I don’t see that in the story.
So they’re gutless and stupid. Nice winning strategy they’ve got there. How do you still support these idiots? The Dems should have abstained enmasse and let the GOP eat this one too.
WHy should they? The Democrats support a debt limit increase. The Republicans do not without concessions. Their allowing it to come up for a vote was an admission that they won’t get those concessions.
It’s still weaseling, but it’s not gutless or stupid.
You also didn’t see in the story that Boehner is in trouble with his caucus, which tells you all you need to know.
Have you not understood the part that Congress is obliged to fund the budgets they’ve already passed? To pay the bills they’ve already run up? How, to you, is a basic responsibility merely something the Democrats support?
Yes, it’s gutless and stupid, not merely weaseling. But at least this time your guys aren’t causing basic damage to the government and our national credit rating too. If you want them to be given credit for that, well, you can keep on wanting.
So you believe Democrats were gutless and stupid to oppose raising the debt limit during the Bush years?
But is he in trouble with the Tea Party Caucus?
Oh, there was definitely a split, but Boehner’s got enough assent from his caucus to be secure in his position:
And more:
Even as conservative activists blasted Boehner in statements, members largely absolved him of blame.
“The frustration the conference has is not with the Speaker. It’s with President Obama,” said conservative Rep. Raúl Labrador (R-Idaho), who voted against Boehner’s reelection and has suggested the House needs new leadership in the next Congress.
Boehner’s allies argued that the Speaker, by steering members away from a head-on confrontation, had saved his party from a repeat of its politically damaging defeat after the government shutdown last fall. Boehner began lowering expectations for a debt-limit victory weeks ago, and conservatives like Labrador publicly argued for putting up a clean bill that would be passed by Democrats.
Yet if the frustration did not erupt at Boehner, it manifested itself in back-biting between members on the two wings of the party.
Inside the Republican meeting on Tuesday, centrist Rep. Charlie Dent (Pa.) stood up to complain that conservatives who rarely supported fiscal plans were once again driving the leadership’s considerations.
“I’m not going to let the country default on its obligations under any circumstances,” said Dent, one of 28 Republicans to support the clean debt-limit extension.
Well, good, then. The TP Caucus lost one. Maybe they’ll take a lesson and not be quite so outrageous or uncompromising in their demands in the future.
: pause :
Naaaaah!
Here’s the difference. I have no problem with members of the opposition party doing a little opposition to raising the debt limit when it has to be done. After all, that’s the pattern we’ve seen for years. However, it is only in the last three years that it’s gone from pro-forma protest to serious possibility of not actually being raised. If the House Republicans had simply griped about spending and the need to raise the debt limit and then not tried to do anything to really stop it, nobody would really care that it passed on a vote that was almost all the Democrats with enough Republicans thrown in to get it to pass because that is how it always worked in the past. Instead it’s news because of the insane hostage taking of the last three years.
In the past, votes against raising the limit were symbolic. Even Obama did it. But the difference is that the Democrats never brought the nation to the brink of default. The Democrats never publicly said “hey, what do you say we take a hostage and see what we can get for it?”
Even in doing the right thing, Boehner seems to lack comprehension of the issue. He said it’s the president who racks up the debt. No, John. When the Congress willfully passes a budget where anticipated revenues are less than spending, it is a certainty that the debt will grow. It’s called arithmetic. If you don’t want the debt to grow, pass a balanced budget. If you don’t do that, grow up and don’t whine about your budget resulting in more debt.
Asterion and Bob, that’s fair enough, but we’re not talking about bringing the country to the brink. That’s precisely what Republicans aren’t doing this time, and you are pissed about it, but complaining about what they did last time to justify being pissed.
Just acknowledge that they did the right thing this time, even though they did it in a weaselly way. And that rather than becoming more extreme, they are slowly growing up.
I won’t believe they’re growing up until I see a few years of reasonable and non-batshit legislative action. I don’t think the Republican party has hit rock bottom yet.
You know very well that it was grandstanding, using a vote as an occasion to make a political point, not with any actual expectation of following through even if they could. You do know that, don’t you? :dubious:
Your guys went ahead and actually fucking did it. It wasn’t “bringing the country to the brink”, as you falsely put it, it was doing a Thelma and Louise right over it. And now you want them to be given *credit *for releasing the hostages this time? Amazing.
Well, I wouldn’t expect legislative action, that’s not what real conservatives are about. This country’s been around for 225+ years, it doesn’t need thousands of new laws every year, with very few old laws repealed in the process.
But where action is needed, I hope it will be more bipartisan in the future.
If that means you’ve embraced Boehner’s admonition that Congress should be judged on how many laws it repeals, then you need to be aware that his total stands at Zero. Congratulations.
That’s not really true. They repealed CLASS, and the President even signed it. And then lambasted them for trying to repeal ACA 47 times, even though a couple of times he signed their partial repeals.
The only reason Boehner put forth a clean debt ceiling was because his own caucus would not support any of his plans. They haven’t “learned” anything, they are just too busy fighting each other to put together a coherent fight.
And now, they’re going to refuse to hold an immigration bill vote, for no other apparent reason than that Obama might get credit for it. Never mind that it would further drive Hispanics away from the party in future elections; their overriding consideration remains personal spite.
Someday, adaher, you may come to see that voting to repeal ACA is like voting to repeal Social Security. And that the more times the guys who still, for reasons you can’t explain to us, have your support, try it, the more childish they look.
Doing a straight count of number of bills passed versus number of bills repealed is far too simplistic. Most of the laws that are passed are replacements or modifications to existing laws, for example this new budget effectively repealed the old budget. Also some laws expire even without being repealed. So it’s not really surprising that straight out repeals are rare. If you further take out those laws that are largely meaningless such as renaming an air traffic control center (oh the horrors of big government), then government doesn’t look quite so far out of control.