Tag Archives: ideology

Resistance is futile, rightwing voting base…

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Romney WILL be your nominee and you WILL vote for him in November. That’s just the way your personal ideologies and the GOP works together.

As TPM has reported, the Republican establishment seems quite interested in pulling back the intraparty attacks on Romney’s Bain record, and it seems they have good reason — in just a few short days it’s made a dent in Romney’s numbers, suggesting what many pollsters have argued about his support: It’s soft.

The underscore that point, the PPP data had a simple point. The firm asked Republican voters “Generally speaking, would you like the Republican nominee for President to be Mitt Romney or someone else?” 34 percent said they were for Romney. A majority of 58 percent said someone else.

— South Carolina Was Always Going To Be A Fight, And Now It Is

A short summary of what the Republican party and its base stands for:

Teaparty Republicans on the debt limit: ‘Give us what we want or the eagle gets it.’

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What will the Teaparty Republicans demand in order to not destroy their own country?

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) suggested Tuesday that Congress will allow the country to hit its debt ceiling, and continue to hold out for dramatic spending cuts while the nation approaches a genuine default.

“I think Treasury has, if I’m not mistaken, has put … out a notice that there is a window within which we have to act in order to avoid the eventual default of this country on its debt,” Cantor told reporters at his weekly Capitol briefing. “And I believe that that outside deadline is early July.”

[...] Geithner laid it out like this. “The Treasury Department now projects that the debt limit will be reached no later than May 16, 2011.”

If the debt limit is not increased by May 16, the Treasury Department has authority to take certain extraordinary measures, described in detail in the appendix, to temporarily postpone the date that the United States would otherwise default on its obligations. These actions, which have been employed during previous debt limit impasses, would be exhausted after approximately eight weeks, meaning no headroom to borrow within the limit would be available after about July 8, 2011.

A commenter simplifies it nicely: If we even get into that zone between “we’ve borrowed the most we can” and “we can’t pay the interest on what we’ve already borrowed,” interest rates are going to start going up and credit is going to getting stupid-tight again. And that’s what Cantor’s saying they’re doing.

 

Wait – who wanted a government shutdown again?

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Michele Bachmann said the Democrats want a government shutdown so they can blame the tea party:

Sure, whatever you say, Bachmann. We’ll just forget about the tea party rallies where “Shut it down!” was a favorite thing to scream and carry on a sign, by both Republican lawmakers / speakers and the teaparty crowd.

And we’ll forget about the NON-BUDGETARY, CHRISTIAN RIGHT-WING riders that your Teaparty Republicans in the House tried to slip into negotiations on budget and spending — extreme far-right social issues that your side was willing to shut down our government for, issues having nothing to do with spending cuts or deficits.

We’ll forget how the tea party really feels about ‘compromise’:

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We’ll forget how Boehner felt he had to appease THE TEA PARTY first in these negotiations, and how the Teaparty Republicans were so willing to shut down our government, cause economic chaos, and furlough 800,000 federal employees for social conservatism — just to stay in the tea party’s good graces.

And finally, we’ll forget about this past week’s Gallup poll finding that Republicans are the only group who expect their leaders to hold out for what they want (51-44), even if it leads to a shutdown. By contrast, Dems (68 percent) and independents (60 percent) strongly support a compromise. Via

There’s absolutely no reason anyone could blame the poor tea party, right?

The policy riders that caused the Teaparty-induced government shutdown

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What are these ‘policy provisions’ (Teaparty ideology) that the Republicans vowed there would be “no compromise” over?

See them all here: OMB Watch: HR 1 Policy Riders (PDF document).

Here’s an example of just SOME of the HEALTH CARE and HOMELAND SECURITY riders: Continue reading →

UPDATED: Mike Pence at a Teaparty rally on a government shutdown: “Shut it down”

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There should be no question as to who’s pushing for a shutdown. Just in case there is, here’s tough guy Mike Pence (R-Ind) at the Teaparty rally of “dozens” last Thursday, saying “Shut it down!” if the Republican-Teaparty doesn’t get their way.

