Republican Jackass of the Week

So many from which to choose. So why choose? Here are five:

Republican Jackass of the Week #1 -- Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-Ohio).

This is the guy who can't stop talking about suing the President of the United States for the vague charge of "lawlessness," and for signing "too many executive orders."

As I've shown in this graph on the June 27th post, President Obama has signed fewer executive orders than any president in 50 years. Boehner was allegedly upset about the President delaying the employer madate portion of the Affordable Care Act -- after begging the President to do just that.

Now, after Boehner's House failed to solve the humanitarian crisis at our southern border, and after passing absolutely nothing and going off on a 6 week recess, Boehner actually said, "There are numerous steps the President can and should be taking right now without the need for congressional action."

Did you follow that logic? Congress asks the President to delay a portion of ObamaCare; President Obama delays that portion of ObamaCare on his own; Congress threatens to sue the President for overstepping his authority.

And now right after failing to pass funding for the immigration crisis, Congress asks the President to take action on his own.

John Boehner:  the weakest Speaker of the US House, presiding over the least productive Congresses in a row, and is once again our Republican Jackass of the Week.

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Republican Jackass of the Week #2 -- Fox Noise.

After Fox's continuous hyping of an alleged Benghazi coverup/conspiracy for two years non-stop, guess what happened this week?

The House Intelligence Committee, led by Republicans, concluded that there was no deliberate wrongdoing by the Obama Administration during the 2012 attack on the US consulate in Benghazi. The report states that no one was deliberately misled, no military assets were withheld and no stand-down order was given to military forces.

That's the exact opposite of what Fox viewers have had drummed into their heads for two years.

No. Only Fox ignores the facts.

This Benghazi hoax has been the lead story on Fox Noise for all this time. Day after day, night after night, there have been lots of shrill, wild accusations made -- including 225 segments on the subject in the last two weeks alone according to Media Matters. But on the day this breaking news was released, guess how many times it was broadcast on Fox Noise?

Not once.

The Committee's report was finally grudgingly mentioned once on their air the next day. Yet another investigation will be launched in September by Republicans who just can't stop fishing for a non-existent scandal.

Fox Noise, foreign owned and Saudi financed, Republican Jackass of the Week.

(Can a broadcast company be a Jackass? You betcha! "Corporations are people too my friend.")

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Republican Jackass #3 -- Representative Tom Marino (R-Pennsylvania).

During a grandstanding speech on the House floor, this Jackass claimed that when the Democrats ran the House, they never had the courage to do anything about immigration reform.

Nancy Pelosi, the former Democratic Speaker of the House, wouldn't hear of it. She actually walked across the floor, waved a finger at him and admonished him! (Of course some sources claimed she "chased him around the House floor" and "became unhinged." Watch the short video below. See for yourself if she became unhinged, or just slowly walked over to admonish him.)

She reminded him that "House Democrats had the courage to pass the Dream Act, and have the courage to stand up for what the American people want now: bipartisan, comprehensive immigration reform."

As it turns out, Tom Marino's party once again failed to pass any immigration law and deserted Washington for a 6 week vacation.

Tom Marino, liar and Republican Jackass of the Week.


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Republican Jackass #4 -- Representative Mo Brooks (R-Alabama)

Old southern white guy Mo Brooks thinks it's the Democratic Party that's racist!

How about that. The party that generally gets 95% of the black vote every election cycle, as well as an increasing majority of Hispanic votes, is racist.

Ron Fournier of the National Journal stated that "the fastest growing bloc in this country thinks the Republican party hates them," referring to Hispanics and Blacks in America. "Your party cannot be the party of the future beyond November if you're seen as the party of white people."

Polls have shown this clearly. And even the Republican party itself acknowledged its problem with women, gays, Hispanics and Blacks after its second big White House loss in November of 2012. They even held brainstorming meetings to figure out how to attract more diverse voters. The results have been published in their "Republican Autopsy Report" that came out right after President Obama's second electoral college landslide.

Having heard Fournier's statement, Mister Mo Brooks of Alabama claimed that "there's a war on whites being launched by the Democratic Party... claiming that whites hate everybody else."

