David Gergen et al. may blame Obama but the voters will blame Republicans:
If no deal is reached, 53% say congressional Republicans are to blame while just 27% think Obama is at fault.
There’s that 27% figure again.
by DougJ| 108 Comments
This post is in: Crazification Factor
David Gergen et al. may blame Obama but the voters will blame Republicans:
If no deal is reached, 53% say congressional Republicans are to blame while just 27% think Obama is at fault.
There’s that 27% figure again.
Comments are closed.
redshirt
I wonder if Stone Age Gallup polled the populace 27% would have been against “Rocks used as tools”.
dmsilev
At this point, I’m convinced that the pollsters know about the “magic number” and are rounding their results up or down to hit it, just to screw with us.
MattF
27% is the moral equivalent of zero.
piratedan
This tax/debt stuff is tedious, it’s like watching an adult attempting to compromise with a three year old who has taken the TV remote hostage. While I don’t wish physical harm on the opposition party and their tactics, I sure as hell wish that they would just hand over the remote and if our policies are so scary bad, let us implement them, ruin the country and then they can reappear on the scene like the Calvary saving the homestedders from the cattle barons who have hired the nefarious gunslingers to throw them off their land… oh wait, the R’s are the cattle barons… never mind, sic the troops on them and turn the ranch into a public park.
JGabriel
Turn it up to eleven!
.
danimal
Damn Gergen, Archbishop of Broder, for his false equivalency. These moderate Republicans act as if there is a rational, policy-driven GOP that Obama needs to work with. They may as well describe the inner workings of Santa’s workshop on the North Pole. HINT: The moderate Republicans itching to bargain in good faith with Obama DON’T EXIST.
This should not be a difficult conclusion, based on the actual events of the past
four yearsfew decades.redshirt
@JGabriel: It’s one louder, in’it?
BGinCHI
McConnell is shitting his pants on the Senate floor in fear of filibuster reform again today.
So if you were wondering, yes, it is a good idea. Hopefully Reid will get this done and send the first message that it’s not business as usual with these obstructionist clowns anymore.
shortstop
I was stunned, STUNNED, to see that 19% of self-identified Republicans think Republicans will be more to blame. This is a tidal wave of sudden GOP accountability.
gocart mozart
@redshirt:
27% of stone age people polled believed that fire was dangerous demon magic and should be outlawed.
gene108
I was watching Washington Journal this morning, while getting ready to go to work.
Rep. Cole (R-OK) was on and he said something that caught my attention.
He was cock sure Republicans would maintain control of the House in 2014, 2016 and beyond.
In short, the Republican controlled House does not have to respond to the whims and fancies of the electorate, because they have safely gerrymandered themselves into a majority for the foreseeable future.
How to flip Republican votes in 2014 will be key.
I know people, who voted for Bush, Jr. in 2000 and/or 2004, who got so disgusted with Bush & Co. and the Republicans in Congress that they voted for Democrats in 2006 and 2008.
I don’t know, if this sort of shift can happen again and how much of a shift needs to happen to overcome the 2010 redistricting.
Republicans in the House managed to nicely insulate themselves because of the state level elections that went the Republican’s way in 2010, therefore I don’t think national polls really matter.
What matters are the polls in each incumbent Republican’s district and I bet those are more favorable for the Republicans.
gocart mozart
The weel undermines traditional transportation values.
redshirt
@gocart mozart: No shit! You know there were people against the wheel too! Probably, 27% of any given population.
It’s a constant.
slag
@shortstop:
Haha. I’ve come to see an inability to take personal responsibility for failure as a hallmark of Republican ideology. To the point at which, when I’m working with someone (or even just encountering them on the street sometimes), I can accurately discern their political leanings from this characteristic alone.
Cultural differences between Rs and Ds, I’m sure, vary across the country, but in my particular locality, you can pretty much spot a Republican a mile away.
nemesis
53%. The gop could give a fuck. They dont hold ANY positions that are popular, yet manage to derail all good governance through gerrymandered House districts and the Senate filibuster.
shortstop
@slag: I don’t disagree! I just assumed it would be more like 3 or 4 percent, as it has been in past polls. Nineteen percent is unprecedented based on the past few years’ performance.
James Gary
“It’s like, ‘how much more obstructive could this be?’ and the answer is ‘None. None more obstructive.'”
Scotty
@gene108:
You need to get as many crazy tea party Republicans as possible to primary and get on the ticket. Then you need to run moderate Democrats against them.
