Since the election of President Obama, the Republican Party, fairly or not, has been labeled the Party of No. They have framed their opposition as standing up against the enemies of liberty: Obama, the Democrats, and their little dog too (the disenfranchised, the poor, the ethnic minorities). For a while they framed it in terms of holding back the redistribution of wealth; they were not going to let the socialists take your money and give it to the shiftless and lazy poor people.
Arun Gupta in Truthout elaborates:
The GOP fights against every Democratic policy – including the stimulus bill, jobs programs, aid to local governments, court appointees, more labor rights, health care, financial regulation, net neutrality unemployment benefits, expanding access to food stamps and Head Start, action on global warming and immigrant rights – because it claims some sort of theft of money or rights is involved.
But lately their opposition seems to have taken a different tack. Now they don't even give a reason. Now they just prefer not to. They have stopped justifying their opposition or even framing it as opposition. Instead, they have begun to say they just want to do nothing. It is like the character in Melville's Bartleby the Scrivener who responds to every request with a simple: "I prefer not to".
When asked this week what he would do to create jobs if the Republicans took back the House, Minority Leader Boehner said they would repeal health care (which cannot be the cause of unemployment because it has yet to be implemented), not do cap and trade, and not raise taxes. That's right. How will you fix unemployment? By undoing and not doing. We prefer not to. They are doing nothing now in opposition. They would do nothing if they were in charge because they prefer not to.