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When it comes to power in Washington, John Boehner isn't exactly a hapless schlub, at least not on paper. He's the Speaker of the House, second in the presidential line of succession, and ostensibly the most powerful member of the legislative branch of government. He has a powerful megaphone, a sizable House majority, and the capacity to have an enormous impact on policymaking.
And yet, John Boehner believes leadership is something others should show. In his new Washington Post op-ed on the larger budget fight, the House Speaker is giving new meaning to the phrase "leading from behind."
The problem, in large part, is that Democrats refuse to make the tough choices necessary to solve our long-term debt crisis.... [P]residential leadership is really what's needed.
Needed for what? Well, according to Boehner, he'd like to see President Obama cut spending the way Republicans want, cut entitlements the way Republicans want, balance the budget the way Republicans want, and approve the Keystone XL pipeline the way Republicans want.
And if Obama disagrees, he's not making "tough choices" and failing to show "leadership."
Left unsaid: John Boehner, despite his power and authority, isn't leading, doesn't want to lead, has no intention of leading, and doesn't even know how to lead -- which is precisely why he keeps waiting for the White House and Senate to do the real work while Boehner waits patiently (or as evidenced by this op-ed, perhaps not so patiently) on the sidelines.
Let's make this easy for the Speaker: (1) Name one budget issue on which you and your party are prepared to compromise; (2) Name one concession you and your party are willing to accept in exchange for a related Democratic concession.
If the answer to either of these is questions is a blank stare, then the Speaker of the House has no business calling himself a leader of anyone or anything.
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Leadership is action, not position. Boehner simply basks in the position, very pleased with himslef.
very typical of alcoholics to brush off real challenges - then go on a rambling rant about how they are prevented from doing their job
anywhere else in the private sector, boehner would have been fired long ago. but he has his PERSONAL REPUBLICAN PUBLIC ENTITLEMENT PLAN.
Bingo Joseph, it's always somebody else's fault in self-will run riot land! Boehner is the leader of lies.
he's an alcoholic? Well that explains everything! We need to stop enabling him....kick his arse out!
He is just an idiot.
The problem, in large part, is that Democrats refuse to make the
toughfalse choices necessary to solve our long-term debt crisisFixed that.
As house speaker, John Boehner might think he has reached his prime but, like Miss
Jean Brodie, seems to have no idea of the damage he is doing with it. He will
eventually though, and perhaps does now, feel remorse for his inaction and the
illogical positions he is taking to support that inaction. He likely also has
some idea of who will betray him. Rachel Maddow says Mr. Boehner is probably a
good man but definitely a bad speaker of the house. However it is not too late
for Speaker Boehner. He can go down in history as the bad speaker, as
characterized by Rachel, or as the savior of American democracy. To be
this savior he will have to start letting the house vote on bills that a
majority of the house, when the democrats are included, wants to pass. He may
lose his job but is the job, as he is presently carrying it out, worth saving? (obamasay.com)
Rachel needs a little practice dealing with what she really sees and relates in pimped outs like boehner. starting with "boehner is probably not a good person since he doesnt mind killing american opportunity, depriving people of health care, helping wallstreet kill for profits, and blaming anyone else for his miserable failing that this piece of sheet calls success".
I think she was just being polite, or maybe kind is the word.
oh she was. but she needn't be. you can be a good and kind person and still give them what they deserve while protecting the public from the likes of what they dont see.
He can't lead because the ideas he wants to put forward were soundly defeated in the last election. He can't try to compromise with Obama because then he would get a primary challenge from an ever more right wing crazy. Republicans also demonized everything this President wants that any compromise would be considered not sticking to Conservative principles.
a really good noble idealistic "man" in his position would resign for the good of america. but boehner is not just a pimped out, he is also a coward which has him incapable of doing what is right for america. worse yet, he steals from the population $274,000 a year and insists he is a man.
Exactly right. He doesn't seem to have any shame. However, he'll have to take his deeds with him to this grave, the poor schmuck.
