Cantor: Dems Err in “Overreacting” to Economic Crisis

Aaron Keyak — April 2, 2009 – 11:18 am | Barack Obama | Democrats | Domestic Policy | Economy | Republicans Comments (0) Add a comment

Republican WHIP Eric Cantor (R-VA) “accused Democrats of ‘overreacting’ to the economic crisis.” The Republican Party’s most prominent member of the Jewish community then went on to declare, “I don’t remove the prospect that we would take the majority back in 2010.”

Cantor is right. One of the top GOP leaders shouldn’t totally discount the possibility that Republicans can win a congressional majority in 2010. But, saying that Democrats are “overreacting” to “the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression” probably doesn’t help their prospects. I’m not going to make a habit of worrying about what’s in the best interest of Republicans, but this doesn’t seem like the right kind of rhetoric for the GOP WHIP. 

Hopefully, Cantor didn’t mean what he said. (His office has made mistakes with press in the past.) However, I fear that this rhetoric reflects the attitude of Republican leadership - not a good sign.

Here’s an excerpt for the Politico piece on Cantor’s accusation:

The Virginia Republican, speaking to reporters at the Christian Science Monitor breakfast Thursday morning, praised Rush Limbaugh for his “ideas” and for avoiding the Democratic error of “overreacting, if you will, which this town often does, to crisis.. Rahm Emanuel said, ‘We’re not going to miss the opportunity to take advantage of this crisis because we’re going to do all the things we couldn’t get done before.”

He went on to criticize Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner’s recent statement that the biggest danger was “doing too little” to deal with the meltdown.

“Doing too much has huge, huge pitfalls as well,” he said.

His comments come a day after the GOP released an alternative budget plan that makes permanent Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, freezes non-defense spending and reduces lower-income tax rates.

Cantor parted with some in his party by saying the “jury is still out” on Barack Obama’s presidency and urged everyone to withhold judgment: “We’re only coming up to 100 days.”

But he quickly pivoted, saying that Obama’s overreach might propel the GOP back to power—and fast.

“I don’t remove the prospect that we would take the majority back in 2010,” he said.

Click here to read the rest and here for an audio recording of Cantor’s remarks.

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