Plan B Forum

Business may like the tea partiers positions on de-regulation, but after the past couple of weeks many in the business community are fed up with their nihilism:

Business groups stand by Boehner, plot against tea party

Despite presiding over a chamber that nearly drove the country to a debt default, John A. Boehner still has the enduring support of a group that would have been most harmed by that event: the business community.

Rather than revisit their strategy of supporting Republicans after this week’s near-disaster, influential organizations such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce are standing behind Boehner. More important, Boehner’s friends in the business community are getting ready to take sides in a few Republican primary races against tea party candidates in Michigan, Idaho and Alabama who could cause the House speaker more trouble.

Now that the shutdown and debt-ceiling fight have exposed a rift in the Republican Party, lines are being drawn in the battle for control: On one side, there is Boehner and his circle of powerful business allies. On the other, tea party lawmakers and activist groups such as Heritage Action and the Club for Growth.

“I don’t know of anybody in the business community who takes the side of the Taliban minority,” said Dirk Van Dongen, longtime chief lobbyist for the National Association of Wholesaler-Distributors, who has known Boehner since the lawmaker’s first election.

In the hallways of the country’s leading trade associations, there is talk about taking on tea party Republicans in at least three states.

The first is Michigan, where Rep. Justin Amash, who had been challenging Boehner during the debt-ceiling fight, is facing a possible challenge from a business-backed candidate. Business lobbyists also talk about funding a challenge to another tea-party-backed Republican incumbent, Rep. Kerry Bentivolio.

Another area for possible combat occurs in a special election next month in the 1st District of Alabama, where former state senator Bradley Byrne, a self-described business-oriented Republican, faces off against Dean Young, a tea party-endorsed candidate who says he’s “against homosexuals pretending that they are married.”

http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/ ... story.html

If some of these kamikaze types can get knocked off in primaries, it might help to stuff the guts back into some of the GOP House members who have been kotowing to the Tea party types in order to avoid a loopy primary opponent...

The ideological anarchists who drove the sorry events of the past two weeks are the real "RINOS". They don't give a shit about the success of the GOP, and the very first requirement for being a "real Republican" ought to be that you care about the fate of the Republican Party...

That seems pretty much definitional to me....

Like many long time Republicans I started off with a fairly positive attitude about the Tea party initially...

But I have now watched them cost the party control of the Senate through two election cycles with their wingnut candidates, (and in the process deny the party some real assets like Dick Lugar and Mike Castle) elect House candidates that regularly spout off with embarrassingly ignorant comments that turn off important segments of the electorate that we need to win elections, (like women, who the last time I checked represent 50% of the vote) and (in my view worst of all) made neo-isolationism a significant faction within the party.

(The whole idea behind the sequester was that it would never come into effect because the Republicans would want to avoid the draconian cuts it imposes on the Defense Department...apparently they never counted on "Republicans" who didn't give a shit about national defense....Who knew?)

And now their latest shenanigans have succeeded in driving the GOP approval rating down to the lowest level in the history of polling...

As far as I'm concerned, this latest fiasco is the last straw...

The good news is, that while they have tanked the GOP's public approval, their own is even worse; Tea Party approval is now down to 21%...(Hopefully it will go even lower)

The time has come for all of the other factions of the GOP; the Reagan Conservatives, (like your humble correspondent) the moderates, the "establishment" Republicans, the business community, etc....

All of those Republicans who believe in limited government, strong defense and pro-growth low tax policies, but who are also rational enough to understand that the only way to achieve progress on those goals, in a country divided politically down the middle is to be able to reach some sorts of agreements and compromises with those on the other other side...

To band together and stand up to these rule or ruin, know-nothing, radical randian neo-isolationist clowns...

Every establishment Republican member of Congress who finds themselves facing a primary challenge from a wingnut should be the recipient of large scale financing and independent help so they can beat back the challenge even in a low turnout primary.

And every wingnut currently in the Congress needs to be facing a primary challenge themselves from a well financed serious opponent.

It's time to stop cowering to these types and take them head on...

None too soon

Who is for the people? The regular "Joe", the working guy who pays outrageous taxes,. We who are sick and tired of both parties who just pay lip service to us.

All candidates are there for one thing, and that is to get re-elected. They take whatever position they think will win them re-election. And to get re-elected they need tons of money so they sell themselves to the business and other groups who will help fund their machine.

Obama, when he was senator, said (and I am paraphrasing here), "they took out a loan, from the bank of China in the name of our children and grandchildren. That's irresponsible, that's unpatriotic" and then he goes and doubles that debt in 4+ years.