NonyNony
@DougJ
Also that 47% figure. Though perhaps not the same 47% figure.
Though the summary is a bit of a lie. Since 12% say “Both Sides Do It”.
slag
@shortstop: Agreed. I wonder who those 19% are. They would make for an interesting study population. Even more so than the 27%, I think.
Roger Moore
@slag:
My guess is that the 19% are the ones who disagree with the use of “blame” to describe the situation. They proudly take credit for driving the country off the fiscal cliff and want to deny any claim that the Democrats might be involved. IOW, they’re even crazier than the 27%.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@danimal: Moderate Republicans are those that will accept whatever Obama agrees to as long as Obama agrees to everything they ask. Radical Republicans will not accept anything that Obama agrees to, even if they proposed it.
What you’re thinking of is a moderate Democrat.
Roger Moore
@Belafon (formerly anonevent):
I find your ideas intriguing and would like to subscribe to your newsletter.
Brachiator
@gocart mozart:
27% of stone age people polled believed that fire was dangerous demon magic and should be outlawed.
Actually, they stoned Natepithecus Silveri for suggesting that they even do any kind of polling. Set human evolution back thousands of years.
Redshift
@shortstop: And that’s after a lot of past moderate Republicans are no longer “self-identified Republicans.”
Alex S.
I don’t like the word ‘cliff’, let’s call it the fiscal lagoon, or the fiscal fjord.
Cassidy
@Redshift: All the cool kids call themselves Libertarians these days.
ruemara
I, personally, am in favor of leading the 27% to cliff at night and letting them find their way down in the dark.
edited to reflect the weirdness that this is comment 27.
@Alex S.:
You like the fjords? I worked very hard on them.
shortstop
@Roger Moore: Oh, good god, you’re likely right. Probably Pollyanna-ish of me to have interpreted it more charitably.
Zifnab25
The only Republicans you need to move are the ones with money. The rest will get dragged along behind whether they like it or not. Just reference the last Presidential election, where everyone’s-least-favorite-candidate won the primary and suddenly became the Most Serious Conservative In All the Land. :-p
The military hawks are going to cut a deal, because their contractor buddies will get hit with sequestration hardest. Once you win over the hawks, the rest is just rationalizing why a Republican Congressman’s vote is a dedication to staunch conservative principles.
danimal
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): No, Gergen is a moderate Republican. What he doesn’t realize is that he is a walking fossil, a zoo exhibit of a soon-to-be extinct species. He, and the 5-10 media personalities like him, speak for no one, have no constituency, and are utterly clueless about the state of the nation today.
There are no rational Republicans in office today, and the Gergen-enablers in the media need to get a clue. It’s terrible reporting to put Gergen on the tv. I don’t dislike the man so much as I believe he is a relic that doesn’t represent anyone outside the Beltway chattering class.
rikyrah
over the cliff…baby.
over that cliff
Lee
@gene108:
Very simple solution.
The Dems need to start targeting the state level elections and start winning back the state houses.
The hard part is pulling it off. Have the Democrats put a Presidential level effort with GOTV in 2014 and you might have a chance of flipping some states as well as taking back the House and keeping the Senate.
Alex S.
@ruemara:
Really? You should get an award for those.
Ash Can
I’m just glad to see that so many people are paying attention to what’s really happening.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@danimal: I would be kind of curious though: If you put him in the Senate, and told him he could run for reelection, how would he vote? I think he knows what going on, and the only thing keeping him moderate is the chair at CNN.
What would “liberal” Nixon be like today?
? Martin
@danimal:
That’s not true. We’re seeing a number of Republicans stepping out of the weeds. The problem was, and will continue to be, that Boehner will not bring anything to a vote that won’t pass without a Republican majority. The Senate bill will pass the House right now if Boehner brings it to a vote, but he won’t because Democrats will be the reason it passes.
The House is 27% Tea Party, 27% Republicans, and 46% Democrats, and Boehner is treating it as though it’s 50% Tea Party, 50% Republicans, and 0% Democrats.
Every villager spun longing tales of Reagan and Tip O’Neill. But they forget that Tip brought bills to a vote that he knew wouldn’t garner a majority of Democrats. He treated the House much more as a Democracy, and he deserves 100% of the credit for Congress working during that period. Boehner is the entire problem. He refuses to bring things to a vote. Period. Full stop. It doesn’t matter if 49% of the House is fucking insane so long as the other 51% is allowed to vote.
