Republicans Won't Take 'Yes' for an Answer - Paul Krugman

[Bill USA]

(emphases my own)

http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/03/03/today-in-well-duh/

Ezra Klein mans up and admits he was wrong. He had written a piece suggesting that if only Republicans knew how much Obama has been willing to offer, they might be willing to make a deal. Jonathan Chait set him straight, informing him that no matter what Obama put on the table, Republicans would find a way to say that it’s not enough. And sure enough, a Twitter exchange lets Klein watch that process in real time, as a top Republican consultant, confronted with evidence that Obama has already conceded what he said was all that was needed, keeps adding more demands.

So Klein admits that Republicans just don’t want to make a deal. Their objections to the deals on the table aren’t sincere; if convinced that Obama has met their demands, they just make more demands.

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The whole push for a Grand Bargain has been based on the notion that we can reach a fiscal deal that takes the whole fight over the budget off the table. What Klein has belatedly learned is how unlikely such a Bargain really is; but the same logic tells us that any Grand Bargain that might somehow be struck, via Obama’s mystical ability to mind-meld Star Trek and Star Wars or something, wouldn’t last. In a year — or more likely in a minute or two — Republicans would be back, demanding more tax cuts and more cuts in social programs. They just won’t take yes for an answer.

Meanwhile, it’s not just Republicans who refuse to accept it when Obama gives them what they want; the same applies, with even less justification, to centrist pundits. As people like Greg Sargent point out time and again, the centrist ideal — deficit reduction via a mix of revenue increases and benefits cuts — is what Obama is already offering; in fact, his proposals have been to the right of Bowles-Simpson. [font size="3" color="red"]Yet the centrist pundits keep demanding that Obama offer what he has already offered, and condemn both sides equally (or even place most of the blame on Obama) for the failure to reach a deal.[/font] Again, informing them of their error wouldn’t help;[font size="3"] their whole shtick is about blaming both sides, and they will always invent some reason why Obama just isn’t doing it right[/font].

(more)

NOTE: Krugman and Joe Scarborough will be on the GOP's Charlie Rose's show - tomorrow. You may want to watch so you can then post here and on Rose's web-site about Scarborough's bullshit.

[CTyankee]

1. Geez, Scarborough just can't let it go! Krugman is gonna wipe the floor with him!

Scar just keeps picking at that scab. Let it go buddy...

what channel is Charlie Rose's show on?

[immoderate]

2. Charlie Rose is GOP?

I have no notion. And I don't watch him. How do you know?

--imm

[Bill USA]

4. he constantly parrots GOP propaganda and has given many Conservative idiots his show to expound,

ad infinitum, on their screw-ball ideas without bringing up any questions of their hare-brained propositions.

The last couple years he's been repeatedly implying in his questions of EVERYBODY who comes on the show, that Obama has shown a "failure of leadership"... this is straight out of the GOP propoganda mill. There is much more that i could site but, really it's kindof a pain to do-so.

He specializes in the insinuating questions which require the answerer to accept an implied premise to the question. Most people don't want to come on a show and get into a verbal wrestling match with the host and let his gamesmanship slide. They go ahead and answer the way the see it.

He had David Axlerod on recently, and tried that with him and Axlerod said: "Well, I don't accept the premise of your statement." Rose came back quickly: "that wasn't a statement, it was question." Axlerod said: "Well, there was an implied premise to your question".. finally Rose conceded, with sortof a grone, that Axlerod was right.


That's the first time I've ever seen a guest on his show do that. The guest on a show isn't about to get 'into it' with the host of the show (most people don't want to get into a contretemps before the cameras).

[immoderate]

5. Thanks!

--imm

[blkmusclmachine]

3. Keep givin' the GOP more, Mr. Prez.

We ain't dead, yet.

:~p

Bipartisanship sucks