The real fight

By Carl 

The drums have been beating for months over this fight, ever since the GOP took back the House in November. This week, they get much louder. The time is at hand:

"Obviously, we need to look at all corners of government," said Obama senior adviser David Plouffe in announcing the speech on NBC's Meet The Press. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., on Fox News Sunday, said, "we've had to bring this president kicking and screaming to the table to cut spending."

Obama's forthcoming plan to reduce the government's red ink will also re-frame a variety of budget-related political battles. 

Cantor's comment is particularly irritating, since Obama's original budget proposal cut $33 billion dollars, which is eerily close to what Boener caved in on for the continuing budget resolution.

But I digress...

What this week's battle will really be about is the debt ceiling. Approve it, and the nation can go on and try to get a handle on the bills. Turn it down, and the nation will instantaneously lose any and all credibility in the world, becoming no better than Uganda or Zimbabwe or Myanmar or Greece or Portugal, or any number of nations who have repudiated or otherwise abrogated their responsibilities to the world.

Like those other nations, we will have sold out to tyrannical dictators, only ours won't be in office, only the men behind the curtains.

The Republicans have already signaled they will agree to the raise, but in exchange they want spending cuts.

Um, duh. Then ur doin et rong, if you're going to play brinksmanship without the very real threat you'll go over the edge. After all, what's the thrill in seeing someone swim in the Niagara River if he's tied by a rope to the mainland? It just amounts to an exercise in exhaustion.

What this really amounts to is the Bush tax cuts, which will expire next year after an extension... again... in 2010. Allowing these to expire would of course immediately cut the deficit and the growth of the debt, but it would also inflict pain on the überrich and the corporatocracy.

Pain, in this case, being defined as the bite of the mite that sits on the gnat that's piggybacking on the mosquito on the collective butt.

The rest of the debate is really just smoke and noise and amounts to next to nothing in terms of cuts... no one seriously thinks Paul Ryan's plan is worth the paper it's printed on... and really is just the GOP saving face from the charge of being the Party of No.

Which they are. You really ought to embrace your inner hater, boys.

(Cross-posted to Simply Left Behind.) 

Addendum: I just wanted to add my voice to those who are expressing their regrets over the loss of one of our very best and brightest here at The Reaction.

Creature, in your retirement, may you find the thread you believe you've lost and come out fighting again really soon. You will be missed.

GOP validates America's hatred of Congress

By Nicholas Wilbur

The Republican Party has validated the American public's growing frustration, annoyance, and near-historically low disapproval of Congress with a bill proposed this week that epitomized the do-nothing reputation and partisan bickering of politicians on Capitol Hill.

The proposal, which Republican Majority Leader Eric Cantor of Virginia touted as a safety measure against the looming threat of a government shutdown, would make the Republican Party's February budget proposal the "law of the land" if Congress fails to enact a budget resolution before current government funding expires on April 8.

The Republican Party's February budget proposal, H.R. 1, called for $61 billion in discretionary spending cuts, most of which targeted popular social programs that the Democratic Party vehemently opposed. The bill earned a veto threat from President Obama even before it passed in the House, and after it passed it was deemed dead-on-arrival in the Democratic-controlled Senate. Nobody so much as blinked when the bill died on the Senate floor due to a lack of bipartisan support.

So what will it take to pass this new proposal and to avoid the potentially devastating effects on the economy and job creation if a government shutdown occurs?

In short, a miracle.

In order to become law, Cantor's bill requires that the same Democrats who so staunchly opposed the GOP's $61 billion in spending cuts on March 17 then turn around not two weeks later and vote for those very same cuts.

Not even Rod Serling could have thought up this one.

But lest you should be fooled by the media's claims that this is yet another "symbolic" measure put forth by the ever-unserious GOP, Cantor was quoted Wednesday telling reporters, "We are serious."

The Hill reported that "aides could not immediately explain how their new bill would solve the crisis or whether they expected the Senate to approve it."

 

According to Cantor spokeswoman Leana Fallon, "[I]t is our hope that this bill will, at a minimum, spur the Senate to pass some bill funding the government for the rest of the year so that we can work quickly to resolve any differences." If Congress fails to act, she added, "passing this bill would at least keep the government open."

 

She is correct. Passing this bill would indeed keep the government open. Unfortunately, it would also eliminate the incentive for Republicans to continue negotiations with Democrats. If their original proposal becomes law, there is no need to "spur the Senate to pass some bill funding the government," because Republicans can sit out the remainder of the talks, wait for current funding to expire, then throw a party for their Tea Party constituents when health-care reform is defunded, the Environmental Protection Agency is gutted, and a slew of other social programs are forced to cut core services and, in effect, jobs, on April 9.

