People know that this problem is not some friggin' game. They know that bailing out Wall Street sucks. But they know they have no choice.
I predict that the House Republicans who voted this down will suffer the modern-day equivalent of tar-and-feathers and will be ridden out of town on a rail. McCain too.
26 comments:
Nice try, but the vote was 228-205. It wasn't just Republicans opposing it. You do know that the Democrats control Congress, right?
By the way, good riddance to the bailout.
Sometimes your spin does whirl into the ridiculous, David C, as in:
"It wasn't just Republicans opposing it. You do know that the Democrats control Congress, right?"
From The Politico:
Republican defections proved fatal to the massive government intervention, rejected 228-205."
Despite bipartisan appeals from the leadership, anti-Wall Street sentiment and the huge scale of the proposed government intervention proved too much for Treasury to prevail.
Democrats more than delivered a majority of their caucus, and Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Cal.) held the vote open to bring her numbers up to 140 votes for the package. But Republicans never topped 70, and the final GOP split was 133 against the bill and only 65 for the measure.
"Sometimes your spin does whirl into the ridiculous"
Yeah, it's my spin that 94 Democrats in a Democrat-controlled Congress voted against their leadership and helped block the bill.
This bill was killed in a bi-partisan fashion. Here's Chris Bowers from Open Left
"check out the partisan breakdown of the bailout vote. It was extremely bi-partisan" AND
"people came together, regardless of party, to defeat this bill, not pass it. It is also just about the only time I can remember where a bi-partisan alliance from the right wing of the Republican Party and the left swing of the Democratic Party came together to defeat the middle."
But keep pretending that only Republican votes mattered in a Democratic-majority House of Representatives. I know, those evil Republicans are just so bad they must be responsible for anything you don't like.
This will rightly go down as a Republican-inspired defeat, given the right wing revolt of last week. Spin it all you want Dave, that's how it will play.
I hardly need add that the meltdown occurred during a Republican Administration, and that this isn't a coincidence: "Ya broke it, ya buy it," as they say.
"Spin it all you want Dave, that's how it will play.'
Except that I'm not spinning it at all. I'm pointing out that the opposition to the bill was bi-partisan, and that Democrats control Congress. You are the one trying to blame one party in obvious defiance of the facts.
I'm well aware that Democrats will try to blame Republicans and vice-versa, especially if the situation worsens.
"I hardly need add that the meltdown occurred during a Republican Administration, and that this isn't a coincidence: "Ya broke it, ya buy it," as they say."
The administration supported the bailout. It failed in Congress, which I will again note, is controlled by Democrats. Democrats could have passed this bill without a single Republican vote, if they could have gotten all their members on board. Fortunately they couldn't.
I'm sure you'll parry by calling St. Andrew "an imbecile" (or some such) but I think Sully puts a wooden spike in your arguments with this:
The bottom line of today, however they try to spin it, is that a Republican president failed to win more than a third of his own party in the House in what most regard as a financial emergency. The collapse of the Republican party as a coherent organization is pretty much complete - and it's silly to blame Nancy Pelosi
George Bush has an "R" next to his name. He brought the bill to Congress. Sixty percent of the Dems voted for it. Only one-third of Republicans.
"Good riddance" to seven percent of the market's value in a single day.
"but I think Sully puts a wooden spike in your arguments with this"
Except that nothing that he said refutes a single thing I wrote. He's just giving a standard one-sided partisan view. and trying to blame Republicans. In contrast, I am pointing out that there was major Democratic opposition to the bill, and that Congress is controlled by Democrats.
Congress being controlled by Democrats, and Democrats voting against the bill are facts. They aren't my opinion, and not spin. You can pretend Democratic opposition and Democratic votes against the bill don't count, but obviously they do. If it's a failure of Presidential leadership, which it certainly could be construed as, then it is also a failure of the House Democratic leadership.
And yes, Andrew Sullivan has zero credibility. But nothing he wrote in this case is anything more than garden variety Democratic propaganda.
"George Bush has an "R" next to his name. He brought the bill to Congress. Sixty percent of the Dems voted for it. Only one-third of Republicans."
See above.
"Good riddance" to seven percent of the market's value in a single day."
The fact that bad things are happening doesn't mean we can't make them worse. I've seen more than enough critiques of the plan to be convinced that the remedy would have been worse than the disease.
Good article here about the proposed bailout and a better solution.
If it's a failure of Presidential leadership, which it certainly could be construed as, then it is also a failure of the House Democratic leadership.
I wonder if you have any idea how utterly pathetic this "could be construed as" admission of failure sounds.
"I wonder if you have any idea how utterly pathetic this "could be construed as" admission of failure sounds."
