The absolute best part of the farm bill failing is that an actual House leader who can actually count the votes in her caucus told Boehner yesterday that this would happen:
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi took to the House floor shortly before the vote on McGovern’s amendment and urged Democrats to vote for it, which all but eight of them did. In an interview with The Nation in her Capitol office shortly after the vote, an exasperated Pelosi said the food stamp cuts could now endanger the entire farm bill.
“I don’t know if this is even going to pass,” she said. “I don’t know what the Republicans have in votes, but they better have a lot.”
Here’s the problem: as it stands now, many Democrats, like McGovern, have said they simply won’t vote for a farm bill with $20.5 billion in cuts, calling them a “poison pill.”
There are some Democrats who will: thirteen Democrats on the agriculture committee, many from rural areas that badly want a farm bill to be passed, voted for the version of the farm bill with those cuts.
But Pelosi predicted that only “somewhere between two and three times” that many Democrats would vote for the final farm bill with that level of food stamp cuts, meaning that House Speaker John Boehner would have to get a majority of his caucus to vote yes on the farm bill for it to pass.
And many conservatives are deeply unhappy with the legislation, in large part because they feel it doesn’t cut enough from food stamps. Boehner may not be able to get a majority of them to vote yes. And if, in order to win their votes, Boehner allows even deeper food stamp cuts, then Pelosi said it’s possible no Democrats would vote yes.
“If they change it on the floor, then all bets are off. It’s not even—I don’t think they can get Collin [Peterson, the ranking member on the agriculture committee who supports the food stamp cuts], depending on where they go with it,” she said. “If they have any adult supervision over there, somebody will say, ’If we go this far, increase these cuts, we better have all the votes that are necessary.‘ ”
Has there ever been a worse Speaker of the House with less control of his caucus than John Boehner?
Rabble Arouser
Boy howdy, I’ll bet that current Republican party leadership is missing the hell out of Tom “The Hammer” DeLay right about now.
Forum Transmitted Disease
Yes.
No, not in my lifetime. What’s a little bit scary is I don’t think he’s even trying to take a preliminary count before bringing stuff to the floor. Pelosi did, Hastert did, DeLay did. I think every House speaker in my lifetime has. You don’t bring stuff to the floor that won’t pass. Boehner doesn’t seem to care if legislation passes or not. Neither does Cantor. I don’t get what these guys are doing.
dmsilev
As various commentators around the web have pointed out, this creates an interesting dilemma for Boehner re: the immigration bill. There are going to be much the same dynamics in play; a bill that a non-trivial number of Democrats can bring themselves to support will be absolutely anathema to a large swath of the GOP House caucus, and there are probably enough nativist GOP reps that passing anything solely on Republican votes is probably not going to happen. And if the Senate passes a bill, sitting around and doing nothing isn’t a great option either.
Maybe Boehner should just resign, telling people he wants to spend more time with his
familylobbyists.PeakVT
Roll call here.
Tokyokie
Beats me, but has there ever been a worse caucus to try to control?
Hunter Gathers
@Forum Transmitted Disease:
All they are trying to do is deal with a group of people who regularly order tire rims and anthrax for lunch.
dmsilev
Newt Gingrich was worse in the sense that he did have some control over his caucus, and hence they were able to get a fair amount of Crazy accomplished. Given the contents of that caucus, let’s be thankful that it’s being run by a horribly weak Speaker instead of the Republican equivalent of Nancy Pelosi.
srv
Oh, it’s just a 15% cut per month, young bucks will have to downgrade to rib-eyes.
MattF
The good news is that Congress beats ebola by a good margin, but, however, not Brussels sprouts or colonoscopies:
http://www.publicpolicypolling.com/main/2013/01/congress-less-popular-than-cockroaches-traffic-jams.html
PeakVT
@Forum Transmitted Disease: Boehner probably doesn’t care that much. Cantor, OTOH, wants to watch things burn.
Baud
Clearly the polls on House members were skewed.
beltane
My suggestion is for Boehner to go have a few stiff drinks and then think about this in the morning.
