Lip reader figures out what John Boehner said that made Michelle Obama roll her eyes.

In the conversation, with Obama and Boehner leaning back to converse behind Michelle's head: "Boehner asked President Obama — a longtime smoker who claims to have kicked the habit — if he’d had a chance to have a cigarette before the luncheon. The speaker, a chain smoker, then quipped, 'Somebody [Michelle] won’t let you do it.'"

Judge Michelle's famous eye-roll now.
	Totally justified and good for her.
	She should have appreciated the ribbing and laughed graciously.
	She should have been wary of the cameras and maintained a dignified demeanor.
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"Watch Michelle Obama Throw World-Historical Shade at John Boehner."

I can't believe she had to sit next to that guy.

Boehner: "At one point several weeks ago... the president said to me, 'We don't have a spending problem.' "

"They blame all of the fiscal woes on our health-care system."

Boehner's repeated response to that was: "Clearly we have a health-care problem, which is about to get worse with ObamaCare. But, Mr. President, we have a very serious spending problem."

[T]oward the end of the negotiations, the president became irritated and said: "I'm getting tired of hearing you say that."

And then there's Harry Reid:

"Those days after Christmas," [Boehner] explains, "I was in Ohio, and Harry's on the Senate floor calling me a dictator and all kinds of nasty things. You know, I don't lose my temper. I never do. But I was shocked at what Harry was saying about me. I came back to town. Saw Harry at the White House. And that was when that was said," he says, referring to a pointed "go [blank] yourself" addressed to Mr. Reid.

It's best, by the way, if you're going to say "Go fuck yourself" never to say it in anger.

There's lots more in that article (in the Wall Street Journal). I was interested in this little bit at the end:

[Boehner] sees debt as almost a moral failing, noting that when he grew up in a "little middle-class, blue-collar neighborhood" outside of Cincinnati, "nobody had debt. It was unheard of. I just don't do debt."

If he's not bullshitting, he's revealing a shocking lack of sophistication. Should families pay rent on apartments until they can put down the entire purchase price of a house? Should businesses expand only through the cash they have on hand? But it's the WSJ that inserts the phrase "almost a moral failing," so I shouldn't read too much into Boehner's simple-Cincinnati-guy posing. He didn't say debt is immoral. Only that he comes from a background where the norm was to follow a budget and pay your bills. How sophisticated is he now about the good use of debt as opposed to the bad? Who knows?

"As the 113th Congress takes its place in the Capitol, John Boehner has been re-elected speaker of the House..."

With 200 votes, says email, just now, from CNN.

Several conservative members of Boehner’s Republican caucus voted against him and others didn’t vote in protest of what they see as the speaker not holding a hard enough line on fiscal issues.

"'Well-placed conservative voice' says Paul Ryan in line to replace Boehner."

Out with the old. In with the new.

Meade says: "It's time for some hope and change."

"Does A Speaker Survive This?"/"Will Boehner’s speakership survive until Plan C?"

Talking Points Memo/Ezra Klein.

Meme watch. Coming in from the left.

ADDED: Here's the presentation of the same material, from the right, at National Review:

The speaker looked defeated, unhappy, and exhausted after hours of wrangling. He didn’t want to fight. There was no name-calling. As a devout Roman Catholic, Boehner wanted to pray. “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,” he told the crowd, according to attendees.

There were audible gasps of surprise, especially from freshman lawmakers who didn’t see the meltdown coming. Boehner’s friends were shocked, and voiced their disappointment so the speaker’s foes could hear. “My buddies and I said the same thing to each other,” a Boehner ally told me later. “We looked at each other, rolled our eyes, and just groaned. This is a disaster.”

Drudge features huge, horrible Pelosi laughing skull-face.

This is expressive:



You have to click over to Drudge to get the real effect. The picture is huge. The link goes here.)

The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee apologizes for saying Republicans had obtained "Chinese prostitution money."

The DCCC admits to making "unsubstantiated allegations," which "was wrong." (Note the grammatical correctness of the verb "was." They don't admit the allegations were wrong, only that making them was wrong.)

The DCCC had seized on an Associated Press report indicating that a former executive at the Las Vegas Sands Corporation in China alleged in legal documents that [Sheldon] Adelson was aware of prostitution at the casino’s location in Macau. Adelson is CEO of the Las Vegas Sands Corporation. “What will Speaker Boehner, Leader Cantor and House Republicans do with their Chinese prostitution money?” the DCCC had asked on its website, according to ABC News. The taunt was referring to House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.), the majority leader.

Their Chinese prostitution money!

"Listen, we’re just politicians. I wasn’t elected to play God."

Said John Boehner:

The American people probably aren’t going to fall in love with Mitt Romney. I’ll tell you this: 95 percent of the people that show up to vote in November are going to show up in that voting booth, and they are going to vote for or against Barack Obama.

