The Republican agenda "appears to have been pulled from a Dickens novel"

[ProSense]

PRESENTING THE PRESIDENT WITH AN OPPORTUNITY....

The agenda appears to have been pulled from a Dickens novel. Congressional Republicans, filled with self-righteous certainty about public attitudes, envisions an ambitious agenda, including the privatization of Medicare, gutting Medicaid, taking away health coverage for millions of struggling Americans, and lavishing tax breaks on millionaires and billionaires.

The GOP's immodest goals, in other words, are to turn back the clock -- not to the Bush or Reagan eras, but to a time before the Great Society and the New Deal. Republicans are working under the assumption that working families and the middle class have had it too good for too long.

E.J. Dionne Jr., while detailing the ways in which the GOP agenda is "radical," urges President Obama to "engage the country in this big argument."

Will his political advisers remain robotically obsessed with poll results about the 2012 election, or will they embrace Obama's historic obligation -- and opportunity -- to win the most important struggle over the role of government since the New Deal? <...>

(The Republican agenda) is all extreme and irresponsible stuff. The president knows it. The coming week will test who he is. When Ryan releases his budget, will the president finally engage?

"This is our time," Obama liked to say during the 2008 campaign. This most certainly is his time to stand up for the vision of a practical, progressive government that he once advanced so eloquently.

I have no real doubts that the president and congressional Democrats will oppose the GOP's extremism. There's simply no way, for example, Obama would endorse privatizing Medicare out of existence. It's a non-starter.

But given the scope of the Republican agenda, and the way in which the House majority likes to negotiate -- demand the truly insane, settle for the merely obscene -- this appears to be one of those times a simple veto threat isn't enough.

<...>

[JuniperLea]

1. "Decrease the surplus population..."

I've been saying for years that the GOP is the Ebenezer Scrooge of politcal parties.

[Blue Owl]

6. Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?

Why yes there are -- and they're even PRIVATIZED so some dickbag can make a few extra million.

[OHdem10]

2. Time after time, they pull out the HOOVER play book and run

the country in the ditch.

In past history we had strong Democrats who would
stand up and explain to the country the why and
how Democratic Policies are the best and work
the best for the WHOLE COUNTRY.(not just the FEW).

[jwirr]

3. They honestly believe that Hoover's way would have worked - it

was just another form of trickle down.

[Safetykitten]

4. With illustrations by President Obama.

[ProSense]

5. Oh joy,

let's just say any dumb thing.

[JuniperLea]

7. +1

When all they have is stupid, it's no wonder all we hear is stupid.

[inna]

9. project much?

[JuniperLea]

10. I'll pit my IQ against yours any day...

And I'll drink four beers and smoke a fatty just to give you an edge... what a childish comment you made. I know you are but what am I? Really?

[inna]

11. lulz.

fucking pathetic, man. doesn't even make sense.

[JuniperLea]

13. Ha! Thanks for proving my point!

Doesn't make sense... :rofl: Thanks for that... I couldn't have made that up if I tried!

[inna]

12. if my comment was childish, yours (about stupidity of other DUers) was nasty, uncalled for

and unprovoked - and in violation of the rules. not to mention that the poster the nasty remark was directed at is nothing short of brilliant.

[JuniperLea]

14. So much hostility! eom

[tanyev]

8. And not one of the fun ones, like The Pickwick Papers.

:(