Bulworth
It’s my privilege to announce that you have won the Internets today. Where would you like your prize sent?
dmsilev
@? Martin: Boehner’s following in the grand tradition of Tom DeLay and his puppet Hastert. “Majority of the majority” was the term they preferred.
RSA
@shortstop:
I suspect that a significant number of those Republicans might think that going off the fiscal cliff is a good thing. (We have to destroy the country before we can rebuild it.) Sure, the question says “blame” but they might take it as meaning “credit”.
gene108
@Lee:
Somehow Axelrod and Plouffe need to figure out how to hand over the OFA infrastructure to the DNC or somehow allow it to function independent of President Obama’s campaigns.
I don’t know, if they will be able to energize people to volunteer in 2014, without Obama on the ticket.
Maybe getting Pelosi back as Speaker may spark similar enthusiasm, I don’t know.
The tools for a big 2014 GOTV are there, but whether they’ll be made ready for use in 2014 or be kept in the drawer is a big question.
artem1s
On Tuesday, House Democrats are expected to press for an up or down vote on the middle-class tax cuts bill passed by the U.S. Senate in July. Rep. Tim Walz will file a discharge petition to bring H.R. 15 to the floor. Tim Walz’s discharge petition to force a vote on H.R. 15 to extend middle-class tax cuts while ending tax cuts for the richest 2 percent.
you can contact your rep online here http://bit.ly/TyoNG2
or call (202) 225-3121. They only need a simple majority to force an up or down vote. Personally I want to see video of the GOP, one by one, voting no to help 98% so the richest 2% get to keep riding the gravy train.
Just Some Fuckhead
That leaves the other 20% that voted for Romney. They are probably blaming both sides.
quannlace
And these are probably the same people who think Obama has too many Christmas trees in the White House.
gene108
@? Martin:
Republicans cannot be seen as having any disunity and breaking ranks in anyway anymore.
Allowing a vote to pass with a Democratic majority and some Republican votes will be all well and good, but right now the Republicans have pegged their hopes for survival on being a monolithic unified entity, whose members will vote unanimously.
Otherwise the Democrats can divide and rule, i.e. Dems stay relatively unified in the House and pass bills the Dem. Senate and White House will clear, with a few Republican votes.
This will negate the influence Republicans will have over the national politics, which is currently to hold the country hostage to do the bidding of a small minority of people, who most of the country doesn’t agree with.
Just Some Fuckhead
Black Heart White Hunter
danimal
@? Martin: I hate to break it to you, but the Cossacks work for the Czar. IOW, if Boehner is the problem, they can always select another Speaker.
Anyone expect a more moderate GOP leader to emerge? Anyone? Buehler?
slag
@Roger Moore: That’s a bummer of a thought. Though it does push the crazification factor up past 33%, which has been my own personal estimate for many many moons now.
Just Some Fuckhead
@danimal:
Martin’s percentages are bullshit anyway. The House is about 50% rightwing nutjobs, regardless of who’s wearing the tri-corner hats and masturbating to pictures of Ronnie and Tip.
shortstop
OT, I’ve been traveling without much intertubes and now that I’m back, I’m having way too much fun reading stories of Ann Romney’s crying jags. Does that make me a bad person? I really don’t care if it does; just want to get the label right.
Full Metal Wingnut
Are the stats really that surprising? Democrat, Republican, Libertarian, Anarcho-Syndicalist-they all hate Congress.
shortstop
@Just Some Fuckhead: I really don’t give a damn if someone’s a nominally reasonable Republican if he/she (who am I kidding, they’re overwhelmingly hes) is consistently voting in lockstep with the crazy. For that reason I find it impossible to sympathize with “moderates” who were successfully primaried by ‘baggers and after the loss, suddenly find the courage to speak out against GOP extremism.
Heliopause
Richard Adams had a funny observation in the Guardian:
“50% of those surveyed say the Republicans would be blamed for a failure to make a deal to fix the problem, while just 27% say President Obama would get the blame.Only 12% said that both sides would be equally to blame – presumably that was all inside the Beltway Washington journalists.”
Just Some Fuckhead
@shortstop: Just because Republicans are able to find, fund and elect crazier motherfuckers doesn’t mean the original crazy ones went sane.