Mitt Romney has some friends, relatives and fellow Mormons ... some people that are going to vote for him. But that’s not what this election is about. This election is going to be a referendum on the president’s failed economic policies.

Mitt Romney believes, just like we do, that if we’re going to get the economy back, if we’re going to put the American people back to work, we need to fix the tax code, we need to stop the regulatory juggernaut that’s going on in Washington and we need to fix our economy. Solid guy, he’s going to do a great job, even if you don’t fall in love with him.

I think we've had enough love for a while. Let's not idolize politicians.

"I got 98 percent of what I wanted. I'm pretty happy."

Boehner.

Pelosi: Boehner "chose to go to the dark side."

"It’s time for us to end this theater of the absurd... It’s time for us to get real."

That doesn't sound very civil. Or compromise-y.

And what is this "dark side"? Apparently, it's conservatism!

Rush Limbaugh: "The Tea Party is putting country before party."

"They can't be bought off with committee assignments or with campaign re-election funds. They can't be bought, and Washington can't understand this. They admit that it's refreshing but it's not as refreshing as compromise would be, speaking of which: Dingy Harry just came out and said that Boehner 3.0 is worse -- is even more unacceptable -- than the original. How is that for the spirit of compromise? We have the President of the United States, the real loser in all of this, the man who is in real trouble -- and we need to start acting that way, and we need to start believing it."

From the opening monologue of yesterday's show.  He was on fire, providing what felt, to me, like the  counterweight to the mainstream media meme (which is: the Tea Party people in Congress are reckless and insane).

"It’s All Over but the Face-Saving?"

Says Nate Silver?

The only real difference, instead, is that Mr. Boehner’s bill would require Congress to approve another increase in the debt limit early next year if it fails to approve the fiscal commission’s recommendations, while Mr. Reid’s would extend the deadline beyond the end of President Obama’s first term in one fell swoop. The bills differ, in other words, in whether there will be another vote on the debt ceiling before next year’s elections.

Mickey Kaus thinks it's "odd" that people aren't connecting “Obama” and “Boehner Plan” and “briar patch.”

He's got an argument that he thinks is so good, he's surprised no one has made it using the term "briar patch":

[I]sn’t the Boehner Plan the President’s most promising route to the “grand bargain” (including revenue increases) he says he wants? It would set up a commission to propose $1.6-1.8 trillion in deficit closing measures–which could include tax increases and entitlement reforms. Then it would force an up or down vote under threat of default if Congress votes “no.” It almost seems like Obama’s dream bill, if you take what he says seriously. If you were cynical you would say that this is why he has semi-threatened to veto it.

So the threat of veto is like Brer Rabbit saying "don't fling me in dat brier-patch" in the old Uncle Remus story "How Mr. Rabbit Was Too Sharp for Mr. Fox."

"'Skin me, Brer Fox,' sez Brer Rabbit, sezee, 'snatch out my eyeballs, t'ar out my yeras by de roots, en cut off my legs,' sezee, 'but do please, Brer Fox, don't fling me in dat brier-patch,' sezee.

"Co'se Brer Fox wnater hurt Brer Rabbit bad ez he kin, so he cotch 'im by de behime legs en slung 'im right in de middle er de brierpatch. dar wuz a considerbul flutter whar Brer Rabbit struck de bushes, en Brer Fox sorter hang 'roun' fer ter see w'at wuz gwinter happen. Bimeby he hear somebody call im, en way up de hill he see Brer Rabbit settin' crosslegged on a chinkapin log koamin' de pitch outen his har wid a chip. Den Brer Fox know dat he bin swop off mighty bad. Brer Rabbit wuz bleedzed fer ter fling back some er his sass, en he holler out:

"'Bred en bawn in a brier-patch, Brer Fox--bred en bawn in a brier-patch!' en wid dat he skip out des ez lively as a cricket in de embers."

Brer Rabbit's problem, of course, was that he'd gotten stuck on the Tar Baby (in "The Wonderful Tar Baby Story"). I think no one's talking about the briar patch because everybody learned to stay away from the Tar Baby after John McCain caught hell for using the metaphor back in 2007:



You have to be forgetful or naive to deploy the old Brer Rabbit/Tar Baby/Briar Patch image these days. Whether it's actually inappropriately racial or not, mainstream political speakers have protected themselves from criticism by staying away from the Tar Baby. Maybe saying "briar patch" is different, but I suspect that, especially when you're talking about this President, it's getting too close to the Tar Baby.

ADDED: Animation.

"The White House is now on the sidelines."

I haven't felt like linking to David Brooks in a long time, but this column about Obama's negotiating on the debt is pretty useful:

[T]he White House negotiating process was inadequate. Neither the president nor the House speaker ever wrote down and released their negotiating positions. Everything was mysterious, shifting and slippery. One day the president was agreeing to an $800 billion revenue increase; the next day he was asking for $400 billion more. Spending cuts that seemed to be part of the package suddenly seemed hollow. Negotiating partners disappeared.

