How to paint yourself into a corner

In a Tuesday morning meeting, Representative Eric Cantor, the chamber’s majority leader, told fellow Republicans to “stop grumbling and whining and to come together as conservatives and rally behind” the House speaker John A. Boehner’s plan. But many lawmakers complained that it lacked sufficient spending cuts. As a further blow to its prospects, the Club for Growth, which scores members on their fiscally conservative votes, came out against the plan.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/27/us/po ... ss&emc=rss

I actually feel sorry for Boehner. He is trying to preside over two different parties that call themselves Republicans

While neither side is shining in regards to this issue, I think the Republicans are looking worse. You just can't do an honest negotiation when you refuse to put everything on the table. The Dems seemed to be willing to bend, even with the entitlements (not sure Obama would of gotten enough of them to agree, though), but the Repubs won't.

The current Boehner plan seems awfully close to the Reid plan...

The Senate plan, unveiled by Reid, and the proposal announced the same day by Boehner overlap in significant ways. Both identify about $1.2 trillion in spending cuts to the day-to-day operating budgets of government agencies, though Reid's proposal also counts an extra $1 trillion in savings from winding down wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Both proposals would create a bipartisan congressional commission to identify further deficit reductions, especially in major health care programs such as Medicare and Medicaid.

The primary difference between the two is timing. Reid's proposal would raise the debt ceiling enough so that it wouldn't have to be reconsidered until 2013, beyond the 2012 elections, as demanded by Obama. The GOP plan would only extend the debt ceiling for about six months.

For Republicans, the timing provides crucial leverage to force Democrats and the president to cut spending in Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security, expensive benefit programs that Democrats have long protected, despite escalating costs.

Credit rating agencies such as Moody's and Standard & Poor's have threatened to downgrade the United States' gold-plated AAA rating if Congress and the White House don't extend the debt ceiling and take steps to bring long-term deficits under control.

While both plans would increase the debt ceiling, ratings agencies have said a short-term increase such as the one proposed by House Republicans may not be enough to protect the U.S. from a ratings downgrade. What's more, neither plan offers the larger deficit-reducing assurances that credit ratings have said they need for the U.S. to retain its place as one of the most secure investments in the world.

http://news.yahoo.com/white-house-threatens-veto-boehners-house-plan-192028424.html

So why won't the Repubs just bend a bit and get this done? I thinking the answer is because they want the issue to come back again right before the elections, even if it could mean lowering our credit rating which would create even more debt due to increased interest we'd have to pay as a result..

The freshmen Republicans were voted in on pledges to reduce taxes, you want them to back down on this major piece of legislation? Not only would it not reduce taxes, it would raise them.
While I think we could stand to see a bunch of company specific tax loopholes cut, I applaud them for sticking to their guns instead of being corrupted.

it was the damn GOP that painted themselves into this corner by trying to attach all this crap to the debt ceiling vote. They (Congress) already spent all this money. Time to pay their bills.

SS109 wrote: The freshmen Republicans were voted in on pledges to reduce taxes, you want them to back down on this major piece of legislation? Not only would it not reduce taxes, it would raise them.
While I think we could stand to see a bunch of company specific tax loopholes cut, I applaud them for sticking to their guns instead of being corrupted.

If they support the current Reid or Boehner plans, taxes will not be increased.

pineinthegrass wrote: So why won't the Repubs just bend a bit and get this done? I thinking the answer is because they want the issue to come back again right before the elections, even if it could mean lowering our credit rating which would create even more debt due to increased interest we'd have to pay as a result..

From my perspective the answer to that question is contained in the last paragraph of your link.

What's more, neither plan offers the larger deficit-reducing assurances that credit ratings have said they need for the U.S. to retain its place as one of the most secure investments in the world.

While raising the debt limit for either 6 months or 18 months may take the scare tactic of default out of play for the negotiations, neither the Reid plan or the similar Boehner plan will protect the credit rating and the Treasury would likely be paying more in interest in the future regardless of which plan was adopted.

The only proposal offered up thus far that both avoids default and protects the AAA credit rating is Cut, Cap and Balance. Nothing containing specifics has yet to emerge from the party of Democrats, either in the Senate or the Oval Office, that satisfies both the deficit reduction demanded by the credit rating houses and avoids any possibility of default on the part of the United States.

Since there will NOT be a "Balance", under any circumstances... What's your second choice?

pineinthegrass wrote:

SS109 wrote: The freshmen Republicans were voted in on pledges to reduce taxes, you want them to back down on this major piece of legislation? Not only would it not reduce taxes, it would raise them.
While I think we could stand to see a bunch of company specific tax loopholes cut, I applaud them for sticking to their guns instead of being corrupted.

If they support the current Reid or Boehner plans, taxes will not be increased.

Reality is that Obama has already gotten his tax increases - it's called ObamaCare. The tax hikes have already been placed on our shoulders, it is now time for the spending cuts that will lighten the load back to something approaching bearable and 25% of the national production isn't bearable.

Hmmmm.... Since 40% of the TARP funds went to tax cuts; and the Affordable Health Care Act hasn't kicked in yet; and no one is being forced to spend a nickel yet, how many dollars is it costing you so far?....EXACTLY?

There's "reality", and there's PS "fantasy"....