 

Putting a new title on an old policy won't change the hearts and minds of Democrats in the Senate. It won't convince the public that Republicans are serious about reaching common ground on the budget. And it definitely won't quell the animosity that Americans feel toward Congress. (According to the latest Gallop poll, Congress has an 18 percent approval rating.)

 

If there is a silver lining to this cloud, it's that voters across the nation, particularly Virginia voters, and especially deficit-hawk conservative voters, begin calculating a taxpayer-based cost-benefit analysis of the type of leadership that comes with paying majority party leaders a salary of $193,000 a year.

 

Or maybe Cantor needs a pay raise.

 

(Cross-posted at Muddy Politics.)

Republicans, spinning wildly, claim credit for positive economic news

By Michael J.W. Stickings 

The question is, do Republicans really believe their own propaganda?

It took less than three weeks for the new Republican Congressional leadership to claim credit for an apparent economic upturn.

An aide to House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, Brian Patrick, emailed reporters [yesterday] morning:

THERE ARE THE JOBS: Republicans Prevent Massive Tax Increase, Economy Begins to Improve: U.S. companies plan to hire more workers in the coming months amid growing optimism over the economy, a quarterly survey released Monday showed, providing further evidence that the jobs market is turning around. In the fourth-quarter poll of 84 companies by the National Association for Business Economics found 42% of companies interviewed, ranging from manufacturing to finance, expect to boost jobs in the six months ahead. That's up from 29% in the first three months of 2010. Only 7% in the latest survey predict they will shed jobs in the coming six months, down from 23% at the start of last year.

The Dow Jones wire story Patrick linked makes no mention of the GOP.

Do they? Maybe, maybe not. Obviously, they're trying to score political points by taking credit for any good news they can find.

It's just so transparent how full of shit they are.

As Steve Benen remarks, "[e]ven by the standards of the most shameless hack, this is farcical. Worse, it's part of a growing pattern":

To reiterate a point from last week, this really is fascinating. The economy started growing again in 2009, with the stimulus giving the economy a boost. We saw growth continue throughout 2010 -- even after those rascally Democrats passed health care reform and Wall Street reform -- while Republicans said Dems were killing the economy.

And now we have several Republican leaders arguing that the same tax rates that were in place last year (and the year before that, and the year before that), coupled with economic policies that haven't even been voted on, deserve the credit for more optimistic projections.

So to review, Republicans in the Bush era brought the global economy to the brink of catastrophic collapse; Obama and congressional Dems helped turn things around; and now those same Republicans whose policies failed want credit for Democratic successes.

I know some folks will find this persuasive, and maybe even some of these GOP officials have deluded themselves into believing their own rhetoric. But it doesn't make the argument any less ridiculous.

That's one word for it.

Here's hoping Speaker Boehner learns to speak the truth

By R.K. Barry 

A CNN / Opinion Research poll conducted between December 17 and 19 indicated that 56% of Americans hold either a positive view of Obama's health-care reform or are of the opinion that it is not liberal enough. More specifically, 43% like it as it is and 13% would probably have liked to see a public option. That leaves 37% who are opposed because the reform package is too liberal and 7% who have no opinion.

Let's be clear here. Of those expressing an opinion, 56% reject the Republican critique of "Obamacare" and only 37% side with the GOP.

Given those numbers,  it is rather difficult to understand what Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va) was talking about when he said of health-care reform that "we just need to repeal it as the American people have spoken out and said."

I'm sure if I spent just a bit of time doing some Google searches I could find a dozen more Republicans saying that their midterm gains were in large part about Americans rejecting health-care reform. I know recently-installed House Speaker John Boehner has been saying similar things. You will forgive me if I don't dig up all the relevant quotes. It hardly seems necessary. 

John McCain recently railed against the repeal of "don't-ask-don't-tell" as an affront to the electorate despite the fact that polls put support for gays serving openly in the military at upwards of 80%. Same idea. Say the opposite of what is demonstrably true and a lot of people will believe the lie and repeat it either because they want to believe what is untrue or because they are too lazy to do a bit of research.

We're not talking about differences of opinion about things that cannot be shown empirically but about things that are, by modern and generally-recognizable standards of truth, considered to be matters of fact. And before you take issue with polling as a source of gathering information of citizens preferences, I assure you that it has become pretty darn accurate over time.

