From: Kermet Merl Key
Columbus
With the midterms just days away, Republicans are running on what Newt Gingrich calls “Kavanaugh and caravans” when they’d rather be talking about their economic success.
They’re doing that because in the midterms its important to turn out the base, but they can’t do that with their economic numbers.
Sure, the stock market is up and unemployment is down, but the deficit is up and wages are flat. The tax cuts for the rich are to blame, but Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell wants to blame seniors and have them pay down the debt with their Social Security and Medicaid. And while tariffs have offset some of the tax giveaways for corporations, local farmers are paying for that, too.
So Republicans and their faithful turn to attacking Democrats as being mean socialists that want open borders. They point to how Justice Brett Kavanaugh was treated at the confirmation hearing while hoping voters forget how their leader, Mr. Trump, mocked Christine Blassey Ford, whom they admit is a sexual assault victim, and did so because, as he told Leslie Stahl on 60 Minutes, “It doesn’t matter, because we won.”
Then, with less than three weeks before the election they start talking about Honduran and Guatemalan refugees coming to our border as some conspiracy by Democrats. To which part of the base does such fear mongering appeal? To folks like Identity Europa, white supremacists that only want to allow white immigrants from Europe into the country. Identity Europa took part in the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville where Heather Heyer was murdered. They believe they have a place in the Republican Party and are trying to take over.
But Democrats are running on health care, education and wages. The blue wave is built on making sure that people don’t lose the coverage they have because of pre-existing conditions and that they can get better coverage so they don’t lose everything they have because of an illness. The blue wave is built on an investment in our future by making sure that every child has the best education possible with the teachers they need. And finally, it’s about making sure that people don’t have to work two or three jobs just to have food, shelter and clothing.
Republicans can run on fear this election cycle, but none of them can run on their record. They’re no longer the fiscal conservatives or free-market capitalists they claimed to be. They’re the party of broken promises and Donald Trump. The deficit is up, but the wall is not.
