Clean Debt Ceiling Passes-- Zippity Do Dah

This afternoon, Paul Ryan voted NO on the paying for the bills he's run up as a Member of Congress. Most of the rest of the Republican House leadership team-- Boehner, Cantor, McCarthy, even radicals like Darrell Issa and Gary Miller-- voted YES, to make sure the government didn't go into default. The clean debt ceiling passed yesterday 221-201. With the exception of two reactionary Blue Dogs-- Barrow (GA) and Matheson (UT)-- every Democrat voted yes. The White House issued a very straight forward, commonsense message:

Tonight’s vote is a positive step in moving away from the political brinkmanship that’s a needless drag on our economy. The American economy is moving forward, but there is much more to do to ensure that more middle class Americans-- and those striving to get into it-- can get ahead. Congress can start by raising the minimum wage so that no one who works full time raises their family in poverty, restoring emergency unemployment insurance for the 1.7 million Americans searching every day for a job who need this vital lifeline to support their families, and taking additional steps to strengthen our economy and restore opportunity for all Americans. The President looks forward to working with both sides to get that done.

The NY Times' Ashley Parker and Jonathan Weisman were less conciliatory in their reporting immediately after the vote. "Ending three years of brinkmanship in which the threat of a devastating default was used to wring conservative concessions from President Obama," they wrote, "the House on Tuesday voted to raise the government’s borrowing limit until March 2015-- without any conditions… [I]t effectively ended a three-year, Tea Party-fueled era when a series of budget showdowns raised the threat of debt defaults and government shutdowns, rattled economic confidence and brought serious scrutiny from an international community questioning Washington’s ability to govern.

“A clean debt ceiling is a complete capitulation on the speaker’s part and demonstrates that he has lost the ability to lead the House of Representatives, let alone his own party,” said Jenny Beth Martin, co-founder of the Tea Party Patriots, as she pressed her on-line petition demanding Mr. Boehner’s dismissal. “It is time for him to go.”

Mr. Boehner stunned House Republicans Tuesday morning when he ditched a package that would have tied the debt ceiling increase to a repeal of cuts to military retirement pensions that had been approved in December and announced he would put a “clean” debt ceiling increase up for a vote.

Enough Republicans had balked at that package when it was presented Monday night to convince the speaker he had no choice but to turn to the Democratic minority. It was another startling display of Republican disunity, fueled by the political ambitions of members seeking higher office and personal animus that burst into the open.

For Mr. Boehner it was a potentially momentous decision. Anger among the nation’s most ardent conservatives at the House leadership may be at an apogee. The Tea Party Patriots, FreedomWorks, and conservative activists on the website RedState.com are all circulating petitions to end Mr. Boehner’s speakership.

Virtually all the incumbents the Blue America candidates are running against, voted for default-- again! Neither of our two most recent endorsed candidates, George Gollin (IL-13) and Michael Wager (OH-14) didn't seem surprised. "Rodney Davis," said Gollin, "has again proven he is captive to ideas he doesn't even understand. When you vote to the right of Cantor on paying the country's bills, you lack the responsibility to serve in Congress. Mr. Davis consistently puts the wants of the 1% ahead of the needs of the rest of us." And Wager told us that his opponent, David Joyce "abdicated his responsibility for support of the nation's full faith and credit by voting against increasing the debt ceiling today. His decision is both extreme and cynical as he has forsaken the interests of most Americans to appeal to Tea Party extremists. Even Speaker Boehner understands the recklessness of Joyce's vote."

Rob Zerban, the progressive Democrat taking on Ryan again, has learned to expect this kind of irresponsible behavior from his disingenuous congressman. "Paul Ryan's blatant disregard for the faith and credit of the United States is astounding. His refusal to pay the bill after Congressional Republicans maxed out the credit card is a classic example of how he pursues his radical agenda-- willing to negotiate right up to the moment where he can score political points by selling out his constituents."

UPDATE: John Kline Let Minnesotans Down Again

Mike Obermueller, the progressive likely to replace Kline next November felt much the same way that most voters in southeast Minnesota felt about Kline and the other Republicans who voted for default again. He told us, "Continuing their recent modus operandi of 'government by crisis,' John Kline and his fellow House Republicans spent the last two weeks trying to find a way to extort some political concessions from Democrats in exchange for agreeing to stand behind the spending decisions that Congress previously made. When they were not able to agree on what to extract, Kline and nearly all of his Republican colleagues voted against the bill that would ensure that our government had the funds it needs to pay its bills.

"While Kline and his friends were looking to score political points, working families and small business owners were facing the inevitable economic insecurity that results from approaching the edge of an economic cliff. There’s simply no excuse for playing games with the full faith and credit of the United States. Taking us to the brink of default-- again-- was reckless enough, but it was completely irresponsible for Kline to try to prevent our government from paying the bills that we already owe.

"We can and should have a thoughtful discussion about how and whether to spend the tax dollars provided by hard-working Americans, but Kline’s willingness to take us to the brink of default, just so he can make a political point, shows just how out of touch he has become with the people in Minnesota."