DeFazio: Obama about to cave in to GOP on debt ceiling

[Poll_Blind]

From The Hill:

Rep. Peter DeFazio (D-Ore.) on Friday morning complained that President Obama is reportedly pursuing a last-minute agreement with House Republicans that would mostly rely on significant cuts to federal spending as a condition for raising the debt ceiling.

Speaking on the House floor, DeFazio said Obama is reportedly "preparing yet another great cave."

"He cuts taxes to create a crisis, and then we cut spending to protect the tax cuts because tax cuts create jobs, except they haven't created jobs, but we've got to continue to protect them," DeFazio said. "It's all very, very sad."

DeFazio is one of the more vocal critics of the Obama administration, and has caught the attention of Obama himself in past years. DeFazio voted against the 2008 financial bailout and Obama's stimulus program. Obama famously told DeFazio, "Don't think we're not keeping score, brother."

I am a picky flaming Leftie, and I love this man to death. He has never let me down. He is the Real Deal.

To President Obama, right back atcha: "Don't think we're not keeping score, brother."

The President may be keeping score, but so are we!

PB

[Name removed]

1. Deleted message

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Bluenorthwest]

2. Same week he said that to Peter, he called Grassley an

'honest broker'. We are keeping score. The only mark against Peter is that he endorsed Obama early on in the primary and took him by the hand all over Oregon. That was a mistake, and it is very sad.

[Poll_Blind]

5. He, just like I, took Obama at his word. We were both swindled and I don't hold it...

...against him any more than the thousands of other DUers who swallowed Hope and Change hook, line and sinker. I didn't think that I could ever have Hope again, and President Obama rekindled that. Just because Obama has let me and the Democratic Party down doesn't mean the Hope he inspired in me has been extinguished too.

PB

[gratuitous]

3. Popular media coverage of progressive dissent < 0

Score that.

[Octafish]

4. Score me with DeFazio.

He's my brother, a Democrat.

[monmouth]

7. Maybe DeFazio could primary Obama...Just a thought...n/t

[truebrit71]

6. As i've said for a while now, he is playing to the independent voters he thinks he can attract..

..with this Clinton-esque triangulation bullshit, whilst clearly forgetting his base...

I cannot figure out how such an intelligent person thinks that placating people that hate you with every fibre of their being garners you any votes.

If he caves (again) he will STILL not have the votes of the republican faithful, LOOSE many votes from the Democratic faithful, and leave the Independents wondering what all the fuss is about...

If I wanted major corporations to run this country, if I wanted to slash the social safety net, if I wanted MORE drilling, MORE environmental roll-backs, MORE wars, MORE attacks on personal freedom and civil liberties, I would have supported the fucking republican candidate....

I'm tired of being outraged anymore...I thought I had outrage-fatigue when Dimson was in office...i never expected it to continue with a fucking Democrat in the Whitehouse...

[Enrique]

8. oh he's just being emo

:sarcasm:

[Name removed]

9. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Enrique]

10. as i recall...

"we" back then was Obama and Rahm. Now, it's Obama and Bill Daley. :puke:

[Bluenorthwest]

14. And he was saying that to the man who introduced him to

half of Oregon, the State that brought him his largest crowd and West Coast delegates that California did not deliver to him. Peter's endorsement was very important for the unknown Senator's campaign here.

[pa28]

19. Yeah I remember that.

We're keeping score too.

[Poll_Blind]

32. It seems a hallmark of the Obama campaign to have forgotten them that brought....

...them to the dance, as it were.

PB

[damntexdem]

11. That doesn't mean that Congressional Dems have to cave as well.

They could still save the party.

[Poll_Blind]

12. If anyone can save it, they can. But they have a fight on their hands against the Administration.

All our reps need our support, and threats that we're going to have their ass on our walls if they give into the Republicans and cut Social Security/Medicare.

PB

[EFerrari]

15. They have to, no one else will. n/t

[Maven]

13. DeFazio is a real Democrat, unlike the fictional character currently in the WH

[Blue_In_AK]

16. Sometimes I wonder what Ted Kennedy would have thought

about all of this, and if he would have regretted his glowing support during the campaign.

[hifiguy]

17. If he had lived to see the shameful betrayals of everything

he and his brothers ever stood for by the Current Occupant he would be spitting nails and throwing thunderbolts about now.

[Chan790]

22. I don't think he'd have dared do it...

We'd have a dramatically different first-term if Kennedy was alive. There is no way he'd have pulled these stunts because Ted Kennedy would have wielded the real power in the Senate and we'd have enough votes to kill GOP debate.

