Apparently the GOP is coming up with a "Doomsday plan" to avoid the "fiscal cliff". It is - as you might guess - kind of stupid and kind of not.
Basically, the House GOP will take up the extension of tax cuts for everyone except the top marginal rates. They will vote present, which will extricate themselves from the Norquist pledge. This will allow the tax cuts for everyone who pays income taxes to be passed entirely with Democratic votes.
Well played, numbskulls.
The single thing that people like about the GOP is that they cut taxes. They aren't interested in Asian land wars or vagina monitoring or homophobia or "moochers and takers". But people like tax cuts, and now the Republicans are willing to cede even this issue to the Democrats in order to avoid raising taxes on Charles and David Koch.
The smart part is that it will relieve the pressure on them somewhat. The other parts of the austerity bomb set to go off in about 26 days include unemployment insurance, infrastructure spending, defense and entitlement cuts (the sequester) and - the old favorite - the debt ceiling increase. By removing the leverage over the tax cuts, they can go back to taking the unemployed and the nation's credit rating hostage.
I realize it must get tired of reading this here, but I can't stress how much this echoes the one primary rule when talking about the modern GOP: They have no interest in governing. Here is a tax cut for tens of millions of Americans, and these nut-balls are going to vote "present".
That is not governing, it's the abdication of governing.
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