Republican reasoning all along has been “no compromise” because of the Teaparty. And if Democrats won’t agree to all the ideological riders in HR1, it’s the Dems fault if there’s a government shutdown. They must not realize everyone can see through that. It’s definitely your fault if your starting, middle, and ending position in a “negotiation” is “no compromise.“

UPDATED: Pence today:

Related: UPDATED: Is it fair to blame the teaparty for a government shutdown?

Remember who to thank if there’s a government shutdown

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Related: UPDATED: Is it fair to blame the teaparty for a government shutdown?

GOP-Teaparty House freshmen to Harry Reid: agree with us or resign!

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Here’s what the freshmen Teaparty-Republicans in the House spend all their time doing (entertaining their tea-base):

ZOMG! Will Reid resign?!

FLASHBACK: Here’s how the Teaparty-Republicans have entertained their tea-base for the first quarter of 2011:

SIX ISSUES the Teaparty-Republicans consider more important than jobs

Because there has been NO JOBS’ BILL created or even discussed, the House Republicans’ supposed “mandate” last November apparently meant they should spend 3 months on the following cultural / societal issues:

1) Curtailing Abortion Rights

2) Defunding Planned Parenthood

3) Defunding NPR

4) Investigating American Muslims

5) Declaring English As America’s Official Language

6) Reaffirming The “In God We Trust” Motto

Read more…

Does any of that sound very serious or productive to anyone else but teabaggers?  Maybe next time there’s a mid-term election, more people might get out and vote…

Government Shutdown Update: Boehner has chosen Teaparty ideology & politics over $73 billion in cuts

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Greg Sargent (emphasis mine):

A senior Senate Democratic aide tells me that in today’s private meeting at the White House, Speaker John Boehner signaled to the President and to Harry Reid that Republicans were not willing to support any budget compromise that can’t garner the votes of 218 Republicans in the House. That would be a break from the GOP’s previous posture: Republican leaders had appeared willing to reach a deal that could pass the House with Republican and Democratic support, even if it meant losing some Republicans.

[...] “Rather than finding common ground, they’re more concerned with appeasing the Tea party and extreme right wing than finding common ground with Democrats,” the Dem aide continued.

[...] “We are now at the figure that was Speaker Boehner’s original proposal,” [President] Obama said. “Speaker Boehner originally called for $73 billion worth of cuts. Members of his caucus insisted on making it $100 billion. What we’ve said is, `We’re willing to go to 73.’”

Same article:

Harry Reid, speaking to reporters just now, went public with this charge, claiming:

“We thought for several days that we were very close to an agreement, but the meeting at the White House and the negotiations over the weekend really indicated to me and I think most people who are watching this that the leadership in the House is being guided by the tea party. They’re saying they won’t agree to anything unless they get 218 Republican votes. We all know that’s a nonstarter. We couldn’t have passed the last short-term C.R. if that were the case. We have been willing to compromise at $73 billion. Our problem is, we cannot agree to take all that from domestic discretionary spending. This $73 billion was the Republicans’ original proposal. So I guess they were for it before they were against it. But now they’re moving the goal post again.”

It will be the Republican-Teaparty’s fault if there’s a government shutdown

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Brent Budowsky at The Hill’s Pundit Blog correctly blames the Republican-Teaparty IF a government shutdown happens on April 8. Why? Because a shutdown will mean TP lawmakers refused to compromise  on any amount of deficit spending cuts if they can’t have their ideologically extremist riders on the H.R. 1 bill. They don’t CARE about spending cuts — it’s the ideology. And that’s what I’ve been saying for days.

The state of negotiations today is that a deal is close that would cut about $33 billion, supported by Democrats, more than halfway toward the Republican position.

If there is a deal-breaker, it would be because ideologically extreme Republicans want to wage near-religious wars against their enemies of the month: NPR, Planned Parenthood and the Environmental Protection Agency. This has virtually nothing to do with reducing the deficit, and everything to do with an ideological extremism of Republicans that is far outside the main stream of American opinion.

I believe there will be a deal, but if there is no deal, and there is a government shutdown, it will be a Republican government shutdown caused by ideological crusades that the American people will not join Republicans in supporting.

Tea Party support is falling fast in the polls.

Read more…

And the Tea Party may as well fold up their misspelled signs, climb aboard their Li’l Rascals, go home and deal with their wacky anger issues over things like “modern day” or “the year 2011.”  Not only did today’s TP rally in DC draw ‘dozens‘ but regular Americans (as opposed to TP ‘Muricans) really don’t like the Tea Party (emphasis mine):

The tea party has hit rock bottom in the eyes of the American public, a new CNN/Opinion Research poll found Wednesday. Just 32 percent of respondents viewed the tea party favorably, while a record-high 47 percent had a negative view of the movement that propelled Republicans to dramatic Congressional victories last November. Fourteen percent had no opinion, and 7 percent said they’ve never heard of the tea party. — Raw Story

Government shutdown: “Nothing is agreed to until everything is agreed to.”

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Aside from the numbers that still seem up in the air, the stalemate over the Republican-Teaparty House members’ ideological riders isn’t going away anytime soon — especially today (emphasis mine below):

The $33 billion figure, disclosed by a congressional aide familiar with the talks and confirmed by Biden, who used a measuring stick tied to Obama’s budget instead of a current spending freeze. The number is well below the $60 billion-plus in cuts that the House passed last month, but it still represents significant movement by Senate Democrats and the administration after originally backing a freeze at current rates.

Under Biden’s math, the White House is conceding $73 billion in cuts from Obama’s requests, which contained increases never approved by Congress. Republicans originally wanted $100 billion in cuts using the same gauge.

Some tea party-backed GOP lawmakers want the original $100 billion. With a tea party rally set for Thursday on Capitol Hill, it’s unclear how many of the 87 freshmen Republicans elected last fall could live with the arrangement between top Democrats and House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio.

Both sides said the figure under consideration is tentative at best and depends on the outcome of numerous policy stands written into the bill…

Read more…

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Government Shutdown: what’s the Republican-Teaparty trying to prove?

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Ezra Klein says it’s beginning to look a lot like a shutdown (emphasis mine):

Brian Beutler has a nice story running down the state of play on the budget negotiations. The takeaway is that Republicans aren’t just insisting that Democrats cut as deep as the GOP wants, but that they also cut in the way the GOP wants. House Appropriations Committee aide Bob Inglee, for instance, told Democrats “they should reach a spending cut target by choosing from the menu of cuts included in the controversial House-passed continuing resolution.” Reading this, you really wouldn’t know that Democrats, who control both the White House and the Senate, technically have a lot more power than Republicans, who only control the House. At the very least, no one appears to have told this to the Republicans.

Brian Beutler says:

Even if this impasse is bridged, the three parties still haven’t addressed the question of policy riders — abortion restrictions, EPA authority and other issues — many of which Republican  rank and file members want included in the final package.

Harry Reid provided a statement this afternoon that doesn’t sound very hopeful (emphasis mine):

I am extremely disappointed that after weeks of productive negotiations with Speaker Boehner, Tea Party Republicans are scrapping all the progress we have made and threatening to shut down the government if they do not get all of their extreme demands. The division between the Tea Party and mainstream Republicans is preventing us from reaching a responsible solution on a long-term budget that will make smart cuts while protecting American jobs, and prevented negotiations from taking place over the weekend even as the clock ticks toward a government shutdown. Apparently these extremists would rather shut down the government and risk sending our economy back into a recession than work with Democrats or even their own leadership to find a responsible compromise.

“For the sake of our economy, it’s time for mainstream Republicans to stand up to the Tea Party and rejoin Democrats at the table to negotiate a responsible solution that cuts spending while protecting jobs.

Hint: this is really NOT going to be about deficit spending or a budget. Regardless of what it does to our country or economy or recovery or people, the Republican-Teaparty will have their tax cuts for the wealthy and their ideological riders (spending  cuts for everyone else) — even if just as much spending could be cut elsewhere.

No, this is about freedom boners and the Teaparty wants to prove theirs are the biggest. We’ll see.

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