Speaker John Boehner gets lambasted from the left and the right. The ad that ran today during the Bengal-Patriot game showed Boehner as a crybaby (literally) who "didn't get his way on shutting down health care reform" so he has shuttered the goverment in retaliation. The ad was paid for by a Democratic PAC, the House Majority PAC.
The communications guy for the PAC behind the ad, Andy Stone, hangs the furloughs on Boehner: "he threw a Tea Party-inspired temper tantrum and shut down the federal government."
Meanwhile ads from the Right a few days ago urged lawmakers to "fire John Boehner" for a deception on the so-called exemption for Congressional staff for Obamacare, and for not hanging tough on dismantling the health care law. The Revive America PAC ad took on Boehner over Obamacare because he "refuses to defund it. This is only the latest Boehner betrayal.”
While Boehner refuses the challenge to bring to the floor for a vote a simple government funding bill with no hostages, keep in mind what no one has dared utter:
Boehner is a SPINO, Speaker in Name only, because the public never voted for a Republican House majority in November 2012.
When the votes were counted in November, Democrats running for the House collected 1.7 million more votes than Republicans. For Democratic members, the ballots totaled 60.2 million and for Republican members, 58.5 million. (see link, pdf pg 15)
Have reporters researched and told you this? The talking heads, when they tell you about the tyranny of the Hastert rule? How about Democratic lawmakers?
The House is supposed to be proportional representation. It's not.
The House majority from 2012 was manufactured almost entirely from the gerrymanders rammed through statehouses in 2010 that sent more R's than D's to the Capitol to take seats in the House of Representatives, 234-201.
[ Link to YouTube. ]
You can see the lopsided apportionment also in individual states — where the delegation doesn't represent the vote from the state.
[ cross-posted at politicalcortex.com ]
In North Carolina, 9R and 4D were sent to Washington for the House, but the votes were 51% for the Democratic candidates for House and 49% for the Republican candidates. Without rounding the numbers were: 50.6% for D and 48.7% for R, and 0.7% for other parties.
The misrepresentation in Pennsylvania is as acute.
Dems outvote Rs for Pa Congress
13 Nov 2012
"Republicans took 13 of the state's 18 congressional seats last week, despite being outvoted by Democrats by more than 75,000. They did it through expert redistricting that protected Republican candidates while packing Democratic votes into 3 districts in SE Pa and one here in Pittsburgh."
The justification for Speaker Boehner to discard legislation that could win passage by Democrats and Republicans voting together – in favor of bills that win favor of "a majority of the majority" – is a false one. The so-called Hastert rule of vote counting in the House of Representatives always had a moral weakness.
In fact, it is a full-blown sham. A disgrace to governing as well.
[ cross-posted at politicalcortex.com ]