No, since I'm not a BDS sufferer, I don't. I don't feel the need to wildly exaggerate every negative thing about Bush. In case you weren't aware of it, Bush is a lame-duck, and he isn't exactly popular with Congress. The impact of his leadership was bound to be underwhelming.
Bush pushed for the bailout, as did the Congressional leadership, both Democrat & Republican. They all failed to get the bailout bill through because there was too much opposition -- from members of both parties.
It is obvious that Bush could not lead the House Republicans to vote for the bail out, but what happen to Nancy's 94 Democrats? David C has a point, if Pelosi is so effective as speaker why couldn't she get it done?
Hey, here is another thought; where was the annointed one Obama? Surely if this bailout is so important to saving the World his changyness Barrack should have arrived to save the day with his rhetorical powers.
Finally why is it incumbent on the GOP to fix Sen. Dodd's and Rep Frank's Fannie & Fred created melt down when their party has majorities in both houses and a braindead administration to champion their socialist fix?
No, since I'm not a BDS sufferer,
Ah, David, 73-74% of Americans disapprove of the job that Bush is doing according to the latest polls. Do they all suffer from "BDS" or might we tentatively conclude that W's presidency has been a colossal failure?
You dead-enders never cease to amaze. I see that JTM is also floating another wingnut favorite: everything that went wrong during the first six years of the Bush Presidency, when the Repubs controlled Congress, can really be blamed Bush's last two years in offce when the Demos took over Congress.
"Ah, David, 73-74% of Americans disapprove of the job that Bush is doing according to the latest polls. Do they all suffer from "BDS""
Of course not. I'm among the group that disapproves of Bush's performance. Disapproving of him has little to do with BDS.
"You dead-enders never cease to amaze."
What's a "dead-ender"? You might want to argue against something other than your own strawman. You totally missed the point anyway. Bush is a highly unpopular lame-duck president with no pull in Congress. It's unrealistic to expect his leadership to accomplish much.
"everything that went wrong during the first six years of the Bush Presidency"
The roots of this situation go back a lot farther than the Bush administration.
"Hey, here is another thought; where was the annointed one Obama?"
A majority of the Congressional Black Caucus voted against the bailout. So I guess this must have been a big failure of leadership by Obama.
rehand,
The question I'm posing is not respecting the first 6 years of Bush while the GOP had control of Congress (FYI I'm part of the 74% who is not happy with "W" and I don't have BDS). What I'm asking is very simple. If the Dems control both houses and have the backing of the President, as in he'll sign the legislation or there isn't the prospect of a veto, why couldn't the Speaker Pelosi get it done? Is it not reasonable to point out that she lacked the leadership to achive a majority?
The second question respecting above is this. If the current crisis is a result of GOP malfeasance and the bailout as presented yesterday is the solution why wouldn't 94 Democrat Reps vote for it? As you've pointed the Democrats have controlled the House now for two years surely they understand the current situation and proposed remedy.
Lastly it is my opinion that this mess was created by Fan and Fred which are Liberal/Democrat creatures. So, again why is it the responsibility of the GOP, in the minority in Congress with an unpopular lame duck President in the White House, to clean up a mess created by Liberal policy.
now, you may not agree with my point of view but surely you have the intellectual horsepower to do better than this nonsense:
"everything that went wrong during the first six years of the Bush Presidency, when the Repubs controlled Congress, can really be blamed Bush's last two years in offce when the Demos took over Congress."
It seems straightforward to me. Pelosi doesn't want to be saddled with the blame if what should be a bipartisan bill goes all wahooni-shaped. The solution - promise a certain number of votes from your caucus and insist on a majority of votes from the Republican caucus as well. Otherwise, if the R-planned bailout flops, you'll be hearing about the "Pelosi bailout" for the next 10 years.
But the Republicans couldn't, or wouldn't muster the votes, making a bipartisan solution impossible. And then, to add insult to injury, the republicans went all WATB, claiming that they would have voted to save the country if Pelosi hadn't said mean things. Beyond pathetic.
JTM-
Over the past two years, the Democrats really only controlled the House of Reps. Not only did they not have a veto-proof majority in the Senate, the majority they did hold consisted of Joe Lieberman. Anything passed by the HoR would be stalled, filibustered or vetoed. I'm not surprised that nothing got done. In better times, I'd have thought it was an ideal situation. As it stands, it's absurd to blame Pelosi for a lack of action. Take a google for all the bills that passed and went nowhere in the Senate.
"It seems straightforward to me. Pelosi doesn't want to be saddled with the blame if what should be a bipartisan bill goes all wahooni-shaped."
True, but that's just an excuse. The fact remains that the Democrats could have passed it without a single Republican vote, if they really wanted to, and if they thought it was that important.
