Donna Brazile's Bile Demonizes the GOP

Several years ago, after Blue Dog Democrat Congressman Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ 8th) was critically shot by a lunatic leftist gunman, Democrats tried to shift the blame to Republicans by claiming that the GOP was fostering a lack of civility.  To that end, Donna Brazile penned a piece with a putative prayer:

[L]et us pray that our political leaders restore respect and civility in their political discourse, and beseech them to forgo the temptation to turn our plea to shun rancor into rancor. 

Noble sentiments.   But to echo a sentiment from the Democrat hustings in 2008: "Be the change you are looking for in the world."  Based upon Donna Brazile's base instincts displayed during this campaign cycle, civility is for suckers and/or the Tea Party.

Donna Brazile has a prominent progressive political pedigree, having being Press Secretary for Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, Campaign Manager for Al Gore's 2000 Presidential Campaign and is Vice Chairman of the Democrat National Committee. So Brazile is a go to surrogate for Democrats, and often graces the sets of ABCNews and CNN.

This campaign cycle Brazile has gone off the rails in vitriol and vituperousness, especially in social media. Campaign operatives can be expected to figuratively demonize their opponents before an election but suggesting that the gates of Hell be locked lacks subtlety and civility. So much for her little prayer after Gabby Giffords was gunned down.

Donna Brazile bridled at being called a radical for being a liberal who makes controversial statements.




 So to play the no labels parlor game, let us consider Brazile's  two egregious Twitter comments in context and flesh them out.

Prior to the midterm elections in which President Obama is not on the ballot but Democrat Congressmen and Senators need voter approval, Donna Brazile lashes out at politicians who do not support POTUS.  Brazile suggests that those who do not let Mr. Obama dictate policy for the next two years are demonic.

This inflamatory rhetoric is intended to stoke up the liberal base to get them to the polls.  But Brazile's bluster also shows an arrogance of power, insisting that the Chief Executive ought to always have his way in the District of Calamity.  Furthermore, the strident language reveals a contemptuous countenance which does not show signs of civility or cooperative governance.

Brazile's social media rants have taken off her mask.   Now informed voters can go to the polls and vote their consciences. 

The Sham of Senate Civility

After the attempted assassination of former Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ 8th), there were calls for civility in political discourse.  In the aftermath of the Tucson shooting,Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said:

Being more mindful of the weight of our words always helps. We have much more to gain than to lose from civility and discretion. …

Some may be inspired by the town halls of two Augusts ago. Others by the heated election debates. Some may be motivated by the conversation that started after Arizona. And many will seek more civility simply because it’s the right thing to do. Whatever the reason, I hope the turn to more responsible rhetoric is more than empty rhetoric. I intend to do my part.

But what Democrats really meant by civility seems to be to silence their ideological opponents with the cudgel of civility via the Lamestream Media without moderating their raucous rhetoric or correcting their faux pas. 

A recent example of this incongruity between rhetoric and reality was Senator Reid's recent call for civil discourse on the Senate floor.  The Senate Democrat Majority Leader had called House Speaker John Boehner a coward for not standing up to anarchists in his own party who Reid implied precipitated the Federal Government shutdown.   Reid also derided his colleague Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) as the "very junior Senator from Texas"  who was acting as the "Joint House Speaker."

Yet Senator Reid lectured the Senate about decorum:

We all have to understand that these rules create a little bit of distance so senators are more likely to debate ideas and less likely to talk about personalities. And if we do that, we maintain a more civil decorum as a result. So I bring this matter to the attention of senators because we've fallen out of this habit. It's gotten worse the last month or so.
 

To be fair, Senator Reid kind of apologized for his harsh words by intoning:  "Some recent stories have even suggested that the speaker is keeping the government shut down because I hurt his feelings. If that's true, I'm sorry that I hurt your feelings."  

So it's OK to capture headlines and slander your opponents, and then give a tentative mea culpa "if I hurt your feelings"?  Where does someone go to get their reputation back?

Reid advocated not mentioning other Senators by their first names and addressing their colleagues in the third person.  This Senate Speak, a District of Calamity (sic) patois which Senator John McCain (R-AZ) has mastered  forces the speaker to call enemies "My Friends" before rhetorically excoriating them.  No wonder why so many ordinary people are turned off by politics. 

Senator Cruz has been the target of Democrats derision in the Federal Government Shutdown fight.  Cruz gave a short floor speech which exposed this Sham of Senate Civility to conceal political perfidy.

