Showing posts with label Eric Cantor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Eric Cantor. Show all posts

Tuesday, June 10, 2014

ERIC CANTOR LOSES HOUSE SEAT IN VIRGINIA PRIMARY

Progressives can gloat over the House Majority leader's loss in today's Virginia primary but that's
Eric Cantor
only if that translates into a negative reaction to Tea Party candidates as it did in 2012. Eric Cantor trails his Tea Party backed opponent, David Brat 55% to 44%. Apparently no one saw it coming and hopefully this might be a precursor to the Democrats taking back the House in November. TPers have an inherent ability to really piss off sane voters and one can only dream of a replay of some of the 2012 races. But if Cantor is considered the most conservative in the House, God help us if Brat does win. Everyone says this seat is solidly GOP but time will tell.

Friday, January 6, 2012

Canada grades the U.S. for its 2011 politics

Do you care?  If you don’t, I wouldn’t bother reading this article.  But I think it is important to know what our neighbors to the north think about us since they are more progressive in their approach to issues like gun control, consumer rights and health care than we are.  Considering just those aspects of Canada’s government, you would be right if you assume their attitude toward American politics is that 2011 was, as they describe it, a year of “lowlights.”

Gabby Giffords
The article from the Montreal Gazette starts with the assassination attempt on Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, which one year holiday will pass this coming Sunday.  As the paper put it, the year began with good intentions by President Obama in his State of the Union Address but basically ended there.  If there was ever a time in recent history where a reevaluation of gun control was called for, and just might have been demanded by the American public, it was then.

It was soon after that a Republican controlled House decided that it would block anything the Obama administration did just for the purpose of insuring that he wouldn’t be a two-term president.  The dysfunction commenced and lasted right down to the last day of December, 2011.  GOP House Speaker John Boehner was quickly reigned in by the radicals of the Tea Party, led by Rep. Eric Cantor, House Majority Leader, and remained under their thumb until the end of the year.



The Keystone XL pipeline from Canada produced a flip-flop on the part of Obama, just when environmentalists thought they had won a major battle.  The President decided to allow earlier consideration of the project when the GOP became obsessed with its approval because of their claim it would create jobs.  Critics think Republicans did harm to its eventual passage by their insistence that it be included in the tax relief bill.

And then there was the birther controversy over whether Obama’s birth certificate was valid.  Canadians considered Donald Trump the “crackpot” he is when using the issue to discredit the President.  Even today there are still two fruitcakes pursuing this stupid theory after the President already provided evidence of his birth in Hawaii.  There was also Rep. Anthony Weiner’s tweeting photos of his genital to a woman.  A Democrat from New York, he first denied, then admitted what he had done, and the resigned in disgrace. 

Sarah Palin
Sarah Palin was around for a while, goading her pathetic followers into thinking she would run for President, when she had no intention of giving up the lucrative speaking engagements these feeble-minded people pay dearly for.  Canadians saw the sadness in the ineptitude of the 112th Congress to accomplish anything, including what they consider “one of the worst pieces of kitchen-sink legislation,” the 2-month payroll tax cut.

House Speaker John Boehner gets the nod as the “weakest political leader’ due his complete lack of control over the Tea Party in the GOP caucus.  He simply could not deliver the votes ending up in a loss of credibility with the White House, Democrats, even Republicans in the Senate.  It almost seemed at one time that Boehner wanted to work with President Obama on a range of issues, but then the Tea Party jerked him back to reality through moves by Eric Cantor.

Regardless of what Canada thinks of U.S. politics, the important thing is what do Americans think of their political situation.  With Congress at its lowest favorability rating ever, 9 percent, that seems painfully obvious.  Andrea Mitchell of NBC News said it best: she commented that only the military has a favorable rating in government.

