Issues
Thursday, June 11, 2009
By FCW Editorial
Poor Jim Himes. The Democratic congressman was elected just six months ago on a wave of hope for our injured nation, and now he's getting clotheslined by disgruntled conservatives.
Himes came to the Pequot Library to deliver some talking points on transportation, health care and energy, cobbled together into a presentation called "Smart Progress" (lame, but the dude is a former banking exec).
"Attendees did not seem to be tremendously concerned with 'Smart Progress' and many were content to ignore the aforementioned problems," the Fairfield Minuteman recounts. "Constituents pressed Himes on his rejection of government school tuition vouchers, his views on climate change, and even whether or not he had read the public law that implements the federal stimulus package." Pequot Library Chairman Kelsey Biggers and Fairfield First Selectman Ken Flatto, "on separate occasions attempted to restore decorum," but to no avail.
It sounds like our worst Thanksgivings: Angry, pent up people tactlessly raising a bunch of unrelated issues, some of which we thought were already resolved, as the elders try to shush them.
And listening to the GOP these days is like opening the door to a roomful of emotionally malnourished neurotics. These are people who think that the president is a Nazi for ordering around the banks and car companies that begged him for money; that old white men should play the race card on a Latina woman; that a blonde with fake boobs and a portfolio of nude shots can be a martyr for social conservatism; that Nancy Pelosi is the one who has some serious explaining to do over Dick Cheney authorizing torture; and that Barack Obama is ashamed of his country (that is, if he actually is an American citizen) because, in last week's speech to the Muslim world, he stated the historic fact that the U.S. overthrew the democratically elected leader of Iran in 1953 and implied the war in Iraq wasn't such a good idea. (And he didn't threaten anyone with airstrikes!)
In past elections, conservatives tried to frighten us into believing in liberal antichrists who would confiscate guns, socialize banks, ban prayer, enslave whites as a form of reparations and concede one of the Carolinas to Hezbollah - if they were ever elected! Now that they have been elected, it seems conservatives have come to believe in their own boogieman.
The situation is not entirely pathetic for them. The issues the country is facing are so dire and so touchy that even veteran Democrats who mismanage them may soon face a hostile electorate - Chris Dodd, anyone? - and, well, the Republicans are still the nation's second biggest political party.
But, as of now, the GOP controls no center of power, not the House, not the Senate, not the White House, and not the hearts and minds of the American people. Whether they should ever take back some of what they had four years ago rests on how they act while powerless - and they're acting like the crazy uncle we avoid going fishing with.
Next time conservatives think about ambushing a Democratic congressman in a library, we recommend they change course, go down another hallway and read.
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