If things had gone this way, Kennedy would have obliterated him by now. Okay, Kennedy would have buried this President before the ink was dry on the crap healthcare bill and we'd not even be talking about primaries because Obama would have been forced to LBJ by now.

[adhd_what_huh]

18. We win!

The goal is to beat the tar out of the republicans. Obama is going all in on the rats and is holding a full house. What ever modifications we agree to now can be undone after we destroy these jack wagons in the next election.

[cherokeeprogressive]

20. Boner walked out.

[FLAprogressive]

21. Sanders/DeFazio 2012

[roamer65]

49. There's two people I can vote for!!!!

[chill_wind]

23. K & R. DeFazio let us in on what was going in the bailout wranglings

when the House wanted some tighter strings on the giveaway.
And how Dem leadership sent in Laura Tyson to watch out for The Street.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7vi2M6TjMU4

I remember the jab after the stimulus votes, but I've always figured Pete probably actually got on Obama's "score card" radar well before he ever got inaugurated. That bit with Tyson was quite a tell.

[Fire1]

24. Not!! n/t

[Hydra]

25. "Obama famously told DeFazio, 'Don't think we're not keeping score, brother.'"

Wow, I didn't know that people's lives were a game to Mr. Hope and Change(TM)

It's like a guy on PBS said after Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson blamed 9/11 on Feminists and gays(paraphrasing since I can't find the quote):

"He(Falwell) has renewed our capacity to be outraged"

[KittyWampus]

26. Not a game. It's fucking War. If you can't deal with Politics get another hobby.

[Hydra]

27. *Laughs*

I know, it's your hobby to support people who are destroying to ordinary people of America. Why is that?

My hobby is speaking truth to power. The truth is, Obama wants these cuts. Do you support him doing that?

[in_cog_ni_to]

28. Pretty damn bad for a President to threaten a Congressman from his own party....

and that is obviously a threat. DeFazio is a Progressive and Obama loathes Progressives....though he DID need them to get elected....then threw them overboard when he didn't need them anymore. They won't make that mistake again.

[ProSense]

29. DeFazio is a

"real Democrat." That's why he voted against the People's Budget. He's not a tool like that caver Obama.

Oh, have you heard Boehner rejected the deal? Phew!

[Poll_Blind]

30. ----> DeFazio on the floor of the House, calling Obama out HERE:

At DU, hosted by YouTube

PB

[David__77]

31. The bailout was the worst thing ever.

What was needed was orderly bankruptcy, not rescue of the existing institutions. A great opportunity was squandered. The smartest people opposed the bailout.

[B Calm]

34. The cash for clunkers program saved a lot of US manufacturing jobs including my own.

[OnyxCollie]

39. TARP and the stimulus are two separate things. nt

[B Calm]

50. The LOANS to GM and Chrysler fall under TARP, they also

did a lot of good protecting US manufacturing jobs. You have to agree, if not for those loans we would have lost an awful lot of jobs.

We need to do even more protecting. A good start would end this free trade stuff and go back to FAIR TRADE. We use to have tariffs on imports entering this country. If it cost an employer 1 dollar in labor costs to make a (made up) product, but this employer could have the same product made in China for 10 cents in labor, there use to be a ninety cent tariff. Those tariffs not only provided much needed revenue, but also protected our manufacturing base here in America.

The GIVE AWAY money to banks and Wall Street, I had a problem with that.

Sorry I don't agree with you 100%. But, I really do think you need to re think about those loans Pres Obama gave to save our jobs.

[Jim Lane]

33. Why did DeFazio oppose the stimulus?

The stimulus was too small but it was way better than nothing, and it did create or save a couple million jobs.

[Sheepshank]

35. wow...we rail against those few that cost the purest of programs with their down vote

...and now here's a thread wanted them to Primary Obama?

[treestar]

36. This is the 8000th post making this claim

And what is "caving?" The choice is to make a deal with a Republican House or default. We need a deal more than they do. Republicans care what havoc that default will cause?

When are people going to start blaming Republicans for their failure to agree to tax increases?

[democracy1st]

38. when are you going to think with your brain,during the Bush admin they raised the debt 7 times!

[treestar]

40. Bush was a republican

that argument goes no where with the Tea Party Congress. They don't care if they are being inconsistent.

all the more reason to blame Republicans rather than the President from our own party.

[Flubadubya]

41. "We need a deal more than they do."

That seems to be the crux of the problem. Maybe we shouldn't be so damned "needy".

If Dem leaders had stood up to the Rethugs using REAL Democratic principles all along, we wouldn't be needing any kind of damned deal with them. This whole fiasco could have been averted if "dems" had behaved like "Dems" a long time ago!

[treestar]

42. OK, so stand up to them and take the consequences

No complaints if we don't win the bet.