Wednesday, January 4, 2012

Americans favor the IRS and communism over the present Republican Congress

Yes, I said Republican Congress.  It is less popular than the dreaded tax folks and the political ideology that is a direct opposite to democracy.  In this CBS rating, the IRS comes in at a colossal 40 percent, communism at 11 percent, the lowly Congress at 9 percent.  Only Fidel Castro ranks lower at 5 percent.  These ratings are taken by major polling services like Gallup and Rasmussen, and reflect the growing feeling that the people in Washington must be replaced in 2012.

In a release from CBS of the approval rating, it is clear that the GOP is continuing to block everything that would help jump-start the economy because they want the President to fail.  It is a blockade Barack Obama has been up against since his inauguration, conceived by a deranged Tea Party and implemented by fanatics like Eric Cantor, (R-VA) House Majority Leader with help from House Speaker, Rep. John Boehner and Sen. Minority leader, Rep. Mitch McConnell.

Communist symbol
According to the Addicting Info site, this is what the Republican Congress has done: “…spent their time passing anti-women bills, bills against birth control and contraceptives, anti-abortion bills, bills declaring pizza a vegetable, bills re-affirming ‘In God We Trust,’ as the national motto, anti-tax bills, anti-environmental bills.”  There is more but just as ludicrous. 

This gang of brainless GOP bullies has frittered away three years trying to convince the American public to hate President Obama and vote him out of office next November.  What they have accomplished is raising the ire of a majority of the voting public, including many Republicans and a number of Independents.  The country is fed up with their shenanigans and they’re not going to take it anymore.  The question is how to make sure voters remember this subterfuge on November 6, 2012.



Maybe it would help to illustrate more cases where the unfavorable is favored over the Republican Congress.  The airlines, which have raised rates and curtailed benefits for several years now comes in at 29 percent.  Keep in mind now Congress is at 9 percent.  Banks, one of the most hated institutions and the target of the Occupy movement rank 23 percent.  The oil and gas industry, often accused of raising the price of gasoline just to improve their bottom line, 20 percent.  And Hugo Chavez, Pres. of Venezuela, ties Congress at 9 percent.

The GOP Congress has done absolutely nothing to create jobs, improve the foreclosure crisis, and they want to repeal the health care bill that has already helped many needy Americans.  Stephen Foster of Addicting Info says, “Hell, Republicans have turned Congress into such a joke that even King George III was more popular during the Revolutionary War.”  He was the British monarch during the American Revolution, his favorability coming in between 15 and 20 percent.

I cannot remember a time in my life where the hallowed halls of Congress have been looked on with such contempt for the people who are supposed to be running our country but yet have let a small group of wacko radicals dictate their actions.  I would be talking about the Tea Party, of course, and until the GOP breaks the umbilical cord with these certifiable maniacs, there will be no breakthrough in Washington.

Tuesday, December 27, 2011

Tea Party massacred on payroll tax decision

Senate majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev) has brought the Tea Party to its knees once again.  He beat Sharon Angle, a TP favorite, for his Senate seat in Nevada just a year ago, and now he backed House Speaker John Boehner, backed by radical TPers, into a corner on the payroll tax bill until they had to lose face and give in to what had been the right thing to do all along.  The only upside to this whole bizarre episode is that the American public is finally seeing the real color of these right wing fanatics.

President Barack Obama signed the two-month extension of the payroll tax cut this past Friday, a victory for himself over a Tea Party that has targeted the President since its inception and his inauguration.  Independents and moderate Republicans should view this as an example of how Democrats and progressives in general can champion tax cuts.  Also included in the bill are a continuation in jobless benefits and a delay in decreased Medicare payments to doctors that could seriously affect Seniors.

Apparently Boehner, who was originally in favor of passing the two-month deal worked out by Senate Democrats and Republicans, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, caved to the TP lunatics led by head maniac Eric Cantor (R-VA) House Majority Leader.  Some have even questioned whether it is Cantor or Boehner leading the House, and if it’s Cantor, then, up until last Friday the Tea Party had definitely been in control. 

