I can no longer hold back. I really, really dislike* Michele Bachmann. Today she appeared on CBS' The Early Show, and was at her most Bachmanny. Besides reminding me why I don't watch the major networks' morning "news" shows, she said a lot of dumb $#!&, and really failed to answer the anchor's questions and dodged most of them poorly.
Bachmann accused the House Democrats of leaving D.C. before voting on the extension of payroll tax cuts and unemployment insurance benefits...from her campaign tour stop of Davenport, Iowa. Look, I get that she's running a tough campaign to be the GOP presidential nominee and we are less than two weeks from the Iowa caucus, but you can't accuse the Democrats of being absent when you are also absent, Michele. (I am not going to verify whether or not the Democrats, or Republicans, actually left Washington, because this is not my point.)
Besides that little double-standard she expressed this morning, the fact is that Democrats and even some of the Republican leadership were ready to pass the bill. Late last week, the Senate passed their bill with huge bipartisan support. Speaker Boehner even seemed on board. Then on Tuesday, the House rejected the bill. I am very pleased to say that not a single Democrat rejected the bill. The most recent maddening twist to this saga is that the Republicans are claiming they will not settle for anything less than a one-year extension of the benefits, as opposed to the two-month stopgap extension in the bill passed by the Senate and presented in the House. This totally pisses me off because the original offer of a two-month extension was intended as a bill that would be easier to pass than a one-year extension. All things being equal, I'm pretty sure the Democrats would have been on board with a one-year extension.
An hour after the House vote, President Obama was so pissed off (my interpretation) that he walked into the press secretary's briefing unannounced and talked to the reporters directly. I love it. It sounds like something Jed Bartlet would do. Funny, though, that this morning on CBS Bachmann said something to the effect that Obama is nowhere to be found regarding passing this bill or starting new negotiations.
This leads me to a larger point, that we'll need to explore futher at a later date, of the Orwellian statements coming from the right wing these days. By "Orwellian" I mean statements like "two plus two equals five." Bachmann provides many examples of this. Today, she gets on national TV and says Obama is not involved in the process, while he is in DC working on this, giving his own press conference, has pretty much given up his Christmas vacation...while she campaigns in Iowa. Too many people out there believe Bachmann and the other candidates' words without thinking for themselves or finding another source of information. Too many voters believe that two plus two equals five.
*"Hate" is a strong word, so I try not to use it unless I really mean it. I only feel hatred, or something close to it, for three living people: Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, and Fred Phelps.
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