House Majority Leader Eric Cantor and No. 2 Senate Republican Jon Kyl want you to know they are taking a principled stand. They are against raising taxes. They will not recommend to their conferences that taxes be raised. They want the Republican base – and particularly young House freshmen – to know they are fighting for them. Welcome to Stage 1 Kabuki, debt-ceiling edition.
Not to beat a dead horse, but Republicans continue to write ominous memos and give cryptic quotes about the political danger House Democrats face if they pass the Senate health bill. They’re publicly naming names now in an effort to scare wavering or vulnerable House Democrats into voting against the bill. (Steve Driehaus and Nick [...]
Jim Bunning is doing all of us a favor. As this comment from the Number 2 Senate Republican, Jon Kyl of Arizona, makes clear, the Republicans are turning toward a form of reactionary radicalism that is well to the right not only of traditional conservatism, but also of post-Victorian concepts of government and–not to put [...]
The Senate Finance Committee’s rejection of two public option amendments has set off a flurry of other proposals that could upend the reformed health care system imagined in the Chairman Max Baucus’s original bill. Earlier today, Democratic Senator Maria Cantwell introduced an amendment that would empower states to set up their own insurance pools of [...]