(Hey, isn't there an unwritten rule stating that Republicans are always to incorrectly refer to it as "the Democrat Party"?)

See? The Democratic party, which has many millions of white, black and Hispanic voters is actually the racist party, not the Republicans, who are almost exclusively older white people.

Go back and read your own party's Autopsy Report. Learn something, Mo.

And enjoy being this week's Republican Jackass of the Week.

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Republican Jackass #4 -- Steven Palazzo (R-Missouri).

Here's his quote from this week: "I find the best advice comes through meditating
on god's word. Please find a copy of the holy bible to help guide you in your decision-making."

He then had his staff deliver a bible to each of the 535 members of the House and Senate.

Hey Steve, breaking news:  the USA is a secular nation. Go ask the first high school student you can find. We don't write laws based on your bible any more than we base them on the Quran or any other cult's book. Do I really need to list the reasons this is so completely wrong?

Barry Lynn, executive director of Americans United for Separation of Church and State, said this action was inappropriate and exclusionary. "When it comes to religion, our nation is pluralistic and diverse. Rather than look to the bible or any other religious book to craft our nation's public policy, we would do well to examine another source instead, one that was actually created to guide governance. It's called the Constitution."

Steve Palazzo, Republican Jackass of the Week.

Republican Jackass of the Week

Once again, John Boehner (R), Speaker of the House.

He was approached very politely in a diner by two soft-spoken young daughters of illegal immigrants, and asked about immigration reform. (Rightwing websites scream he was
"ambushed"! Judge for yourself in the short clip below.)

"How would you feel if you had to tell your kids at the age of 10 that you were never coming home?"

The 17 year old who posed the question had a similar conversation with her father when she found herself in that situation at the age of 10.

The Boner, who could barely be bothered to look away from his scrambled eggs, muttered, "I'm trying to find some way to get this thing done. It's uh, you know, not easy, not going to be an easy path forward. But I've made it clear since the day after the election it's time to get this done."



"Time to get this done."

That's what he told them. But then yesterday he completely ruled out working with the Senate, which had already passed a comprehensive immigration bill with bipartisan support back in June.

The popular Senate bill was sponsored by Sen Charles Schumer (D-NY), and would give 11 million undocumented immigrants a legal path to citizenship. The bill includes increased border security and includes requirements to pay fines, back taxes, excludes felons, etc.

"We have no intention of ever going to conference on the Senate bill," The Boner was quoted as saying yesterday.

John Boehner, once again, the latest Republican Jackass of the Week.

Boehner's Latest Government Shutdown

A few facts:

About 900,000 people's jobs and paychecks are affected by this latest partial government shutdown.

There are 435 US House members. About 40 of them are the far rightwing fringe Teabaggers.

The Affordable Care Act, known as ObamaCare, was passed in 2010. It was approved by the US House, the US Senate, signed by the President of the US and deemed Constitutional by the US Supreme Court.

Sad, drunken clown

John Boehner, the least effective Speaker of the House in American history, knows he has more than enough Democratic and Republican House votes to pass the Senate's "clean" bill (one that doesn't contain add-ons to defund or repeal ObamaCare) and keep the US government funded.

Despite all this, the cowardly Speaker of the House has refused to allow the Senate bill to come to a vote in the House, where it would easily pass. Why? Because he's scared to death of the Teabaggers, who would revolt. He'd probably lose his job as ineffective Speaker and go back to just being another ineffective Congressman.

So he's putting 900,000 jobs and paychecks on the line to save his own. This guy is an embarrassment.

President Obama is right. Allowing this bunch of radicals to defund or delay ObamaCare for a year would mean that any rogue member of congress in the future would be able to pick any established law, and simply because he doesn't like it, hold the US hostage until his demands to defund, delay or repeal it are met.

Funny thing is, despite all the Regressive Republicans' worst efforts, and despite the partial government shutdown, today is the day ObamaCare opens to the public nonetheless. Today's the day you can go to healthcare.gov and begin sorting through all the affordable options available to you.

