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Faryn Balyncd
Faryn Balyncd's Journal
Faryn Balyncd's Journal
October 30, 2013
This is a curious backstory in more than one respect, but the thing that blows me away is not that Fox presents phony "news", but that they have obviously created a culture where their producers seem to have absolutely no qualms about overdubbing false, unaccredited sound tracks to an unmatched video track, and then presenting it, straightfaced, on their "news" as something that was said on the house floor.
They seem to be incapable of imagining any other any other business-as-usual, or the possibility that they would be caught, or that anyone would care.
Perhaps they think that news is mythical allegory.... and that there is no point even pretending to report historical facts as they happened, but just create slick, phony stage productions to illustrate, and dress up, their commentary.
We have come a long way from Murrow, Cronkite, and Brinkley.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1017155332
So we've reached the point where phony photoshopped video is "news"-business-as-usual?
This is a curious backstory in more than one respect, but the thing that blows me away is not that Fox presents phony "news", but that they have obviously created a culture where their producers seem to have absolutely no qualms about overdubbing false, unaccredited sound tracks to an unmatched video track, and then presenting it, straightfaced, on their "news" as something that was said on the house floor.
They seem to be incapable of imagining any other any other business-as-usual, or the possibility that they would be caught, or that anyone would care.
Perhaps they think that news is mythical allegory.... and that there is no point even pretending to report historical facts as they happened, but just create slick, phony stage productions to illustrate, and dress up, their commentary.
We have come a long way from Murrow, Cronkite, and Brinkley.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/1017155332
October 26, 2013
Should Gene Sperling be fired IMMEDIATELY?
...or should the bastard CONTINUE to advocate the rape of Social Security & Medicare FROM THE OFFICE of the White House National Economic Council?
(a rape that would be totally without purpose if we would only change the tax rates for the 1% back to what they were AFTER the 1981 Reagan tax cuts, not to even consider the tax rates during the Eisenhower years.)
(and a rape that will not only add a nail to the coffin of the American middle class, but which will be a huge step in manipulating the Democratic Party into literally snatching defeat from the jaws of victory beginning in 2014.)
October 19, 2013
.... or would Trotskyist Wing, be more appropriate?
(I think more Americans would understand the Stalinist label, and recognize it in the behavior of the Republican right.)
George Lakoff and others have long recognized both the importance of linguistics in political debate, and the diabolical skill with with the right wing has employed linguistic framing to advance goals which, if truthfully labeled, would be roudly rejected by Americans.
"Conservatives understand what unites them, and they understand how to talk about it, and they are constantly updating their research on how best to express their ideas."
-George Lakoff
When "Tea Party" was invented by the Koch Brothers (along with their Big Tobacco sidekicks), they accomplished several things:
(1) They created the illusion of a grass roots, spontaneous movement
(2) They created the illusion of patriotism
(3) They created the illusion that the "Tea Party" was separate from the Republican Party, which both increased their leverage on leass rabid Republicans, and gave Republican leaders plausible deniability when necessary
In the 1960's (when we actually had an investigative press), the Birchers were exposed for what they were, and, as a result, they were marginalized.
Today, the corporate media trips over itself mirroring right wing memes, and using whatever terms right wing strategists have devised to project their evil message in a more favorable glow.
Isn't it time we retire the Koch Brothers designed pseudo-populist label with a more accurate label, a label which with resonate with Americans?
What if we were to hear less of the supposedly autonomous "Tea Party", and more about the "Stalinist Wing of the Republican Party"?
Linguistics: Should we refer, not to Tea Party but to the "Stalinist Wing of the Republican Party"?
.... or would Trotskyist Wing, be more appropriate?
(I think more Americans would understand the Stalinist label, and recognize it in the behavior of the Republican right.)
George Lakoff and others have long recognized both the importance of linguistics in political debate, and the diabolical skill with with the right wing has employed linguistic framing to advance goals which, if truthfully labeled, would be roudly rejected by Americans.
"Conservatives understand what unites them, and they understand how to talk about it, and they are constantly updating their research on how best to express their ideas."
