Another GOPe “win”
Doesn’t even rise to the customary level of a Pyrrhic victory, so they’ve really outdone themselves this time.
McCarthy’s debt-ceiling deal with Biden comes up short on his vow to rein in IRS
Kevin McCarthy trumpeted a debt-ceiling deal Sunday, but increasing debt another $4 trillion with minimal concessions is nothing to boast about.To be fair, the House speaker has a razor slim majority and Republicans don’t control the Senate, where Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and his sidekick Lindsey Graham have announced that the only thing they care about is Ukraine.
But McCarthy’s one dealbreaker should have been his promise to defund President Biden’s massive $80 billion to turbocharge an already weaponized IRS.
This was the totemic centerpiece of his pitch to become speaker.
It was the most memorable promise of the Republicans’ midterm campaign to win back the House.
It struck a chord with voters, wary of funding a new “army” of armed IRS agents to harass middle-class families and small business owners and abuse their powers to target political dissidents, Soviet-style.
“Our very first bill will repeal the funding for 87,000 new IRS agents,” McCarthy vowed.
“You see, we believe government should be to help you, not go after you.”
Actually, Kev, it’s my own belief that the government should just stick to its Constitutionally-prescribed remit, which consists entirely of:
- Securing the national borders
- Providing for the common defense
- Regulating interstate commerce
- And otherwise just leaving me the fuck alone, forget about all that “helping” bushwa
But that’s probably just me, I do admit. Anyhoo, guess what happened next. Go on, guess. I DARES ya.
“Promises made,” the newly minted speaker said Jan. 9, banging the gavel on the first bill of the Republican-controlled House.
What about promises kept?
In the debt-ceiling deal outlined Sunday and due to be inked later this week, McCarthy has allowed the lion’s share of that extra IRS funding to remain unmolested: preserving $78.1 billion of the $80 billion.
As rebel GOP Rep Dan Bishop put it: “So there will be 85,260 more IRS agents rather than 87,000 to eat you alive. Big win.”
A-yup, that’s about the size of it. Perfectly typical of the in-cahoots Vichy GOPe swine, though.
Overpromising and underdelivering is what turns voters off the GOP.
True enough, I suppose. What it also does, though, is expose beyond possibility of further debate just who exactly they really are, and what exactly it is they’re really doing.
You don’t mount a powerful six-month fear campaign about 87,000 new, armed IRS agents ready to break down people’s doors, and then meekly capitulate at the first sign of resistance.
Even if those fears were exaggerated, your credibility rests on delivering a lot more than 2% of what you promised.
Ahh, but that statement assumes some things that are decidedly NOT in evidence with the Vichy GOPe swine: one, that they have at least some integrity, and two, that they give a tinker’s damn about any perception of “credibillity” among an electorate that they assume won’t be paying attention to what they’re doing in the first place. Just, y’know, to name two of ‘em.
Much more yet to this fine if somewhat bitter-tasting article, of which you should read the all.
(Via Sefton)