Curt wrote “Boehner Plans Amnesty Sellout To Pelosi” on 1 Dec 14. Vince wrote “Surrender: Why does anyone ever vote for the Republican Party – at least one run by Boehner & McConnell?” on 14 Dec 14. And Curt wrote “Floor Drama: Boehner Embarrassment As House Nearly Kills Omnibus On Procedural Vote” on 11 Dec 14. So Flopping Aces has done a good job of documenting John Boehner’s ineffectiveness as House speaker.
Not satisfied with the damage he’s already done, there’s this action by Boehner:
In the final days before the start of the new Congress, House Speaker John Boehner and the Republican establishment are quietly purging strong fiscal conservatives from prominent budget and finance committees.
Now today (2 Jan 15) we get evidence of just how dissatisfied with Boehner we conservatives are. In a national telephone poll conducted on 26-30 Dec 14 of 602 people who identified themselves as Republican voters and independents who lean Republican and voted Republican in 2014, the following results were obtained:
| Select John Boehner as House Speaker | |
|---|---|
| John Boehner, definitely | 11% |
| Boehner, probably | 15% |
| Someone new, definitely | 34% |
| Someone new, probably | 26% |
| Don’t Know/Undecided | 15% |
Notice that the “Someone new, definitely” category has the greatest response, and that the two “Someone new” categories comprise 60%, a clear majority.
Consider the responses to these statements:
| Speaker Boehner has been ineffective in opposing President Obama’s agenda. | |
|---|---|
| Strongly agree | 29% |
| Somewhat agree | 35% |
| Somewhat disagree | 15% |
| Strongly disagree | 9% |
| Don’t know/no response | 12% |
This means that 64% of us think Boehner is ineffective.
| House Speaker John Boehner has the best interests of the American public at heart, rather than special interests. | |
|---|---|
| Strongly agree | 9% |
| Somewhat agree | 34% |
| Somewhat disagree | 23% |
| Strongly disagree | 20% |
| Don’t know/no response | 13% |
Wow! A similar number of us (43% to 43%) think Boehner puts special interests ahead of us as not. On a salary of $233,500, his net worth is about $3,588,556. Not bad for government work.
Now consider these results:
| Where would you place yourself on a scale where 1 means very conservative and 7 means very liberal? | |
|---|---|
| 1 | 25% |
| 2 | 17% |
| 3 | 23% |
| 4 | 16% |
| 5 | 9% |
| 6 | 4% |
| 7 | 4% |
| Don’t know | 3% |
FWIW, the mean response is 2.94, so this poll is not primarily fire-breathing conservatives.
| Do you consider yourself to be a supporter or opponent of the Tea Party movement? | |
|---|---|
| Strong supporter | 22% |
| Not strong supporter | 35% |
| Not strong opponent | 14% |
| Strong opponent | 8% |
| Don’t know/no response | 20% |
While the “Strong supporter” category can be interpreted as “very conservative,” they are far from the majority of respondents. This poll represents “Republicans,” not the TEA Party.
The poll was commissioned by the People’s Poll and supervised by Caddell Associates. Yes, Pat Caddell is a Democrat, so these results cannot be dismissed as some “hack job.” The poll has a Margin of Error of +/- 4.00 percentage points.
That Boehner is not conservative – fiscally or socially – is not in doubt. As Lester Jackson wrote:
Conservatives find it especially galling — and intolerable — to have a Speaker who (a) shows utter contempt for the representatives whose election resulted in his ascension to power; and (b) does everything he can to subvert the wishes, interests and values of these representatives and their constituents.
BTW, “Republican” doesn’t necessarily mean “conservative.” After all, Boehner has demonstrated beyond a doubt that he’s a RINO. But we have to start identification somewhere. Since we know that conservative Democrats are very rare, “Republican” will have to do for now.
Cross-posted at The Pot Stirrer
@Redteam #96:
“You do realize when all the Muslims take over they’re going to cut your head off, right?”
And YOU realize that IF the Muslims DO take over, YOU just might WISH that they WOULD cut your head off.
1. Muslims are NOT going to take over the United States in your lifetime or mine.
2. When Muslims DO take over places, they kill and subjugate indiscriminately, not bothering to determine who their victims sleep with. They’d just as soon cut YOUR head off as mine.
