Stung by their stereotyping as the "party of no," House Republicans eagerly promoted the unveiling of their alternative to President Obama's budget today -- but when they finished speaking, reporters had one big question: Where's the actual budget? You know, the numbers that show deficit projections and discretionary spending?
There certainly was no hard budgetary data in the attractively designed 18-page packet that the House GOP handed out today, its blue cover emblazoned with an ambitious title: "The Republican Road to Recovery." When Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) was asked what his goal for deficit reduction would be -- President Obama aims to halve the nation's spending imbalance within five years -- Boehner responded simply: "To do better [than Obama]."
When pressed further by reporters, Boehner promised that Republicans would release their actual budget within the next few days and pointed a finger back at the president.
After Obama delivered a prime-time speech previewing his budget, Boehner said, "he didn't offer his details until days later."
The lack of any statistical heft in their packet left the House GOP stumbling out of the gate as it worked to re-dub itself as the "party of yes," in the words of No. 3-ranked leader Mike Pence (R-IN). House Republicans unveiled an alternative plan for the foreclosure crisis yesterday, and they are continuing to tout their economic stimulus proposal (along with an erroneous claim that it creates more jobs than Obama's).
You can read the Republican Road to Recovery here.
Let us call this Republican "budget" what it really is--a shiny little marketing gimmick which touts the same, stale, GOP talking points of more tax cuts, oil drilling, and business deregulation. There are no numbers, or even estimates, or even wild-assed guesses as to how much American taxpayer money will the Republicans spend in their own budget, or even where the money will go. Of course, there are lots of numbers in the Republican Road to Recovery on how the congressional Democrats and President Barack Obama's budget will spend us into so much debt like a drunken sailor in a whorehouse. A shiny little marketing brochure, presented by the Republican Party, as a "budget."
Then again, you have to understand what the Republican Party has become--a party bankrupted of any type of ideas or policy issues. This was a party that attempted to push its own extremist ideology down the rest of the country's throat during the eight years of the Bush administration--the Permanent Majority Party! This was a party that trumped ideology over policy, demanded rubber-stamping from its members, and refused to compromise with the Democrats. This was a party that sent this country into a serious economic crisis, a deep recession, created a financial mess, incurred a huge national debt, and has sunk us into two losing wars. And as a result of the GOP's hard shifting to the right, and the terrible economic and foreign policy problems that have occurred because of the conservative extremism, the Republicans were completely stomped in the 2006 and 2008 elections. Now with their ideas overwhelmingly rejected, the GOP has nothing left to present as a policy debate. Instead, the Republicans repackage the same, stale, ideas into new Powerpoint presentations, while giving press conferences to present their same crap under a new coversheet. The Republican Party has traded policy issues for marketing spin, and is hoping that the American public will be ignorant enough not to see through their charade. The GOP has not changed.
They are still the Republican Party of No:
Here is a DailyKos video of Republican Minority Leader John Boehner at a press conference, presenting the Republican Road to Recovery to reporters:
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