Poor Boozer Bonehead. For years he's waited for his turn to hold the gavel and yet he never took notes (especially from Nancy P.) on how to garner his caucus and lead. Now that he's in the "position", he's just trying to keep the tea-potty wolves at bay. Wait a minute I'll start crying in 5...4...3...
Still waiting huh, so are WE Boozer Bonehead!
Good one!!
i dont lend him any sympathy for what good normal persons like yourself would see being stuck like he pretends. ever hear of good-cop-bad-cop? thats the conjob he is pulling on america right now. you can bet when he returns to his badcops (no offence against the police here) he is laf'n out loud and telling how much he got President Obama to concede and then as he lafs more, asks one of the opposers to put down his hand of opposition so he can stroll back the the WH and say that President Obama is a really sharp guy and tough negotiator because one more obstructor backed off and "only 229 more to go sir. so what else can you give up? we'll knock'm all down one at a time!" (snicker snicker)
really. that is exactly what he does. DUMYA didnt fool me either.
STEVE....how musch is it to put an op ed in the same place as boeners was....maybe we can talke a collection and have this post put out there!!!!!!
This man is a perfect example of actual governance being abandoned in favor of strict partisan politics and a permanent state of campaigning. He complains about Obama going on with campaigning when he is the one doing it himself. No issue can be addressed in any other light than its affect on future elections. Look up hypocrisy in the dictionary and you will see that orange face smirking back at you.
boehner is a "do nothing lazy repoobli-CONMAN".
the reality is, he wants to get paid for doing nothing - thats what cons do
and that is what he is banking on
Boehner is the titular head of the crazy. Is it any wonder he strives to fob off leadership when it's impossible for him demonstrate any? If he had brass cojones, he'd show leadership by ignoring the crazy and breaking the "Hastert Rule".
Steve
Boehner is, unfortunately, third in line for the Presidency not second. Second in line is VP Joe Biden.
Um, no. Joe Biden is first in line, and the Speaker is second.
The President isn't in line at all. He's already there.
The President himself is not "in line" for the Presidency. He is already there. Steve is correct, since the VP is first "in line" and the Speaker is second "in line".
This Wikipedia article might help.
Oops! My bad . Thanks for correcting me. I apologize Steve.
Boehner and the repubs are failing to show leadership by proposing revenue increases that the president wants. There, does that sound as goofy as what Boehner keeps saying? If you want something, whether it is a new pony or spending cuts, you have to ASK for what you want, not simply tell the other person that you want some indefinite thing and then accuse them of failure of leadership when they refuse to do so. Maybe this concept is beyond the pinheads on the right....actually, they have demonstrated that it is far beyond their meager mental capabilities.
This is going to require waiting ntil 2014 to fix. They have no intention of ever comprimising on anything because the only thing wrong with their thinking, in their minds, is the message. We are getting the message loud and clear morons and you are losing the House in 2014
Boehner’s caucus is deserting him. The poor man knows he is the weakest link in the chain of the new GOP.
One of the chief tenets of business: Once you do agree to something, you must honor that agreement, or people will stop trusting you very quickly, and you won’t be in business for very much longer.
For the so-called “business party”, the GOP should know this. Yet they apparently don’t?
Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi has said that cutting Social Security would “strengthen” it, and President Obama’s spokespeople keep emphasizing his eagerness to cut Social Security’s cost of living adjustments. The fact that Social Security has nothing to do with the deficit is beside the austerity point.
If Mario Rubio succeeds this clown as Speaker of the House, will we have gone from Speaker Boner to Speaker Beaner? Just wonderin'...
are we going to make him cry?Poor John boy is so misunderstood
The GOP is always crying about President Obama's failure to lead.... leadership, leadership, leadership!!! To my friends in the GOP, let me suggest this to you: How about trying some "follower-ship"!!!! If you want to steer the ship so much, then win the damned election next time... otherwise, take your oar and ROW THE FREAKIN' BOAT!!!!
