Tag Archives: Capitol Hill

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Boehner: glutton for punishment

Word now is that U.S. House Speaker John Boehner is going to seek the speakership once again … if the Republicans gain control of the Senate and strengthen their control of the House.

Is this guy a glutton for punishment or what?

Members: Boehner will stay on

I had heard from someone close to the speaker some months ago that he’d had it up to here with the tea party wing of his party. Boehner, who hails from the so-called “establishment wing” of the GOP, has been fighting with the insurgents within his GOP caucus. He’s expressed growing frustration with their intransigence that, according to those who know him, goes against the speaker’s instincts to compromise when the opportunity presents itself.

Now comes word that he’s all in for the next Congress particularly if Republicans win control of the Senate and perhaps strengthen their grip on the reins of power in the House.

But will any of that make life easier for Boehner, who’ll have to carry the water for the tea party that could be emboldened even more in their efforts to stymie legislation?

I’m thinking not.

Which is why I’m also thinking that he just might call it a career after he’s re-elected from his Ohio congressional district.

This little back story just turn into a major act.

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GOP getting unhappy over IRS probe

Might there be some restiveness brewing within Republican congressional ranks?

It appears, according to Politico.com, that some GOP members of Congress are getting a bit tired of the incessant probing, questioning and spending of taxpayer money over a controversy that seems to have run out of steam.

http://www.politico.com/story/2014/03/darrell-issa-irs-tea-party-investigation-105119.html?hp=l7

You remember the Internal Revenue Service “scandal” that boiled up nearly a year ago when it was learned that the most loathed agency in the federal government was vetting conservative political action groups’ request for tax-exempt status? Remember when all that broke?

It was considered a big deal because some folks feared that the IRS got its marching orders from the White House, perhaps from within the Oval Office itself. Heck, maybe the president himself awoke in the wee hours one morning, picked up the phone and called the IRS himself and ordered the agency to stick it to those right-wingers, correct?

Well, none of that seems to have happened. Instead, the IRS acted apparently as it is charged to do — with liberal and conservative groups alike — and vetted tea party groups carefully to ensure that they didn’t violate federal tax status laws. Investigators have determined that all decisions reportedly were made by field office personnel; they were not mandated by White House directives.

None of that has satisfied House Government Oversight and Reform Committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., who keeps beating the drum looking for something — anything! — that ties this controversy to President Obama’s shirt tail.

It turns out some of his GOP colleagues — not to mention Democratic House members — are getting weary of it.

“There is a perception that if your case is rock-solid, it doesn’t need months to sort it out,” said Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, who is considered a probable successor to Issa as chairman, given that Issa is being term-limited out of the chairman’s seat at the end of the current Congress.

The case has been far from rock-solid. In fact, it has been shown to be mushy soft and full of holes.

Let’s get off this one, Mr. Chairman, and get back to legislating — which is what we pay our lawmakers to do.

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Speaker Boehner's future starting to get cloudy

This isn’t exactly a scoop, but I’m hearing some rumblings from folks in the know on Capitol Hill that the speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives has had it up to here with the tea party wing of his Republican Party caucus.

Indeed, John Boehner, R-Ohio, has called them out already over their insistence that the government default on its debt obligations if they don’t get spending cuts to offset increases in the national debt.

I’ve long thought of Boehner as a good-government Republican who’s been whipsawed by the tea party cabal within his GOP caucus. He’s been hamstrung by threats of open rebellion among some of those clowns. Back home in his Ohio congressional district, he hears murmurs of candidates challenging him from the right as he runs for re-election.

How much fun can this be? Not much if you’ve worked hard to be second in line — behind the vice president — in the presidential succession queue.

Boehner has been in the House a long time. He’s been a loyal Republican linked more to the “establishment wing” than to the tea party insurgent wing.

What might the future hold for Boehner?

