Stephen Colbert Wins Big on Morning Joe

Former GOP representative Joe Scarborough is by far my favorite TV Republican. Scarborough takes a reasoned, intelligent, and bi-partisan approach to politics, and he typically features guests on his show who do the same. Whenever I'm awake at the crack of dawn, my TV is tuned to "Morning Joe" on MSNBC.

Today Joe had a hilarious 20-minute segment with guest Stephen Colbert, who tackled topics like open marriage and poor candidate favorability ratings with his typical unflinching tongue-in-cheek demeanor.

Here's a short clip from the Colbert segment - my favorite moment  is when Scarborough completely loses it, as Colbert compares Ron Paul to fairy tale imp Rumplestiltskin.

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Turn of Phrase - GOP Caves and Agrees to Extend Payroll Tax Cuts

"It may not have been politically the smartest thing in the world."

- House Speaker John Boehner, commenting on the the initial decision of House Republicans to oppose legislation that would extend existing payroll tax cuts for two-months and enable additional Congressional negotiation of the issue.

After overwhelming negative public response and pressure from both Democrats and Senate Republicans, House Republicans have reversed field and indicated they will pass the stop-gap proposal that passed the Senate by an 89-10 margin.

Resistance from the Tea Party element of the Republican party held the bill up for several days and threatened the continuity of payroll tax relief for 160 million workers, as well as the extension of unemployment benefits for nearly 2 million Americans without jobs.

From a political perspective, the Congressional struggle to pass legislation that almost everyone agrees on perpetuates the general image of Washington dysfunction. More importantly, with the 2012 election season already underway, the incident ironically appears to leave Republicans taking their typical obstructionist position while President Obama fights for tax cuts.

The incident revealed a deep divide among Republicans, and the absence of a clear consistent position on the bill highlighted the lack of cohesive leadership within the party. Republican failure to support the bill initially, followed by their subsequent reversal of policy, made the party look petty, weak, and disorganized. It looks as though Speaker Boehner, who is known for his propensity for easy weeping, may finally have something to cry about.


Related Post: Republican Tax Cut Rejection Paves Way for Obama

Republican Tax Cut Rejection Paves Way for Obama

Republican House Speaker - John Boehner

House Republicans jeopardized an extension of the payroll tax that expires on January 1 by rejecting a bipartisan proposal that passed the Senate with an overwhelming 89-10 vote.

These rebel Republicans have risked doing real world harm by potentially increasing taxes on 160 million Americans, and they have damaged themselves politically, putting the President in position to take a strong but reasonable stance against them.

The proposal sent from the Senate to the House is far from perfect but it buys time for further negotiation,  guaranteeing for the next two months the uninterrupted continuation of a payroll tax break that currently leaves an extra $1,000 per year in the bank accounts of average taxpayers.

In rejecting the Senate proposal, House Republicans demonstrate ongoing and unpopular legislative obstructionism and they further perceptions of general Congressional impotence. Their failed leadership has fostered the creation of a political morass, but it has left us with a few clear conclusions.

1. Even when almost everyone on both sides of the aisle agrees something is right for the country, Republicans will still oppose it if they think it complicates things for the President. 
2. If there was uncertainty about the dysfunction that exists within the Republican party, the total absence of coordination shown between House and Senate Republicans should remove any doubt.
3. Democrats HAVE negotiated the current proposal in good faith by:
• Dropping from the bill their original plan to pay for the tax cut extension by adding a 1.9% surtax to millionaire incomes
• Adding to the bill the "fast tracking" of the Keystone Pipeline (which Republicans support but the President strongly opposes)
4. Republicans will sell the organs of their elderly mothers to protect or even add new tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans, but they won't accept a reasonable proposal to extend tax cuts that already exist and benefit 160 million Americans, most of whom are solid middle class citizens.
5. House Republicans have ceded important political ground to President Obama, who can now begin the 2012 election year by showing Americans his commitment to fighting for middle class tax cuts and opposing this do-nothing Congress that sports the worst approval ratings in history.

