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Democrats’ Shutdown Spin Defies Logic

By: Curt Levey (Diary)  |  April 8th, 2011 at 05:58 PM  | 

RESIZE: AAA

From the diaries by Erick.

The charge: Republicans are willing to shut down the government over the issue of Planned Parenthood funding.  Democrats and the media are making the charge and Republicans are denying it – arguing that, instead, the disagreement centers on the total amount of budget cuts.  But the GOP’s denial only feeds into the assumption that everyone seems to be buying into, namely that if Planned Parenthood funding is what stymies a budget deal, it is the GOP that will stand guilty of shutting down the government over the issue.

Excuse me for being logical in the midst of a shutdown “crisis,” but why is virtually everyone – even Republicans – buying into this assumption when it can just as easily be said that Democrats caused a shutdown by refusing to cut funding for their beloved Planned Parenthood?

Consider the logic. If the only thing preventing a deal between A and B is disagreement over including X in the deal, then failure to reach a deal can just as easily be ascribed to A’s refusal to include X as it can to B’s demand that X be included.  In fact, you can’t even logically say who is doing the demanding and who is doing the refusing.  For example, are the Democrats refusing to include a Planned Parenthood rider or are they demanding that Planned Parenthood be funded?

This logic transcends the questions of whether Planned Parenthood is or isn’t the real sticking point and whether it should or should not be funded.  Nor does the logic depend on whether “abortion” or “women’s health” better describes the underlying issue.  Whichever way you come out on those questions, the logic remains the same: there is no rational basis for saying that it is Republicans, rather than Democrats, who are forcing a shutdown over the Planned Parenthood issue.  And vice versa.

Nonetheless, if the Democrats continue to employ rhetoric rather than logic, Republicans’ best defense is to go on the offensive by turning the Democrats’ illogic against them.  Put the Planned Parenthood issue on the Democrats’ shoulders by pointing out that Democrats are so beholden to the radical Left and so obsessed with protecting the nation’s number one provider of abortions that they’d rather subject Americans to the hardships of a shutdown than see their beloved Planned Parenthood lose a little of its government handout.  It is at least as true as what the Democrats are claiming.

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  • junkbondtrader41

    Quick, Speaker Boehner! Here’s a grenade to fight back, just pull the pin and hang on to it tight!

    • http://barnettlaw.org Frozen_Man

      If you disagree at least make the case.

      I think that Curt has a very valid point. The republicans can just as easily say that the democrats are so married to having taxpayers pay for abortions that they are willing to shut down the government if the country doesn’t continue to pay for abortions. Excellent post Curt and unlike the comment above your post actually made a thought out and well articulated argument.

      • junkbondtrader41

        Than just ideologically committed political junkies like us, it won’t fly.

        I just heard Dick Armey respond to Larry Kudlow’s suggestion that we make the deal for $39 billion in cuts being offered and drop the PP rider, to move on to bigger fish. Armey’s response was that in his 30 years of analyzing polls, he’d yet to ever see a poll where a majority supported government funding of abortion. Problem with that is intensity, not raw numbers Sure it may break our way on a general question of should it be funded, but if it’s a question of a defunding fight triggering a shutdown, you won’t find enough folks who care about it THAT MUCH to be a political net benefit to us. The attitude is, “Get it done, let’s avoid the shutdown and debate this some other time.”

        By doing what Mr. Levy suggests, we’d simply be lending credence to the charge. Playing into the caricature the Dems framed for it. The correct response is dismiss it, deny it, and stay relentlessly on message about spending. In other words, exactly what Boehner’s already doing.

      • slimmu

        federal funding for the last 40 years so because its an established program its a much easier perspective that Republicans are trying to defund it rather than Democrats trying to fund it. If it was a relatively new program I could buy Curt’s logic more.

        The other argument is that this should be about the budget, meaning if cutting Planned Parenthood would save X dollars but Democrats are gonna whine and moan then do the sensible thing and propose cutting other things that will add up to X dollars. I know, why should they give in to the Democrats? Because somebody has to be the grownup and make sure the government still functions and the troops get paid.

        • Diogenes314

          Then we should try to be sensitive to their point of view and reasonable about this. Find some middle ground. For every dollar they insist on giving planned eugenics, they agree to 10 dollars in cuts elsewhere.

          Then we kill it later.

  • thebardofmurdock

    A fourteen-trillion deficit
    Is nothing at to sneer,
    But in these times of hope and change
    We think we?ve been austere.
    Another one-point-five-trillion
    And then we?ll start to pare:
    We want to keep our budget cuts
    All legal, safe and rare.

