Will the GOP send Rashida Tlaib a nice bouquet for all of the fodder she provided them in the midterms? The progressive House Democrat and Squad member delivered a ‘formal’ response to Joe Biden’s State of the Union address, in an effort that one House Democrat likened to “keying your own car.” Instead of speaking as “a lifelong Democrat,” however, Tlaib offered a response as a spokesperson for the Working Families Party.
At first, Tlaib sounded supportive notes about Biden, but it didn’t take long to contradict his SOTU message:
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Speaking on behalf of the progressive Working Families Party, the “Squad” member mirrored many of the issues mentioned in Biden’s remarks, commending the administration for boosting the struggling economy and for quickly tackling the coronavirus pandemic through health care and financial relief. But the Michigan lawmaker quickly pivoted, homing in on talking points that the president either avoided, or had a differing opinion on.
Tlaib particularly focused on climate change, calling on Biden to ban federal fossil fuel leasing and to direct federal agencies to reject permits for new projects. In contrast, the president barely mentioned climate change ― which was at odds with his domestic agenda of making the biggest climate investment in U.S. history. …
Tlaib’s comments also contrasted with the president’s on police reform, specifically on defunding the police.
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“We can’t police away homelessness, poverty or our mental health crisis in our country,” said Tlaib. “Care, not more criminalization is how we ensure lasting safety for all.”
So much for repositioning the Democratic Party on crime, eh? One has to wonder what Tlaib thought of the applause Biden’s remarks on increasing police funding and resources got, especially among her Democratic colleagues. “Defund the police” turned out to be every bit as idiotic an experiment as those who warned about returning to lax-on-crime policies said they would be, and now Democrats own the high-crime wave it produced.
Furthermore, it’s telling that Tlaib hammers RNC for its own idiotic rhetorical cover for the January 6 riot as “legitimate political discourse,” but fails to mention Democrats’ rhetorical support for the riots and insurrections in 2020. Democrats insisted that the looting and pillaging of major cities such as Minneapolis, New York, and Seattle were also “legitimate political discourse” and “mostly peaceful.” Progressives in particular excused the insurrectionist “autonomous zones” seized by radicals for weeks or months in those cities, trapping residents and imposing rule-by-force within mainly progressive cities.
Most of the rest of this is meaningless agenda regurgitation and spin, which in fairness pretty much qualifies it for the SOTU League. Tlaib delivers it well enough but the production is amateurish, with a strange and distracting soft focus and poor lighting. Also, it appears the Working Families Party skimped on the broadband for this transmission, introducing artifacts and skips in the video. It’s about the only thing about the progressive agenda that gets delivered on the cheap in this “formal” response.
Still, the ambitions of the progressive wing and their desire to push even more radically to the Left after the next election comes through loudly and clearly. Republicans will waste no time packaging that up for ads in competitive districts, which may be expanding already after Biden’s flop last night.
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