A source close to the speaker has intimated that Boehner is fed up. He well might pack it in after the next Congress convenes in January 2015. It’s looking as though the GOP will strengthen its majority in the House and might even take over the Senate from the Democrats. The question well might be: What will the new House majority look like? Some of the tea leaves are suggesting that Republican ranks will swell with more tea party types, giving Boehner even more grief than he’s experienced already.

Thus, this source indicates, he well might just resign and let the House choose the next pigeon, er, speaker to run the place. Boehner then might go back home, or he might stay in D.C. and become, oh, a lobbyist.

I’ve also learned that this scenario has been discussed openly within the halls of Congress.

Yes, the atmosphere in Washington is toxic. Speaker Boehner’s immediate future plans just might tell us all something quite telling about how poisonous it’s become in the nation’s capital.

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Tide is turning seriously against Democrats

Democrats beware.

A congressional election on the Gulf Coast of Florida has just spelled impending disaster for your party this coming November.

Republican David Jolly has just defeated Democrat Alex Sink for the seat vacated by the death of longtime Republican U.S. Rep. C.W. Bill Young. Democrats thought the special election could provide a breakthrough in a traditionally strong GOP district. They were mistaken.

http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/local/adam-c-smith-column-david-jolly-victory-spells-trouble-for-democrats/2169745

Jolly won, although by a narrow margin.

He managed to make the Affordable Care Act the issue. He nationalized a local contest. Sink was sunk by her support of the ACA, which Republicans have demonized successfully — and wrongly, in my view — as some kind of evil government intrusion.

How will this play out in all 435 congressional districts? Not well if you’re a Democratic candidate, or so it appears at this moment.

Democratic candidates are spooked, or at least they should be spooked, by the prospect of running for Congress with public disapproval of the ACA so high. Tampa Bay Times political columnist Adam Smith put it this way: “Don’t be surprised to see vulnerable Democrats across the country start distancing themselves from health care reform in a way that Sink did not.”

None of this discussion, of course, matters for the 13th Congressional District of Texas, one of the most reliably Republican districts in the House of Representatives. Incumbent Mac Thornberry of Clarendon faces a Democrat this fall, someone named Mike Minter; Thornberry will cruise to re-election.

The contested races involving potentially vulnerable Democrats do pose a problem. Democrats have all but given up the idea of regaining control of the House and they are in serious danger of losing control of the Senate.

What happens if the GOP gains control of both congressional chambers? Well, gridlock will tighten. Dysfunction will intensify. Tempers will flare. Relations between the White House and Capitol Hill will go from bad to worse to abysmal.

Government will not work.

When the new Congress takes over in January 2015 we just might be longing for the “good old days” that are about to pass into history.

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Worst Congress ever?

Great day in the morning! I think we have an area where congressional Democrats and Republicans actually agree.

They all seem to agree that this is the worst-performing Congress in history.

Worst Congress ever?

Of course, that’s where the consensus ends. They’re blaming each other for the dysfunction that that ails the legislative branch of the federal government.

I’ve long been a good-government kind of guy. I like government to work for the country and believe government has a role to play in helping those who need a hand. Thus, I tend to lean to the left. No surprise, probably.

The Republicans who have run the House of Representatives since 2011 have a different view. Many of them believe Congress shouldn’t do nearly as much as it’s allowed to do. So, when the president has proposed legislation and ideas to help folks, Congress has been prone to resist disposing of those ideas.

“I tell people, we’re not getting anything done and that’s good,” said Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., who intends to leave the Senate at the end of 2014.

Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., who has served in Congress since The Flood, recently announced his intention to retire at the end of the year. He said the place no longer is fun, no longer productive and no longer worth his time and effort.

Dingell is not alone.

Does the president deserve some of the blame for this dysfunction? Sure. Governing is a shared responsibility, which is why I get so annoyed at those who blame the president for all that ails the nation’s political system. Barack Obama promised to break the gridlock loose. He hasn’t delivered on that promise. One of the common criticisms of the president is that he isn’t fond of schmoozing with legislators the way, oh, Lyndon Johnson would do. Thus, when he proposes an idea, Obama prefers to let the merits of the idea win the day, without actually working with legislators to persuade them to push the idea into law.

