Hints at sounds of screaching halt coming from Congress...

[Townsend]

http://www.ktul.com/Global/story.asp?S=14000671&utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter

Conservatives' clout flummoxes House GOP leaders

WASHINGTON (AP) - The clout of tea party advocates and other hard-line conservatives in Congress has caught top Republicans by surprise, raising questions about whether GOP leaders can impose enough discipline in their House majority to pass tough measures, such as raising the debt ceiling.

Within 24 hours this week, House Speaker John Boehner's team had to pull a trade bill from the chamber floor, suffered an embarrassing setback on a USA Patriot Act vote, and failed to recoup money paid to the United Nations.

And in electoral politics, the tea party's threat to Republican incumbents came more into focus. Three GOP senators up for re-election in 2012 could be looking at challenges for their party nominations. One of them, five-term Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah, crossed town Tuesday to tell the tea party's national town hall that he has supported its budget-balancing, smaller-government agenda for decades.

Democrats and Republicans said the events show that GOP leaders have yet to gauge the full extent of libertarianism and independence in their newly swollen ranks. Republicans gained control of the House thanks to sweeping victories last fall, many involving tea party loyalists.

"If they're divided on an issue like the Patriot Act, it's a bad omen for things to come regarding unity on their side," said Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md. "It's only going to get tougher for them when it comes to budget issues."

Many congressional Republicans want to slash spending beyond levels their party leaders support. GOP leaders say Congress must raise the federal debt ceiling this spring to avoid dire economic problems. Judging from the week's events, it may be a tough sell.

All three House setbacks can be reversed. The Patriot Act and U.N. votes needed super majorities under expedited House rules, and Republican leaders probably can pass them later with simple majorities. Likewise they can try to build enough support for the trade measure.

House Republican leaders Wednesday shrugged off suggestions that they've lost control of their caucus.

"We're not going to be perfect every day," Boehner told reporters. He noted that Tuesday's effort to extend provisions of the Patriot Act failed partly because it was opposed by three dozen Democrats who previously had supported them.

The Patriot Act vote would have extended the life of three surveillance tools central to the nation's post-Sept. 11 anti-terror law. The 277-148 vote fell short of the two-thirds majority required under the expedited rules.

Voting nay were 26 Republicans, many of whom have libertarian leanings and are wary of government intrusion in private lives. Joining them were 122 Democrats.

A similar vote occurred Wednesday on a bill to force the U.N. to return $179 million the United States paid into the U.N. tax equalization fund. The 259-169 vote was short of the two-thirds threshold.

Some lawmakers said GOP leaders had failed to give colleagues enough details about the trade and Patriot Act bills, and therefore they overestimated the level of support. Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, a tea party favorite, said freshmen lawmakers didn't have "adequate time to digest" the contents of the Patriot Act bill.

"I hope it makes us get sharper," said King, who supported the act's extension.

Boehner said the Patriot Act provisions will be extended under a simple-majority vote soon.

When asked why the bill was brought up under the two-thirds majority rule, Boehner glared at the reporter and said, simply, "It was."

Another Republican leader Wednesday tried to cool the cost-cutting fever of tea partiers. House Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers, R-Ky., proposed ending more than 60 government programs and cutting $35 billion in spending.

Cutting more deeply at this point, Rogers told colleagues, could lead to furloughs of federal workers at the FBI and the Drug Enforcement Agency, or politically wrenching cuts to health research, special education grants to local school districts, or college Pell Grants.

There were other signs in Washington this week that Republicans are still grappling with the influence, or threat, wielded by fiscally conservative, libertarian-leaning members. Not all are associated with the tea party, but the tea party movement has boosted their numbers and clout.

Hatch's remarks at the tea party "town hall" were carried or commented on by C-SPAN, Facebook, Twitter and other outlets.

His appeal reflected the belief that tea party activists could oust him next year in the GOP nominating process. That's what happened to his colleague Bob Bennett, the veteran conservative senator who critics accused of being too willing to compromise with Democrats on some issues.

Hatch saluted the tea party for waking up the electorate, and ticked off a list of policy positions he shares with the movement: support for a constitutional amendment requiring a balanced budget; repeal of President Barack Obama's health care overhaul; a general distrust of big government; and a zeal for cutting spending.

"I for one want to thank the tea party for what they've done," Hatch said.

[Gaspar]

Awesome!  This means that Congressional spending may be brought to a complete halt!

Now we just need to figure out a way to reverse it.


No man's life, liberty, or property are safe while the legislature is in session. – Mark Twain (1866)

This country has come to feel the same when Congress is in session as we do when the baby gets hold of a hammer. – Will Rogers


Conservatives and liberals are kindred spirits as far as government spending is concerned. First, let's make sure we understand what government spending is. Since government has no resources of its own, and since there's no Tooth Fairy handing Congress the funds for the programs it enacts, we are forced to recognize that government spending is no less than the confiscation of one person's property to give it to another to whom it does not belong – in effect, legalized theft. – Walter Williams

If we do not halt this steady process of building commissions and regulatory bodies and the special legislation like huge inverted pyramids over every one of the simple constitutional provisions, we shall soon be spending many billions of dollars more. – Franklin D. Roosevelt

The principle of spending money to be paid by posterity, under the name of funding, is but a swindling futurity on a large scale. – Thomas Jefferson

You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
You cannot help small men by tearing down big men.
You cannot help the wage-earner by tearing down the wage-payer.
You cannot further the brotherhood of mankind by encouraging class hatred.
You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
You cannot establish sound security on borrowed money.
You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than you earn.
You cannot build character and courage by taking away man's initiative.
You cannot help man permanently by doing for them what they could do and should do for themselves.