Villago Delenda Est
Can’t we arrange for a 16 ton weight to accidentally fall on David Gergen?
Chris
OT (and sorry for link to Christian News Network): Mississippi may become first abortion free state.
Ah, Mississippi. “We had to give rights to the black people, but we’ll be damned if we give them to women, too!”
Higgs Boson's Mate
@shortstop:
Those are my sentiments as well. The party could have reigned in the ‘baggers at the outset yet they didn’t. They were all too excited by the newly-rabid to recall that a rabid dog doesn’t care who it bites. So fuck them all, both the ‘baggers and those who did not speak out.
? Martin
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Assuming 100% of Dems vote for the Senate bill, in the next Congress only 17 Republicans need to cross over. The other 49% can remain rightwing nutjobs – only 17 out of 234 need not be.
I don’t think my math is so far off.
Villago Delenda Est
@? Martin:
This is true, but there is no Republican interested in being a Tip O’Neil, because if you do, you get primaried by a lunatic teahadist asswipe.
Chris
@Higgs Boson’s Mate:
Word to you both.
I also really resent how fucking low the bar has gotten for “moderate Republicans,” to the point that a few Republicans in the middle of a massive economic recession (not to mention the deficit) finally admitting, after four fucking years of crossing their arms and refusing to govern, that maybe there are times when it’s acceptable, after all, to raise taxes on the rich from their lowest level in eighty years to their previous lowest level in eighty years… are hailed in the media as moderates and visionaries.
shortstop
@Just Some Fuckhead: Especially when they’re not suddenly ceasing to hate on minorities, women, non-heterosexuals, immigrants, non-Christians, liberals or the economic bottom 99 percent…they’re really just bitter about someone doing it better. Pain and injustice don’t exist until it happens to them.
slag
@shortstop: If reveling in the despondency of unexamined privilege is wrong, I don’t want to be right.
Roger Moore
@ruemara:
You might say I’m pining for the fjords.
Patricia Kayden
@Alex S.: Or the “fiscal curb” as Chris Hayes calls it.
Villago Delenda Est
@Roger Moore:
That, or you’re just resting.
Lavocat
Yeah, well, Gergen can go fuck himself w/ a barbed-wire dildo.
Patricia Kayden
@Chris: For safe legal abortions. I am sure that Mississippian women who need to get abortions find a way to get them despite living in an anti-choice nanny state.
Roger Moore
@? Martin:
Not really. Boehner acts the way he does because his caucus is insane and will throw him out and replace him with somebody crazier and less principled if he puts a foot out of line. The inmates are firmly in control of the asylum.
Full Metal Wingnut
@Roger Moore: Maybe that’s one reason the WH is treading carefully w the House. Obviously Boehner is not our ally, but having Boehner sacked and replaced with a lunatic would be very bad.
shortstop
@Patricia Kayden: Right, the unsafe illegal kind. When you’re really poor, as many Mississippians are, going to where abortions are legal isn’t an easy proposition. You have to take (possibly unpaid) time off work, perhaps get someone to take care of your kids, find the funds to travel to another state, possibly stay in a hotel for two or three days if that state has “waiting period” abortion laws, etc.
It seems from our perspective of relative privilege that all of that is more easily overcome than the results of an unplanned pregnancy would be. But for those without resources, a cascading set of obstacles very often results in feeling hugely overwhelmed and unable to take immediate action. And so a lot of Mississippi pregnancies will be carried to term because for many people the challenges of not doing so proved too great, and other women will die from botched illegal abortions. And that is exactly the point of all these laws making it difficult for those without resources to obtain legal abortions.
I know you know all this. ;) Just pointing it out for some of the good-faith liberals who still don’t get why these laws are a big deal.
Roger Moore
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Or saying they don’t know, i.e. they’re too ill informed to make a decent judgment. Kind of goes along with voting for Romney, doesn’t it.
Full Metal Wingnut
@Patricia Kayden: This is sarcasm right? Not everyone has the means to go out of state for an abortion. But everyone knows that so why am I bringing it up.
Chris
@shortstop:
And that’s why a non-trivial number of conservative women feel comfortable complaining about sluts getting pregnant. They know they’ll never be so poor they’ll have trouble getting an abortion.
shortstop
@Chris: Conservative women, conservative men…and some liberal men. I’ve had a few conversations through the years with otherwise perceptive guys who don’t understand why “waiting period” laws are a problem. Once you explain it, they immediately get it. Conservative women, on the other hand, have a lot invested in continuing the denial.
honus
@shortstop: Naw, it’s just typical republican whining. “Whaaaaaaaaa the MSM will blame us like they always do.”
