http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Columns/2 ... -Corollary"Former Republican congressional staffer Mike Lofgren first alerted me to this phenomenon two years ago... he discussed the tactic of filibustering all legislation in the Senate and all nominations to administration positions, regardless of merit.... 'A couple of years ago, a Republican committee staff director told me candidly (and proudly) what the method was to all this obstruction and disruption. Should Republicans succeed in obstructing the Senate from doing its job, it would further lower Congress's generic favorability rating among the American people. By sabotaging the reputation of an institution of government, the party that is programmatically against government would come out the relative winner.' A deeply cynical tactic, to be sure, but a psychologically insightful one that plays on the weaknesses both of the voting public and the news media'... An ABC News/Washington Post poll out this week confirms that the strategy is working. I recalled Lofgren’s statement on Wednesday when I saw that House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp (R-MI) blasted the Internal Revenue Service for delaying the 2014 filing season by two weeks. Said Camp, “There is no reason the IRS should not be able to do its job on time.” The IRS explanation for the delay, however, is both understandable and believable—it is because of the 2-week government shutdown that Camp’s party petulantly undertook a quixotic effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act": Bruce Bartlett: Republicans and the “Lofgren Corollary”
The interesting thing is that at the end of the Clinton Era of relatively good government when all 5 5ths of the income scale did better at the end of each 4 year period people's staisfaction with government was much higher. An objective measure of 'better government'. Bush II immediately fucked the country in a way obvious to all.
