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Cruz ‘Perplexed’ by GOP Attacks on Him, Won’t Back Down in ‘Defund Obamacare’ Fight

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Photo Credit: Daily Caller Republican Texas Sen. Ted Cruz is “perplexed” by GOP attacks on his effort to defund Obamacare and has no intention of backing down, despite complaints from other Senate Republicans that his crusade is not realistic and could potentially damage the party’s chances in the 2014 midterm elections.

“There may be people who lob attacks at him, but he’s not going to return those attacks,” Cruz spokeswoman Catherine Frazier told The Daily Caller, taking a firm stand in a battle that could determine the GOP’s strategic playbook heading into the 2014 midterms.

Cruz and fellow junior Republican senators Mike Lee and Marco Rubio are involved in a “coordinated effort,” according to Frazier, to urge Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell to block all continuing-resolution budget bills until Obamacare is defunded, either through budgetary means or by passing the Defund Obamacare Act, which has already failed three times in Congress.

Republican Sens. Bob Corker of Tennessee and Richard Burr of North Carolina strongly criticized the effort of Cruz and his two fellow junior senators, while Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn suggested that the plan’s political backlash could jeopardize Republican efforts to hold a majority in the House of Representatives next year.

Read more from this story HERE.

Obama’s Idiotic Grand Bargain: ‘If GOP Raises Corporate Taxes, I’ll Spend More on Public Works and Obamacare’

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Photo Credit: Getty ImagesBy Wall Street Journal. In Chattanooga on Tuesday, the latest stop on his economic inequality tour, President Obama made himself an offer he couldn’t refuse. If Congressional Republicans agree to a corporate tax increase, he said, then he’ll agree to spend more money on his favorite public-works projects. If Republicans bargain hard, will he also offer an expansion of ObamaCare as a sweetener?

We know this sounds like an exaggeration, but that’s the essence of what the President proposed as what he called a new “grand bargain.” Mr. Obama will agree to reform the corporate tax code—a GOP priority and one even the President claims to support—but only if the reform raises more revenue and only if he is allowed to spend that windfall on his priorities.

A White House press release clarified that the President would also like to raise taxes on individuals, not just businesses, while allowing federal spending to rise still higher. But showing they retain a sense of humor in the West Wing, the press release suggests that the President is willing to forgo this tax increase for now because he wants to “work with Republicans.”

This isn’t a serious proposal, and he knows it. It also isn’t bipartisan, since he is offering a compromise with appeal to the ideological spectrum running from Elizabeth Warren to Chuck Schumer. Perhaps these are the only Members of Congress whom Treasury Secretary Jack Lew has in his iPhone.

The real bipartisan reform opportunity would be to get behind the chief Senate and House tax writers, Democrat Max Baucus and Republican Dave Camp. They’ve been holding hearings on tax reform for years, and Mr. Baucus has even invited all Senators to send him a list of tax provisions they’d like to retain and why. Read more from this story HERE.

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Take your jobs plan and shove it, Mr. President: Your policies have harmed Chattanooga enough

By The Free Press.

President Obama,

Welcome to Chattanooga, one of hundreds of cities throughout this great nation struggling to succeed in spite of your foolish policies that limit job creation, stifle economic growth and suffocate the entrepreneurial spirit.

Forgive us if you are not greeted with the same level of Southern hospitality that our area usually bestows on its distinguished guests. You see, we understand you are in town to share your umpteenth different job creation plan during your time in office. If it works as well as your other job creation programs, then thanks, but no thanks. We’d prefer you keep it to yourself.

That’s because your jobs creation plans so far have included a ridiculous government spending spree and punitive tax increase on job creators that were passed, as well as a minimum wage increase that, thankfully, was not. Economists — and regular folks with a basic understanding of math — understand that these are three of the most damaging policies imaginable when a country is mired in unemployment and starving for job growth.

Even though 64 percent of Chattanooga respondents said they would rather you hadn’t chosen to visit our fair city, according to a survey on the Times Free Press website, it’s probably good that you’re here. It will give you an opportunity to see the failure of your most comprehensive jobs plan to date, the disastrous stimulus scheme, up close and personal. Read more from this story HERE.

Tit for Tat on Preferred Legislation

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If liberals can refuse to defend laws that they don’t like, then conservatives can refuse to fund those that they deem undesirable.

