Why are we always tricked into not discussing the real issues?

[Nancy Waterman]

We go round and round as whether it is religious freedom or birth control.
We go round and round discussing the proof that Obama was born here.
We go round and round on every issue the president supports and the GOP opposes.
None of this is really the issue, which is why we just go round and round.

The real issue is that the GOP totally loathes Obama and everything he does or supports, not because they actually disagree with any of it.
If it were coming from a White Republican, they wouldn't disagree with anything.

But President Obama is a symbol to them of the diverse, multi-cultural, multi-ethnic country that the US is becoming, and they hate it. It is not just that he is African-American, although that is certainly part of it, but he is the child of a foreigner and a White American woman. He is biracial, with a foreign-sounding name. He is a symbol of the end of the the White, Anglo-Saxon, Protestant domination of this country and a future of shared power among many diverse groups. The whole concept of him agitates their sense that White Christians are being somehow victimized and robbed of their right to dominion over all, and they are unhinged and furious at the idea. None of the issues we discuss seem to make any sense because they don't. They are all "proxy wars" and a way of attacking Obama and attempting to decrease his power.

[Sparkly]

1. Women's health is a "real issue" to me.

[Nancy Waterman]

4. Of course it is a real issue

But I don't think they attack it because they aren't for it. Most of their wives probably use contraception. They attack it, at least regarding the religious freedom versus contraception argument, so they can crush Obama. He put contraception in the health care law, and they see it as a way to attack. It was never an issue before and is already on the books in a multitude of states.

Abortion is a real issue for a lot of people, that is true. But if you hate abortion, why would you not want more contraception and more sex education? Why would you not want more accessible health care for pregnant women so the babies are healthy? It makes no sense.

Most of the stuff we go round and round about is nonsense, but forced on us by the GOP. Remember Libya? First they said we should go in sooner, then when we did, they said we shouldn't have gone in. So we had to discuss the pros and cons of a policy they undoubtedly would have applauded had it been from one of their own.

Another big problem is that the GOP start believing their own bullshit, and then argue forcefully for it when it doesn't make any sense. I just feel we spin our wheels a lot when we could be discussing real ideas and real solutions to problems. But they are truly stuck in their sense of victimization and their fear of a diverse future and a changing America. And they act out their rage all the time.

[Skidmore]

2. The real issue is that

there is a concerted effort that has been funded and staffed over the past three decades to

1) destroy the New Deal
2) disenfranchise women
3) reverse civil rights legislation
4) institutionalize a permanent two-class economy.

Period.

The election of President Obama emboldened them to throw away their dog whistle and drag out the megaphone. This is a group of people who see themselves as entitled above all others and are so fearful of losing their entitlements that they will do anything to hold onto them.

[socialist_n_TN]

3. Correct. And at base, ALL of those issues are economic..........

as are all politics.

[jumptheshadow]

5. I agree, but this has been going on for a long time

We sure were surrounded by a lot of irrelevant conversation during the Clinton presidency.

While I agree that President Obama is more provocative to the blinkered fundies simply for being who he is, the strategy of changing the subject has been in place for a while.

[lunatica]

6. They're not just changing the subject

Because, as we've seen during Bush's administration and in states like Ohio and Wisconsin, they follow through and actually change the laws so we're forced into all these heated battles whether we see the bigger picture or not.

[Proud Liberal Dem]

7. I blame the media mostly

They have to be dragged, kicking and screaming, into covering anything we're talking about. Anytime a right-winger/Republican so much as farts and/or unleashes a torrent of verbal diarrhea, they're right there to "cover" it ad nauseum. I don't know if it's because they support the right-wing ideology or if their stuff just has a "train wreck" appeal to it or what but clearly somebody at the top seems to think that coverage of right-wing/Republican issues and their "manufactroversies" are likely to generate higher ratings, publicity.

[ProSense]

8. I don't think

"Why are we always tricked into not discussing the real issues?"

...this is the situation. In fact, the Republicans' ignorance and Rush vile attacks presented an opportunity to focus on the right wing's assault on women's rights. Their disgusting tactics exploded the issue, in all it's facets, in the national media.

The reaction has been powerful: women and men standing up to show support and even women legislators highlighting the hypocrisy.

Good read:

The Scariest Part About Being a Woman
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2012/03/03/1062657/-The-Scariest-Part-About-Being-a-Woman

[Proud Liberal Dem]

9. Good Point

n/t

[glinda]

10. Media ownership owned by special conservative interests. That

way good people are fighting against soooo many other issues that they are broken up and become less powerful. Drill baby drill. Frack behind your back.

[RevStPatrick]

11. I think you've still missed the "real" issue...

...that we are being distracted from.

There's a small percentage of people who want to privatize and own everything on the planet.
Their project is multi-generational, and they've succeeded amazingly well so far.
They want to be able to charge us user fees for every drop of water and every breath of air we consume.

They want to own the legislative apparatus that makes laws that we have no choice but to break, the enforcement apparatus that will apprehend us when breaking those laws, and the prisons that warehouse us and use as slave labor.

Forget about "Obama."
He's not the "real" issue.
He's just as much of a distraction as anything else.
That's why they allowed him to be "the first African American president."
He's a great distraction, while being a team player.

The real issue is that in another generation, or sooner, a handful of wealthy families will own everything on the planet, and you will have to pay rent to them to live here.

[RainDog]

12. The attacks on women have gone on under various presidents

I do not see these attacks as something aimed at Obama - he benefits from these attacks b/c women align with him.

[grantcart]

13. Because we concede the mythology.

We concede that the Founding Fathers were Evangelical capitalists rather than revolutionary radical rationalists that paid lip service to an abstract Deism.

We concede that in the classrooms and that raises a population that is largely uninformed about the reality of our roots.

They then hijack rational discourse by appealing to issues (faith, prayer, guns) that hark back to an America that never existed.

We are always dealing with the symptoms rather than the disease.

[PotatoChip]

14. Spot on- you nailed it.

or at least a huge portion of it- what really is going on here. DU Rec.