No, I don’t like Texas Senator Ted Cruz’s plan to filibuster the House resolution to keep the government open. I would like to see the Senate vote of the legislation, forcing Democratic Senators to choose between their party’s priorities (an increasingly unpopular law) and their constituents’ concerns (the growing cost of healthcare and their diminishing options caused by said legislation).
I wish that the government could defund Obamacare, but, as Thomas Sowell and Tom Coburn have pointed out, it’s not going to happen.
Still, for all the Texas Senator’s posturing, he has done something the legacy media fail to do–bring the unpopular health care law into the news. It does seem our broadcast media are downplaying (or outright ignoring) the problems with the president’s signature achievement.
Like John Hinderaker,
I am not crazy about Cruz’s plan to block cloture on the House resolution, but I applaud his speech. Obamacare is unpopular, and Republicans should pound away at it non-stop. Within the last few hours, reports have surfaced that House Republicans may attach a one-year delay in Obamacare’s individual mandate to the Senate’s “clean” continuing resolution. Obamacare may also feature in upcoming debates over raising the debt ceiling.
Via Instapundit. If the compromise continuing resolution forces the Democrats to sign on to anything scaling back Obamacare, that may be due in part to Cruz’s grandstanding.
RELATED: Glenn notes the different coverage the media accords to filibusters by Texas politicians:
DYLAN BYERS IN POLITICO: Ted Cruz, Wendy Davis and media bias. “When a Democrat like Texas state Sen. Wendy Davis filibusters against abortion restrictions, she is elevated to hero status, her tennis shoes become totems. When Cruz grandstands against Obamacare, he is a laughingstock in the eyes of many journalists on Twitter, an ‘embarrassment’ in the eyes of The New York Times editorial board. . . . Davis wasn’t viewed through a critical lens at all. Her willingness to stand for 11 hours was evidence of the American dream in action. Period.”
Once you understand that the trad-media are, in Scott Johnson’s words, “a Democratic protection racket,” it all makes sense.
UPDATE: Well, maybe our friends in the legacy media will continue to ignore the issue. As Jim Geraghty reports, they are making Cruz the issue and not Obamacare’s implementation:
But what one thinks of Ted Cruz is, in the grand scheme of things, a rather minor matter compared to the program’s impact on full-time employment, its malfunctioning software, the program’s failure to ensure coverage for 500,000 children, and the way lower-income families that have good insurance plans will be forced to pay much more for them.
Of course, to discuss those subjects, you have to know something about how Obamacare is being implemented and the ensuing problems. To fume and scoff and sneer and mock Ted Cruz… you don’t really need to know that much.
UP-UPDATE: Offering a viewpoint similar to my own, albeit more thoroughly considering the issues, Jonathan Tobin grants that “Cruz’s Grand Gesture Deserves Respect“:
But this is a moment when credit must be given where credit is due. His filibuster was a model of reasoned argument in which he labored mightily to call attention to the fact that the American people are unhappy about the way a Democratic Congress forced ObamaCare down their throats. They are rightly worried about the way it will affect their own health care as well as the potentially devastating impact it will have on the economy as jobs are killed and costs rise.
Read the whole thing.
The local Noon TV-News showed Cruz reciting “Green Eggs and Ham” without even mentioned WHAT he was filibustering. It was presented as a sound-bite that just held him up to ridicule as GOP dysfunction and obstruction.
Ignore the message…destroy the messenger
An incredibly important part of this process has been left out of the post.
This link explains the key to the game the Senate and many Republican Senators are playing by attacking Cruz:
http://therightscoop.com/mark-levin-mitch-mcconnell-just-stabbed-ted-cruz-and-mike-lee-in-the-back/
For those who don’t “link” I will post the core of it:
Understand? Every Republican Senator who votes for the House Bill to defund Obamacare is knowingly voting for an amendment that will strip defunding Obamacare from the bill.
But those Republican Senators will happily coddle their sheeple and explain that they voted to defund Obamacare.