-George Lakoff
When "Tea Party" was invented by the Koch Brothers (along with their Big Tobacco sidekicks), they accomplished several things:
(1) They created the illusion of a grass roots, spontaneous movement
(2) They created the illusion of patriotism
(3) They created the illusion that the "Tea Party" was separate from the Republican Party, which both increased their leverage on leass rabid Republicans, and gave Republican leaders plausible deniability when necessary
In the 1960's (when we actually had an investigative press), the Birchers were exposed for what they were, and, as a result, they were marginalized.
Today, the corporate media trips over itself mirroring right wing memes, and using whatever terms right wing strategists have devised to project their evil message in a more favorable glow.
Isn't it time we retire the Koch Brothers designed pseudo-populist label with a more accurate label, a label which with resonate with Americans?
What if we were to hear less of the supposedly autonomous "Tea Party", and more about the "Stalinist Wing of the Republican Party"?
October 17, 2013
So here's the audio of what the Holy Spirit woke up Diane Reidy to say to those apostate Congressmen:
https://soundcloud.com/toddzwillich-1/floor1-101612-wav
"“He will not be mocked! This is not one nation under God. It never was.
The greatest deception here is this is not one nation under god! It never was.
Had it been, it would not have been!
The Constitution would not have been written by Freemasons!
You cannot serve two masters! You cannot serve two masters!
Praise be to God, Lord Jesus Christ."
God not happy with US voting to pay its bills! Sound file:
So here's the audio of what the Holy Spirit woke up Diane Reidy to say to those apostate Congressmen:
https://soundcloud.com/toddzwillich-1/floor1-101612-wav
"“He will not be mocked! This is not one nation under God. It never was.
The greatest deception here is this is not one nation under god! It never was.
Had it been, it would not have been!
The Constitution would not have been written by Freemasons!
You cannot serve two masters! You cannot serve two masters!
Praise be to God, Lord Jesus Christ."
October 15, 2013
Stopping at the pharmacy on the way home from the hospital with my post-op wife, we dropped off her prescription at the pharmacy. When we called to see if it was ready, we were told that the Humana Prescription Drug Plan had refused coverage because the licensed physician who signed the prescription was employed as a resident physician.
When I called Humana, the very nice person person who Humana had hired to field such calls relayed to me the message Humana has trained her to tell such policy purchasers: that "THE GOVERNMENT MADE US DO IT. Medicare won't allow insurance companies to pay" for prescriptions written by fully licensed physicians who happen to be employed as a resident physician at the time.
How much Humana paid the person who dreamed up that blatant lie is unclear.
But what is clear is the type of business practices that have become "business as usual" in our current corporate culture.
These everyday nickle and dime denials make sense from one and only one perspective: These are the foundations which allow Humana's current CEO Bruce Broussard to be paid $10.5 million per year, (not counting $323,000 in "commuting" expenses), even as they pay peanuts to the nice people they hire to man the complaint lines.
PGA TOUR golfer Scott McCarron cracks a joke as (from left) Humana Challenge CEO Bob Marra, Humana President and CEO Bruce Broussard, and Desert Classic Charities President John Foster share a laugh at the Humana Challenge Mayor's Breakfast
What passes for "capitalism" in today's culture would make Adam Smith VOMIT.
Humana Pays CEO Broussard $10.5 million by cheating post-op patients out of their precriptions:
Stopping at the pharmacy on the way home from the hospital with my post-op wife, we dropped off her prescription at the pharmacy. When we called to see if it was ready, we were told that the Humana Prescription Drug Plan had refused coverage because the licensed physician who signed the prescription was employed as a resident physician.
When I called Humana, the very nice person person who Humana had hired to field such calls relayed to me the message Humana has trained her to tell such policy purchasers: that "THE GOVERNMENT MADE US DO IT. Medicare won't allow insurance companies to pay" for prescriptions written by fully licensed physicians who happen to be employed as a resident physician at the time.
How much Humana paid the person who dreamed up that blatant lie is unclear.
But what is clear is the type of business practices that have become "business as usual" in our current corporate culture.
