It Begins Now: Election Starts Reclamation of Nation

 

By Tammy Bruce
WashingtonTimes.com

A child waits under the voting booth while her mom cast her vote at Janney Elementary School, precinct 30, Washington, D.C., Tuesday, Nov. 6, 2012 (Craig Bisacre/The Washington Times) 

There have been enough twists and turns during these last two weeks before the general election to give Space Mountain at Disneyland a run for its money. A roller coaster ride is fabulous, but one of the main reasons you can let go and enjoy it is because you know how it’s going to end.

Not so much with this election. One thing is for sure — no matter who wins on Nov. 8, the citizen upheaval borne of government betrayal will survive the season. The 2016 election is but a battle in the war for reformation of a government that has prioritized itself over the well-being of the country itself.

One does get the impression that politicians like House Speaker Paul D. Ryan and Senate Leader Mitch McConnell expect business as usual once the dust settles. They couldn’t be more wrong.

For eight years now, the Republican bureaucracy in Washington, D.C., not only (willfully?) underestimated President Obama and the sheer destructive and corrupt willfulness of the Democratic Party, they also looked away from rage in the cities, suburbs, along rural routes and in dying towns. We are drowning in the ambivalence and incompetence of a self-obsessed federal government.

And Republicans looked like they had no intention of interfering.

The concern of those quiet, middle-class Americans about the economy and a government too enamored with itself was viewed with hostility not just by Democrats but by Republicans as well. The Republican Party adopted tea party concerns rhetorically, promising for the 2010 and 2014 midterms that stopping the Obama agenda and defunding Obamacare would be their top priorities.

We believed them and gave them the House in 2010 and the Senate in 2014. Then they facilitated the Obama agenda and kept Obamacare fully funded.

Instead of seeing the tea party movement as a warning, as an opportunity to adapt to the concerns of an increasingly worried American populace, the bureaucracy instead cast arguments against the Obama-Clinton domestic and international agenda as racist, sexist or ignorant.

For eight years now the American people first thought they were being betrayed, then were pretty sure they were, and then became convinced of it. The Republican-led Congress made a career of having hearing after hearing about Obamacare or Benghazi — lots of theater and no action.

House Speaker John Boehner eventually resigned, and Mr. Ryan was elevated to the speakership only to continue to fully fund Mr. Obama’s Syrian migrant and immigration schemes. Obamacare, in the meantime, was allowed by Republicans to become a funded monster, virtually eliminating the ability for the average American to afford both health insurance and health care.

Just this week, one week before the election, Mr. Ryan spoke on “Fox & Friends” and once again insisted Obamacare would be dropped if Republicans win: “Obamacare is collapsing under its own weight. We can and will replace it if we win this election.”

When asked by host Steve Doocy about how that “lines up with Donald Trump and his plan,” Mr. Ryan said, “They’re virtually one and the same. We’ve talked with Donald all year long on these things, same with tax reform … same with moving people from welfare to work, same with rebuilding national security, securing the border. …”

Republicans in Congress have been saying that for eight years and have never delivered. After so many years, it’s reasonable to believe that they’ve never had success because they prefer the status quo.

If Mr. Trump wins, establishment Republicans will fight him like they’ve never fought Mr. Obama. If Mrs. Clinton wins, then they will excuse their lack of opposition and fight because she’s the “first woman president.”

The people have been warning them for years that we’ve had enough, giving them opportunity after opportunity to adapt and fight for us, only to find ourselves the target of vitriol, ridicule and the Internal Revenue Service.

Make no mistake: Mr. Trump is no one-off flash in the pan— he’s the symbol and the action of an American citizenry that is being betrayed and used. No matter what happens on Tuesday, be ready because the fight is only beginning.

• Tammy Bruce, author and Fox News contributor, is a radio talk show host.