Baud
@beltane:
So you’re saying he should act like it’s Thursday.
cmorenc
@John Cole:
Yes, Boehner is probably the weakest Speaker of the House in US History by a comfortable margin, but OTOH he has by far the worst, most difficult caucus to work with in US History, at least since the Civil War a hundred fifty years ago. Even LBJ or Sam Rayburn’s legendary skills would be challenged to the max trying to lead the bunch of colossolly uncooperative bozos Boehner has to deal with. But Boehner fails to make even a competent attempt at it.
Just Some Fuckhead
@srv: These motherfuckers would never go hungry if they could eat flat screen teevees.
Keith
I think the best part is that Eric Cantor is blaming the Democrats for failing to come up with enough votes to pass it. Awesome!
Yatsuno
@Forum Transmitted Disease:
Feature, not bug. These are individuals who believe government cannot do anything better than the private sector, so they have taken it upon themselves to prove that theory correct.
eemom
OT, but this seems like some good head ‘splodin’ news for the firebagger wannabes around here.
/tribalist
slag
@Forum Transmitted Disease:
Maybe they want to use Democratic “No” votes in their campaign commercials? Context has never been particularly relevant in those, and maybe there’s some good base-driving stuff deep down in the bill that they can conveniently bring up?
MattF
Pelosi is good at counting votes and, wonder to behold, she’s probably not even the only Democrat who can do that. But Boehner is probably the best the Republicans can do. And… it’s not very good.
Just Some Fuckhead
@eemom:
No surprise there. Republicans are the best defenders of law and order because they are authoritarian in nature. A liberal in charge of the FBI would be a disaster. You’d see something very similar to the hooker and blow scandal that’s going on with the Secret Service. I’m a liberal but even I recognize our weaknesses and the importance of having serious conservatives in all the most important leadership roles of government.
Christie/Lieberman 2016
kc
many Democrats, like McGovern, have said they simply won’t vote for a farm bill with $20.5 billion in cuts, calling them a “poison pill.”
Good for them.
Soonergrunt
@eemom: James Comey was the Acting Attorney General who refused to sign off on a Bush Admin warrantless surveillance program. This prompted the White House Chief of Staff and a couple of other people to go to John Ashcroft (who was sick in the hospital) and try to get him to over-rule Comey. Ashcroft refused.
EconWatcher
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Comey is not even remotely a liberal. And he does not have an expansive view of civil liberties.
He does, however, have respect for the rule of law, and wasn’t about to get steamrolled by the likes of Alberto Gonzales.
This appointment is classic Obama: The candidate is competent and appropriate, but by his very presence also sticks a political shiv to the last Administration and its lawless ways.
BGinCHI
There is no Republican Party.
The states with GOP majorities are pursuing policies that are far to the right of the national numbers on these issues. This is nearly all that’s left. Soon there will only be strong state GOP parties and little nationally.
Then we are going to see some crazy shit in terms of Federalism and States’ Rights.
EconWatcher
By the way, Comey donated to McCain’s campaign in 2008 and Romney’s in 2012. Just sayin.’ I still like the appointment.
dollared
So what we’re seeing is that if the Republicans get their act together, the house and the senate will pass large cuts to food stamps and large giveaways to agribusiness giants. And many Democrats will support it.
And this is eventually what will happen, with non-trivial Democratic support. It just won’t be as bad as Eric Cantor wants it to be.
And this is good because?
danielx
Several..Boehner is an old-school pol who still holds the deluded view that the Republican Party should actually attempt to present sane policy alternatives and, you know, do some things legislatively. His caucus doesn’t give a shit about legislation unless said legislation is somehow punishing people; they just want to burn the motherfucker down.
Just Some Fuckhead
@EconWatcher:
Me too. I don’t understand why we don’t have more Bush retreads in this administration. You’d think the Bush admin years were a failure or something.
EconWatcher
@danielx:
Here, here. You don’t have to like Boehner. But he’s actually one of the most reasonable and decent members of his caucus. Admittedly, you might call this the soft bigotry of low expectations, but still….
Spaghetti Lee
And many conservatives are deeply unhappy with the legislation, in large part because they feel it doesn’t cut enough from food stamps.
