Mike Papantonio • February 4, 2009
There are at least 177 reasons why President Obama should not waste energy trying to be a president of compromise.
Last week, every Republican in the House tried desperately to prevent a much-needed stimulus package from moving onto the Senate floor. Not one Republican could force himself or herself to acknowledge that 10 million Americans are unemployed. Not one of those 177 lockstep congressmen seemed to notice that 8 million homeowners have been through bank foreclosure. America's banking industry is barely standing. Factory doors are being chained closed. Commercial businesses of every kind are folding at a pace that seems irreversible. But yet 177 Republican congressmen still want to further promote their failures by refusing to support an economic stimulus package.
I will add to the list of 177 reasons Obama should end his attempts to compromise with Republican leadership that put us here to begin with. Reason number 178 would be that Obama was sent to Washington with a mandate to change failed policy rather than compromise with the architects of those policies.
I would also add reason 179 to the list of why Obama should abandon his attempts at bipartisan compromise. The Republican Party is in a total free fall. They have no common ground with Xers, Millennial voters, Latinos, African-American voters, moderate Democrats or independents. Do the electoral math and it is clear that the Republicans have morphed into something resembling an historical artifact ...
http://www.pnj.com/article/20090204/OPINION/902040313/1161/NEWS01