Pledging My Time

The Republican "Pledge To America" sounds more like a threat than a promise. At a lumber company in Virginia, House Republican leader John Boehner and several of his factota unveiled a program Republican House candidates and incumbents are running on in the fall campaign. It;s essentially this: Cut taxes, cut federal spending, repeal the health care law, and oh yes, stop federally funded abortions while they're at it (in deference to the religious right). No mention of job creation, no explanation as to what they'd replace the health care bill with, none of that stuff. Boehner, deputy leader Eric Cantor, Mike Pence, and a couple of other GOP congressmen picked an amazingly low-key setting for their announcement; rather than trumpet a plan on the steps of the Capitol in Washington, as Newt Gingrich did with his Contract With America in 1994, they unveiled it at a lumber yard (manly) in northern Virginia (the real America), specifically in the unincorporated suburb of Sterling (unincorporated = no government = no taxes = no need to participate in local affairs).

Their presentation was so muted, in fact, it makes one think they believe they're going to win the House anyway. And, most likely, they will. Well, that's what Nate Silver's FiveThirtyEight blog has been consistently forecasting for weeks. But this "lemon Pledge," as liberals have derided it, is so short on specifics and details, you wonder if maybe the Republicans take their would-be victory so much for granted that they don't need to deal with programs and solutions. Boehner himself just said yesterday that they don;t need to talk about solutions to problems in an election campaign. Uh, isn't that the best time to do it - I mean, to help persuade undecided voters and give the base something to vote for? Oh, right, the base voters already have something to vote against - President Obama - and they don't care about specifics. Just as long as there's a pledge to America.

Public radio is asking America for pledges of late. Because commercial radio is so awfully predictable and predictably awful, I listen to two public stations where I live, a folk rock station (WFUV-FM in New York) and a jazz station (WBGO-FM in Newark, N.J.). Both stations have been asking for money ad infinitum in their current pledge drives, both of which end September 30; they've been going on interminably, and I don't even remember when they started. But they fact that these drives have been going on for so long only underscores how bad the economy is and how badly these stations need money in light of money no longer coming from different sources. Public broadcasting always loses corporate donations and government assistance in bad times, and it's lucky to get any of it back when times get better. I'm even being made to feel guilty by WFUV announcers if I don't give anything, even though I can't. As a taxpayer, I'd be happy to see some of my tax money to keep public broadcasters on the air and free of corporate sponsorship, which is how countries in the rest of the Western world pay for public radio and television. But this is America, where the free market has the upper hand. I'm just quietly waiting for the current pledge drives to end so I can hear more music.

All of this pledging made me decide to take the pledge and commit myself to a fundraising party a woman in my social network is hosting on Saturday, when the march for jobs takes place in Washington. What made me decide to do so was the recent news from Connecticut, showing that the distinguished Democratic Senate candidate Richard Blumenthal has seen his lead over his drug-pushing, violence-peddling Republican opponent shrink to three points.

That scared the hell out of me.