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Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Obama and the "Republican Congress"

At the debate last night, the president said: “You know when members of the Republican Congress say, `We're going to sign a no tax pledge, so that we don't ask a dime for millionaires and billionaires to reduce our deficit so we can still invest in education, and helping kids go to college,’ he said, `Me too.’”

The phrase "Republican Congress" is not accurate, because Democrats have controlled the Senate since the midterm election of 2006.  But the president was not making a slip of the tongue.  A previous post cited several occasions on which he has referred to "the Republicans who run Congress."  And as we see below, he has spoken of a "Republican Congress" on at least 13 occasions this year.  Apparently he is following President Truman's model and using the opposition on Capitol Hill as a rhetorical foil.