On the REAL side of things, I suspect that we will learn a few lessons from the current French experience. I think that France will NOT become the next Islamic caliphate. I think that the French will get quite fed up with the sort of BS that a few imbedded “sleepers” have stirred up, and will respond effectively to preserve the Western culture that they established long before generously welcoming immigrants from Islam.
The threat from Islam is noisy but barely serious. They get our attention only because they prefer splashy acts of violence that earn news coverage, but such drama alerts us and cements our resolve to fight back, just as Hitler’s rocket bombing of London hardened the British resolve to win WWII instead of terrifying them as he had expected. An enemy that obsessively explains itself is much easier to defeat than one that reveals nothing. Islam is too stupid to win anything big. We have nothing to worry about.
@George Wells:
I think you’re right.
@Redteam #102:
Thanks for the agreement.
I don’t often get credit for being right here on FA.
I accurately predicted the progress of gay marriage several years ago, and some here simply shut up on the issue and let it die rather than acknowledge that their predictions had failed to materialize. They simply did not appreciate the flexibility of cultural mores.
This flexibility is at the root of the growing acceptance of homosexuals in all aspects of society, and more interestingly, it speaks to the question YOU raise about the influence of Islam in America.
This notion of cultural flexibility – of social relativity – suggests that it would indeed be possible for the Muslim faith to not only gain a significant foothold here but to actually become predominant at some point in the future. No laws, no constitutional amendments enacted now could really stop such a transformation of faith if such a change was wanted by the people of the future.
HOWEVER…
Such a transformation would NEVER occur at gun-point.
Islam will never win the hearts of anyone by means of terror.
This is their fundamental flaw, and one that I am frankly grateful for.
They are so insanely violent and so diametrically opposed to the basic tenets of Western Civilization that they will NEVER gain any more support than from the most extreme, mal-adjusted, sociopathic, marginalized fringes of our society.
I can almost thank Islam for attracting these failures out into the open so that we can deal with them. Sad that they exist, and there’s a cost to “correcting” the problem, but these individuals were damaged well before Islam came along and drew them like flies into the light.
The fact that $hit happens is just a part of life.
@George Wells:
I think you’re fooling yourself. You think the average person “likes’ homosexuals better than they did? They just don’t talk about it for fear of being criticized. Putting up with them is hardly the same as ‘accepting’.
@Redteam: I notice you are in the habit of editing people’s posts??
@Redteam #104:
“You think the average person “likes’ homosexuals better than they did?”
Actually, that is quite correct.
You see, geezers such as yourself aren’t changing at all. You CAN’T – it’s the old-dog, new-trick thing all over again.
But the AVERAGE person isn’t you at all. Geezers are dying off and being replaced with young kids who know plenty of gay peers and who see nothing wrong with it. When you die, your “vote” won’t be replaced with an equally strident young opponent of gay rights. For today’s average youth, gay is COOL.
This evolution has nothing to do with fears about political correctness. Kids don’t relate to that. Neither do they relate to Old Testament nonsense about “abominations.” They see truth unclouded by the ignorant biases of their grandparents. And this evolution has been progressing for quite a while now. The increasing acceptance of gays in the culture is real and measurable, thoroughly documented even in the conservative press, and irreversible.
It actually tickles me to see that you are stuck in the dark past. It helps remind me of how wonderful it is that we all die eventually, and take our ignorance with us to the grave. It also comforts me to know that the numbers of people who adhere to your constipated views of civil rights are rapidly shrinking.
Oh, nothing is perfect. Racial civil rights should be well settled by now, but our country is STILL filled with racists of every color. Although interracial marriage is legal in every state, there are still huge numbers of people who would be mortified if their child decided to marry outside of their race. The same will be true with gays and their rights. It will take a very long time for these biases to die out of the culture. The progress in that direction recently has been surprisingly rapid. Probably unsustainably so. But that progress will not likely reverse itself, precisely because you and those of your ilk will inevitably die, and be replaced by children of the 21st century. Thus speaks progress.
You’ll have to excuse me now – my tailor is here to measure me for a new Burka. I think I’ll be sticking with a nice, CONSERVATIVE basic black.
