ANALYSIS/OPINION
Democrats probably aren’t bright enough to remember the old maxim, “When your enemy is self-destructing, don’t get in their way.”
If they are, then they should be dancing in the halls of the Party of Treason, otherwise known as the Democrat National Committee Headquarters.
On Tuesday, the Republicans announced their self-destruction plan. It is called the American Health Care Act. For six years, Republicans have promised repeatedly if they were ever back in power, they would repeal Obamacare. Unfortunately, instead of keeping their promises, they decided they liked big government. After all, only the Republicans can make the trains run on time, right?
Thomas Massie, the great congressman from Kentucky called the new GOPcare bill, “a stinking pile of garbage.” The congressman understates his case.
GOPcare has huge problems and it reveals an even worse disaster for the GOP. Repeal of Obamacare was a Republican article of faith. Even the duplicitous former Republican Majority Leader Eric Cantor knew this. That is why he scheduled so many Obamacare repeal show votes when he was leading the Republican Congress. He didn’t want Obamacare repealed but he knew he had to act like he was doing something for the benefit of the base.
The real problem is the GOP is finally acknowledging the base it pays attention to. It is not the base that swept them into power in the House of Representatives in 2010 or in the Senate in 2014. It is not the base that put Donald Trump in the White House.
The base the Republican Party pays attention to is the Chamber of Commerce and the corporate lobbyists. The Chamber insanely wants amnesty for illegal aliens to pass. The GOP ignores the fact this would make the Democrats the permanent majority in about 10 years. Instead they simply ask how high the Chamber wants them to jump. Corporate lobbyists want to strip away the rights of American citizens to go to court and sue, so the GOP promptly throws the U.S. Constitution into the Obama-Pelosi industrial strength shredder. Insurance lobbyists want Obamacare to be turned into an even bigger cash cow for them so they go to the Republican leadership and they get GOPcare.
At this point, it probably is not a shock that the Republican leadership is not listening to the base that put them in power. Not a single major conservative leader or conservative organization has come out in support of this bill. Senators Ted Cruz, Mike Lee and Rand Paul oppose it. The House Freedom Caucus opposes the bill and that could be enough to kill it.
But for the Republican Party, the damage is done. Clearly there are few in the Republican Leadership who remember or understand why 2006 and 2008 happened. In both of those elections, the conservative base became so disgusted with the Republican Party. The voters were tired of the Republicans telling the folks at home they were conservative, then going to Washington and being big spenders. The voters punished the GOP and it took the Tea Party’s message of fiscal conservatism to save the GOP.
If the GOP blows this, and it looks like they are on the way to self-destruction, the Chamber of Commerce won’t save them. The corporate lobbyists and the Insurance lobby won’t save them.
And neither will the conservative voters.
