I dunno what it was about Tax Day, but a lot of GOP-related nuttiness crossed my browser today:
First, last Friday, the Democrats in the House nearly tricked the GOP majority into voting for an even more extreme budget than Paul Ryan’s nutto budget.
Republicans were caught with their pants down Friday when Democrats pulled a fast one on the House floor. In the lead up to a vote on their controversial budget, Republicans nearly zapped it and replaced it with an even more conservative 10-year vision for the country — the right-wing Republican Study Committee’s budget alternative.
To recap, Democrats took a flyer.
They waited until the last minute, and then voted “present” on the RSC plan. That put the question of whether to swap out Paul Ryan’s plan for the RSC’s in GOP hands. At the last moment, Republicans realized that a majority of their party had voted for the farther-reaching budget and had to whip votes backwards to prevent it from passing accidentally. It was quite a scene.
A freshman California lawmaker made a big splash but barely broke even at a glitzy and controversial January GOP fundraiser featuring country singer Leann Rimes, new campaign filings show. Celebrity, it seems, comes at a cost. Rimes and her entourage made out well at the Jan. 4 fundraiser that served as Republican Rep. Jeff Denham’s big political debut in Washington. Between assorted fees, flowers, catering and other costs, Denham’s special fundraising committee reported spending $212,250 on the Rimes event. The committee, meanwhile, raised only $212,900 from outside contributors. Add it all up, and Denham’s special committee spent nearly a quarter of a million dollars to net a grand total of $650 in outside contributions.
Last, Michele Bachmann’s profile is now high enough that the German newspaper Spiegel interviewed her, capturing some of that special MN-6 crazy:
Spiegel: Last week, you voted against the budget compromise for 2011. The budget includes cuts worth $38 billion. Why are you so opposed?
Bachmann: The deal that was reached is a disappointment for me and for millions of Americans who expected $100 billion in cuts. Instead, we’ve been asked to settle for $39 billion in cuts. We’re missing the mandate given us by voters last November.
Spiegel: How deep would you like to see the cuts ultimately be?
Bachmann: I think that my opinion has been from the beginning that we need to have a defunding of Obamacare in any final agreement. There is no other issue like Obamacare that has unified people across America. We’re talking Democrats, independents, apolitical people, Libertarians, Republicans. All people want to see Obamacare defunded.
Spiegel: Yet the majority of Americans support the idea of universal health care.
Bachmann: Obamacare is a crime against democracy because a material part of that bill was not disclosed to the Senate nor to the House of Representatives. The funding was hidden in the bill. That was fraud and I can’t vote for any budget that fails to bring back that money from Obamacare.
Spiegel: The US is currently struggling with an unemployment rate of 8.8 percent. If the government slashes spending to the degree that you wish, would it not lead to a loss of jobs?
Bachmann: Job creation comes from the private sector. Job creation doesn’t come from the federal government creating more jobs.
Spiegel: But when the government slashes spending, jobs are lost.
Bachmann: Not at all. I do not believe that that is true. I think that the private sector will get a signal that they will be able to keep more of their money.