Turning the extension of the payroll tax cuts into a slippery political football is a huge misstep on the part of Congressional Republicans, and the Democrats will most certainly use this incident to their advantage in the 2012 Presidential and Congressional elections.


Related Post: Obama Taunts Republicans Over Payroll Tax Cut

Is Rick Perry Just Another "Pretty" Face?

There was an article in Mother Jones magazine this morning that offered an interesting take on why Rick Perry was so badly routed in this past weekend's Florida straw poll. The article alleges that Perry is simply too Sarah Palin-esque (i.e., lazy) in his approach to preparing for the opportunities he has to showcase himself, like the Republican candidate debates.

According to the article, Perry believes that his winning personality and his bullshit Texas bravado, instead of thoughtful consideration of issues and prepared policy positions, should be enough to garner him favor among voters. Based on his massive fall from grace of late, that is not how Republican voters feel. Perry is paying for his lack of effort with a rapid downturn in public perception of his viability as a candidate.

I congratulate my Republican friends for not letting the candidate get away with his just-smile-and-talk-Texas-tough strategy. Our national problems are too big for us to seriously consider someone for President who doesn't take the time to truly understand the issues and formulate serious plans for addressing them.

We may not have seen the last of Perry, but he better damn well start "hitting the books" a little harder if he wants to be a legit contender for Commander-in-Chief.

Mitt is From Mars, Perry is From Venus

Interesting Republican presidential debate analysis and recap from Slate.

Republican Presidential Debate Starts Cannibalism Season

Party politics in the United States seldom yields anything surprising or new, but nothing is so predictable as the intra-party cannibalism that occurs during one of the major parties televised Presidential candidate debates.

If you belong to the party that currently holds the White House, there is almost nothing so wildly entertaining as watching opposition party maneaters swarm into a feeding frenzy when they think they smell an open wound on one of their own kind. It's like watching wild antelope race across the savanna, and then suddenly turn and attack the weakest of their own herd. (Okay, that would actually be grotesque to see in the animal world, but it's great when you are watching opposition party politics.)

At last night's Republican presidential debate in Tampa, Texas Governor and newly-crowned front runner Rick Perry was the seemingly pre-selected target of his peers. Perry took shots from a host of other candidates on topics ranging from taxes to Social Security to the mandated vaccine against HPV in young girls. Pundits generally say that Perry weathered the attack reasonably well...but I say, who cares!

 The almost-primary-season Republican political cannibalism is well underway, and that's the show I'm excited to see. The only thing I will enjoy more is when the race really heats up and they all take outlandish and absurd ultra right-wing political positions ("God makes my tough political decisions," "Gays aren't actually people," "For better or worse, James Earl Ray was just trying to make a point") that will push me solidly back toward my Democratic core and cement my support for President Obama in 2012.

I know the nature of televised intra-party political debates encourages politicians to say the craziest things. Still, these eat-your-own party member buffets do help us see how far to the right (or left) a candidate will go to differentiate him/herself from the field. They probably don't truly believe all the wacky shit they say during the intra-party debates, but they might. Right, Michele Bachmann?

Time for Obama to Win or Go Home

For the last two years, President Barack Obama has attempted to steer our country in a positive direction. Meanwhile, the omni-negative nay saying Republican leadership has done nothing except stall the car, set up road blocks, and periodically jerk the steering wheel hard to the right in an attempt to make sure we do nothing but cruise around in circles as long as Obama is driving.

I appreciate the President's attempts to work "with" Republican leadership, but the truth is you will never find common ground when the other guy refuses to leave his ideological island. I think it's time for the President to screw the pursuit of the middle way, unapologetically lay out the bold agenda he believes is right for the nation, and challenge the Congress (both Democrats and Republicans) to get off their sorry asses and get this country moving again. 

If they refuse to even see what tricks you have in the bag, Mr. President, it's time to leave them holding that bag for a while. I hate to say it, but compromise and negotiation are a lot more likely when you have just clocked the other guy in the nose. It's time to come out swinging and win or go home.