From USA TODAY:
Sen. Pat Toomey voted against the debt-limit compromise last week, partly because he didn’t think the budget-balancing recommendations of the bipartisan committee it created would stick.
A week later, Toomey finds himself serving on the committee he voted against.
The Pennsylvanian was one of six Republican members appointed Wednesday to Congress’ new 12-member “supercommittee.”
Original movie posterFormally known as the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, the panel will be asked to reduce the deficit by at least $1.2 trillion over the next 10 years.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., also appointed Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., and Rob Portman, R-Ohio, who served as President George W. Bush‘s budget director.
House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, appointed Rep. Jeb Hensarling of Texas, the No. 4 Republican in the House, to co-chair the panel. He also tapped two committee chairmen with jurisdiction over taxes and entitlement programs: Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp and Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton, both of Michigan.
All except Toomey voted for the debt-limit increase last week. Toomey opposed the deal because it didn’t cut enough — especially in the short-term — and because the long-term cuts proposed by the commission may never materialize.
…snip…
He softened his criticism Wednesday, pointing to his opposition to tax-based ethanol subsidies as evidence he can work with Democrats.
…snip…
All the Republican appointees are “taxpayer friendly,” said anti-tax activist Grover Norquist. They’ve all signed his pledge not to raise taxes — which was a key obstacle in the various failed plans to raise the debt ceiling.
…snip…
Wednesday’s appointments leave three slots to fill. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., will pick three Democratic members by Tuesday.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., on Tuesday appointed Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass., and — to co-chair the panel — Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash. Murray also chairs the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC).
HYSTERICAL RAISINS 
guaranteed deadlock.
pull the trigger.
goodbye golden years retirement.
hello cardboard box and cat food for dinner.
(baby boomer lament)
edgyleh, that will only work until the corporations that sell cat food jack up the prices until only the rich can afford it for their cats (and maybe the help once in a while to keep their strength up).
What a f**cking mess. Who elected these ass holes, anyway? I used to dislike blaming the voters, but not anymore.
i used to think i underestimated the american voter. not anymore. there are pockets of sanity, but there’s a lot of ignorance (willful and otherwise) out there, and i don’t see it getting better anytime soon.
I’ll name that Toomey right here.
poifect!!!
Are they using a dart board to select this “crack ” panel of the chosen 12, or are they smoking crack?
i think they’re smoking crack and then getting out the dartboard.
So does this mean we now have a politburo? Does this mean we will have to revive the old slogan “better dead than red!”….glad to see the Iowa Moefest went down tonight, some of the Moe wanabees are getting antsy like the Grinch being highly offended by the asking of questions. And the royal entorage will appear soon. Rumor has it that the bearwoman is there to try the fried baloney and whipped cream!
i was very busy today. i had my 7-year-old neighbor over so she could help me make her favorite food, macaroni and cheese. i make the best mac & cheese, if i do say so myself. it takes an hour to bake, so i bought her a jigsaw puzzle that we did together while we waited. after she had 2 helpings here, i took the rest over to her house, and i wound up hanging out there for a couple of hours. her parents are from columbia, but she was born here. her mom became a citizen a few years ago, and her father passed his citizenship test today after living here for 15 years. he was so happy and proud. he only has to take the oath now. they have to contact him as to when the ceremony is. with all the shit happening in this country, there are still people who still want to come here and are proud to become citizens. it makes you stop and realize that, with all the nonsense that goes on in d.c., this is still a pretty good country to be in. by the way, her dad plans on registering as a democrat. he already calls marco rubio’s office and tells them how much they suck. how did i get into telling that story? oh yeah, i was so busy that i missed the whole corny debate. from what i’ve read, everyone stuck pretty much to script, so i didn’t miss much.
Tech note: I think it’s WordPress..they zapped my contact info at NewsCorpse too…
ever since wordpress did the last big update, it’s been acting a bit hinky. i still have phantom comments at times and the text in the diaries sometimes gets all wacky. hopefully, they fix all the glitches one of these days. sorry about the inconvenience, jerry.
Not all WordPress, as this stupid puter droped all my Weather Channel stuff too (I check every night-my former D/FW area is 10 to 15 hotter in daytime to here, and at night there is a 30 to 35 degree diff!!) Liked your rant on our newest Americans. And tommorow, the King of Texas will seek fealty! Go Parry!
Isn’t it hilarious how cranky people are getting over Stephen Colbert’s ad? Wow. The humorless pundits among us! They actually think he can alter the course of the election by telling people to write in the Parry candidate. Believe me, the real Perry is far more frightening a candidate than an imaginary one.
the beltway press has no idea what’s going on outside of their little bubble. did you see when stephen colbert hosted the press dinner? there were plenty of guffaws, but none in that room. the rest of the country was laughing, but the media just didn’t get the joke. maybe because they are unable to laugh at themselves.
the weather channel? 😯 the rethuglicans have hacked your computer, jerry! 😡 they don’t want you hearing about how that damned democratic heat index that’s totally made up so that people will be brainwashed into thinking that this whole climate change thing is real.
i was at a birthday party for the macaroni and cheese kid. it was in a park, and it was soooooooooooooooooooooooo friggin’ hot out! it took about 2 minutes for me to be totally drenched in sweat. the kids were lucky. they had a little water park to cool them off. the adults sat and tried to drink enough water to fend off dehydration.
More stonewalling and inertia. Yippeee. Exactly what the stock market doesn’t thrive on. Why can’t we see that Republicans are incapable of compromise – incapable of even considering shutting tax loopholes? What we need to do is to appoint a nonpartisan (is that a real word?) group of accountants to fix the tax code. Or, let’s just put some WWF wrestlers on this supercommittee and have them duke it out.
i think we all see that rethuglicans are incapable of compromise. when will the president see that? that’s what frustrates me more than anything. he should have told them to kiss his ass and then tell the american people that he wants to get things done, and they just want to stonewall. put them on the defensive for a change. don’t allow them to control the debate.
On a lighter (and completely unrelated) note;
“Several high-profile Republican women have become targets of “cybervandalism” on Amazon.com…..Sarah Palin, Michele Bachmann and the former Delaware Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell each have items attached to their names in the “Amazon.com tag cloud” that, to say the least, weren’t put there by their supporters…..Instead of displaying O’Donnell’s new book, Troublemaker, on the page of items tagged to her name, Amazon features several sex toys, the DVDs for the films The 40-Year-Old Virgin and The Last American Virgin, and fertility pills for men. And of course, there’s a witch costume on sale for about $25.On Bachmann and Palin’s tagged pages, books and campaign memorabilia mingle alongside links to Japanese sex videos, vibrators and medicine for irritable bowel syndrome.
But one conservative man has been targeted….items tagged with Santorum’s name include guides to anal sex, lubricant and a VHS tape of the Jerry Springer episode, “I Married a Horse! The Show about Real Animal Lovers!”
😆 i love it!!! passive-aggression is so much fun!!
I think Frank over at AFrankAngle had the best idea – let each party appoint the OTHER party’s reps.
And NYCEdges, you need to Google the word “Santorum”, or look it up on Wiki. Fun stuff!
i told frank over there that i thought that was an excellent suggestion. too bad those in d.c. can’t think outside the box like frank can.