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The Republicans Who Voted to Lose — Again
This is about the 1.7 TRILLION dollar spending bill, but it might as well be the title of a weekly column.
The Democrats shoved a four THOUSAND page bill under the pen of Mitch McConnell while they were in a lame-duck House session. All the Republicans had to do was threaten (or force) a shutdown and resolve it with yet another CR, a Continuing Resolution to bridge the operation of government until the next session, in which the Republicans control the House by a slim majority. If I recall correctly, all bills not signed before the next session become moot. This would force the production of a new bill in a House controlled by the GOP, and since this is revenue, it’s the House’s job.
A handful of House Republicans have threatened the Senate GOP with dire consequences if they let this apocalyptic bill pass, and now the Senate has done just that instead of working to peel one or two Democrats away, with the following Republicans joining the Democrats to pass the damned thing by a supermajority:
Richard Shelby – AL
Lisa Murkowski – AK
Tom Cotton – AR
James Inhofe – IA
Todd Young – IN
Jerry Moran – KS
Mitch McConnell – KY
John Boozman – LA
Susan Collins – ME
Roy Blunt – MO
Roger Wicker – MS
Rob Portman – OH
Lindsey Graham – SC
Mike Rounds – SD
John Thune – SD
John Cornyn – TX
Mitt Romney – UT
Shelley Capito – WV
Rep. Chip Roy (R – TX) seems to be leading the charge from the House to hold Senate Republicans accountable. This is right and good, and I hope he gets the support he deserves. He will certainly have my support. You all know me — I could not possibly argue against this:
“Kill this terrible bill or there is no point in pretending we are a united party.”
Hit ’em again, Chip!
The incoming House majority is a slim one indeed, which weakens the GOP. It, therefore, strengthens the crunchy-cons who want the GOP to straighten up and act like something other than Democrats. Whatever the GOP wants in the House, it can be threatened by a kingmaking minority. And the GOP’s response will as usual be to partner up with Democrats to defeat conservatives. They did this to “crush the Tea Party” and they did it when Trump was President.
Watch for the numerous inevitable instances of Republicans lining up to negotiate with their Democrat pals while fighting against the conservative base. I’ll certainly have no interest in your point of view if you refuse to see it for what it is this third time around. Chip Roy ain’t havin’ it and neither am I.
His Twitter feed is a great place to start.
He has been calling out earmarks, sponsoring amendments to cut various abusive expenditures and naming names for the wall of shame.
I do not suspect that he will go the way of Tom Cotton or Dan Crenshaw any time soon. This is my guy.
Published in General
There was no foresight about Ukraine. There was no foresight about energy policy and who has the leverage. Now everybody pays.
Government needs to stick to basic “public goods” like foreign policy and national security.
The vast majority of countries are garbage. Maybe we can help them. Maybe we can’t.
Trading with China was a terrible idea. They are mafia that wants to rip off their own people and the whole planet. We could have imported wage deflation and job destruction from anywhere else.
There are Americans and American presidents who did have such foresight. I seem to remember that the WSJ was warning about energy dependence back in the 80s, and was saying it over and over again. President Trump was definitely pressuring Germany on the problems with energy dependence on Russia.
Well, everybody’s going to pay, anyway.
I’m also talking about all of that John Mearsheimer stuff and NATO and all of that. I don’t trust anybody to get any of this stuff right.
I get that people don’t like watching videos here, but you really ought to check out the latest interviews of Felix Zulauf. They are all over the place.
Or, maybe they are scared of what “Biden” might do next. International relations are all complicated.
I think you should assume that events are unfolding exactly as desired. People have been working for decades to make Western countries energy-starved. Non-Western countries are happy to help with this suicide, not realizing they are next.
You can’t be serious —
Sweden and Finland fear Jo-Jo the Monkey Boy will attack them?!?!
The new house GOP could show they are serious by returning the budget process to regular order with smaller appropriations bills like they used to. Both parties have gotten used to waiting to the last minute so they “have” to pass pork laden omnibus bills to keep the government going. It’s lazy.
If they don’t, then they are just the red colored branch of the Uniparty.