John Boehner's and the Pope's Balancing Acts: Boehner's act fails; the Pope succeeds

Circus balancing acts nearly always succeed. It they do not, performers do not stay long in the business.  Politics is another story. Last week saw balance take a back seat to extreme views when House Majority Leader John Boehner threw in the towel, foreseeing a collision with a forty  member Tea Party caucus wanting to hold hostage the functioning of government to a single issue.  Pope Francis with great delicacy delivered messages in person to the American people and Catholics in a way that would make a tight rope walker proud.

In past eras, the middle, the balance between poles, was once the substance of the business of governing.  It is rare now when balance works and often imbalance is cheered by partisans holding less than a majority vote when they roll over their opposition without having themselves to budge an inch or take a political penalty at the ballot box.

Boehner quit, he said, to save the institution of Congress. He probably meant that Congress was structured to force compromise. I suspect another reason was that he wanted to come to the aid of the Republican Party.  Most right wing Tea Party members of his GOP Congressional caucus were protected from political repercussions by representing safe districts with constituents who agreed with them. The Tea Party had failed to get their way on defunding Planned Parenthood when the House votes were counted.  Never mind federal laws already prevented federal funds from being used for abortions. They cared little if their actions would deprive the service of any federal dollars to provide other low cost women’s health services.  They threatened to block approval of the entire federal budget, resulting in shutdown of government services.

Boehner had been there, done that. In 2013, the GOP dominated House engineered an actual shutdown for two weeks over a single issue, defunding Obamacare.    The result: The economy took a $12 to $24 billion hit. The GOP got the blame in spite of their attempt to cast blame on a stubborn President.  Polls showed Americans believed the GOP was responsible over Democrats 39 percent to 19 percent.

In order for Boehner to stop this government shutdown, he would have had to draw on Democratic votes, an anathema to Republican extremists.  They had attacked Boehner in the past for relying on the enemy and Boehner was facing some very contentious moments if he did it again. Clearly he was just tired of it and he, humming “ Zip-a-dee-doo dah”, quit.

On the other hand, Pope Francis was last week’s balancer in chief, giving pronouncements on his visit to the US about what he considered to be the moral course on critical governmental issues, some of which warmed the hearts of conservatives with his family focus, and cheered liberals with issues such as caring about income inequality, humane treatment of immigrants and refugees, caring for the poor, and global warming.   While he did not propose legislative directives of “thou shall or shalt not” to Congress, he urged compromise and dissed extremism. Nonetheless, he made his points without adding to the political polarization he so deplored. Perhaps the Pope inspired devout Catholic  Boehner to turn his disgust with extremists into the action he took. 

The edited version appeard in the Oct 1, 2   2015 Sky Hi Daily News www.skyhidailynews.com

 http://www.politico.com/story/2013/10/congress-approval-rating-government-shutdown-098657#ixzz3n2M1Juop

Boehner and McConnell fall on swords to stop Tea Party bitten by amnesia bug

This past  week, John Boehner, House Speaker  and 27 of his fellow Republicans, fell on their swords to aid their party  when they joined with Democrats   to raise   the debt ceiling  with no strings attached and to block  Tea Party  threats to shut down the government again. The Senate then passed the legislation on a party line vote, though  enough Republicans led by  minority leader Mitch McConnell,  voted to break  the filibuster rule requirement of 60 votes. The GOP leaders realized the Tea Party must have been bitten by the amnesia bug.to try to repeat their last fiasco and other failed strategies.   

Last fall,  Boehner let the Tea Party have their way and the GOP did shut down the government. The  political backlash   was so severe , Republicans  even feared they would lose seats in the 2014 midterms and set up another Democratic win for the White House in 2016.   The GOP was  saved by   the bungled roll out of Obamacare, charges the President’s” lied” about keeping insurance,   and a budget deal.

