An open letter to all of our lurking Republicans

[Bjorn Against]

Dear Republicans,

It has been really interesting to watch these past few months as your party is suddenly very concerned about bi-partisanship. After eight long years of listening to you scream at us with your “you are either with us or you are with the terrorists” rhetoric you suddenly are acting as if you want to play nicely with us. You complain that Obama is not willing to reach across the aisle to you because the fact that he just gave you one of the largest tax cuts in American history is just not enough as far as you are concerned. You want more, and you stomp your feet insisting that we aren’t willing to listen to your ideas and give you what you want.

Well here is the problem, we have listened to your ideas for the past eight years. Not only have we listened to your ideas, but we have had to endure the consequences of your ideas. You told us that tax cuts for the rich and doing away with regulations on corporations would spur economic growth, but instead of spurring that growth you insisted was going to happen your policies lead us to the brink of another Great Depression.

Of course you will all insist that you are not responsible for George Bush’s actions, the fact that you cheered everything he did and questioned the patriotism of all his critics is suddenly supposed to be irrelevant. We are supposed to ignore the fact that virtually every Republican member of Congress voted the way George Bush wanted them to vote over 90% of the time and pretend that you were always as critical of Bush as you are now that the public has figured out what your policies have done to this nation. That is right, your policies. George Bush would have never made it to the oval office if it had not been for your enthusiastic support for him and the agenda he wanted to push forward, his policies would have never been implemented had you not cheered them on and therefore his policies are your policies and you can not escape that simple fact.

Don’t tell us about the “new faces of the GOP” because there is nothing new about what you are offering us. Your solution is tax cuts for the rich despite the fact that your previous tax cuts for the rich not only failed to stimulate the economy, but instead brought this nation further in to debt and placed it on the edge of economic collapse. This failed “solution” is the only solution you are offering, and yet you scream at us about bipartisanship because we don’t want to see your idea fail yet another time.

Whether it is the economy, health care, national security, or any of the other issues facing our nation the Bush policies that you have enthusiastically supported have all proven to be failures. Despite your so-called “war on terrorism” there is more violence in this world than at any other time in decades. The Middle East is in flames, and the only thing you have to say is “well there hasn’t been a terrorist attack since 9/11”. Of course there have been a few terrorist attacks since 9/11, but you don’t like to count abortion clinic bombings so you just conveniently ignore them. Now you will say that you are referring to international terrorism and you will brag about how Bush got through his past seven years without seeing yet another terrorist attack, but you will ignore the fact that terrorist attacks were not exactly common before Bush took office. When the best argument you can come up with is “Hey we may have seen the biggest terrorist attack in our nation’s history under our watch, but at least we didn’t get hit after that” then it is a sign that you really do know that your party did not accomplish anything of value during the past eight years you were in power.

But now you insist we should listen to your ideas. Well I have listened to your ideas, we have all listened to your ideas and we have all seen the consequences of those ideas. We have all seen our friends and family have to go through foreclosure, we have all seen people we know being sent off to war, we have all being worrying about whether our jobs will be part of the next set of layoffs because your party put Wall Street investors above ordinary citizens. We know what your ideas have done, and we are not going to seriously consider adopting your ideas ever again. You had your chance and you blew it, your ideas got us into this mess and there is no way in hell that we are going to use your ideas to get us out.

Sincerely,
A Citizen

[Somawas]

1. Well said.

Did you notice how the Fine Governor of the Great State of Louisiana mentioned the other night that Republicans had gotten "lost" but now had gotten found, apparently?

[Bjorn Against]

10. Yes I noticed, and he was one of my primary inspirations for writing this letter.

[StopTheNeoCons]

25. Great letter, but too civil and long for rethugs, will make no impression

[RJ Connors]

36. You're right, his letter is above 6th grade level so

right wing conservatives are never going to get it. But it is a great letter and I am just sorry that someone in our party in D.C. has not said it publicly in a national forum.

[Kurovski]

2. That pretty well sums it up.

aexcept we did have another attack after 9/11. The anthrax mailings.

[BluePatriot21]

5. and...

the Washington DC Sniper also.

The anthrax was from Cheney and friends, is that still a terrorist attack?