    We know the voters turned us out
    The last election day,
    And gave the House to radicals,
    Hell-bent on foul play.
    But voters took a different tack
    And did the Senate spare,
    So we just treat Republicans
    As legal, safe and rare.

    Though consequences are to flow
    Beyond the ballot box,
    In truth we don?t much give a damn
    For populi?s clear vox.
    So let those new House members
    Pass all the bills they dare;
    Their chances in the Upper House
    Are legal, safe and rare.

    And if the House?s budget cuts
    Are aimed at NPR,
    We?ll brand the cuts extremist hate;
    We?ll paint the cuts bizarre.
    And if Planned Parenthood should fall
    Into the budget snare,
    Abortion?s kept, we?ll say, by us
    As legal, safe and rare.

    Here?s hoping never comes the day
    The public starts to seek,
    The truth behind our fresh facade
    And media technique.
    For if they do we run the risk
    They may become aware:
    Few words can mask the truth as well
    As legal, safe and rare.

    thebardofmurdock.com

    • http://electionsanalysis.blog.com paint_it_red

      = self-contradictory, redundant, and b.s., respectively

  • melbedewy

    how for 6 years (2000-2006) we had a Republican Congress and a Republican President who funded PP-and not one of the Right’s talking heads noticed it!
    If the maggot party wants a shut down to keep feeding baby killers and NPR millionaires BRING IT ON!

  • victrola

    Do Democrats really want this to be the reason they shut down the government. Soldiers don’t get paid because we can’t cut a dime of taxpayer money from abortion clinics?

    Every American knows Planned Parenthood=Abortion Clinic, no one buys the spin for a minute that they’re primarily a women’s “health” clinic for the poor.

    Even among people who are pro-choice, Planned Parenthood is not exactly a “cherished” institution, I would say a good 50% of the people who think abortion should be legal are still not “pro-abortion mill.”

    With Democrats controlling the Senate and White House, I’m not sure this battle is going to break the Democrats’ way. I’ve heard several conservatives I respect say that this is not the time to place these riders on the budget bill (and maybe they’re right) but I’m amazed Democrats are so giddy to have this fight, especially ones in purple and red states that are going to have tough fights in 2012.

    • Diogenes314

      I personally can think of about 10 different issues more important than the mediocre sums going to PP to fight over. Personally I wouldn’t have cared if they dropped this particular rider as long as the EPA and Obamacare riders were in place. That being said, if they want to make this their issue, call their bluff. And if they change their mind about filibustering over this WE filibuster until either the bill or the CR gets an up or down vote.

      Old school filibuster, 24/7, nobody goes home until we get a vote.

  • disintelligentsia

    Make sure the public knows that Republicans are not shutting down the government over PP because the Dems can always submit a separate bill to fund it that can be separately debated and voted on.

    Hammer away on the fact that, in these austere times, we need to fund only those things that are necessities. Every item that is not a necessity, particularly a hot potato like abortion, needs to be scrutinized closely, publicly debated and brought to the floor as a separate bill. Simple as pie. We’re not shutting down the government over PP, we just want complete transparency and accountability over what we spend our citizen’s hard-earned money on. The Dems on the other hand are holding our government hostage for their liberal agenda that has nothing to do with the day-in and day-out job of governing and serving our Nation.

  • http://electionsanalysis.blog.com paint_it_red

    how about we say okay, fine, we’ll fund PP so long as they cease all operations related to abortions. They can have funds for their other services, such as they are, if they stop doing abortions.

    Of course, the Dems won’t agree to it. Then it should become crystal clear the Democrats are shutting down the government and tanking the economy because funding abortion is just more important to them.

    Or, how about this – no funding for PP unless they stop funding abortions and stop making campaign contributions to political candidates. Its a bit of a cozy system. Schumer and his ilk get money from the same organization they stump to pay for with federal tax dollars.

  • bk

    The Democrats are saying that they find it so important to give money to abortionists that they put them in line ahead of our troops in terms of importance, being willing to have our troops go without pay if PP can get what they demand.

    Here’s another twist that never gets mentioned. Ronnie Earle and his successor spent millions of dollars trying to get Tom DeLay put in jail for “laundering” less than $200K of non-taxpayer money. PP, the unions, etc. along with the Democrats are “laundering” hundreds of millions of dollars of taxpayer money. Democrats give it to these groups and they donate a huge chunk of it back to the Dems who are giving them OUR money so that those Dems can get more power and give out more money and get a bigger kickback and … repeat endlessly.

  • quill67

    As I stated in a diary post earlier today, the left will control the terms of the debate unless we are specific in our demands.

    I suggest a list of 3 or 4 specific demands then the public knows exactly what we want and what we are holding out for. These demands should also make the public aware of the abuses that the Dems and Obama have been doing.