“Unacceptable! Not enough poor people starving to death! More pain and humiliation is required!”
Ass. Holes.
Just Some Fuckhead
@dollared:
I got yer pony right here, fbag.
Baud
@dollared:
Because in 2010, voters decided that Democrats were not handing out enough ponies to justify keeping them in control of the House.
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Ha! You’ve snarked your way to the truth. Impressive.
Spaghetti Lee
@EconWatcher:
I think the difference is about the same as a pile of stale dog shit vs. a massive, festering, disease-ridden mound of pig turds big enough to fill a dunk tank. The second may be far worse, but don’t fool yourself into thinking that makes the first one good.
I can’t think of a single Republican in the house I’d characterize as a decent, reasonable person. The few that were left mostly got wiped out by the ’06 midterms, and they were almost all from New England.
EconWatcher
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Um, dude, you are aware that he rather famously testified against the Bush Administration, in one of their more embarrassing incidents, right?
We’re not going to get an ACLU member as head of the FBI. I’ll take a guy who stood up to his own bosses in defense of the rule of law.
eemom
@Soonergrunt:
Yep, Comey may be a republican but as I understand it he was pretty fucking impressive in that whole episode.
But hey, what’s that compared to a 29 year old attention whore who dumps classified shit? There’s yer true hero…..unless you’re an authoritarian/tribalist/Obot.
Spaghetti Lee
@Baud:
Because in 2010, voters decided that Democrats were not handing out enough ponies to justify keeping them in control of the House.
Oh, what bullshit. No one except people who spend six hours a day reading left-wing blogs cares about the stupid pony metaphors. The economy sucked and the Republicans were riled up.
patroclus
The most recent Speaker in this sort of a position was Joe Martin, who throughout his career was an inveterate opponent of FDR’s New Deal but in 1953-5 was saddled with a right-wing McCarthyistic Congress and had Charlie Halleck nipping at his heels for the leadership. Time and again, he attempted to get bills to the Floor that were saddled with Republican nihilistic provisions yet couldn’t get enough Republicans to actually vote for them because they were too “liberal.” Then, Sam Rayburn, like Pelosi today, had far more control over what might pass because he held the balance of power – Martin used to say “if Sam was for it, it’s easy to pass” but if Rayburn withheld support, it went down again and again. Trade legislation, appropriations bills and even farm bills went down only to have to be resurrected by Rayburn (working with Ike) later.
The last time Dems were in such a situation was 1931-33, before FDR. Speaker Garner, who was a strong personality but only had a 1-vote margin in the House, really couldn’t get anything passed for some time because Dems opposed some of the compromise stuff he negotiated with Hoover (a nationwide sales tax was the most notable). Eventually, Garner got stronger as a Speaker and the RFC was created (and was later used as the New Deal bank), Prohibition was repealed and a tax on beer was enacted. My guess is that Boehner will not follow the Garner example and will stay weak, and if anything gets done (farm bill, immigration), it’ll be Pelosi working with Obama (like Rayburn with Ike) as it did today.
MikeJ
@dollared:
Except the Senate version which has already passed doesn’t include it and Obama has already said he’d veto.
So if you ignore the what’s actually happening on earth, yes, you could say that.
EconWatcher
@Spaghetti Lee:
All I’m saying is that if the House were full of Boehners instead of teabaggers, we’d get some deals done. Ethically questionable deals, I’ll grant you. But the nation’s business would get done.
SatanicPanic
@cmorenc: It almost makes you feel bad for Boehner. He just wants to collect his tobacco checks and drink his bourbon, but he’s got to watch over an insane group of morons.
Fort Geek
@Forum Transmitted Disease: Republicans want to show that government doesn’t work. I wonder how many of the teabaggers and other wingnut flotsam in Congress have ties to the Dominionists who want a theocracy here.
Baud
@Spaghetti Lee:
I actually didn’t mention blogs (I think it’s a broader problem), but as someone who does spend too much time on them, I think they didn’t help and probably hurt us during that time.
fuckwit
@Spaghetti Lee: That’s not a rebuttal, because you didn’t finish. Yes, the R’s who read right-wing blogs were fired up, came out, and voted. Why weren’t the D’s who read left-wing blogs and care about these metaphors fired up? Oh, that’s right, ponies, or lack thereof.