But just think about the idiotic ideas that have fairly recently been in circulation amongst far too many Americans: Obama is a Muslim; he was not born in America; he is a socialist; he hates America; climate change is an elaborate hoax; and almost any piece of weirdness that comes out of Glenn Beck's mouth. And then there are the claims by various Republicans that Americans reject health-care reform or gays serving openly in the military.

Conservative politics in America seems to be far too much about just saying shit, no matter how absurd, just to see who is either stupid enough or lazy enough to accept it as truth.

I once read something, which I admit may not be true but struck me as plausible and at least suggestive. It was a claim that the KGB, the intelligence agency of the former Soviet Union, would work through its networks to put clearly untrue information in circulation that would support its interests simply because a certain subset of the population will always accept as plausible anything they hear and repeat it.

In my experience, it is not uncommon to hear someone offer an opinion contrary to all facts with the commnt that they had heard it somewhere, though they could not tell you where or what proof was provided.

For the longest time, the suggestion that tobacco did not cause cancer was in this camp, though thankfully that is now a part of the past.

As I say, just put it out there and some people will believe it and repeat it. Too much of politics is done this way, which, when bending the truth, seems to be about the maxim "go big or go home."

What I would say to the Eric Cantors and John Boehners of the world is that they should go ahead and work for the legislative agenda of their choice or the choice of those they think got them elected. But please do try to keep the bullshit to a minimum about the extent to which you are speaking for "the American people."

Although if you want to attack health-care reform, which seems to be pretty popular, and fight for tax cuts for the super rich, which seem to be pretty unpopular, that's fine with me. See you in 2012.

(Cross-posted to Lippmann's Ghost.)

Quote of the Day: Dana Milbank on Republican hypocrisy (and worse)

By Michael J.W. Stickings

As the Republicans take over the House, it's time for some perspective. And Milbank's got it:

For incoming Majority Leader Eric Cantor and his House Republicans, something strange happened on the way to Wednesday's "Opening Day" of the new Congress.

For two years, Cantor and his colleagues campaigned against high deficits. Now, in the new majority's first major act, they plan to vote to increase the deficit by $143 billion as part of a repeal of health-care reform. [Ezra Klein has more on this.]

For two years, Cantor and his colleagues bemoaned the Democrats' abuse of House rules to circumvent committees and to prevent Republicans from offering amendments. Now, Cantor confirmed on Tuesday, Republicans will employ the very same abuses as they attempt the repeal.

For two years, the Republicans complained about unrelenting Democratic partisanship. Now they're planning no fewer than 10 investigations of the Obama administration, and the man leading most of those has already branded Obama's "one of the most corrupt administrations" in history.

For two years, the Republican minority vowed to return power to the people. Now the House Republican majority is asking lobbyists which regulations to repeal, hiring lobbyists to key staff positions and hobnobbing with lobbyists at big-ticket Washington fundraisers.

Not that we could have seen this coming or anything. Right, American voters?

Happy New Year! Happy 112th Congress! Enjoy reaping what you have sown!

Top Ten Cloves: Surprises On first day of GOP majority In Congress

By J. Thomas Duffy

News Item: In House, new Republican majority plans to act fast to undo Obama's agenda

10. Representative Steve King (R-IA) insists on having title of House Majority Idiot

9. Republicans hire Rulon Gardner to taunt outgoing Democrats as "The Biggest Losers"

8. To save time, GOP majority insists all floor speeches need to be a Twitter-like 140-characters or less

7. First bill: all members need to be as tanned as new Speaker of the House, John Boehner

6. New Majority Whip Eric Cantor challenges King for House Majority Idiot

5. Swearing in new members is delayed, as newly-elected Tea Party Congressmen show up with misspelled signs and shout down the Speaker

4. New Speaker of House Ceremony delayed -- gavel keeps slipping out of Nancy Pelosi's hand due to it being soaking wet from John Boehner's crying

3. Michele Bachmann gets so excited with having the majority, she gets confused and starts investigating herself for anti-American activities

2. Big confusion -- Tea Party Members thought they were reading the Constitution, but, due to error, actually are reading leaked cables by WikiLeaks

1. LeBron James shows up, announces he's "taking his talents to Congress."

Bonus Links

Igor Volsky: Will Republicans Be Able To Defund Health Reform?

Jack Stuef: Michele Bachmann To Defeat Obama, Be First Female, Banshee President

Kathleen Hennessey and Tom Hamburger: Tea party freshmen embrace status quo - After campaigning against D.C.'s ways, new Republican lawmakers quickly turn to lobbyists and fundraisers

Pat Garofalo: House GOP Repeatedly Promised $100 Billion In Spending Cuts That It Now Calls "Hypothetical"

(Cross-posted at The Garlic.)