The density between the ears of these ingrates is immeasurable.
[A]fter 85 House Republicans joined Boehner in raising taxes without spending reductions during the end game of Monday night’s fiscal-cliff negotiations, Tea Party leaders and conservative activists from around the country are dusting off their tri-corner hats and "Don’t Tread On Me" signs, and now say that their members are as energized as they have ever been since the first Tax Day protests in 2009. And the Republican Party, they add, had better beware.
The mad tri-corner hatters should being genuflecting at the altar of the Boehnerariat, whose partisan members played their roles dutifully and brilliantly.
The speaker's "capitulation" was a farce: the speaker knew it, his lieutenants knew it, even the dozens of tea-partying congressmen who voted against the bill knew it. That's the only reason the vote was allowed to take place. Far from crippling the government-drowners, the farce empowered the right. It applied a Democratic-enabled veneer of reasonableness to Boehner's speakership, which will boomerang on said Dems, just as Virginia's Rep. Jim Moran prophetically warned on the House floor: "We will look back on this night and regret it."
Yet tea partiers out in the boonies and bayous can't see it; which, however, should hardly be surprising.
What exactly would you have done? If it's stay over the Cliff as long as necessary, maybe 2 to 3 months, per Krugman? I can't agree w/that b/c of the $8gal milk spike & the emergency longterm unemployment & other immediate payments besides the taxes. The gop will only pass something if it's of benefit to them. We won't be able to pass anything else the way it is now.
Posted by: cat | January 03, 2013 at 05:31 PM
Based on the coverage of this and everything leading up to it, I'm not sure that Boehner came out of this looking "reasonable." I'm also skeptical that any outcome would have done anything except leave the Tea Party feeling angry and "empowered" because they ALWAYS feel angry and empowered (hence the myopia you reference). Their ascendance to the hallowed halls of Congress is all the evidence they need that Americans (of the "real" variety) support their views and want them to stop the evil President and his socialist minions. I'm not convinced that ANY result of the fiscal cliff discussions would have changed that.
Polls show that the GOP is losing support and that their brand is becoming more and more tarnished. I think the President's current course is designed to let that trend continue. At some point, GOP leaders will HAVE to address the Tea Party cancer themselves. I don't think anyone else can do it for them.
Posted by: JTL | January 04, 2013 at 09:08 AM
"...now say that their members are as energized as they have ever been since the first Tax Day protests in 2009."
Ah, I remember those protests well. Just after and before and during the first of Obama's massive tax hikes of that year, when a national 50% sales tax was created and an average income tax rate of 80% was made law. /
Posted by: Bulworth | January 08, 2013 at 08:58 AM