With each passing day, I become more and more confused about the political aspects of what I see, read and hear regarding the government shutdown in general, and the new health care tax in particular. And most of all, I’m confounded by Fox News.
It seems to me that the morning show, Fox and Friends, does quite a good job in presenting timely items, and most often, let’s the issues speak for themselves. Predominately, any opinions presented seem to be derivative of the facts of the matters, rather than any specific bias or editorial slant.
Bret Baier’s Special Report on Fox News, however, includes a panel of pundits, many of them right-leaning, including several highly regarded conservative thinkers. Additionally, there are well known, well respected newsmen such as Brit Hume.
They’ve all held my attention in the past few days, especially so because of their virtually universal opinions that the Republicans are harming themselves by shutting down the government over the incumbent’s health care tax. And while they claim this will result in a voter backlash, harming the party at the polls, they themselves are pounding the party they prefer, spouting negativism, and in my opinion making the situation for Republicans considerably worse. Yet, what’s even sadder is, they’re very likely wrong.
An article by by Rich Lowry, in today’s New York Post via Drudge, states that: “Pew Research has found disapproval of the health-care law at an all-time high in its polling. CNN’s latest survey has disapproval at 57 percent and approval at 38. Health care, a core Democratic strength for decades, is becoming a liability. A New York Times poll found that more people disapprove of President Barack Obama on health care than approve by a 54-to-40 margin. Trust for Republicans and Democrats on health care is about even, according to the Pew poll.”
Furthermore ”The problems with the health law are invariably described by the president and his allies as “glitches,” or harmless technical snafus that no one should worry about. But the law suffers from basic design flaws beyond the question of whether the Obama administration can get its software to work. It depends on young, healthy people buying insurance even as it reduces their incentive to do so; it encourages employers to dump workers off their current insurance; it suppresses full-time work, through the employer mandate; in 10 years, the law still leaves 30 million people uninsured.”
And lastly: “The law’s fate over the longer term matters because it is almost certain to survive the immediate confrontations over the so-called continued resolution and the debt ceiling. It will be determined over the course of the next two elections, when Republicans will continue to pound away — rightly — over the sighs of annoyed impatience of the left and the media. Resistance is not futile.”
So, as the preceding very accurately points out, the odds seem extremely high that the Republicans are correct in employing every tactic they can to repair the horrendous mistake the ramming through of this legislation's caused.
And if it takes a government shutdown to help prove their point so-be-it. Because in the end, their efforts will prove to have been the right thing to do. And since that’s the case, I’d think these conservative commentating geniuses should be able to grasp that point. But since they can’t, it further illustrates why they’re commentators in the first place.
Because if they really knew what they were doing, they’d be out there doing it, instead of sitting around a studio table babbling and incorrectly shooting their mouths off.
That’s it for today folks.
Adios
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