitbat
Filed under “sports”? You must still be seeing the world through Steeler-colored glasses.
SmilingPolitely
Fortunately, rigged voting machines will be there to save the day.
zzyzx
Maybe they can hire the refer…
*sigh* try to forget, and hope that we get in again before 2036…
Krista
Or pretty…depending on how you look at it. Personally, I find that the image of Santorum being ousted has the kind of beauty that would make the angels weep.
p.lukasiak
Rove isn’t worried.. he already has the GOP talking points mapped out
1) 9-11
2) 9-11
3) 9-11
4) 9-11
usw…
Jorge
Don’t worry, we’ll be knee deep in the most dangerous situation the world has ever faced because Iran magically created a nuclear program and only a George Bush friendly congress will be able to help us.
demimondian
The new Republican talking point will be that we haven’t moved the goalposts, but the pylons. Voting for a Democrat will be out of bounds.
Paul Wartenberg
At what point are the voters going to realize it as BUSH’S fault that would happen and stop buying into the GOP bullshit spin that Democrats are to blame? The GOP’s been running the whole show since 2001 and they 1) bloated the deficit, 2) ignored domestic security issues such as upgrading port security, utilities security, and other key high-level targets, 3) mismanaged an invasion and occupation of a second-rate third-world nation 4) created and promoted a culture of corruption the likes of which hadn’t been seen since the Grant Administration. At this point, how can the Democrats do worse?!?!
Nikki
Yup. Terror alerts galore!
Krista
Nice catch, Jorge.
LITBMueller
We’re all assuming there will BE a Congress! What if King George decides they have interfered with his Article II powers for the last time?
“Execute Order 66….”
;)
Well, maybe nothing that drastic… But, those pesky Congresscritters better make sure they don’t end up on the Rove Blacklist(tm)!!!
Makes me laugh….a guy who is in danger of being indicted is threatening others with blacklisting! :)
Radioleft
In New York, a state traditionally split 50/50 between Dems and Republicans, the Republicans can’t even find anyone to run. Even New York’s Republican mayor is backing Democrats because the vindictive Senate Republicans are withholding money for education because of the city’s overwhelmingly Democratic population.
In Texas, overwhelmingly Republican in recent years, and not a state that usually supports third parties, has two independent candidates running for governor in addition to a Democrat.
http://blog.radioleft.com/blog/_archives/2006/2/7/1749013.html
Al Maviva
I’m actually looking forward to a bunch of Republican incumbents being thrown out on their asses in 2006. They are pigs in the freakin’ trough. Bridges to nowhere, anybody? I’m a conservative, not a Republican. When the Republicans quit being conservative – around the time Bush was elected, more or less – they started sowing the seeds of their destruction. It started with the tossing of fiscal restraint post-9/11 (No Child? Medicare Drug Benefits, anybody?), it has continued with big brother-ism in the national security arena. Not that we don’t need to enhance security, but it has to be done with care and *responsible* oversight. Good luck on that. Entitlements will eat the national fisc, if defense spending for an ever spiraling GWOT does not do so first. And what about the social security crisis? I guess we’ll worry about that in 2015 or so.
Because they cannot handle themselves as a responsible *conservative* majority party, jackanapes like Pat Leahey and Chuck Schumer have colorable political grounds to go wading into the details of national security policy. You really want Pat Leahy, who gets in trouble about once a year for leaking national security information, investigating code word classified NSA programs? I don’t, the fine details of whatever he discovers will be in the Post within 24 hours of being briefed. But I can’t see why he shouldn’t wade right in, thanks to the Republicans’ generally infantile behavior and dereliction of duty. He’s got every right to do so as a senator. Yeah, I think the NSA probe is going to devolve into just more congressional stupidity and bullshit with no real action take to resolve it either way because the facts, if Gen. Hayden is being truthful, are not egregious; but it’s not like congressional Republicans and the WH didn’t bring it on themselves. Bring on the Pelosi/Reid Congress. Maybe if you add the WH’s stupidity, and Pelosi and Reid’s stupidity, it will average out to a decent trajectory for the nation. I’m not hodling my breath, but a man has to hope.
Steve
I just want to know when Paddy got front-page posting privileges.
