We Should Applaud Fact Speaker John Boehner Can Cry In Public

Over the past several days, and again this morning in an interview on Face The Nation we watched as Speaker John Boehner teared up and needed to wipe his eyes.  Some laugh at this, make snide remarks, and think it somehow not manly.

Horse hockey to those sentiments.

In 2011 I wrote these words about Boehner and this tears and agree with them now as much as ever.

There are many reasons to chide John Boehner, Republican Speaker of the House of Representatives, but his shedding of tears is not one of them.  While I may not understand the reason he tears up over this or that topic, it is not for me to judge.  I will stick to the issues he is wrong about and challenge him on the policy goals for the nation.

It was not until the last few years that I saw my now 90-year-old dad cry.  To show emotion was not part of his DNA,  as he was like many from his generation.  I think that was very unhealthy for many like him who never got in touch with their emotions.  My brother is much the same as my father.    “Buck it up” is much more my brother’s motto than any healthy inner reflection, connection, or expression of his emotions.

On the flip side was my mother who never needed to worry about an ulcer as she never allowed anything to hide her emotions.  She was honest with how she felt.  I am very much like her in that talking and expressing how  I feel is just as easy as devouring a chocolate bar.  I would have it no other way.  I only wish everyone in my family had the ability for self-reflection, inner perspective, and the better over-all health it allows for.   (Lord knows that statement is true!)

Which takes me back to John Boehner’s tears.

I have no problem with someone who is honest enough with his feelings, and comfortable enough in his own skin, to express them.

Fight Boehner on education funding and taxes.  (And countless other issues.)

But applaud him for being a real person….a man in touch with his feelings.

Time For House Teabaggers To Put Up, Or Shut Up

There is a broad sense of understanding in the nation that one of the reasons for the dysfunctional nature of Washington is the fact about three dozen crazed House members hell-bent on not allowing government to operate have done everything in their power to fulfill their mission.  Trying to extract concessions from their party in ways that are not even remotely possible and clearly not sensible has not stopped their attempts to be nothing more than homegrown political terrorists.

So it is now time after they were reasons one, two, and three for the resignation of Speaker John Boehner to either step up and place their ideas on a way forward for a vote of the whole body or to understand that clearly there is no reason for anyone to listen to what they sputter about anymore.

Today in The Wall Street Journal the top editorial could not have made that fact more clear.

This is the moment for the rebellion caucus to put up or stand down. The Members should organize behind a candidate of their own, put their tactics to a vote among their colleagues, and abide by the result. The worst outcome would be if they continue to use a threat to depose the next Speaker as a way to dictate strategy from the caboose.

The time to shut down the uneducated and moronic fringe members of the house has arrived.  The future of the GOP and the election of 2016 is at stake.

American voters are watching.

10 Days Ago I suggested Speaker Boehner “Tell The Conservative Jackasses To Go To Hell”

From September 14th.

There is no way I would want the job or stress that Boehner faces in the weeks and months to come.  There is no way I would not at once jettison the chamber that is more committed to driving the nation into the ditch than governing.   I would retire to a beachfront home and get a glass of wine and read in the sun and let the knuckle-draggers spin and slime away in the muck which they have created.

I have long been of the view Boehner could have been a great speaker as he wants to move the trains on time.  He could have worked out compromises with the White House had there not been a continuous narcissistic band of loud-mouths from the far-right threatening his every move.   Those deadweights on the party are more interested in the sound of their shouts and blather than the well being of the nation.

For that reason alone I hope Boehner comes to peace within himself and tells the conservative jackasses to go to hell and takes off for his time in the sun.  I would be happy to share my reading list with him.

Kindred Spirits: Speaker John Boehner And Speaker Thomas Reed

On Tuesday I started my latest book.  Little did I know that it would be a perfect fit for the political bombshell that landed this morning when House Speaker John Boehner made it known he would resign his position and leave congress at the end of October.

No one can blame Boehner for the decision he made.

In fact just about ten days ago I suggested that Boehner tell the conservative jackasses to go to hell.

There is no way I would want the job or stress that Boehner faces in the weeks and months to come.  There is no way I would not at once jettison the chamber that is more committed to driving the nation into the ditch than governing.   I would retire to a beachfront home and get a glass of wine and read in the sun and let the knuckle-draggers spin and slime away in the muck which they have created.

