national

Wounded? Certainly. Rendered politically impotent. Possibly. I care not whether he stays as speaker or not but isn't it telling that the guys/gals "in the middle" are either retiring or being marginalized? Unfortunate.

Boehner is toast, and he should go. But this situation is--or should be--no surprise to anyone. There's a proverb in SE Asia: "teaching the dog to bite you". It means encouraging a behavior in someone to the point where that behavior ends up harming you. Case in point: Spousal Unit, who is a better tennis player than owatonnabill, will sometimes give him pointers that enable him to score some points that he otherwise would not have. Spousal Unit has taught Dog to bite her. For years, Boehner has spouted the same ideological line as has the Tea Party, and it has won him a certain power as well as national recognition. Now, however, Boehner is spouting compromise. The Tea Party folks, rightfully indignant with the knowledge that to go along with Mr. Speaker casts them as turncoats with their OWN electorate, refuse to go along. They will not sell out principle in the name of compromise, and are calling Mr. Speaker to task because of it. In effect, Mr. Speaker is being bitten by the Tea Party because his support for their principles, so long and so publically out there, is suddenly absent. One may decry rigid ideology as the enemy of practical politics, and that is a whole 'nother discussion, but the fact of the matter is that Boehner is getting what he deserved. The dog is biting him. And he has only himself to blame.

Boehner is no different than Reid or Pelosi, the old guard that just keeps hanging around to collect thier pension. Thier idea of Government just keep spending baby and we will have 10% of the country pay for it all. Well guess what were broke, the numbers dont work anymore. Eventually the entire country will be on the Government dole, Greece here we come.

They are afraid of a unelected man, with a lot of money behind him. Grover. He is sinking our country, along with the tea party.

It's too bad the whole country has to suffer because the conservative movement is unraveling. Unfortunately it's another two years before we can bring the House back to a being a working body.

I want to see a compromise between the extremes that represents the vast majority in the middle. At the same time, I'm agonizing between letting it go off the cliff to force a long term solution instead of just another kick the can down the road approach. How many cowards does it take to run the government?

It's painfully obvious that the Teapublicans learned absolutely nothing from their trouncing on Nov 6 as they continue their all-out obstructionism and disgraceful refusal to govern. In this party's greatly-diminished, splintered state, they have no new tricks left to play - just the same old ideological rigidity and shirking of responsibility to govern. A more destructive force toward democracy has never been seen before.

"It's too bad the whole country has to suffer because the conservative movement is unraveling." ------------------------------------------------------------- The whole country is going to continue to suffer as long as dumbocrats remain in charge of the white house and the senate. Once the takers represent the majority of the population, they will elect dumbocrats in perpetuity and the country will go from suffering to catastrophe. There just won't be any more republicans for them to try to blame anymore, so their ridiculous policies will finally be exposed.

Obama won re-election with a SMALLER margin than in 2008, so he LOST ground in terms of popularity. Boehner needs to be a Republican (we already have Dems). Repubs held the House majority. There is no Obama mandate. Half the nation still can't stand him. Dems claimed to opposed the Bush tax cuts. Now they like them. There's no reason to cave now.

"Case in point: Spousal Unit, who is a better tennis player than owatonnabill" Speaking about yourself in the third person and calling your wife "spousal unit" is a little odd. And is marrying a "spousal unit" permitted under DOMA? I thought it was one man and one woman...no "units" allowed.