"As it stands, it's absurd to blame Pelosi for a lack of action."
If it's absurd to blame the Speaker of the House for the lack of action, it's doubly absurd to blame the Republican minority. You can't have it both ways.
"But the Republicans couldn't, or wouldn't muster the votes, making a bipartisan solution"
Yeah, and neither could the Democrats.
"the republicans went all WATB, claiming that they would have voted to save the country if Pelosi hadn't said mean things. Beyond pathetic."
No, actually they didn't. Three Republican leaders supporting the bill claimed that Pelosi's speech prevented them from picking up more Republican votes. I don't think there are any Republicans on record saying they actually voted against the bill because of Pelosi's speech. It's a lame excuse, but it's not the same thing that you are alleging. Also, Pelosi's speech was pretty stupid. She's not exactly the brightest Speaker of the House we've had.
How about the Democrats who voted it down? How about that rousing example of bipartisan unification that Pelosi showed in her speech just before the vote?
I thik you are correct the first responce by folks at the dinner table will be to swallow the bait and blame the Republicans
and then slowly they will realise that the Republicans have been set up and THEY themselves are considered too stupid to understand
The fast one Pelosi etal pulled, and then I think there will be a backlash, October surprises should be closer to election day
Now I don't think Pelosi PLANNED to sabatoge the vote. I think she expected it to pass and used the opportunity to set up a blatantly partisan Blame the Republicans it's all their fault witch hunt,
It just suceeded a tad more than she expected.
Talk about putting the Country first?
The Democratic Party has not been so rabidly ant-Nation first as this, since the American Civil War,
Now one thing that McCain and the Republicans DID do is strip the pork for Orgs like ACORN out.
Let see if Pelosi tries to put that back in?
I am puzzled though.
What does Voter Fraud have to do with keeping our Financial system from Meltdown?
"Ah, David, 73-74% of Americans disapprove of the job that Bush is doing according to the latest polls. Do they all suffer from "BDS" or might we tentatively conclude that W's presidency has been a colossal failure?"
And that makes his approval rating what exactly compared to the Pelos and Reid Congress
3 times better or so???
bhcanuckistani,
"Not only did they not have a veto-proof majority in the Senate, the majority they did hold consisted of Joe Lieberman."
For the six years of previous GOP control the Republicans certainly didn't have a veto or filibuster proof majority. Simply put no excuse.
"As it stands, it's absurd to blame Pelosi for a lack of action."
I'm not trying to make the case that it is all Nancy's fault but she certainly deserves a significant portion of the blame. Also, it is absurb to lay the blame solely at the feet of the House Republicans. No, what is going on in DC is the reason I'm no longer a party guy. Between goodies for Acorn and subsidies for CEO's I've seen enough. Perhaps we are better off with out a bailout.
"And that makes his [W.'s]approval rating what exactly compared to the Pelos and Reid Congress."
And your point is . . . what? That Bush has done a good job? Or is this just a variation on the inevitable Repub refrain, "The Democrats are worse!"?
No office holder in America holds more power and ability to set the national agenda than the President. Consider the Republican rubber stamp Congresses of Bush's first six years. I think National polls in America mean more when they assess the President's popularity vs. that of the Congress. It's a political science truism that everybody hates Congress, but that citizens invariably hold a higher opinion of their local representatives.
Redhand said...
"And that makes his [W.'s]approval rating what exactly compared to the Pelos and Reid Congress."
And your point is . . . what? That Bush has done a good job? Or is this just a variation on the inevitable Repub refrain, "The Democrats are worse!"?
Well that does seem to be what the DATA indicates.
I mean you were the one who threw up approval ratings as a guage of
competance to rephrase your own words
"Ah, David, 73-74% (maybe 86-91% FOR Congress) of Americans disapprove of the job that Bush (Pelosi and Reid are) is doing according to the latest polls. Do they all suffer from "BDS" (Democrat Derangement Syndrom) or might we tentatively conclude that W's presidency (the Pelosi Reid Congres) has been a colossal failure?
"BDS" (Democrat Derangement Syndrom) or might we tentatively conclude that W's presidency (the Pelosi Reid Congres) has been a colossal failure?
It's obvious you're committed to the "the Democrats are worse" meme. So perhaps we should wait for the ultimate poll to gauge the people's verdict on the Republicans over the last 8 years. FWIW, I don't think it's going to be a good year for the GOP in the Presidential race, . . . or in Congress.
Congress's approval rate was dismal in late 2006, too. It might have gotten worse since then, but not by much.
The American people just seem to think everyone in Congress except their own representatives is a moron, no matter which party is in charge.
Post a Comment