[Flubadubya]

43. I'm going to repost a reply to another DU'er who has similar views as yours...

All the time I see you and others complaining about how there is so much criticism of Obama and the Dems, and hardly ever a word of criticism about Republicans. These are my thoughts on that:

If I have a beloved family member who is royally fucking up,you bet I'm going to be harping at, and complaining about that loved one; most likely to the exclusion of expressing how I feel about that jerkwad at work who bugs the shit out of me.

It's only human nature to be more concerned about the behavior of those you are most akin to than those you are not.

Just let the Prez and those blue dog Dems start pushing for the actual benefit of their constituents, and you'd see all kinds of praise and adulation pouring forth from the "liberals" on DU for their leaders. Meanwhile, it's so much more troubling to see the wolves in sheep's clothing tearing down our revered institutions from the inside rather than those attacking from the outside. Moreover, when you have the Democratic party dying from within, you realize how terribly vulnerable it is to the "depraved insanity of the repubs"... and you should know, we'll never reform the rethugs, so who are we going to try to persuade?

By the way, it's just nonsensical to always defend the indefensible... and boy do I see a lot of that around here.

[treestar]

44. Raising the debt ceiling would be what we'd be getting in return

Family analogies don't work. This is politics.

If the Pres. stands up to them then we get the default. No complaining about the consequences. If he is to have the courage then so should those who demand he take that risk.

[Flubadubya]

45. I simply refer you back to post #41 regarding where we're at...

in this process and why we never needed to be on this precipice. Yeah, it's obviously too late for him to do anything "bold" now, but I really didn't expect him to anyway, given his track record.

And yes, the family analogy most certainly does work... I think you just don't want to see it...

[treestar]

46. Why are you, ostensibly a Democrat, blaming the Democratic President

for people voting in a Republican Congress? This is a political issue. It is not the President's fault that there is a Republican Congress. It is the fault of voters. The Republicans' stance is their own fault. Why do you not blame Republicans?

It is as if you believe that the Presidency should be more powerful than Congress, if only the President has a forceful enough personality to get opposing politicians to give way. the Founders are spinning in their graves. It's close to the cult of personality.

[Flubadubya]

47. I absolutely do blame Republicans...

Their world view is so extreme and far from my own, words cannot even express how I feel about their destructive nature and behavior. Knowing that about them, I know I can never depend on them to do ANYTHING, EVER, in Congress or otherwise that will improve conditions in this country and I don't see any need to waste the energy on criticizing what I cannot change. Do you?

On the other hand, I matter-of-factly expect my Democratic leaders to represent REAL Democratic principles and to enact them into law in this country. When I see that they are not doing that, I am disappointed, disgruntled, and very likely to criticize them... because I know they can do better.

Most importantly, however, your argument posits a claim that simply is not so... Nowhere have I said that I expect the President to be all-powerful and to be able to single-handedly slay the vicious "Rethuglidragon". I have only claimed that my concern is that the Democratic Leaders AND the President are behaving problematically by not standing up against the Republican insanity. I never said the President could or should handle this all alone, thus, the Founders will not be spinning in their graves over anything I have said.

If today's democrats behaved more along the lines of the Democrats of yore (i.e. being as doggedly devoted to Democratic principles as the idiotic republicans are of their shit-house crazy ideologies) then we wouldn't have so damned many of the slimy little bastars in Congress where they can have such a detrimental influence on our laws.

The only way that I see we can boot the Rethugs out and get more truly "socially conscious" Democrats in leadership positions is for them to start showing us that they mean to stand firmly and solidly behind real Democratic principles.

It is obvious that handing the Rethugs everything they demand on a silver platter and asking meekly, "Is that enough?" just doesn't work when, like a petulant child, they toss the platter back in our face, fold their arms, stomp the ground, turn red in the face and say loudly, "No, I want more!" So, we are supposed to just say, "Well, OK, then, what if I sweeten the deal just a little more for you?" If our Dem leaders cannot figure out where this is going to go, then they need to be educated.

I'm sorry, but I would bet that you and I actually have more in common than we do with ANY Republican. We obviously just see the way out of this mess a little differently. I will continue to criticize (hopefully always constructively) the members of my party/family who simply do not behave in a manner that will most effectively advance the Democratic Cause... and that is only because these things matter so much to me. I wouldn't give you a plugged nickel for ANYTHING a republican stands for. So, it's all up to the Dems we want to support to help us out... and if they don't, then we need to work to replace them with Dems who will.

Peace...

[Dont_Bogart_the_Pretzel]

48. Well said.

Couldn't agree more!

[lumberjack_jeff]

37. I'm keeping score, and invoking the mercy rule.

Game over, man.