Thursday, December 22, 2011

WSJ, Rove Slam House GOP

The Wall Street Journal editorial page and Karl Rove are dependable Republican advocates. It is therefore news when they publicly criticize the GOP as they each have done over the House Republicans' handling of the payroll tax debate.

GOP Senate leader Mitch McConnell famously said a year ago that his main task in the 112th Congress was to make sure that President Obama would not be re-elected. Given how he and House Speaker John Boehner have handled the payroll tax debate, we wonder if they might end up re-electing the President before the 2012 campaign even begins in earnest.

After a year of the tea party House, Mr. Obama and Senate Democrats have had to make no major policy concessions beyond extending the Bush tax rates for two years. Mr. Obama is in a stronger re-election position today than he was a year ago, and the chances of Mr. McConnell becoming Majority Leader in 2013 are declining.


The current GOP has allowed Tea Party extremists to take over the House and are paying the price as even the WSJ and Rove acknowledge. Political actors committed to ideology over good sense can be depended on to overplay their hand.

--Ballard Burgher

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