... Every time you think the ultras in the current GOP won't go there, they do. They'll sabotage economic growth for short term political advantage. They'll sabotage their own president in negotiating with allies. They're happy for the US to default if it means they can damage Obama. Their own plan for immediate, drastic austerity would be catastrophic for the global economy. Their pre-Arab Spring belligerence would shut America out of a critical opportunity to ease tensions with the growing and burgeoning Muslim world. And they have no problem treating the world economy as a partisan plaything.
If they claw their way back to power this way, our system really will be broken for a long time. And the great possibility of an adult conversation on pragmatic grounds to help the economy will be lost. And this is emphatically not Obama's fault. He tried. They threw it back in his face again and again. Which means, I believe, that we should double down in backing him, instead of the ear-splitting whine coming from the left.
That's from Andrew Sullivan. Much as I'd like to disagree with him, I don't think he's got a word wrong. He's talking, in part, about some comments made by conservative David Frum, who's disgusted with the GOP in general and in particular for their attempts to influence Federal Reserve deliberations. Steve Benen also has similar thoughts.
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It's for sure I'm not the only person in America today who's also very aware of the clock. We're about to put to death yet another person whose guilt is seriously questioned. Couple more hours of life, even though key witnesses recanted their testimony, saying the police had forced them to say they'd seen him murder a policeman. Whether one is for or against the death penalty, this should lie heavy on the consciences of decent people.
