Jan. 31, 2013: Senate Majority Harry Reid, D-Nev., center, with Senate Majority Whip Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., left, and Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-NY., right, answer question regarding immigration reform on Capitol Hill in Washington. ((AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais))
The editors of the New York Times often come across as school girls at a Justin Bieber concert when it comes to the Democrats. Thursday, they upped their school girl skirt just a bit more for the Democrats. “If ever there were a moment for Democrats to press their political advantage, this is it,” the editors opined. “Political Power Needs to be Used,” the headline read. The editorial board at the New York Times, ten days after President Obama was sworn in, are impatient for the hope and change they expected last time.
Hilariously, the editorial came out the same week news broke the State Department shut down the office created to shut down Guantanamo Bay, which was supposed to be hoped and changed into oblivion on Day 1 of President Obama’s first term. Hence the impatience for Democrats to finally do something.
Walter Duranty was a Pulitzer Prize winning reporter for the New York Times. He is famous because he was an apologist for Stalinist extremism in the Soviet Union. Duranty, apologizing for the Stalinist regime, constructed a justification for abuse that revolved around the necessity of autocratic government and a rejection of individual liberty and free enterprise because of the Russian people’s culture. He covered up reports of Russian famine and attacked other journalists for reporting the truth. His reward was the Pulitzer Prize.
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Today it is as if Walter Duranty is ghost writing the Times' editorials. Instead, Andrew Rosenthal, a worthy successor to Duranty’s legacy, is in charge. Rosenthal is the editorial page editor of the Times and culprit of one of the biggest fables ever created by a political journalist.
In 1992, Rosenthal covered the campaign of then President George H. W. Bush. On February 5, 1992, President Bush visited the National Grocers Association convention in Orlando, Fla. One of the exhibits was, according to Snopes.com, the urban legend debunking website, “a demonstration of NCR’s checkout scanning technology, an event Times reporter Rosenthal turned into a chiding front page story about Bush’s lack of familiarity with the details of ordinary life in America.”
Rosenthal imagined details of the event, at which he himself was not present. Even the NCR employee who demonstrated the technology to President Bush disputed Rosenthal’s characterization. Other reporters took issue with Rosenthal too, but the Times stood by him. Since his promotion to editorial page editor, Rosenthal has continued imagining up and overseeing others creating fairy tale editorials to champion their favored liberal protagonists and attack conservative antagonists.
When George W. Bush was president and won re-election with more than 50% of the vote, the Times still insisted Democrats fight and oppose him.
In 2002, after Republicans made historic mid-term gains in the United States House of Representatives and Senate — only the third such time since the turn of the 20th century — the Times lamented the win and demanded restraint in Washington.
In fact, while the Times editorial board now demands the Democrats “press their political advantage” because “[their] message … has widespread support, and they have increased their numbers in both houses of Congress,” they used their same editorials after major wins by Republicans in 2002 and 2004, to urge consensus and cautioned Republican majorities against overreach.
Then the Times' editorial board wanted Republicans to restrain their power because the nation was divided. Now, with a divided Congress and Republican gains at the state level, the Times’ editorial board insists “power needs to be used.” Americans must never accuse the New York Times editorial board of intellectual honesty.
Never mind that the Republicans kept the House of Representatives. Never mind that the Senate Democrats have several vulnerable Senators up for re-election in 2014 from states Barack Obama lost twice. The Democrats must act.
Americans should welcome the Times’ editors’ call for the Democrats to do something. According to the editors, the Democrats’ should go big on “taxes, guns, education spending, [and] financial regulation.”
Yes, please, act on all those items.
The Democrats in the Senate should raise taxes. House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said last year the Democrats needed to raise taxes even on the middle class.
The Democrats should try to pass an assault weapons ban.
They should try to pass more financial regulations.
They should try it all.
The House Republicans will never go along for the ride. The American people will see just how far afield the Democrats really are. Then in 2014, the American voters can remind the New York Times editors that most Americans use their paper as a litter box liner, not as a guide Washington should ever follow.
Along the way, the nation can watch Senators Baucus (Mont.), Begich (Ark.), Hagan (N.C.) Johnson (S.D.), Landrieu (La.), and Pryor (Ark.) — all Democrats up for reelection from states Barack Obama lost in 2012 — painfully squirm, cut deals, and undermine the New York Times’ editorial claim that their preferred policy solutions really are widely supported.
Please Harry Reid, listen to the New York Times.
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