Political analysts view this defeat and turmoil leading up to the showdown as significantly hurting the GOP in their backbone Republican philosophy of tax cuts at any cost.  It clearly shows that when it comes to the wealthy, there is absolutely no concession on taxes, but they are willing to sacrifice the middle-class and lower income groups on the basis of demanding a year’s extension over the two-months that was finally passed.



Jon Summers, who was instrumental in Reid’s win over Angle, thinks that things will go much the same way at the end of the two-month extension as it did last Friday.  Democrats are on a roll and they will get what they want in February of 2012.  Harry Reid has already predicted that the Tea Party, spawned in hard times, will just fade away as the economy improves.  In the second phase of the payroll tax cut fight, even more damage could be done to the GOP by TPers that place extreme right ideology over their country.

If you want to know who to blame, you can take a look at the list of Tea Party caucus members here, led by presidential hopeful (?) Michele Bachmann, along with some other good info on the group by Wikipedia.  The list is a blueprint of House representatives and Senate members, some of which are running for office in 2012, that we progressives want to give the boot.  This is also the gang

that is apparently enraged at John Boehner after caving to Democrats last Friday.

When Congress reconvenes in January and the fireworks start, it will be interesting to see who is on the offensive and who is on the defensive.  If the Democrats and all progressives alike don’t take advantage of their current momentum to slay the ultra conservative dragon, the elections of 2012 could well be a complete toss up.

Monday, December 19, 2011

House Speaker Boehner freaks out on payroll tax cut. Is Tea Party to blame?


Speaker John Boener
 It was a slam dunk with a vote in the Senate of 89 to 10 to pass the two-month extension on the payroll tax cut and jobless benefits, also including a deal on the Keystone XL pipeline.  But House Speaker Boehner caved to the Republican caucus that Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer described as “…a small group at the extremetry to dictate every move this nation makes.”  This sounds like Tea Party extremists to me, and once again Boehner has reneged on an agreement.

Majority Leader Eric Cantor
Everyone involved agreed it wasn’t the best and should have instead been a plan to carry these programs through for a full year.  But Boehner had earlier left it to Senate leaders to come up with a deal, one that even Republican Mitch McConnell was in favor of.  But conservative extremists, apparently led by House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, turned their wrath on Boehner who once again changed his mind and went with the flow.  Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Sen. Schumer question Boehner and the GOP’s ability to lead.

Reid has said repeatedly that the Dems. have supported the two-month deal because “that was the best we could get.”  A statement that seems to reflect a combination of the willingness to negotiate with Republicans—completely contrary to the latter’s refusal to raise taxes—and some degree of weakness that must be turned around soon if progressives are to win control of this country.  It has to start from the top down and we haven’t seen much of that from President Obama.

It is also clear that the GOP is insisting on including the pipeline issue in any payroll tax legislation because they back the oil industry as is the case with any big business.  This, even though there is some credible concern by environmentalists and the state of Nebraska where the pipeline is scheduled to cross.  But politics aside, it is incomprehensible that conservatives would make this demand in light of its opposition possibly scuttling the passage of the whole payroll tax bill, just to support the corporate world.

 

So what can you expect if the payroll tax bill is not passed?  A cancellation of the program means that individuals will pay from $700 with a salary of $35,000 to $2,341 if you earn $110,000 and up, the maximum.  But there are some questions re. just how much a continuation will spur the economy.  There are those who believe, because it takes such a broad sweep in income, there is not enough emphasis on low and middle-income households which are most likely to do the most spending in the marketplace.

But this whole fiasco is just another example of a dysfunctional government that has now taken on a life of its own.  These morons in Congress walk around in a state of denial, in delusions of grandeur actually believing what they are doing is right.  Power is king and being reelected the only goal of their actions.  However, if they think this goes unnoticed, the Pew Research Center shows discontent with Congress at record levels.  Right now two-thirds of voters believe lawmakers should be voted out of office in 2012.  Amen!

Donald Trump Says He Will Be Indicted On Tuesday

  THAT'S TODAY... Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg has brought the case to this point, now looking at a possible indictment. Trum...