The spending insanity has to stop. The bailout has supposely yielded money back to the gov as those bailed out have repaid what was given to them. Did that money go to paying off the money the gov borrowed to lend to these companies? Given th amount of debt we have, I think it just went into the general fund when it should have been earmarked, not for some bridge to nowhere, but for the express purpose of paying down our debt. Like when a homeowner who has gotten a windfall (or even just a few extra hundred dollars) might send to his mortgage company to pay off on the back end of his mortgage.
The real fiscal cliff is coming up and we better start tightening our belts or we will all go over that cliff. It won't be pretty.

Of course, the Tea Party has some fans:

Democratic strategy promotes Tea Party rivals

BUFORD, Ga. — Representative Paul C. Broun earned national notoriety by invoking Hitler and Marxism to critique President Obama. He dismissed global warming as “one of the greatest hoaxes perpetrated out of the scientific community.” Evolution, the physician has warned, is a lie “straight from the pit of hell.”

Sounds like a candidate the Democratic Party could never get behind, right?
Related

Not so fast.

To some Democrats, Broun’s extreme and colorful comments sound like sweet music, the makings of a perfect Republican candidate for Georgia’s open Senate seat — perfect, that is, if you want the Republican to lose.

“He’s so far out on the extreme, even for the people of Georgia, that he could be a key player in helping the Democrats win,” said Jim Manley, a Democratic strategist and former aide to Senate majority leader Harry Reid.[He ought to know...the Reid campaign was very active in helping Sharon Angle win the Nevada primary. Harry's a big fan of the Tea Party.] “There would be pages of comments that Democrats could use against him in a general election.”

As party leaders look ahead to the 2014 mid-term elections, some are looking for a replay of 2012, when Democrats honed a strategy that some credit for the surprising defeat of Republicans in Senate races in Indiana and Missouri.

Democrats, for example, ran ads that praised the credentials of a Republican candidate known for extreme right-wing views, hoping that would dim the chances of the more mainstream GOP contenders, those with the best chance of beating the Democratic nominee.

When the tactic worked and the fringe candidate won the primary, the Democrats then opened fire on his or her record of extreme views and combustible comments.

Democrats and their allies — with tens of millions of dollars in superPAC cash and other streams of outside money — are actively researching the backgrounds and positions of insurgent candidates in Kentucky, Iowa, and North Carolina among other states with contested Senate primaries.

They are poring over video footage, records, and polling data in hopes of finding candidates they can boost in the primaries and then paint as extreme in the general election.

Georgia represents one of the most striking opportunities. The state’s Republican primary field is crowded and chaotic, with three members of the US House, a former Georgia secretary of state, and two wealthy businessmen among the field of seven vying to replace Republican Senator Saxby Chambliss, who is retiring.

In addition to Broun, Representative Phil Gingrey has also made statements that could be used against him in a general election.

“If I’m the Democrats, I’m trying to promote Paul Broun. I’m trying to promote Phil Gingrey,” said Joel McElhannon, a Georgia Republican consultant not involved in the race. “They’re the most likely candidates to really say something that would undermine the Republican Party’s chances to win next November.”

http://www.bostonglobe.com/news/politic ... story.html

Intercine warfare is never good for a party, at least in the short term, and should generally be avoided if at all possible...

But the war is upon us...

Since 2009, the Tea Party has been waging a war against the rest of the Republican Party, and they haven't been the slightest bit bashful about admitting it. Just yesterday, even in the wake of the budget fiasco, Sarah Palin sounded the bugle for yet another charge:

"Friends, do not be discouraged by the shenanigans of D.C.'s permanent political class today," Palin posted on her Facebook page early Thursday, as the federal government reopened and hours after Democrat Cory Booker defeated Republican Steve Lonegan for Senate in New Jersey.

"Be energized," she said. "We're going to shake things up in 2014. Rest well tonight, for soon we must focus on important House and Senate races. Let's start with Kentucky - which happens to be awfully close to South Carolina, Tennessee and Mississippi - from sea to shining sea we will not give up. We've only just begun to fight."

http://www.ksdk.com/news/article/403195 ... n-4-states

Note that she's not talking about going after Democrats; she's talking about knocking off responsible conservative Republicans....

So there's already been a war going on; the problem is that for the most part only one side has been fighting it, while the other side just kept their heads down, tried to appease them, and hoped that they'd run out of steam...

