Gridlock We Can Believe in!
By Wynton C. Hall
The Republican takeover of the House has the liberal intelligentsia (oxymoron?) all in a stir. To hear liberals tell the story, the GOP’s running the House can mean only one thing: congressional gridlock.
Indeed, the cacophony of liberal shrieks has already begun. A Huffington Post headline screams, “2010 Elections to Usher in Era of Gridlock” (Gasp!).
The AP ominously asks, “Hello to Gridlock … and Goodbye to Recovery?”
Ever the keepers of all things conforming with comity and civility, The New York Times introspectively wonders, “Can the Republicans Avoid Gridlock?”
From every corner, at every turn, the ubiquitous liberal rallying cry now seems to be: “Republicans will be nothing but obstructionists! All they will produce is gridlock! Oh the horrors of it all. Gridlock!”
To which the American electorate replies: “Thank God! Bring on the gridlock!”
President Obama has yammered endlessly about how he, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and the members of his bumbling administration have fought to yank, tug, and pull the "American car” from the evil Republican “ditch” (Zzzz … can someone over in the White House speechwriting chop-shop please churn out some fresher analogies? Seriously!).
Yet, to Mr. Obama’s chagrin, the American electorate has responded, “Gee, Mr. President, last we checked, you’ve been the one driving the car for the last two years. So we are going to elect Republicans to pull the emergency brake on this runaway car before you drive us off a cliff.”
The mandate that voters have sent Washington is clear: Slam on the brakes! Reverse course! And that’s exactly what voters have done. At present, the incoming gridlock gang of Republicans stands at 61 members in the House and 6 in the Senate.
What this means is that Americans have decided that gridlock is far preferred to the insanity that is the current national trajectory. What’s more, the markets seem to be keen on the new gridlock gang, as stocks immediately climbed to their highest levels in two years. Markets like certainty. Gridlock gives investors greater assurance that fewer seismic legislative shifts are likely to occur over the next two years.
What liberals seem not to understand—or choose not to accept—is that Americans have exercised one of the tools that the Founders gave them:
1.) Legislation is supposed to be hard to pass...
2.) Political agendas are meant to be stifled...
3.) Ideas are expected to be torpedoed...
That’s the whole point!
It’s a neat little thing called separation of powers, checks and balances. The Constitution is a genius document. Gridlock is one of the primary tools our Founders gave us to exert control on those who wish to control us.
Much to the shock and dismay of the Leftist establishment, Americans are not as stupid as many liberal commentators would have us believe. We get it. We realize that any efforts to repeal Obamacare can and will be vetoed by Mr. Obama. We know that Republican massage of tax cuts for all may be denied by Mr. Obama. We realize that no major legislative efforts are likely to pass in the next two years. And guess what? That will represent a major victory for voters, because that will mean we have staunched the spending, slammed the brakes on Mr. Obama’s out-of-control “car” (move over Lincoln … there’s a new wordsmith in town! yeesh!), and that “We the People” have wrested power from Washington.
(Editor's Note: We the People also understand what that veto pen will mean to Obama's future - and the future of what's left of his veto supporting cast of liberal clowns - come the 2012 election. Veto away, Mr. President! We can wait to repeal government mandated health care until after Sarah Palin is sworn into office.)
Tuesday was just the opening salvo in a two-front battle. Voters are content to stay in a holding pattern until the next flank opens up in 2012. Until then, gridlock will suit us just fine.
The GOP-led House will give us gridlock we can believe in.
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Wynton C. Hall is a visiting fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University and the owner of Wynton Hall & Co., a celebrity ghostwriting and speechwriting agency. He is the author, most recently, of The Right Words: Great Republican Speeches that Shaped History.
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