That Boehner’s action risked  his  speakership and Mitch McConnell gave fuel to Tea Party opponents in his upcoming primary  shows that the Tea Party has   nearly   completed their takeover  of the Republican party.   In Colorado,  traditional  business oriented Republicans are only bystanders in a battle between the Tea Party Express and local ultra conservatives   to see who can endorse the most conservative candidate to take on Democrat Sen.  Mark Udall in November.  Similar battles elsewhere   guarantee that Democratic candidates for state houses and  Congress in blue and purple states will have an advantage in facing  the most extreme opponents who will have problems  pivoting to the center to  appeal  to moderate middles in the general election.  

This year the situation is different . The web site works. As of February 1 nearly 14  million are already covered by Obamacare (3.3 million through the exchanges; 7 million through Medicaid expansion and  3 million young adults on parents’ policies).  An estimated 60% of the  5 million losing individual insurance have found other insurance policies or qualified for cheaper ones.. By the 2014 mid terms, the administration  projects    six  million will have signed up through Obamacare  exchanges. .  The Tea Party still is adamantly advocating  total repeal and no replacement. All those  benefiting  by November 2014  will not look kindly on candidates wanting to take away their newly acquired affordable  insurance coverage.

The Tea Party’s domination of the GOP will also help  Democrat’s chances of holding onto the Senate since key states with large Hispanic populations swung  blue in 2012  by their  disaffection with the GOP’s perceived hostility, Colorado included..   Thanks to Tea Party fanatics in Congress, Boehner was forced to back down from any compromise or even a piecemeal approach to immigration reform this year.

The Tea Party  continues to  alienate  unmarried women, a must win voting block.   Anti choice platforms and  Insults  continue, the latest by former  Gov. Mike Huckabee who opined   women wanted the pill  because they could not keep their “libido” under control.   The GOP ‘s repeal  of  Obamacare would   eliminate  Obamacare  standards  that prohibit  higher  premiums  for women  or covering  mammograms  and birth control pills sans  co-pays. Since women comprise much of the minimum wage workforce, GOP opposition to raising it is one more  turnoff.

The ABC's of Minority Rule. How did the Tea Party pull off the shutdown and can they do it again? They did, can, and are.

  Is defunding or delaying the Affordable Care Act (ACA), aka Obamacare, worth shutting down the government?  Polls are showing 72% of Americans do not believe it is.   The polls were   taken before the marketplace exchanges were opened October 1  that gave  consumers a  hands on chance to separate fact  from GOP fear hyping fiction. Many consumers liked what they saw.  In the first three days of a six months enrollment period, 10,000 opened accounts  to get insurance  with the Colorado administered exchanges.

 A  minority  group of around 40 Tea Party  House members were able to engineer the shutdown. How did they pull it off and  can they do it  again?  Thanks   to the Hastert rule and gerrymandering they did,  can,  and are . They are adding to their  surrender terms by refusing to increase the debt limit. Failure to raise the debit limit  threatens  to undermine   our nation’s economy  by   leading to  default on  payments for bills already obligated and  due .

  The 250 furloughed BLM , National Park,  federal conservation, and Forest Service employees are only some of the victims in Grand County. Their families lost buying power. Businesses  had also  hoped the last days of the tourist season, fall colors and elk rut viewing, would bring in some money  but the tourist season’s end  is already upon us.

 If the entire House of Representatives had been  allowed to vote, a   resolution to reopen and fund the government without  defunding the ACA  would have  passed right away. However  a  minority group in  the GOP caucus,  the Tea Party, was   determined to use the strategy of linking the issue of  continuing to fund the  government to  defunding or delaying the ACA. This  kept any “clean” bill, one  without reference to  the ACA,  from being  voted upon  by  the entire House. How far they will go on the debt limit threat is yet to be seen.

 One culprit that allows this to happen    is a rule of  the  GOP caucus in the House of Representatives, the Hastert Rule.  Unless the majority of the House GOP caucus agrees, a bill will not come up for a vote of a whole House . This rule  keeps   a coalition of moderate Republicans and Democrats from joining together to vote  for  a bill a faction of the GOP opposes.   GOP Speaker  John Boehner  chose to   invoke the Hastert Rule, some observers charge, because if he did not , the Tea Party would keep him from   being  re- elected Speaker again.   