@George Wells: “The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends towards justice.” MLK
It bends a little more quickly, if each of us, in our own way, place our hands upon it.
Thank you George, for your well written post.
@Rich Wheeler:
Thanks, Rich, for your kind words.
I find it somewhat disappointing that Retire05 has left the building, and that most of the other opponents have thrown in the towel. Evidently the desire to be on a winning side of an argument trumps the calculus of righteousness, proving again that there really ISN’T any absolute standard of morality.
And dear Redteam, for all of his willingness to join the game, lacks any ammunition beyond denial, a position that becomes increasingly irrelevant with each passing week’s additional gay marriage states. One would think that the opponents would by now have realized that for them there really isn’t ANY route to a win, NO argument that could turn the tide. They keep fielding the same dysfunctional excuses, and keep getting caught by the same mistakes in logic. They can’t possibly believe that they have a snowball’s chance of victory. They only keep up the delaying tactics to pander to their extreme right evangelical base – an increasingly marginalized and irrational fragment of our society.
The sportsmanly thing to do would be to concede noble defeat and set about mending strained relationships, not sulk off into a corner and lick wounds while acknowledging nothing or suggesting that Muslim terrorists would come here and stop what Republicans have failed to stop: a long-overdue correction of yet another time-honored tradition of minority persecution. I suspect that if Germans and their country had really effectively apologized to the Jews for their astonishing crime against humanity that was the Holocaust, Jews would not still be harping the subject today. But there are still factions in Germany that wish World War II had ended differently, and that the final solution had indeed “solved” the “problem,” just as there remain many in the United States who hold to Redteam’s hostile views, insuring that this “discussion” won’t die for quite a while. Pity. There are other, more pressing issues to resolve, and this one is really over. Finally! …Well, almost.
@Rich Wheeler:
Then you notice ‘incorrectly’. I don’t edit them, I just copy a sentence and edit it. I don’t credit it as a quote.
@George Wells:
If age makes ‘geezers’ then you’d be there also. You’ve said you’re a senior citizen.
I know you know already, but you have a very narrow perspective of the world. Gay people have always been around (let’s round that off at say, 6000 years, if it is ‘cool’ why are they still trying to get acceptance? I don’t think very many boys will ever prefer fooling around with another guy when they can fool around with girls as an alternative. (about 2% now and about 2% a hundred years from now, maybe) So what 2% think is cool, 98% will never think is cool. Though libs, such as Rich will slap you on the back and tell you how great you are, let someone tell him, “hey, I didn’t know you are gay” and see how long it takes him to say “oh hell no”. So while society may become more ‘tolerant’, that’s just what it is, tolerance. I wonder about how you discuss the subject, for example: “The increasing acceptance of gays in the culture”. Why do you represent that ‘gay’ is a condition that has to be ‘accepted’? Do you think that gay’s will one day accept ‘straights’?
Have you ever heard me call gaiety an ‘abomination’. I just call it an abnormality, a cross-wired brain. I sure don’t oppose equal rights for gays. But am I gonna adopt one as a ‘best’ friend. Not likely.
Do you somehow think that your ignorance won’t go to the grave with you? Do you ever think that the ‘natural state of affairs’ one man, one woman reproduce, the world goes on will be replaced with one man, another man, no children, civilization ends? No, I think the ‘normal state of affairs will continue, gayism will remain abnormal.
could that be because gay people don’t have children? (not if they are true to their beliefs)
what about those of your ilk? Don’t you think they die out also?
Why is he working on a Sunday? Didn’t he remember the sabbath, or is that another wacky idea of those of my ilk?
@George Wells:
You are 100% wrong in that perspective. I have 0 relationship to evangelicalism of either the right or left. Jumping to conclusions seems to be a trait of lefties.
You know that trends can always be reversed. Smokers were looked upon with indifference two hundred years ago, now most of the population, in the US, don’t want it around. And they always had a much higher level of tolerance than gays have. So just because something is tolerated now, doesn’t mean it will be next year. Look at the tolerance of Muslims in Paris two months ago, compared to the feelings there today.
LOL, no that’s not correct, the other barrell is loaded with reality. Persons tolerating others is not the same as acceptance. You let one mother find out that some gay guy fooled around with her 10 year old kid and she is not gonna be a believer. Most parents won’t even let the other parent of a child be abusive of that child, so they sure as hell aren’t gonna side with a gay when he wants to have sex with her child. And don’t say that won’t happen.
