July 9, 2014

As Kevin Drum noted this Wednesday, Republicans aren't about to lift a finger to try to help alleviate this crisis at the border: Yet Another Day in Republican Scumbaggery:

Today President Obama asked Congress to approve $3.7 billion in emergency funding to help deal with the surge of minors crossing the border. You may color me unsurprised over the Republican response:

The proposal was quickly met with broad skepticism among Republican lawmakers, who were doubtful that the package would be approved quickly — if at all....GOP leaders, who have called on Obama to take stronger action, said they were reluctant to give the administration a “blank check” without ­more-detailed plans to ensure that the money would help stem the crisis at the border.

The president “is asking to use billions of taxpayer dollars without accountability or a plan in place to actually stop the border crisis,” Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said in a statement.

Asked if he thought lawmakers would approve the proposal, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said, “No, given the mood here in Washington, I don’t have confidence it will happen.”

Well, of course it won't happen. The crisis along the border is tailor made for Republicans. It makes their base hopping mad, it juices their campaign fundraising, and anytime the government is unable to address a problem it makes Obama look bad. Why on earth would Republicans want to do anything to change any of this?

They won't. But they'll be more than happy to run to the cameras like Ted Cruz did on Megyn Kelly's show and blame the whole mess on President Obama, attack him for fundraising, because we all know Republicans never spend any time doing that, and for refusing to do a photo-op down at the border. I'm sure if he had gone they would have been screaming that he's wasting tax dollars and government resources.

Here's more on Cruz and Kelly from Fox's blog: Cruz: Obama ‘Doesn’t Have Time to See Children Who Are Suffering Because of His Failed Policies’:

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) was on “The Kelly File” tonight to discuss President Barack Obama’s decision not to go to the border while in Texas.

“The cynicism of President Obama seems to know no bounds,” Cruz said. “He is in Texas tonight, he’s going to two major fundraisers where he wants to be with wealthy Democratic donors, but apparently he doesn’t have time to actually go and see the border, he doesn’t have time to see the children who are suffering because of his failed policies.”

Cruz said that playing pool seems to be more important to the president than seeing the humanitarian crisis that Obama has created.

The Texas senator said that tens of thousands of children are crossing the border in the custody of violent drug dealers due to Obama’s lawlessness. He said the president has no intention of correcting or changing this.

Cruz called Obama an “absentee president” who is not focused on the people “who are paying the cost for his failed policies.”

“For President Obama, it’s all politics all the time,” he said.

That's one big heaping helping of projection right there. Think of the children! President Obama hates children!

It doesn't matter what he does. This is the way they're going to act. Cruz has got the feigned outrage bit down pat. It would be a little less revolting if it didn't sound like almost every other corporate media outlet around today as well with everyone from Mrs. Greenspan to Wolf Blitzer to Tweety to you name it opining about "the optics." Never mind if anything gets done to actually fix the problem or not, it's all about the politics and whether it makes President Obama "look bad."

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