It seems, though, that whenever he reaches out, his “friends” on the other side slap his hand away.

Therein lies the crux of the problem.

Republicans blame Democrats for Congress’s failure to deliver … and vice versa.

At least they agree that the legislative branch is a loser.

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Look out if GOP captures Senate majority

U.S. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., thinks the Republicans will gain control of the Senate when the votes are counted in the 2014 mid-term election.

Of course he’d say that. He wants nothing more, except perhaps to be speaker of the House whenever John Boehner, R-Ohio, decides to call it a career.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2014/02/24/rep_cantor_republicans_will_take_the_senate.html

My own thought simply is that Republicans had better get ready for the fight of their lives if they govern both houses of Congress.

It’s been a knock-down, drag-out bloodbath during the first term-plus of Barack Obama’s presidency. The GOP-controlled House has managed to stymie the president’s agenda at almost every turn. Senate Republicans had done a good job of blocking appointments to key judicial posts until Democrats decided to change the rules to make it easier to circumvent filibusters.

The atmosphere in Washington has gotten quite toxic since President Obama took office.

If you think it’s been bad so far, then the final two years of the Obama presidency will require gas masks.

If Cantor’s prediction comes true, then the Senate will be able to block virtually every appointment the president hopes to make. The Supreme Court? None of the justices is going to leave the high court voluntarily.

The fights over budget issues only will intensify. The majority in the House will feel emboldened to throw up even more roadblocks. With the GOP in control in the Senate, if Cantor’s dream comes true, there will be no way for the upper chamber to act as a counterbalance.

What will the White House do? Look for the president to examine every possible legal action he can take through executive authority. He still has the power of his high office.

You know the saying about “being careful what you wish for.” Republicans want badly to control all of Capitol Hill, not just half of it.

If you thought the fighting was bitter to this point, well, just wait. It’s going to get downright bloody — and this is not how government is supposed to work.

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Congressman is gone; don’t end investigation

Trey Radel has bid adieu to the House of Representatives, which means — more than likely — the end of an ethics investigation into the act that got him into trouble.

The probe should go forward.

Radel resignation likely ends ethics investigation

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, a watchdog group, has called for the continuation of the investigation by the House ethics committee.

To what end? How about sending a message to lawmakers who mess up that the threat of an investigation isn’t just for political purposes, to pressure them to leave office.

Radel pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor charge of cocaine possession when he tried to buy the drug from an undercover narcotics cop in Washington, D.C. He went into rehab, came out and then today announced his resignation from Congress, after serving for less than a full term.

He’s not the first lawmaker to leave under a cloud. Democratic Reps. David Wu of Oregon, Jesse Jackson Jr. of Illinois and Republican Rep. Nathan Deal of Georgia all left Congress while under investigation. Once they blew the joint, the probes ended. Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., also was being investigated. He quit the Senate and the Senate ethics panel released its report a month later.

CREW thinks there’s more behind Radel’s resignation and wants questions answered. The group wants to know, for example, who introduced Radel to his drug dealer? Did Radel share his cocaine with anyone?

Ethics investigations shouldn’t be about politics. They should seek answers to why lawmakers flout the law, the rules of ethical conduct and should make strong recommendations that the entire Congress should adopt.

Sadly, this often isn’t the case. Trey Radel is but the latest example of an ethics probe that gets derailed because committee members seemingly don’t want to bother with examining the conduct of someone who’s no longer serving.

It should matter to them. They, too, serve the public — and the public deserves a Congress that behaves ethically.

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‘Compromise’ not such a dirty word

It turns out that compromise indeed is possible in the 113th Congress.

