November 15, 2017

Sen. Ron Johnson's turn to shoot the GOP in the foot


Let's see - Obamacare repeal, X.  Border wall, X.  Tax reform and tax cuts - heading towards an X.
If the GOP can't avoid shooting itself in the foot on tax cuts, what good is it as a party.

Hey Senator Ron Johnson, shut up, suck it up, and do something for the team.  In the end any tax cut is a step in the right direction.  This isn't a matter of the perfect being the enemy of the good, this is a matter of getting something, anything, done before the midterm elections. ANYTHING.

It's not that I'm saying this is your last chance to do something...oh wait, it is.
WASHINGTON—Sen. Ron Johnson (R., Wis.) said he opposes the Senate Republican tax package, saying it unfairly benefits corporations more than other types of businesses.

“If they can pass it without me, let them,” Mr. Johnson said in an interview Wednesday. “I’m not going to vote for this tax package.”

Mr. Johnson’s position could undermine the Senate’s efforts to pass a tax plan by early December or get the bill to President Donald Trump’s desk by Christmas. Republicans are counting on near universal support from within the party to pass a bill on party line votes. With 52 seats in the Senate, Republicans can lose no more than two votes unless they can somehow find a way to win votes from Democrats.

Other Senate Republicans have expressed concerns. Jeff Flake of Arizona, for example, has worried about deficits and Susan Collins of Maine has worried about Republican plans to repeal the insurance coverage mandate in the Affordable Care Act as part of a tax overhaul.

Until now, no Senate Republican has come out definitively against the GOP tax plan. The risk for Senate Republican leaders is that other Republicans get behind Mr. Johnson’s opposition.
The one way this turns out to be good is that the GOP are trying to signal to Democrats that they can't get their act together so that the Democrats don't bother to mount a decent opposition and then the Republicans surprise everyone with a consolidated, fully GOP-backed bill that gets to the president's desk without significant obstacles. In other words they make fake obstacles so that real ones don't get put in place. Now that would be sweet. Then again, I'm 99% certain that's giving the senate GOP too much credit.

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