As most who follow politics well know, on the issue of marriage, twice recently, liberals refused to honor the law when it comes to marriage. Of course, as we also know, such efforts were successful.

Particularly troubling was the case involving California’s Proposition 8. Because the state of California refused to defend Prop 8 in court, it was left up to plaintiffs without legal “standing” to do so…Since the state of California still refuses to defend what was passed by their citizens, same-sex marriages were allowed to resume in California. In other words, California officials scanned the political landscape and deemed it now safe to simply ignore the law.

Other states are taking notice. Earlier this month, the Attorney General of the state of Pennsylvania, Kathleen Kane, announced that her office would not defend her state’s ban (since 1996) on recognizing same-sex marriages.

Liberals across the country seem to be perfectly content with this approach. However, they will howl like rabid dogs whenever it is proposed that the House GOP may consider a similar approach when it comes to funding Obamacare. As some conservative pundits have recently noted, most notably Rush Limbaugh, there are republicans that are also balking at the proposition of not funding Obamacare.

Read more from this story HERE.

Ted Cruz: D.C. Republicans ‘Scared’

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Photo Credit: APSen. Ted Cruz believes Republicans can defund “Obamacare” if they stand together, but he said “scared” Republicans are standing in the way.

“What I can tell you is there are a lot of Republicans in Washington who are scared. They’re scared of being beaten up politically,” Cruz (R-Texas) told Glenn Beck on TheBlaze radio show Monday.

Cruz said there are too many members of the GOP that want to vote against Obamacare symbolically, but don’t actually want to follow throw.

“I’ve been astonished by how many Republicans in Washington want a fig leaf … but they don’t actually want to succeed,” Cruz told Beck.

As long as Republicans don’t cave, Cruz said, they can win the fight, a theme he reiterated in other media appearances Monday.

Read more from this story HERE.

Are Republicans Too Divided to Have a Civil War?

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Photo Credit: APA nasty fight is brewing among Republicans over a proposal to defund Obamacare. Another intra-party fight is flaring over national security and the war on terror. And yet another is well under way over immigration reform. In each, some Republicans seem more fired up to go after each other than to take on President Obama and the Democrats. The conflicts could be signs that the party is headed toward all-out civil war. Or they could be part of an unhappy but temporary stretch for a party that still hasn’t gotten over its rejection by the voters in 2012.

It’s more likely that this is just a rocky time for a rejected and confused party. The conflicts inside the GOP today just don’t line up in the configuration of a classic civil war. There are multiple issues involved, and the lawmakers on various sides of various issues don’t lean the same way on each issue. Republicans who are opponents on one issue are allies on another. Looking at the Senate, for example, it’s unlikely that there will be a total civil war between Senate Faction A and Senate Faction B when some members of the opposing factions are united in Faction C, or Faction D, or so on. In other words, it may be that the Republican Party is too divided to have a real civil war. Perhaps chaos would be a better description. We’ll know more later.

What we know now is that GOP lawmakers are remarkably tense over the issue of defunding Obamacare. When I asked Sen. Tom Coburn about it Friday, he went off on the issue, calling the proposal “dishonest” and “hype,” not to mention “impossible.” It can’t be done, given the Republicans’ 46-vote minority in the Senate, Coburn argued, and the government shutdown that could result from such a maneuver would be disastrous for the GOP.

Coburn questioned the motives of the GOP senators — among them Mike Lee, Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and Rand Paul — who are behind the effort, calling the move “a denial of reality mixed with a whole bunch of hype to promote groups and individuals.” And then: “The worst thing is being dishonest with your base about what you can accomplish, ginning everybody up and then creating disappointment.” Later, when I mentioned Lee specifically, Coburn responded, “Lee’s answer [to critics] is, ‘Give me a different strategy.’ Well, there isn’t one, because we lost the [election]. I’m getting phone calls from Oklahoma saying, ‘Support Mike Lee,’ and I’m ramming right back: Support him in destroying the Republican Party?”

Those are pretty strong words from a senior Republican about his fellow senators. And some other GOP senators echoed those sentiments. “I agree with my friend Dr. Coburn,” tweeted Sen. John McCain. And Richard Burr called the defunding ultimatum “the dumbest idea I’ve ever heard.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Tea Party House Members Take on Establishment Senators in Fight to Defund Obamacare

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Photo Credit: majunznkBy Elise Viebeck. The Tea Party is ready to take a stand on defunding the divisive healthcare law and willing to risk a government shutdown in the process.

