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The idea being that 80-90 percent of the media coverage will be "look at what this hoser did" instead of "this is what President Obama said about why health care reform is so important at this time in our history".
The speech was released in advance, the idea that this was some kind of spontaneous deal is laughable.
Now if you are a simple, venal creature like that which apparently populate the GOP High Command these days then I suppose the positive points of that strategy appeal to you.
However there are also clear negatives. The main one of which is that you put your party on display as embracing the worst kind of redneckery. No more plausible deniability, "spontaneous citizen anger at townhalls" etc.
You are doing something that is pretty well unprecedented in this country's history (the caning of Sen. Sumner etc. nonwithstanding, we are talking about the President here), this is not even mentioning the rest of them carrying stupid signs/pamphlets. The GOP made a conscious decision to essentially turn the Congress into a Teabag event.
Right Wingers will continue to support the GOP and stay riled up. Those on the left will continue to loathe the GOP.
How is this kind of move supposed to appeal to anyone on the fence or in the middle at all? Or convince those that recently bailed on the GOP to come back into the fold?
Are the Joe Wilsons of Congress going to start showing up to SOTU addresses in shirtsleeves, overalls and suspenders? Bring guns or an overseer's whip into Congress? Would ANYTHING really surprise me anymore? Are they going to turn their backs on the President during his speech?
Does anyone think the positives of this conscious strategy by the GOP outweigh the negatives, for them? I'd be curious to hear discussion.
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