Even so, the GOP has long and successfully peddled the idea that government is inefficient (more inefficient that GM?) and burdensome to the point that even progressives believe it. Who do you have more control over -- your state legislator or your HMO executive?
If Obama succeeds he proves that government can work, that us is better than me, and we are better off when government does work for the common good. It is useful and necessary. And a major pillar of the GOP will crumble. That makes this a vital topic of political discourse. So take Limbaugh (or at least the ideas he is fronting) seriously and refute it. It's the GOP's worst fear.
While we're on the topic of Limbaugh and the GOP (before I get tired of an easy target) there are other monsters dancing in the conservative psyche. We've long noted their authoritarian streak. From Glenn Greenwald at Salon:
The Coulter/Hannity/Limbaugh-led right wing is basically the Abu Ghraib rituals finding full expression in an authoritarian political movement. The reason people like Rush Limbaugh not only were unbothered, but actually delighted and even tickled by, Abu Ghraib is because that is the full-blooded manifestation of the impulses underlying this movement - feelings of power and strength from the most depraved spectacles of force.
Greenwald continues that this gang loves Ann Coulter so much because her words so openly emasculates Democratic men. GOP men will act from power and strength, Dem men are wimps.
As for Limbaugh himself, it seems not only has he become the head of the GOP, he is working to be God. From Deepak Chopra:
Limbaugh has been plowing the field of moral outrage for decades, but unlike Billy Sunday and the other hot-headed radio preachers who cashed in on social resentment in the Great Depression, Limbaugh threw out God. With no religious tradition to anchor himself, he can swing wider. Anything Limbaugh judges against is condemned, not by scripture, but simply by him being pissed off. Whatever Limbaugh hates -- however petty, personal, and arbitrary his animus -- is ipso facto wrong.
So, though the Right wants to trumpet how they stand for family morals, they adore a guy who defines morality by what he's pissed off at? Has that been fueling the lack of morality shown by many on the Right over the last 8 years? Alas, that doesn't help in crafting a pragmatic solution to anything.
Alas, it isn't just Limbaugh. He's just the public front at the moment.
One last poke into the psyche of the GOP: It is from a comment, which appeared about a week or so ago when Dick Cheney spouted off about how Obama dare not refuse to use torture because that would leave our country defenseless. Amazing how secretive Cheney was when he was VP and now he refuses to stay in his underground lair. I can't find the quote I read, but more than one person has come up with the same idea. Cheney's words made several people wonder if Cheney was incompetent and was able to cover it up by being a sadist.
Cheney's harsh criticism of Obama brought a mild joke-rebuke from Obama's press secretary Robert Gibbs. That set off a teapot tempest by the mainstream media -- Cheney is a former vice president of the United States! Have you no decency? That prompts Glenn Greenwald (again) to note that our journalistic watchdogs are too loyal to the political establishment (or at least the GOP). But back up a second… While the press jumped all over Gibbs (representing Obama), they did not jump over Cheney. Obama is the president of the United States! Has Cheney no decency?
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