Tag: Grover Norquist

Grover In Wonderland

Grover sized

WRT to the so-called fiscal cliff negotiations, President Obama, as expected, caved on his many promises to draw the line of tax increases at $200-250k, settling for $400-450k. This has the effect of reducing his initial position of raising $1.6 trillion in new revenues to a mere $620 billion. The difference will likely be made up in even further cuts to discretionary spending, including an already weakened social safety net, though Obama made some vague promises to offset some of the difference by closing some tax loophole and other exemptions.

While in the short run the Obama Administration won some significant concessions on issues like extended unemployment insurance, green energy tax credits (at the price of extending subsidies for the fossil fuel extraction industry), and patching the Alternative Minimum Tax loophole (that was starting to sweep more and more of the middle class into its grasp because it wasn’t originally indexed to inflation), he has substantially weakened his future negotiating position with the Rethugs by not insisting that the debt limit be extended permanently.

This latter development sets up a replay of hostage taking strategy that the Rethugs used so effectively in 2011. While Obama has stated in no uncertain terms that he wouldn’t entertain negotiations on the issue, he hardly has the negotiating cred to convince anyone that he won’t fold on that issue as he has on so many others. (I heard today a spokesman for Patriotic Millionaires, who have lobbied for higher taxes on individuals in his income class, say that Obama was the worst presidential negotiator evah.)

That said, the bottom line on the income tax issue for Rethugs is that because they agreed to higher income taxes (if only on the top 0.016%), it represents a clear break with the vaunted Grover Norquist no tax increases ever pledge. Nonetheless, as a leader in the Grand Old Denial Party, Grover tried to spin the defeat, saying:

“The Bush tax cuts lapsed at midnight last night. Every R voting for Senate bill is cutting taxes and keeping his/her pledge.”

Interviewed on MSNBC by a dumbfounded Andrea Mitchell, she offered a more realistic assessment:

“Wait a second,” Mitchell interjected with a laugh. “We’re not living in the Alice in Wonderland world here. There is a tax increase for wealthy Americans. It’s literally a tax increase. Rates are up.”

Earlier, Grover had tweeted:

“We had an election Boehner was elected speaker. Now lame duck obama should get over it.”

Oh, Grover, you quack us up. The Rethugs regained control of the House despite receiving less votes than the totality of Democratic reps nationwide, thanks to the 2010 census and some heavily biased redistricting shenanigans.

That sound you’re hearing is the cement shoes hardening around your feet as history awaits your plunge into the primordial D.C. tidewaters. Future generations might find it necessary to re-drain the Washington swamp, at which time your rotted corpse will surface and serve as a time capsule embodying the worst of the Greed is Good ethos that has done so much to corrupt the US government.

Bon voyage, you selfish prick. And may the Ancients of Days judge you divinely.

Is It Over For Grover?

In a front page story Tuesday titled For Tax Pledge and Its Author, a Test of Time, the NY Times meditates on the prospects of Grover “Poopy Head” Grover following the decisive defeat of the GOP in the 2012 presidential elections.

The article begins thusly:

Next to the oath of office, it has been perhaps the most important commitment that Republicans in Congress can make. It is called simply “the Pledge,” and its enforcer is such a fixture in the party that he is known simply by his first name, Grover.

But the pledge and its creator, Grover Norquist, a 56-year-old conservative lobbyist, have never before faced a test as they do now. The federal deficit stands at $1 trillion. The social safety net continues to grow — and, in the case of Medicare and Social Security, remains hugely popular. And unless the two parties can agree on a fiscal plan before Jan. 1, hundreds of billions of dollars of tax increases will go into effect automatically, meaning that Congress does not even need to act for taxes to rise.

The combination means that Mr. Norquist, whose long record of success is a rarity in Washington, finds himself in a tricky spot. Some top Republicans, including Speaker John A. Boehner, are saying they now agree with Democrats that the government must collect more tax revenue. Others have gone so far as to break with Mr. Norquist publicly.

By Mr. Norquist’s count, 219 House members — enough for a majority — and 39 senators have committed to the pledge. But some of those members who signed on, many of them years ago, have started to back away, apparently leaving him several votes shy of the majority he would need to block any tax increase.

The last broad-based tax increase the Rethugs supported was 22 years ago, signed into law by George H.W. Bush.  So it may be a bit early to write his political epitaph.

For instance, mid-term elections like the one coming up in 2014 historically favor the losers of the previous presidential election. And Citizens United will continue to pump ungodly amounts of money into GOP campaigns. Presumably, the 43 billionaires who supported Mitt Romney will know better than to naively dump all their money on political hucksters like Karl Rove and Dick Armey.

Nonetheless, exit polls from Nov. 6 show a growing majority of voters supporting tax increases on the rich to help bring the deficit under control and to preserve vital safety net programs for the poor and middle class. While I don’t believe I’ve ever before quoted John McCain clone Lindsey Graham favorably, he did state the obvious when he told the Washington Post:

“The demographics race we’re losing badly. We’re not generating enough angry white guys to stay in business for the long term.”

Hear that, Poopy Head?

Regressive Repuglicon Hatriots

Regressives in Congress have substituted partisanship for patriotism, placing party loyalty above loyalty to America.

The Cult Of Grover: What Rot He’s Wrought

Have the Dems finally tired of being buggered by the mythical unicorn of bipartisanship?

Rethugs Demand Dems Undergo Empathobotomy

Even before the GOP regained control of the House, they’d successfully cowed Democrats into accepting their terms on legislation ranging from health insurance reform to the extension of the Bush tax cuts. Since then, they have upped their game by extorting large cuts in the social safety net in exchange for extending unemployment insurance to the millions of workers laid off …

Atlas Mugged: Making The World Safe For Sociopaths

What do Ayn Rand, Paul Ryan, the Teabaggers, and Lucifer have in common? (If you want to feel the backward, you must click it.) In Ayn Rand’s 1957 novel and current movie, Atlas Shrugged, the ideological template for those wishing to usher in a new Gilded Age run by billionaire plutocrats like the Koch Brothers, Atlas is meant to symbolize …