    Does the public really know that know thousands of companies and unions have been exempted from the health bill?

    Does the public really know that the EPA wants to mandate drastic increases in electricity costs without congressional approval?

    Does the public really know that the FCC wants to limit free speech?

    The government shutdown is our opportunity to get the public’s attention.

  • runner12

    to defund PP that have nothing to do with abortion.

    1. We cannot afford it anymore. In our current fiscal crisis, everything is on the table to be cut, everything.

    2. These clinic are not subject to the same hygiene and safety standards as other medical facilities in most states. They provide substandard care in most cases.

    3. Their primary function has little to do with women’s health. Their primary function is to lobby for the pro abortion movement both in action and with funding.

    The list could go on and on.

  • Tbone

    We don’t have to justify any cuts. End of argument.

  • ddawg

    Re: the subject, I speak of some of the conventional wisdom I’ve seen that says Republicans will be blamed if there is a shutdown, there’s nothing we can do about it, so we should avoid it by making a deal, then fighting a different battle later.

    However, this is a small budget fight, with a gigantic budget fight looming on the horizon. They’re both budget fights, not two different issues. Either the public is with the conservative position on the budget issue, and they would support conservatives in the case of a temporary shutdown, or they are not, and there’s no way, no matter what conservatives do right now, that the public will support their efforts to implement Paul Ryan’s proposed budget.

    Another line of thought I have seen is that conservatives need to postpone controversy until after re-taking the Senate and Presidency. That’s great, but there are no guarantees. If conservatives don’t take all 3 in 2012, do we continue to kick the can down the road for fear of public backlash?

    As noted by Mr. Levey and several commenters, we need to commit to engaging the PR battle. We have plenty of material, including the Democrats’ willingness to shut down government because they had to keep their abortion mill of choice fully funded. As Mr. Levey says, that’s just as logical as saying the Republicans are willing to shut down government in order to help save the lives of the most innocent among us. Wait. Both of those would be roughly accurate if a shutdown did, in fact, come down to Planned Parenthood [scratches head].

    Come on, Republicans. Engage!

    • avgjo

      Planned Parenthood is still funded. That’ll peeve off social conservatives like me and many others. The amount is a joke, fiscal conservatives will note. And now the GOP has made it clear that all Obama and Reid have to do to get what they want is threaten a shutdown.

      Boehner=Obama’s handpuppet.

      And what is the grassroots doing about it…?

      • runner12

        They just got 40 billion in cuts, not too bad. Obama can spin it any way he wants, but the reality is that the House forced him to cut spending.

        Also, part of the plan was that the defunding of PP would come up separately. This may end up helping us because we can have a discussion directly on PP without the Dems using budget and military pay as a shield to fund abortion with taxpayer money.

        I might also add that I think O looked like a complete moron trying to take credit for doing absolutely nothing.

        • avgjo

          the spending cuts amount to a third of the interest that will accrue this week, if my math is right. The Planned Parenthood thing will go nowhere with Reid and the dims running things. O has been taking credit for doing nothing, and because the GOP doesn’t point it out, his numbers are far higher than they should be.

      • carolina

        get as much done as we would like until we take over the senate.

        The dems don’t have to roll over, and they won’t. I just hope their resistance to cut spending gets a LOT of them ‘cut’ in 2012.

        • avgjo

          would have acceded. He didn’t. So they didn’t

        • runner12

          Remember that people overwhelmingly support the Ryan budget. The Dems will not be able to avoid facing this one. They are going to be forced to continually defend their unwillingness to cut spending.

          • avgjo

            And our side is woefully lacking.

          • runner12

            We are too timid about our positions. Our side often fails to cut through the lies of the Left with logic and reason. Instead we apologize for our beliefs.

            This must change.

  • rightwingmom52

    and Obama didn’t either. Your logic is indeed what our side should have been saying all along, but that would have meant being willing to back it up, and they never intended to do that. In caving to the Dems, didn’t Boehner prove that he cared about as much for the unborn as Obama cares for the troops? How many grassroots calls do you think he and other reps received telling them that we’d have their back if they just wouldn’t cave? They broke a promise to us, and as a result, more babies will die. I realize there are times we have to be practical and work with what we have, but Boehner wasted an opportunity to put forth the very logic you presented at a time when more people are against abortion, especially those paid for with our tax dollars. He sold the unborn down the river every bit as much as Obama was willing to sell the troops.

    On a side note, in a comment about cutting PP, Kirsten Powers said that Planned Parenthood is the antithesis of pregnancy centers. I doubt she intended to make our argument for us, but that pretty much sums it up.