Posted on 12/20/2012 5:33:30 PM PST by SeekAndFind
WASHINGTON – House Republican leaders abruptly pulled their fallback tax bill from the floor Thursday night, conceding that they did not have the votes to pass it.
“The House did not take up the tax measure today because it did not have sufficient support from our members to pass,” Speaker John A. Boehner said in a statement. “Now it is up to the president to work with Senator Reid on legislation to avert the fiscal cliff.”
The decision was a major setback for the speaker, who was pushing his so-called Plan B to prevent lower tax rates from expiring on most Americans. It came after the House had narrowly approved a plan to suspend planned Pentagon cuts.
With just days to go before more than a half trillion dollars in tax increases and spending cuts kick in, a chasm separates congressional Republicans from President Obama, even though the latest deficit offers from the president and the speaker are numerically very close.
The struggle to win Republican support for a measure that would allow income taxes to rise on a sliver of the top one percent of taxpayers telegraphed a grave decision for the speaker. A deal with the president would almost certainly lose a huge swath of his Republican conference, but it could pass with Democratic support. Does he make that deal and risk a Republican revolt, or do leaders allow the nation to careen off the so-called fiscal cliff?
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
Yay! Maybe some of our Reps have spines after all.
They did pass a spending bill, didn’t they?
How about simply putting up a bill to extend the current rates for all (and all house republicans should go for that). Then leave it to the senate dems and the dim president to turn it down raising the taxes for all?
Americans have sent a loud and clear message: they want higher taxes.
They should get them.
Barry’s freeloading 47% is going to be really PO’d that “the rich” won’t subsidize their nanny state and pay for all their freebies. It’s possible those “obama foams” are about to run out of minutes. LOL!
Boehner made a big mistake by agreeing to raise taxes. The Republicans should have made sure they don’t want taxes to go up for ANYONE. That way if sequestration happens, they can say they were not for it.
Boehner made a big mistake by agreeing to raise taxes. The Republicans should have made sure they don’t want taxes to go up for ANYONE. That way if sequestration happens, they can say they were not for it.
It’s good news that Boehner was not able to get the votes for his idiotic “Plan B.” Also, that there’s not much time remaining for this worst of all negotiators to come up with Plans C - Z.
I hope the refusal of enough Republicans to back “Plan B” is a harbinger of things to come, like tossing Boehner’s sorry rear end out of the leadership (along with Cantor and McCarthy).
I figured as much when I heard Paul Broun one of our great conservative reps from N GA stood up and gave a “not gonna do it” speech today.
This is the best possible outcome.
Now there will be no more phoney “negotiations” and the ball is entirely in BO’s court. Whatever happens it will be BO’s economy.
This will tend to conflict with the conventional wisdom that the Tea Party is a spent force.
No plan B. Too bad, how sad. Maybe now to plan C.
Boehner needs to resign now. The republicans look like idiots. This is not helpfull at all. Bottom line no leverage, no leadership, pass the cuts at under 250k, regroup and fight in Feb. over debt ceiling. Anything else we look like crap.
You are correct
Polling says something completely different. Dems are dancing on twitter and laughing right now.
Boehner is now a SINO, Speaker in name only. His leadership is done!
Excellent. Hopefully, the next step will be to replace the Orange Pussy as Speaker.
“Take a stand conservatives! Stand up to the rinos! Don’t trust Boehner! Don’t raise taxes!”
Huh? What? You actually did what I asked? Wahhhhh! We should have compromised! Wahhhhhh! This will hurt us!”
Have the house pass a bill making the Bush era tax rates permanent. They’re not cuts since everyone’s taxes remain the same. Drop it in the Senate’s lap and go on Christmas break. Let Barry and Ried deal with it. Boehner & co. will get blamed no matter what so screw ‘em.
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