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The Latest Confirmation Of Dysfunction in Washington

John Micek on

So, no, he’s no suburban socialist. Not by a long shot. But what he is, however, is a near-perfect fit for his Bucks County-based seat. And his triangulations have made him increasingly difficult to beat. In 2018, a good year for Democrats, he narrowly fended off a challenge from Scott Wallace, winning 51-48 percent.

But in 2020, as Biden carried the ‘burbs, Fitzpatrick handily dispatched Democrat Christina Finello 56-43 percent, buttressed, in no small part, by his canny votes with Democrats in the lead-up to the election.

Given the shifting demographics of the Philadelphia suburbs, and the steady shellacking the GOP has sustained there for the past couple of cycles, you’d think Republicans would be inclined to cut a guy like Fitzpatrick a bit of slack.

Sure, he was there with the Dems on infrastructure, but when it came time to condemn the former president for trying to topple the government, he meekly fell in line.

But such is the state of the current GOP that any departure from orthodoxy, even one that brings home $11.3 billion in highway aid and $1.6 billion worth of bridge replacement cash for the Keystone State’s kidney-dislodging highways is the ultimate act of betrayal.

Despite the bill’s passage, there’s still a better-than-even chance that Republicans will recapture the House in 2022.

 

Votes in favor of infrastructure were a no-brainer chance for Republicans to show they’re actually in favor of something, instead of the usual performative posturing on critical race theory, nonexistent voter fraud, and other culture war issues.

But the old GOP, the one that built the interstate highway system, left the American mainstream behind several exits ago.

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Copyright 2021 John L. Micek, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate.

An award-winning political journalist, John L. Micek is Editor-in-Chief of The Pennsylvania Capital-Star in Harrisburg, Pa. Email him at jmicek@penncapital-star.com and follow him on Twitter @ByJohnLMicek.


Copyright 2021 John Micek, All Rights Reserved. Credit: Cagle.com

 

 

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