New Congress, New Soap Opera

The Terminator’s final film in which he played the Governor of California has finally ended, and it was a bomb.

This week the muscular actor turned politician, Arnold Schwarzenegger, left the stage he occupied for six years, leaving the state with the seventh biggest economy in the world completely indebted. He left amidst harsh criticism and a negligible approval rating of only 20 percent. In other words, it was a box office failure.

The good thing is that his departure marks the close of a political melodrama. But it also opens the door for another, and no less in the U.S. capital, where this Wednesday a new Congress will be inaugurated. Regardless of the next chapters to come, there will certainly be tears from today on.

Above all, we know that the new leader of the House of Representatives, Republican John Boehner, will play the antagonist to President Barack Obama throughout this episode of the political soap opera. He’s famous not only for his artificial tan, but also for the ease with which he can bring himself to tears.

Once he takes his seat and is given his mallet, you can be certain that Boehner will burst into tears while retelling the story of how he went from being a bartender to becoming the third in command in Washington. Later, when being interviewed by a conservative television network, he will cry again as he remembers his childhood. And of course there will be more tears before the day is over when he shares his plans to mercilessly fight Obama’s plans.

But even so, he is not the only person that the president will have problems with. We have constructed a useful list of the individuals who will attempt to steal the political stage from Obama from today on:

Mitch McConnell, the leader of the Republican minority in the Senate, is best known as “Doctor No,” not only because he opposes everything that the White House proposes, but because he himself has said that his principal mission is to prevent Obama from being re-elected into a second term in office.

Mario Rubio, a young man (he’s 39-years-old) and charismatic senator from Florida, has been described as the future of the Republican Party and the Obama-equivalent to the conservatives. He has already been flagged as a potential candidate for the 2016 presidential elections. The son of Cuban emigrants who fled the island and escaped communism, conservatives hope that he will be able to ingratiate himself with the Latino voting population. However, it is difficult to see how this political novice has risen to preeminence in light of anti-immigrant laws, such as those put forth by the state of Arizona.

Rand Paul, a recently elected senator from Kentucky, son of the Congressman Ron Paul, hopes to be one of the more influential voices of the far right in the Senate with his racist and extreme political opinions.

Jim DeMint, a senator from South Carolina, has gained power and influence with his refusal to negotiate with the president or any other Democrats.

Darrell Issa is a congressman that has promised to make the president’s life impossible and to deeply investigate every dollar wasted by Obama’s administration.

Another person who will make the White House suffer is Michele Bachmann from Minnesota, a member of the ultra-conservative tea party and a fierce opponent of everything that the president has put forth, especially his health reforms.

And in a Senate where the Democratic majority is weak, independent senators have risen to great importance. The ex-Republican from Alaska, Lisa Murkowski, and the ex-Democrat from Connecticut, Joe Lieberman, will certainly be courted by both parties in the upcoming months.

We will also have to closely follow those who supposedly support the president and are in the same party: the Democratic Minority Leader and very liberal congresswoman from California, Nancy Pelosi, who will keep an eye on Obama to make sure he doesn’t cede too much to his adversaries. And what to say of Harry Reid, the leader of the Democratic Majority in the Senate, whom the Republicans took for politically dead, but when all was said and done, was re-elected (albeit with difficulty) and will now try to keep the Democrats united.

You can leave out the Senator and ex-presidential candidate John McCain, who has become a bothersome and embittered politician who opposed absolutely everything he once promoted. He and Senator Lindsey Graham have become the “Batman and Robin” of the right.

In the meantime, Obama has already thrown the first punch, having said that he has a lot in common with Boehner, remarking that “both are people of color, even though [Boehner’s] doesn’t seem very natural.”* The now powerful leader answered that he has never used artificial tanning. Don’t you dare laugh with skepticism because you might make the man, who is third in line to the White House, cry.

*Editor’s Note: This quotation, accurately translated, could not be verified.