Editor’s Note: Sally Kohn is a progressive activist, columnist and television commentator. Follow her on Twitter @sallykohn. The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of the author.
Story highlights
Sally Kohn: House GOP try to sue President for not implementing a law they fought
Kohn: GOP does not let facts stand in the way of irrational partisan attacks
Kohn: Republicans' sole strategy since Obama was elected was to smear him
She says GOP not doing its job: Too busy spending our money on revenge stunts
In the beginning, one might have considered it bold – even inventive – to oppose every single thing President Obama supported.
But it quickly became tiresome and predictable over the last five years. And now, as House Republicans weigh a resolution to sue President Obama for not quickly enough implementing a law the same Republicans voted more than 50 times to repeal or stall, all hell has broken loose.
Republicans are just being obnoxious now. And dangerous. And nuts.
On Wednesday, the House Rules Committee will debate a draft resolution to file a lawsuit against President Obama, wasting taxpayer dollars in what is plainly a political stunt.
Their complaint? That President Obama did not implement the employer mandate in Obamacare quickly enough. That’s right, that same employer mandate Republicans have berated Obama for, the one in the health care reform law they’ve voted 54 (failed) times to try to repeal or delay or stall – the law, incidentally, that’s working – House Republicans are now using taxpayer money to sue President Obama for not implementing it quickly enough. Yeah.
Meanwhile, at least Republicans aren’t going full-political-stunt and impeaching President Obama … yet. Sarah Palin has thrown her constitutional-scholar-like support behind the idea. Though as Attorney General Eric Holder said of Palin this weekend: “She wasn’t a particularly good vice presidential candidate. She’s an even worse judge of who ought to be impeached and why.”
Republicans bash President Obama for issuing executive orders. But why should facts like the Constitution or how every president in history has used executive orders, and in most cases more than President Obama, stand in the way of a good partisan line of attack, let alone a political stunt? Facts and proportionality certainly haven’t been a barrier for Republicans so far.
For instance, also within the last week, conservative talk radio host Ben Shapiro said on Fox News that the Obama White House is a “borderline Jew-hating administration.”
Republicans had long criticized the President as anti-Israel. For instance, the Romney campaign ran a commercial criticizing Obama for not visiting Israel during the first three-and-a-half years of his presidency, and conservative pundit Mark Levin accused President Obama of “hating Israel.”
But suggesting the White House and by, er, obvious implication President Obama, hates Jews is a whole new level of accusation. It’s also a whole new level of crazy neglect of basic facts.
President Obama has increased security assistance to Israel every single year since taking office and Obama personally championed providing an additional $275 million over its standard foreign military financing aid in order to fund the construction of the so-called “Iron Dome” defense system.”
But facts, schmacts. Republican smears against Obama are even more impervious than the Iron Dome. No logic or reason can pierce their facade of BS.
Witness Texas Republican Sen. John Cornyn, who last week called President Obama “tone deaf” for not visiting the border during his trip to Texas. Texas Gov. Rick Perry also dinged the President along these lines: “The President needs to come to the border, to see it himself.” For his part, President Obama said, “I’m not interested in photo ops, I’m interested in solving a problem.” Which sounds almost like Obama is quoting Cornyn and Perry … back in 2011.
Then, when pressing Congress to pass immigration reform, President Obama went to the border and … Republicans criticized him for doing so.
“What Sen. Cornyn is looking for, President Obama cannot deliver with another speech or photo op, and that’s presidential leadership. Words matter little when there is no action,” a Cornyn spokesperson said at the time. Similarly, in 2011, Perry criticized Obama’s trip to the border, “I was very disheartened when the President came into El Paso a couple of weeks ago (and) had a photo-op.”
In case you’re not good at math, that’s Republicans criticizing President Obama for doing something and then – just three years later – criticizing him for not doing the same thing. Try as you might, there’s just no way to rationalize the difference. Republicans damn President Obama he does it and damned if he doesn’t.
But if you still believe in facts, here’s something for you: Republicans crashed our nation’s economy with their astronomical tax cuts, lax oversight of business and unfunded wars.
But instead of facing the truth and re-examining how their policies systematically harm our nation, Republicans just attack and blame President Obama. They simply don’t know what else to do.
That’s not so say President Obama never does anything wrong or doesn’t sometimes deserve blame. Of course he does and we should have political checks and balances.
But while blaming and condemning President Obama has been Republicans’ sole strategy since the moment he was elected, they’ve taken that crazy irresponsibility to the next level – including suing the President of the United States of America for doing his job and carefully implementing laws, even the ones Republicans hate. That’s what all presidents do.
Meanwhile, Congress is supposed to work with the President and pass laws. Republicans are the ones who aren’t doing their jobs. They’re too busy spending our money on their partisan revenge stunts and inventing new outlandish attacks against Obama to distract the American people from the giant mess the Republican Party has caused – and not only are they not doing anything to fix it, they have no solutions.
The more irrational and hypocritical the Republican attacks get, the more they’re desperately trying to hide this simple truth.
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