The unfortunate reality with newspapers is the prose always contains a narrative that is meant to grip the reader the way distant war music of an approaching army would grip the senses of a soldier. Doesn't matter when either the army isn't approaching or the battle is already in full swing and there is no truth in painting the reality as gentler than what is feared to come.
Take this article in the New York Times: "GOP Eyes Tough Task - Winning Reid's Seat." The article reports that Republicans are gunning for Senator Harry Reid's Senate seat. It remembers former Senator Tom Daschle and forecasts a ferocious fight. It makes everything seem sunny for Reid: he will raise $25 million, Obama will campaign for him...(here comes the ominous drumbeat stuff)
"Still, the challenge of a potentially tough race next year has added another complication to an existence that was already complicated enough. Mr. Reid, pivotal to the success of Mr. Obama’s ambitious agenda, must corral support for it in the face of an increasingly resistant Republican minority."
Increasingly resistant? When were the Republicans EVER supportive of anything that the Democrats have proposed? If by increasingly resistant he is looking at a time span that begins when the Wright Brothers were still just tinkering around with bicycles, then Adam Nagourney is correct.
However, this Republican party has never been more or less resistant today than they were 14 years ago. They are the party of corporate America. Plain and simple. They will always oppose Democrats and the resistance will never abate until they are thrown out of Congress along with all of the Democrats that have lately flipped sides and joined industry lobbyists: Ben Nelson, Evan Bayh, Ron Widen in Oregon--who is proposing a crap health care plan that would tax health care benefits as income.
This is another article that serves as an intimidation tool for the Republican Party. That may not be the intention, but it will be the practical effect. Senator Reid and his aides may read this article along with everyone else on Capitol Hill and Senator Reid may start taking middle-of-the-road stances that benefit industry because he thinks that looks bipartisan.
There is nothing Republican or Democratic anymore. The divide in the Capitol and in our country today is between corporately connected industry on one side and mom and dad small business owners and workers on the other. The Senators who vote with the Republican Party have sold out to industry. Period.
