New Dem Talking Point: GOP Senators Did “Hit And Run” On Our Economy
In the current skirmishing over the economic crisis, Dems have largely confined their attacks to a case against the current GOP response to the disaster, labeling it the “party of No,” with less discussion of past GOP behavior than Dems might have engaged in.
That’s about to change. The DSCC is putting together a campaign designed to broaden the narrative by blaming the crisis on the GOP’s longtime embrace of deregulation, a DSCC official says. The campaign will target GOP Senate leader Mitch McConnell and vulnerable GOP Senators. This Web vid, which will go out to the DSCC list later this morning, is the first salvo:
“Republicans have done a hit and run with our economy,” the vid says. “For eight years, Republicans backed President Bush’s policies that let business go unregulated, rewarded runaway speculation, and favored the wealthy. They broke our economy. And now, they don’t want to help fix it.”
The DSCC is taking a page here from Obama’s 2008 campaign playbook — the broader effort to define the underlying philosophical differences between the parties on the economy was one of Obama’s stock attacks. But the use of it largely receded after he took power.
The new Washington Post poll suggests that the electorate may be willing to embrace the narrative Dems are spinning. It finds that while only 26% blame Obama for the financial crisis, some 70% blame Bush deregulatory parties, with roughly half of Republicans sharing this view.
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This combined with that sorry excuse for a “budget” the Republicans presented last week could be a powerful message. Oh, and BTW, aren’t the Republicans supposed to provide details of their budget with numbers on April Fools day? What genius decided on that date?
This is good politics, but it also has the virtue of being self-evidently true. More, please.
Man they aren’t letting up at all, and I say good for them. The media certainly isn’t putting any pressure on the GOP or their past transgressions and hypocrisy so its great to see the Democrats holding their feet to the fire!
That’s a great little ad. The truth hurts. I hope they run it nationally for awhile.
Mitch McConnell may be safe for a few years, but many a Republican will be doing much ’splaining in the 2010 and 2012 election cycles regarding the smarmy Bush years, and me thinks voters won’t be buying it. Unless the Republican party wakes up and realizes it’s rapidly becoming irrelevant unless it changes its game, it will see its national demise! -Kevo
I’m sure that the Republican “leadership” will counter this effectively–Not! Look at their great strategists: Michael Steele, McConnell, Cantor, Boehner; then look to their other “leaders”: Sarah, Joe Plumber, Rush. I thank the Lord Jesus every day that the Republicans are so inept. What a bunch of buffoons! Hey, get your popcorn–the clowns are coming!
Finally some focus on deregulation. Look there were many factors that went into this economy over the last ten years and certainly Fannie/Freddie played a role. And that is all the Rep/Conser talking heads seem to talk about and hardly anyone challenges them on this. Fannie/Freddie and Subprime Loans were NOT the only things that took this economy down, in fact until the Gramm/Leach/Bliley Act and the Future Commodities Modernization Act (brought to you by Repub Phil Gramm in 1999 and 2000 respectively)deregulated the industry and allowed for the 40-1 leverage and the concept of credit default swaps, among other things – it was not lucrative for financial institutions to take these risks. Once they were able to take these risks, then yes, it became profitable for them to do so and then relaxed ALL of their lending standards. Look – we have had poor people with credit challenges since the beginning of time, however it was never worth it for financial institutions to take on the risks associated with these borrowers, so the banks forced these borrowers to put down large down payments and offered them only higher interest rates to offset the risk – until deregulation (champion concept of the GOP)…it’s about time we focused on that, just as much as we focus on Fannie/Freddie/Subprime.
The new Washington Post poll suggests that the electorate may be willing to embrace the narrative Dems are spinning.
While the Washington Post, New York Times, cable news, etc. suggest that the so-called “liberal media” are more than willing to embrace the narrative that the Reptiles are spinning.
effective
JennD said -:”Finally some focus on deregulation”
That’s what I like here too. Outside of putting a copy of “Tear Down This Myth” into every mailbox (and getting people to read it) I think that deregulation ideology is now the perfect target for exposing and undercutting the Reagan/conservative mythology.
Knock ten seconds off and put it on the air nation wide.
