House Speaker John Boehner is reportedly working on a backroom deal with Democrats that would protect Planned Parenthood while paying lip service to conservatives who want the group defunded.
A group of House conservatives is threatening to force a government shutdown on October 1 unless federal money for Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest abortion provider, is stripped from a funding bill.
Boehner and other Republican leaders are worried that voters will blame the GOP for a shutdown, and they seem to have worked out a secret strategy for avoiding that possibility.
Today the House leadership is expected to introduce two bills: One would block Planned Parenthood’s federal funds for a year. The other would inflict criminal penalties on doctors who don’t try saving infants born alive during abortions.
While the measures should pass the House, they are dead on arrival in the Senate and would certainly be vetoed by President Barack Obama anyway.
Critics say that Boehner knows the bills are doomed and that they amount to nothing more than posturing. Boehner and other Republicans will be able to make it appear like they stood up to Planned Parenthood — and, in exchange, more conservative House members may not force a shutdown on October 1.
But the end result is the same — Planned Parenthood will get its federal funds.
Not all Republicans are on board with this plan, though.
“Our leaders wave the white flag every time there’s a confrontation,” said Rep. Mark Salmon, R-Ariz.
Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., said Boehner wants to “implement what the lobbyists want, not what the constituents of our district want.”
The issue over federal funding of Planned Parenthood came to a head recently, after secretly recorded videos released in July raised questions about whether the group profits from selling fetal tissue for medical research.
The Associated Press contributed to this article
If this happens it’s time to retirw JB
Actually, it’s past time!
Amen!!!
Why can’t Boehner and McConall be recalled?…I keep asking this question many times, but I’ve never received an answer yet.
Are you talking about a recall election for the House of Representatives for Boehner, or a recall election within the House for the Speaker of the House (leader) position? If you are referring to the leadership position, it can be done, but many Republicans Representatives are worried that if they go against Boehner, he will go Obama on them – and they are right to be careful. However, if enough people called their Representatives and said you back them supporting a new leader in the House, that would help give those House Republicans some courage.
Basically there is no provision in the Constitution or anywhere else in government to recall a sitting Senator or House member except voting them out at their next election. It’s had to believe that the Founding Fathers over looked this issue but it’s true. I live in a state where the majority of citizens opposed “partial birth abortions” and there was a drive to recall both Senators that approved of them. We circulated recall petitions and actually had enough signatures required to recall a governor who is far more powerful that a Senator but some court shut down the whole process. Six years is an awfully long tie to have to wait to vote some politician that does not represent the constituency but the party.
Actually until the 17th Amendment, United States Senators were chosen by the State Legislatures, and could be recalled by them. The 17th Amendment was needed because too many U.S. Senators were representing the big banks and other special interests – not the state or the people. However, the supporters of that Amendment should have worded it differently. They should have allowed the people to elect the Senators (as we still do today, but the Legislatures should have retained the right to re-call a U.S. Senator when he/she was not representing the State, as the Founding Fathers wanted.
Boehner, McConall, and obama are like three peas in a pod. They, ALL three, should be tarred and feathered and ridden out of the country………preferably to Mexico……..on a razor sharp rail. They are the MOST TWO FACED BASTARDS in this country, to say the least.
They are mainly interested in what their big donors/contributors want.
Pastoral incompetence! We need a leader to restore AMERICA! Who ever it is!!
boner-pelousy mcconnell -reid obummer and the rest of the communist/marxist bastards need to be introduced to the columbian neck-tie.. maybe that would shut them up.
Why in the world do we need Politian’s doing their job with hidden secrets and agendas? You are working for the people who pay taxes that you are to oversee and place where it is needed and not in your pockets. Boehner, why secrets to do your job that we pay you to do. Tax dollars isn’t secret money.
Didn’t old Ross Perot ask that same question? Why do we need Congress at all. His answer was to have every issue that would be brought before Congress be brought before the people. The people would use their phones or computers to return their response. Sort of an “initiative referendum” form of government. It is probably more complex than that but it would certainly give everybody their say instead of relying on lying, cheating corrupt politicians that seem to not give a damn what their constituents want.
Nothing secret about this anyway. Everyone knows that stand alone bills can’t pass so the Leader’s advocating stand alone bills “up or down votes” means nothing as they cannot pass. What is is frustrating is the way they prevent us from attaching riders to popular legislation which would have a chance. They think we are too stupid to understand what they are doing. They’d better be worrying about their leadership positions and even better PRIMARY THEM OUT.
I wrote to Boehner and explained since the Government had not accomplished what it promised I would not be sending any money to them. If people want major changes, I would think Mr. Trump might fill the bill.
Do you ever get the idea Boehner and McConnell would have been unwilling to do anything about the concentration camps if they had been politicians in Hitler’s Germany? Yet, Planned Parenthood has ended more lives than Hitler’s barbaric minions could have ever done.
I and other conservative Christians worked to elect a Republican House and a Republican Senate in part to end the slaughter of innocent babies by Planned Parenthood–the world’s biggest murderer for hire. I would like to see more than a few half-hearted attempts by Boehner and McConnell on this issue. If Sen. McConnell can regularly defeat the rising stars of Kentucky’s Democrat party surely he could deal with Planned Parenthood and the baby slaughter industry.
Boehner and McConnell are nothing more than Pelosi and Reid hiding behind a different logo. Neither one has done a single thing to stop anything the democrats want despite being the majority of both chambers. They are gutless cowards working for a gutless and corrupt Congress. The only way to make this nightmare go away is for the people to take physical action as Thomas Jefferson recommends in the Declaration of Independence. It is the only solution to an oligarchy.
How soon can we make it go away with smoke and mirrors without standing up and not look bad is always the politician way.
This is the right site for anybody who really wants to understand this topic.
You know so much its almost hard to argue with you (not that I really
would want to…HaHa). You definitely put a brand new spin on a
topic which has been written about for years. Wonderful stuff, just wonderful!
UP Boner.