These everyday nickle and dime denials make sense from one and only one perspective: These are the foundations which allow Humana's current CEO Bruce Broussard to be paid $10.5 million per year, (not counting $323,000 in "commuting" expenses), even as they pay peanuts to the nice people they hire to man the complaint lines.
PGA TOUR golfer Scott McCarron cracks a joke as (from left) Humana Challenge CEO Bob Marra, Humana President and CEO Bruce Broussard, and Desert Classic Charities President John Foster share a laugh at the Humana Challenge Mayor's Breakfast
What passes for "capitalism" in today's culture would make Adam Smith VOMIT.
October 11, 2013
Here's a pithy quote from The American Conservative's "State of the Union" editorial "It’s Time to Throw the Tea Party One Ring into Mount Doom", published October 8, discussing what this old line, right-wing, conservative (and certainly not "moderate"
publication terms the " implacability of the House's kamikaze-cons" :
". . . Why are Republicans inflicting real, immediate, and tangible harm on the economy in order to accomplish the impossible (delay or defund Obamacare) address an abstract future threat (debt) or merely to save face? Why isn’t the majority of the House majority isolating its rightmost faction and ending this pointlessly asinine pissing match?"
"Contra the conventional wisdom, I maintain that no one in leadership will lose his job. The very nature of Tea Party opposition, whether it issues from the likes of Bazooka Ted and His Gang in the Senate or the unappeasable Jacobins in the House, is to throw weight without consequence. They evince no interest in actually wielding power from the inside, which would require restraint, conciliation, and moderation. They are hysterics on the brink of utter demoralization. The danger they pose to democratic norms, institutional comity, and political functionality is precisely why they can’t be bargained with; they must be marginalized."
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/its-time-to-throw-the-tea-party-one-ring-into-mount-doom/
Thinking it might be appropriate to simply (& politely) inquire if my Republican representative had read this editorial, and what his position on the House Republican direction since being taken over by the Kamakaze Cauucus, I called both my representative's office, and also Speaker Boehner's office.
Unfortunately, unlike my representative, none of Speaker Boehner's offices seem to be answering their telephone today, or at least not within 1 hour. (Can't imagine why)
Here's a link to House members office telephone numbers:
http://www.house.gov/representatives/
(While it's important to keep the conversation polite) . . . should not any Republican representative have an opinion on the Kamakaze-cons that are tearing apart their own party?
If your Representative is a Republican, ask if he/she has read The American Conservative's Op-Ed:
Here's a pithy quote from The American Conservative's "State of the Union" editorial "It’s Time to Throw the Tea Party One Ring into Mount Doom", published October 8, discussing what this old line, right-wing, conservative (and certainly not "moderate"
publication terms the " implacability of the House's kamikaze-cons" :
". . . Why are Republicans inflicting real, immediate, and tangible harm on the economy in order to accomplish the impossible (delay or defund Obamacare) address an abstract future threat (debt) or merely to save face? Why isn’t the majority of the House majority isolating its rightmost faction and ending this pointlessly asinine pissing match?"
"Contra the conventional wisdom, I maintain that no one in leadership will lose his job. The very nature of Tea Party opposition, whether it issues from the likes of Bazooka Ted and His Gang in the Senate or the unappeasable Jacobins in the House, is to throw weight without consequence. They evince no interest in actually wielding power from the inside, which would require restraint, conciliation, and moderation. They are hysterics on the brink of utter demoralization. The danger they pose to democratic norms, institutional comity, and political functionality is precisely why they can’t be bargained with; they must be marginalized."
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/its-time-to-throw-the-tea-party-one-ring-into-mount-doom/
Thinking it might be appropriate to simply (& politely) inquire if my Republican representative had read this editorial, and what his position on the House Republican direction since being taken over by the Kamakaze Cauucus, I called both my representative's office, and also Speaker Boehner's office.
Unfortunately, unlike my representative, none of Speaker Boehner's offices seem to be answering their telephone today, or at least not within 1 hour. (Can't imagine why)
Here's a link to House members office telephone numbers:
http://www.house.gov/representatives/
(While it's important to keep the conversation polite) . . . should not any Republican representative have an opinion on the Kamakaze-cons that are tearing apart their own party?
