House GOP - Government As Farce

I've copied this from my blog. Excerpts from Mr. Benen's article are oriented at the left margin. My comments are indented. If this proves difficult to read, you can see the original post here: http://whateyethynk-politics.blogspot.com/2014/08/eye-recommend-border-failure-rocks.html


BORDER FAILURE ROCKS HOUSE GOP LEADERSHIP, by Steve Benen --

Simply unbelievable.

"It's hard to overstate what a humiliating failure this is for the House Republican leadership team, especially House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio).

House Republican efforts to build support among their more conservative members collapsed Thursday as congress prepares to cut town for a month-long recess without first passing a funding bill to address the thousands of unaccompanied minors being detained at the U.S. border.

Confronted with the Republican leadership's inability to shore up enough votes, House Speaker John Boehner pulled the doomed legislation, which would have provided $659 million in emergency aid to the U.S. border."

Mr. Benen then explains that an emergency meeting would be held Thursday evening before Congress adjourned for their 5-week Summer vacation, but the news today (Friday) is that Congress will remain in session for an additional day to see if Speaker Boehner can corral more votes for the bill.

"It was the first real test for the new House Republican leadership team and they appear to have failed miserably.

In a statement, Boehner blamed President Obama for Republican's inability to pass their own legislation."

How it can possibly be seen as President Obama's fault that House GOP members refused to vote for a bill they themselves wrote is beyond me; but then blaming the President is easier for the Speaker than admitting his own ineffectual brand of "leadership" I suppose. And it plays so well to the GOP's fact-adverse base.

&quot Mr. Boehner) urged the president to take unilateral action regardless of Congress."

You have got to be kidding me!

"The timing is breathtaking: literally yesterday, GOP lawmakers voted to sue Obama for circumventing Congress, and less than 24 hours later, Boehner is publicly urging Obama to circumvent Congress.

The resulting image is a helpless party, lacking leaders, direction, and purpose. House Republicans were desperate to prove they're capable of being a governing party, and in the process, they've proven the opposite...

...The real story today is one of epic incompetence and a party that's practically developed an allergy to completing the basic tasks of government.

This is, of course, great news for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who now appears to have more influence over what happens in the House than the actual House Republican leadership team.

But in the meantime, John Boehner's Speakership is turning into something of a tragedy. How many times has he put together a bill, only to be betrayed by his own folllowers? A Democratic source on Capitol Hill recently sent around a brutal collection of bills Boehner asked his members to support, only to see his own House GOP conference reject his appeals: a grand bargain, a debt-celing bill in 2011, a payroll tax extension, a transportation bill, a farm bill, one fiscal-cliff bill, another fiscal-cliff bill, another farm bill, and then yesterday. I think my source might have even missed a couple, including the collapse of Boehner's debt-ceiling bill in February 2014...

...Boehner has to be asking himself about the value of a leader with no followers. As if we needed additional evidence, he remains the Speaker In Name Only."

Republicans across the country have been screaming that something needs to be done about the crisis at our Southern border. The Senate, with bi-partisan support, quickly passed a bill to fund and deal with the problem. The House refused to even read that bill, (because it was a bi-partisan agreement or because the President supported it--take your pick), saying instead they would write their own, which they did. But then John Boehner pulled the bill because not enough Republicans wanted to vote for that one either.

I imagine that even Southern Republican Governors are scratching their heads this morning.

So what we have is a party that writes its own bill then refuses to vote for it and a party leader who tells the man he is suing for what he calls over-stepping his position that he should solve the problem by over-stepping his position.

Someday, someone will write a doctoral thesis on this period in our history. I suggest the title: Government as Farce, the Story of How the Republican Party Chased Its Own Tail Until It Choked On It.