If Boehner Breaks Hastert Rule over CRomnibus, that Frees ALL Republicans to Support New Speaker

The only ethical response to betrayal by one's own leader is to find a new leader.

There have been famous betrayals, but for America one stands out. Benedict Arnold was a general in the American Revolution. Thousands of officers and enlisted followed him, obeyed him, attended to his every word. That was prior to September 21, 1780 and his plot with the British to turn over the critically strategic ground of West Point to the British in exchange for money and position. After his betrayal of his country, it would have been a strange thing indeed to have found his troops arguing that they still owed Arnold that same loyalty as they had before. After all, his own actions had violated the trust they had placed in him.

During the Speakership of Dennis Hastert (Republican, Illinois) Hastert verbalized the idea that a speaker who relied on the minority party to pass a bill was violating the trust of his fellow majority members. Hastert said that it was not his job to push legislation that had been rejected by most of those who had elected him to the office of Speaker of the House. The unofficial rule is that a majority of the majority party must support a bill before it is brought to a vote. Otherwise, a Speaker is using cronies to permit the minority party to rule the House of Representatives.

During his time as Speaker, John Boehner has violated the Hastert Rule six times, and even though Boehner himself once rejected the idea of passing bills with minority party votes, he has used this method of passing spending bills that would have been rejected by his own supporters.

Boehner's most famous betrayal was last February 2014 when he had support from only a mere TWENTY-EIGHT Republican representatives but still put a so-called 'clean debt ceiling' bill up for vote. That bill passed by a vote of 221-201, overwhelmingly democratic. Boehner had obviously betrayed the trust of his supporters while heeding the voices of 28 cronies against the vast majority of his own people.

Much was made this past election about those who were shunned in their House races for election when they suggested that they might not support Boehner for Speaker in the new Congress that takes power in January 2015. Marilinda Garcia had funds withheld by the Republican Campaign Committee when she hinted that she would not support Boehner for Speaker. http://www.redstate.com/2014/10/06/nrcc-withholds-funds-after-marilinda-garcia-nh-02-says-she-may-not-vote-for-boehner/

At best, this is a new member of the Republican House being told that loyalty is expected of its members. At worst, it is campaign extortion. In either case, however, there is the message being sent from the Speaker that support should be forthcoming from the membership toward the leadership.

Arnold expected support from his troops. He was their general. He had been victorious in battle, had suffered hardship alongside them, and had even shared the danger of the heat of battle. In many ways he had earned their respect and their support.

But his betrayal canceled all that. He went over to the other side. He put his own troops at grave risk. He is justly condemned by history. His name has become a byword for traitor.

A leader who turns to his enemy to win a victory for the enemy over his own troops and their interests is rightly called a "Benedict Arnold."

Speaker Boehner has willingly betrayed his own troops in the past. If he does so in this matter of a funding bill that permits our lawless President to pay for illegal immigrants to receive status and benefits, then Boehner has betrayed not just his own caucus, but he has betrayed the huge majority of voters who chose republicans this past November to stop amnesty, to stop ObamaCare, to stop out-of-control spending, and to stop a chaotic foreign policy.

Boehner will steal one entire year of power from the Congress that has not yet taken office, for their power of funding will be neutered until September of 2015. He will betray the support his own people have shown him by siding with the enemy.

He will also violate the terms of his understanding with those who were to support him for Speaker. They give loyalty in return for loyalty. They give support in return for support. They will have been betrayed.

There will be zero reason to continue him as Speaker of the House. The only ethical response to betrayal by one's own leader is to find a new leader.

“So, there's nothing worth saving here?”

Please explain the line of reasoning that lead you from my remarks to that conclusion.
In the final analysis, my remarks were too brief, too cryptic (perhaps that is saying the same thing two different ways), and therefore easily misconstrued.
So . . . my fault.

Democrats were the Slavers (there were others . . . Moslems, Monarchists, etc) opposed to Lincoln and the party he founded. Later, events forced them into becoming Segregationists. But Democrats cared for neither term (Slavers or Segregationists ~ who can blame them), so they chose to piggyback their misanthropic ideas on the liberality of Jefferson – Madison, calling themselves “Liberals,” “Progressives,” and the like. To this day, Democrats attempt to use threats, bribes, and intimidation to get what they want. Some Republicans have likewise always thought of themselves as “liberal” and for all practical purposes are indistinguishable from Democrats (we call them RINOs). The days of the whip and the sale block, or even of the KKK are gone, of course, but the same devices applied in more subtle ways still prevail, as have they always, and will continue to be applied until they are exhausted (if ever that day comes).

None of the above, of course, having to do in any way with the Judeo-Christian ideas of the Founding Fathers, of which Lincoln spoke so highly.

“Or am I reading too much into what you wrote, dear brother in Christ?”

Indeed, I think you are.