That is a full blown lie. When you tell half a lie knowingly, you are lying in full.
Would that Dan had bothered to explain the game in his post above. Perhaps someone of merit can bring it to his attention. I assume that he is ignorant of the political game being played. After all, there is no reporting of any substance out there explaining it.
However, anyone listening to Cruz during the 20+ hours would have heard it over and over and over.
What Ted Cruz is doing is called “leadership.” I can understand why political observers are unfamiliar with it. It’s been a long time since we have seen any.
Perhaps, as is often the case, I’m being too optimistic, but I have a feeling Ted Cruz lit a fuse last night that will have long term effects. Time to get our patriot on, kids.
I think OBamacare should go full steam ahead. Why? Well, the people that adore and bow before their Messiah are the first ones to get hammered with this law. Maybe these dumbs**ts will realize their Savior is not one at all. And if they still support this b**tard, it shows how dumb they are. And if their paychecks go down dramatically due to added penalties for ACA or their hours are cut, I will applaud this. Why? The ignorant that voted for this man should suffer for their stupidity.
#3 – Right on, V.
And I’m mad as hell at our so-called “senior” Senator from Texas, John Cornyn, for daring to undercut Cruz by aligning himself with the Squishy wing of the GOP – namely McCain, Grahamnesty and other RINOs – by daring to bring about cloture.
In Texan terms, Cruz is William Barnett Travis fighting inside the Alamo, against almost insurmountable odds for freedom. Cornyn is giving aid and comfort to Santa Anna.
Message to Cornyn: you will be primaried out of the GOP senate race come next March. Bank on it, you traitor.
Regards,
Peter H.
It’s simple you can’t win if you don’t fight. The establishment GOP has become an army afraid to engage.
#3 V the K, yup, you’re on to something here. Compared to Obama’s leading from behind (or is that leading with his behind) it was a real pleasure to see a man stand up in the United States Senate and speak truth to corrupted media and political power. No doubt in my mind who I’m looking forward to voting for in 2016. Time for some new voices in the cesspool that is Washington, and Ted is a huge breath of fresh air. YOU GO SENATOR CRUZ!!!!
As the day unfolded, I was most saddened by the confused Republicans who could not understand the whole standing on principle posture Cruz took when it was obvious (to them) that he was not going to turn the battle.
When, pray tell, was the last time any Republican stood his ground and fought tooth and nail? Was it Yosemite Sam McCain in 2008? Was it the courteous Mr. Romney in 2012?
I watched a great deal of the Cruz endeavor and he did a superb job of laying out his objections and dealing decisively with Durbin and Reid.
Just who is the “voice” of the Republican party? I would posit that Cruz has set a high bar for anyone who thinks he might be a contender.
So, I will anxiously await the blue blood, country club Republicans to put their man or woman forward with a stronger, winning message. Who will it be?
Sorry guys, other than his impressive bladder-control I wasn’t impressed by Sen. Cruz.
So, Ted B., did you listen to Cruz or did you just kind of surf by him? I ask, because Cruz was very specific about cataloguing the enormous problems in Obamacare and he spoke truth and details in an articulate listing that must have stirred the resentment of every Obamanaut on the planet.
Durbin kept popping up to stick a fork in him and each and every time Cruz buried him with with logic, evidence and without sarcasm or incivility.
Is that what didn’t impress you?
I looked at Cruz and imagined him at the 2012 debates instead of Romney and saw a man who would have held his own and taken it to Obama. That, for me, is a refreshing change from the McCain-Romney tactic of being above taking aim and firing when necessary.
What parts of the Cruz message didn’t impress you or especially disappointed you?
If you only heard the MFM coverage of Cruz, of course you’re not going to be impressed. The ten minutes he spent reading Green Eggs and Ham got more coverage and commentary than the 21 hours of substance… because the MFM is biased and stupid.
It’s a lovely thought, davinci, but it carries one fatal flaw: the assumption that Barack Obama will enforce the law against his followers.
