Once again conservative columnist Kathleen Parker has gone a muck and strayed from the GOP insane asylum reservation and is slamming the GOP for its negativity and obstructionism. The root cause to the GOP's toxicity? Obamacare, of course, one of the few things the House GOP has voted on during an otherwise do nothing session of Congress. Parker is especially brutal in highlighting the fact that the GOP has nothing as a proposed alternative to Obamacare other than going back to a thoroughly broken system. Needless to say, Parker's criticisms will not sit well among the knuckle dragging ranks of the Christofascists/Tea Party base of the GOP. Here are excerpts from her Washington Post column:
As the government health-care Web site chugs along, the Obama administration has begun a counter-initiative to combat Republican naysaying — and its weapons are of superior grade.
The bunker buster is positive messaging and a return to hope and change. For Republicans, it’s whatever the opposite is. Despair and stagnation? Gloating and gloom?
“Obamacare” may be fraught with potentially lethal problems, including the bungling of information as people sign up without any guarantee of privacy, but nothing is more toxic than “this is going to be a disaster.” Every time Republicans slam on the brakes, Obama tosses coins and candy into the crowds.
Even if the president at times resembles Baghdad Bob, the Iraqi spokesman who said everything’s fine here as U.S. bombs exploded in the background, Republicans are the shock-and-awe gang with no plan for the day after.
Democrats have targeted the GOP’s soft spot, which is a hard line on social services. Thus, when Republicans want to drastically cut food stamps, it is a piece of cake (and not the moldy sort Marie Antoinette suggested the peasants eat) to designate conservatives as cruel and heartless.
When Republicans say the health-care plan is doomed, a train wreck, a disaster, etc. — and offer no hopeful options — they appear to be rooting only for failure.
This approach is a blessing for Democrats, who have responded by shining a light on success stories: the 25-year-old who gets to stay on his parents’ insurance plan another year, the child or elderly parent with a preexisting condition who now can get insurance, the family who never could afford insurance and now can
What Democrats know keenly — and Republicans seem never to learn — is that positive beats negative every time. Thus, we see MSNBC’s clever montage of Republican negativity: A series of unfriendly faces decrying the Affordable Care Act (ACA) with apocalyptic language. Which would any everyday American prefer? The healer or the doomsayer? The elves or the orcs?
This is not precisely reality, but perception drives policy as much as reality does. The key for Republicans is to drop the negative attacks and refocus energies on the positives of their plans. They have some, right?
What alternative solutions are Republicans hiding behind their backs? Frank Macchiarola, former Republican staff director of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee (and my patient guide through the ACA) proposes in a commentary , co-written with Republican former senator Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, that the GOP lead with solutions rather than piling on criticism. The authors agree with Democrats’ goal to expand access to care, including to those with preexisting conditions. But the cure, they suggest, is in targeted policy solutions rather than a one-size-fits-all approach.
“No” gets you nothing but nothing — and gloating floats no boats.
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