How Grover Norquist hypnotized the GOP

[RC]

>SNIP<

"It is now clear that the Republican strategy is to drive America to the brink of fiscal ruin and then argue that the only way out is to cut spending for the powerless. Taxes — a dirty word thanks to Norquist’s “no new taxes” gimmick — are made to seem beyond the pale, even as the burden of paying for our society shifts disproportionately to the middle class and working poor. It is the height of fiscal folly. It is also not who we are as a country."

>SNIP<

I remember sitting in the Dunster House dining hall at Harvard with Norquist when we were sophomores or juniors in college, while he explained his view of government, or lack thereof. It sounded logical — the notion that we could live independently of each other, making our own decisions in our own self-interest. But then who puts out the fires? Who answers the calls to 911? Who educates poor children? Who helps people with disabilities?

>SNIP<

From the Comments:
cbl55
Republicans have created their own Grand Inquisitor of American politics, and he stands over them with a baseball bat and chains, making sure that nobody with half a brain or with a will of his own will get very far. They've signed their own suicide warrants. No matter how many times they tell us how delicious the kool-aid is, it's Inquisitor Grover who's mixing up the brew and pouring it in big, ice-cold glasses.
7/1/2011 9:26:05 AM CST
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http://www.washingtonpost.com/how-grover-norquist-hypnotized-the-gop/2011/06/30/AGYOUlsH_story.html

[sfpcjock]

1. LOOK

...at the stubbly beard. You are getting sleeeeeeeeeeeeeeepy.

[HughBeaumont]

2. I call him The Most Important Yard Gnome In History.

Fucking Yard Gnome.

If anything speaks volumes about the GOP, it'd be who they listen to the most.

And they, amazingly enough, take their advice from a stubbly, stumpy, walked-off-of-a-wedding-cake Yard Gnome who talks like a Muppet.


THIS Yard Gnome.

And make no mistake, he IS The Most Important Yard Gnome in History.

Why is he so revered and influential? How do you get that job? Do you just have to be able to walk in and out of mouse holes, be really shittin' annoying, sound like you need Nyquil and have the logic skills of Michele Bachmann? I guess I couldn't make it as big as he did because I'm not willing to have my nose up corporate ass all day, right?


Grover knows what Koch ate for dinner.


Ha, fuckin' gnome.

[damntexdem]

3. Libertarianism: inadequate view of human nature, ...

defective view of society, disastrous view of economics, catastrophic political view.

Both the hyper-individualists and the collectivists are wrong: as humans, we are individuals with brains locked inside individual skulls, and at the same time we are a most-social species. Those individual brains do not develop on their own, rather in constant social interaction -- and those so deprived do not develop at all. So in many ways, we are social constructs of the societies we grow up in; but we are still individuals, who can, do, and need to think and in many cases choose for ourselves. The libertarians deny the social side to this, thus do not deal with humans as we are.

Yeah, we may all want to do it our own way (wanting autonomy), but how we want it has already been profoundly formed by our societies. And most important, we can't get it all our own way, rather must cooperate to get what we want, even if it is only our own individual gain. Running a society, an economy, or a country on the basis of everyone doing their own thing just will not work.

[denverbill]

4. He didn't hypnotize them. He bought them, period.

K Street bribery, pure and simple.

[7wo7rees]

5. He mesmerized them with a catchphrase they can't forget

"We will shrink government small enough that it can be drowned in a bathtub."

All the GOP torture-lovers out there know a waterboarding reference when they hear one.