Tag Archives: Boehner

February 22, 2013 · 1:34 PM

“Obama’s Sequester?” No Way

“Obama’s Sequester?” No Way

Speaker of the House, John Bohener, et al are making sure that they pin the “sequester” bill on President Obama.  The idea is to blame Obama for anything that goes wrong once the sequester is set in motion.

Economist and former Economic Adviser to Vice President Joe Biden,  Jared Bernstein knows a thing or two about these things and wrote the following piece:

Salon

It’s time to defuse the latest fiscal time bomb

This originally appeared on Jared Bernstein’s blog, On the Economy.

For my sanity and yours, I rarely get into the silliest corners of politics, but this conservative talking point that the word “sequester” must actually be called “Obama’s sequester,” like they had nothing to do with it, is really beyond the pale.  I get that both sides are trying to position themselves to not get blamed for this totally preventable, self-inflicted wound, but here are some facts that belie this ridiculous Republican disowning of a policy they supported.

–The sequester was part of the Budget Control Act, passed in 2011 with bipartisan support.  In fact, a larger share of House R’s voted for the bill than D’s: 174 (73%) voted for it and 66 against, while Ds were split 95-95.   In the Senate, 28 Rs voted for it and 19 against, while D’s supported it 45-6.

–Voting in support of the bill that contained the sequester were Reps Boehner, Ryan, Cantor and Sen. McConnell.

–Speaker Boehner said of the bill including the sequester: “I got 98% of what I wanted.”  Given their highly amped up disdain of the sequester now, I find it hard to believe that this was the 2% he didn’t want.

–On the day of the vote, Rep Paul Ryan explained the spending cuts in the bill to Sean Hannity, adding the following:

“And if they breach that amount across the board, sequester comes in to cut that spending, and you can’t turned that off without a supermajority vote. We got that in law. That is here…”

–Then there’s the Power Point slide that the Daily Beast put up yesterday from Speaker Boehner in July of 2011 advertising the sequester as a selling point to his fellow R’s: “[The bill] sets up a new sequestration process to cut spending across-the-board…”

So, should we be calling this “Ryan’s sequester?”…“Boehner’s sequester?”

No.  We—they—should stop acting like truculent kids on the playground, get to work, and defuse their latest fiscal time bomb.

Related articles

4 Comments

Filed under Sequester

Tagged as , , , , , , , ,

December 20, 2012 · 10:58 PM

John Boehner swings and misses on “Plan B”

Speaker of the House, John Boehner has some ‘splainin’ to do…

The Washington Post -Chris Cillizza

It’s hard to overestimate the significance of what happened — or, more accurately, didn’t happen — on the House floor tonight.

Roughly 24 hours after publicly pledging that the House would pass a bill that would extend the current tax rates for all but those earning $1 million or more, Speaker John Boehner was forced to admit defeat — putting out a statement explaining that the legislation lacked the requisite support to bring it up for a vote on the floor.

To be clear: This was a gambit by Boehner designed to be a show of force to President Obama. This was Boehner putting himself out on a limb in hopes wavering members would follow him. This vote mattered to Boehner.

And he lost it.

It’s not clear what the fallout within the chamber will be — there is no obvious challenger to Boehner as Speaker but one could, of course, appear in the wake of this moment — but here’s what we now know:

1. Any bargaining power Boehner had with Obama — or hoped to have — is gone.  The goal of passing “Plan B” was to be able to say to the president and Senate Democrats that House Republicans were the only people who had passed something that would avert the fiscal cliff. Now, not so much.  Obama already had the upper hand in these negotiations — he was reelected just over a month ago — and Boehner knew it. What happened on the House floor tonight made a bad bargaining situation for Boehner that much worse.

2. The Republican party is in a bad place.  Boehner is, ostensibly, the leader of the GOP right now since he is the Republican foil to the President. When that leader can’t rally a majority of votes in a chamber his party controls for a proposal he has made clear is personally and politically important to him, it suggests one thing: no one is at the controls.  It’s also the latest indicator that the party is deeply divided between establishment types like Boehner who are trying to find the best deal possible and the base of the party who isn’t interested in making those sorts of compromises.

3. Boehner has lost control of the narrative. The next few days will be filled with stories about how this happened and what it means for Boehner.  There are  – and will be more — quotes from conservative types questioning why he even sought to bring the bill to a vote. There will be those privately — and maybe publicly — raising concerns about his political relevance. Boehner has been around the political block before and knows all of this is coming. And, if a deal gets reached at some point between now and Dec. 31, he will likely (and smartly) declare victory and try to move on. But the next ten days (at least) are going to be very rough for him — and on Republicans more broadly.

Related articles

 

2 Comments

Filed under GOP Leadership Quagmire, John Boehner

Tagged as , , , , ,

October 17, 2011 · 12:05 AM

In The Alternate Universe of the GOP: Cantor: We Need To Rely On The Wealthy To Address Income Inequality

I’m beginning to wonder if Cantor, DeMint, Issa,  Boehner and their ilk even understand what the average American faces economically?   After all, in Washington, DC most politicians are millionaires and seem way out of touch with the “common folk” of this country.

This is not just about income inequality Mr. Cantor.  It’s about the despicable practices of Wall Street like stealing working folks’ money in various ways! It’s about disparaging the working class on an unprecedented basis while lining their pockets with unprecedented billions.

Mostly, its about Washington politicians continuing to tout tax cuts for the rich and austerity for the programs most middle class folks depend on like Medicare and Social Security.

Think Progress

The 99 percent movement protests are going global as more and more people seek to register their frustration with corporate greed and injust economic policies. Preferential tax treatment has helped drive the U.S. to its worst level of income inequality since the Great Depression, with the nation ranking more unequal than the Ivory Coast, Ethiopia, and Pakistan. Since 1979, “the gaps in after-tax income between the richest 1 percent of Americans and the middle and poorest fifths of the country more than tripled.”

America’s recognition of the indisputable level of inequality is forcing Republicans to back away from their condescending treatment of the “Occupy” protesters. Once concerned about these “growing mobs,” House Majority Eric Cantor (R-VA) ismaking an about-face. Today on Fox News Sunday, he told host Chris Wallace that the president and Republicans “agree that there is too much income disparity in this country.” Pointing to the public’s “complaint” about the unfair economic playing field, he insisted that Congress should rely on America’s wealthy “to take care of income disparity”:

CANTOR: We know in this country there is a complaint on the folks on the top end of the income scale that they make too much and folks on the end don’t make enough. We need to encourage those on the top income scale to create more jobs. We are about income mobility and that’s what we should be focused on to take care of the income disparity.

Watch:

Continue reading here…

Related articles

Comments Off

Filed under GOP Myopia, Income Inequality

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

July 26, 2011 · 1:48 AM

Boehner to America: give me what I want or you’re all screwed

This just about sums up Boehner’s speech last night…

Daily Kos

Summing tonight’s news: Obama gave a speech. Then Boehner gave a speech. Obama stressed compromise, Boehner stressed that “bipartisan” somehow meant the hardcore teabagger “Cut, Cap, Balance” plan that everyone knows has no chance of passing the Senate, but Boehner doesn’t really care because none of this is really about debt or deficit at this point.

This time we didn’t get vaguely-drunk-sounding Boehner, we got cranky petulant Boehner, and he delivered a speech that was basically a televised ransom note. Then a bunch of pundits said some stuff that I didn’t hear because nobody gives a crap what they think anymore.

Right now, the U.S. stock market is staring in the mirror, holding a big container of pills in one hand, and wondering where it all went wrong.

 

Related articles

1 Comment

Filed under John Boehner

Tagged as , , , , , , , ,