Partisan Rant #328 or payback's a bitch.

I have been thinking about the sad state of affairs that we find ourselves in here in America and I would like to make a few comments about the Obama presidency. Whether it lasts another year or five more years, I have a sneaking suspicion that we lay dead in our tracks and that nothing can be achieved.

Why, do you ask? Because it is evident that Republicans hate this president more than they love their country. They have done nothing since his election except thwart and obstruct him on every issue and position. I have never seen a more partisan GOP. From the Issa hearings to the Solyndra investigation (a program first vetted by Bush) the clear aim of the Republicans has been to effect maximum pain on our leader at every turn. Even if America goes down the toilet, what most matters to the GOP is returning to power.

They paint him as a marxist over a health care plan that has been the aim of every democratic and progressive agenda for the last 20 years.  He is a closet muslim, a revolutionary, a disciple of Reverend Wright and Bill Ayres, he is responsible for  everything short of performing Black Masses in the Lincoln Bedroom.

The Republicans have been remarkably successful at holding the line of their complete obstruction. So, what have we learned? That if one side has its oars in the water and the other side decides not to paddle we will surely sink. The problem is that this type of spoiled and petulant behavior works both ways. If the Repubs do return the power, can they not expect the same type of resistance and behavior from the democrats? And what does this type of tit for tat behavior mean for the future of our country?

A divided population and a divided electorate means that there is no mandate. If we don't work together, nothing will get done. That means both sides will have to ultimately compromise or we will forever remain in a morass. Let the man elected to lead, lead for once and see if the sky falls in. But a republican party would rather talk about getting rid of social security and medicare and the EPA and letting people without insurance simply die.

You left this President with the nastiest and worse hand possible. You said that the markets would police themselves and the predators like Morgan and Goldman ran wild peddling their worthless paper. But it's Obama's fault because he tried to stimulate the economy you trashed and couldn't clean up your mess. Bush spent like a drunken sailor and Obama has to pay the ticket.

I would hope that Democrats have a long memory of the current brand of GOP intransigence. It will be nice to tell them where to stick it some day and give them the same back of the hand they have shown our president. But Dems are built a bit different and will probably take the fall, with the realization that making things work is more important than bringing down a presidency and exacting punishment and retribution. It is a pity that the radical ideologues on the right don't share the same sense of responsibility.