A Season For Remembering

Americans forgot by whom and by what policies our economy came crashing around us within mere months of the catastrophe. So it's worth remembering, for however long it's possible, what the typical R reaction was to Obama's plans for bailing out the auto industry, as American carmakers are having their greatest successes in years:

Rep. John Boehner (R-OH): “Does anyone really believe that politicians and bureaucrats in Washington can successfully steer a multi-national corporation to economic viability?” [6/1/09]

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL): “It’s basically going to be a government-owned, government-run company. …It’s the road toward socialism.” [5/29/09]

RNC Chairman Michael Steele: “No matter how much the President spins GM’s bankruptcy as good for the economy, it is nothing more than another government grab of a private company and another handout to the union cronies who helped bankroll his presidential campaign.” [6/1/2009]

Sen. Jim DeMint (R-SC): “Now the government has forced taxpayers to buy these failing companies without any plausible plan for profitability. Does anyone think the same government that plans to double the national debt in five years will turn GM around in the same time?” [6/2/09]

Rep. Tom Price (R-GA): “Unfortunately, this is just another sad chapter in President Obama’s eager campaign to interject his administration in the private sector’s business dealings.” [6/2/09]

Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX): The auto company rescues “have been the leading edge of the Obama administration’s war on capitalism.” [7/22/09]

Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ): When government gets involved in a company, “the disaster that follows is predictable.” [7/22/09]

These are the guys whose economic policies we're asked to follow, the piss-poor prognosticators whose ability to ignore what happened less than four years ago, when those theories were in place, are once again given credibility by RWS™ and teabaggers alike.

Not a single R candidate for the presidency -- Mitt Romney, let's remember, called for Detroit to go bankrupt -- has admitted they were wrong; nor have they suggested any meaningful plans for our future other than more tax cuts (except for the 99%, of course) and deregulation. Romney was, if it's possible, even wronger than most:

IF General Motors, Ford and Chrysler get the bailout that their chief executives asked for yesterday, you can kiss the American automotive industry goodbye. It won’t go overnight, but its demise will be virtually guaranteed.

So speakethed the guy who's the likely R nominee. Afraid to take a position on the payroll tax cut, he's willing to wade into the most compelling issue of our time, balls a-poppin', and pander that say he'd deport Obama's uncle. Gutsy. The guy who changes positions like dirty (yet magic) underwear, actually did take a stand on the auto bailout, and was completely wrong. So now he takes the safer path, and just lies. And lies. And lies. (That last link, from a conservative, draws the same conclusion I have: he has so little regard for people that he doesn't care. He cares so little, in fact, that his campaign unabashedly, proudly, admits they lie.) It is, no kidding, his preferred modus operandi. And guess what? Rs (the aforementioned single individual, far as I can tell, excepted) are fine with it. More than fine: it's what they do.

So here we are, as the new year approaches, poised to sign the country up to be screwed once again, as if it never happened. It's a goddam parallel universe, where idiocracy rules.

Pass the eggnog, please, with plenty of bourbon in it.