But instead of a new working relationship, the Republicans dug in their heels, vilified the man they were supposed to be working with, fired up the hate-filled rhetoric (communist! socialist! - nevermind that 999 out of 1000 people using those words have no clue what they mean - including the vast majority here on USMB)...and then blamed Obama for responding in kind.
Dead on Vanquish!
What Republicans have been doing since Obama took office is not 'politics', it borders on treason. Democrats opposed Bush and his policies, but they were always a loyal opposition and minority. Which means they put the American people ahead of their party. Republicans made a collective decision to do whatever it takes to destroy Obama and the Democrats even if the country was destroyed with them.
Do we need some Republicans to be the ones to tell us what has happened to the party of Lincoln? How far back do you want to go? Barry Goldwater was very disturbed at where the party had gone before his death, he had planned to co-author a book on the subject with former Nixon aide John Dean. Dean's book, Conservative Without Conscience was the result of numerous conversations he had with Goldwater and Dean has written numerous other books and op-ed pieces on how authoritarians have taken over the party. He said we were very close to fascism during the GW Bush administration. Victor Gold, George H. W. Bush's speechwriter and former Goldwater aide in the '60's wrote a scathing book on the GOP.
Invasion of the Party Snatchers How the Holy Rollers and the Neocons Destroyed the GOP
How about someone more recent, like former GW Bush speechwriter David Frum?
On ABC's Nightline; Frum: "Republicans originally thought that Fox worked for us and now we're discovering we work for Fox. And this balance here has been completely reversed. The thing that sustains a strong Fox network is the thing that undermines a strong Republican party."
Or the article Frum wrote that got him fired from his position at the right wing think tank, the American Enterprise Institute.
David Frum - Waterloo
March 21st, 2010
At the beginning of this process we made a strategic decision: unlike, say, Democrats in 2001 when President Bush proposed his first tax cut, we would make no deal with the administration. No negotiations, no compromise, nothing. We were going for all the marbles. This would be Obamas Waterloo just as healthcare was Clintons in 1994.
We followed the most radical voices in the party and the movement, and they led us to abject and irreversible defeat.
There were leaders who knew better, who would have liked to deal. But they were trapped. Conservative talkers on Fox and talk radio had whipped the Republican voting base into such a frenzy that deal-making was rendered impossible. How do you negotiate with somebody who wants to murder your grandmother? Or more exactly with somebody whom your voters have been persuaded to believe wants to murder their grandmother?
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Whether it's McCain being force to take Palin as VP or Frum being fired for revealing the truth; Republicans today must toe the line, parrot the group speak or be ostracized and challenged in primaries by candidates that are willing to goose step to the party by Grover Norquist's 'Club for Growth'
If your ideal model of America is something along the lines of Germany in the late 30's or the Soviet Union in the '50's then today's GOP is perfect for you.
"Mark my word, if and when these preachers get control of the Republican party, and they're sure trying to do so, it's going to be a terrible damn problem. Frankly, these people frighten me. Politics and governing demand compromise. But these Christians believe they are acting in the name of God, so they can't and won't compromise. I know, I've tried to deal with them."
Barry Goldwater