(Above: Parker Griffith speaks at “Hot Dogs and Yellow Dogs”)
“We are now the dominant party,” Parker Griffith, Democratic candidate for governor said yesterday at an event dubbed “Hot Dogs and Yellow Dogs.”
That may be the case on the national level right now — although “dominant” is probably much too strong of a word for a Party on the verge of losing the Senate — but it’s far from the case in Alabama.
And that’s not even close to the most out-of-touch Griffith seemed during his short, 3-minute speech.
“The first day of my administration, I will call a special session to expand Medicaid,” Griffith proudly proclaimed. Gov. Bentley has repeatedly said that he will not expand Medicaid under ObamaCare, a position widely supported by Alabama’s conservative electorate.
Griffith said decisions like that are entirely the result of an Alabama Republican Party that is horrified of upsetting its base.
“We have a current administration, both in the executive branch and the legislative branch, that are afraid of the tea party,” he said. “The tea party is bought and paid for by the Koch brothers and billionaires from out of state. If we turn this state over to the tea party, we will never get it back in your lifetime. This is a critical and important election. I’ve seen ’em, and they’re worse than you think they are. I know ’em very well.”
Griffith, sounding much more like Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid than a candidate for governor in a solidly conservative state like Alabama, pounded on the same talking points that national Democrats have harped on over the last several months.
“We’ve watched (Republicans) attack women, blacks and hispanics… I want y’all to get as mad at them as y’all were at me,” he said, alluding to his past as a party switcher. “If you can’t get madder, then damnit, we’re going to turn it back over to them.”
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