Republican Jackass of the Week

The Boner blinked.

"There should be no conversation on shutting government down," Regressive Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner said. "That's not the goal. There's no interest on our part on shutting the government down."

No wonder this man drinks so much.

That was then.

Now, after a closed-door meeting with his caucus, John Boehner has caved to the crazy, extreme, far rightwing fringe of his party, the Teabaggers, and agreed to hold a House vote on a measure that would keep the government funded, but only if Obamacare, the Affordable Care Act, is defunded.

"We are going to pass a resolution that will defund Obamacare."

As I've written before, Obamacare isn't going anywhere. The Teabaggers have led John around by his orange nose before, voting 41 times in a row to defund or repeal Obamacare. But that's not going to happen.

The Affordable Care Act passed the House and the Senate in 2010, was signed into law by the President of the United States, and has even gotten the rightwing Supreme Court's endorsement of its legality.

It's the law of the land and it's not going to be repealed. Funding Obamacare is mandatory.

But that won't stop these fanatical ideologues from holding a virtual gun to the head of America to get their way.

Never before in history has any congress attempted to extort an American president into succumbing to their political demands by holding the USA hostage, threatening to shut down the government -- which will stop payments to US troops, retirees, and close many government services -- as well as damage the full faith and credit of the US government by failing to pay our bills. These bills represent the money that congress itself has already spent.

It would be like you going on a wild spending spree with your own credit card and then refusing to pay when the bill arrives unless some totally unrelated demand is met.

Some have described the Republicans' demands as a Kamikaze mission, destroying themselves in the process, since everyone knows that if there's a government shutdown, they will be to blame. This is what happened in the '90s. Back then a similar Republican-led government shutdown resulted in one Newt Gingrich losing his speakership and the Republicans losing their congressional majority.

Will they go off the deep end again and destroy themselves? Or will they tell the Teabaggers enough is enough, sit down and shut up, and let the adults take over?

We'll find out by the end of the month.

Regressive Republican and Speaker of the House (for now), John Boehner. This week's Republican Jackass of the Week.

Bonus Republican Jackass of the Week

John Boehner and the Republican-run House of Representatives.

With only two weeks left before the government shuts down, taking with it a whole host of services as well as paychecks to retirees and American troops, what do you think Boehner and his gang did yesterday?

(A) Resumed negotiations that would keep the government running and increase the debt limit so the Treasury Department can borrow enough money to pay for the bills that Congress already racked up.

-- or --

(B) Wasted everybody's time and money, voting for the 41st time, to repeal Obamacare.

I don't even need to tell you what these idiots did.

Republican Jackass of the Week

Fox Noise's main teleprompter reader and Rupert Murdock's obedient soldier, Bill O'Reilly.

He whined this week about why Republicans weren't invited to the 50th Anniversary celebration of the March for Jobs and Equality on Washington, which originally culminated with Martin Luther King's famous "I Have a Dream" speech.

"All the speakers were Democrats," he proclaimed. "That was a glaring error and does not indicate a desire for inclusion."

Why weren't they invited?

Turns out they were. And every single one of them said no.

Speaker of the House Orange John Boehner said no.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said no.

Pappy Bush and the Lesser Bush both declined for "health reasons."

Former governor Jeb Bush was invited to represent the family and said no.

Of course, the facts wouldn't fit the Fox agenda. And that's not what Fox's aging, angry, racist audience wants to hear anyway.

Billo, this week's Regressive Republican Jackass of the Week.

UPDATE: Bill has allegedly apologized for his incorrect assumption since this posted.

Republican Jackass of the Week

This time it's the entire Republican-controlled House of Representatives, allegedly run by Speaker John Boehner.

Today's their last workday, if you can call it that, before their 5-week summer vacation. Usually at this time of year, they tend to scramble to get things done before running out the door.

But not Bourbon Boehner's Bunch.

Today, they'll waste more time and taxpayer money voting, for the FORTIETH TIME, to defund the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare, despite the fact that even the rightwing Supreme Court admitted it was Constitutional, and Boehner himself referred to it as "the law of the land."

