Crystal Balling It

Doug J at Balloon Juice ponders what happens if the GOP takes over the House, a government shutdown...or worse?

The government shutdown was a political failure for Republicans—it did no damage to Clinton, who sailed to victory in 1996. The trouble with a government shutdown, from the Republican perspective, is that it generates too many stories about people who couldn’t visit public parks that week and that it focuses attention on actual budgetary details; it’s a battle fought on reality-based turf, and that terrain is not favorable to Republicans.


Endless investigations are another story. While Republicans did suffer losses in 1998, the fact that they won the White House in 2000 means that impeachment must be viewed as something of a political success. Moreover, modern Republicans excel at destroying their opponents personally, and personal destruction was the end goal of the various investigations of Clinton.

There are those who say that Republicans won’t be able to do this with Obama, because there is nothing significant to investigate. I would ask them to remember that Gingrich-era Republicans took 140 hours of testimony about the Clinton’s Christmas card list.

Here’s how it plays out, I think…if Republicans take the House, they’ll launch endless, pointless investigations of Obama. At least some of these will have a nasty, racial tinge, a la the New Black Panther Party stuff. Establishment media will take all of these investigations very seriously and start hankering for a president who “can bring the country together”. This sets the stage for a Republican nominee who is a uniter, not a divider (who knows if the GOP will succeed in nominating a candidate who can dupe Villagers into buying this line—EDIT: I think Villagers will buy it from John Thune or Mitch Daniels, they won’t but it from Sarah Palin, with the other possible nominees, I’m not sure one way or the other).

I disagree with him partially.  Impeachment wasn't a success, the whole Florida fiasco was something else and it wasn't Clinton on the ballot.  I actually think we'll see both a government shutdown AND impeachment in the next two years if the GOP gets the House back.  Americans have stopped giving a damn altogether about infrastructure in this country.  They've stopped caring about schools and stopped caring about roads and stopped caring about maintenance altogether and as a result, the vocal Teabagger minority is absolutely trying to shut the government down.

So yeah, you thought it was bad before, America?  Put the Republicans back in charge. Obama Derangement Syndrome every day of the week, all you can eat poutrage, and the economy will burn, burn, burn.