George, I think you well know that the marginalized and fragmented part of our society is gays. Yeah, two guys can live next door, but let them fool around with Mama’s baby boy and see how long they last. I will concede that Mama won’t let a homosexual that lives next door fool around with her daughter either. But it’s not that the gay will be accepted, NEITHER of them will be tolerated.
So you think the only persons that persecuted Jews were the Germans? I think the Dimocrats here are still persecuting them. (tho not to the extent of the Holocaust)
I wish you’d elaborate a little. I can’t think of any hostile view I have. I know for sure I’ve never expressed any here. Just believing that gays will never be accepted into polite society is not hostile, it’s realistic.
So some grudgingly saying they don’t care if you have sex with a guy is a victory? Well, I guess you have to claim your victories where you can find them.
I suspect Retire05 is not too far away, we all have to take a break occasionally, as you did a couple months ago.
@Redteam #110:
“So what 2% think is cool, 98% will never think is cool.”
I’m afraid that you’ve missed my point entirely. Your 2%-98% breakdown might apply to your generation, and it might apply to the percentage of gays in the population, but it certainly doesn’t apply to the 10-30 age group that is replacing us. No, that demographic doesn’t INCLUDE more gays, but it DOES include a whole lot of people who personally know and like gay kids. They ACCEPT them. They don’t JUST tolerate them. To that age group, more often than not, their gay peers are looked upon as something special, and as being particularly deserving because of their class having overcome the stigma that earlier generations of bigots heaped upon them. I’m guessing that you have no way of knowing that this transformation is under way, and I doubt that you’d believe it just because I told you so. But you might consider looking into the matter a bit before making such boldly uninformed statements about the cultural “acceptance” of gays.
“I wonder about how you discuss the subject, for example: “The increasing acceptance of gays in the culture”. Why do you represent that ‘gay’ is a condition that has to be ‘accepted’? ”
First of all, the first sentence – the one that took a quote of mine – doesn’t logically lead to a representation that “gay” HAS to be accepted. I never said that it did HAVE to be accepted, I just commented that it is IN FACT gaining ever-increasing acceptance. I view “tolerance” as when a neighbor DOESN’T torch my home, when he DOESN’T pour sugar into my car’s fuel tank at night. Thanks for small favors. I view “acceptance” as when neighbors send us anniversary gifts, when they invite Paul and me over for dinner or drinks, and when they send their 6 and 10-year-old boys with us to a professional wrestling match held at the Norfolk Scope. These are NORMAL social activities that signify more than grudging “tolerance.” They signify fondness, trust and acceptance. Perhaps you can’t tell the difference, but I sure can. All the same, I never said anyone has to “accept” gays. Acceptance isn’t something that can be demanded or bought or legislated. It is something that is earned, one-on-one. And with gays now living more open lives, their neighbors are learning the truth about us and are seeing that most of us ARE worthy of more than just “tolerance.”
“Do you think that gay’s will one day accept ‘straights’?”
Funny. Wouldn’t you know it? Some of my very best friends are straight. They are among those who ACCEPT me for exactly who I am, not some fantasy idea of what they think GOD wanted me to be.
You’ve brought up the more-or-less immutable 2% statistic quite a few times, and I’d caution that this number may drift higher as the world’s population continues to increase. It will eventually become beneficial to the species if a lower percentage of the population actually reproduces, and some instinctive bias toward homosexuality might play a role in controlling otherwise unchecked population growth. Such trends have been noted in other species from time to time.
@George Wells:
That’s an interesting thought. I hadn’t really thought that God would find a way to control population by making boys like boys so that they wouldn’t fool around and get girls pregnant. I would have thought he would have just reduced fertility levels, or created more crop failures.
George, you are the one that refers to gays being accepted. My question was simply if everyone is now thrilled to have gay buddies, why are they concerned about ‘acceptance’? Sounds as if you have so many straight friends trying to get you to their social events that you might be having a hard time to keep your gay friends on your schedule. Just imagine the turmoil when every straight couple has a party, they’re going to be considered as social failures if they can’t get a good turnout of gays for entertainment of the ‘regular’ folks. I mean, they want to ‘be cool’ don’t they? Ah, I’ll bet you do love those wresting matches, all those hunky guys in their speedo’s showing you their packages. Never thought of wrestling being gay entertainment, but makes sense.
