To the Honorable Republican Members of the House:
What in the hell do you think you are doing? I mean, seriously, have you lost your minds entirely? Have you gone completely and absolutely freaking nuts? Do you have anything resembling a clue at all? No?
Allow me to help, then. Your opposition to the new stimulus legislation defies logic, reason and sanity itself. You are engaging in self destructive behavior for yourselves and for the nation.
You want the stimulus package to devote 40% of its price tag to tax cuts, and the rest to unemployment benefits? It ain't going to happen. You know it isn't going to happen. And if you didn't notice, having your way with tax cuts for the last eight years is part of the reason that we are where we are. Oh, your allowing the greed and avarice that drives wall street to run wild contributed, as did blind devotion and lemming like support of an unjust war that has drained our nations coffers. But this is your chance for a fresh start, to get on board with President Obama and the direction that America has loudly indicated it wants. You actually have a chance to leave some of your mistakes behind; are you too stupid or just too arrogant to do so?
Did you not notice that the candidate who ran on the platform of tax cuts being the panacea for the economy lost, and lost badly? Do you not realize that when President Obama told people that they were going to have to buckle down, get to work, and sacrifice that they heard him and accepted the challenge?
Do you think that you are going to increase your relevance at this point in time, and your future influence, by opposing the stimulus package at this point? You are truly engaging in moronic behavior. Not only are you setting yourself up to take the blame for any further economic downturns through your opposition (not that I care about that, but you should), but you are also ensuring that President Obama is less inclined to listen to you in the future.
President Obama has already handed you an olive branch, something you can take home and show to your constituents, in the form of urging the cutting of $200M from the package for birth control programs. While overpopulation and declining availability of resources is a major contributing factor to our long term economic decline, you were still given something that you could have made political hay out of at home. But that wasn't enough for you. You want to push for the sake of pushing, resist President Obama's initiatives for the sake of resisting them. It is obvious to me, and will become increasingly obvious to your supporters, that at this time of absolute national crisis, your first priority is politics and the arrogance of trying to claim to be right, as opposed to the health and well being of our nation. If you want to commit political suicide, fine, but don't try to bring the rest of us down in your hubristic attempt to cling to the failed approaches of the Bush administration.
I realize, that by definition, conservatives are resistant to change. But America tried it your way for the last eight years. The result has been, to put it mildly, a catastrophic and unmitigated failure. And we haven't seen all the fallout from having your greedy hands at the helm; this month already, 200,000 jobs were lost. That is 200,000 people without work, with increasingly dim employment prospects. What good will a tax cut do these people? Or the 2.6 million folks who lost their job last year. And still you repeat the mantra of tax cuts over spending on programs that will actually get people back to work?
Do you have any idea what happens when an economy truly, wholly and fully fails? Have you read any history at all? Do you know what happens to those who bring down a nation through their pride; to those who put their own enrichment before the needs of the country they are duty bound to serve in times of severe crisis?
One definition of insanity is said to be trying the same thing over and over, with an expectation of a different result. By this standard, you are engaging in truly deranged behavior.
It's time to fish, cut bait, or get off the boat. Take your choice. You've had your chance, and you failed epically. Either get on board with the will of the people, or get the hell out of the way.
Sincerely,
A Concerned Citizen