When it shows itself, we learn that things actually can get done, such as approving a federal budget that keeps the government running through September. The House of Representatives approved the deal overwhelmingly and has sent it back to the Senate hopefully for final approval.

http://www.cnn.com/2014/01/15/politics/house-spending-bill/index.html

The $1.1 trillion budget deal marks a departure from recent history, where Republicans and Democrats have fought over every big and little thing in the budget. It has produced gridlock, made a lot of people angry, shut down part of the government for a time, forced public opinion of Congress into a sinkhole and redefined the term “political dysfunction.”

Does this signal a new day on Capitol Hill? Probably not. However, one can hope.

Tomorrow might bring a new set of hassles and disagreements, particularly in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives that seems to have declared its intention to block everything House Democrats and the Democrat in chief in the White House want to do.

The bill reduces funds for the Internal Revenue Service, gives federal workers a 1 percent pay increase and gives money to the Environmental Protection Agency. These measures make Republicans happy. Meanwhile, Democrats got something for themselves, such as funding for Head Start, which helps early childhood education efforts.

No one is entirely happy with the deal, nor are they entirely unhappy.

That’s the spirit of compromise. Things can get done. It’s how you legislate. It’s how good government is supposed to work.

What’s more, it doesn’t inflict nearly the pain that stubborn intransigence can produce.

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Congress sees ‘spike’ in approval rating

What gives here?

Congress’s approval ratings, which had been languishing in the single digits for months on end, suddenly have taken a “spike” upward. According to the RealClearPolitics.com poll average — the one that takes in all the major polls’ findings and averages them out — shows congressional approval at 12.4 percent, as of Dec. 9.

I think we’re going to see even more improvement in the days and weeks ahead.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/congressional_job_approval-903.html

On what do I base that bold prediction? It’s the budget deal hammered out by Democrats and Republicans, actually working together to avoid a government shutdown that has done the trick.

I’ve noted already that the deal announced by committee chairs Rep. Paul Ryan and Sen. Patty Murray — a Republican and Democrat, respectively — is far from perfect. But the bigger point is that legislation rarely satisfies everyone. Good government almost always is the product of compromise, which by definition means both sides have to give a little to get something done.

If you track congressional approval ratings on the link attached to this blog back to when the government shut down in October, you’ll notice a decided tanking of public approval of Congress. Republicans leaders who run the House of Representatives took it on the chin the hardest from Americans fed up with the obstruction, the posturing and the do-nothing approach taken by the GOP.

It goes without saying — but I’ll say it anyway — that both chambers of Congress are populated by politicians … even those who say they “aren’t politicians.” Therefore, politicians depend on the people’s feelings about the job they’re doing if they want to stay in office.

All 535 members of the House and Senate should take heed at this “spike” in approval ratings. I think Americans are sending them a message: Do something — for a change.

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Bipartisanship clawing its way back? Maybe

The U.S. House of Representatives, led by the Republicans — who are in turn being rattled by the tea party wing of their own party — is beginning to rumble with bipartisanship once again.

Perhaps.

http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2013/12/12/house_passes_budget_bill.html

The House voted 332-94 in favor of the two-year budget deal hammered out by a conference committee co-chaired by Republican House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan and Senate Budget Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray.

Is the deal perfect? Hardly.

But it prevents another partial government shutdown, which turned out to be a nightmare for Republicans in October — when the latest shutdown occurred.

The usual right-wing crazies are calling the deal a loser. They gripe about it not cutting enough money from government spending. They want to keep the mandated budget cuts called “sequestration,” which the committee managed to toss aside.

Some lefties also are unhappy, about the failure to provide long-term unemployment insurance for about a million jobless Americans. I happen to agree with their unhappiness — therefore, I won’t call myself “crazy,” if you get my drift.

The House vote, though, did attract a lot of GOP support, which produced the overwhelming victory for common sense and compromise … which ought to be the hallmark of legislating.

I still fear the tea party cabal in the House is going to find a way to torpedo further attempts to make government work. For now, it’s been pushed aside. I’m happy about that.