“Celebrating Misery”: House Republicans’ Ghoulish Defunding Rally
There was something ghoulish about the rally that House Republicans held today in the Rayburn Room after they voted to defund health care reform. The party atmosphere was so boisterous, the cheers and laughter so loud, that it was easy to forget everyone in the room had just voted to keep tens of millions of people from getting health insurance.
By keeping spending at its current levels through mid-December, they had also voted to continue the sequester, which is preventing millions of people from getting public housing subsidies, Head Start seats, and unemployment benefits. The sequester is also taking a serious toll on scientific research and investment in infrastructure, not to mention its infuriating drag on employment and the economic recovery. How about another round of applause?
This shouldn’t come as a surprise, of course, from a House that had voted the previous day to cut food stamps for 3.8 million low-income people, including many very young and very old recipients. But at least they didn’t have a party to celebrate that vote.
Today, though, everyone was in a great mood.
“When we acted, it wasn’t just a group of Republicans, but it was a bipartisan vote,” said Kevin McCarthy, the Majority Whip. (O.K., fine. Two Democrats voted for it, and 188 voted against.) “Let me state that again because I want to make sure you write it correctly. [Huge laughter.] It was a bipartisan vote because we’re Americans first! [Cheers, applause.]”
But some Americans are last, like the millions who would have to get all their medical care from an emergency room if the House had its way. That didn’t seem to bother Eric Cantor, the Republican leader, who pushed through the food-stamp bill and today claimed the health law was turning the country into a part-time economy. (Actually, the recession had started that trend long before President Obama’s health law took effect.)
Mr. Cantor called on Senate Democrats to pass the House bill, which isn’t going to happen, and even named a few from conservative states, like Mark Pryor of Arkansas and Kay Hagan of North Carolina, who Republicans hope to defeat for re-election by linking them to the health law.
What he didn’t mention, though, is that the House’s real beef is with Senate Republicans, not Democrats, many of whom have denounced the extremist tactic of threatening a government shutdown if health reform isn’t defunded. The defeat of the House demand in the Senate is pre-ordained, and when the measure comes back to the House next week without any mention of the health law, and with little time left to avoid a shutdown, the laughter and applause will be long gone.
By: David Firestone, Editors Blog, The New York Times, September 20, 2013
“Ugly And Getting Worse”: A Republican House Divided Against Itself
It didn’t get much attention last week, but House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) suffered a significant defeat last week. The Virginia Republican, as part of a larger rebranding campaign, crafted something called the “Helping Sick Americans Now Act,” which intended to transfer money from the Affordable Care Act to high-risk pools for the uninsured.
Democrats saw through the scheme, but more importantly, House Republicans hated the idea, seeing it as a plan to “fix” Obamacare. Humiliated, Cantor was forced to pull his bill without a vote.
The overlooked fiasco was a problem House GOP leaders saw coming.
Less than two weeks ago, House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy walked upstairs to Majority Leader Eric Cantor’s Capitol office to discuss a sensitive issue: Why did Cantor schedule a vote before McCarthy had the chance to survey Republican support?
The meeting — described as “tense” by several people familiar with it — ended with McCarthy abruptly standing up and storming out of the room. Aides downplayed the exchange. But a week later, it turned out that McCarthy’s pique was merited: The health care-related bill was suddenly pulled from the floor in what was the most recent stumble for House Republicans.
If this was a rare misstep, and the Republican-led House ran like a well-oiled governing machine, it’d be easy to overlook. But the trouble with Cantor’s bill appears to be evidence of a much larger and deeper problem.
We talked a month ago about House Speaker John Boehner’s (R-Ohio) “Make the Senate go first” rule that effectively takes the House out of the governing process altogether, but Jake Sherman’s report makes it seem as if Boehner doesn’t have much of a choice — this is a House “in chaos.” Republican leader are “talking past each other”; the House conference “is split by warring factions”; and influential outside groups are fighting their ostensible allies.
It’s ugly, and it’s getting worse.
There appear to be a series of factions, which clearly don’t see eye to eye. Right-wing lawmakers want to invest their time and energy into combating Democrats and voting on health care repeal; Cantor and his allies are focused on rebranding and conservative-friendly solutions; and Boehner has some big-ticket items in mind as he weighs the future of the so-called “Hastert Rule.”
In the meantime, four months into the new Congress, the House has no policy agenda, and according to the Politico report, GOP leaders even consider immigration reform a “long shot” in the lower chamber.
I’m not entirely convinced that the House is so far gone that governing is literally impossible, especially if the Speaker’s office is willing to forgo the “majority of the majority” and start passing bills with Democratic votes. Boehner has already done this four times this year, and if he’s willing to do it some more, this Congress may not be a complete disaster.
But clearly House Republicans are divided against themselves. There’s no meaningful leadership; no interest in cooperation or compromise; and post-policy nihilism rules the day. The demise of Cantor’s health care bill was a reminder that House Republicans will reject their own party’s policy ideas with nearly the same speed as they’ll reject Democratic ideas.
