Tuesday, October 22, 2013

When government is designed to fail as GOP intends, this is what government looks like ... by gimleteye

There is a problem with the GOP, especially the strain of Republicanism of Jeb Bush whose terms as governor Florida suffered, and that is: if government isn't good for anything, or if the only "good" government is local government, what happens when the simplest of observations -- how greed and self-interest  business interests overpower the public good -- prove true?

The GOP has only itself to blame for the echo chamber -- including its media arm, Fox News -- for sounding senseless. Last Sunday, during an interview with Fox News' Chris Wallace, Florida Senator Marco Rubio said that his party should punish President Obama for refusing to change health care reform after being approved by Congress and vetted by the US Supreme Court. "“This notion that they’re going to get into a room and negotiate a deal with the president on immigration is much more difficult ... because the way the president has behaved towards his opponents over the last three weeks as well as the White House and the things that they’ve said and done."

By embracing policies and budgets that ensure the failure of government programs -- like EPA enforcement or safety standards that otherwise protect public health -- and arguing these programs belong, not at the federal level, but at the state and local levels, the GOP advocates government failure. And when the local GOP operatives (Miami Dade County / Department of Environmental Regulation) seize levers of power, as it is today on so many fronts, the defenders of breaking-government-to-fix-government sound like so many chattering monkeys in trees. Who pays? We all do.

8 comments:

Oscar said...

If Obamacare was designed to fail, then put the blame where it belongs ... on the Democrats.

Obamacare was passed with ZERO Republican votes. It was designed, passed, and implemented by Democrats. Even the chief architect of the act, Democratic Sen. Max Baucus, now calls it a train wreck.

The Republicans warned us of this nightmare and they were 100% correct. They tried valiantly to help us avert this disaster and they were thwarted every time by Democrats.

It is undeniable that the Democrats built Obamacare. It's now time for them to own it.

Anonymous said...

I love the ACA and think it will substantially help Americans. However, I do not understand why a contract of that magnitude, which is so important to Americans, would be given to a foreign company. And to a company who could not produce or perform at this level of complexity. Is there something wrong with our IT companies? Some US contracts should be limited to only US companies. In the end, it may be US IT intelligence that gets the system going.

Anonymous said...

obama designed it to fail because he really wants a single payer system.

worst president ever.

Anonymous said...

We all know the drill by now:
1. Obama screws up
2. Obama denies there is a problem
3. Obama admits there is a problem and blames someone else (preferably George Bush)

O said...

Rubio did not say Republicans want to "punish" Obama. No one ever said punish. He suggested Republicans don't trust Obama after his behavior in recent weeks/months, which is the way most of America feels. Big difference.

Anonymous said...

What people who are not in IT don't realize is that just because someone has a computer science degree does not mean they can design large complex systems. There are IT soldiers, officers, and generals. It looks like ACA had a bunch of fast talking soldiers in charge of a very complex project that needed a full contingent of generals who understood and could think through every component of the project with the support of field forces working on their small sections.

Anonymous said...

Odumbo shut down the government because he did not want to defer Obamacare for one year for average Americans. It's now inevitable that Odumbo will defer it for one year because his administration does not know how to make a website. The shutdown could have been averted if Odumbo just listened to his critics. Oh, the irony!

Prem said...

George Washington warned of the pitfalls of party politics in his farewell speech. Seems like everything he warned about came to pass.
Both the Demcorats and Republicans in their national conventions before the previous presidential elections changed rules without the consensus of their members. Their leadership chose to ignore points of inquiry and order demanded, and passed these rules without an actual vote, but based on consent determined by the chair.
These parties don't represent a collective will, they represent the manufactured will of elites:



All obstructions to the execution of the laws, all combinations and associations, under whatever plausible character, with the real design to direct, control, counteract, or awe the regular deliberation and action of the constituted authorities, are destructive of this fundamental principle, and of fatal tendency. They serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put, in the place of the delegated will of the nation the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community; and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common counsels and modified by mutual interests.