Of all the things in politics that I hate, the one I despise the most is the single-issue voter. And it’s not just because some people wouldn’t mind a zombie apocalypse breaking out as long as it meant that they could hold onto their precious birth control.
No, this is something a little different. My last “Strategy with V” was a lengthy Facebook status, so I thought I’d write future notes on that subject here and make it something of a segment.
Alright, here we go.
Put yourself in the shoes of the President. As I indicated earlier this year, his goal for his second term, above all others, is to ensure that a Democrat will take his place in 2016. His second term needs to be Gerald Ford – a time where things got substantially worse all around but everybody knew better than to blame him for all of it because he had a lukewarm tenure and didn’t screw anything up royally (and no, pardoning Nixon wasn’t a screw-up despite what those that still begrudge him for it will tell you) – in a nutshell. Barack Obama’s second term will consist of a replacement for Justice Ginsburg at some point, some kind of immigration reform (maybe), and something interesting related to either housing or environment (it’s a tossup just like before) that he never got around to last time. As for foreign policy, it seemed as if he thought he himself was backed into a corner with Syria but it seems to have boiled over and now he can go back to being the hippie that he promised he would be.
Never mind that he’s full of crap. He’s got scandals on the Harding level of egregious that he hasn’t been held accountable for (Benghazi and F&F most notably). Obama has been working behind the curtain to defund, delay, or issue exemptions to certain parts of the Affordable Care Act, knowing how unpopular the bill is (rightfully so, mind you). He knows that the next president is going to be the one who deals with the greater contemporary consequences of implementation of the Affordable Care Act. He’s gambling that it’ll work to the country’s benefit somehow so to ensure that Democrats will continue to control the executive for another 8 years at least after he’s out, cementing his legacy as a conflict-weathered but driven president.
Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, and the Tea Party love to rhetorically dress themselves up as the President’s most dangerous opponents, but in reality, they’re playing straight into his plan. Obama needs Republicans to fight him every step of the way on Obamacare. He needs them to fight amongst themselves, but more importantly, he needs them to try and defund it and go to the extremes of shutting the government down, not just because of the easy talking points it gives them about how “The right wing is holding America hostage” or how “Republicans want you and your family to die of diseases”, etc, (which is almost assured to bring him a Democrat House in 2014 given how easily the intellectually devoid are going to buy into that drivel) but also because it’ll continue to delay the implementation of the law, at the expense of time. The longer Republicans obsess over OCare, the more time is wasted – time that could be better spent actually hashing out good ideas for piecemeal reform and holding to the tenets of Article I, which was written with the hope that Congress would be the body that keeps the President’s power in check and holds the man himself accountable.
And don’t kid yourself. The Republicans in the House know exactly what I know. They understand what he’s doing and (most of them) are fully aware of the strategy behind it. They know where their place is as pawns in the President’s game but they can’t do anything about it. They can’t change their tactics. Know why? You.
Yeah, you – all of you idiots who are incessantly harping on about how you want Obamacare defunded and repealed entirely, pledging to primary anyone who does not comply. It’s your fault; not your Congressman’s fault. Your Congressman needs to keep his job so he/she can fulfill whatever novel ambition they have over the long term (one that you probably support to some extent, by the way). But they need your vote, and this is a democracy*, so they’ll cater to your childish whims. You, the single-issue voter are the reason the President is going to WIN, because you thin-skinned lot have to go for the jugular every single time at the slightest provocation. You don’t know how to take a step back, consider the broader perspective, think, strategize, and plot – y’know, the thing that the ones who are still alive on “Game of Thrones” do. You’re the reason this country is in a state of malaise whether it wants to admit it or not. You’re the reason Obama looks like the good guy. You’re the reason that this leftist parasite you so despise is getting bigger and more monstrous by the day. You are the weakness in our political culture.
Get the picture? If you’re a single-issue voter, and that issue is the defunding or outright repeal of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, YOU ARE THE REASON IT’S GOING TO BE IMPLEMENTED!
– Vivek
*I know we’re technically more of a Republic but I didn’t want to get into that here.
This is about how I feel right now.
brainsnorts
ok, a few things first, the benghazi thing, get over it. bad things happen. we can’t stop everything. forget about the white house reaction and focus on the actual event. even if the WH screwed up the reaction and the talking points, they could not have stopped that from happening any more than bush could have stopped 9/11. that’s the important part, and that’s what hillary clinton was trying to tell people, and i totally agree. whoever it was who carried that out disguised themselves as a protest mob. they showed up in khaki’s and shit to look like protesters, then they whipped out the armaments. nobody could have stopped that, and that’s the part that counts. nobody could have saved those who died, and that’s what counts. so let’s leave that alone and let it go.
second, about the single-issue voters. you’re right that they are screwing things up but is it their fault? what if my conscience really is focused on abortion? what if everything else doesn’t matter so much to me, but abortion really hurts me for some reason? maybe my mother had an abortion early on and i was “robbed” of a brother or sister. just making shit up here. if that is my one issue, i have that right. and i prefer the single-voter to the blind party follower. i prefer someone who at least cares about something over the guy who says, “what? election? just check all the Dems and i’m good.” so maybe they are having a bad influence at certain times, but at least they are thinking.
at the same time, i wonder – and you would know better than i would know – are these single-issue voters usually more likely to also be the blind party followers? are they more likely to either listen to Fox news or MSNBC and let one of those channels decide for them? i don’t know enough to know.