The Dems are knee deep in this themselves. All they are doing is opening themselves up for being hypocrites. Who had control of Congress from Jan 2007? The Democrats. Who was it that said Freddie and Fannie were just fine? Democrats.
Stop with this pedantic posturing. Is Obama going to spend 4 years blaming Republicans as the economy collapses? Is he the new Nero, fiddling as Rome burns?
Oh catch up to the times Halgrim. Last I checked the Obama Administration is working hard to fix our broken America. Bush left us in the same condition as he left the Texas Rangers – wrecked! -Kevo
“Is Obama going to spend 4 years blaming Republicans as the economy collapses? Is he the new Nero, fiddling as Rome burns?”
Of course, the Republics spent 1980-1992 blaming Carter, and 1993-2009 blaming Clinton (or at least trying to – it’s kinda tough assigning “blame” to a President whose terms produced budget surpluses, 22M new jobs, etc.)
And that “fiddling” thing? That fits Bush better than it could any Democrat.
But I realize you guys need to keep pretending that the Republics are NEVER part of the problem. Here’s a better idea for you: go back to sleep. We’ll wake you when the economy’s better – even though your boys (sic) did their level best to destroy it.
Halgrim: the seeds for this disaster were sown by a republican congress and president long before the DEM’s came into power in 2007. Go watch the latest Frontline “Ten Trillion and Counting” to see how Bush never saw a tax cut he didn’t like, even while running two off the books wars and telling us all to go shopping.
“Bush left us in the same condition as he left the Texas Rangers – wrecked!”
Actually, that statement applies to every company he’s ever “run”. Good thing for him that Poppy’s friends were always there to bail out his sorry butt.
Loved it! I say run it nation wide.
The Dems are knee deep in this themselves.
Well, ankle deep, as compared to the GOP who is in WAY over their heads.
Who was it that said Freddie and Fannie were just fine? Democrats.
Fannie and Freddie held 25% of subprime, all of them conforming to a level of standards. The other 75% was private, and not necessarily conforming to any standard. And the UNREGULATED derivatives market (thank you Phil Gramm and the GOP) was “worth” 8x the debt it was built upon. Anybody who blames the current economic collapse on Fannie and Freddie is either an idiot or a liar.
Stop with this pedantic posturing.
Typical right-wing statement when they don’t want to take responsibility for their actions. The economy crashes due to deregulation and failure to enforce the regulations on the books (see Bush’s SEC, OTS, and OCC)? Let’s “stop with this pedantic posturing.” Years of failure in Iraq? This is a time to look forward. Years of failure in Afghanistan? Let’s not dwell on the past.
I’m calling “bulls***!” It’s time for the GOP to stop whining, man up, and take a little responsibility. Yeah. Right.
Good ad, but the truth is less like “hit-and-run” than a time bomb, one that went off a few months early. The GOP, knowing a Democratic takeover was about to happen, has been planning all along to blame it all on the incoming administration.
Incompetents that they are, they cut the fuse four months short.
Alright, this is a good start. Now let’s see someone, anyone, start talking about the monetary policy under the Bush administration. We were supposed to have a mild recession a few years back, but Bush and company were so set on “proving” that tax cuts were the magic bullet (when they actually had basically no effect other than a transfer of wealth upward) that they held real interest rates *negative* for the last several years. This forestalled the inevitable (you can’t run an industrial economy without recessions), but the cheaper-than-free debt meant we were all burning the furniture to heat the house. So when it finally came around, the recession was a borderline depression…and to make matters worse, we can’t cut the Fed interest rates to stimulate growth. They’re already at the floor.
I think this is just as big an issue as the deregulation and mortgage craziness. But I’ve not heard anybody in the press give it the time of day.
Democrats did just as much to harm the economy as the republicans. They were all in favor of free markets and their past legislative deregulatory accomplishments prove it.
“Democrats did just as much to harm the economy as the republicans.”
This Republic talking point has been disproved time and again. One of the great things about “Teh Party Formerly Known as the Party of Personal Responsibility” (a/k/a GOP) is their ability to project their own failings onto everyone else. They’re also super-dee-duper at playing the victim(s) at the drop of a hat.
But thanks for playing! What do we have for this loser, Johnny?