Off-years are base elections. R base was fired up. D base was dejected, outraged, defeated, disgusted, by all the non-pony-materialization, and stayed home. Everyone who was paying attention knew this was going to happen.
Bokonon
The best part about this mess is Eric Cantor … who is in rare form. Cantor immediately issued a smarmy, whiny press release that tries to pivot away from the smoking crater in his own caucus and blame DEMOCRAT PARTISANSHIP for the failure of the farm bill.
Cantor is claiming that the Democrats’ failure to vote for this bill had ruined two years of hard work … the bastards! Why couldn’t those doggoned Democrats just fall in line and do what they were told and supply the missing GOP votes that the GOP needed to overcome their vicious intra-party divisions and pass their own bill? After all, don’t the Democrats owe that to the GOP? Aren’t they intimidated by the GOP’s threat that any replacement legislation is going to be evern MORE right wing and extreme? WHY WON’T THE DEMOCRATS ACT LIKE THE STOOGES AND CHUMPS THAT RUSH LIMBAUGH SAYS THEY ARE??
Cantor is desperately spinning, and trying to turn the media coverage away from the real issue – which is the GOP’s internal divisions, insane policy positions, and general epic failure here.
I sincerely hope the little schmendrick fails this time. I am so sick of seeing the media follow Cantor’s lead, stick him in our face, and hold him up like a serious, thoughtful legislator.
Chris
@patroclus:
Thanks for the history. It figures that the last time this kind of paralysis would’ve occurred would’ve been during the Red Scare.
Spaghetti Lee
I’m also gonna go with “this caucus is impossible to manage”. The ones who aren’t actively crazy/fatally stupid (Bachmann, Broun, Gohmert) are living in fear of the Teabagger borg that will primary their ass to oblivion if they so much as smile at a Democrat. Me, I’d say fuck the asshole caucus, do what’s right, and start looking into private sector positions, but that’s why I’m not a politician.
Spaghetti Lee
@fuckwit:
Maybe I’m just a little suspicious because it fits so neatly with what people here already like to do, blame FDL for everything. Not that FDL doesn’t have lots of morons, but seriously, go up to someone and start talking about firebaggers and obots and ponies and see how many blank stares you get. Elections are won on the 95% of voters who don’t follow these blood feuds obsessively, not the 5% who do.
BGinCHI
That Boehner and Cantor (sometimes) come off as “reasonable” compared to the rest of their caucus tells you everything about that barrel full of shitty monkeys.
I was going to Godwin an example but why bother.
Chris
@BGinCHI:
Yep.
I say the same thing about Chris Christie at the governors’ level.
dollared
@MikeJ: OK, didn’t know that, so good.
El Caganer
It shows how far our elected reps keep moving to the right, that the Senate bill seems moderate because it “only” cuts $4 billion from SNAP. I don’t know how we turn this thing around.
ChrisNYC
@Spaghetti Lee: It matters (not FDL; FDL doesn’t matter). But it matters whether people who call themselves Dems are talking positively about things like, say, the 2010 HCR. Because if Dems don’t do that talking no. one. else. will. That was a huge bill and scary for a lot of Americans. Justifiably so. Fed reg of healthcare. Huge step. Tremendous dropping of the ball by allowing the TP to capitalize on it while there was a collective and orchestrated “kill it” or “meh” from Dems, even internet Dems.
Berial
I’ll never understand the why of off-year elections being low D turnout. You can’t win if you don’t even show up. If there is voting to be done at minimum show up and vote dammit.
Baud
@ChrisNYC:
That’s my take as well. There are only so many people producing information out there, that if the institutional players aren’t generating it, it doesn’t make it into the public consciousness.
fuckwit
@Spaghetti Lee: If there were such a thing as mandatory voting, maybe. But, in reality, winning elections depends on getting your people motivated to vote. So you need 2 things: 1) people who are in your base, and 2) getting them to the polls. You can win by growing either or both of those: growing your base (working item #1) or motivating the people you already have (working item #2), or of course both.