” Acceptance isn’t something that can be demanded or bought or legislated.”, if that is so, why are you so thrilled when it is legislated, or court ordered. Someone must be ‘demanding’ it, or it wouldn’t be in the courts.
@George Wells:
Interesting suggestion, that heterosexuals come built in with some ‘instinctive bias’ toward homosexuality. Has there been any research done on this, you suppose?
@Redteam: That image of the wrestlers is imbedded in my mind—thanks for that. Ugh
To football. In Seinfeld’s words–“everything comes out even.” Dallas got a victory against Detroit via a bad homer call. Lost this game on an overturned good catch. Sorry Jerry and Chris.
Peyton Manning played miserably again. There are at least 7 NFL quaterbacks I’d rather have.
Rodgers was phenomenal. Flacco, Brady and Luck all played well. Some GREAT FOOTBALL STILL TO BE PLAYED
Money coming in on Urban Meyer’s Buckeyes as betting line has dropped from 7 to 5.5.
I still like Ducks 41-24.
@Rich Wheeler:
I think final call was correct. Hit ground, lost control.
Yeah, but I bet it made George’s day. I couldn’t imagine anyone getting turned on by that, but……… I agree Peyton played poorly. Didn’t throw well at all.
I wouldn’t disagree, sounds about right. Yep, 4 more games. Seattle to win it all. (well, except for the Ducks part)
@Redteam #113:
Well, you are getting a bit silly now, aren’t you?
First of all, I actually don’t have a single gay friend who lives within a hundred miles of my home, so no, I don’t have the social conflicts you speculate. Oh, some of our neighbors could be gay, I suppose, but they haven’t revealed themselves or set off my GAYDAR, so they are invisible and unknown to me. Paul and I haven’t gone to a gay club in 30 years, and gays haven’t come knocking at our doors, so I gather your impression of wild gay sex parties just doesn’t apply in our case.
Professional wrestling homoerotic? Not in my book. There was nothing in it at all for me. I went just because I was supportive. Paul liked it for the cheap, proletarian drama of who was a good guy and who was a bad guy THIS week, and the fake violence seamed to entertain him, but if either of us wanted to see sexy guys wrestling, we’d go to a college wrestling match, not to “professional” wrestling, where everyone is an over-weight, exaggerated caricature of one sort of clown or another. Just something else you seem to know nothing about.
“Acceptance isn’t something that can be demanded or bought or legislated.”, if that is so, why are you so thrilled when it is legislated, or court ordered. Someone must be ‘demanding’ it, or it wouldn’t be in the courts.”
Very stupid question, Red. What I said was correct. What you said: that I was thrilled when acceptance is legislated or court-ordered – is completely wrong. “Acceptance” has NEVER been either court ordered OR legislated. Equal rights under the Law have been legislated and court-ordered, but equal rights are not the same things as societal acceptance. How can you possibly confuse the two? I’m thrilled to have gained equal marriage rights. Period.
@Redteam #114:
“Interesting suggestion, that heterosexuals come built in with some ‘instinctive bias’ toward homosexuality. Has there been any research done on this, you suppose?”
Numerous species have been observed exhibiting increasing levels of homosexual behavior when their populations reach levels that strain their immediate environment. Physical crowding and/or food supply limitations have been noted as possible causes of this phenomenon, the obvious benefit of more homosexuality being the reduced pressure of additional offspring on the limiting resource.
Similar behavior has been noted when some environmental factor disproportionately reduces the numbers of one gender within a population, leaving many individuals of the other gender with no possible hetero mate. This particular phenomenon can be seen in the human populations aboard naval ships that spend long tours at sea. Many otherwise heterosexual sailors turn to their homosexual shipmates for sexual gratification during long periods out of the range of female companionship. There is some elevation in the proportion of males who report being homosexual in the population of males in the Navy (well above the baseline 2%) but this may be attributed to the appeal of working more or less exclusively with males that attracts gays to join that service in the first place. On the other hand, the proportion of sailors who both report being heterosexual AND who admit to having sexual relations with other men is MUCH higher than the similar proportion in the general population. This strongly confirms the old adage: “Any port in a storm.”