There has been a concerted effort in the Lamestream Media to discredit Ted Cruz as just advancing his own presidential ambitions by prominently fighting for defunding Obamacare.  This scathing critique comes from Democrats as well as Cocktail Party Republicans who understand the earnestness of Tea Party conservatives who threaten their cushy situations.  Establishment Republicans are content to go along to get along, cast symbolic votes which they can sell to their primary voters but do not mean anything.

While Cruz may leverage his prominence in the Shutdown fight for the 2016 Presidential race, he is also living up to his role to represent constituents who are fed up with the status quo and the meaningless games politicos in Washington play rather than fight for their ideals. Civilly telling the truth is a rarity between the beltways these days. 

It is beyond the pale of propriety to characterize Tea Party types like Senator Cruz as anarchists for standing up for the Constitution. But the hostility towards such honest oratory from Tea Party politicians is revealing.  

 In the face of totalitarian influences across the globe, George Orwell opined:  "The further a society drifts away from the truth,  the more it will hate those that speak it."  In a similar vein, the author of 1984 also  wrote: "During times of universal deceit, telling the truth becomes a revolutionary act." 

Maybe Senator Reid's crie-de-coeur will be heard on the other end of Pennsylvania Avenue, where outrageous Obama incivility now seems to be an everyday occurrence 

Outrageous Obama Incivility

President Obama with Senior Advisor Dan Pfeiffer

As the new fiscal year looms without a budget passed, and the debt ceiling debate on the horizon, the Obama Administration ought to be building ad hoc coaltions to prevent the United States going off the fiscal cliff.  Yet when President Obama's Senior Advisor Dan Pfeiffer went on CNN's "The Lead with Jake Tapper", the White House pressed a bombastic bric-a-brac against Republicans.

Having an Obama  senior spokesman call Republican opponents "suicide bombers" is beyond the pale of civil political discourse coming  from the White House.  These verbal bomb throwing  through the auspices of the Oval Office neither builds Congressional coalitions vital for governing (as opposed to campaigning) and this infelicitous  and incindiary analogy shows a shocking lack of civility.  In the same day, Obama White House Press Secretary Jay Carney dredged up birther barbs to mock Republicans for wanting to defund Obamacare.

After the near assassination of former Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ 8th) in January, 2011, President Obama made a grandiose speech at the Together We Thrive rally  in Tucson which memorialized the fallen in  the atrocity where President Obama proclaimed:

But at a time when our discourse has become so sharply polarized -– at a time when we are far too eager to lay the blame for all that ails the world at the feet of those who happen to think differently than we do -– it’s important for us to pause for a moment and make sure that we’re talking with each other in a way that heals, not in a way that wounds.  

President Obama then rightfully noted that a "more civil and honest public discourse can help us face up to our challenges as a nation."  So how do Dan Pfeiffer's inflamatory remarks against ideological opponents fit into this call for civility?

Perhaps President Obama gave himself a waiver on civility.  After all, President Obama's 2012 re-election campaign persisted on an unsubstantiated insuniation that Republican Presidential Nominee Governor Mitt Romney (R-MA) was a felon for alleged misrepresentations when he was at Bain Capital.  Political campaigns ain't beanbag, so rough and tumble rhetoric is not out of the ordinary, particularly for a politician who can not win without smearing his opponent.  But governing is different than campaigning.

While Pfeiffer's smear of his opponents as suicide bombers is outrageous and unwise, it is not the only example of inflamatory accusations that have the imprimatur of Obama's Oval Office. Democrat Congressional leaders such as House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA 8th) and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) have been wont to refer to uncooperative Conservative Republican legislators as "Arsonists".  Senior Obama White House Advisor Dan Pfeiffer echoed this arsonist accusation and kidnappers comparison against Republicans.  Or progressive radio host Thom Hartman who compared Senator Ted Cruz's  (R-TX) filibuster to "Taliban-styled suicide bombings".   Kind of sounds like the Obama White House talking points were passed out.

These slanderous characterizations from the Obama White House give Democrats surrogates in the Lamestream Media license to copy scurrilous phrases.  This was quickly spread by  MSNBC's Chris Matthews did when the former Democrat staffer turned broadcaster asked  Representative Scott Perry (R-PA 4th) why the Republicans want to hold the country "hostage".

The Obama Administration seems intent to demonize and try to delegitimize their opponents, ala Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals. But Pfeiffer, Pelosi and Reid are not alone in voicing vitrolic language against idelogical opponents.  Senator John McCain referred to Senator Cruz and Senator Rand Paul as "wacko birds", while Congressman Peter King  critiqued Senator Cruze as a crazy, fraudster and suicidal.  While these invectives abrogate Reagan's Eleventh Amendment, they are not as vial as a voice of the President of the United States in a time of real Islamist jihadi terrorism comparing Republicans to suicide bombers. 