[Kurovski]

6. Oh, no. No terrorist attack.

Just a friendly reminder to Capitol Hill and the Media as to who they were dealing with, and what they could expect in the future if they stepped too far out of line.

[kerry-is-my-prez]

26. Guess it only counts as a "terrorist attack" when it's done by Arabs...

:sarcasm:

[Ticonderoga]

28. And no one has convinced me

that 9/11 wasn't a "gift" from Cheney and "friends" either.

[Bjorn Against]

13. You are right, and there were attacks on abortion clinics as well as I did mention.

It is interesting to note however that all the terrorist attacks that came after 9/11 were acts of domestic terrorism which were committed by right-wingers.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

35. boy o boy, this little summary should be a paragraph unto itself in the essay!!!

Or several paragraphs!

Just to help highlight the point and keep it at the front of awareness!

Thanks also for saying OUT LOUD that abortion clinic bombings ARE terrorism that the reich wing encourages, as it keeps us stuck in furor over religious dogmas, and distracted from their non-"religious" activities.

[SharonAnn]

38. But, why didn't * protect us before 9-11? He had warnings and did nothing!

If he had done everything possible to prevent it and it still happened, I would forgive him. But he did NOTHING! Absolutely nothing! That's why I won't forgive him.

Remember the Millennium bomber? Clinton had warnings and acted on them. They alerted every agency, etc. And they were actually able to catch one guy and disrupt the entire plot.

That's the difference. Though the warnings were specific to commercial airlines, he didn't warn the FAA, the airlines, the pilots unions, no one!

Sorry, but when it counted, he didn't protect us.

And then, he kept cutting the budget $ for infrastructure and so we had the levee breach during Katrina, the Interstate bridge collapse in Minnesota, etc.

Sorry, but he didn't protect us.

[Fire1]

50. You're not supposed to depend on the government to

'protect' you. :sarcasm:

[spartan61]

3. WOW!!! Great letter!

[JuniperLea]

4. JuniperLea applauds...

Standing... still applauding... wipes tear from cheek... shakes head... smiles as another tear runs down... continues applauding...

[Kurovski]

7. Kick. (nt)

[RC]

8. That is too much verbiage if you really intended that for any lurking Republicans.

Too many multisyllabic words. No pictures. Too much variety in the subject matter. You need to apply the KISS principle and spread things out over several weeks or months. Oh, and keep repeating what you want them to remember over and over again.

[Enthusiast]

30. And above all, have

it delivered by a 'manly man', with a deep voice, that talks loud and makes threatening gestures.

[redqueen]

9. Great letter... one minor quibble.

Seems to me that we've been listening to their ideas for 28 years.

[Bjorn Against]

11. You are right and I actually considered writing about their failures before Bush as well...

I decided to focus on the past eight years because I think it is very emblematic of the Republican's failure, but it really goes back much further than eight years. In fact I would argue that it goes back much further that 28 years to at least the days of Nixon, and you could go back further yet to the days of Hoover and the robber barons. To cover the whole history of Republican failure would take a lot more than a one page letter so I chose to focus on an era that is still on people's minds, but you are absolutely correct that this did not begin with Bush.

[redqueen]

14. Yes, good point... it goes back much farther than that.

Good idea to focus on the recent past, too. :thumbsup:

[sallyseven]

34. My mother, when I was a little

girl, told me to never vote for s republican. I am now over 70 and it is still true. They hate people. Great post. Remind your kids of this time and make sure they understand how bad those people are. They are all clones of each other. Think alike. Greedy bastards.

[SnowCritter]

24. I was thinking the same thing

All of this started with Reagan.

[DKRC]

12. K&R! Great letter!

:applause:

[JuniperLea]

15. Kick for the night crowd...

Error: You've already recommended that thread.

[Bounty_full]

16. Impressive

I was so impressed I've adopted the same signature.

[B Calm]

17. You need to shrink the OP down to a couple sentences if you expect

any of the ignorant, nose-picking, burger-eating, knuckle-dragging republicans to actually read it!

[Lisa0825]

18. Shared on FB!

When I first went on FB, it was only my political friends in my contacts there. Now some old friends, friends from other circles, and "barely" friends have added me. I wonder if this will get a reaction. There are a few that I don't want to get annoyed with me, ut FB was (for me) first and foremost my connection with my political circle, and I won't quit that because new folks joined my circle.

