GOP Takes On AARP — Could This Be Their Waterloo?

by Robert Quigley | 12:05 pm, October 29th, 2009

» 6 comments

gop aarp

Despite the GOP’s lack of numbers in the Democrat-controlled House and Senate, they have been remarkably successful at picking off enemies like Van Jones and ACORN with concerted attacks.

Now, they’re taking on a much bigger target: the AARP, which numbers more than 40 million members. Whereas their past targets have been on the fringes in one way or another, how is a campaign against a mainstream, powerful interest group going to play out?

According to CQPolitics, high-profile House Republicans including HRC chairman Mike Pence are accusing the AARP of working out “backroom deals” with the White House by supporting the Obama administration’s proposed health care plan in exchange for bigger membership and a special exemption from executive pay caps affecting most health insurers: “‘It’s a backroom deal where Washington Democrats are protecting executives at places like AARP,’ Pence charged.”

As Hot Air’s Ed Morrissey points out, the AARP is still, first and foremost, a business with a direct interest in insurance policy; it “was formed 50 years ago for the express purpose of providing insurance to retirees, in the days before Medicare. Today, over half of its $1.14 billion annual revenue comes from insurance premiums, royalties on credit cards, and so on.”

But does an AARP backlash have legs? ”Is AARP The New ACORN?” asked a TPMDC headline, and the (anonymous) AARP official contacted by the site largely said ‘yes.’ ”‘Oh, absolutely,’ an AARP official told TPMDC. ‘They’re using their standard methods to target us.’”

The difference between the AARP and other GOP targets this year is that the AARP is big, mainstream, and well-funded. Before either of their respective scandals broke, Van Jones’ record of liberal activism made him an easy target, as did ACORN’s advocacy. Even in instances when conservative attacks haven’t produced noticeable results, like the onslaught against Kevin Jennings for his non-encouragement of statutory rape or the charge that the National Endowment of the Arts has been sucking up to Obama, there hasn’t been that much blowback. The targets — an openly gay activist, a harried federal agency — haven’t been big or popular enough to produce a broader outrage.

But the AARP is different: its power as a political organization comes from the fact that its membership is not all that politicized. The fact that 60,000 of its members left over its position on public health care has been a solace to right-wing blogs, but it’s largely irrelevant in the grand scheme of things: recall that 60,000/40,000,000= 0.15%.

Unless the GOP turns up a smoking gun memo in which AARP officials boast about the coke and lap dances they got at an Obama-sponsored Hawaiian soirée, painting the organization as White House cronies just is not going to resonate with the vast swaths of its membership that don’t obsess over bloggy minutiae. And any serious attempt to do so will make the GOP, and not the AARP, look the more off-center of the two.

AARP, AARP GOP, AARP Health Care, AARP Republicans, ACORN, Mike Pence, Van Jones

http://www.facebook.com/people/Joe-Callan/100000200979966 Joe Callan

Robert, why don’t we have excerpted lines from GOP representatives about these accusations instead of just:

“Republicans are accusing the AARP of working out “backroom deals” with the White House by supporting the Obama administration’s proposed…”

Which Republicans? Do we have a bigger quote than “backroom deals”? If they are indeed taking on the AARP, I agree it could be their Waterloo–but isn’t there more particular information to tell us about the scope and nature of these accusations?
Robert Quigley

Joe, that’s a good point — there should have been a hyperlink in there. I’ve more thoroughly sourced that paragraph per your comment.
hadashito

Don’t count ACORN our just yet !
The attacks on ACORN by Karl Rove ( going back a long time), right wing Republicans in the House, the gullible Demoratic members of the Congress, that lunatic Glenn Beck, and the corporations which have been hounding ACORN since it was founded, are going to find that their witch hunt may not produce the result they desire.
Singling out a NGO for defunding will be found to be UNCONSTUTUTIONAL by ACORN investiations. If ACORN is to be defunded, then so must Haliburton, KBR, and Blackwater, just to name a few, whose violations far outweigh the miniscule psuedo-violations that are alleged about ACORN. There were a few problems regarding voter registrations that ACORN remedied itself to the satisfaction of its government supporters – - that is, long before the Fox “News” witch hunt was launched. And the recent silly stunt that was videotaped, hardly rises to the level of a serious violation of its agreements with the Congress and its supporters. The members of Congress, the Bank of America, and ACORN’s other former supporters who have all mindlessly jumped on the witch hunt bandwagon will be embarrassed by their stupid reliance on Fox “News” for their “Information”.
Egregious violations have been committed by the aforementioned NGO’s in Iraq and Afgahanistan included murders, corrupt practices involving large amounts of money, and quite a long list of other crimes, some of which have been investigated, the organizations found guilty, and heavy fines levied – - but the incredibly stupid Congress still continues to fund them, while the right wing members of the Congress have submiitted a bill to defund little old ACORN because it registers disadvantaged people who will most likely go on the vote for Democrats ! The entire mess is a shameless attempt by the Republicans, their leaders at Fox “News”, and the corporations which want to suppress Democratic voters.
The push to single out and defund ACORN is unconstitutional and will be the result of investigations the are now being conducted.
If they do go on to “target” AARP, they will soon find that have caught themselves a a tiger with a lethal bite and a public elephant that will crush them in the process. Glenn Beck, whose ego has by now become bloated beyond his capability to realize that his miniscule intelligence fails him, and now intends to pick on an organization that is highly capable of defending itself, will soon see that he’s got that tiger by the tail.
ImNotBlue

I thought most people realized the AARP was garbage when the started to support folks who went around the globe promoting Hugo Chavez and the like.

This is an old story, I’m afraid. They are now, and have been for quite some time, a left-leaning organization. They don’t say that publically, of course, lest they lose more members. Just look at how angry someone like hadashito gets when the right talks about AARP… that should tell you all you need to know. If it’s enough to get his/her panties in a bunch like that… which party do you think they’re associated with?
Sunnyr

AARP sold out a large segment their membership to the Liberal Loons in Washington DC. They are minimizing their losses …..it is actually much higher than they are reporting. Tens of thousands of AARP cards were turned in to another Senior Citizen Agency for a free year of membership into the new club. AARP is a LIAR and they are hurting more than they are letting on.
mzalia

The $ 53 million or so in federal funds cover several fiscal years, beginning many years ago and was unbroken. Tha means that the past administration was on board with ACORN. Get it. ACORN is the establishment. They lived comfortably with the George W. Bush administration. Check the original date when they were approved for funding and audit their inolvement. They can be tracked. You might be surprised.