October 11, 2013
From, of all places, "The American Conservative":
". . . on the implacability of the House's kamikaze-cons . . . "
". . . Why are Republicans inflicting real, immediate, and tangible harm on the economy in order to accomplish the impossible (delay or defund Obamacare) address an abstract future threat (debt) or merely to save face? Why isn’t the majority of the House majority isolating its rightmost faction and ending this pointlessly asinine pissing match?"
"Contra the conventional wisdom, I maintain that no one in leadership will lose his job. The very nature of Tea Party opposition, whether it issues from the likes of Bazooka Ted and His Gang in the Senate or the unappeasable Jacobins in the House, is to throw weight without consequence. They evince no interest in actually wielding power from the inside, which would require restraint, conciliation, and moderation. They are hysterics on the brink of utter demoralization. The danger they pose to democratic norms, institutional comity, and political functionality is precisely why they can’t be bargained with; they must be marginalized."
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/its-time-to-throw-the-tea-party-one-ring-into-mount-doom/
Now that "Tea Party" has overstayed it's welcome, maybe the GOP should try some re-branding.
"Kamikaze-cons", "Kamakazecans", or "Banana Republicans"?
The American Conservative: Throw Tea-Party "Kamikaze-Cons" into Mount Doom
From, of all places, "The American Conservative":
". . . on the implacability of the House's kamikaze-cons . . . "
". . . Why are Republicans inflicting real, immediate, and tangible harm on the economy in order to accomplish the impossible (delay or defund Obamacare) address an abstract future threat (debt) or merely to save face? Why isn’t the majority of the House majority isolating its rightmost faction and ending this pointlessly asinine pissing match?"
"Contra the conventional wisdom, I maintain that no one in leadership will lose his job. The very nature of Tea Party opposition, whether it issues from the likes of Bazooka Ted and His Gang in the Senate or the unappeasable Jacobins in the House, is to throw weight without consequence. They evince no interest in actually wielding power from the inside, which would require restraint, conciliation, and moderation. They are hysterics on the brink of utter demoralization. The danger they pose to democratic norms, institutional comity, and political functionality is precisely why they can’t be bargained with; they must be marginalized."
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/its-time-to-throw-the-tea-party-one-ring-into-mount-doom/
Now that "Tea Party" has overstayed it's welcome, maybe the GOP should try some re-branding.
"Kamikaze-cons", "Kamakazecans", or "Banana Republicans"?
October 8, 2013
...or is it something else?
Is the Republican Supercommittee a revived Catfood Commission on steroids?
...or is it something else?
October 7, 2013
Republicans could never admit that the ACA was a centrist plan that in its essentials was the Heritage Foundation designed 1993 Republican plan. To do so would destroy their propaganda. So they portray a centrist health care plan (which Republicans formerly endorsed) as "socialism", and mount a late hour obstructionist drama (which was doomed to fail) in order to placate their base, and in order to set up a crisis in which:
1. They hope to get a deal gutting SS and MC, and
2. They want it done in the context of a fight "about "Obamacare", so they can continue to peddle the ridiculous (but widely believed) lie that "Obamacare" is an attack on Medicare..... In this fashion they hope to accomplish their goal of gutting Social Security & Medicare, but escape paying the political price, since their propaganda machine will peddle the meme that "Obamacare" created the crisis and bears the blame for cuts to SS and MC.
Now, a Tea Party favorite House Republican (with one of the "most conservative" ratings by the Club for Growth and the American Conservative Union) is now pushing for exactly such a (so-called) "compromise". Moreover, Rep. Dennis Ross (R-FL) now frankly ADMITS that the original opposition to "Obamacare" was done to "maintain credibility" with the Republican extremist base (since Republicans "ran on repealing Obamacare" , but that the REAL OBJECTIVES are "rolling back entitlements" and "tax reform" (for the 1%).
