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.
They already did that earlier this year. The bill has been sitting on Harrys desk ever since.
“Polling says something completely different. Dems are dancing on twitter and laughing right now.”
This is just the beginning!!!
The GOP has ZERO credibility on spending, deficits, and taxes.
Now, they CAN”T EVEN PASS A BILL THAT SENATOR REID SAID HE WOULDN’T EVEN ALLOW ON TO THE SENATE FLOOR!!!
The GOP Establishment is nothing but a group of FOOLS!
They spend years slamming and sandbagging genuine conservatives. They tells us how Sara Palin, Christine O’Donnell, Sharon Angle, and Todd Akin are too conservative. They stick us with “candidates who can win moderates” like McLame, Romney, and Scott Brown.
The so-called “rising stars” of the GOP are either RINOs (Christie) or too timid to say they support Bible-believing conservatives (Rubio).
It is time to SMASH the GOP and send it to the ash heap of history. The sooner, the better.
The GOP deserves the forthcoming electoral disaster it has brought upon itself.
Well said! Not sure into as far. The rebuilding needs to begin. We need to think long term not short term. Your passion is inspiring though :)
Looks like Boehner’s purge didn’t have the desired effect.
Boehner looks done. Time for a new Speaker.
I suggest Barry and Harry come up with a plan to cut taxes for the middleclass or they are going to have a nation wide tax revolt on their hands in mid JAN.
No it did not. What are the next moves? Market futures already down. I can here Obama now, because of republican ineptitude they have decided to go over cliff and hurt the middle class. Plus the investor class is going to be mad as well. Dems are almost happier than election night. I do not see a way out. Obama can’t even negotiate. Who would he negotiate with. The republicans are idiots and look like it. Why isn’t everyone asking for resignation?
Didn't work for Romney, and it doesn't work for you.
Time for you to come up with a new meme
I hope this drives his rino ass right out of the speakership.
See who else you can purge you fn puss.
The Senate already recessed for Christmas anyway.
At the same time there was no way he would get the Republicans to vote for any tax increase ~ and he knew it.
Now Obamugabe knows it too.
Wonder why Democrats are dancing and crowing on Twitter ~ their boy has no more cards to play.
Because Dems hate America and any set back is good news for them !
Boner needs to resign now .
He is a spineless stooge for K street and nothing more !
His secret deals and purges and gun grabbing talk was too much for the
GOP .
He is the K street crooks leader and nothing more !
Demand his resignation way your local reps office !
Merry Christmas Jim. Didn’t they already do that six months ago? How about this; implement the Paul-Mac Penney plan. Eliminate baseline budgeting. Implement continuous process improvement within the government and provide the folks that eliminate waste say 10% of what they save. Tell the dims take it or leave it. Tell them if they don’t take it no debt limit increase. And mean it. Then go home. I’ll hear the dims whining from here in Az.
You want him to do what?
Hate to be the bearer of bad news but enough republicans will cross over and vote for senate bill of 250k and below. In the end that is what might happen. This is why Dems are happy. Not enough tea party to stop it.
Dems are in a great position because of the party not being unified. This is going to end up with a worse deal because the mainstream party will deal. No way republicans are going to
Let market tank.
Also, the Speaker controls the flow of legislation ~ although there are ways to override his decisions that doesn't happen all that often.
Obama and his trolls imagine they have all the cards in this ~ whereas they have none.
Sorry to hear that !
He was my sisters too in mt Vernon !
There is already a bill. Anyway you go ahead and live in the un-skewed poll land. We are so colossally screwed now. Do you honestly think Obama can’t negotiate and get 30-40 republicans on board? Burton has already said the senate bill will pass after the 1st. An un- unified party can’t win. Better put “’a house divided can not stand” some how I thought quoting Lincoln was appropriate since the republicans are in full scale civil war.
Boner overplayed his deal maker Rino hand when he announced that the Tea Party is over and then removed some people from committee assignment as punishment for getting uppity.
I hope the pick a Speaker who can actually talk and coordinate a political opposition against the Dems.
