Romney made his closing argument today. Basically: If he’s not elected, the Republicans in Congress will throw America over the fiscal cliff:
“You know that if the President is re-elected, he will still be unable to work with the people in Congress,” Romney said. “He has ignored them, attacked them, blamed them. The debt ceiling will come up again, and shutdown and default will be threatened, chilling the economy.”
Despite the apocalyptic warnings on the economy, most of the Republican nominee’s speech focused on a more modest argument that as president he would work with both sides to build a stronger economy. He said that, like Obama, “I promise change, but I have a record of achieving it.”
Note the passive voice at the end of that first paragraph: “The debt ceiling will come up again, and shutdown and default will be threatened, chilling the economy.” That debt ceiling will rise on its own, and the threats will just appear out of nowhere! They can’t be stopped!
Except, that’s not how it works. Threats don’t materialize without someone to make the threats. In this case, Romney’s party is doing the threatening, which means that Romney, as the face of the Republican party, is making this threat. He’s essentially trying to take America’s future hostage. This is low, even for Romney.
Heed the warning: It’s going to happen no matter who wins
“Mark my words: the ceiling’s going to fall off the cliff unless we put a cap on it. USA y’all, YEEEEEAHGHW!”
And Valerie Jarret said this: “After we win this election, it’s our turn. Payback time. Everyone not with us is against us and they better be ready because we don’t forget. The ones who helped us will be rewarded, the ones who opposed us will get what they deserve. There is going to be hell to pay. Congress won’t be a problem for us this time. No election to worry about after this is over and we have two judges ready to go.”
Which is scarier? They both scare the bejesus out of me.
“Threats don’t materialize without someone to make the threats. In this case, Romney’s party is doing the threatening, which means that Romney, as the face of the Republican party, is making this threat.”
Don’t you triple-threaten me. Those threats are threats and threatening me with threats is a threat. So threaten to use threats but don’t be a threatening threat.
You bet.
Stay wet, Portland. Stay wet.
I liked your comment, ROM. Don’t get cocky….
I had the OshKosh B’gosh scared out of me once, you don’t really want the details…
Not really, this is not news at all. This has always been basic Republican strategy. Increase the deficit and debt when you’re in power, and then scream to high heaven about irresponsible spending when you’re in the minority. They’ve been doing this for decades. They screamed at Clinton about the debt that they created. Clinton fixed the deficit, but instead of follow through on their claimed fiscal responsibility, they enacted massive tax cuts and brought us back in the red, then gave us unfunded mandates and expensive and unnecessary wars, all without a peep about the deficit or debt – until voters brought the grown-ups back to fix the mess they created.
Deficits and the debt are only an issue when Democrats held power. They are conveniently forgotten when Republicans are in power. Dick Cheney himself admitted “Deficits don’t matter.” That is, only when Republicans are running the place and nobody with a pulpit will call them on it.
I do want the details Todd! Fess up
I feel confident that since there is no legitimate source backing the Jarrett comments above, the blogosphere will shut it down.