Brachiator
@Chris:
RE: OT (and sorry for link to Christian News Network): Mississippi may become first abortion free state.
The story goes on to note:
@Patricia Kayden:
RE: For safe legal abortions. I am sure that Mississippian women who need to get abortions find a way to get them despite living in an anti-choice nanny state.
Well, let’s check on the possible ramifications. Hmmm
Well, this is hardly surprising.
I guess Mississippi should try outlawing sexual intercourse.
Joel
@Lavocat: That sounds like something Bill O’Reilly would like.
Villago Delenda Est
@Brachiator:
That is the ultimate goal of these people, after all.
Bubblegum Tate
@honus:
Verbatim Facebook Wingnut Barometer:
Chris
@shortstop:
Yeah… I’ve always found it interesting that while conservatives had successfully alienated large majorities of all nonwhite groups, that’s not nearly as true for women. I think it’s here that I read that while Mittens lost the woman vote, if you limited yourself to white women he still won a majority, though less than his majority among white men. And this was one of the most anti-woman elections they’ve run in a long time.
Not sure what it is; I suspect the fact that conservative women have the notion of their inferiority inculcated into them not by strangers but often by their own parents, siblings, priests – in short, by everyone that raises them – makes for a brainwashing that’s a lot harder to break through.
Chris
@Bubblegum Tate:
We’re already back in a recession? I didn’t know; last I heard the economy was improving, however shakily, and had been for some time. Is this just his isolated ravings, or some new wingnut meme?
shortstop
@Chris:
I think that’s part of it, especially for less affluent white women and devoutly fundamentalist or conservative Catholic white women, but…SWEEPING GENERALIZATION ALERT!…it’s also true that it’s easier to rationalize away sexism when you’re comparably well off and have the resources/network to navigate around obstacles. Misogyny is real, widespread, and causes untold pain and hardship, as well as sharply reducing opportunities for a lot of competent humans, but I don’t think anyone can fairly argue that most white American women in reasonable economic circumstances (and I am one) suffer from prejudice to the degree that racial minorities, immigrants, much of the LGBT community, etc. do. The more money, education and/or contacts you have, the easier it is to get over or skirt around the barricades that other people put in your way — I think that knowledge is what propels a lot of white women of a certain economic class.
I see a similar phenomenon among Log Cabin Republicans, virtually all of whom are well-heeled gay men. They don’t think they will be subjected to the injustices and indignities that less affluent gay men will suffer. They’re right…to a certain extent, but they trust too much that the anti-gay brigades won’t also come for them, just as too many non-poor white women believe that they’ll be spared the constraints and humiliations the right would like to impose on XX Americans.
Felonius Monk
Rocket scientist Ted Nugent has some stimulating new ideas:
Chris
@shortstop:
But the same class difference doesn’t work out for nonwhite voters – does it? I’m sure that Republican minority voters are drawn mostly from comfortable backgrounds, but even when you account for class difference Republican nonwhites seem like far more of a fluke or anomaly (particularly in the black vote) than Republican women. Which is why I figured the slut-shaming and indifference favored by middle-to-upper-class women wasn’t enough to explain it.
redshirt
@Felonius Monk: The “Jail or Death” Nugent Watch does not seem to be going forward as promised. Wither thou, Ted?
trollhattan
@Felonius Monk:
He’s having a big week, having already advised Bob Costas that “forks and spoons don’t cause obesity, duh!”
WereBear
I agree, and would add that it is also a case of the obstacles NOT coming up for such women at the same rate.
The same affluence that would let one travel to get an abortion would make it less likely to be needed when there’s a OB/GYN prescribing convenient birth control and there’s always money to obtain it.
If someone is married to an affluent husband they don’t need to bother their head about glass ceilings or unequal pay. If they are working, they have a career above the level of secretary or middle manager where such policies are more common, and more devastating.
Their social level means the men in their set may be the height of non-gentlemen… but not to them, as wives and mothers of the same group.
