Appeasing The Freshmen
by digby
The Daily Beast had an item over the week explaining that the Freshman Tea partiers are all being co-opted already by Boehner and the corporate masters and that despite their ostentatious budget hawkery there’s no reason to believe they’ll be causing any substantial trouble for the Big Money Boyz:
The peerless self-importance of the class continued in the burlesque house-setting of the caucus chamber, with some of the prideful rubes still sporting their campaign paraphernalia as if this was Animal House awaiting the toga moment. The pay-off for Boehner arrived when it was time to vote by secret ballot on the leadership for the 112th Congress. The froshers settled down dutifully and, without any doubts or even questions as to why there was only one name on the ballot for each leadership position, they voted for the men and women who had twice approved the Bush administration’s TARP heresy in 2008 that began the long fall of the country into bailout nationhood.”The Tea Party kept the TARP leaders in power,” scoffed an unhappy veteran Republican. “The revolution was over the first day.”
They are making noises about raising the debt ceiling too, and that might be more of a problem simply because it’s called a “debt ceiling” which will make it harder for the Tea Party types to ignore. But the consequences for the markets of doing this are severe and I suspect Boehner will try to organize some kind of Kabuki to allow his fanatics to vote against it while he ensures that it gets passed. The financial overlords will not be pleased. But there are opportunities in this. Dday explains:
If Boehner actually wants this vote, I don’t think there’s a whole lot to worry about here. He’d get upwards of 180 Democrats in support and would only have to find 40 or so from his side of the aisle. There’s a path to allowing the tea partiers to stand firm on their principles while still getting the debt limit raised. However, the most likely scenario is for Boehner to use the leverage he has to extract significant spending cuts in exchange for the vote. If those cuts are draconian enough that House Democrats refuse to support them, then we could see an impasse.
Playing chicken with the debt limit isn’t a tea party game. It’s a standard issue GOP tactic. And they have a lot more nerve than the Democrats do so I’d lay odds they get what they want
Meanwhile, the Tea Partiers are starting to sort out their priorities. Last week it was reported that GOProud had tried to push the line that the Tea party wasn’t socially conservative and they got a pummelling from Religious Right. This week the major Tea party leaders are sending a letter to congress:
Tea Party Nation founder and CEO Judson Phillips plans to set the GOP congressional leadership straight about the tea party’s legislative demands, after a handful of Tea Party Patriots and a homosexual activist group, GOProud, released an open letter last Monday urging Republicans to ignore social issues. This coming Monday, Phillips plans to release an open letter of his own urging the GOP to address several fiscal matters and at least three social issues, including the preservation of the “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell” policy banning open homosexuals in the military. “There is a battle going on for the heart and soul of the tea-party movement,” Phillips told WND. “GOProud has its own agenda. It wants to create credibility for itself by leveraging the tea-party movement, but GOProud has never been a part of the tea-party movement.” Phillips is also taking aim at abortion. “The abortion industry is a multibillion dollar industry. Why are they getting funding from the government? Cut that off!” said Phililips.
Let’s not get confused here. Boehner will finesse the budget issues without harming any important donors or contractors. That’s his job and he’s good at it. But they are going to have to provide some red meat to the bloodthirsty Freshman Tea Partiers. I feel fairly confident that they’ll come up with something.
.