(no subject)

Nine months old, bears repeating:
http://newsflavor.com/politics/world-politics/republican-sabotage-gop-again-rejects-own-budget-position/

Republicans in March said they wanted to see an 85:15 ratio in cuts to tax increases. Dems offered 83:17. Republicans said F you, we’re outta here. President says that’s childish. DC pundits declare president a dick.

I am not shitting you.

...

Consider:

Mitt Romney’s Massachusetts health insurance mandate morphs into the Affordable Care Act, but Republicans suddenly learn to hate the individual mandate at the heart of both plans

Republicans insist tax cuts never have to be “paid for” with spending cuts, then demand that the 1099 reporting provisions that have the effect of increasing tax liabilities for business be repealed; Democrats agree to repeal them (thus lowering business tax liabilities), and Republicans block the move because the cuts aren’t paid for

Senate GOP demands a vote on permanent extension of Bush tax cuts, is offered such a vote, then blocks their own deal

January’s Senate rules reform fight ends with an agreement that, in part, includes a deal to pass a bill reducing the number of presidential nominations requiring Senate approval, thus lowering the number of potential filibusters gumming up the works. When the bill is ready to move to the floor, Republicans attempt to block it

Since we’re going by playground rules today and calling people dicks, we might as well call this what it is. In G-rated parlance, it’s Lucy and the football. In MSNBC-rated parlance, it’s fucking bullshit, and everyone on the playground should kick you in the ass.

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And now...
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/02/opinion/krugman-pink-slime-economics.html
Paul Krugman calls out Paul Ryan's "budget" as the most awesomely dishonest bit of fiscal politics in the nation's history:

So the Ryan budget is a fraud; Mr. Ryan talks loudly about the evils of debt and deficits, but his plan would actually make the deficit bigger even as it inflicted huge pain in the name of deficit reduction. But is his budget really the most fraudulent in American history? Yes, it is.

To be sure, we’ve had irresponsible and/or deceptive budgets in the past. Ronald Reagan’s budgets relied on voodoo, on the claim that cutting taxes on the rich would somehow lead to an explosion of economic growth. George W. Bush’s budget officials liked to play bait and switch, low-balling the cost of tax cuts by pretending that they were only temporary, then demanding that they be made permanent. But has any major political figure ever premised his entire fiscal platform not just on totally implausible spending projections but on claims that he has a secret plan to raise trillions of dollars in revenue, a plan that he refuses to share with the public?

What’s going on here? The answer, presumably, is that this is what happens when extremists gain complete control of a party’s discourse: all the rules get thrown out the window. Indeed, the hard right’s grip on the G.O.P. is now so strong that the party is sticking with Mr. Ryan even though it’s paying a significant political price for his assault on Medicare.

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Find me a witness amongst these shades. :(