Democrats keep saying that Republicans keep blocking Democratic legislative initiatives. But…what initiatives? Democrats don’t bother to actually propose them. They float them in the media rather than propose them in the halls of Congress. But does theoretical legislation really count as having been blocked by obstructionists?
Theoretical Democrats
Ted Rall
Ted Rall is a syndicated political cartoonist for Andrews McMeel Syndication, WhoWhatWhy.org and Counterpoint. He is a frequent contributor to The Wall Street Journal, a graphic novelist and author of many books of art and prose, and an occasional war correspondent. He is, recently, the author of the graphic novel "The Stringer."
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Great cartoon.
Only thing missing: there’s no graph. Has Obama actually, literally, honest-go-God not proposed a single bill? And how does that compare to other presidents?
Alex, yes, of course, Obama has proposed a number of bills. But he hasn’t proposed many important ones, especially not from a progressive standpoint. In fact, I can’t think of a single one that would qualify as liberal legislation of any significance. Perhaps someone else can correct me. I have read on Twitter, for example, that I should consider his judicial appointments to be important ask of legislation. Or that renewing the food stamp program qualifies as a significant piece of liberal legislation.
Bwahah! I called it. i TOTALLY called it.
I wrote: “Secondly, there have been a number of things proposed by the Democrats that would’ve helped that the Republicans have blocked. I’d list them, but you’re so far gone I’m sure you’d find a way to dismiss them as “not Democratic enough” or some other ODS inspired bullshit.”
Thank you for proving me completely and utterly correct about the modern left yet AGAIN, Ted.
While Obama has actually gotten a few positive things accomplished and prevented a few negative things from happening, he has pretty well not done what he said he would – in this way he is just like a lot of other hack politicians. But having said that, I am mightily pissed at the continued wars, NSA and droning. The USA needs to get back to doing what it can to help its own people and infrastructures – which it has fallen on its ass in doing for so many years now. Can you imagine just a few of the billions being tossed in every direction being used to address and help the problems we have now? Its ridiculous.
Wow, this is lazy even for you.
Yes, of course proposals count. Obama has proposed that Congress legislate on all sorts of things, which the Republican’s have said they would block. It is not the President’s place or job to write legislation. I’m glad Obama gets that, and sorry you don’t.
Secondly, there have been a number of things proposed by the Democrats that would’ve helped that the Republicans have blocked. I’d list them, but you’re so far gone I’m sure you’d find a way to dismiss them as “not Democratic enough” or some other ODS inspired bullshit.
Thirdly Obama’s attitude is direct result of 40 years of the left’s shitty attitude and corresponding shitty electoral strategy. Don’t like the results of your attitude? Don’t whine, change your attitude, and youll change your results. It really is just that simple.
@whimsical: since you seem to be unclear on the concept of how bills become law in United States of America, let me elucidate you.
We won’t talk about how members of the House of Representatives or the Senate can propose laws. That part we all know. When the president wants to propose legislation, he has one of his political allies in one of the two houses of Congress, in this case a Democratic senator or representative, draft a piece of legislation.
If that bill is of importance to the White House, the White House personally shepherds that legislation through Capitol Hill by sending its emissaries – for example, in the Senate, this would be the vice president – to help it make its way.
The president can help by using the so-called bully pulpit – the power of being able to give a speech to the nation that will be covered on national news, sometimes life – to make his case directly to the American people and ask them to pressure their representatives.
Presidents have done this since the beginning of the Republic.
Pres. Obama has reversed this process, using the bully pulpit to call for various changes that address various problems using soaring rhetoric, backed by absolutely nothing concrete.
What traditionally follows such speeches is a bill sponsored by the White House ally in Congress. But that hasn’t happened. What we get instead is the assertion that there is no point to propose democratic/liberal/progressive legislation because it would only be blocked in Congress.
Which perhaps it would be. But we have no way to tell. Because Obama doesn’t try.
Today’s Democrats appear to have forgotten that it is important to propose legislation even when it doesn’t necessarily have a chance of passing through Congress. First of all, it shows your party’s liberal base that you care about the issues that they do. Second, it puts the Republicans on record as having opposed those moves. For example, let’s say that Obama were to propose a $15 per hour minimum wage.
Republicans would vote against it. And next year, Democrats in liberal districts could issue campaign ads on television that said: “Congressman Roberts voted no to help the working poor.” Good stuff.
I suspect that the real reason that, for example, Obama doesn’t want to propose such legislation is that it would actually have a chance of passing because it would be so popular with the American people. And the corporate masters would not like that.
30 seconds on the internet yielded this (by no means comprehensive) list of bills proposed by Democrats in response to Obama’s prompting all of which were blocked by Republicans:
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2011/01/03/bills-republicans-have-blocked/
But I’m sure you have some (entirely bullshit) reason why none of them counts, right Ted?
