No Party’s Mission: Remove Obama ‘12

05 November 2010 |permalink | email article

Despite pledges of cooperation between President Obama and newly empowered Republican leaders to work together in a newly divided government there was little yielding on deep policy differences. Mitch McConnell, the Republican minority leader, said “their view is we haven’t cooperated enough. But he made it clear Wednesday, and again Thursday in addressing the conservative Heritage Foundation, the ultimate GOP goal in 2012 is to defeat Obama and replace him with someone who won’t veto their right-wing agenda. The president’s good faith White House dinner late this month with the No leadership is a waste of public funds.

Election outtakes

A front-page close up, grossly unflattering and racist four-column-wide photo of President Obama at a new conference on Wednesday about Republican victories was disgraceful, and a stain on the New York Times banner about “All the News That’s Fit to Print.”….Rep. Michele Bachmann’s announcement that she will seek a House leadership post suggests she plans to secure prominent place for the emboldened tea party movement in Congress. It runs counter to defining the party: the outsider, anti-government phenomenon that shook up the GOP this year….Democratic challenge: the party failed to turn out their core vote among young people and minorities, while women split their vote between the parties….Rep. Darrell Issa pledged to investigate both Obama and George W. Bush with his newfound subpoena power….Loser Meg Whitman paid $11.6 million to her political consultants during the long campaign – 14 times more than what the parsimonious Jerry Brown spent on his advisers to win by 13 points….Democrats win six of seven statewide offices but the race between Republican Steve Cooley and Democrat Kamala Harris is too close to call, with some 2 million provisional and late absentee ballots still to be counted, and the outcome hinging on L.A. County where Harris won by a 14-point margin.

What they said

“Therefore, each in our own way, we must take up the cause for which Yitzhak Rabin gave his life: building a shared future in which our common humanity is more important than our interesting differences.” – Bill Clinton, in a moving NYT op-ed tribute by the 42nd president marking 15 years since an assassin’s bullet killed his friend, the Israeli prime minister.

“Had I not authorized waterboarding on senior al Qaeda leaders, I would have had to accept a greater risk that the country would be attacked.” – George W. Bush, in his memoir, “Decision Points.” NYT’s Michiko Kakutani wrote: “Despite the eagerness of Mr. Bush to describe himself as a forward-leaning, resolute leader, this volume sometimes has the effect of showing the former president as oddly passive and strangely cavalier.”

   

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