Irresponsible

To continue the theme of party discipline, it strikes me that, although I didn't focus group test it,  "irresponsible" might be a very good word for the GOP to use against the Democrats with respect to the immediate task of passing a budget or shutting down the government.

If the Dems were as genuinely concerned about the effects of Republican-proposed budget cuts as they now pretend to be, they would have passed a plan more to their liking while they controlled the whole of the legislative and executive branches over the past two years.  But they didn't, and that was irresponsible.  Instead, with the nation on the brink of economic disaster, they handed off to the GOP the heavy lifting of fashioning a budget that at least appears to be fiscally sane and all they can be counted on to do is obstruct the process and carp from the sidelines.  That is irresponsible. 

Republican spokesmen should use that word every chance they get, use it, in fact, to the point of it becoming trite.  Sure, in short order, journalists will begin to roll their eyes and mutter "yeah, yeah, yeah" when they hear it.  But also very soon, if they persist in using it nevertheless, if they remain disciplined as a party in using it, the American people will begin to associate "irresponsible" with the Democrat Party...and rightly so.