As for the no longer existent bully pulpit, well, like most people who don’t understand technology, you fail to grasp that the world has moved on.
NOBODY watches speeches any more. Instead, they get pissed at the President for pre-empting their shows and figure they’ll read about what he said online.
So its smart to skip the step where they get pissed at you and just deliver your message to where they’re going to read it anyway. Which Obama has done reliably and consistently.
But to acknowledge that means both understanding the ways in which your world view is incorrect, and giving Obama the credit he deserves.
Both of which are impossible for the modern left, which is why they fail and are marginalized over and over again.
Whimsical, where’s the liberal/progressive/socialist version of the Tea Party? The Occupy movement? Hah! They threw away their momentum on PC consensus schemes rather than any sort of direct action.
The Repubs would rather stand and take the heat for a partial government shutdown rather than compromise for incremental changes. If they didn’t, the Tea Party purists will burn them in their primaries.
The contemporary Left is way too enamored with compromise, consensus and Kumbaya co-operation that they’ll demand it even when they know it’s not preferable or even possible.
Great cartoon, Ted.
Democrats will support only bills sure to pass.
They will not support a bill on principle, willing to fail, arousing public ire in the face of oppositional support of injustice, then trying again.
Gutless.
It’s even worse when you remember they had a supermajority and still punted on the public option because “it might be filibustered”. It’s worth noting too that you can wait the stupid things out if you’re really determined.
«Bwahah! I called it. i TOTALLY called it.» Once had an uncle who loved to point out that «self-praise stinks», «Whimsical» ; pity you don’t seem to have had one as well. Rather than celebrating your own perspicacity and brilliance, you might have been better advised to take Ted up on his challenge (« … In fact, I can’t think of a single one that would qualify as liberal legislation of any significance. Perhaps someone else can correct me.) and show us which of those bills blocked by Republicans on the list to which you provided a link you yourself consider significant liberal legislation. Then, perhaps, we could get down to the nitty-gritty and discuss real issues, rather than your view of «the modern left»….
Henri
Oh, @Whimsical. So silly. OK, so I read this list. I’ve seen many like them before, so I was prepared for the overwhelming sense of underwhelment I felt.
Here are my takes:
I’m going to not comment on things Republicans “attempted to block.”
I would have favored this. It failed because the Dems halfheartedly proposed it. But it qualifies as pretty weak tea. Companies that ship jobs overseas should be taxed heavily and denied access to US markets.
Again, a good idea, though totally self-serving since Republicans have been more effective at bundling anonymous contributions. Not liberal legislation, just something good to self-perpetuate the Democratic Party.
I might have taken this one more seriously were the Obama Administration not deporting at a faster rate than Bush. In any event, this is again not a significant piece of legislation. Amnesty must apply to all Americans — i.e., humans who now live in America.
I have trouble seeing how allowing gays and lesbians to murder brown people for low wages is progressive.
Promoting militarism by increasing benefit for veterans does not qualify as progressive. To the contrary.
Previously commented upon ad nauseum, but suffice it to say: the ACA was written by the Heritage Foundation, omits a public option, and includes no price controls.
Although I favor this, this is rah rah America fuck yeah 9/11 hoohah. And very small-bore, since it affects a tiny percent of Americans.
BP and other companies guilty of trashing the environment should be nationalized. Their officers should be charged and imprisoned. Nothing less qualifies as significant. All this does is give the government more money to use to bomb brown people.
Sorry, I don’t see that Obama or the Democrats actually proposed legislation here.
Cackle away, @Whimsical. We have radical problems. Radical problems will not be solved by milquetoast solutions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moving_the_goalposts
And I quote:Democrats keep saying that Republicans keep blocking Democratic legislative initiatives. But…what initiatives? Democrats don’t bother to actually propose them.
I GAVE you a list of Democratic initiatives. Had you been more eager to deal with the facts and less eager to Democrat bash, you could’ve found them yourself.
Or you could’ve been gracious and admitted your error, and supported the Democrats in moving left, even a tiny bit.
But the modern left has lost its ability to be gracious, and to empathize- its become “Not good enough no way no how. I’m NEVER supporting you again.”
And as long as you have that attitude towards tiny moves to the left, you will NEVER get big ones.
It really is just that simple.
Oh, whimsical, you are so cute. And so consistent! That’s an admirable trait. However, it isn’t moving the goalposts. Everyone knows where I stand. To the left of the Democratic Party. So when I say that the Democratic Party hasn’t proposed any bills, it is kind of a given that I mean not any significant bills. Right?
Seems to me that you’re the person trying to move my goalposts. I have been pretty clear all along. And anyway, you were talking about a cartoon. When I say “bills” it is pretty obvious that I don’t mean any bills at all. I mean any kind of worthwhile bills.
Ah, Ted- the desperate scrambling of a man trying to shore up an argument he knows that he has lost (but his ego wont let him admit it) is always good for a laugh. So Thanks for that.
