Before I get into this, I want to say that I do not affiliate myself with either party. As far as I'm concerned, the vast amount of money that goes into politics makes both parties corrupt as their endgame is the same: stay in office by appeasing your donors at every turn. However, the false equivalency that has been going on in American politics needs to stop. The Republicans are doing far more damage to the country than the Democrats. Since the Republican-induced government shutdown in 1995, the GOP have been in perpetual campaign mode and have abandoned any form of responsible governance. In the late 90's they were obsessed with getting Bill Clinton impeached because of the political victory that they would gain. In the past decade, they focused solely on migrating wealth towards the upper class and starting trillion dollar wars with absolutely no exit strategy. Now that Obama wants to spend money in order to get us out of a recession (because growth is the only way to get out of a recession, ask Greece how their austerity project is going) the GOP is freaking out and lashing out against big government even though they oversaw one of the largest expansions of federal power in this nation's history.
Calling the Republicans disingenuous probably does not do their staggering lack of accountability justice. When a genuine, grassroots movement like the Tea Party that is concerned with corruption and lack of oversight emerges from the right, they are classified as patriots. When a movement with similar grievances emerges from the left like the Occupy Wall Street protests, they are decried as "mobs" by the Majority Leader of their party in the House. I wonder if Mr. Cantor's demonization of the protestors has anything to do with who his principal donors are...Here's where the supreme nitwit in the federal government gets his money. The political opportunism here is so obvious it's insulting to think that the public cannot see around it. The Tea Party began as a response to the massive expansion of federal government under George W. Bush but was not adopted by the GOP until a Democrat was in the White House. Now a movement centered around the obvious corruption between Wall Street and Washington is classified as dangerous. What if this movement was protesting unions and abortions as well? Then would it be filled with heros and patriots?
The problem with the modern day GOP is that they are so smug and elitist that they believe their vision for America is supreme and anything that does not fit into their worldview is dismissed as blasphemy. They believe that tax cuts are the only answer to the ills of the economy even though there is very little evidence showing that they produce dramatic effects. The University of Arizona has a study that demonstrated little correlation between tax cuts and economic growth. Banning all forms of abortions is one of their chief priorities even though the country remains very split on its importance (the religious forces behind this movement are obvious and a violation of the separation of Church and State). Compromising with Democrats is seen as a form of weakness and therefore is not practiced. The Republicans are like the little kid in the candy aisle stomping his feet and screaming because he's not getting what he wants. It's sickening. Surprisingly, even though I have vilified the GOP in this space, I still strongly believe that we need them now more than ever.
Historically, the GOP has been much more efficient at governance and has enacted many successful policies like George H.W. Bush's cap and trade which dramatically reduced the amount of acid rain in our atmosphere (now that this policy is espoused by Democrats, it is untenable...shocking). The Democrats are so inefficient that they did not even bother proposing a budget for the last fiscal year. The GOP traditionally has been against subsidies of any type because it is not the government's job to pick winners. When that happens we end up with problems like this Solyndra scandal. Let the private markets determine what companies should live and which should die. Additionally, the GOP's laser-like focus on national defense is a good thing that sadly, has been hijacked by special interests (just like everything else in Washington). The primary job of any state is to provide protection for its citizens; national defense should receive as much funding as it needs. Democrats have campaigned against the United States' military power, what they do not seem to understand is that having the best weapons and defense systems is the best deterrent to war.
Hopefully the GOP will come to its senses sooner rather than later. Perhaps this Occupy Wall Street movement will end up calling them out on all of their bullshit and expose their hypocrisy and intransigence. Either way, we need the Republican party to grow up soon or else our political system will spiral further into dysfunction.
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