Showing posts with label Eric Cantor. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Eric Cantor. Show all posts
Thursday, June 12, 2014
Eric Cantor
Eric Cantor's "stunning" loss to Tea Partier David Brat really is not all that stunning. After the 2010 census, Cantor's dependably Republican district was further gerrymandered to make it even more Republican and more conservative. For Cantor, that may have backfired.
Brat's campaign issue was immigration, where Cantor had let a tiny glimpse of light shine through between his position and the brick wall of the hardest of the hard right. "We all don't care much for furriners in these parts."
Well, then tell me, Jim Bob: how do you feel about the Jeeeeewwwwwws?
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Boehner's Dilemma
John Boehner has a problem. Well, okay, he has several problems.
First, despite his nominal leadership of the Republican party, he can't control the troops. Given his long history in the House, this must have come as a surprise to him — if there was anything Republicans have been good at for the past thirty years, it's been party discipline. The Tea Parties seem to have ruined that.
Second, he can't help but feel Eric Cantor's dagger poking at his side, looking for a good soft spot between the ribs. Cantor really wants to replace Boehner as Speaker of the House, and he doesn't seem to mind keeping his party divided against itself to get there.
Boehner is a corporatist, but also a pragmatist. As a corporatist, he prefers not to mess around with the possibility of creating financial meltdown. As a pragmatist, he follows Reagan in the belief that when you get 80% of what you wanted in a negotiation, you've won. When Obama offered up large chunks of Medicare and Medicaid on the altar of "moderation," Boehner was willing to go along with closing a few tax loopholes for the rich.
Cantor saw Boehner's "weakness" as an opportunity to run up to the front of the Tea Party parade with a large bass drum. Although he's been sounding more and more like a Grover Norquist ideologue lately, I suspect Cantor is much better understood as a pure opportunist — a man whose personal ambition far outweighs any party loyalty
After a few drinks the other night, I had this really neat fantasy. It won't come true, of course, but a lot of us would be supremely amused if it did.
John Boehner has lots of friends with money and power. Suppose he quietly encouraged some of them to start a "draft Eric Cantor" campaign for the 2012 presidential race. After all, the current crop of candidates is not especially impressive, and even the Tea Partiers have to be able to see that Cantor has a lot more on the ball than the intellectually challenged Michele Bachman.
I know, very unlikely — but what if Eric Cantor's hubris was great enough to get him to go along with it, and what if he won the nomination?
Why, then you'd have a black man running against a Jew for the highest office in the land! Oh no! Crisis in Redneckland!
As for me, I'd still be poking around the available third-party candidates looking for a place to cast my protest vote — but at least I could have a few good laughs.
First, despite his nominal leadership of the Republican party, he can't control the troops. Given his long history in the House, this must have come as a surprise to him — if there was anything Republicans have been good at for the past thirty years, it's been party discipline. The Tea Parties seem to have ruined that.
Second, he can't help but feel Eric Cantor's dagger poking at his side, looking for a good soft spot between the ribs. Cantor really wants to replace Boehner as Speaker of the House, and he doesn't seem to mind keeping his party divided against itself to get there.
Boehner is a corporatist, but also a pragmatist. As a corporatist, he prefers not to mess around with the possibility of creating financial meltdown. As a pragmatist, he follows Reagan in the belief that when you get 80% of what you wanted in a negotiation, you've won. When Obama offered up large chunks of Medicare and Medicaid on the altar of "moderation," Boehner was willing to go along with closing a few tax loopholes for the rich.
Cantor saw Boehner's "weakness" as an opportunity to run up to the front of the Tea Party parade with a large bass drum. Although he's been sounding more and more like a Grover Norquist ideologue lately, I suspect Cantor is much better understood as a pure opportunist — a man whose personal ambition far outweighs any party loyalty
After a few drinks the other night, I had this really neat fantasy. It won't come true, of course, but a lot of us would be supremely amused if it did.
John Boehner has lots of friends with money and power. Suppose he quietly encouraged some of them to start a "draft Eric Cantor" campaign for the 2012 presidential race. After all, the current crop of candidates is not especially impressive, and even the Tea Partiers have to be able to see that Cantor has a lot more on the ball than the intellectually challenged Michele Bachman.
I know, very unlikely — but what if Eric Cantor's hubris was great enough to get him to go along with it, and what if he won the nomination?
Why, then you'd have a black man running against a Jew for the highest office in the land! Oh no! Crisis in Redneckland!
As for me, I'd still be poking around the available third-party candidates looking for a place to cast my protest vote — but at least I could have a few good laughs.
Sunday, May 29, 2011
Eric Cantor on Taxes
Naturally, we already know House Majority Leader Eric Cantor's take on taxes: cut them, with special emphasis on cuts for the rich and for corporations. Yesterday's speech called for a 25% maximum rate, with the usual trickle-down rationale — let the rich and the corporations keep more of their money and they will, as Republicans like to express it, "invest in America." This is supposed to lead to rapid job growth.
As usual, the basic premise is fallacious. Top tax rates in the United States already are extremely low. Corporations are, in common parlance, "sitting on mountains of cash." Why? Thanks to low demand caused by high unemployment and concomitant excess productive capacity, it doesn't make sense to "invest in America."
As for wealthy individuals, they certainly are looking for places to invest the extra cash they pocketed thanks to the Bush tax cuts and their unconscionable extension under Obama. The sad fact, though, is that American business and industry doesn't offer very satisfactory returns on investment these days. Surplus funds are more likely to go to faster growing parts of the world like India and China, used for commodities speculation, or sunk into the new social media bubble. (Social media companies, by the way, provide very few new jobs.)
What we need — contrary to both Republican and Democratic talking points — is more government spending, because the private sector just is not coming through. If we can pick up employment — in infrastructure improvement, education, health care, environmental preservation, and other areas where we need lasting, long-term improvements — demand for private sector goods and services also will grow.
What we don't need is European style austerity programs. They're only making things worse in Europe, and they are beginning to have the same effects here.
As usual, the basic premise is fallacious. Top tax rates in the United States already are extremely low. Corporations are, in common parlance, "sitting on mountains of cash." Why? Thanks to low demand caused by high unemployment and concomitant excess productive capacity, it doesn't make sense to "invest in America."
As for wealthy individuals, they certainly are looking for places to invest the extra cash they pocketed thanks to the Bush tax cuts and their unconscionable extension under Obama. The sad fact, though, is that American business and industry doesn't offer very satisfactory returns on investment these days. Surplus funds are more likely to go to faster growing parts of the world like India and China, used for commodities speculation, or sunk into the new social media bubble. (Social media companies, by the way, provide very few new jobs.)
What we need — contrary to both Republican and Democratic talking points — is more government spending, because the private sector just is not coming through. If we can pick up employment — in infrastructure improvement, education, health care, environmental preservation, and other areas where we need lasting, long-term improvements — demand for private sector goods and services also will grow.
What we don't need is European style austerity programs. They're only making things worse in Europe, and they are beginning to have the same effects here.
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