Pb
I’m with you Al, at least on the first paragraph, and the need for some balance in government. And with Joe Scarborough as well. And that scares me a little. :)
As for the NSA scandal, well, Bush‘s position on this and many other issues is clear, and has been clear from the beginning–he stays the course, remember? Their position is, “Don’t tell the enemy what we’re doing!” Apparently ‘the enemy’ now includes American citizens, and most–if not all–members of Congress. Once you know that, it makes sense that they never told us this outright–we had to figure it out the hard way.
The Other Steve
The only social security crisis is the fear that the Republicans might try to “fix” Social Security by eliminating it.
CaseyL
*sigh* A Democratic sweep.
Would that it were true.
But I have great faith in GWB and his handlers to continue using the fearmongering that has consistently worked so well for them; and I have great faith in the American people to swallow it hook line and sinker, like they’ve consistently done every time they get near an actual voting booth; and I have great faith in the Republican Party to already be implementing whatever voter fraud techniques it’s come up with lately.
Consolation prize: Having a front row seat as the World’s Greatest Democracy decides to vote itself out of existance.
Steve
Wow, Al claims to be a fan of fiscal restraint, and then he complains because the Democrats shot down a plan to borrow $5 trillion in new debt to set up a private account system. Just wow.
The idea that Social Security faces a “crisis” is right up there with the notion that tax cuts increase revenues. Both of them are lies which are told to justify an otherwise indefensible policy objective, and both of them get believed only because some people want to believe them.
Pb
Steve,
It’d be interesting to try to set up a list of future potential crises and see where restructuring social security would rank as a priority. Even if you avoid the military issues (which would mean ignoring nuclear proliferation, war, nation building, and whatnot), as obligations go we still have a much larger debt (adjusting for inflation) to worry about, some serious energy concerns, a health care crisis, encroachments on our civil liberties, the cycle of corporate corruption / lobbying / lawmaking / welfare (and the corruption in Congress that enables it), issues with global competitiveness, immigration (a potential solution to the last problem?), climactic irregularities and natural disasters… it’s a huge list, and practically all of these issues are much more urgent.
Richard Bottoms
That lone of bullshit is the last line of defence of the Republicans. There’s no difference between us & them so stick with the person you know.
Sorry, no sale.
Richard Bottoms
Even better news. Straight talking John McCain isn’t interested in the black vote in 2008. This just gets better and bettr.
All we need now is for Bill Frist to kick off his campaign at Bob Jones University. And I can’t wait for the first waffle on the Confederate flag issue.
We are so going to kick your ass.
Al Maviva
Steve, social security reform isn’t a problem until you look at the demographic bulge of the baby boomers, the decreasing ratio of earners to entitlements, and you consider that the new medicare benefit plus social security will likely account for 60%+ of the budget within 10 years time. Yeah, there’s welfare and WIC and other social programs, but they are a drop in the bucket once the government starts taking over the health care business. We’ve gone from a 10:1 ratio of earners to eligible retirees, to a 3:1 ratio, and it will be a 2:1 ratio within 10 years due to the baby boom. You think us Republicans act like pigs? Wait ’til you see a 35 million member AARP. P.J. O’Rourke nailed it when he said that democracy only works until the 51% figure out that they can vote themselves a pay raise out of the 49%’s pockets. I’m not saying Bush’s plan was the right one, but at least partial privatization of SS has to figure into public policy. The government isn’t a bottomless piggy bank, it’s your pockets, and my pockets, and every other earner’s pockets. I’m fine with a limited number of social programs, but it’s bad policy, and bad for our culture, to get people looking to the Fed Gov to take care of their every need.
You are worried about complacency in the face of federal encroachment on civil liberties… has it ever occurred to you that nurturing a paternalistic, fed gov-as-mommy mentality in the public is part of the reason so many people are willing to give the fed gov such a long leash? Hey, how can you possibly have anything to fear from the folks who give you a monthly pension payment, money to buy prescription drugs, and money to help rebuild your house in the flood plane? Why, surely the government is looking out for your best interests…
The Other Steve
Huh? McCain is upset because Obama wrote him a letter saying Reid’s bill looks pretty good?
And McCain interprets this as Obama doesn’t care about the issue?