  Another  culprit is the recent  redistricting process   that  enabled state legislatures dominated by the GOP   to gerrymander Congressional district boundaries  to make more districts overwhelmingly Republican in a general election.  These “safe” districts mean that any  member of the GOP running for Congress  who does not follow  the Tea Party’s line  could face a challenge from them  in a primary battle.  The implied or real  threat was enough to give the Tea Party additional votes of House members  who may not have  been in 100% agreement with a shutdown,  making the Tea Party the majority in the House  GOP caucus.

Knowing in advance that the Senate Democrats and the President would stop or veto any bill that   defunded,  delayed  or sabotaged the ACA , the House GOP controlled  by the Tea Party  continued sending  bills to the Senate with those poison pills and the threat to shutdown the government. Failing to bully the President to ditch the ACA,  his signature piece of legislation,  they then tried to   divide their opposition by offering to fund   a few popular programs, including reopening national parks , while excluding   other federal agencies, including some in Grand County.   To open the government for all services and agencies,  a vote by the entire House is all that is needed.

Hastert rule: why it is so difficult for DC to reach compromises

Did you ever wonder why the Republicans in the House of Representatives refuse to compromise or even to negotiate on the big issues? The culprit is mostly an obscure rule invoked by the GOP caucus in the House of Representatives since the days of Speaker Newt Gingrich and named after his successor, Dennis Hastert.

The rule: The Speaker should not allow a vote by the entire House on a bill unless a majority of the majority party caucus supports it. This rule is not in the Constitution; it is a rule practiced solely by Republicans. When Democrats have been in the majority of the House, they have never invoked a similar doctrine.

The result recently has been to allow Tea Party ideologically driven members be the tail that wags the entire House. The Hastert rule prevents moderate Republicans who are a minority of the House GOP from joining with Democrats, the minority in the House, to form a coalition of a majority of the whole by depriving them of an opportunity to vote on bills that the majority of GOP members don't approve. The House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) does have the power to ignore the rule, but he rarely uses it.

Between 2010 and the 2012 November election, the Republicans were in the majority in the House and the Hastert rule held fast. However, the November election was a shock to many in the GOP. They lost the women and Hispanic vote, and consequentially the race for the White House. There are those in the GOP who believe that if they are ever to regain the presidency, they are going to have to pass legislation that will appeal to those important blocks.

Speaker Boehner has broken the Hastert rule three times recently, however, no doubt fearing backlash against the party that could hurt in the 2014 elections if he did not. Deals to avert automatic tax increases at the beginning of the year and a relief package for states hit by Hurricane Sandy were allowed to come to the floor for a vote without approval of a majority of GOP. Both bills passed the House largely with the support of Democratic votes.

Last week, the Violence Against Women Act passed the House without the vote of the majority of Republican members because Boehner permitted the bill to come to the floor for a vote. This allowed a minority of Republican members to join with Democrats to form a majority of the whole House and pass the bill.

Exit polls after the November election and others taken last week revealed that an impressive majority of voters wanted budget cuts and deficit reduction to be balanced … more revenue generation as well as cuts. Nonetheless, we went over the sequester cliff. Why no compromise could be reached that reflected the voters' will on the sequester is the GOP's single-minded dedication to a principle accepted by more than Tea Party members: Absolutely no deal will be struck that includes even closing tax loopholes to raise revenue. Speaker Boehner dared not break the Hastert rule over this issue and risk his speakership. Any Republican in a heavily GOP safe district would also have faced a primary if they, too, voted for the approach favored by voters nationwide. There is no profile in courage in this Congress.

The only way to crack the stone wall of the Tea Party is if the sequester creates so much voter/supporter/business community outrage over the results that any hope of re-election of a significant number of Republicans in 2014 is put in jeopardy. The Democrats believe it will happen and the Republicans are gambling it will not. Who wins that gamble will soon be known as the full impact of the cuts will be felt over the next several months.

This was my column today in the Sky Hi Daily News

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