As I write, the “tax deal” worked out between Obama and Republicans in Congress has passed its first procedural hurdle, with more than 60 Senators voting to open debate on the legislation.
As I have pointed out before, a marginally acceptable bill as originally announced has become an insult to voters who put Republicans back in charge of the House and substantially closed the gap in the Senate. The bill now is what John Fund correctly calls a Tax Deal With A Side of Bacon.
I don’t begrudge the original “deal” although there were very good arguments against it.
But did we really need to buy off Chuck Grassley (R-IA) with ethanol subsidies? Of course not, this was all just pork barrel politics of the type which infuriated the electorate when Democrats were buying off Ben Nelson and Mary Landrieu when it came to Obamacare.
We may not be able to stop it this time, but we should hold the Republican leadership to account for failing to provide courage and leadership on these payoffs.
This type of conduct has to stop, or the Republican leadership will rip the momentum out of the emerging Republican majority.
The voters in the Republican Party are not hostages, and we do not suffer from Stockholm Syndrome.
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Comments
Either you are less infuriated than me, or you hide it better.
After an historic election, the first big bill ignores every message sent.
The main course is a gob-smacking gruel of increased spending on UI with NO corresponding spending cuts to pay for it.
The grist and pork just makes the gruel taste worse. That it includes ethanol, a catalyst not a fuel, hastens the inevitable trip to the washroom.
I am infuriated by this bill and by the tools on the Right who are supporting it. There's nothing to be done now, they're going to hand the Left a HUGE victory in the version of another Porkulus bill. So now we wait and see what the new bunch does in a few weeks. I see we already lost one – Kristy Noem came out and gave this craptastic bill her blessing. So she's been bought off already.
Agreed. Not a hostage, but how much of our income can be confiscated before we can claim "victim" status?
And Steele is running for RNC chair again. Those with power do not let it go easily. If he wins it, I turn in my GOP card and go Independent. That's the deal I'm brokering.
@Whiskey Jim
It is not the first big bill…we barely staved off the DREAM Act amnesty (so far). The Dems are desperate to pass things before Christmas. We all need to be on the phone to senators telling them NO! to both bills…Tell them to go home and leave us alone.
They. Just. Don't. Get. It. Message NOT heard, and faux Conservatives are going to be voted OUT. We will remember. This is the first vote, and many will follow, but we will remember them all. The Republicans are begging to become a third party, eh? They just might get it, like it or not.
They think we're stupid, that they can use us to get what they want and then steamroll right over us as if we never mattered at all. I guess they forget that there will be more elections and we'll continue to take out the trash for as long as we need to. At least I hope we will, this latest idiocy just proves that we can't go back to sleep – ever.
The strategy to pass the correct bill was simple; "we all care about the unemployed. So let us cut spending in other areas to offset the cost." Good lord, the first place to begin would be ethanol. The landing for farmers would be soft given corn prices driven by world demand (The world is getting richer and does not want to eat rice).
Everyone would have blamed the Dems if the bill did not pass and taxes went up. They know that.
The majority supports not increasing spending, and I believe does not understand we are adding $1 Trillion to the deficit in this one.
I hope people take note that Jeb Hensarling is already arguing for House Assistant Democrats to support this bill as it is. Great start Jeb! Is that the new standard for conservatives once promoted to leadership? Supporting the very thing that embodies what conservatives hate the most?
Why didn't Michelle Bachmann fight for that post? Now she is suspect too. Everyone talks like a fighter but when the game is on the line, they are all Assistant Democrats.
Ethanol? And these are the guys that will repeal Obamacare?
If this tax deal is the new way of doing business promised the voters during this past election, then the re-elected better start packing and the newly elected better not unpack.
I sent an email to McConnell on Friday evening. No response as of this Monday evening. We will stay angry. I can burn a Republican as easly as a Dem. We have a new representative, a Republican, in my district. Going to see what he does. I can vote different in 2012.
You know, I'd expect people to have a better grasp of reality around here. Of course, if impotent (and I expect generally ignorant) ranting makes people feel better, I'm all for along as they stay out of the way while the grown-ups start to actually make things better.
You know, I'd expect people to have a better grasp of reality around here. Of course, if impotent (and I expect generally ignorant) ranting makes people feel better, I'm all for along as they stay out of the way while the grown-ups start to actually make things better.
"I can vote different in 2012."
So how is that going to make any difference? If the Republicans who run for office claim they will vote different, but turn around and vote with the Democrats, how do you fight it? There is no third party and no time to build one.
I'm a bit surprised that anyone thought things would change very much after the so-called "historic" election of 2010. Whether they have an "R" or a "D" after their names, politicians all love money and power, and once they arrive in DC they *are* the establishment, no matter what they say. Most cannot resist the courting of lobbyists as they realize who's buttering their bread.
I will not be surprised if the Republicrats pursue the ploy of distracting the restless natives with the whole social issues stuff, as we have seen this month in the Smithsonian kerfuffle…