I’ve run into women who are baffled by the complaints of feminists and equal rights activists… because they have never needed their own rights defended. And make all the wrong assumptions about why.
ruemara
@Chris: I don’t quite see it as just a class difference. Some of it is racial, some of it is herd mentality. The problem is, they truly, deeply believe that the policies put forth may affect some people, but it will only be THOSE people and even if it isn’t, it won’t be them. Ever. And when it does, it will be the fault of those people I disagree with and not my vote to screw myself, my daughters and my granddaughters, because $50 in tax savings was worth it all.
@Felonius Monk:
No.
shortstop
@Chris: Not sure I argued it very well, but let me try to clarify: Being born white in the U.S. confers an automatic, and huge, advantage. I think race and a certain amount of money/education/resources provide enough protection for too many white women to ignore blatant sexism. I think the same is true for white (not sure there’s any other kind) Log Cabin Republican men.
However, you can be a wealthy and well-connected racial minority — you can even be president of the United States — and you’ll still be constantly subject to the extremely prevalent racism here. It’s simply ubiquitous and impossible to escape if you’re black, for example. The black Republicans you mention as an anomaly (for crying out loud, over at the National Review they’re suggesting that JC Watts — JC FUCKING WATTS! — should be RNC chair to “improve minority outreach”) seem to me to be doing it mostly for the novelty factor, trading a willingness to serve as highly exploited tokens for a notability they couldn’t get as black Democrats. They have to feign indifference in the face of constant insults and condescension from their own party, but even the most “No, really, I believe in the GOP philosophy” types occasionally let their anger with conservative white racism show, as, for instance, Michael Steele has begun to do.
I’m certainly not suggesting that economic privilege is the only answer for why a large portion of white women vote against their self-interest. I just think it’s a major one. As you say, religious and cultural upbringing/environment certainly play a big part for many. And honestly, the GOP tribalism we discuss often around here is also involved, I think. There are more than a few white women of all economic situations whose self-identification as Republicans–including hating minorities and other Others more than they love themselves–trumps all.
McJulie
@Chris:
That is certainly a factor among some evangelical types — complementarians who believe in the “proper” sex-linked ordering of things.
But prominent Republican women — the Sarah Palin/Ann Coulter/Phyllis Schlafly types — often seem to have a very strong whiff of “queen bee” syndrome about them. They hate women and disrespect them as a group, but see themselves always as a special snowflake exception.
Brachiator
@shortstop:
I keep reading stuff like this, but I don’t know if it is really the case.
You can be a well-heeled gay person, and still be excluded from the hospital by vindictive relatives when your partner becomes ill. Without the protections of marriage or even domestic partnership, trying to leave property and other assets can be blocked by other family members, and there is little in the law to provide protection.
Fighting discrimination can still be difficult, even if a gay person has deep pockets.
I just don’t know that economic privilege always, or consistently, confers the benefits that people think it does.
Even with respect to affluent women and abortion, it was not always the case that these women could get abortion where poor women could not. Often, affluent women had to leave their home state or country, give birth and give the child up for adoption.
And even today, rich women (I’m talking ’bout you, Anne Romney and sisters) are less able to ignore sexism as they are offered a golden prison which supposedly muffles any pain they might feel.
shortstop
@McJulie:
Very good point. Palin’s used to being the center of attention and will say whatever will keep her there, including denigrating other women. Coulter’s just a shock frock. Schlafly had some fucking nerve earning a law degree and practicing before switching to a full-time career traveling the country lambasting women who work outside the home. All different but all wanting to be the special ones, and loving the goddess status conferred upon them by many Republican men. I think Kathryn Lopez and Maggie Gallagher would love to do the same thing, if they could get Republican men to pay more than glancing attention to them.
Chris
@shortstop:
Logical. So, in essence, Republican white women aren’t that different from Republican white men who’re voting against their economic self-interest.
There’s just an added layer of “voting against your own self-interest” that puts them somewhere in between white men and nonwhite people… and the polls do reflect that since they’re still less likely to be Republican than white men, but more likely than nonwhite people.
shortstop
@Brachiator:
No one’s arguing that it “always or consistently” does — only that it mitigates many of the problems suffered by less-connected members of the group, and that the people voting against their self-interests are trusting too much in its power to always do so.
shortstop
@Chris: Right, exactly. And I have a foolish and miserably unmet expectation that anyone who’s suffered bias due to his or her demographics will automatically be better able to relate to members of other marginalized groups. I just don’t get white women who are racist, black people who are homophobic or gay men who are sexist. But there they are.
Brachiator
@shortstop:
RE: I just don’t know that economic privilege always, or consistently, confers the benefits that people think it does.
