CAN MIKE McINTYRE BE CONVINCED THAT THE NC SEVENTH DISTRICT DOESN'T NEED HIM ANYMORE?

Mike appears to be telling this crowd to stop chanting
Republican slogans. Sorry the photo is a bit blurred.
It was free. You get what you pay for.

By Verne Strickland / December 14, 2011

One of my most adorable (I did not say ‘adoring) fans told me in an email recently that I am “terminally partisan” or something like that. I can’t remember the exact words. I did not see that as an insult, but as a badge of honor.

This gentleman, who claims he’s one of the two people who regularly read my vapid drivel (my words) says I should just leave Mike McIntyre alone.

But why? Mike is such a natural foil and fop – before an election, during a campaign, and even after an improbable win – that I, an inveterate conservative punster and renegade, cannot resist poking sport at the guy.

I ask again – why? Because, since my political schooling at the knee of Jesse Helms, one of my greatest pleasures in life has been skewering liberals, atheists, effete poseurs, cynics, Mormons with more than six wives, and most of all – phony politicians. 

Mike may fit into one or more of those categories, although I wouldn’t want to fathom a guess as to which ones might apply. I am fairly certain about at least one of them.

I used to also delight in trashing communists and communism, although I’ve become less fascinated by them since the rise of the upwardly mobile and infinitely more threatening radical Muslim hordes of the world, who have proven their affinity for insufferable arrogance, ignorance, ambition, deceit, killing, persecution of women and Christians, and world domination. 

Some things do change, don’t they? But not Mike. We’ll soon get to see the Robeson County flash – now an excessively incumbent insider Democrat – as he limbers up for another go at it. 

He’ll be back with the same old schtick – talking like Jesse Helms when he’s in the district, but acting like Nancy Pelosi’s lapdog when he’s on the Hill.

Can Mike be convinced that the Seventh doesn’t need his “service” anymore? 

Conservative GOP candidate Ilario Pantano, gearing up for a return match with the Mikemeister, will have plenty to say about that. And, after almost taking McIntyre down for the count in 2010, he looms as an even more formidable challenger when the starting gun sounds for 2012.

It promises be the shot heard from Leland to Lumberton. Can't wait.

Exasperated House liberals back Pelosi, point finger at President Obama

Verne Strickland Blogmaster / August 10, 2011  

YOU CAN'T TELL THE PLAYERS WITHOUT A PROGRAM -- AND AS USUAL, YOU CAN'T TELL THE PLAYERS ANYTHING!

By Mike Lillis / 08/09/11 08:15 PM ET / THE HILL

 

Frustrated liberals are standing behind House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), even though she has not attempted to torpedo bills that they strongly opposed.

Dozens of House Republicans have defected this year on high-profile bills on funding the government and raising the debt limit, ostensibly giving Pelosi and her liberal-leaning caucus leverage.

But that perceived sway has proven largely meaningless, as Pelosi’s allegiance to the administration has left her in the awkward position of tacitly endorsing policies she dislikes.

In short, as long as President Obama and GOP leaders are forging bipartisan deals, the leverage of House Democrats will go only as far as their willingness to buck their own president — something they’ve so far been disinclined to do.

Indeed, amid the year’s most contentious and partisan budget battles, House Democratic leaders have prioritized the appearance of party unity over the policy concerns of their caucus.

Liberal Democrats, for instance, objected to the nearly $40 billion in spending cuts included in the 2011 continuing resolution (CR) enacted in April. More recently, they howled in opposition to the debt-limit package bursting with domestic spending cuts but entirely absent any tax-revenue increases.

Although Pelosi voted against the CR, she did so quietly, without announcing her intentions beforehand or whipping fellow Democrats to join her in opposition. She even suggested she would vote yes if her support were needed to pass the bill.

Pelosi supported the debt-limit bill while conceding it was a raw deal for Democrats. Although most observers predicted House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) would need Democratic votes to pass the proposal, Pelosi afterward said she thought the Republicans could secure the votes on their own.

“I’m unhappy about the fact that this was developed with a premise that the Republicans would have the 218 [votes needed to pass the debt-ceiling bill],” she told reporters last week, according to Talking Points Memo. “Since they didn’t, we should’ve had more influence.”

Half of the House Democratic Caucus rejected the final deal, while 73 percent of House Republicans voted for it.

The bipartisan deals on the CR and the debt have complicated Pelosi’s effort to win back the House because it is difficult to criticize Republicans for backing deals that Obama signed into law. Moreover, the presidential race will be center stage next year, and House Democrats have grumbled that Obama’s actions in 2011 clearly illustrate that winning back the House is not among his top priorities.

A growing number of liberal Democrats and policy groups say the White House has left Pelosi little choice through the budget debates. They’re blaming Obama’s deal-making style for undermining most of the leverage held by Pelosi and other House Democrats.

http://thehill.com/homenews/house/176191-exasperated-house-liberals-back-pelosi-point-finger-at-president

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