[waterboy]

What a load. Context, context is everything.

Corporations are also committing "legalized theft" (as though that contradiction in terms is even possible). They own nothing. They have no resources of their own as they only shepherd the resources of their stockholders. The thing a corporation and a government both have in common is the implicit understanding that others, whom they have explicitly approved of, who they implicitly have faith in, whom they have directly elected, are going to spend their money for them in an effort to maintain or increase their value. Even their goals are the same. Some are in it for short term monetary gain, others have committed that money for longterm safety. Some even give the money for causes they hold dear with no expectation of return. Imagine that. Corporations are just mobsters by your definition.

Roosevelt oversaw a pretty large growth in government both pre-war and during the war. Strange you would pull that quote. Jefferson owned, and mated, with slaves while proclaiming that only landowners should be able to vote, so not all of his proclamations were gems.

You cannot bring about wisdom by reproducing as policy what you have read on a bumper sticker.

[Gaspar]

Glad to see you still carry a flag in the war against the private sector. 

[heironymouspasparagus]

Would be good to see them stop.  Any day they do nothing is a day they cannot hurt us more!!

[Gaspar]

Would be good to see them stop.  Any day they do nothing is a day they cannot hurt us more!!

+1

Our freedom is only endangered when congress is in session.

[waterboy]

Glad to see you still carry a flag in the war against the private sector. 

Its not as big or as bright as the one you carry for anarchy!

[Gaspar]

Its not as big or as bright as the one you carry for anarchy!

Not anarchy, just freedom.   

[guido911]

Not anarchy, just freedom.   

To Waterboy, freedom is anarchy. Duh!

[waterboy]

One man's freedom is another man's anarchy and vice versa. There's your bumper sticker.

[guido911]

One man's freedom is another man's anarchy and vice versa. There's your bumper sticker.

So because I want: to keep more of the money I earn; the government to curb its discretionary and entitlement spending;  those that are innovators and risk takers to be rewarded and not punished by taxation, I am an anarchist in your opinion? If so, this anarchy thing is freakin awesome.

Here's your bumper sticker: "I wanna suck on the teat of the (name your anarchist)".

[RecycleMichael]

Here's your bumper sticker: "I wanna suck on the teat of the (name your anarchist)".

+1

[waterboy]

No chance at enticing me with your craziness G('s). Bolsheviks thought they were fighting for freedom. Pol Pot thought he was defending his country from aggressors, thus defending their freedom to rule. The Nazi's wanted freedom for Deutschland. You want freedom from taxes and gub'mnt.

Well, we all doin' what we can.

[nathanm]

What G and G don't quite understand is that it's not just the government that has the capability to encroach upon our liberty. Government is a vital check against monopolists who cry "freedom" while bringing ruin to our economy. It's not perfect, by any means, but it's a damn sight better than nothing.

If business replaces government, we might as well be back to monarchy for all the say we get in how our country is run.

I'm a firm believer in checks and balances. That is, government exists to balance other powers. Government has branches which (should) balance each other to prevent one from growing too great. Even we the people should have a balance. That balance is the Constitution, which helps to stave off the tyranny of the majority.

I think (large) business is pretty much broken in this country, but I don't advocate wholesale dismantlement of the corporate form. I also think government is pretty much broken in this country, but I also don't desire to see it dismantled either. I would like both to be fixed. Just like when my deadbolt is sticky and my shower leaks, I fix the problems rather than tearing down my house because it doesn't work right.

G and G seem to think that deadbolts are for rubes and showers are for elitists.

[waterboy]

 

I thought for a few moments that my intellect might be failing me. That I might be misusing a word. So I got out the old college Websters to look up the word "Anarchy". That was worthwhile. Every Libertarian should do that before they start listing their bumper sticker politics.

Anarchy: 1. Absence of government. 2 Lawless confusion and political disorder. 3. General disorder [Gk. anarchias without a leader]

So, yes G(1), freedom is anarchy of sorts. Freedom from government. And the Greek word kind of brings to mind Tea Partiers doesn't it? Who is their leader? Do they really want any leader? Judging by the way they recently treated Rand Paul one wonders if they only consider a "leader" anyone who agrees with the group.

Anarchism: 1. The theory that all forms of government are incompatible with individual and social liberty and should be abolished. (philosophic anarchism- The advocacy of voluntary cooperation and mutual aid as a substitute for the coercive power of the state).

That nails it. The G's are philosophic anarchists.
Who are fighting for freedom of course. They are freedom fighters. All hail the freedom fighters may they always have freedom fries at their table and freedom flags pinned to their lapels.