Rep. Dennis Ross (R-FL)
Bloomberg reports that Ross is supportive of a "deal" that would include (you guessed it) "means testing Medicare", chained CPI, and would lead to what right wingers label "tax reform"
Ross is not alone:
“You’re starting to see a shift in the thinking among members of the conference from all factions,” said Representative Charles Boustany, a Louisiana Republican. Boustany said he would also back a deal that didn’t delay the health-care law’s individual mandate -- a requirement that Americans who lack insurance purchase it through government-run exchanges -- if it also repealed a tax on medical devices, led to entitlement cuts and created a process for tax reform.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-10-04/tea-party-s-ross-says-debt-worth-yielding-on-obamacare.html
What Ross describes is, of course, classic "Shock Doctrine" strategy as described by Naomi Klein.
But, of course, corporate media will be too busy mimicking Fox News/Koch Brothers memes (in the corporate media's never ending quest to disprove the lie of "liberal media bias" , to discuss the methods of Shock Doctrine Disaster Capitalism.
President Obama's job will not be made easier by the "false equivalencies" promoted by a corporate media intent on promoting endless "compromises" between centrist and ever more far right extremist positions.
Our President's negotiating position will be strengthened by an perceptive, active (and yes, DEMANDING) Democratic base that recognizes the political reality and that strengthens the President's hand by clearly communicating that compromises that weaken essential programs are not acceptable, and through mobilizing such an assertive and articulate Democratic base, actually reversing the ever more rightward tilt in the public discourse.
The reason our President explicitly told us our job, to "hold my feet to the fire", is because reversing this ever-rightward tilt (of public discourse & debate) is what strengthens his hand.
"Your job is to hold my feet to the fire. . . So, you need to be out there everyday raising these issues, telling us when we’re doing the right or wrong thing. . . My role is to be President of the United States. . . "
http://www.stanforddaily.com/2011/12/01/a-foot-in-two-worlds/
And in this age of a dysfunctional, derelict corporate media, our President needs us to do our job more than ever.
Republican ACA Obstructionism: Smokescreen for BROADBASED Shock Doctrine Attacks
Republicans could never admit that the ACA was a centrist plan that in its essentials was the Heritage Foundation designed 1993 Republican plan. To do so would destroy their propaganda. So they portray a centrist health care plan (which Republicans formerly endorsed) as "socialism", and mount a late hour obstructionist drama (which was doomed to fail) in order to placate their base, and in order to set up a crisis in which:
1. They hope to get a deal gutting SS and MC, and
2. They want it done in the context of a fight "about "Obamacare", so they can continue to peddle the ridiculous (but widely believed) lie that "Obamacare" is an attack on Medicare..... In this fashion they hope to accomplish their goal of gutting Social Security & Medicare, but escape paying the political price, since their propaganda machine will peddle the meme that "Obamacare" created the crisis and bears the blame for cuts to SS and MC.
Now, a Tea Party favorite House Republican (with one of the "most conservative" ratings by the Club for Growth and the American Conservative Union) is now pushing for exactly such a (so-called) "compromise". Moreover, Rep. Dennis Ross (R-FL) now frankly ADMITS that the original opposition to "Obamacare" was done to "maintain credibility" with the Republican extremist base (since Republicans "ran on repealing Obamacare"
, but that the REAL OBJECTIVES are "rolling back entitlements" and "tax reform" (for the 1%).
Rep. Dennis Ross (R-FL)
Bloomberg reports that Ross is supportive of a "deal" that would include (you guessed it) "means testing Medicare", chained CPI, and would lead to what right wingers label "tax reform"
Ross is not alone:
“You’re starting to see a shift in the thinking among members of the conference from all factions,” said Representative Charles Boustany, a Louisiana Republican. Boustany said he would also back a deal that didn’t delay the health-care law’s individual mandate -- a requirement that Americans who lack insurance purchase it through government-run exchanges -- if it also repealed a tax on medical devices, led to entitlement cuts and created a process for tax reform.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-10-04/tea-party-s-ross-says-debt-worth-yielding-on-obamacare.html
What Ross describes is, of course, classic "Shock Doctrine" strategy as described by Naomi Klein.
