The GOP had a good night Tuesday Night, sweeping into a majority in the U.S. Senate – though still not enough to overcome a super majority of 60 seats, which is what it takes to get anything passed in the Senate – and growing their numbers in the U.S. House. Not to worry, the shoe will be on the on the other foot next election when it comes to Republican seats up for grabs. All we Democrats need to do is give Republicans enough rope to hang themselves for the next two years, by letting them go blindly forward with their agenda.
Voices from the far right, such as conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh, and Texas Senator Ted Cruz, will continue to push the idea that the Republican Party won a mandate to push their agenda through Congress, which at the top of the list is investigating and finally impeaching President Barack Obama. That will never happen but for the sake of spinning out the clock until next election, the GOP’s agenda will not be pretty nor will it be what the American people want out of their government, though those conservative voices will insist it is, no matter what the polls say over and over again.
Kentucky Senator Mitch McConnell the Minority Leader and soon-to-be Majority Leader has made public remarks, saying he believes he can work with the White House on some common ground issues. Do not believe it for a moment, every election we hear the same thing from leaders of both parties, of how they are all going to get along and tend to the nation’s business, but then, they never really do.
For the next two years, the Republicans will have a small list of things to do, which will be the same list that they have been pushing for a long time now. As always, there will be a push to repeal Obamacare and it will certainly not gain much ground, but those Republicans who made campaign promises that if they win the Senate, they will repeal and replace Obamacare, has to show they tried to do something. Still, even if they were able to get a bill through Congress to repeal Obamacare, once it landed on the president’s desk, he would surely veto it, and no way, would there be a two-thirds majority to overturn that veto.
Then, there is Obama and that same drumbeat; Benghazi, Benghazi, and Benghazi; you would think President Obama ordered the attack himself on the embassy where four embassy staff members was killed, by the endless investigations into the tragedy. The war in Iraq and the deception that led us into it is something we all should just move on from of course, but let us squeeze anything we can out of Benghazi, Benghazi, and Benghazi.
Then there is the IRS scandal plus the idea that President Obama has used his executive power to do what they, the Republicans have tried so hard to keep him from doing, which is to do his job when it comes to the pressing issues of our times. They will Investigate, investigate, and investigate, anything and everything they can use to scrutinize this president, his administration and his possible Democratic replacement nominee in 2016, former New York U.S. senator and secretary of state, Hillary Clinton.
One thing we can always count on from Republicans when they are in charge is a huge push to cut taxes for the wealthy, while at the same time, working to cut social programs for everyone else. We will hear the same old song and dance about how letting millionaires and billionaires keep more of their money will mean more jobs for the rest of us. The problem with that old trickle-down economics theory is that the trickle never comes; the wealthy get wealthier and everyone else makes less and less money as time goes by, yet pays more for everything, from real estate to food.
Another important issue, immigration reform, will get a lot of lip service from Republican lawmakers but as always, fear of the big bad wolf, the Tea Party, will keep Republican leaders from compromising with Democrats and the president, so nothing will get done meaningful on immigration. Republicans will continue to ignore the needs of Hispanics at their own peril and comprehensive immigration reform will not happen before the next election in 2016, and then only if Democrats once again wrestle control of congress from Republicans and also hold onto the White House.
To sum it up, unless the president can get the current lame duck congress to make some bold last-minute moves, such as raising the minimum wage or immigration reform, it will likely not get passed in the next congress either. The next two years is going to be a bumpy ride that will do nothing but take us in circles, with no progress being made in Washington D.C. except by executive order from the White House.
Let me add here, even though the president will be vilified by Republican lawmakers and the conservative media for doing so, Americans will look at the dysfunctional U.S. Capitol and realize that the only wheels turning, no matter how small, because of his limits, is President Obama’s executive power.
The GOP will do what it always have done in the last several years, which is to ignore the voice of the majority of Americans, for the voice of the few, which is those who are wealthy enough to feed those hungry campaign coffers of theirs to the hilt.
Republicans lawmakers like Sen. Ted Cruz and media personalities like Rush Limbaugh will tell Republicans lawmakers what they believe America wants from them, no matter what those “bias” polls say. Repeal Obamacare, cut corporate taxes, build the Keystone pipeline, cut regulations on polluting industries and financial institutions, the same old, same old, and nothing new will come from the Grand Old Party who cannot see past their own noses when it comes to the needs of average Americans.
President Obama will get the blame of course, good old scapegoat Obama, for vetoing their bills and for, as they say, destroying the country. Republican lawmakers will take it all the way to 2016, proclaiming their failure to get things done was all because of the president and the Democrats who refused to sign on to their legislation.
Perhaps the predictions I have made here will prove to be wrong, and if so, let us only be glad of it, because miracles never cease. America’s voice; that means the voice of the rich, the poor, the middle-class, African-Americans, Hispanic, Asians, straights and gays, women and men, all have spoken out loud and clear, when it comes to immigration reform, a minimum wage increase and equal rights for all Americans. If Republicans decide not to listen to that voice come November 2016, there will be a reckoning of huge proportions, and all the money in the pockets of the Koch brothers, will not save them from it.
This is a republish from my website: Fidlerten Place