The R’s are in “motivate your existing base” mode since they aren’t growing it (demographic death awaits them). The D’s have had Obama who is perhaps the best we’ve had in my lifetime for GOTV and outreach to new or infrequent voters. Problem is, those voters don’t vote in midterms. Political junkies do. If you are going to win midterms you have to either motivate your political junkies to vote, or somehow do outreach to those infrequent voters with some issue that will motivate them to get out. Also, keep in mind that negative advertising and mudslinging turns off EVERYONE except the hardcore crazies. So throwing millions into attack ads is most likely to keep everyone home… advantage for team R.
The R’s have a ton of tricks in their motivation toolbox to use to get their base out, and to demotivate their opposition’s base. I’m not sure what our plan is, and we only have a year to go.
fuckwit
@Berial: You would be surprised at how many people– even D’s– think we have an elected dictatorship, and the President makes the laws, and nobody else matters.
Baud
@Berial: @fuckwit:
Also, voting is partly social (like going to the game!) and D’s generally have done a poorer job than R’s in making voting and political participation part of our social fabric.
trollhattan
BTW, happy 150th to West Virginia, perhaps a bit lost to all by coming just before the 150th of Gettysburg.
Now, please to be cleaning up your act.
Chris
@Berial:
Continually high turnout depends on institutions that can mobilize large amounts of voters. Evangelical churches, for example, have been doing this for Republicans for years – tapping into that network to maximize fundie turnout in 2004 in Ohio was a big help for Bush. Unions used to be the big organizations that did it for us (still are, in some states). Political machines, for both parties, were big on doing that throughout the 19th and 20th centuries. Etc.
The trouble with Democrats right now is that I don’t see those sorts of institutions that exist to guarantee high turnout election after election. Obama For America is a fantastic electoral machine, but it’s still all centered around one person. We need institutions that can deliver turnout in local and state elections (that’s where we’re hurting most), not just presidential ones, and that can survive the passing of individual politicians.
eemom
@Baud:
There is NO excuse for not voting. NONE.
It is fine and reasonable to debate the reasons our side sucks at motivating people to vote, as you’re doing — but I can’t be bothered. It is just too fucking simple and obvious, AFAIC; and it’s not asking much, that everyone with two brain cells to rub together do something as easy as get their ass to the polls ONCE a year, to make this world suck marginally less than it does.
I fucking HATE anyone who doesn’t vote.
Joel
@Spaghetti Lee: as far as the obot/firebagger stuff is concerned, it’s 0.0005% that we’re talking about, if that. that said, there’s a multiplier. you need leaders to organize the base and they have to be highly motivated.
MikeJ
@Chris:
I’ll betcha that at least once a month the Democratic party for your city/town/county/CD has a meeting. Do you ever go? Ever been a precinct captain? Do you know who your neighbors are and which ones are going to vote?
Not meant to single you out, Chris. It’s for every Dem who complains about our lack of organization and never tries to work with what we do have.
Baud
@eemom:
I don’t disagree. As much as we engage in the whole Obot/Firebagger thing on the tubes, I find non-voting (except for those affected by voter suppression) a far more frustrating aspect of our politics.
piratedan
@MikeJ: ding ding ding… blog comments are easy, hauling your ass to meetings and phone banking is hard. Putting yourself up in front of your fellow citizens is even harder. I have to admit I’ve thought about running for office, going slow and starting with a school board and those tradeoffs of not being able to be a lazy bastard whenever I want to always win regretfully. So I work the phone banks and donate cash and time instead to allay my guilty feelings.
Bobby Thomson
@Yatsuno: This. The criticism of Boehner that he never passes anything is meaningless to people who, on the whole, see the U.S. Congress as a nuisance and would prefer that it do as little as possible. In other words, Republicans.
Capt. Seaweed
@dmsilev:
Patricia Kayden
@Berial: I vote every chance I get and I’m in a very blue state. Not sure why some Dems don’t understand that it’s important to vote in each election. Otherwise we get what we have now — Repubs in control in the House and in several blue states.
