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Andrew Sullivan is singing the blues over today’s Massachusetts election.
Regardless of who wins, he thinks the country and its two major political parties are failing to address the great problems of the age, problems like health care reform and anthropogenic global warming:
Yes, I’m gloomy. Not because I was so wedded to this bill, although I think it’s a decent enough start. But because if America cannot grapple with its deep and real problems after electing a new president with two majorities, then America’s problems are too great for Americans to tackle.
Incredibly, he credits “the FNC/RNC* machine” with not merely crafting Martha Coakley’s loss with guile to overmatch Machiavelli but also with “the power to wield populism to destroy any attempt by government to address any actual problems.”
This is to laugh at. Mr. Sullivan’s brain must have been turned to oatmeal by Karl Rover’s non-existent Jedi mind control. The RNC is almost as clueless as Democratic leadership about what to do with Tea Partiers, but at least for the most part Republicans don’t slag the Partiers with dirty names.
Mr. Sullivan should get out to Tea Party rallies in person. He would discover that the Tea Partiers are just as mad at free-spending Republicans as they are mad at earmarking Democrats.
Everyday folks don’t want the government running the health care industry. They want to keep the money that they’ve earned, and spend it on what they deem worthy.
And, Mr. Sullivan: the Tea Partiers are American from the top of their billed caps to the aiglets on their athletic shoes. They grapple with America’s problems over the dinner table and across the cash-and-wrap and over cubicle walls. They are small business owners paying for their own health insurance. They are workers paying more to fill their tanks and heat their houses because of screwy energy policy. They are parents attending school board meetings to hear which schools will close for lack of money.
You’re welcome to crawl into a hole and whimper, Mr. Sullivan. The rest of us have work to do.
(Hat tip: Mike Allen at Politico Playbook.)
* I believe that the combined acronym stands for Fox News Channel & Republican National Committee, as though the two work in lock-step with one another.
