Posted on 06/30/2010 8:30:18 AM PDT by Maelstorm
Well, it is official.
Eric Cantor and John Boehner — particularly Eric Cantor — have decided they don’t need or want conservatives and, more troubling, do not have any intention of trying to win at the polls by forcing Democrat hands on Obamacare.
Our leadership is behaving badly.
Last week and on Monday I mentioned Rep. Steve King’s effort to repeal Obamacare and start over. He’s filed a discharge petition. If he gets 218 signatures, Nancy Pelosi must hold a vote.
At the time, I was hearing that Eric Cantor was desperate to undermine Steve King’s efforts and, sure enough, he’s trying. Worse, he has John Boehner helping him.
Let me explain.
King’s legislative effort would repeal Obamacare and start over. In effect, all those Democrats who have been saving they too want to start over get a “put up or shut up” moment by signing the King discharge petition.
Today, Eric Cantor and John Boehner are announcing that they’ll sign King’s discharge petition, but they’re also going to go with one by Congressman Wally Herger that would repeal Obamacare and replace it with a Republican alternative.
Notice that Cantor and Boehner were absolutely silent on Rep. King’s efforts until they had Wally Herger’s discharge petition ready to go. Why? Because they want to bully Republican House members into signing the Herger petition and undercut the repeal effort with a “replace and replace with lame legislation” effort. In effect, this undercuts a unified repeal effort and muddies the waters.
This is a direct confrontation by the House GOP leadership with conservatives and with Heritage Action for America, the Heritage Foundation’s spin off 501(c)(4) group.
It is also stupid for a number of reasons:
* If the GOP unites behind the Heritage effort on the King “Repeal Obamacare” bill, we actually have a chance of winning. 60% of Americans want this to happen, and numerous Democrats are gettable in this fight. The Herger “Repeal and Replace” bill has zero chance of passing, it will drive a number of GOP members away who don’t agree with this particular replacement bill and give Democrats an easy excuse to not sign onto the repeal movement. * The Republican alternative is a milquetoast alternative. * The Republicans are buying into the slacker mandate — letting adults stay on their parents’ health insurance until they are 26 years old. * The Republicans spent months calling on the Democrats to work with the GOP to draft Obamacare. The Cantor-Boehner strategy means the GOP is now pushing a proposal to the floor of the House without input from the left or even from conservatives.
Tea Party activists and others should pay attention here: Eric Cantor and John Boehner are implementing a strategy that makes it look like they are on your side, but are in fact stabbing you in the back.
Cantor and Boehner are spinning this as a good thing. But it is not. It muddies the water and gives Democrats an escape from being forced to take action.
Any Republican who signs on to the Herger discharge petition should be driven from office for betraying the “repeal” cause. This does nothing but provide cover to people who don’t really want to repeal Obamacare, just nibble at the edges.
And should the GOP take back Congress in November, we should remember this betrayal and the lies that go with it.
I met Cantor prior to the 2008 elections. I told him that Republican congressmen should run against the left. They should point out how bad things have gotten since the Democrats took over. I told him that even if we lost in 08, it would set the rhetorical and ideological stage for 2010. I may as well have been speaking Martian.
Cantor wanted individual races.
He lacks will and political foresight. He’s a Jew and a Columbia grad so it’s nice to have him in congress, but he is above his pay grade in the GOP leadership.
These men do NOT seem to have the fire in their bellies or the guts to fight bloody with the opposition...NO ONE appears to be fighting for the return of the Constitution, our liberty and our rights....they seem to back down or back off when they meet resistance...all talk, no ACTION.
When is the GOP in general going to develop some balls...why is the GOP so weak...where the hell are the patriots we need...WE THE PEOPLE have certainly shown just how patriotic and resolved we are to win in November.
Get good and angry and VOTE EACH AND EVERY PROGRESSIVE REPUBLICAN (EVERY RINO) OUT OF OFFICE. SUPPORT CONSERVATIVES WITH YOUR TIME AND FUNDING. FIGHT LIKE THE COMMUNISTS/SOCIALISTS IN THE WHITE HOUSE DO....FOR KEEPS.
I totally agree with you. You’ve put it all in prospective.
We’re the boots on the ground and it will be up to US to win the day, with or without the GOP. Stay focused, stay vigilant and crush the enemy.
Agree, as do several other posters upstream of you.
Conservatives can and are rolled too easily by the left. Happens to conservative politicians, happens to conservative voters. There is this hair-trigger gene many have and the donks know just how to take advantage of it.
Repeal only will be used against us as the Party of No with no ideas of their own. You need to also be for something and people need to see the choice.
Strategy and tactics do go beyond “Kill them all”. We will lose if conservatives continue to pound their chests and demand 100% purity along with jumping sideways with every new release of innuendo.
The only way the sheeple will accept repeal is with a replacement bill that does things right, and in a way we conservatives can accept.
Yes, that is correct, IMO. Also, it can probably be kept to 10 pages or less, be put online for several weeks and debated everywhere, openly and then changed in accordance with public inputs, if needed.
If we can show ideas that work without draconian central government controls and loss of liberty, I cannot see how we can fail. The recent decline in even donk earmarks due to the GOP avoiding all earmarks, is an example of leadership from our side that works.
Not shocked. I don’t trust either of them.
By all accounts we will win the house, so why give them any time in the spotlight? To use a football metaphor, don’t spike the ball until you cross the goal line.
The GOP backers are Charlie Brown and the RINOs are Lucy.
Cantor is backpeddling faster than Jimmy Carter running from a rabbit.
He is? Just today I read that he doesn't want to repeal all of ObamaCare, just parts of it. "Repeal and replace," or more honestly, "We can do socialism better than the Democrats."
They are making a mistake. Even if they will ultimate keep some provisions this is not the technique one takes to achieve the goal of repeal. I really don’t understand why they don’t get it. All that blurring the line does is make it harder as well as set the stage for the dilution of opposition to that horrible bill. I’m beginning to think that some in the GOP are willing to go soft on Obamacare to help set the stage for the ascendancy of Mitt Romney.
And leaving “pre-existing conditions” in negates the whole purpose of insurance.
The entire idea of insurance is that you can assess the risk of an event in a pool of people who are paying premiums.
As soon as you say that somebody gets to wait until AFTER they have an event to join the pool, you are no longer talking about something rational.
Irrationality is the sole province of government.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.