It was phenomenally hard to figure out exactly who was offering what. Democrats in Congress were kept in the dark and were understandably suspicious. It was all a recipe for misunderstandings, hurt feelings and collapse.

... [T]he president lost his cool. Obama never should have gone in front of the cameras just minutes after the talks faltered Friday evening. His appearance was suffused with that “I’m the only mature person in Washington” condescension that drives everybody else crazy. Obama lectured the leaders of the House and Senate in the sort of patronizing tone that a junior high principal might use with immature delinquents. He talked about unreturned phone calls and being left at the altar, personalizing the issue like a spurned prom date.

Obama’s Friday appearance had a gigantic unintended consequence. It brought members of Congress together. They decided to take control.

And isn't that how it should be? Let Congress write the legislation. The President has a veto power to be exercised or not... after he is presented with the product of Congress's complicated work. Why should he be in charge at the front end, trapping legislators trapped in the territory of the White House — or Camp David! — using his power and prestige to humble them?

In fact, now — as Brooks notes — Boehner and Reid are presenting written proposals that we the people can look at and judge.

Boehner released a plan that involved statutory spending caps with an enforcement mechanism to make sure the cuts are real. Reid released a plan involving bigger long-term spending cuts, with much of the heavy lifting done by a bipartisan select committee. These two carefully coordinated plans are different, but they naturally fit together....

This should be a humbling moment for the White House, and maybe a learning experience. 

It shouldn't have to be called humbling. I think the President was trying to humble Congress. That shouldn't work and it didn't work.

A toast to separation of powers!

Obama spoke on the debt crisis again tonight, and Boehner spoke too.

I'd say Boehner won. Here are the President's remarks. His favorite word was compromise:

... I’ve told leaders of both parties that they must come up with a fair compromise in the next few days that can pass both houses of Congress -– and a compromise that I can sign.  I’m confident we can reach this compromise.  Despite our disagreements, Republican leaders and I have found common ground before.  And I believe that enough members of both parties will ultimately put politics aside and help us make progress.

I don't believe he believes that. Is he putting politics aside?

... [D]o you know what people are fed up with most of all?

They’re fed up with a town where compromise has become a dirty word....

The American people may have voted for divided government, but they didn’t vote for a dysfunctional government.  So I’m asking you all to make your voice heard.  If you want a balanced approach to reducing the deficit, let your member of Congress know.  If you believe we can solve this problem through compromise, send that message.

America, after all, has always been a grand experiment in compromise.  

I had to stop and think: Is America really about compromise? I thought of the Missouri Compromise. And the Three-Fifths Compromise. Maybe compromise is a dirty word for a good reason!

Here's Boehner's speech. Excerpt:

I want you to know I made a sincere effort to work with the president to identify a path forward that would implement the principles of Cut, Cap, & Balance in a manner that could secure bipartisan support and be signed into law. I gave it my all.

Unfortunately, the president would not take yes for an answer. Even when we thought we might be close on an agreement, the president's demands changed.

The president has often said we need a "balanced" approach -- which in Washington means: we spend more... you pay more. Having run a small business, I know those tax increases will destroy jobs.

ADDED: "Obama refuses to sign short-term debt-ceiling hike, said DC raised 18 times under Reagan. How long-term were those?"

Ezra Klein says the Republicans have won and now please can they stop?

Because "if they push it over the brink, they're likely to lose..."

There you have it. Ezra says you've won, now stop winning, or you'll lose.

"As I read the Constitution, the Congress writes the laws and you get to decide what you want to sign."

Boehner says he told Obama.

Boehner: "The deal was never reached, and was never really close."

"In the end we couldn’t connect. Not because of different personalities but because of different visions for our country."

"Boehner's Obama Gamble: A tax increase now for the promise of tax reform later won't fly."

Yesterday's Wall Street Journal editorial (before Boehner backed out):

Republicans would be putting their fingerprints on a tax increase in return for spending cuts as a first order of business, which would raise the dividend and top income tax rates to 39.6% (from 35%), or 41% if you include the phase-out of deductions. (Plus the 3.8% payroll tax hike baked into ObamaCare.) Only then would Mr. Obama and the Democrats negotiate the details of tax reform and lower overall rates. 

But why at that point would Democrats want tax reform? They'd have achieved their main political goals of a huge debt-reduction deal, getting GOP cover for a tax increase, and putting Republicans cross-wise with the tea party. Raising tax rates first also makes the math of tax reform that much harder to negotiate on both revenue and income-distribution grounds. Under the Beltway's scoring rules, cutting rates would look like an even bigger gain for higher-income folks and an even bigger revenue loss for the Treasury.

As The Politico puts it: "Under pressure from right, John Boehner steps back on debt deal."