Just Because You Say Something Doesn't Mean It's True

The NY Times's Carl Hulse documents the GOP denial:

Some House Republicans are boasting about their chances of regaining control of the House in 2010 and relegating Democrats led by Speaker Nancy Pelosi to minority status for the second half of President Obama’s term.

“I have no doubt that we will,” said Representative Tom Price, the Georgia Republican who leads the conservative Republican Study Committee. “The American people want checks and balances, and the way to do that is to put Republicans back in charge.”

Publicly and privately, Republicans have been upbeat about the midterm outlook, saying voter unrest demonstrated at meetings this summer coupled with strong candidate recruitment have them highly optimistic about capturing 40 or more Democratic seats and resuming command of the House. They are talking confidently about knocking off such old bulls as Representatives David R. Obey of Wisconsin and Ike Skelton of Missouri, the chairmen of the Appropriations and Armed Services Committees.

“In terms of candidate recruitment, fund-raising and issue development, we are far ahead of where we were at this point in 1993 — and you remember what happened in 1994,” Representative Pete Sessions, the Texan who heads the National Republican Congressional Committee, told the conservative Web site Human Events. Mr. Sessions, of course, was referring to the election that swept Republicans into the House majority after four decades in minority exile.

Yep, it's 1993 all over again, why just look at those GOP numbers!

That comes from the CBS/NYT poll, which shows Democrats outperforming their January 1994 selves, while Republicans are wildly underperforming their '90s predecessors. The numbers, however, were surprising enough that I wanted to check them again. So this comes from The Washington Post's poll.

Politics is generally viewed as a zero-sum game: When one party gains, the other loses. But Republicans have pursued a strategy turning politics into a negative-sum game: Both parties lose. They have effectively harmed the Democrats' agenda but done so at great cost to their own favorability numbers.

Yep, just like 1994. Sure the GOP will take control of the House. And John McCain will win the White House in a landslide...

The Five Stages Of Giving People Grief

The Rumpies come through again with a detailed look at how the Village Idiots and GOP whiners operate.

1. Denial. There is no way this thing I don’t like is happening because things I don’t like are not allowed to happen, ever!

2. Anger. OMG!! Despite my warm-up bout of kicking and screaming this thing I don’t like continues to happen!!! Now I’m really mad!!!!

3. Bargaining. Maybe if I kick and scream and stomp and howl and hold my breath until I turn blue, this thing I don’t like will stop happening!!!!!

4. Misdirection. If the thing I don’t like doesn’t stop happening right this minute, communist Muslim liberal terrorists will rape us to death in the streets!!!!!!

5. Distraction. Hey, there’s another thing I don’t like!!!!!!!

And if that doesn't explain the Village and the GOP since 1994, I don't know what does. Find something they don't like (which mysteriously is anything anyone to the left of Newt Gingrich does), make a Federal case of it, try to convince everyone on Earth that THIS IS THE EXISTENTIAL BATTLE OF OUR LIFETIMES on the Sunday Bobblehead Revue and then move on to whatever else pisses them off the next week.

You would think the Democrats had figured out the M.O. by now.

Another False Rasmussen Choice

Those wacky guys at Rasmussen Reports keep pitting a public option health care plan against all kinds of things to see which one wins the battle of public opinion. Last week, it was public option versus not losing your health care completely, an idiotic false choice if I've ever heard one, and this week it's new health care spending versus more tax cuts for the middle class, again another false choice that Rasmussen is simply using to scare people.

Most members of the Senate Finance Committee were relieved this week to find that their health care reform plan will cost under $900 billion over the next 10 years and is actually projected to bring the federal deficit down by $81 billion.

But a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that most voters continue to favor middle class tax cuts over spending more money for health care reform.

Thirty-three percent (33%) of voters say new spending for health care reform is more important. But 54% rate middle class tax cuts as the priority over more health care spending. Thirteen percent (13%) aren’t sure.

Americans would like more money over lots of things, I suspect. No doubt the Club For Growth people are thrilled about this and are going to use this as proof that we should scrap all government programs that use tax money to help people, cause, and here's a shocker, Americans don't like paying taxes.

Still, this is another false choice, and a bad economic choice in the long run. What has to pay for these tax cuts? Cuts in other government programs. Of course, that's what the GOP wants, a Democratic government cutting programs for traditional groups of Democratic voters, the less affluent, minorities, and urban residents.

I bet if you had a poll seeing which ones Americans liked more, ice cream sundaes or having to work several hours of OT just to make ends meet, most Americans would prefer hot fudge and sprinkles. The whole point of this poll is to try to scare Democrats into believing the Republicans are right and always have been, which of course explains exactly how well the Republicans did in the last two elections.

StupidiNews, Weekend Edition!

• A plane carrying eleven UN personnel has crashed in Haiti, killing all aboard.
• A father of a British soldier killed in Afghanistan has told former PM Tony Blair that he has "blood on his hands".
• SC Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham is moving to block trying 9/11 terror suspects in the United States.
• California's state budget may have even less revenue than estimated, meaning more cuts will most likely be on the way.
• NASA's LCROSS lunar mission has been judged a success despite the failure of the crashed satellite to kick up a huge plume of lunar matter.