Establishment Republicans worry the strategy will repeat the Clinton-era government shutdown showdown, which hurt Republicans in the 1996 elections.

Tensions will reach a boiling point after the August recess, when lawmakers start negotiations over how to keep the government open.

In the meantime, old-guard Republicans are sending a clear message to conservatives: The shutdown isn’t worth the risk.

On Friday, Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.) said that a plan to shut down the government to block funds for ObamaCare would cost the GOP control of the House and could destroy the party. Read more from this story HERE.

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Sen. Cruz: Defund Obamacare before Americans become ‘addicted’ to subsidies

By Valerie Richardson. Sen. Ted Cruz urged conservatives Saturday to join a petition drive to defund Obamacare, calling it their last chance to stop the national health-care plan before its implementation in January.

“On Jan. 1, the exchanges kick in and the subsidies kick in,” said the Texas Republican in a speech Saturday at the Western Conservative Summit. “Once those kick in, it’s going to prove almost impossible to undo Obamacare. The administration’s plan is very simple: Get everyone addicted to the sugar so that Obamacare remains a permanent feature of our society.”

He asked foes of the Affordable Care Act to sign a national petition launched Saturday that calls for Congress to approve the Sept. 30 continuing budget resolution only if it eliminates funding for Obamacare.

The online petition, called Don’t Fund It, is located at www.dontfundobamacare.com

Opposing Mr. Cruz’s defunding plan was Republican strategist Dick Morris, who urged Republicans to “let the consequences of Obama’s policies happen.” Read more from this story HERE.

IRS Workers Want Out of Obamacare (+video)

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photo credit: fibonacci blueBy Todd Beamon. The federal employees who will be responsible for administering Obamacare for the American people don’t want it for themselves.

The National Treasury Employees Union, which represents workers at the Internal Revenue Service, is asking its members to write letters to Capitol Hill saying they are “very concerned” about legislative efforts requiring IRS and Treasury employees to enroll in the Obamacare exchanges.

“I am a federal employee and one of your constituents,” one letter begins, Forbes blogger Avik Roy reported on Friday. “I am very concerned about legislation that has been introduced by Congressman Dave Camp to push federal employees out of the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program (FEHBP) and into the insurance exchanges established under the Affordable Care Act (ACA).”

Camp, the Michigan Republican referred to in the letter, is chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, whose members oversee tax legislation in the House of Representatives. The U.S. Supreme Court ruled last year that Obamacare’s insurance subsidies are technically tax credits, falling under the authority of the IRS.

Camp introduced legislation in April to put all federal employees on the healthcare exchanges in response to news reports that members of Congress and their staffs were seeking to be exempt from the Obamacare requirement that they enroll in the exchanges. Read more from this story HERE.

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Krauthammer: Effort to defund Obamacare ‘really dumb’

By Jeff Poor. On Friday’s “Special Report,” Washington Post columnist Charles Krauthammer went against the conventional wisdom of some in the conservative movement by arguing efforts to defund President Barack Obama’s 2010 health care legislation at the expense of shutting down the federal government was “really dumb.”

“Never issue a threat you’re not prepared to in the end honor and deliver on,” Krauthammer said. “And if the Republicans imagine they’re going to either stop the funding of the government or refuse the raising of the debt ceiling, they’re out of their minds. It would be a catastrophe in the end. All the president has to do is wait and they’re going to cave. This happened on January 1 of this year. It happened with the debt ceiling. We know the end game. Why would you threaten something and demand in return something you know the president will never do? It’s his signature legislation. It would be repudiation of his entire first term. The only alternative is to go over a cliff. It is really dumb.” Read more from this story HERE.

GOP Feuds Over Obamacare Funding

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Photo Credit: APBy Manu Raju and Jake Sherman

A brewing Republican versus Republican fight over whether to use a government funding measure to choke off Obamacare is splitting the party ahead of this fall’s budget battles.

A growing number of Republicans are rejecting calls from leading conservatives, including Sens. Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz and Rand Paul, to defund the president’s health care law in the resolution to keep the government running past Sept. 30. The rift exposes an emerging divide over how the GOP can best achieve its No. 1 goal — to repeal Obamacare — while highlighting the spreading fears that Republicans would lose a public relations war if the dispute leads to a government shutdown in the fall.

