Friday, March 06, 2015

"Trading Places" Comes To Capitol Hill

by JASmius



Remember that movie?  Starred Dan Akroyd and Eddie Murphy as a snobbish Wall Street stockbroker and street hoodlum, respectively....



....on whom the Duke Brothers (Ralph Bellamy and Don Ameche)....



....conduct a ruthless social experiment seeking to turn one into the other and then back again, on which their mutual bet is a single dollar.

That flick came immediately to mind when I saw the following two stories.

First, the jig seems suddenly to be up for New Jersey Democrat Senator Robert Menendez:

Federal authorities are set to bring criminal charges against Democrat Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey, according to multiple news sources.

Menendez allegedly used his Senate office to push the business interests of a Democrat donor and friend in exchange for gifts, CNN said.

A representative for Menendez could not immediately be reached for comment.

Attorney General Eric Holder approved requests by prosecutors in the public integrity section to bring forth the charges, according to CNN, and an announcement could come within weeks.

Prosecutors are nearing a deadline under the statute of limitations on some of the allegations.

Given that there's no such thing as a Democrat who isn't corrupt, I take it for granted that the allegations against Senator Menendez are true.  But that isn't what interests me about this story.  Note the part about prosecutors nearing the end of the statute of limitations on these charges.  That suggests that DOJ has known about them for years and has been sitting on them for all this time, and are only moving on them now.  Leading to the next question: Why now?  And then you remember that Senator Menendez has been astoundingly vocal in his withering criticism of the Obama Regime on its nuclear sellout to the Iranian mullahs and a staunch backer of the renewed tough economic sanctions that The One has angrily threatened to veto.  And just as suddenly, everything falls into place and makes sense.

Robert Menendez bolted the reservation.  Robert Menedez fell away from the party line.  And so Robert Menendez must be destroyed, even though it means New Jersey GOP Governor Chris Christie gets to (temporarily) increase the GOP's Senate majority by another seat.

Contrast this apparently outgoing apostate Democrat with the sudden love being show by House Democrats for the leader of their opposition:

House Democrats have vowed to back Speaker John Boehner if Tea Party Republicans attempt to oust him from his leadership position.

The speaker angered right-wing Republicans this week by capitulating to Democrat demands to fund the Department of Homeland Security without reversing President Barack Obama’s [illegal] executive orders on immigration.

With Boehner voting for the measure even though two-thirds of GOP members voted against it, conservative Republicans are said to be openly considering a coup in a bid to get the gavel into the hands of one of their colleagues.

But, according to the Hill, Democrats will block any such move.

"I'd probably vote for Boehner [because] who the hell is going to replace him? [Ted] Yoho?" said New Jersey-9 Representative Bill Pascrell, referring to the Florida Tea Party Republican who has crossed swords with Boehner on several bipartisan compromise bills.

"In terms of the institution, I would rather have John Boehner as the speaker than some of these characters who came here thinking that they're going to change the world."

Like animals such as Pascrell didn't.  All Yoho and friends are trying to do is change it back.

Democrat Arizona-3 Representative Raúl Grijalva told the Hill that he believes that it would be bad news for Democrats if Boehner were replaced.

"Then we would get Scalise or somebody? Geez, come on," said Grijalva, referring to House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-LA1. "We can be suicidal, but not stupid."

I'm not sure what the difference is, actually.  But the pragmatic self interest is candidly expressed.

Massachusetts-2 Democrat Representative Jim McGovern said, "Personally, I don't want to waste two years. And I think that the crazy Tea Party-type would probably not be willing to work with us on anything.

"My hope is that what comes out of this is that Boehner realizes that there are some people in his caucus who are unreasonable, and you can never get them to say 'yes' to anything," he said. "Rather than spending so much time agonizing over how to please them, maybe he just ought to focus on how you build more bipartisan coalitions and actually get some things done."

i.e. Democrat, pro-Obamunist legislation.  As though there is some sort of obligation for the majority the voters elected to eschew their own priorities and kowtow to the minority they did not.

And Democrat Representative Gerry Connolly of Virginia-11 says any attempt to replace Boehner would be quite a conundrum for his party.

"I think it would pose a real existential dilemma for us," said Connolly. "I mean, on the one hand, if you have a chance to take out a Republican Speaker, why wouldn't you do that?

"On the other hand, if the obvious alternative is a Tea Party speaker, now you've got to worry not only about your own political situation, but frankly about the institution. I think that would give very serious pause to the Democrats."

Return "the institution" to its constitutional roots and limitations constitutes a "threat" to that institution?

No, it does not, in actuality.  But it does pose a threat to the Obama Regime, at least theoretically, as well as to whatever miniscule relevance congressional Donks have left.  And apart from all of that, they simply want to (1) stick it to House conservatives (again) and (2) both embarrass and indebt John Boehner by being the ones responsible for saving his Speakership.  Which means that for all intents and purposes, Boehner is could very soon become a de facto Democrat Speaker of the House of Representatives.  And this, in turn, would mean that the Democrats are now officially running BOTH houses of Congress from the minority.

Or, in other words, business as usual in Washington, D.C.

Exit question: If Boehner equates to Lewis Winthorpe III and Menendez equates to Billy Ray Valentine, does Nancy Pelosi - who would be relegated to even greater irrelevance - become the Ophelia of this scenario?



Seems an altogether fitting punishment for John-boy, if you ask me.

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