That approach has done nothing but damage the party, damage the country, and further embolden them...

The time has come to fight back, and fight back hard; not just on defense, but on offense...

Somebody bring me some popcorn, this could get quite entertaining . . . .

Guinevere wrote:Somebody bring me some popcorn, this could get quite entertaining . . . .

What, not enough entertainment so far? Need I remind you of the Masturbation Witch of Wilmington? Sharron "Keep Bartering That Chicken" Angle? Paul "Science is Lies Straight From The Pit of Hell" Broun? One-L Crazy Eyes Bachmann? Pizza-man Herman Cain? Ol' Screechy Half-Gov? The Texas Brain Trust, Louie Gohmert and Joe Barton? And the latest star of our show, the Cubo-Canadian Anchor Baby?

The GOP has more clowns than the Ringling Brothers.

Lord Jim wrote: If some of these kamikaze types can get knocked off in primaries, it might help to stuff the guts back into some of the GOP House members who have been kotowing to the Tea party types in order to avoid a loopy primary opponent...

***

Every establishment Republican member of Congress who finds themselves facing a primary challenge from a wingnut should be the recipient of large scale financing and independent help so they can beat back the challenge even in a low turnout primary.

And every wingnut currently in the Congress needs to be facing a primary challenge themselves from a well financed serious opponent.

It's time to stop cowering from these types and take them head on...

Good luck with that. As I said three years ago, and as you have finally come around to seeing, the Tea Party is quite literally an attempt to appropriate the existing Republican Party apparatus and replace it with a fundamentally neo-Fascist party financed by powerful anti-tax, anti-regulation corporate interests working hand-in-glove with far-right extremist ideologues to manipulate an angry and ignorant bloc of the electorate. As long as the Koch-Olin-Scaife cabal has money (and they have more money than most countries do), they will be buying elections and the GOP until their corporations are not only people, too, my friend, but are actually holding seats in government.

I think you're wrong Sue, it looks to me like the Koch's are becoming isolated in the business community at this point re- the Tea Party; and now there will be plenty of money on the other side to start taking the TP candidates out in the primary process.

And there's some evidence that even the Kochs are having second thoughts about this bunch....

Lord Jim wrote:I think you're wrong Sue, it looks to me like the Koch's are becoming isolated in the business community at this point re- the Tea Party; and now there will be plenty of money on the other side to start taking the TP candidates out in the primary process.

And there's some evidence that even the Kochs are having second thoughts about this bunch....

I don't think "establishment" Republicans will be able to draw the kind of money that the Tea Party supporters are willing to funnel into targeted races, and I think there are probably even more "establishment" Republicans who would toe the Teabagger line to get the far-right money and/or avoid a primary fight. As the events of the last three weeks have shown, the Tea Party has the traditional GOP leadership completely terrorized.

I'll believe it once I see just one active republican lay out the
Plethora of problems with the tea party philosophy

Sue U wrote:

Guinevere wrote:Somebody bring me some popcorn, this could get quite entertaining . . . .

What, not enough entertainment so far? Need I remind you of the Masturbation Witch of Wilmington? Sharron "Keep Bartering That Chicken" Angle? Paul "Science is Lies Straight From The Pit of Hell" Broun? One-L Crazy Eyes Bachmann? Pizza-man Herman Cain? Ol' Screechy Half-Gov? The Texas Brain Trust, Louie Gohmert and Joe Barton? And the latest star of our show, the Cubo-Canadian Anchor Baby?

The GOP has more clowns than the Ringling Brothers.

They mostly just made me want to bang my head against the wall. But seeing them eat their young(and their old, and their middle-aged), *that* would be entertaining.

I'm starting to take bets that Jim will be voting for Hilary Clinton in 2016.
.

Only if Liz Warren is her running mate

These people were just supposed to show up to vote, and help to elect Republicans...

They weren't supposed to actually field their own candidates...

As I said before, it's like Frankenstein's Monster (very appropriate for the season... )

And now it's time to take The Monster down...

It's time to have these simple minded idiots fold up the cots they've been sleeping on in their Congressional offices and send them packing...

It's almost like something out of a Steven King novel...

The Tea Party had created a crisis in the Republican party before last November, for those paying attention.


But the Republicans have a history of sucking up to evil and then discovering that evil wants to drive the bus if they're paying for the gas. In the past they did it by drawing in the southern Racists and the "Social Conservatives" without learning a thing from either one or even acting as if they have a conscience.



yrs,
rubato