It sounds like the White House communication staff need to take a crash course at the National Institute for Civil Discourse.   After all, the NICD launched a website "YourWordsCount.org" which reminds readers of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu's word of wisdom: "Civility costs nothing and buys everything."   But that would also mean that they would be reminded of dear leader Obama's quote:

You and I, as citizens, have the obligation to shape the debates of our time – not only with the votes we cast, but with the voices we lift in defense of our most ancient values and enduring ideals. Let each of us now embrace, with solemn duty and awesome joy, what is our lasting birthright. With common effort and common purpose, with passion and dedication, let us answer the call of history, and carry into an uncertain future that precious light of freedom.

So much for shaping the future in an uplifting way.

In the aftermath of the Tucson shooting, the elite Liberal media were quick to lambast Tea Party Conservatives, particularly former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, for  dangerous symbolism on  pamplets which "targeted" politcally vulnerable  Democrat districts like Giffords' with crosshairs.  Ironically, the Democrat Congressional Camapign Committee used bullseyes for their targeted districts.    But as Chris Plante would put it: "If it wasn't for double standards, liberals would have no standards at all."

From a partisan political perspective, the Obama Administration's beyond the pale references to Republicans clearly demonstrates that the Obama White House does not want to deal and is pushing to peg Republicans with any blame for a government shutdown.  They may be calculating their strategy premised on the 1995-1996 government shutdowns which allegedly hurt Republicans (even though that was not demonstrated at the ballot box).   But according to the latest Pew Poll, both Democrats and Republicans would be blamed for a government shutdown.

In the scheme of things, political blame is inconsequential compared to the quantum corsening of civil discourse that has been displayed by White House operatives Dan Pfeiffer and Press Spokesman Jay Carney. Such uncivil exchanges are unworthy of authority in this Constitutional Republic.

A Bit on Gauzy Gun Grab Gambits

After the Navy Yard shooting , many are troubled at another massacre in America.  This has inspired progressive politicos to renew efforts to “do something”. 

[L] Gabrielle Giffords [R] Mark Kelly testifying before Congress Feb. 2013

One such source for grabbing guns is the “Americans for Responsible Solutions”, the gun control pressure group created by former Representative Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ 8th) and her husband Mark Kelly.  Giffords  who was critically shot in the head in an assassination attempt in Tuscon, Arizona in January 2011.  Since then the couple has sought to “support the Second Amendment” while “keeping guns out of the hands of dangerous people like criminals, terrorists, and the mentally ill.”.

Gabby and Mark’s letter reads in part:

We have disturbing problems - gun crime, mental illness, and the easy access that dangerous people have to guns. But our public officials seem more interested in political theater and special interest threats than in leadership. Congress, you must lead. Come together, take a sober look at the problem, and pass laws that protect our families and communities. Please act. 

How could anyone oppose that?

But as Oscar Wilde observed: “It is always with the best of intentions that the worst work is done.”  Digging deeper into to discern the policy prescriptions,  one discovers that the Americans for Responsible Solutions advocate:

• universal background checks

• limiting the sale on “assault” weapons

• limiting high capacity magazines

• stopping gun trafficking

Thus the bromides from Gabby and Mark’s open letter were translated into policies which are political non-starters that are also gauzy gun grabbing forays. 

[***]

But in my estimation, clamoring to do just “Do SOMETHING” is imprudent.  While dialoguing with an Americans for Responsible Solutions proponent,I noted that Remington 870 pump shotgun  which the Navy Yard shooter used was one that was exempted from Senator Feinstein’s "modest proposal" as it is a popular hunting rifle.  My interlocutor interjected “That proves my point–we need to do better”.  It seems that the Swiftian allusion was not well appreciated. But it seemed like no contrary opinions were acceptable for one so convicted.

If the government wanted to do something, then for starters this Administration (and future ones) could enforce the gun laws already on the books with due process not by showy tactical teams in low risk situations.  Alas, after that,  there are not easy answers.  So it is worth having real debate on causes and solutions.  However, Representative Steve Cohen (D-TN 9th) goes on MSNBC and slandered Second Amendment supporters as being "Murderers Row", this does not seem like respectful or introspective civic discourse.  And refusing to respond to point by point challenges on the root causes of mass shootings or the consequences of the “Do SOMETHING” impulse makes it seem like the issue is being cynically stoked to fire up bases for partisan wedge issue politics at the expense of innocents. 

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