Which "scandal" will the GOP push through midterm elections?

[rucky]

They've thrown the spaghetti against the wall, giving them enough time to see what will stick through the midterm elections. Place your bets: which one will the the one they go with?

5 votes, 0 passes | Time left: Unlimited
	Benghazi
	0 (0%)
	IRS
	3 (60%)
	AP
	0 (0%)
	All three
	2 (40%)
	Two of them
	0 (0%)
	This will all blow over before midterms
	0 (0%)
	0 DU members did not wish to select any of the options provided.
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[Smarmie Doofus]

1. The semen stain on the blue dress. n/t

[Turbineguy]

2. They will invent

a new scandal even worse than all the other scandals ever. The investigation alone will cost more than WWII. But the GOP will sell national sovereignty to pay for it, so it won't be a problem.

[rucky]

3. The IRS scandal has a full GOTV narrative for their base

1) Big bad gubmit pushing around the poor widdle tea people.
2) Bonus points it's the IRS. Who wants to be a staunch defender of the IRS?
3) GOPeople don't understand tax status, nor do they want to. Good luck educating them on what 501c-4 status is about.
4) The IRS apologized. Doesn't matter they apologized for the appearance of what they were doing - not what they actually did. An apology is an admission of total wrongdoing in their eyes. It's also never enough!

This one will drive you bonkers for the next 18 months.

[Gidney N Cloyd]

6. Agreed. This one's got classic 'us against them,' rally the troops stuff.

The perception of oppression is a great motivator.

[alc]

4. they'll all pass

And repubs will focus on Obamacare. And they'll probably have a lot of ammunition with that.

Dems will say the republicans haven't helped make it work. repub governors fought it in court then wouldn't implement it. repubs haven't allowed additional funding.

repubs will counter that they shouldn't have passed such a huge program when almost 50% of congress (and the country) was against it and why would you expect any help from those near 50%? That they said costs would be much higher at the time, so now that they are, why should the dems expect additional funding? The 1000s of voters who perceive benefit from ACA won't care. The millions who perceive their health care went down or health insurance cost went up will side with the repubs. (perception is what matters, not results)

The real issue with these scandals is that it distracts from the effort to make Obamacare work and to make people perceive that it's working. Any credibility hit the administration takes on the scandals will affect their efforts to influence people's perception of Obamacare and consequently of any congressman who supported or fought for it.

[JoePhilly]

7. Won't fit on a bumper sticker.

[alc]

11. it'll fit in a 30 second commercial.

And if dems don't win the perception battle it'll fit on a bumper sticker

How's Obamacare working out for you?

Got Obamacare? Sorry.

Don't hit me. I have Obamacare and can't get medical help.

I pre-paid my Obamacare tax? Have you?
(won't make sense to most people if they think about it but will remind many that they will owe a tax next April. I pay quarterly self-employment estimates and I imagine I would be pre-paying some amount if I didn't have insurance, so it's not a ridiculous statement)

And on a t-shirt

My congressman voted for Obamacare and all I got is this lousy insurance.

My congressman went to DC and all I got is this lousy Obamacare.

[JoePhilly]

14. Most of those slogans speak only to Tea Party whack jobs.

They only work if you already hate Obamacare.

There is nothing there that would draw new people into this narrative.

Obamacare was supposed to lead to Nazi death camps. Its hasn't.

[GoCubsGo]

5. Other

All of the above, plus one or more others that they will concoct between now and then.

[JoePhilly]

8. Something else that catches the media's eye at the time.

[Pelican]

9. They'll push all three...

... but only IRS one will get any traction.

[deutsey]

10. They're thinking they've hit the trifecta again

[lpbk2713]

12. As always, they'll pull something out of their ass.

If the scandal du jour isn't working for them the'll just make some shit up a la Swifties.

Count on it.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

13. Probably the IRS

but does the Tea Party engender the same sympathy anymore and, more importantly, do the Republicans *really* want to prop them up when they're trying to win back the Senate and hold the House? I've heard some analysis suggest that while it may keep the *base* stoked, it's not going to move people into their column either.

[JoePhilly]

15. Who thinks the Tea Party groups are not primarily political groups?

That's the rub.

The majority of Tea Party affiliated groups appear to be political organizations first and foremost. And so, having dozens of such groups apply for tax exempt status should set off some alarms. That's easy to understand.

The GOP won't want to spend much time trumpeting the non-political nature of these groups because its BS on its face. That plus the fact that the GOP is trying to pull back its crazy Tea Party base, not give them more momentum.

I also think the AP story will die a similar death. The GOP can't demand greater protections for the news media because they are happy to control the media. The last thing they want is a discussion of how we need to change the Patriot act or other post-9/11 laws to limit the governments ability to spy on the media.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

17. Well, that's certainly a good point

OTOH it might be really good to have some real investigations about the groups applying for tax-exempt status and how legit they really are. I'm sure that not all of those groups were legitimate tax-exempt orgs and I'm sure that some additional scrutiny was most likely warranted. I agree with you about the AP story as well. Anytime anybody complained about the things that the Bush (mis-)Administration was doing national security-wise was greeted with a big shrug (and screams about "9/11"!) by Republicans back then. We can certainly debate about the Patriot Act, etc. but it didn't sound like things happened the way the AP initially portrayed I don't think the Republicans are much interested in THAT debate either.

[UTUSN]

16. R#1 & K for, yip, the '14 & '16 CAMPAIGN has started!1 Poll leaves out IMPEACHMENT!1 n/t