Pantsed

In this iconic picture of Lucy, Charlie Brown and the football, can anyone guess what role John Boehner played last week?  In an incredible feat of incompetent negotiating, Boehner conceded a two decade Republican position on taxes and got NOTHING in return.

As I asserted in my prior post on the fiscal cliff, to understand the Statists, you need to view it through the addiction model.  Addicts and alcoholics will promise ANYTHING to get their next fix.  Similarly progressives will made all sorts of pledges on FUTURE spending cuts in order to get their fix (increased taxes) TODAY.  The taxes are immediate.  The cuts....well, they never quite get there.  They did it to Reagan.  They did it to Bush 41.

You knew it was going to end badly for conservatives when Boehner after the election stated, "Well, we're only 1/2 of 1/3 of the government."  Later, he adopted the language of Left and said that taxes would have to go up on "the rich."  Can you imagine Nancy Pelosi or Harry Reid making such statements at the outset?  Nonsense.  The correct position would have gone something like this, "Yes, Obama won the election, but the people also chose to maintain the body in which the Constitution vests taxing and spending authority in GOP hands.   President Obama's proposal to raise taxes, spend $60 billion MORE, and demand that Congress hand over unlimited authority over the debt ceiling to the executive branch shows how irresponsible and contemptuous the president is on fiscal matters and we have to be the adults in the room."

There were two positions that the GOP could have taken that were superior to where we ended up.  The first, and the one advocated by this writer, would have been to pass Simpson Bowles.  That would have put Obama in a terrible political box since it was HIS commission's proposal.  I wrote to my Congressman proposing that and two days later, he (along with Congressman Lapinski) proposed exactly that.   The second tactic would have been to allow the fiscal cliff to happen, and raise taxes on ALL taxpayers.  That would have had the double benefit of all taxpayers feel the brunt of the Big Government costs that they supposedly voted in and ensured there would be meaningful spending cuts.

Instead, Boehner and McConnell chose surrender.  I was so incensed that I tweeted conservative pundit Michelle Malkin, who commented on my tweet and retweeted it.

Michelle Malkin @michellemalkin No, they are pantsing US. RT @mkos66:@michellemalkin Boehner and McConnell got totally pantsed. 02:29 PM - 01 Jan 13