WASHINGTON — Speaker John Boehner failed to harness his unruly House majority Thursday night and canceled a planned vote on a bill to extend income tax cuts for most Americans while allowing rates to rise on millionaires.
The turn of events appeared to weaken Boehner’s hand in budget negotiations with the White House. If his bold gambit had passed, the Republican leader would have gained a fresh bargaining chip in talks with President Obama. But the staunch resistance of conservative Tea Party representatives to tax increases of any kind — despite closed-door entreaties by the speaker — foiled that plan, and his move, dubbed “Plan B,” backfired.
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What great and glorious leadership we have. All this conniving, pandering and spineless huffing and puffing is exactly what our country DOESN'T need. That's a bitter tea that Boehner, Cantor and Ryan will be drinking to celebrate their Pyrrhic victory.
When the rank and file rejects the leader's efforts, as has happened here, it's not a victory for that leader, Pyrrhic or otherwisel, but maybe I've gotten nitpicky in my middle age.
I agree with JLErwin.
Boehner's purpose here was to pass his "Plan B" bill and then blame the President and the Senate for not passing it too. It was suppose to strenghten his hand in the negotiations and allowing him to blame the President and the Democrats if we went over the "cliff."
Instead, Boehner is in a far weaker political position because he can't control his own caucus, and if we go over the "cliff," he will take the full blame.
Obviously I don't like calling it a "cliff." It's not all that bad if something gets done during January and February. Most of the fear-and-loathing has been for political effect.
"The turn of events appeared to weaken Boehner’s hand in budget negotiations with the White House. If his bold gambit had passed, the Republican leader would have gained a fresh bargaining chip in talks with President Obama" Typical media Spin on this news. Actually Republicans were angered after Barack Obama earlier BRAGGED at a news conference that John Boehner "CONCEDED" that tax increases on the "Rich" were necessary. ..Democrats really were looking for political cover for their unpopular tax increases. Now it is time for Obama to CONCEDE; otherwise HE owns the bad economy.
Unpopular tax increases! Did you follow the election results that showed that 60% of the voters favored tax increases on the top 2%?. Do you realize that 10% of that number came from people that didn`t even vote for Obama. You are so out of touch with any reality of what is going on that it is actually scary.
The spin from "Mikey's World", right next to Bizarro World. If your version helps you sleep at night, Mikey, then cling to it -- desperately.
This is certainly a unique tea party/republican holiday card to the taxpayers of America. You will note its two word text isn't Merry Christmas.
Merry (bad word that begins with the letter that comes after "e") Christmas!
Well I'm certainly proud I left a party of fruit cakes, nuts and other assorted deranged characters. Where are the Dirksen's, Dole's and other sane and noble Republicans when you need them. Gone, all gone and what is left is nothing short of pathetic.
The GOP has experienced a hostile takeover by the Tea Party, and they glibly said 'FU' to the venerable Senator Dole when they rejected the Disability Treaty.
What was that about Obama can't lead his party? Say what? What?
Does anyone remember the LAST gift from the te party? It was the budget standoff that dropped the US bond rating and then the stock market costing everyone's 401k's to go into the basement. Thanks to all the voters that put all these mental defectives in the US house, we'll probably go through the same thing again.
Obama needs to put his offer on the table (whatever version) and close the negotiations. It's as simple as that. This is where Obama just doesn't "get" the leadership thing. I keep waiting and hoping he'll grow a pair but it's just not in his nature. I'm glad he's there, but he just makes all of this so much more protracted than necessary.
Actually I think he may be merely holding back until after the end of the year for the new Congress and then simply get what he wants. Boehner can't get a bill passed and I think the Pres. knows it. Given that is the situation with Boehner there isn't much ponit in negotiating.
Another reason the President may not want to put an offer on the table and simply say "Vote!" is that he wants to avoid his own Plan B rout. The President arguably wants to make sure the votes are there when the time comes to vote on a plan blessed by him.
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Perhaps John Boehner (by all accounts a decent guy) should round up his supporters in the Republican caucus and cross the aisle, thereby becoming Democrats. Probably most could keep their seats in Congress. Apparently, fear of being "primaried" keeps a lot of otherwise reasonable Republicans from acting in a sane fashion.
Ever notice how it's always the South that holds the country back? Party labels change, but the behavior is always the same: threaten, scream, obstruct, delay, water-down, and plain old lie. Must be all that born-again religion among white Southerners.
Guess who will block the coming campaign to ban the sale of large-capacity, semi-automatic, military-style rifles?
As a son of the South who moved to Boston to escape, I think you have little idea how bad are the politics of the South. There are no meaner, more vicious politicians. They've been calling their opponents a variety of names from the time I was old enough to know about it. There have been at least a couple of incidents when a defeated governor refused to move out of the office. After 1954 it became even worse, with racists TV ads to enlighten your evening. Then it took a really nasty turn when Richard Nixon's "Southern strategy" consisted of inviting segregations (known by me and my friends as "segs") to become Republicans, using all the code words familiar to any Southerner. The segs are a little more sophisticated nowadays, but they're still there, dominating the Republican party and still using those code words.
Where does our political polarization come from? That's where. It's a Southern tradition. And it's often based on religion in a place where Baptists don't consider Catholics or Methodists as Christians. Intolerance is a way of life.
Correction: segregations = segregationists
The interesting question for me is why a savvy legislator like Boehner pushed PUBLICLY for a vote on a HIGH-STAKES issue before being sure of his caucus' support. This was an easily avoidable "error." I can't help but wonder if we're not hearing a key piece of the story.
His buddy Eric Cantor was on TV yesterday with that cold smile of his, promising the votes were all there. This team needs to be replaced -- period.
Worst. House Speaker. Ever. And worst Majority Whip ever, too. Either the Obama team were better vote-counters than Boehner and Cantor, or they knew that the Speaker was bluffing. In either case, they certainly knew it was all for show, since any bill that the GOP managed to get out of the House was DOA in the Senate. At this point, the Pres has opted to go over the fiscal cliff, and take his chances with the electorate.
There are a lot of Speakers that I know nothing about, not even their names, but I'm with you in spirit. Boehner is at least the worst I can remember.
I think he's probably a nice guy who might have made a fair Speaker a couple of decades ago, but that's a serious handicap in today's Congressional environment. Boehner apparently doesn't have the ability to cajole, threaten, or jaw-bone as needed. Considering some of the Congressmen he has to deal with, he needs to be a little ruthless.
Once the tax cuts have expired, the President can present a bill to restore the cuts for the middle class. He will have the upper hand because I don't think the most Republicans could realistically vote against it and he doesn't need all of them.