But, of course, corporate media will be too busy mimicking Fox News/Koch Brothers memes (in the corporate media's never ending quest to disprove the lie of "liberal media bias"
, to discuss the methods of Shock Doctrine Disaster Capitalism.
President Obama's job will not be made easier by the "false equivalencies" promoted by a corporate media intent on promoting endless "compromises" between centrist and ever more far right extremist positions.
Our President's negotiating position will be strengthened by an perceptive, active (and yes, DEMANDING) Democratic base that recognizes the political reality and that strengthens the President's hand by clearly communicating that compromises that weaken essential programs are not acceptable, and through mobilizing such an assertive and articulate Democratic base, actually reversing the ever more rightward tilt in the public discourse.
The reason our President explicitly told us our job, to "hold my feet to the fire", is because reversing this ever-rightward tilt (of public discourse & debate) is what strengthens his hand.
"Your job is to hold my feet to the fire. . . So, you need to be out there everyday raising these issues, telling us when we’re doing the right or wrong thing. . . My role is to be President of the United States. . . "
http://www.stanforddaily.com/2011/12/01/a-foot-in-two-worlds/
And in this age of a dysfunctional, derelict corporate media, our President needs us to do our job more than ever.
October 5, 2013
Who woulda thunk it?
After the much heralded (& non-existent) "moderate" Republicans ended up voting along party lines to block a clean bill to end the shutdown, we now see hints of the GOP's real strategy emerging. Coming in the form of a "willingness to compromise", but rather than coming from a so-called "moderate", it comes from an unabashedly far right, Tea Party backed Republican House member rated as one of the House's "most conservative" members by both the government hating Club for Growth, and the American Conservative Union.
Rep. Dennis Ross explains his "turnaround" on the ACA by stating that the hard line he supported last month was necessitated by the fact that Republicans “were elected to repeal and replace Obamacare" and had "to offer an alternative for the sake of our credibility".
Bloomberg now reports that Ross is supportive of a "deal" that would include (you guessed it) "means testing Medicare", chained CPI, and would lead to what right wingers label "tax reform".
Bloomberg reports that Ross is not alone:
“You’re starting to see a shift in the thinking among members of the conference from all factions,” said Representative Charles Boustany, a Louisiana Republican. Boustany said he would also back a deal that didn’t delay the health-care law’s individual mandate -- a requirement that Americans who lack insurance purchase it through government-run exchanges -- if it also repealed a tax on medical devices, led to entitlement cuts and created a process for tax reform.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-10-04/tea-party-s-ross-says-debt-worth-yielding-on-obamacare.html
An interesting aspect is that while the so-called "moderate" Republicans have been a fantasy, what we see now emerging is coming not only from one of the Club for Growth's most hardline anti-government "conservatives".
And from one who admits that the initial position (focusing on "Obamacare" was necessitated by the need to "maintain credibility" with their base (having campaigned on the promise to repeal "Obamacare" , but that their real target is crafting a deal with broader goal: gutting social services in general and tax cuts for the 1%.
Bloomberg: Tea Party’s Ross Says Debt Worth Yielding on Obamacare
Rep. Dennis Ross (R-FL15)
U.S. Representative Dennis Ross, a Florida Republican, said he would support a broad spending deal that didn’t include changes to the health-care law, becoming the first Tea Party-backed House lawmaker to publicly back off the fight that has shut down the government for five days....Ross, ranked among the House’s most conservative members by both the Club for Growth and the American Conservative Union, said he shifted his position...
...Now, Ross is pushing for other changes, such as means-testing for Medicare payments and switching to a formula that may make Social Security beneficiaries’ cost-of-living increases rise more slowly. Those would be “major reforms” that should win Republican votes.
Rep. Charles Boustany (R-LA3)
. . . . “You’re starting to see a shift in the thinking among members of the conference from all factions,” said Representative Charles Boustany, a Louisiana Republican. Boustany said he would also back a deal that didn’t delay the health-care law’s individual mandate -- a requirement that Americans who lack insurance purchase it through government-run exchanges -- if it also repealed a tax on medical devices, led to entitlement cuts and created a process for tax reform. . . . . . .Ross took a hard-line stance just last month, saying that Republicans who took office in 2010 “were elected to repeal and replace Obamacare." . . . "We’ve got to offer an alternative for the sake of our credibility,” he said then.