[SoCalNative]

54. Me as well

here's hoping it takes off and becomes an internet sensation

[footinmouth]

19. May I applaud you?

Thank you for such a well thought-out post. You have managed to lay it all out without name calling or insults, just the facts. Everything you have written is true. I think their party has become irrelevant. I never see a new idea from them. They might as well cal themselves the party of the fetus, it seems to be the only thing they stand for. We're here for you to see that you get born, then you're on your own.

[NBachers]

20. No terrorist attacks on America?

What happens when an IED blows up Americans?

What happens when a sniper blasts an American's head to vapor?

What happens when a car bomb maims and kills Americans?

What happens when a human bomb blows themself up and kills or injures Americans?

What happens when police forces we've been training use our own weapons to kill us?

What happens when restaurants or nightclubs are blown up with Americans inside?

What happens when helicopters filled with Americans get blasted out of the sky?

Are these not acts of terrorism?

Or do these dead and injured Americans not count because it happened in a furrin cuntry??

Who's responsible for putting these Americans in harms' way?

[druidity33]

44. who put American Soldiers in Iraq?

What are you trying to say here?

Cuz i'm not gettin' it.


The fact that we have around 150,000 troops there probably contributes to all that death and mayhem.

And again... who put them there?



:eyes:

[myrna minx]

21. K&R. Well said. n/t

[malaise]

22. Superb letter

Fugg them.

[Jeneral]

23. Grin

"...but you don’t like to count abortion clinic bombings so you just conveniently ignore them."

Suddenly the death of innocent Iraqis is nothing compared to abortion when a girl is raped or a woman is suffering.

[Kajsa]

27. So THAT'S their "new plan"

that Boehner keeps rambling about,
the one that will

" create twice the jobs at half the cost"

Jindal mentioned it Tuesday night also.

It must be this,

" Your solution is tax cuts for the rich despite the fact that your previous tax cuts for the rich not only failed to stimulate the economy, but instead brought this nation further in to debt and placed it on the edge of economic collapse."

because I've heard of nothing else coming down the pike.

Great letter, Bjorn Against!

I hope this is widely read and circulated.

:) :applause:

[Enthusiast]

29. The Party of Reagan

is the party of hypocrisy. And that is all that needs be said.

Like the author said, they have completely abandoned Bush saying he isn't a true conservative. I call bullshit. He was exactly like Reagan-cut taxes for the wealthy, borrow and spend and talk tough. This is the mold of ideal Republican they have followed. Talk tough about 'fiscal responsibility', 'tax and spend' then double and triple the deficit while cutting marginal rates. Reward your cronies! By all means, reward your cronies. They SAY they are fiscally responsible, but they are not. They accuse the Democrats of not being responsible with 'your money', while they are completely irresponsible with 'your money'. They say one thing and do another. That equals hypocrisy.

The Republican belief system is bankrupt and now our country is, as a result. Make no mistake, it is a belief system, similar to a religion.

[Roland99]

31. Hear! Hear!

[mwb970]

32. P.S. Your spokesmen suck!

If you republicans continue to be led by Limbaugh and spoken for by Palin, Jindal, Cantor, and the rest of the dimwits we see on TV or hear on the radio all the time, I say go ahead! You will remain in the political wilderness for a long, long time.

I didn't even mention Hannity, Ingraham, Liddy, Malkin, Weiner, O'Reilly, or the emetic Glenn Beck. If these are your exemplars and brightest lights then, well, goodbye republican party. RIP, not.

[mnhtnbb]

33. What a great "fuck you". Tempted to send it to my brother, the Republican.

If I do, I'm sure I'll never hear from him again. We manage to get along by not discussing politics.
I blew his wife off last summer (blocked her e-mails) over repeated BS anti-Obama e-mails that she wouldn't stop sending. Guess that's enough.

[NanceGreggs]

37. Fantastic!!!

:applause: :applause: :applause: :applause: :applause:


:patriot: K & R!!!!!!!!!!!

