So, yes, of course it’s hilarious to hear the Republicans claiming that they’re all about jobs in the same week they’ve admitted that no one believes they’re doing anything about jobs.
And I laughed and I laughed when I read that Tennessean article. Because it’s not that they’re not taking up social issues. They’re just spinning them as being about jobs. Shoot, to look at the Republicans, you’d think that there are a shit-ton of multi-million dollar corporations who would just love to do business in a state that oppresses gay people, erases transgender people, and dicks over women and children, but they just can’t find one, so Tennessee must strive to be that place.
But it’s also true that they aren’t getting as much nonsense up for a vote. And ponder this:
The GOP’s large class of 21 new House members could benefit from the delay, Pope said. “When they get there, they are full of expectations and vinegar,” Pope said. “But they don’t have to be up there showboating and passing 30, 40, 50 or more pieces of gun legislation. … The slower approach is fine.”
Now, ask yourself: How much would it suck to be a new Republican? You already didn’t get any juicy committee appointments. Now they’re blatantly saying that the Republican leadership is stonewalling them. So, is the leadership signaling that they’re not sure how firm those seats are? Are they freezing out the radical elements of the party?
This is interesting–watching what we might call the Chamber of Commerce faction try to play nice with but also disempower the Tea Party faction.
I don’t know how it’s going to turn out. I think Harwell might be smart enough to play that kind of nonsense, but I’m not sure Haslam is. And eventually, the new kids are going to get restless and figure out that they’re being dicked over. If you thought they didn’t like being patronized by the Dems, just wait…
Tiny Cat Pants 
B. you are correct, last week they ask us to stay late in the State and Local Government Sub. to get caught up, after about 5:30 when all the Press had gone home they brought up the Crazy Bills, Nullification, Birther Bills, Etc. in order to Kill the Tea Party Legislation. They didn’t want their Freshmen embarrassing them in the light of Day. So just for fun the Democrats started voting for the junk. One Bill By Pody of Wilson County was for Term Limits the Democrats voted for it and the Republicans all voted against it. It Failed 5 to 4. When they ask us what we were doing, we told them that they were their freshman not ours and they would have to stop their crap, not us.
Haslam doesn’t have to play the game. He just has to yell at the GOP leadership until they do. He’d be dumb to do otherwise.
Rep. Turner’s comment confirms what I’d suspect, that the GOP is counting on House Dems to block the crazy stuff. That’s what the level 1 mage would do. None of those incumbents wants to be primaried, I think many of them believe that’s a real possibility if they cross tea partiers.
They may not have to be so smart. Just holding the office (and the desire to stay in) will temper the fire of enough of them to weaken that radical fervor. The rest will be out in a term or so.
Yeah. Cause term limits are something that people don’t want to see, that are a huge joke.
I guess we’ll just have to take Term Limits to a referendum, so that all you longterm good ol boys who hang out in the statehouse voting under cover of darkness on the jokey stuff can’t secretly vote to keep your jobs.
This post, coupled with the snide comment from an elected official who admits to the political equivalent of locker room towel snapping, is evidence enough of why
A)voters are disenteresred and disenfranchised
B) the two-party system is a joke
C) term limits are desperately needed. See, if we had term limits there wouldn’t be this entrenched old guard blocking all the hope and change from happening.
“B) the two-party system is a joke”
But far less funny than the hilarious one party system
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I feel torn about term limits. On the one hand, I share some of Coble’s mistrust of entrenched old guards. On the other hand, time spent in filling any position responsibly generally does lead to a level of expertise in a topic that term limits just discard.
That’s always been my dad’s argument against term limits–all of the expertise and experience it would cost us.
Which is a valid point. But in my mercifully brief time on the Hill it seemed that the “expertise and experience” that was getting tapped into was mostly which lobbyists offered the best junkets, who to cozy up to for re election, etc. Reps spend an inordinate amount of time either courting favors or campaigning for re election. I’d double all terms and then place a two-term limit. Granted it’d give us long Senate terms. But otherwise it would give us HOR members with the same office parameters as the President, and those term limits have worked just fine for everyone. Except, perhaps, FDR.
Whereas I would change the election process to make it less dependent on expensive broadcast advertising, doing away with the need to kiss up to lobbyists.
Well, yes. That too. Of course I don’t care for the whole “pay for campaigns with public funds only” thing that many folks are positing as a solution.
Let campaign funds be collected ONLY from registered voters in the particular district or state. No outside money, no organization’s money.
Term limits give power to unelected bureaucrats. We don’t need Sir Humphrey Appleby running the country.
Ms. Coble I think you missed my point. I didn’t like the late night session ( the Committee actually started at 3:30 and went to about 7:30 they just didn’t bring up the Tea Party bills till late. ), But they ( the Repubs ) wanted the Democrats to do their dirty work for them, and we were have no part of it. So we voted for some of the Bills to make them kill their on Bills. When you are at a numerical disadvantage in ever committee you have to think outside the box to try and stop some of this junk. Sometime it works sometimes it doesn’t.