And, as has been shown time and again — the DOJ, the IRS, the EPA — Barack Obama is a lawless Chicago thug who uses the law to punish his opponents and reward his cronies.
The Obama Party has every intention of denying those who vote against Obama and the Obama Party access to health care. Furthermore, those who vote for Obama and support the Obama Party will receive unlimited subsidy, freedom from any scrutiny, and a blank check to do as they wish at taxpayer expense.
This is why the battle is necessary NOW. Depending on the psychotic and bigoted Obama Party to do the right thing, or on the lapdog media to hold them accountable for not, is a fool’s errand.
No, I don’t like Texas Senator Ted Cruz’s plan to filibuster the House resolution to keep the government open.
Neither did Peter King and John McCain.
Can someone please tell me what happened to Dan’s balls?
You know what I find interesting? Watching a bunch of progressive leftists attack Ted Cruz because:
– An illegitimate American because his father wasn’t an American citizen and he was born in Canada.
– An illegitimate Hispanic because his mother was white.
– An elitist who, because he graduated from Harvard, cannot possibly relate to middle-class Americans.
That much irony in your blood should be fatal.
Ted Cruz is doing more to fight Obamacare than any other politician. And regardless of whether or not his tactics will have any direct effect, they will fire people up and given the cause momentum.
Um, what do they think “Hispanic” means?
Instead of fighting with no end-game why not work to reform the law to make it better? Health care and the uninsured are real problems. If it’s repealed those problems would still exist. Obamacare has many things wrong with it that could be solved through governance.
House GOP should be making this fight about changing provisions and not a wide scope repeal. That is a fight that could be won.
But the radicals don’t want to govern. They want to fight.
I have no doubt this is true. But as someone (who, like Barack H. Obama, was once a carpetbagger to Illinois) once said, “You can fool all of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time, but you can’t fool all of the people all of the time.”
Once the disaster which is the (un)Affordable Care Act truly sinks in—and bear in mind this as currently scheduled will not occur until the current occupants of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW are safely ensconced in their beach front retirement home in Hawaii—the contrast between the layabouts who get 2 AM finger slivers removed for free and the people who can’t even get a consult for a joint replacement scheduled for six months or longer (at any price) will become markedly apparent. Then the real “class warfare” will begin.
Over the last couple of months, I had occasion to visit several large US cities (including one I visit on a regular basis, as well as the area in Dear Leader’s back yard). One of the common denominators of all was the presence of motor vehicles with “I ♥ OBAMACARE” bumper stickers—often as the only promotional decal on said vehichle. [Of all the messages you could slap on your car and that’s the unique one you chose?!]
You could say they are naïve MSNBC viewers, or DNC
plantsoperatives, but the end result will be the same: once the masses who don’t have a particular strong opinion (other than perhaps being one of the polled who go on the record as being generally opposed to the ACA) see the effects, the only vechicle with said bumper sticker which will be safe from repeated keying will be the beaters with no value to begin with. Then those same bumper stickers will be as popular as “McCain ’08” stickers are today. That’s when the sleeping giant will start to awake.Never underestimatate the power of otherwise uninvolved and apathetic individuals to rise up against the powers that be when the pimple on their butt becomes infected and they are told that the beautiful healthcare coverage they have been promised for a low monthly payment of $1300 only covers a Band-Aid applied by an EMT with a co-pay of $100.
Nope.
Obamacare is a law written by leftist radicals and bigots who, when someone proposes changes in the name of good governance, screams that that person is “Ayn Rand” and “Tony Perkins”.
You cannot deal with people like that. They are psychotic bigots who don’t want to govern; they only want to fight.
And, as we all know, mike, you’re just demanding that we pander and give you freebies as the price of your whore vote.
littlelettermike,
You really have nothing to say, do you. Your “good governance” mantra is basically a plea to have an all embracing nanny state of kind, loving souls who will patch up your boo-boo, hug you, give you some pie and send you back out to play.