[Alcibiades]

39. The Republican ideology has been tested

It does not work. If they think Obama's tax cut for working people is so small it's trivial then why didn't they enact a larger one? Oh, yeah, it's because they only like big tax cuts, and those by definition go to the people with big money. Oppose big government? Better get rid of the military, then, because it's the biggest part of government. Opposed to government invention in the economy? Then you should have told Bush, Paulson and "stanky" Bernanke.

The fact is, our economy grew very well under Truman, Eisenhower and LBJ. We had tax rates under those presidents Republicans today would consider confiscatory. When they first started cutting taxes, they cited the Laffer curve and claimed revenue would go up, an idea Bush Senior called "voodoo economics." When it became clear that it really was voodoo economics and that lowering taxes on the rich only lowers revenue, they simply acted as if they had not made the former claim and emphasized the supposed economic benefits of tax cuts. Now that Bush and the Republican Congress has actually cut taxes and minimized needful regulation to such an extent that we are on the cusp of a depression, they got nothin.

There is nothing left of the party that William Buckley era Republicans created. It's now the party not simply of those hostile to liberal ideas, but people hostile to ideas in general. Socially moderate, taxcutting Republicans have no reason to stay with the Republican Party. Republican ideas sound good in theory, but they do not work. The modern Republican Party has shown itself to be unrespectable and irresponsible. I call on all sensible Republicans to leave their party and join us, the party of the adults.

[Cha]

40. Brilliant..thank you, Bjorn.

Oh yeah, they are all respondsible for the bushites in control for 8 years and what they dumped on America.

[ejbr]

41. Now STFU!

(the lurking Repigs, not the poster of this spot on letter.)

[glinda]

42. Here is MY letter:

I will do everything in my power to make sure you never ever get into office again. When you complain that the Stim Bill is too big and jeopardizes future generations, the truth is there is not a gazillion dollars that can fix the mess that you and your Party have gotten us into especially in regards to the environmental state of the Planet.

[NM Independent]

43. Very well said.

I think I'll bookmark this for when the inevitable emails from my family about the budget fights to come.

[GoCubsGo]

45. They should just shut up and be happy that...

...they aren't being treated the way they treated the Democrats from 2001-2007. Lord knows they deserve it.

[LiberalLovinLug]

46. Bravo

"“Hey we may have seen the biggest terrorist attack in our nation’s history under our watch, but at least we didn’t get hit after that” then it is a sign that you really do know that your party did not accomplish anything of value during the past eight years you were in power."

This is the one myth, that of keeping America safe while the Decider was in charge, that we must be vigilant to enlighten. Why is it always framed .....after 9/11? That was 8 months, not 8 days, into his watch. Fact is his whole administration was NOT concerned with reports coming in about al qaeda plotting to attack American soil, even some where commercial airlines were mentioned. Instead the Decider took a record number of vacation days for any sitting president in his first year.

[lsewpershad]

47. Well said

I could not have said it better.

[Ignis]

48. Condensed Version for Short Attention Span Freepers:

You had your chance.
You fucked up royally.
Now we have to clean up the mess.
No thanks necessary, or expected.

[pansypoo53219]

49. not 8 years.

since reagan in 1980. most recently there.

[windoe]

51. The RW extremist neo cons have totally distorted the conservative base

beyond all recognition in this country, using religious extremism and xenophobic paranoia to gain their power. Todays Republican Party is NOT CONSERVATIVE by any definition of the word, the real conservatives out there need to call them out and regain their voice.

Aren't traditional conservatives for fiscal responsibility, conserving the land and resources, and for real national security? We need true conservatism and true liberalism in our national discourse (and everything in between), the current propaganda is a poor substitute for real debate.

I have always seen 2 sides of a national debate, one maintaining flexibility and liberty, and the other providing standards and institutional structure. It is like the 2 sides of our brain (right controlling the 'left' and the left side controlling the 'right' in society...) We need both flexibility and structure, one keeps a check on the other. Hope I am making sense here, but this has always been my view of the 'left and right' in the world--strength and flexibility.

Perhaps I should add that in order that the new paradigm go beyond this duality it must work through it to strive for balance and integration.

[DinahMoeHum]

52. Stupidity: doing something over and over and expecting a different result.

The Republikkkan Party in a nutshell.

:evilfrown:

[gtar100]

53. Kick!!

[butterfly77]

55. Kick &Recommended!