I have long been of the view Boehner could have been a great speaker as he wants to move the trains on time.  He could have worked out compromises with the White House had there not been a continuous narcissistic band of loud-mouths from the far-right threatening his every move.   Those deadweights on the party are more interested in the sound of their shouts and blather than the well being of the nation.

For that reason alone I hope Boehner comes to peace within himself and tells the conservative jackasses to go to hell and takes off for his time in the sun.  I would be happy to share my reading list with him.

It can be argued that Speaker Boehner left under high-minded reasoning if you discount the political turf battle that would have required him to get assistance from Democratic house members to counter the three-thumb crowd who wished to oust him.

High-mindedness is also front and center in James Grant’s highly readable and lively “Mr. Speaker”, the story of  House Speaker Thomas Reed from Maine who will resign rather than lend his support to the war fever of President Teddy Roosevelt.   It is becoming quite clear as I read this book that Reed is the most fascinating politician history rarely talks about.

So as I will read the newspapers which land on the front stoop with reports of Boehner leaving Washington, I will also be found in the front yard turning the book pages and stepping back in history to discover the life and times of another speaker who bid farewell and went back home.

Not All Republicans Want To Shut Down Government At End Of Month

Today it was reported that nearly a dozen Republican freshmen have penned an open letter to their colleagues strongly suggesting there be no government shutdown.  That possibility is real given the zeal of far right-wingers in congress and across the nation to stop government from working.  The letter came from first-termers, with virtually all of them coming from competitive districts.

It also caught my eye today that New Hampshire Sen. Kelly Ayotte is strongly rejecting any call for a shutdown.  She has made it clear that it was a mistake for her colleagues to try and attach defunding of Planned Parenthood to a stopgap spending measure.  The senator has every reason to feel that need to act more progressive as she is facing a donnybrook of a campaign when she will likely face Democratic Gov. Maggie Hassan in 2016.

End Of Scott Walker Presidential Campaign Political Cartoons

Sen. Lindsey Graham Desires Mating Increase, For America’s Sake

While I agree with the underlying argument that needs to be made about increasing the number of workers in America, I do question if this tactic is the best way to make the point.

Especially from what everyone assumes is a gay senator.

Sen. Lindsey Graham is fond of saying federal entitlement programs will go broke if there’s not an influx of new workers, but he seldom gets a volunteer when he suggests there should be a new baby boom.

“We’re going to need more people to come into the country, or have an increase in birth rate. Strom had four kids after he was 67,” the South Carolina Republican said again Monday at an event in Spartanburg in his home state. “Do I have any volunteers?”

That’s a reference to the late Sen. Strom Thurmond, R-S.C., who had a total of five children including Essie Mae Washington-Williams, the mixed-race daughter he fathered at 22.

Graham, who was stopping at a Rotary Club back home during his rather unlikely 2016 White House bid, said he actually did have someone on the campaign trail volunteer to help Social Security’s solvency by procreating later in life.

“One guy raised his hand in New Hampshire, but he was deaf — he didn’t understand what I said. He was a nice fella, and I didn’t have any confidence either that he could actually accomplish the mission,” Graham said.

“If you don’t have a baby boom of 60-year-olds, you better supplement your labor force because we’re running out of workers,” Graham said in his familiar stump speech. “So, the demographics of the baby-boom retirement require us to improve the immigration system that’s completely broken … and it requires us to adjust the age of retirement and means test benefits to save the country from becoming Greece.”

Ben Cauley, Survivor Of Lake Monona Plane Crash With Otis Redding, Dies

Just across the street from where James and I live is the site of the horrific plane crash on Lake Monona in 1967 that took the life of Otis Redding.

Now another chapter in that story has ended.

Trumpeter Ben Cauley, a member of the Stax Records group the Bar-Kays and the only survivor of the plane crash that killed most of his bandmates and Stax star Otis Redding, has died in Memphis. He was 67.

While he has long been known as the sole survivor of the crash that killed Redding, Cauley was a survivor in many other ways.

He had struggled with health issues for years, including a stroke he suffered in 1989, but he persevered through all of it and continued to play his trumpet.