The debate is happening behind closed doors and over Senate lunches, as well as during a frank meeting Wednesday with House leaders in Speaker John Boehner’s suite where fresh concerns were aired about the party’s strategy. On Thursday, the dispute began to spill into public view, most notably when three Senate Republicans — including Minority Whip John Cornyn — withdrew their signatures from a conservative letter demanding defunding Obamacare as a condition for supporting the government funding measure.

Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) called the push to defund the law through the continuing resolution the “dumbest idea” he had ever heard. Read more from this story HERE.

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Photo Credit: Reuters House GOP-ers: Defund Obamacare in CR

By Jake Sherman and John Bresnahan

More than 60 Republicans have signed a letter urging Speaker John Boehner to defund Obamacare when Congress funds the government in September.

The letter, being circulated by the office of freshman Rep. Mark Meadows, doesn’t explicitly say that supporters will vote against a government funding bill if it does not strip funding for Obamacare. But it says that signers of the letter are “urging [Boehner and Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.)] to defund the implementation and enforcement of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act in any relevant appropriations bill brought to the House floor in the 113th Congress, including any continuing appropriations bill.”

“In light of the Administration’s recent delay of the employer mandate and the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) scandal, it is imperative, now more than ever, that Congress do everything in its power to halt the implementation of the healthcare law,” Meadows writes. “It is entirely unacceptable that the IRS, a government agency that actively discriminates against Americans, is in charge of implementing a law that Americans do not want.” Read more from this story HERE.

‘Obamacare’ National Marketing Campaign To Cost Nearly $700 Million

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Photo Credit: BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP/Getty ImagesIt will make you stronger. It will give you peace of mind and make you feel like a winner. Health insurance is what the whole country has been talking about, so don’t be left out.

Sound like a sales pitch? Get ready for a lot more. As President Barack Obama’s health care law moves from theory to reality in the coming months, its success may hinge on whether the best minds in advertising can reach one of the hardest-to-find parts of the population: people without health coverage.

The campaign won’t come cheap: The total amount to be spent nationally on publicity, marketing and advertising will be at least $684 million, according to data compiled The Associated Press from federal and state sources.

About 16 percent of Americans are uninsured, but despite years of political debate and media attention, more than three-quarters of them still know little about the law known as “Obamacare,” according to recent surveys.

“It’s not sugar cereal, beer and detergent,” said Brooke Foley, chief executive officer of the Chicago-based Jayne Agency, one of the advertising firms crafting messages to reach the uninsured.

Read more from this story HERE.

Defunding Obamacare Already Sees Success

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Photo Credit: WNDBy Garth Kant

Whether the GOP should press for debilitating cuts to Obamacare – and risk a government shutdown – is the talk of Capitol Hill, but a most important point may be getting lost in the chatter: The strategy is already working.

A discussion with the “House Doctor” indicates the strategy to defund Obamacare is already largely in effect and has scored some significant victories.

Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Texas, is uniquely qualified to assess Obamacare after spending nearly three decades practicing medicine in North Texas, serving as co-chair of the Congressional Health Caucus and authoring the WND book “Doctor in the House” with its prescriptions for more efficient and less expensive health care.

Burgess told WND, “In the last continuing resolution, there was a billion dollars cut out of the implementation of the Affordable Care Act. There was well over $300 million cut out of the Treasury Department budget for implementation of activities regarding the Affordable Care Act. So, those were some serious sideswipes.”

The doctor-turned-lawmaker said GOP efforts to limit the implementation of Obamacare are already seeing results. Read more from this story HERE.

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Government shutdown looms over ObamaCare

By Alexander Bolton. ObamaCare is at the center of a rapidly escalating fight that threatens to shut the government down this fall.

Senate Republicans, including two members of the leadership, are coalescing around a proposal to block any government funding resolution that includes money for the implementation of the 2010 Affordable Care Act.

But such a move is a nonstarter for President Obama and congressional Democrats. Republicans have tried this maneuver in Obama’s first term, only to back off later to the chagrin of Tea Party leaders.

This time, GOP lawmakers are emboldened by problems plaguing the administration’s ObamaCare implementation. But that zeal could put Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) in a tough spot. Both leaders have downplayed previous talk of shuttering the government.

In the House, 64 Republicans have signed onto a letter pressing Boehner not to bring any legislation funding ObamaCare to the floor. Read more from this story HERE.