I don’t see the mitigation when a gay person cannot visit or comply with the last wishes of a dying partner when the sick person’s relatives exclude the partner from the hospital.
I wonder whether gay publications or web sites have reported on or interviewed Log Cabin Republicans to see what they actually have to say about the deal that they make with themselves in order to support the GOP.
There is a long tradition, in the US and elswhere, of groups who gain privilege who then turn around and try to kick those below them further down the ladder they have just climbed.
DougJ
@James Gary:
Win
shortstop
@Brachiator:
Once again, m-i-t-i-g-a-t-e-s m-a-n-y o-f t-h-e p-r-o-b-l-e-m-s.
The usual response is that change is happening, change is going to keep happening and it happens all by itself, magically outside of efforts by Democrats and activists. In other words, they’re perfectly content to let everybody else do the heavy lifting and then enjoy the resultant benefits, such as almost a fifth of our states adopting equal marriage and the president signing this (which still needs to be hard legislation, not an EO).
Bubblegum Tate
@Chris:
I don’t think it’s a full-blown meme, but I’ve seen several wingnuts state this. It’s sort of an extension of the whole “the BLS is cooking the books to get Obama re-elected!” thing they had going for a bit, except now, it’s that “all the various reporting arms of the government (i.e. not just the BLS) are beholden to Obama and have been ordered to pretty up the numbers, when the truth is that we’re back in a recession because take a look around, doesn’t it look like a recession? But Dictator Obama will never allow this truth to be spoken!”
Chris
@Brachiator:
This.
I kept thinking of that a year ago when I was watching Herman Cain joke about frying Mexicans at the border, root for discrimination against Muslims, and heap abuse onto the poor and unemployed.
The man reminded me of a modern day Father Coughlin, a member of a still-unpopular minority (Irish-Catholics) who made a career out of taking dumps onto even-more-unpopular minorities (Jews and blacks) in order to suck up to the bigots of the majority group.
shortstop
@Chris: ‘Twas ever thus. But that doesn’t mean I don’t hold a special contempt for the people who do it.
Chris
@Bubblegum Tate:
Ah, yes, I see. The Wingularity proceeds apace, then.
@shortstop:
Oh yes. I easily have more contempt for Herman Cain than for the entire rest of the candidate field put together. And that candidate field included Mitt Romney.
? Martin
@Roger Moore:
Sorry, but if you take the job you do the job.
Brachiator
@shortstop:
Dude, I got it. The question remains how gay Republicans deal with the deepest and most important areas of their personal lives where money and privilege does not provide help or immunity.
And of course, another question would be how conservative gays square the claim that relief just “magically happens” with opposing the real efforts of Obama and the Democrats to end discrimination against gays.
@Chris:
Or Irish American Congressman Peter King scapegoating Muslims in much the same way that the Irish used to be scapegoated.
And I think that my contempt (no other word for it) for Mitt Romney intensified as I saw the degree to which he demonstrated an inability to connect the way that Mormons had been treated in this country with the scorn heaped on other groups.
Chris
@Brachiator:
Yeah, but the anti-Irish/anti-Catholic feeling is largely a thing of the past. Cain’s bigotry was contemptible because he was from a demographic that’s still getting shit on by the GOP, and because of the way he himself reacted when exposed to some of it during the campaign. (Recall him noting that the word “nigger” in the name of Rick Perry’s ranch wasn’t exactly cricket, getting lambasted from all over the spectrum, and almost immediately apologizing for forgetting his place).
I noticed that for Romney too. It’s a hell of a tight rope he was walking. When JFK ran for office, he tried to say his religion wasn’t an issue because no one’s religion should be an issue – “I believe in an America where the separation of church and state is absolute.” Content of character not group identity, etc.
Romney by contrast was flogging the “Judeo-Christian nation” horse for all it was worth, playing to the GOP notion that there is a religious identity that’s more American than the others. Except, of course, that most of the people who believe that don’t recognize Mormons as part of that identity. Oops.
Just Some Fuckhead
@? Martin:
He’s doing the job they want. When he bucks them to do the job you want, he’ll be replaced!
Brachiator
@Chris:
I don’t know. It takes some mighty big cabbages to talk approvingly about the IRA and then to demonize Al Qaeda. At least, in some quarters. But I take your point.
I agree with everything you say about Romney’s obtuseness.
Chris
@Brachiator:
This is very true.