Yet another Conservative rooting for failure. Poor guy.
People should have know from the day he received the gavel. Any grown man that cries at the drop of a dime has no business being the leader of cub scouts. I never heard of the man until he was annointed Speaker of the House and he broke down crying. The Congress will never get anything done as long as he's speaker because he's not a leader.
Speaker Boehner is so full of it!!!! Why do the Republicans think cutting Social Security and Medicare will solve our budget problems? What would help solve them is to close the tax loop holes for corporations and the wealthy, place the Bush tax cuts back in place and quit funding big oil companies and others who make such high profits. One in four corporations do not pay taxes. Bring off shore corporations back or penalize them so they have no choice but to bring their companies back so our people will have jobs. Prohibit off shore tax evasion and make the wealthy pay their fair share of taxes. The only thing that the Republicans want is for the wealthy not to be taxed and they are held hostage by the lobbyists and millionaires who put them in office. I say make sure you know who to vote for in 2014 because we need to clean house. I am sick and tired of them trying to balance a budget on the elderly and the middle class.
Q. Why do the Republicans think cutting Social Security and Medicare will solve our budget problems?
A. they dont. their pimps want your/our social security money to steal our futures by making promises and returning price fraud. if wallstreet ever gets 1 penny of your social security, you can kiss your a$$ goodbye and bury your children if you can afford it.
here is a hint of the prood of that.
wallstree is a gambling bet on a price rigged future based on the creation of debt by monetizing a return on the aggreggate sum repriced against future value which difference is pocketed by wallstreet leaving you - the victim whose sum was taken - to be played off against a future pretense of value which in real time becomes an inflated price that in real time negates any possible future benefit.
in reality, that leaves you with not just a 0 sum gain, but a negative one as your future was "sold". effectively you would have "short sold" your life and the lives of all your descendents.
but its worse than that - the setback prevents future generations from having any takeoff point because you sold it and left them with a debt they should not have. and yet it's much worse than that but i will let you take a stab at it. think "contango".
JCommon right could you imagine what the Fall of 2008 would have been like if Dubya had pushed the privatization of Social Security through so that Wall Street could get their grubby hands on all that money. All Republicans would have said is "Well that's the free market system just correcting itself." Then a majority of the country's residents would be without retirement savings. They are a wonderful lot those publicans....
leadership? you cannot lead after you have declared war against the general public. make no mistake -
the relationships have changed since we have reverted from family farming to agrabusiness. from creating jobs and wealth to feeding wealth. we have not evolved - we have mutated.
repubes are not leaders - they are negotiators, period. you will no longer find real leaders for the party of the pimped outs.
“We are what we always were in Salem, but now the little crazy children are jangling the keys of the kingdom, and common vengeance writes the law!”
― Arthur Miller, The Crucible
The fact that Boehner keep harping on a mythical "long-term debt crisis" instead of focusing on jobs and the economy tells me that he is not capable of leadership of any kind. And certainly not moral or intellectual leadership.
Projecting and lack of comprehension.
Leading is not following your directions. The President reaches out and gets mocked for it.
Boehner and McConnell want to lead the country's (and all other countries') economy downward so they can say "the President failed". That's what they want, to have the Ds lose and the citizens that voted for the opposite from what they keep presenting, to lose.
Remember, they don't care about the voters for Obama, we professionals and retired, veterans, aged- we that earned SS and Medicare, some having resources, those of poor resources, we that "are dependent on gov't. and believe we are victims".
Right on point Rachel, John Boehner is like the song Charlie Brown, Why is Everybody Picking On Me? Paul Ryan budget is Poison Ivy. Just don't Touch! Brilliant men like these can justify their every inconsistency!
if only democrats and the president would finally speak these word about Boehner
i more often wonder why they dont call him a traitor to american principles and otherwise common criminals in the business of kidnapping and extortion.