Dems have overplayed their hand on anti-gun hysteria and if we had a GOP with a mouth attached to a brain, we could be nailing the Dear Reader for driving the nation over a cliff by refusing to compromise within a two party system. He thinks he’s a freakin’ dictator. He’s dysfunctional.
leading from behind John? Or from the sides? Or from the bottom? Or the top?
Boy that John A. Boehner is one hell of a leader ain’t he?
What you said!
What's your point? Did you want the Reps to pass this bill and destroy their brand? Or hurt small businesses that file individual returns and eliminate up to 700,000 jobs?
This is a good thing. Boehner and Obama need to negotiate in public. Why should the Reps in the House follow like docile sheep and not have any input into this process?
Boehner made a terrible mistake in 2010 by agreeing to the extension of the tax cuts for just another year instead of making them permanent. He squandered away any leverage he had. And the sequestration deal originated by the WH was a trap. Better to go off the cliff and then we can really start talking about real spending cuts and the long term fiscal problems that beset this country. Only a crisis will get the attention of Congress and the WH. Let the chips fall where they may.
Actually I would have preferred the grand bargain last year where we had a 10-1 spending revenue ratio on the table. Now we are looking at I don’t know what? The deal on the table is 1-1 and now I don’t think we can get that. The chips fall is an appropriate term. Since we are going to shove them over to the Dems. What happens now is we go over cliff then pass senate bill for 250k. It will only take 30 republicans and Dan Burton has said everyone will vote for it.
We also look like idiots doing it. A poll today 53% said republicans are too extreme. If your not in power all you can do is slow down the march to
The left. With a civil war going on how do you think we are going to get back in power? Plan b was a bad bill. It was a bad idea. Boehner is weak. The Tea Party has what 70 votes, maybe. Unless everyone is pulling in the same direction the left will kill us. That is the point. We left the grand bargain on the table las year because it was not ideologically perfect. We let the good be the enemy of the perfect and now we are getting hosed. A lot of this is our own fault. So you will excuse me if seeing where the chips fall sounds like a bad plan.
A strong unified party can do great things. A divided party will get run over. This will mean the 40 most liberal members of our party just became the ones with the most power.
I don't know where you came up with that number, but according to the Woodward book, it was Obama who nixed the Grand Bargain by demanding more revenue than what was agreed upon.
And do you really believe that the Dems want to cut spending? Look what is happening with sequestratration. Both parties cannot agree on how to cut $100 billion dollars a year out of an annual budget of $3.7 trillion.
Unless we reform the entitlement programs, the deficits will continue to grow. We have 10,000 people a day retiring for the next 20 years doubling our population over 65. By 2030 one in five will be 65 or older. And by 2030 there will be just two workers for every retiree down from 3.3 today and 16 in 1950. Medicare and SS costs will go up regardless of what is done to those programs. Medicare has been running in the red since 2008 and SS since 2010.
And now we have Obamacare, another huge unfunded entitlement program that will grow in much the same way as Medicare did. Medicare now costs nine times more than projected.
Since we are going to shove them over to the Dems. What happens now is we go over cliff then pass senate bill for 250k. It will only take 30 republicans and Dan Burton has said everyone will vote for it.
Going over the fiscal cliff really involves going back to the Clinton-era tax rates for everyone. And add on top of that the new taxes associated with Obamacare along with a 31% cut in reimbursements to hospitals and doctors. And there are also the sequestration cuts.
The only reason why Obama is making such an issue about taxing the rich is to destroy the GOP. It raises very little revenue compared to what our deficits are and Obama wants to increase spending on top of the growing costs of the entitlement programs. If the GOP agrees to increase marginal tax rates for the "rich," it will cost many jobs and destroy completely the GOP as the party that doesn't want to raise income taxes and claims that our problem is spending.
We also look like idiots doing it. A poll today 53% said republicans are too extreme. If your not in power all you can do is slow down the march to The left. With a civil war going on how do you think we are going to get back in power?