Methinks McCain is projecting. i.e. he’s the one playing politics.
EL
Medicare is actually a much bigger problem, even before the drug benefit that appears to be for the pharmaceutical companies more than the elderly.
Al Maviva
Hey, Richard, so John McCain goes after Barack Obama for backtracking on promises to support ethics reform in Congress, and that makes McCain (and all republicans) racist? I guess by those standards, I must be a racist too, because I disagree with Don King on the subject of who should control the sanctioning of heavyweight fights. Not to mention that I disagreed with Shaun Alexander on the subject of who would win the Superbowl. So that makes me a double-super(bowl)-racist, right?
Are you sure you aren’t a Freeper troll?
yet another jeff
Wait wait…Al, are you saying that the Democrats are at fault for the running amok of the current GOP? Because they coddled the public until they were so soft as to fall for the bullshit coming from the current (non-conservative) GOP?
Steve
You totally ignored the point of my comment, which is that it will take trillions of dollars of new borrowing to set up a private account system. Sure, we’ll probably have better returns overall, but we’re the same taxpayers who will have to pay the interest and principal on those trillions of dollars of new borrowing. It’s the same logic that says you don’t max out your credit cards so you can invest more money in the stock market.
None of this is relevant in the slightest. The fact is, if you assume the economy will continue to follow historical trends, there is NO projected deficit of payments in Social Security at any time in the foreseeable future. In fact, the administration had to latch onto the most pessimistic forecast out there, and even then the best they could claim is that Social Security will face a deficit 50 years from now.
You seem like a very smart guy, Al. I don’t know if you’re trying to fool people or if you’re honestly confused about these things, but trust me, you cannot snow me on this issue.
Pb
Al,
I personally can’t stand this statistic, and the various ways it is misused–you at least don’t present it as badly as I’ve seen in the past. However, even if you had gotten it exactly right, it’s still misleading.
Pb
Al,
It might. It definitely makes McCain a liar, though. The next question is, what’s his motivation.
The Other Steve
Actually I think medicare plus social security already accounts to over 50% of the budget. So your hyperbole and hand waving isn’t particularly convincing.
So your answer is to eliminate a program which has resulted in tremendous financial freedom for millions of Americans. Allowing parents to continue to live by themselves in their retirement years, instead of having to shack up with their children?
I can’t imagine people are going to support you on that.
I don’t have a problem with looking at ways of tweaking things, maybe not paying out as much for early retirement except based upon some needs analysis. But the fact is, people want to retire earlier, not later. People don’t want to be forced to depend on their children either.
Come back to me when you have a real solution to the problem, rather than this crisis bullshit.
Richard Bottoms
Calling the only black senator a liar is a sure way to piss off black voters. Don’t recall saying anything about it being racist.
It’s just politically dumb and it has the advantage of not being true. Obama shot right back telling McCain to piss up a rope.
The Other Steve
Oh yeah, one more thing, with SNARK…
So it’s bad to spend money being a nanny to Americans.
But it’s ok to spend billions being a nanny to Iraqis.
I can save you $500 billion over the next 5 years today, by pulling troops out of Iraq.
Richard Bottoms
BTW. Is there some special pair of glasses Republicans wear that allow them to read what isn’t being written??
Could you quote where I used the word racist with regards to John McCain?
Now, whichever one of the next crop of Republicans running for president who sets foot at Bob Jones University will instantly qualify, though.
Pooh
I think he’s cribbing from some ancient Greek dude, but it’s hard to argue with this point.
I’m not touching SS with a 20-foot poll, as I know less than nothing.
As far as 2006 elections, let me give this a focus group test run to see how it works on keeping John in the GOP fold:
OOGA-BOOGA-BOOGA! TERRA TERRA TERRA! WHAT WOULD JACK BAUER DO?
Richard Bottoms
Unless your motivation is to destroy a program Republicans have hated for decades. The American public told GW to screw off on this one.
The Other Steve
Would have to agree with that.
The rate military spending is going up is also a crisis.
KC
Don’t mean to be a downer here, but I’ve never seen a party screw an opportunity up like the Dems. It’d be nice though to balance out the executive branch with at least one house of Congress.