For many Beltway pundits, the inability of House Republicans to act like a governing caucus is mainly President Obama’s fault — if only he’d schmooze with them, form personal relationships, and act like a character in an Aaron Sorkin movie, maybe these radicalized nihilists would be more likely to get something done.
But all available evidence suggests the collapse of the House GOP is out of Obama’s hands. The House Republican conference is simply broken.
By: Steve Benen, The Maddow Blog, May 1, 2013
“Cheney And Deep Doo Doo”: It Was Dick Cheney That Let North Korea Get Nuclear Weapons In The First Place
Guess who’s offering congressional Republicans guidance on foreign policy?
Former Vice President Dick Cheney discussed tensions on the Korean peninsula with Republican leaders in Congress in a closed-door meeting Tuesday, warning them that the United States was in danger.
“We’re in deep doo doo,” Cheney told lawmakers, according to CNN, which first reported the talk.
Rep. Steve Southerland (Fla.) who attended the 10-minute meeting with GOP leaders said Cheney called North Korean leader Kim Jong Un unpredictable and, citing his own experience dealing with former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein, said “you never know what they’re thinking.”
How reassuring. Cheney thinks he’s qualified to speak about U.S. policy towards North Korea because of his “experience” with Saddam Hussein — as if Cheney’s role in shaping U.S. policy in Iraq has value and applicability now.
Incidentally, why, pray tell, was Cheney helping lead a closed-door with congressional Republicans? Because Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), the #3 person in the House GOP leadership, invited the former vice president to speak.
I mention this because it’s not as if Cheney cornered these guys and Republican lawmakers were forced into listening to the failed former V.P. They wanted to hear from him and thought they’d benefit from his guidance.
Indeed, they seemed delighted to have been offered words of wisdom from Cheney. That his entire foreign policy worldview has been thoroughly discredited, his credibility on foreign policy and national security has been exposed as a pathetic joke, and the damage he’s done to the United States will take generations to heal, apparently didn’t dissuade House Republicans from taking the guy seriously.
But before we move on, let’s pause briefly to reflect on how it is we ended up in “deep doo doo.” After all, it was Dick Cheney that let North Korea get nuclear weapons in the first place.
As we discussed last week, the Clinton administration negotiated an Agreed Framework with North Korea in 1994, which was successful in “bottling up North Korea’s nuclear program for eight years,” and which eased the crisis on the peninsula. In March 2001, Colin Powell said Bush/Cheney would pick up where Clinton/Gore had left off.
The Bush/Cheney White House then immediately rebuked Powell, forced him to walk back his position, and rejected the Agreed Framework. Kim Jong-il hoped for a new round of negotiations, but the Republican administration refused. As Cheney himself put it, “We don’t negotiate with evil — we defeat it.” The Republican president instead added North Korea to an “axis of evil.”
By 2002, North Korea unlocked its fuel rods, kicked out international weapons inspectors, and became more aggressive in pursuing a nuclear weapons program. In response, “Bush didn’t take military action, he didn’t call for sanctions, nor did he try diplomacy” — instead focusing his energies on selling the United States on the need for a disastrous war in Iraq.
Indeed, Bush and Cheney argued at the time that the U.S. had to hurry up and invade Iraq before it could acquire nuclear weapons, effectively telling North Korea that the way to avoid an invasion was to advance its nuclear program as quickly as possible — which it did.
As a result, North Korea became a nuclear state on Bush/Cheney’s watch, and paid no price for its actions. The world is left with an isolated dictatorship, craving attention, and playing with the most dangerous weapons the world has ever known.
Thanks, Dick, for the fascinating insights on “doo doo.”
By: Steve Benen, The Maddow Blog, April 10, 2013
“Can You Hear Me Now?”: A Moment Of Real GOP Clarity In The Fiscal Debate
As you regulars know, I’ve been hoping and hoping that reporters will press top Republicans on a simple question: Is there any ratio of entitlement cuts of your choosing to new revenues you’d accept? Three to one? Four to one? Five to one?
Well, John Boehner was asked something very close to that question on ABC News today:
MARTHA RADDATZ: Is there any ratio of entitlement cuts to new revenues that you would –
SPEAKER JOHN BOEHNER: The president got his –
MARTHA RADDATZ: — say that the is three to one, four to one –
SPEAKER JOHN BOEHNER: — tax hikes. The president –
MARTHA RADDATZ: — nothing?
SPEAKER JOHN BOEHNER: — got his tax hikes on January the 1st.
MARTHA RADDATZ: So, the answer to –
SPEAKER JOHN BOEHNER: He–
MARTHA RADDATZ: — that is no?
SPEAKER JOHN BOEHNER: — he ran his election on taxing the wealthy. He got his tax hikes. But he won’t talk about the spending problem and that’s the problem here in Washington.
We’ll take that as a No. House GOP majority whip Kevin McCarthy was also asked that question on NBC today:
DAVID GREGORY: Is there any ratio that you could accept?
REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY: There are no new tax increases because you don’t need it. If you look at this report –
DAVID GREGORY: But you’re never going to get entitlement reform –
REP. KEVIN MCCARTHY: You’re going to get nothing.
DAVID GREGORY: — without tax increases. Is that political reality?
Again, until we hear otherwise, we’ll take that as a No.
And so it’s now sinking in that: 1) Republicans are not getting the entitlement cuts they want without agreeing to new revenues; and 2) Republicans are explicitly confirming that there is no compromise that is acceptable to them to get the cuts they themselves say they want. The GOP position, with no exaggeration, is that the only way Republican leaders will ever agree to paying down the deficit they say is a threat to American civilization is 100 percent their way; they are not willing to concede anything at all to reach any deal involving new revenues to reduce the deficit, or to get the entitlement reform they want, or to avert sequestration they themselves said will gut the military and tank the economy.
But … but … but … Obama needs to lead and prove he’s Serious by offering still more entitlement cuts than he already has!
Come on. Is the situation clear enough now?
By: Greg Sargent, The Washington Post, The Plum Line, March 17, 2013
“Beating Back The Insurgency”: House Passes Fiscal Deal, Sends Agreement To White House
Seven hours ago, House Republicans were fired up and ready to kill the bipartisan fiscal agreement that the Senate passed easily last night. Tonight, however, the House passed the Senate deal relatively easily, 257 to 167.
House Speaker John Boehner was, as expected, forced to ignore the arbitrary, so-called “Hastert Rule,” and bring the bill to the floor despite the opposition of most of the majority caucus. By the time the gavel fell, however, it was far more than a sliver of House GOP members who bit the bullet and grudgingly supported the compromise — 85 Republicans voted for the bill tonight, while 151 voted against it.
Of particular interest was the division among GOP leaders. Boehner and House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan voted for the Senate compromise, while House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy voted against it.
The rumors of sharp fissures among Republican leaders are true, and Boehner and Cantor are obviously not on the same page. It’s a dynamic that’s well worth watching as the new Congress gets underway, and the House GOP leadership tries to govern with an even smaller caucus.
Regardless, while Boehner surely wished he enjoyed more support from his own members, Cantor does not end the evening looking especially strong — he briefly led the insurgency against the fiscal agreement this afternoon, and ignored the wishes of his own Speaker, but the effort to derail the deal ended up failing badly.
President Obama, who will sign the completed agreement quite soon, is scheduled to speak from the White House briefing room any minute now.
But as the dust settles, it’s worth considering how the day unfolded in the House. The GOP caucus gathered for a preliminary, midday meeting at which Republicans insisted on “amending” the bipartisan bill — making it far more favorable to the right — and then sending it back to the Senate with an ultimatum: pass the House version or else.
But by the time House Republicans gathered for a rare evening meeting, the push behind the effort had fizzled, and the earlier threats started to look like empty bluster. So, what happened? A few things, actually.
First, GOP members realized that amending the Senate package would necessarily unravel the entire process, and there would be no doubt in anyone’s mind who would receive — and deserve — the blame for higher taxes and sweeping austerity measures that would do real harm to the economy: House Republicans.
Second, there was limited support for an amended bill, anyway. Remember, Boehner’s “Plan B,” which died an ignominious death just two weeks ago, set the higher marginal income tax threshold at a $1 million and included all kinds of right-wing goodies intended to secure Republican support. It failed miserably. The amended Senate bill would have set the threshold at $450,000 and it would have generated zero Democratic votes. It quickly became apparent that the proposal couldn’t pass, and wasn’t worth pursuing.
The clock only made matters worse — GOP leaders, having already missed the New Year’s Eve deadline, maintained they wanted to wrap this up well in advance of financial markets opening in the morning.
And that left the House with a choice: either pass or kill the deal. With the help of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and her disciplined caucus, the chamber chose the former.
One other thought to keep in mind as members head to the cameras tonight: House Republicans had no say in shaping this deal, but that was by design. I saw Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) complain this afternoon that he thinks the Senate acted like a “dictatorship” that wants to rule over the House.
Let’s not forget recent history — which is to say, the history from last week. The White House worked with the Speaker and his office on a compromise, and Boehner abandoned the talks. A few days later, Boehner’s caucus abandoned him, leaving a scenario in which the entire chamber was lost and directionless.
And it was at that point, the Speaker announced, “Now it is up to the president to work with Senator Reid on legislation to avert the fiscal cliff.” In other words, the House GOP leadership gave up and ceded power to the Senate and the White House.
House Republicans weren’t really in a position to wait until Jan. 1 and then decide it had changed its mind about who deserved to have a hand in crafting a bipartisan agreement. The Senate didn’t play the role of a “dictatorship”; it simply did the work the House was unable and unwilling to do.
And now, the process is over, and the bill heads to the White House for the president’s signature. We’ll have plenty more coverage in the morning.
BY: Steve Benen, The Maddow Blog, January 1, 2012
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