Obama is flitting about the country in his extravagantly expensive jet with his attached entourage promoting Obamacare which is already “the law of the land” and for what purpose? How many “free” clinics could have been staffed and opened with the money he has poured down the crapper advertising the “law of the land”?
You don’t even know what the issues are. You can not identify a place in this country where anyone has been denied medical care.
It is past time for you to spell out your “good governance” model and to drop the mean radical stuff and examine the issues.
Your broken record is pure Alinsky and Hitler in that telling the same lies over and over only works on minds like your own. The drum beat of repetition of the lies only means they have taken on a life of their own.
We are a Titanic economy in very deep trouble. And you are here telling us to ram the iceberg again. Amazing.
I think littlelettermike may be onto something, as opposed to “on something,” as we usually suspect. llm suggests that Republicans work with Obamacrats to “fix” Obamacare. Well, from what we’ve seen, the Obamacrats definition of “fixing” Obamacare means exempting themselves and their cronies from it. Nice start. Now, if we just e x p a n d that fix… say, by exempting everybody from Obamacare… we would have a solution. So let’s defund Obamacare, exempt everybody, repeal all the stupid parts (i.e. all of it)…. and start from scratch with free market based health care and the assuredly *radical* notion that, you know, people should be responsible for their own health care. (Rather than the Obamacare scheme of enslaving the young and healthy to pay for the old and sick).
Don’t you remember Obama saying his goal is single payer. That is why they WANT this bill to fail, so they can institute full-on Government healthcare, and it looks like the Rinos will give them what they want. John McCain has never been so mad in his life. I just wish he would go after Obama, or the idiot democrats as hard as he has Ted Cruz. John gave the Democratic response to Ted, so I think it’s time for him to move on over to the Democrat side. Embarrassing, really.
Obamacare. Single payer. Frankly, I don’t care if either one is enacted; both systems are economically and fiscally unsustainable. A health care entitlement will only hasten the collapse of the welfare state. Let it burn.
John McCain is a man of his own making. Catch him, if you can.
John McCain is the dictionary definition of Useful Idiot.
OK. Every single Senate Democrat voted for cloture on the House Bill which defunded Obamacare.
A lot of Republicans in the Senate [Alexander (R-TN),Ayotte (R-NH), Barrasso (R-WY), Blunt (R-MO), Boozman (R-AR), Burr (R-NC), Chambliss (R-GA), Chiesa (R-NJ), Coats (R-IN), Coburn (R-OK), Cochran (R-MS), Collins (R-ME), Corker (R-TN), Cornyn (R-TX), Graham (R-SC), Hoeven (R-ND), Isakson (R-GA), Johanns (R-NE), Kirk (R-IL), McCain (R-AZ), McConnell (R-KY), Murkowski (R-AK), Thune (R-SD), Wicker (R-MS)] joined with the Democrats and voted for cloture on the House bill to defund Obamacare.
Wow, the Democrats and the RINO’s all voted for cloture and the house bill to defund Obamacare.
So, now the RINO’s can go forth a crow about voting to defund Obamacare and every single Democrat will have to explain to everyone in sight why every single Democrat voted to defund Obamacare. Right?
Right?
Right?
C’mon, RINO’s, explain this incredible double-cross of historic proportions on the part of Democrats. Not just a few Democrats. Every Democrat in the Senate including Harry Reid.
Ted Cruz and his band of Republican radicals voted against the House bill to defund Obamacare. They were alone. Not ONE Democrat joined them in voting against defunding Obamacare. NOT ONE.
Oops. Harry Reid immediately amended the House bill to extract the defunding of Obamacare and EVERY Democrat voted for that.
So, now we have a whole herd of Senate RINO’s left lying and spinning and throwing mud at Cruz and his merry band of miscreants for actually having balls. How the sissies do hate testosterone.
The brouhaha about Senator Cruz brings to mind this moment from 1980:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OO2_49TycdE
Ya don’t pull on Superman’s cape. And ya don’t pick fights with a guy with a twinkle in his eye.