Pooh
Don’t know where else to put this one, but Donald “Stuff Happens” Rumsfeld was for fraud and corruption before he was against it
Blue Neponset
I think the public is waking up to the fact that the anti-government party shouldn’t be running the government. A lot can happen between now and November, but if the Repubs have to actually run on their records they will do poorly this fall.
Richard Bottoms
Enough with defeatist crap.
Al Gore got the most votes of anyone in history at the time of the 2000 race. He won the popular vote.
quietpc3400
In trouble at the polls. All the more reason to bomb Iran! Here’s how it will go:
– Bomb Iran – either Israel alone (but of course supported to hilt by US and the Kurds) or Israel and US in March or April
– Regular orange terror alerts starting in May
-Catch a few more “Osama’s #2 or #3” guys
– Pull out 100K or so troops from Iraq through end of summer
– Right near election, sudden “discovery” of a terrorist plot or something similar that Bush/GOP saved us of from.
RalphF
Well, if we dems do get to take over we will want to thank the current repubs for expanding the rules for the majority party so much.
Brian
Given that this is an early poll, given the recent track record of polls, and given both that the Democrats have found ways to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory and that, fault the Republicans as we may, they DO know how to run political campaigns…
IF the Repubs. should lose, I don’t see that as a bad thing for several reasons, not the least of which is that they do better when they’re not in power. I seem to recall William Buckley saying “Conservatives are better standing athwart history and crying ‘enough!’, not directing it.” Or something like that. This assumes that the Republican party still has conservatives in it somewhere, though, instead of ‘liberal, but just for our values’ people. CHINOs, maybe? Conservative Hewers In Name Only?
Rusty Shackleford
As much as I appreciate John Cole and Balloon Juice it’s voters just like him who are resposible for the Bush Admin Act II. These people were fully aware of what Bush was up to but pretended otherwise until the morning after (basically) the 2004 election. Not they’re shocked, shocked! at the mess we’re in.
Jorge
Holy wow you would think that no Democrat had ever won an election instead of the country rallying around the POTUS after the most bloody day on the homeland since the Civil War. Bush’s and the Reps approval ratings are like a mountain that peaked right after 9/11 and have been on a constant down slope since.
Now, that doesn’t mean 2006 will go to the Dems. But I really do hope that the 9/11 surge hasn’t fooled anyone into thinking the country has gone completely Republican. Or heck, maybe I do hope it has fooled folks.
Will
John, would you mind qualifying how badly you want Republicans to lose in ’06?
Richard Bottoms
Ahh yes, the great William F. Buckley:
Negro backwardness? What a beacon of truth and justice we have in WFB. Fuck him.
Mike in SLO
I certainly don’t agree with much of what Al is saying policy-wise, but I do agree that conservatism died and was replaced by some fiscally irresponsible hybrid when the Bush Administration came to power. You can argue all you want with Al about fiscal policy, but us progressives should be cheering him on for his observance that the current administration is anything but conservative. It will take the John’s and Al’s of this world to open the eyes of the rank and file Republicans to their betrayal by Bush and Co. The right in this country will not be swayed by the Progessive or Democratic message even when correct and factual, but they can be swayed by honest conservatives like John and Al reminding them what real conservatism is all about. When the real conservatives wake up and shout out, then real change will take place and we will all be able to argue policy like the good old pre-Bush days. Until then, we need these guys!
Dantheman
“Might get ugly in 2006.”
Of course it will. That’s just the Republican playbook. Just ask the Swift Boat Veterans. Or the folks who distributed leaflets in 2004 saying the Democrats want to ban the Bible. Or many other examples.
rachel
As long as that asshat Santorum is defeated, I don’t give a crap what else happens.
Richard Bottoms
William F. Buckley voted for segregation before he voted against it.
Faux News
John’s blog buddy Andrew Sullivan kept insisting during the 2000 election that Bush would govern from “the sensible center”. He dismissed articles from Molly Ivins who kept stating that would not be the case. Now Sullivan, like John Cole is also shocked at the mess we are in.
The Disenfranchised Voter
He is and it’s obvious.
McCain posted the letter to Obama on his website.
And he accuses Obama of playing politics?
Ha! Right, McCain–Hypocrite.