A spending deal would clear the way for compromises on other issues, such as immigration and revising the tax code, he said....“There are a whole lot of other issues that haunted us at the election other than Obamacare,”
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-10-04/tea-party-s-ross-says-debt-worth-yielding-on-obamacare.html
The battle is just beginning.
Bloomberg: GOP Rep. Ross reveals GOP's REAL goal: gut Medicare, chained CPI, & cut taxes.
Who woulda thunk it?
After the much heralded (& non-existent) "moderate" Republicans ended up voting along party lines to block a clean bill to end the shutdown, we now see hints of the GOP's real strategy emerging. Coming in the form of a "willingness to compromise", but rather than coming from a so-called "moderate", it comes from an unabashedly far right, Tea Party backed Republican House member rated as one of the House's "most conservative" members by both the government hating Club for Growth, and the American Conservative Union.
Rep. Dennis Ross explains his "turnaround" on the ACA by stating that the hard line he supported last month was necessitated by the fact that Republicans “were elected to repeal and replace Obamacare" and had "to offer an alternative for the sake of our credibility".
Bloomberg now reports that Ross is supportive of a "deal" that would include (you guessed it) "means testing Medicare", chained CPI, and would lead to what right wingers label "tax reform".
Bloomberg reports that Ross is not alone:
“You’re starting to see a shift in the thinking among members of the conference from all factions,” said Representative Charles Boustany, a Louisiana Republican. Boustany said he would also back a deal that didn’t delay the health-care law’s individual mandate -- a requirement that Americans who lack insurance purchase it through government-run exchanges -- if it also repealed a tax on medical devices, led to entitlement cuts and created a process for tax reform.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-10-04/tea-party-s-ross-says-debt-worth-yielding-on-obamacare.html
An interesting aspect is that while the so-called "moderate" Republicans have been a fantasy, what we see now emerging is coming not only from one of the Club for Growth's most hardline anti-government "conservatives".
And from one who admits that the initial position (focusing on "Obamacare"
was necessitated by the need to "maintain credibility" with their base (having campaigned on the promise to repeal "Obamacare" , but that their real target is crafting a deal with broader goal: gutting social services in general and tax cuts for the 1%.
Bloomberg: Tea Party’s Ross Says Debt Worth Yielding on Obamacare
Rep. Dennis Ross (R-FL15)
U.S. Representative Dennis Ross, a Florida Republican, said he would support a broad spending deal that didn’t include changes to the health-care law, becoming the first Tea Party-backed House lawmaker to publicly back off the fight that has shut down the government for five days....Ross, ranked among the House’s most conservative members by both the Club for Growth and the American Conservative Union, said he shifted his position...
...Now, Ross is pushing for other changes, such as means-testing for Medicare payments and switching to a formula that may make Social Security beneficiaries’ cost-of-living increases rise more slowly. Those would be “major reforms” that should win Republican votes.
Rep. Charles Boustany (R-LA3)
. . . . “You’re starting to see a shift in the thinking among members of the conference from all factions,” said Representative Charles Boustany, a Louisiana Republican. Boustany said he would also back a deal that didn’t delay the health-care law’s individual mandate -- a requirement that Americans who lack insurance purchase it through government-run exchanges -- if it also repealed a tax on medical devices, led to entitlement cuts and created a process for tax reform. . . . . . .Ross took a hard-line stance just last month, saying that Republicans who took office in 2010 “were elected to repeal and replace Obamacare." . . . "We’ve got to offer an alternative for the sake of our credibility,” he said then.
A spending deal would clear the way for compromises on other issues, such as immigration and revising the tax code, he said....“There are a whole lot of other issues that haunted us at the election other than Obamacare,”
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-10-04/tea-party-s-ross-says-debt-worth-yielding-on-obamacare.html
The battle is just beginning.
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