Villago Delenda Est
These maggots should be taken out behind the building and shot.
Omnes Omnibus
@Villago Delenda Est: Well, yeah, but since the sequester we ain’t got the bullets.
sherparick
Pelosi captures the Nihilism of the Confederate Party in this quote from the Nation article.
“….I can’t speak with any authority on whom is motivated by what there, in the micro, in the individual,” she said. “But in the macro, I think they are comfortable where they vote. I think they are doing what they believe. And what they believe is not a healthy thing for children or other living things.”
Read more: Pelosi Blasts Proposed Food Stamp Cuts, Says Farm Bill Is Endangered | The Nation http://www.thenation.com/blog/174903/pelosi-blasts-proposed-food-stamp-cuts-says-farm-bill-endangered#ixzz2WoA3i2Rs
Follow us: @thenation on Twitter | TheNationMagazine on Facebook
Southern Beale
Predictably, Tennessee Republicans took the hypocritical route.
amk
@dollared: thugs get their act together only to pass the repeal ebil obamacare for gazillionth time. So, chill.
Jay C
@Forum Transmitted Disease:
AFAICT, just killing time til the midterm elections, when they assume (and, sadly, probably correctly) that a toxic combination of vast amounts of GOP money and general Democratic apathy will return them another majority-Republican House, so that they can go and keep on doing nothing until the 2016 election. When, they hope, the US will elect a “proper” (i.e. Republican) President, so stuff can start getting done again. Probably dreadful stuff, but at least they can say “it’s being done”….
Mike in NC
@Jay C: Killing time, indeed. Look for 50+ worthless yet symbolic votes to repeal ACA. They have nothing better to offer.
Desert Rat
Yes. Let me introduce you to Tip O’Neill, circa 1978-whenever he retired. He had Democrats voting for the GOP agenda in about the same numbers Boehner has with Nancy and Barack now.
Doc Stankus
@Forum Transmitted Disease:
“Responding to market forces”
Tripod
@Berial:
Old people. They vote disproportionately in off year elections. Back in the day they were reliably FDR Democrats, nowadays they’re reactionary fuckwits.
Persia
@Tokyokie: Yeah, I like picking on Boehner as much as the next hippie, but holy shit they are a herd of angry, stupid cats.
Ksmiami
@BGinCHI: let them go but first we take back our military assets and build a wall. The far right is far from believing in democracy. I’m done with them
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@fuckwit: Off-years are base elections. R base was fired up. D base was dejected, outraged, defeated, disgusted, by all the non-pony-materialization, and stayed home. Everyone who was paying attention knew this was going to happen.
Heck, you could see it happening five minutes after they announced Obama won the 2008 election people were posting in the liberal forums how Obama is worse than Bush. It’s worth noting there is an element on the Left too that just wants to see it all burn. As distasteful Brodorism is, I think that’s one of Obamas points that there has to be a middle ground were the moderates can meet because the extremists just want chaos for chaos sake so no one side successful run the country by itself.
RaflW
I’m totally horrified by the seeming nonchalance with which so many in media/pundit land are treating the substance of the farm bill fail. Yes there’s chortling or various “analyses” of how this will hurt the immigration bill … but no one seems to care, other than Democrats with a spine in the House, that the GOP is basically saying “Hey poor people, starve. While you’re at it, FOAD.”
As someone on twitter said last night, the GOP might want to rethink a strategy of more guns + more starving people. Might not work so great for them.
cwazycajun
tom delay corruption inc the guy fake chrisitain is nothing but walking BS yeah I guess one more peice of crap republicon cant hurt……yeah right
cwazycajun
@dmsilev: pelosi actually was good at her job boner is just that mr orange crush cant do anything cause he has a bunch of waccado’s to deal with
cwazycajun
@fuckwit: exactly which dems think we have elected a dictator??? the ones that scramble to cluster faux noise??/ we have serious concerns over some of his policies but dictator not so much
Djur
@Enhanced Voting Techniques: D turnout in 2010 was normal for midterms, R turnout was high. You would expect depressed D turnout if the magic-purity-pony brigade had an effect.