Every time you open your mouth you prove me completely and utterly right about the modern left.
Sadly, you’re so in love with your own ego and the high you get from Democratic bashing that I don’t think you’re capable of learning how to get what you want.
At least not until after the collapse you’re longing and working for. And of course, once that happens and you’re actually living in a fascist theocracy (that you helped bring about) I have no doubt you’ll come around to my point of view- because the consequences brought on by yours will be so horrific that you and the rest of the modern left will be unable to maintain your state of willful ignorance of your shitty attitudes and the shitty consequences of them.
But then, of course it’ll be too late. For all of us.
Whimsical, what you call a “shitty attitude” other people might call an unwillingness to accept things as they are.
What you are missing is that there is a track record. We have tried things your way for the last 40 years. Liberals and progressives and Socialists and Communists and left libertarians have voted democratic. They have not pressured the Democratic Party in any meaningful way to any meaningful extent.
We of the left have fallen into line. We have voted for Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.
Before that, in the primaries, we voted for John Edwards and Ted Kennedy and others who were relatively liberal in the context of the Democratic Party, only to see them ruthlessly and often unfairly denied their opportunity to be nominated for the presidency.
The problem is, whimsical, you and I don’t share the same political agenda. The nation that I want to create will have equal incomes for everybody regardless of whether they work at a school or behind a desk or in a coal mine. The nation that I want to create will guarantee the necessities of life – education, housing, food, transportation, retirement – to every citizen, equally, regardless of whether they were born rich or poor. In fact, the nation that I want to create would not have rich or poor people.
Tens of millions of Americans share my desires and dreams and hopes.
We have worked with in the Democratic Party. Many of us still continue to do so. But what have we gotten for our efforts? Not much. That’s the part that you keep failing to address in your screeds about shitty attitudes.
Henri-
I was right, I am right, and I will continue to be right. Instead of wasting your time bashing me for pointing out the obvious, why not join me in trying to get Ted and the left to pull their head out of their respective ass.
As for Ted’s challenge, the answer is in the question itself: anything that has been passes is as liberal a piece of legislation that could be passed. And that is a direct result of the left’s shitty attitude and corresponding shitty election strategy for the past 40+ years.
Ted wants more liberal legislation passed? Ted is going to need to change his attitude before that has more than a snowball’s chance in hell of happening.
But Ted would rather whine about the results that his shitty attitude gets than do the hard work necessary for change.
«… anything that has been passes [sic !] is as liberal a piece of legislation that could be passed.» And we live, of course, in «the best of all possible worlds» – Dr Pangloss, meet «Whimsical» ! Fortunately we Ted around to play the very necessary role of a current Voltaire, to make us laugh at today’s pompous theologians who transmogrify political Evil into Good….
Henri
No, henri we dont.
The best of all possible worlds would be one where the left didnt stick its collective head up its collective ass 40 years ago and maintain the shitty attitude that drove the Democratic party right for 40 years.
But we don’t live in that world. We live in a world where the lefts shitty attitude ensures that nothing more liberal that what Obama has already proposed can get passed, because the left has made sure that people who propose such things lose elections (ironically, and stupidly, for not being left enough).
And we will continue to live in that world until the left understands why they are at fault for the current state of political play, accepts responsibility for the current state of political play, and changes its shitty attitude.
Then we will live in the best of all possible worlds.
Till then you can try and distract from the lefts shitty attitudes with all the ad hominems you like. It just proves me correct about the lefts attitude problem, and how theyd rather have a shitty attitude than progress on the goals they claim to want-yet again.
«lefts [sic !] shitty attitudes» «his [i e, Ted Rall’s] shitty attitude», «get Ted and the left to pull their head out of their respective ass», « left didnt [sic !] stick its collective head up its collective ass» all from the fecund (not to say faecal) keyboard of «Whimsical», who has the gall to lecture us about «ad hominems» !…
O wad some Power the giftie gie us
To see oursels as ithers see us!
It wad frae mony a blunder free us,
An’ foolish notion:
….
Henri
Yeah, henri- its not actually an ad homienm when its true. Which mine have been and yours haven’t.
But by all means ignore the first law of holes, keep digging and attack the messenger because you can’t bear to deal with the substance of the message.
You just prove me completely and utterly correct the more you open your mouth.
«Whimsical», it’s never wise to parade one’s ignorance publicly – an argumentum ad hominem/mulierem remains such irrespective of its truth value. Thus even should you be correct in stating that something you call the «left» has «shitty attitudes,», and its «collective heads up its collective ass» – which some might will care to dispute – these characterisations remain argumenta ad hominen/mulierem. I did not choose to employ the scatological vocabulary which seems to be your wont, although I did mention something about «today’s pompous theologians» and have above, after reading your previous post, added the term «ignorance». If the shoe fits – as in your case it definitely seems to do – then you might as well wear it….
Henri