@George Wells: I spent 4 years in the Navy, on an aircraft carrier, made long cruises, went into ports regularly, never saw any homosexuality amongst any of the Navy men around me. I did know of a couple guys that were said to be homo, but never saw any ‘activity’. With the one child policy in China, you’d think it would be a nation of gays by now, but I haven’t heard of that happening either. (but then I’m not keeping score)
I don’t think I said anything about you having ‘wild gay sex parties’. Implication was that straight people want the ‘cool gays’ to be at their parties. 2% of the population and you and your partner are the only two gay people in the Norfolk, Va area. Wow. I can’t believe you are saying you don’t feel ‘thrilled’ when a court rules in favor of gays. The ruling certainly is about acceptance via the claim of equal rights. There is no right that you’ve gained that you didn’t already have. It may take a court order for some to actually allow you to actually exercise the right, but that’s only a matter of ‘acceptance’. For the record, I would not allow my 6 or 10 year old son to accompany two gay males(only) to a wrestling match. They may be safe, but why take the risk? .. by the same standard, I wouldn’t allow my 6 or 10 year old daughter to accompany two males anywhere either.
@Redteam #119:
Well, you certainly did a wonderful job of proving that you were unaware of what was going on around you what, 50 years ago? Maybe it was because I was LISTENING… and WATCHING, that I know the extent of what was going on aboard ship. It was hard to miss. And I was on what was called “Independent Assignment,” not part of any ship’s company, not subject to “general quarters,” and never on any one ship for more than about two weeks. Yet I saw PLENTY of BJ’s and buggery, and it wasn’t done in much secrecy at all. Maybe it was different during the Civil War, when you were serving…
“There is no right that you’ve gained that you didn’t already have.”
Good attempt at having yourself committed. Last year I did NOT have the right to marry Paul in Virginia, and NOW I am married – in Virginia – to Paul. That was a right gained. But if it makes you happy, keep making pretend that this ISN’T a HUGE financial and legal benefit to gays, all the while I am now covered by Paul’s Government Employee’s Health Insurance, will enjoy the inheritance/estate tax marriage exemption when one of us inherits the other’s estate, etc., etc. You simply haven’t bothered to learn how much this means to gays because it doesn’t apply to you. But your ignorance of the facts doesn’t make you an expert on anything but the art of blind denial.
Your fearful thoughts about trusting children to neighbors tells me that you’ve never had the good fortune to get to know a neighbor enough to trust him or her with much more than a leaf rake. I earned the trust of my neighbors a very long time ago, and never gave anyone cause to regret it. You make the ignorant assumption that all gays are ass-less chap-wearing exhibitionists and pedophiles, which begs the question of what dark secrets YOU have in YOUR closet? Exactly why are YOU so distrustful of others? Not worthy of trust yourself, and figure everyone else is just as bad?
Think up a snarky answer and then hold that thought for a week. I’m hitting the sack early because we’re leaving for Cancun at 4:30 am. Hopefully, I won’t miss the 5th Circuit’s annihilation of the Gay marriage bans in Louisiana, Texas and Mississippi.
Have a nice week.
@George Wells:
Not unless one of you is hiding a vagina. A marriage is one man, one woman. anything else is something else. You can fool 2% of the people all of the time. They ‘think’ they won something.
not something I would have watched even had I been invited. Doesn’t go to my tastes. which decade are you referring to? I was on ship 58-61. I don’t have Gaydar, but I didn’t see any girly guys with lisps either.
My observations over the years has taught me that as soon as you think you can trust someone, it’s when they start making their moves. You just let your gay partner get real close with another gay guy and see how far you trust him. Is that why you live in a city with no other gays within a hundred miles? Get your mate as far away as possible. Although from what I’ve heard about gays, they don’t have relationship fidelity anyhow, so that may not be a concern to you.
Since gays tend to be persons of rampant infidelity, I’m sure that’s not a concern of gays. They expect infidelity. Not worthy of trust? I’ve never hit on another woman since I married 54 years ago. Has my wife been hit on? Ask her.