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Latest from Jay Bookman
Let 'em vote, Mr. Speaker. Let Congress do its job
If you believe John Boehner's words, he holds a strong negotiating position with President Obama. If you watch his actions, they communicate weakness poorly masked by bluster. “There are not the votes in the House to pass a clean CR" to reopen government, the embattled speaker told the country Sunday ...
Distortion damages debate
Sometimes, the little things tell you a lot. Here’s one example:Earlier this week, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid supposedly said that he didn’t really care whether the shutdown of the National Institutes of Health meant that some child afflicted with cancer might be denied treatment at an NIH facility. It ...
Klezmer meets rock and roll? Oy vey
OK, see, this is why you can't lose faith in America. We keep coming up with creative cross-fertilizations like the Shondes (a Yiddish term for shame or scandal). They're a bunch of Jewish kids from Brooklyn, putting out what a Rolling Stone reviewer calls "a mix of riot-grrrl furor, arena ...
Fox News' hilarious redefining of 'equally fed up'
Hilarious. You really have to admire the effort, if not the results. Here's how Fox News describes the results of its own newly released poll: "WHILE CONGRESS CONTINUES to point fingers over who is to blame for the current budget impasse, Fox News polls show Americans appear equally fed up ...
'... know when to hold 'em, know when to fold 'em'
To pull off a manuever of this magnitude with control of just one chamber of just one branch of government, three things are essential for Republicans: 1.) A clear plan of action, with a clear goal; 2.) A party committed to and fully united in support of that plan. 3.) ...
Economic chaos may not be enough to force deal
UPDATE, as reported by the New York Times: "WASHINGTON — With a budget deal still elusive and a deadline approaching on raising the debt ceiling, Speaker John A. Boehner has told colleagues that he is determined to prevent a federal default and is willing to pass a measure through a ...
What's really at stake in the shutdown/debt ceiling fight
A helpful reminder from Erick Erickson at RedState: "Congressmen, this is about shutting down Obamacare. Democrats keep talking about our refusal to compromise. They don’t realize our compromise is defunding Obamacare. We actually want to repeal it. This is it. Our endgame is to leave the whole thing shut down ...
Boehner's stunning hypocrisy exposed, loud and proud
An angry House Speaker John Boehner strode to the floor of the House Monday night, the night of the shutdown, to insist that all he was fighting for was fairness for the American people. He focused particularly on the bogus "exemption" from ObamaCare that is supposedly being given to members ...
First-day surge on exchanges proves pent-up demand
When Apple launched its iTunes Match software, which allows users to store and access their music on one site for all Apple devices, it proved so popular that Apple's servers crashed when so many users rushed to activate it. This was not considered an embarrassing failure on Apple's part, but ...
With Iran, a last best chance at a sane resolution
While President Obama refuses to negotiate with House Republicans over the budget and debt ceiling, saying that he won't talk with people who are threatening to harm the country, talks with Iran over ending its nuclear program seem to be progressing. In the most recent development, the Iranian Parliament has ...
Both parties playing a role in Georgia’s U.S. Senate race
Everything has to go almost perfectly for Democrat Michelle Nunn if she hopes to be truly competitive in next year’s U.S. Senate race here in Georgia.So far, things in Washington are going almost perfectly.Yes, the drama of a government shutdown and the possibility of another, much more serious confrontation over ...
This would be one sleazy, cynical escape hatch
I find this hard to believe, but hard-to-believe things are happening right and left these days. Mainly right. Now, I may be reading this wrong, but House Republicans appear to be eying the so-called Vitter amendment as their escape hatch from this little problem that they've created for themselves. The ...
Who put the handcuffs on Boehner? These guys did
John Boehner could end this right now. He has the votes; he just doesn't have the guts to use them. If he put a "clean" bill before the House that funded the government at current levels, with no extraneous language about ObamaCare or other issues, it would pass with a ...
The shutdown is here, so now we wait. Right, Mr. Speaker?
Apparently, Mr. Speaker, the president isn't going to negotiate. So ... now what's your plan? Wait to see who cracks first under the pressure that will mount, hour after hour, day after day, even week after week if necessary? OK then. We'll wait.... While we're waiting, though, maybe we should ...
GOP insists it will shoot the hostage. Really, it will....
Marc Thiessen, a former Bush speechwriter and now a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, has an interesting column in the Washington Post on the Republicans' hostage-taking strategy. He writes: "Democrats are in such a panic over the prospect of a government shutdown that President Obama spent four hours on ...
'ObamaCare exemption' a case study in GOP dysfunction
One of the recurring right-wing gripes about ObamaCare is that members of Congress and their staff were somehow granted an "exemption" from the law when it was passed in 2009. The complaint has become a standard part of the right's email-chain, talk-radio recitation about the evils of ObamaCare, with some ...
Stopping a dangerous strategy
In its early days, the Tea Party and its supporters made a great show of their reverence for the U.S. Constitution. At Tea Party rallies, speaker after speaker would reach into a back pocket, suit pocket or purse, pull out a copy of our government’s founding document and wave it ...
Because you just can't do everything ... that's life!
Frank Sinatra was The Man. No, strike that. Frank IS and will always be The Man. Back in the early '80s, during my Vegas years, I used to drive down the Strip, past Caesars' Palace, and the billboard out front would read simply, "He's here!" Because really, what else need ...
Ted Cruz wins big by losing big
Twenty-five Senate Republicans -- a majority of the GOP Senate caucus -- voted this afternoon to invoke cloture on a budget resolution to keep the government funded, and by doing so cast a vote in favor of ObamaCare. At least, that's how Ted Cruz and his supporters see it. Within ...
GOP leaks its list of demands for not killing the economy
The House GOP has leaked a tentative list of its demands in return for not wrecking the American economy and pushing the government into default on its debt. As reported by National Review, that list reads, and no, I'm not kidding: -------------------------------------------- One Year Debt Limit Increase Not a dollar ...
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