Just as the two terms of The Worst Person Who's Ever Lived and his partner in crime, The Worst Person Who's Ever Lived If Indeed He Were a Person, made us yearn for the comparatively benign years of Richard Nixon — today's House and Senate Republicans have us begging to go back to the days of Bob Dole as Senate Majority Leader. Or even Newt Gingrich as House Speaker.
After all, goodness gracious. Both those guys were awful in their own respective ways, but — at least stuff got done. The wheels of government continued to turn, jobs were filled, services were funded. Filibusters were a rarity, and dramatic — something special, like in a Frank Capra movie. Ideology was not injected into the most basic of programs, like food stamps.
Today, House Republicans think that Americans going hungry is no longer important, so to please agribusiness, they pass a farm bill with SNAP stripped out of it. And Senate Republicans have abused the filibuster to such an extent that Harry Reid is ready to push the button and declare nuclear war.
As frustrating as all this is in the short term, in the long run there may be some silver linings. First, we cats suspect that former GOP Presidential nominee Bob Dole is mighty mad. We've never been big fans of the guy who coined the term "Democrat wars" (and probably permanently enshrined the pejorative adjective "Democrat" in the English language). But after being rejected on the ADA treaty, and now seeing his food-stamp legacy shredded, Dole must feel the Republican Party has left him. Little wonder that Elizabeth Dole is hinting that Hillary's the one to beat in 2016.
Second, it is clear that the American people blame the GOP for Washington's major malfunctions. That, coupled with their ticking demographic time bombs and their insistence on taking right-wing positions that nobody agrees with, bodes ill for Republicans' ability to elect future Presidents.
But we cats wonder if it has not dawned on the Republicans that they could be doomed in, say, the Senate as well — not just to a permanent minority status but to a pathetic permanent minority status. They've already lost the seats from states like Virginia, Colorado, Minnesota and New Mexico; they don't have a firm grip on North Carolina; they're gonna lose Georgia and Arizona next time around (our fearless prediction). And who knows what will happen to wild-eyed characters like Ted Cruz as Texas turns more and more purple?
All of which makes the GOP's filibuster abuse even more short-sighted and incomprehensible.
We cats would PURR, but we hate political stupidity. So we'll narrow our eyes, look askance, and switch our tails instead.
(IMAGE: Bob and Elizabeth Dole (r.), having a sad as they watch the disabilities treaty implode)
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