Day: December 22, 2011

The kamikazes’ casualty list this year is long. They blew up the debt-ceiling vote this summer, sparking a downgrade in the nation’s credit rating. They blew up the appropriations process so thoroughly that routine spending votes morphed into philosophical standoffs that nearly locked down the federal government three times and required seven temporary funding patches just to keep the lights on. And this week, they managed to blow up not just a tax cut that nearly everyone in Washington agrees is a good idea, but also their party’s hard-earned reputation for cutting taxes and, quite possibly, their chances at a long-term majority in the House and future control of the Senate.

— Patricia Murphy, writing in the Daily Beast that Democrats have dubbed the Republican House freshmen “the kamikazes” because they “have shown time and again that they are willing to blow up their careers and everything around them in service to their cause.”