Back in September I attended the 9/12 rallies in Washington I talked to a lot of tea party members gathered at the capital and asks many questions, this was the most significant one:
“Who here trusts the GOP?” Not a single hand went up, but people over and over promised me that if the GOP spent like the democrats they would be back to throw them out too. No wonder the GOP is scared of the tea party.
Yesterday’s vote on the Omnibus Spending Bill confirmed this. Remember that only Kirk was a tea party win bigtime. It is the most amazing thing to see. Republicans are so afraid of the tea party that even before the Tea Party people are in congress the Republicans are changing.
I really didn’t think I”d see this. I am very pleased.
What are people saying?
Here is Reuters:
Democrats abruptly abandoned a fight over spending on Thursday and said they would instead extend government funding on a temporary basis, a move that gives Republicans a greater chance to enact the deep cuts they have promised.
It’s really sets things up for a change.
Politico is sad:
The decision Thursday night sweeps away months of bipartisan work by the Senate Appropriations Committee which had crafted the $1.1 trillion bill to meet spending targets embraced by Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R—Ky.) himself prior to the elections.
Yup nothing more bi-partisan than taking the public’s money and spending it on pork.
Doug Ross comments on Politico:
See if you can detect the spin from The Politico, the last redoubt of former WaPo reporters who don’t even try to disguise their party allegiance.
Bazinga!
National review’s Rich Lowry sees it for what it is
Tonight may indeed may be a “seminal moment,” as McCain said. This was to be the appropriators’ last hurrah. In the end, they couldn’t see it through, and it’s not going to get any better for them next year.
He cites McCain who deserves a lot of credit here
Gateway points out that there were plenty of republicans who started the day on board:
Reid says nine Republican senators approached him today to tell him that while they would like to see the bill passed, they could not vote for it.
This is very believable.
Interestingly enough the Frum Forum just quotes Politico but has no comments. I guess tea party victories aren’t worth commenting about over there.
Gay Patriot points out that this is happening because congress didn’t do its job:
You mean, Congress hasn’t even acted to fund the government for the current fiscal year? Wonder if we’re seeing any outrage on the editorial pages of the nation’s major dailies. Guess the Reid-Pelosi Democrats were so busy not letting a crisis go to waste than they created another kind of crisis.
Democrats you did this to yourselves.
Nice Deb isn’t dancing yet:
I hope some deal wasn’t struck with Republicans. I’m sorry I have a suspicious mind, but I do…
Well history would suggest this type of thing.
Cubachi asks a basic question:
Should a bill that will take two days to print and an estimated 50 hours to read on the Senate floor be passed? Of course not
That never stopped them before
Michelle Malkin points out the republican alternative to fund government is more than 2000 pages shorter
This is the Senate Republicans’ one-page joint resolution to keep the government-funded through February 2011 (via GOP Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell):
In fact it is one page and Michelle has it on her site. She also had a play by play of the night in the senate and in the house.
Jane Jameson at Right Wing News isn’t letting her guard down:
Let’s take a deep breath, give each other a tip of the hat, and maybe even enjoy a cocktail but this discredited and dingy Congress grinds on in lame duck session….. so there is no rest.
Put your computer on, pull up the two links to the House and Senate and keep checking to see what they are doing. CALL CALL the numbers below. The Democrats are hoping we will all be too busy with the holidays to care what is happening. DO WHAT YOU CAN.
good advice.
Bottom line we have to be on this every day. This is only the first step but the first step of a journey is always the hardest.
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