Only one way for Boehner to save Republicans from themselves.... And it's going to be ugly

[DonViejo]

Portrait of a powerless man

There's only one way for Boehner to save Republicans from themselves on the sequester. And it's going to be ugly

BY STEVE KORNACKI

Why does John Boehner subject himself to this?

Not for the first time this year, and probably not for the last, the speaker allowed to the floor on Thursday a major piece of legislation that a solid majority of the Republican Conference voted against, that passed mainly on the strength of Democratic votes, and that the Obama White House will now trumpet as a major achievement. The bill at hand was the Violence Against Women Act, which had easily passed the Senate only to meet with fierce resistance from conservatives in the House. In the end, 138 House Republicans went on the record against it, while 87 backed it. Among Democrats, meanwhile, there wasn’t a single “no” vote.

We saw this same dynamic at the start of the year, when the fiscal cliff deal passed with just 85 Republicans voting “yes” – and 151 voting “no.” And we saw it a few weeks after that, when a $50.5 billion Sandy aid package cleared the chamber with only 49 Republicans supporting it, and 179 opposing it.

The common thread in all of these instances is that true-believer conservatives imposed politically toxic positions on the GOP conference and Boehner had embarrassingly little ability to put a stop to the madness. It was only when the power of public outrage, poll numbers and pressure from members in marginal districts grew just strong enough that Boehner had the ability to allow floor votes and resolve the issues without losing his speakership to a coup of angry conservatives.

Really, this has been the story of Boehner’s entire tenure as speaker. In the 112thCongress, Boehner famously negotiated to the brink of a deficit reduction “grand bargain” with President Obama, one that would have exchanged modest revenue increases for serious cuts to safety net programs. But even that was giving away too much in the eyes of the Tea Party crowd, forcing Boehner to walk away from the table. Back then, Boehner could mostly settle for not striking deals with the administration and leaving most issues to fester. In the minds of most Republicans, the lousy economy would knock Obama out of office in 2012 and deliver the Senate to the GOP too, empowering the party to impose a true-believer agenda in 2013.

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http://www.salon.com/2013/03/01/portrait_of_a_powerless_man/

[niyad]

1. mass seppuku?

[R. Daneel Olivaw]

3. One can hope.

[Agschmid]

2. Good read.

More and more will start to pass with a majority if the minority in the future. Bad sign for Boehner.

[indepat]

4. Given half a chance, the true-believers will inflict such mass damage, pain and suffering, or death

on the country, its institutions, and the lives of tens of millions, the electorate will finally sound the death knell to these true-believing unpatriotic purveyors of mass hate and destruction. Go GOP, go straight to hell.