Since the Democratically-controlled Senate is not in a million years going to agree to kill off Obamacare, and the President is certainly not apt to sign a bill destroying his own signature health care plan, this is just another circus act to placate the far rightwing radicals in the Regressive republican party. Now they'll be able to go home to their gerrymandered districts and beam with delight in bragging about their vote that accomplished, yet again, absolutely nothing.

They're calling this 40th attempt to defund Obamacare the "Keep the IRS Off Your Health Care Act." Cute.

Another waste of time bill passed this week is called the "Stop the IRS Act," which would mandate the firing of any IRS agent who "takes official action for political purposes." Of course, not a single IRS agent has been found guilty of such a thing, despite months of interrogations from car-thief and insurance-fraudster Darrell Issa. Even the Bush-appointee who was in charge of the IRS during this fake scandal said there was no political motivation and the Obama White House had nothing to do with scrutiny of some rightwing groups.

Were any jobs bills passed? Any infrastructure bills passed? Budget plans? A way out of the sequester? Transportation bill? Housing bill? Immigration reform? Efforts to reduce gun violence? Background checks?

No.

They haven't accomplished a single priority demanded by Americans according to most polls.

John Boehner remains the weakest, least-accomplished Speaker of the House we've seen in decades, a so-called leader who can't control the fringe element of his own party. And his Congress remains the least productive in American history.

But hey, enough about that.
It's vacation time, right John?

Regressives Still Obsessed with Abortion

Put away the bourbon and do something useful.

They're at it again.

The party that lost seats in the House and Senate, and lost the White House in a second electoral vote mandate -- and continues losing young voters as well as women, Hispanics, the LGBT community and blacks -- is back at it, doing what they do best: putting on an expensive show for their far rightwing Teabagger base, and alienating everyone else.

They are, yet again, trying to change American abortion law by making it illegal to have an abortion after the first 20 weeks. This is about the time that women discover if there's going to be a problem with the fetus, or if it'll put the woman's life in danger. In addition, experts have long concluded that the age of viability is about 24 weeks. That aside, the point of this theatrical show is to pretend that they're going to take away, inch by inch, American women's reproductive privacy rights. Make the cutoff point 20 weeks now, 18 weeks next time.

Oh, and exceptions for rape, incest and health problems are not included.

Of course this House bill is going nowhere. This nonsense will be ignored by the Senate. And even if it were taken up by the Senate, and somehow magically passed, it would never be signed by the President.

This is all about fundraising and humoring the far rightwing base of the Republican party. And unfortunately, it's a total waste of what little time the House actually shows up for work -- and costs taxpayers millions of dollars.

It's as useless and expensive as pretending to repeal Obamacare, the Affordable Care Act, 37 times.

Remember, this is the party that loudly proclaimed that if they got the majority in the House in 2010, their number one priority would be "jobs, jobs, jobs!"

But so far Drunken John Boner has not put forth one jobs bill. They're too busy working on blatantly unconstitutional bills like banning abortion and repealing Obamacare -- both of which have been established as legal and Constitutional by the US Supreme Court.

Republican Jackass of the Week

Based on "The Parting Shot" on the Bill Press Show:

It's the US House of Representatives, in Republican control, run by Speaker of the House, John Boehner.

The 1948 Congress was famously referred to as the "do nothing congress." But that was nothing compared to the 112th Congress over the last two years, which was the least productive congress in American history. And it looks like the current 113th Congress will accomplish even less, setting the bar even deeper into record territory.

Four weeks ago they sat around for a whole week and passed one bill: to renew the production of helium. Then they went home for ten days.

This week they worked all of three days and passed one bill, allowing business owners to replace overtime with "comp time." This bill is dead on arrival in the Senate. It's going nowhere.

And next week they will vote on only one issue -- to pretend to repeal Obamacare for the 39th time.

That's it. No action on climate change, immigration, common sense gun control, tax reform, education, or anything else.

These people are getting paid $174,000 a year and they accomplish absolutely nothing.

The US House of Representatives and John Boehner: this week's Republican Jackass of the Week.