SeesThroughIt
Very true–Republicans are far beyond anybody else when it comes to this. Of course, they like to say that it’s just that they have better ideas, that their policies resonate with the American people, blah blah blah bullshitcakes, but really, they are incredibly organized and ruthlessly efficient when it comes to running a campaign.
Steve
But McCain isn’t playing politics! He wants a bipartisan solution, what could be less political than that?
Of course, McCain gets his definition of “bipartisanship” from the Mac Buckets Dictionary, where it reads “Bipartisanship, n. 55 Republicans and Joe Lieberman.”
The Disenfranchised Voter
I think McCain’s only real mistake in all of this was posting the letter on his website. It makes it clear that he wants to make this about politics, otherwise, he would have keep the letter private.
The Disenfranchised Voter
*kept
Pooh
TDV, you are seriously the worst speller ever who cares about his spelling.
Pb
Faux News,
The difference is, Sullivan realized his mistake a bit sooner.
Bob In Pacifica
Social security? Medicare? Hey, let’s have a tax cut! And let’s give it to the wealthiest one-half of one percent of the nation!
Steve
Hey, a tax cut in a time of war, no less.
Interesting how the folks who like to spread misinformation about the Social Security “crisis” always scurry off when people who are actually informed about the issue speak up.
ppGaz
If this has already been seen here, my apologies.
Courtesy DKos.
64 percent. That’s virtually everybody but the KoolAid drinkers.
The Disenfranchised Voter
LOL! I’m not a bad speller, I’m a bad typist. I actually type with just my two index fingers (and a thumb here and there), and I’m faster than most people who use all of their fingers.
I really should start to preview before I submit, but I never end up doing it.
(Though I just started with this post)
Pooh
*golf clap for typo free post*
The Disenfranchised Voter
Thank you, Thank you.
*bows*
Richard Bottoms
Reverend Lowery lays the smackdown on the smirking chimp:
Anyone who is surprised has never been to a black funeral before.
Steve
That sounds pretty softcore. The only time I went to a black funeral they were speaking in tongues.
tbrosz
Richard:
Buckley wrote that in 1957, while the Democratic Party was making a full-time career of pushing segregation in the South, and Robert Byrd was just barely out of his sheets. Wouldn’t be too smug about it.
searp
Conservatism didn’t die, it simply has never been the animating force of the Republican party. The Republicans represent monied interests, period. “Conservatism” in this world is simply no-taxes-no-regulations-on-corporations. It has nothing to do with libertarianism, isolationism, social policy, etc etc.
The Republicans are in trouble because a slavish devotion to the welfare of corporations, as opposed to the citizenry, isn’t popular. The more apparent it becomes that we are governed for the benefit of the few, the less popular the Republicans become.
How to deal with this? Simple: the faux-populism of Karl Rove, who cares as much about your average churchgoer as Jack Abramoff. That is: say anything, lie like crazy, get 50% + 1 vote, and then do what you want.
Rusty Shackleford
tbrosz Says:
Richard:
Buckley wrote that in 1957, while the Democratic Party was making a full-time career of pushing segregation in the South, and Robert Byrd was just barely out of his sheets. Wouldn’t be too smug about it.
February 8th, 2006 at 2:56 am
Tbrosz or “Mrs. Ann Coulter” – you choose, all those Dixiecrats that made a full-time career of pushing segregation in the South scurried off to the Republican Party long ago, and have remained ever since.
“I want to say this about my state. When Strom Thurmond ran for president, we voted for him. We’re proud of it. And if the rest of the country had followed our lead, we wouldn’t have had all these problems over all these years either.”
— Mississippi Senator Trent Lott, Dec. 5, 2002
When will the Republican Party stop providing refuge for America’s bigots?
Barry
Mike in SLO Says:
“I certainly don’t agree with much of what Al is saying policy-wise, but I do agree that conservatism died and was replaced by some fiscally irresponsible hybrid when the Bush Administration came to power.”
No – this is conservatism. Some of the people who voted GOP in 2000 could legitimately claim surprise, but nobody who voted GOP in 2004 have that as an honest excuse. And considering that almost everybody who voted GOP in 2000 voted GOP in 2004, perhaps ‘some of the people’ is a bit much.