In the final analysis, my remarks were too brief, too cryptic (perhaps that is saying the same thing two different ways), and therefore easily misconstrued.

Dear brother in Christ, indeed your remarks were "too brief, too cryptic." The hope motivating my reply was to draw out your thoughts; and so, I tossed you a "bouquet."

I don't think I "misconstrued" your remarks. I had written:

It is evident that America is now a “house divided against itself.”

And you replied:

As it was in Lincoln’s day, has been ever since, and always was.

I instantly caught the (unstated) reference to the history of human chattel slavery in America. I have long thought that the "three-fifths of a person" definition pertaining to some men is the Achilles Heel of the U.S. Constitution. From the beginning, as it were.

And you are right to say as it "always was." I daresay many, if not most, of the Founders were slaveowners. It is beyond question that George Washington and Thomas Jefferson owned slaves.

Still, I find it interesting that, at the end of their lives, the two men made entirely different decisions about the future of their human captives.

By his Last Will and Testament, Washington emancipated all his slaves.

When Jefferson died, he left an estate $200K in the red (in then-current dollars — a "King's Ransom," an astronomical sum in today's dollars). He had over 200 slaves employed in agriculture, and also in his manufacturing activities (he was a huge nail mogul for a time), some of whom were highly skilled and ingenious individuals.

So, what did his Last Will and Testament provide for with respect to these human captives?

Except for five, all were sold as his chattel property at auction, to help defray claims against his (bankrupt) estate.

The five who were emancipated are nowadays widely regarded as his own children, born of the slave Sally Hemmings (possibly the half-sister of his beloved wife, who died young). TJ did not emancipate Sally. [Possibly he had sound reasons for this.]

Just goes to show that there is a sort of difference in character between a Washington and a Jefferson.... To me, the former is almost a saint; and the latter, the very figure of the modern, post-Enlightenment Man.

So the background here goes deep. You pick up at the time when "Democrats were the Slavers," first made manifest in the Abolition Movement, which eventuated in the bloodiest and most costly war America has ever fought, the Civil War, made even more ugly by the fact that it was a war conducted between brothers.

In the aftermath, after the assassination of Lincoln, Republicans in Congress proposed Amendments to the federal Constitution guaranteeing, not only the emancipation of slaves, but also their right as U.S. citizens to enjoy all the benefits as equal members of American society, under just and — above all — equal laws.

The congressional Democrats fought the Thirteenth, Fourteenth, and Fifteenth Amendments tooth and nail. But in the end, they could not stop their submission to the States for ratification. At least three-fourths of the States ratified them, as constitutionally mandated [Article V]. Voilà: new constitutional Law.

The response of the Democrat Party? Well. certainly it was not to bow their heads to the will of the supermajority of the sovereign States. Instead, it turned out that, wherever the Democrat party was dominant, a regime of "separate but equal," of Jim Crow law, even active terrorist repression (e.g., the Ku Klux Klan) became the norm for the next roughly one-hundred years.

So, my question is: Why, oh why, do so many contemporary Americans of (remote) African heritage seem to believe the Democrat Party is in the business of defending and advancing their interests???

A total cynic might say that "one can take the slave out of the 'plantation'; but that doesn't necessarily mean that one can ever take the 'plantation' out of the slave."

I feel sure that such a "conclusion" would leave some of our greatest, pre-eminent American thinkers — such as the "magnificent" Frederick Douglass, Booker T. Washington, Martin Luther King, Jr., et al. — spinning in their graves....

I daresay this sort of thing — "underclass" social dependency — really got started with LBJ. Race relations were beginning to boil in his time. I gather he figured the best way to manage that situation — to the benefit of his Party, of course — was to recognize that Black Americans "were voters, too"; and thus "could be bought."

So today, we are still reaping the whirlwind of that constitutional Achilles Heel.... For even though the American People, through Civil War and Article V constitutional American legal process, have sought to rectify this early profound defect in our original Law, making "reparations" for it in multi-trillion-dollar expenditures of taxpayer money over the past five decades — race relations in America seem to be going from bad to worse. And the economic status of many Black Americans has likewise gotten worse.

I guess we can thank our ersatz-president 0bama for that. He's a "transformational president" all right. But he is not a "healer"; he is a DIVIDER.

His main tactic is division leading to conquest. He uses the "Race Card" to move his "agenda" along.

He could care less about the genuine welfare and prospects of Black Americans. They are just other pieces to be played, in whatever game he's playing.

But THAT is a subject for another time!!!

Anyhoot, just some musings, my friend. If I offended you in what I wrote, please know that was never my intention; and that I apologize to you, and hope you will forgive me.

Thank you so very much for expounding your thoughts, dear brother in Christ!

I hope and pray that you and all your dear ones will have a Happy, Blessed, Merry Christmas!

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