So all of you guys who have been asking if the Republican party is going to recalibrate after its defeats in 2006 and 2008? Here’s your answer. They are pushing into prime-timea social conservative who (among other things) favors teaching intelligent design in the schools. Meet the new repubs, same as the old repubs. How fucking disappointing.
Forgive me for not being clearer. The article is intended to put the lie to Ms. Hutchison’s claim, by showing that Republicans did, indeed, have input into the stimulus bill. In fact, Kit Bond has gone on a promotional tour of his state to brag about his input and how it will help his constituents (in spite of having voted against the bill, himself). It was in a live interview on one of the morning MSNBC shows that Ms. Hutchison made her false claim that Republicans were excluded from having any input in the bill. If I could find a quote to back that up, I would, but at the moment it’s eluding me.
Aha! This is not from this morning’s interview, but it’s the same damn lie. Excerpts from Senator Hutchison’s Floor Speech in Opposition of the Economic Stimulus Bill
Here I will repeat the facts from the previously posted article:
So who’s the disingenuous one again, Kay?
He did not sound like Mr. Rogers! Do not insult the Pittsburgh icon and paragon of kindness.
He sounded like Kenneth, the page from 30 Rock.
Sorry, missed the edit window.
Here’s a link to a discussion of Jindal’s performance at The Washington Monthly.
David Brooks is also quoted as saying:
The fact that they are still lying about stuff like the train from LA to Vegas is only proof that Republicans have not even yet begun to reconsider anything. They are still the same party of incompetent and malevolent [profanity deleted] that they ever were.
Louisiana, the state with the lowest bond rating of all 50 states.
http://www.allcountries.org/uscensus/508_bond_ratings_for_state_governments_by.html
That’s some good Republican fiscal management. And they trot out this Governor as their standard bearer to preach to the rest of us and tell us how things should be run. Amazing!
I was coming by to say the same thing. Could the GOP have chosen anyone WORSE SUITED to follow Obama? Jindal did a lousy job of speaking and as far as I could tell, didn’t respond to Obama’s actual speech. He sounded like he was reading a story to pre-schoolers, fercrissakes. Any hopes he had of being the republican candidate in '12 were permanently shit-canned after his lame-ass performance.
All I gotta say is that while watching this I was thinking to myself, “Palin and this guy are the current hope of the Republican party? That’s pathetic.”
He reminded me of Lieberman in that he looked like there was someone just off camera winding up to slap him in the face.
-Joe
Like gonzo, this is the first time I’ve seen Jindal speak. If this is the best that the GOP has in the works, then we are in big trouble. BIG trouble.
First, doesn’t the guy know how to read a teleprompter? Second, that stupid smile. Next time you think about smiling, Bobby, think again.
This “limited government” argument won’t work today. We had eight years of GOP control where all spending increased. We have Dems wanting a $900 billion dollar stimulus, with a GOP alternative of “only” $500 billion. Limited Government?
How’s that elimination of the federal Department of Education coming? Department of Energy? HUD? Commerce? The fact that Jindal can talk about “getting the government off our backs” makes me think that this thread title is corrrect…
I know I should have been annoyed by the content of Jindal’s spiel; but that was just more of the Republican 'same ‘ol same old’; I’ve heard the bovine excrement so often (ever since the Reagan era) it doesn’t even bother me any more.
It does bother me when a politician addresses people as though they were developmentally disabled three-year-olds. I kept expecting him to bring out visual aids (look, kids, this is a dollar! You can use it to buy things like candy, or a puppy…), or a sock puppet.
And what was up with the candy cane tie? Taken along with the pointy ears, it could’ve been one of Santa’s elves on televison talking politics.
It occurs to me that the SotU opposition rebuttal isn’t the path to political stardom it seems to be touted so much as. Remembering recent Democratic rebuttals, we had Jim Webb (who was supposed to be a superstar of the Democratic Senate and has been…pretty low-key since) and Kathleen Sebelius (who was supposed to be a superstar of the national Democratic party and has been…pretty low-key since, flurried speculation of her eventual role in the Obama White House notwithstanding).
Also, this seems to be the new Republican strategy: If we dress up the same old excrement in shiny new diverse boxes, people will lap it up! They seem to think Obama was elected because he is black. The same way they thought they were going to woo the die-hard Hillary Democrats by choosing a woman for VP candidate. The Republicans can’t seem to understand that there are things going on under the surface. Everything with them is superficial. The image is more important than the message.
Jindal Balls, Jindal Balls, Jindal all the way!
Exactly. For a Rhodes Scholar, this guy sure is stupid. About 2 minutes after bringing up the maglev train, which even if it was true would be a good thing, he then goes on to say that we need to solve our dependence on foreign oil. THAT’S WHAT THE FUNDING FOR HIGH SPEED RAIL IS IN THERE FOR YOU STUPID FUCK.
Really, this guy is the Republicans next great hope? All he did marginally repackage the same old dumb GOP ideas.
My morning constitutional was more cogent than Jindal’s speech. At least they’re made out of the same basic material.
Robin
I disagree. The high speed rail won’t solve our dependence on foreign oil. It won’t begin to make a dent in it.
But let’s assume that the high speed rail was both: a) true and b) an absolute waste of money. Fine. Eliminate it. But you’ve got to do way deeper than that. Obama does as well. Cut out all earmarks and end the Iraq war. There is still an astounding amount of spending that needs to be slashed to get our budget anywhere near resembling balanced. Neither the GOP or the DEMS have the courage to touch any of it.
These aren’t the same “dumb” GOP ideas. I guess you could say that they are the same GOP ideas of the last eight years, but that wasn’t the GOP that I grew up supporting. And I think that this is a good indicator as to why they are losing big time. If we are going to have massive government spending, why not let the Dems do what they do best?
The GOP is so bad off that they seem to have one qualification: be NOT a white male and you jump to the front of the pack…
When Republicans say “we need to find solutions to our dependence on foreign oil”, what they mean is “Drill, baby! Drill!” In other words, drill for more domestic oil. Which is, in itself, servicing TWO lies (that a) domestically drilled oil would be sold exclusively in the US and b) that the oil companies need NEW areas to drill in when they’ve got millions of acres in mineral rights that are currently untouched).
This is exactly what I meant in my next-to-last post. The modern GOP is so obsessed with perception that they completely ignore substance. They see Obama being so popular and somehow convince themselves that it’s because he’s black. So Jindal and Steele suddenly are pushed to the front of the stage in order to become the next Obama. They see that the Democrats are (most of the way through the primaries) pretty evenly split between Obama and Hillary, so they make a Republican woman the VP candidate, regardless of the fact that she was so incredibly unprepared to face the national spotlight that they actually kept her under wraps for a month after the convention.
You’re not the only one who thinks that.
I had to work last night so I missed all the fun. I must admit I fully support the Republicans in their current tactics. It’s ever so much fun to watch them shoot themselves in the foot. I even sat in my car for a few minutes after I got to the bus stop just to listen to Charles Grassley sound like an idiot on NPR. Link.
Don’t forget he also laughs at the idea of money for volcano monitoring. I wonder how he feels about hurricane monitoring…
What a waste of smart.
Didn’t Obama say last night that he identified trillions of wasteful spending and that they’ve barely scratched the surface and that it would take a long time to review all of it?