Ryan Pivots Away From Cruz For Boehner-- Will It Work?

Cuccinelli, struggling to stay in the 30's in recent polls, has already started cutting back on media spending. He knows he lost. The hit the Republican brand took during his gubernatorial campaign was too great to iovercome-- even as his opponent, corrupt political wheeler-dealer Terry McAuliffe, was one of the most flawed and unattractive candidates the Democrats could have possibly put up. Gallup shows the GOP at the lowest approval rating-- 28% and rapidly dropping-- ever! Even Ted Cruz's Utah Tea Party lackey, Mike Lee, has seen his approval among home state voters evaporate since he went on his shut down the government crusade. "57% of Utahns overall would like Senator Lee to be “more willing to compromise” versus 43% who prefer that he “stand by his principles.” That result is not possible in Republican-dominated Utah without at least some Republicans preferring compromise.  In fact, 38% of all self-identified Republicans prefer that Lee compromise compared to 99% of all Democrats.  Independents side heavily with compromise at 65%." And Erick Erickson is predicting a full scale Republican civil war and a breakaway third party.

I’m being told by several sources that Speaker Boehner and Majority Leader Eric Cantor are plotting to give up trying to either defund or delay Obamacare.

...Cantor, Boehner, and with them Mitch McConnell and John Cornyn are expected to cave in and fully fund, unimpeded, Obamacare.

They will work up a new deal that includes a debt ceiling increase with a few sops to the GOP as cover. The only change they are still considering it the medical device tax repeal, which is being heavily lobbied for by former Boehner and McConnell staffers who left for K Street.

A number of Democrats who are recipients of campaign cash along with these Republicans may provide a crony capitalist bridge over which this one tax repeal can pass while leaving in place all the other taxes, penalties, and fees.

But John Boehner, Eric Cantor, Mitch McConnell, and John Cornyn will ensure that Obamacare is fully funded and give the American public no delay like businesses have.

In doing so, they will sow the seeds of a real third party movement that will fully divide the Republican Party.

Looks like the GOP suicide mission is succeeding, though not in the way Ted Cruz and the House Teatards planned it. So now, the pivot. Ryan and his establishment cronies want to jettison the whole Obamacare aspect of their jihad and go after what they and conservative Democrats (New Dems and Blue Dogs and plain old corporate whores) call entitlements and what normal people see as earned benefits, i.e.- Social Security and Medicare. Ryan's whole raison d'être has always been fulfilling the old GOP dream to cut these anyway. (Just keep in mind that the last time the Republican Party went full-out in their war against Social Security-- 1936 when Alf Landon ran on repealing it-- Landon won 2 small states (8 electoral college votes) and the congressional Republicans were reduced to 88 seats in the House and 16 in the Senate. They've been a little more subtle since then-- but the goal has never changed.)

Ryan's puerile OpEd in the Wall Street Journal Tuesday evening was the trial balloon that the Republican congressional leadership wanted to move towards the Grand Bargain that Obama and Boehner crave. The giveaway is that there word "Obamacare" appears nowhere in his missive. Nor does "the Affordable Care Act." He just wants to go back to the good old fashioned GOP position of gutting Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. And that's a "compromise" I wouldn't trust Obama to get anywhere near. Boehner and Cantor and Ryan are pushing through a 6-week extension of the debt ceiling-- without ending their government shutdown-- to set the table for the Grand Bargain negotiations to achieve what the voters would never approve in a million years. This warning came from Social Security works yesterday:

While Republicans have made high-profile attempts to defund President Obama’s signature health care law, that’s not their only target. 

50 House Republicans, led by Rep. Reid Ribble of Wisconsin, just sent a letter to Speaker Boehner urging him to make cuts to Social Security benefits before the debt ceiling is raised and our government re-opened.

And yesterday morning, Paul Ryan published an op-ed asking for the same thing: Cuts to Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid in exchange for an increase to the debt ceiling.

...Rep. Ribble’s ideas about Social Security reads like a wish list straight out of Romney/Ryan’s play book:

• Raising the retirement age
• Slashing annual cost of living adjustments through a new formula known as “Chained CPI”
• Means testing for Social Security recipients

Cutting benefits for those most in need is outrageous enough. Demanding them as a precondition for funding the government and ensuring we don’t default on our national debt obligations is both reckless and irresponsible.

Our Social Security system needs to be expanded, not cut. Cost of living adjustments already struggle to keep up with the rising costs that seniors face every day. If these “Ribble Republicans” get their way, everyone who receives Social Security now, or who will receive it in the future, will see less and less in return for what they paid in over their lives.

Van Jones, Paul Ryan is neither serious nor reasonable. 

We're looking at the government pulling another Shock Doctrine threat on us to stampede everyone into the unthinkable. There's good news and bad news is the tweet below... because there's more than one way to read this message from ConservaDem/corporate whore Michael Bennet of Colorado: