I think the argument could be made, re: the recent confrontation over the debt ceiling and Obamacare. Via Ed Morrissey, Sen. Cruz hints at it in his ABC News interview:
“I will say that the reason this deal, the lousy deal was reached last night, is because, unfortunately, Senate Republicans made the choice not to support House Republicans,” Cruz told ABC News. “I wish Senate Republicans had united, I tried to do everything I could to urge Senate Republicans to come together and stand with House Republicans.”
First, let’s note that eighteen GOP Senators did stand with House Republicans, leaving 27 who didn’t.
But what about the 27? Some seem clueless about the larger issues, as for example, Sen. McCain who said “The real losers [in the shutdown] were the American people,” when the reverse is true: Americans lost when government re-opened under terms of greater debt, and with Obamacare intact.
As Morrissey didn’t support the recent confrontation, he goes on to argue that “The only way to dismantle ObamaCare is to win [future] elections.” I disagree.
Since raising the debt ceiling brings America closer to its coming default, and since Obamacare is bad law that harms our economy: then patriotic lawmakers should use any legal, constitutional means available to obstruct or delay them, with whatever votes they can muster today. Yes, rock the boat!
But 60% of Senate Republicans, it seems, would rather undercut the boat rockers – or even attack them. If their problem isn’t a form of Stockholm Syndrome, then I suspect it’s the GOP’s real civil war, K Street vs. the Tea Party.
K Street, or the GOP’s Washington / Big Government wing, has won a round and now presses the advantage by trashing the boat-rockers in the media. But I say, kudos to Sen. Cruz for at least having tried to do the right thing.
As former Sen. Jim DeMint has just said, of Obamacare:
The reason [we fight] is simple: to protect the American people from the harmful effects of this law…
More and more people have had their work hours cut, their jobs eliminated and their coverage taken away..
We know that premiums are going up due to ObamaCare—Americans are getting notices in their mailboxes every day…
[Americans] shouldn’t have to wait three more years for Congress to give them relief from this law, especially when the president has so frequently given waivers to his friends. Full legislative repeal may not be possible while President Obama remains in office, but delaying implementation by withholding funds from a law that is proven to be unfair, unworkable and unaffordable is a reasonable and necessary fight.
Raising the debt ceiling is equally bad law. Would that more of the GOP had seen clearly on that as well as Obamacare, and stood up to obstruct both.