Tag: Republicans
Tea Party Queen’s State Has Less Tea Partiers
25 percent
Number of Delaware Republicans who self-identify as Tea Partiers, according to Public Policy Polling. Only 18 percent of Alaska Republicans say the same.
Verbatim
When you make an important decision in your life when you’re angry, there’s an 80 percent chance you’ll make a mistake. To have an election based on anger, apathy and amnesia is nuts. That’s exactly what’s going on all over America today.
Former Pres. Bill Clinton, speaking at a Democratic fundraiser in Atlanta.
Bush Proved Tax Cuts Don’t Lead to Job Growth
1.9 million
Net number of jobs created under Pres. George W. Bush after his tax cuts were enacted in 2001, according to the Wall St. Journal. Bush created the least jobs of any president since Hoover during the Great Depression. Pres. Bill Clinton created 22.4 million jobs, and left Bush with a $236 billion budget surplus. Historically, the economy tends to grow under Democrats, who traditionally do not cut taxes, and shrink under Republicans, who almost always do.
Verbatim
We welcome John Boehner’s change in position and support for the middle class tax cuts, but time will tell if his actions will be anything but continued support for the failed policies that got us into this mess.
White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, in a statement quoted on Politico.
GOP Candidate Goes All Batsh*t Beck-Crazy, Right in Front of Onlookers
Kudos to those in the crowd for not bursting into peals of laughter — or waves of tears. This folks, is where the GOP/Tea Party is taking us. Truly scary.
GOP Now Running Against Wall Street Bailout They Voted for – Here’s a List of GOP Reps and Senators Who Voted ‘Aye’
On MSNBC last night, Rachel Maddow looked at the political rationale behind the White House decision to make House Speaker Wanna-Be John Boehner, R-Ohio, the face of the “Party of No” in the midterm elections.
Boehner was chosen, in part, because he is a boozey, overly tanned cartoonish character, but mainly because he was the GOP leader in 2008, back when it was the Bush rubberstamp party. In late September 2008, when the United States financial system was in freefall, Boehner took to the well of the House and tearfully begged the Republican caucus to support the Bush bank bailout of Wall Street and the “too big to fail” banks, officially known as the “Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008”:
REP. JOHN BOEHNER, MINORITY LEADER: Think about what happens if we don’t pass this bill, think about what happens to your friends, your neighbors, your constituents. So, I ask all of you, both sides of the aisle: what’s in the best interest of our country? Not what’s in the best interest of our party, not what’s in the best interest of our own re- election– what’s in the best interest of our country? Vote yes.
The bailout eventually passed both houses of Congress, with over 90 Republicans in the House and 33 GOP senators voting yes. (There’s a complete list at the below.) The vote was taken before the rise of the GOP’s astroturfed tea party mobs and their virulent opposition to Obama policies — particularly the government funding of programs intended to resolve the financial collapse brought on by the Bush Recession.
Since the rise of tea baggery, many, if not most, of the Republicans in Congress have made a spectacle of themselves by desperately kowtowing to the mob, so it is surprising to see many of their names on the list of Republicans who voted “aye” on the tea baggers’ much-despised Wall Street Bailout.
Verbatim
Despite his claims that he is “like Oregon,” it’s clear from [Sen.] Ron Wyden’s record that he has simply lost touch with his constituents during his 14 years in Washington … Wyden is a career politician who has championed a reckless economic agenda that has driven our national debt to a staggering $13 trillion and failed to create jobs as the Evergreen State’s unemployment has skyrocketed to 10.6 percent.
– Press release from the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which is clueless about state nicknames. Washington is the evergreen state. Oregon is the beaver state. The NRSCC also fails to omit that the nation’s economic woes are directly attributal to the party’s diastrous economic policies over the 12 years when they controlled one or both houses of Congress and the eight years they held the White House.
Like Sarah Palin, Only African-American
When tea bagger and fired CEO Rick Scott chose Florida Rep. Jennifer Carroll as his running mate, it was obvious that he did so for cynical reasons. Seeing the pair go before the press confirms it. Carroll has no idea what an “Arizona-style immigration law” is, and asks the reporter to explain it to her. Scott goes from seething with annoyed indulgence (his usual posture with the press and voters) to looking concerned as Carroll’s lack of knowledge on the topic is exposed. For the record, Carroll was born in Trinidad.
On Message: GOP-Fox TV
GOP-Fox TV After years of speculation, the connection between Fox News and the Republican Party became public on Aug. 17, 2010, with the revelation that Fox’s owner, News Corp, had donated $1 million to the Republican Governor’s Association. This move reverses a position taken four months earlier by News Corps CEO Rupert Murdoch, who, when asked if it was appropriate for Fox News to promote rallies sponsored by Republican operatives doing business as the “tea party,” said, “No, I don’t think we should be supporting the tea party or any party.” Now that the financial relationship between Fox and the Republican Party has been established, the network should no longer be described as a “news channel.” Editors should use “GOP-Fox TV” instead of “Fox News Channel” in all references.
