Just Before the Midterms, a Look at the GOP Status Quo

Paul Ryan gets credit for being the intellectual wonk of the GOP. He's
actually its leading hack. Nice work. But Boehner wants his job back.

If John Boehner wanted to establish the true colors of the Republican Party as we head into the midterms -- Congress actually recessed this past week until the elections -- he certainly did it with gusto. We'd almost forgotten his contempt for the less fortunate.

Boehner comes off, often, as an incompetent who runs his party because no one else apparently wants to. Still, I think I know what he's doing here as he leaves a statement meant to reverberate across the country until November 4th:

“This idea that has been born, maybe out of the economy over the last couple years, that you know, I really don’t have to work. I don’t really want to do this. I think I’d rather just sit around. This is a very sick idea for our country.”

(There's a video of this here. Embedding is restricted for the moment.)

This is John Boehner's 47% statement, an echo of both Mitt Romney and Paul Ryan's famous makers and takers remark. Is this an accident? Did Boehner accidentally broadcast the Republican contempt for the unfortunate?

Yes, yes he did. And it's catnip for the Republican base. It's a reminder that they're the winners -- the makers -- and the Dems are the losers -- the takers. In fact, even unemployed GOPers assume they're the winners, they just don't have jobs. I don't know how this works. Someone, I'm sure, can explain it to me. Of course, unless only Dems are unemployed. Hard to call.

Anyway, the battlelines are being drawn.