The reality is that we are not getting back into power anytime soon. We have reached a tipping point thanks to the rapidly changing demographics of this country fueled by immigration, legal and illegal, and minority birthrates. By 2019 half of the children 18 and under will be minorities as classified by the USG and by 2042 half of the country will be minorities. 87% of the 1.2 million legal immigrants that enter the US annually are minorities and almost all of the 500,000 illegal aliens are minorities. With 300,000 to 400,000 anchor babies born in this country to illegals, the demographics will make the Dems the permanent majority party. And I have no doubt that Hillary will be the next President of the US by a landslide.
We left the grand bargain on the table las year because it was not ideologically perfect. We let the good be the enemy of the perfect and now we are getting hosed. A lot of this is our own fault. So you will excuse me if seeing where the chips fall sounds like a bad plan.
That is patently false.
A strong unified party can do great things. A divided party will get run over. This will mean the 40 most liberal members of our party just became the ones with the most power.
If the GOP-controlled House passes a bill that allows the tax rate to increase for the wealthy, the GOP will be divided and destroyed. That is why Obama is pushing it. There may very well be a Third Party movement as a result based largely on Tea Party principles.
Beyond partisan politics and who gains advantage, there are principles and different visions of what the role of government is in our country. As patriots, the GOP must do what is best for the country. At this point, the GOP may have as much influence as it will ever have for the foreseeable future.
If you want to be effective as a negotiator, the other side must believe that you have certain non-negoitable positions. Obama must believe that the GOP will go over the cliff rather than concede on those positions. We will have to deal with the short term consequences up to and including losing power. In the long run, this country is on an unsustainable course. What the Dems want to do will destroy this country. We should not assist them, especially in raising more revenue to keep the collapsing welfare state going a little longer.
We all know what is coming based on the decline of other great nations and civilizations. First, the "rich" (aka business) are raped and taxed to rob them of their wealth, Second, the battle of Guns versus Butter, which butter usually wins since it has more constituents. Third, taxes are raised on everyone including things like VAT, fees, higher income tax rates, etc. Then, the economy collapses and a man on horseback takes over to restore civil order.
We see this happening in Europe now. For decades, the US has provided the security umbrella to allow them to develop their welfare state. But now, it is collapsing and their is very little to tax. Many have already cut benefits and their public sector, but it is not enough. They have eaten their seed corn and are now in a slow death spiral. We are going the same way. Do you want to fight now or kick the can down the road until we run out of road? The solutions will be far more painful than they are now.
The problem is with this negotiating tactic you have diminished the Tea Party. A bill will get passed. Bills are passed by the fringes. Establishment republicans will pass a bill with a majority of Dems. Will that bill have any tea party influence if establishment republicans team up with Dems?
That is what will happen. We may have the same principals but I am for getting the best deal possible. I do not believe a divided party will get us a better deal.
Time will tell.
Tax bills MUST originate in the House ~ what part of MUST don’t you understand?
For the last decade the libs have been telling us the Bush tax cuts are for the rich. Now they tell us we will go over the cliff if we don’t save them for 98% of the people. Got it.
I am not going to argue a fact that the senate passed a bill to extend Bush tax cuts under 250k. Since it is not a NEW tax it does not. Yes new taxes and spending must originate in the house. I am aware of the rules.
Doesn’t matter anyway we will go over cliff and republicans will be blamed and in truth after yesterday we look like idiots. 53% of Americans see us as too extreme. The brand is hurting, bad.
The problem for the Democrats is they do not control the legislative agenda of the house ~ they used to, but they don't now. The Senate can send over all sorts of stuff but they can't force the house to vote on it anyway, nor can the minority party, which takes us into the so-called 'discharge petition', where you might have democrats and republicans both demanding a bill being taken up ~ and there the Speaker still has lots of options ~ mostly to delay indefinitely.
To pass an Obamugabe bill in the house you have to take over the house.
Boehner imagines he has enemies trying to take over the house ~ he thinks they're Conservatives. All of which means he's a madman who must be deposed as soon as possible.
Doesn't say just 'new taxes' ~ the specific reference is to 'raising revenue' ~
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