Hensarling Could Be an Actual (Mushy?) Conservative

Tea Party favorite Michelle Bachman has dropped out of the race for the number 4 position in the House Republican leadership, the House Republican Conference Chair. She has endorsed the establishment candidate, Jeb Hensarling. So how good does Hensarling sound? For that matter, how good to the other three likely Republican leaders sound?

Hensarling has a substantially more conservative lifetime average from the National Taxpayers Union than Boehner and Cantor, 86% to their 70% ratings. Like the two mushy moderates, Hensarling's record, however, improved drastically in the three Democrat-majority years over his previous performance, in his case from 81% to 93%. The likely third-ranking Republican, Kevin McCarthy of California, bucked the Democrat tide of 2006 to win his first election and so has a record only under Democrat majorities, with an average of 81%, so he falls between the Boehner and Cantor on the one hand and Hensarling on the other hand, into the zone I call mushy conservative.

Breaking down their voting records into the period when the GOP had a majority and the period when the Democrats had a majority, moreover, we see a startling change in their voting patterns: both Boehner and Cantor actually had liberal Republican voting records (64% and 63%) when their votes actually determined spending, taxes and regulation. Boehner and Cantor rose a stunning 20 points to the mushy conservative range only when their votes, under the Democrats, could no longer determine spending, taxes and regulations. Hensarling had a smaller increase, but still 12 points, taking him from mushy conservative when his votes could determine the outcome to solidly conservative then the Democrat majority rendered his votes irrelevant. While McCarthy has no record under a Republican majority, we can see that he voted marginally worse than Boehner and Cantor under the Democrats. I've summarized their voting records below.

We don't yet know how conservatively Tea Party favorite Michelle Bachman will vote, nor do we know whether Boehner, Cantor and Hensarling will revert to their previous records when their votes once again determine spending, taxes and regulations. We also don't know if McCarthy will continue to vote mushy conservative or fall down to the previous levels of Cantor and Boehner. I do know two things: that I would have felt more confident of the Republicans if they'd chosen Michelle Bachman as their 4th-ranking House leader, and that we need to watch the four of them--like a hawk.


Analysis of NTU Averages of Likely House GOP Leadership
Name Likely Position NTU Avg Avg Under GOP Majority Avg Under Dems
John Boehner (OH) Speaker 70% 64% 84%
Eric Cantor (VA) Majority Leader 70% 63% 83%
Kevin McCarthy (CA) Majority Whip 81% - 81%
Jeb Hensarling (TX) Conference Chair 86% 81% 93%


http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1110/44976.html

Democrats Could Lose Even Old Safe Seats

As the New York Times story at the link below demonstrates, even the liberal media have to admit that the Democrats' creation of massive new Big Business subsidies and shoving of fascist health care down our throats have created such a backlash against the Democrats that they might lose even some of their traditionally safe seats in Congress. It's the very likelihood that Democrats will suffer major losses in November that leads them to their current scorched earth policy, trying to impose as much fascist control as possible over our lives now, knowing that when they're back in the minority they can use the filibuster to stop Americans from repealing the fascism that Democrats are imposing on us now. I don’t expect Democrats to lose the 40 House seats required to lose their majority entirely this November alone, nor to lose the Senate (which would require Democrats to lose every competitive contest). I do expect, however, that they will suffer substantially more than the traditional midterm congressional losses, losing their ability to overcoming virtually any filibuster in the Senate while losing a practical, working House majority in support of most of their fascist policies.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/25/us/politics/25campaign.html?th&emc=th

Bare Majority Says Congress Too Liberal

You really have to wonder who thinks that at filibuster-proof Democrat majority in the Senate and a similarly-large Democrat majority in the House is "too conservative?" Are these 22% radical leftists, or just largely ignorant? It would be interesting if we could visit a parallel world where the major news and entertainment media hadn't been dominated by liberals for more than a century and see what people there think--but then, holding all other variable constant, people there wouldn't have put the Democrat in the majority. :-D Even with the liberal domination of the news and entertainment media, and of government workers and the government-monopoly education establishment, a majority of Americans recognizes that the current Congress is too liberal, so we can feel thankful at least for that. Certainly the Democrats have no mandate from the people to socialize everything--or anything--in sight.

http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/august_2009/51_say_congress_is_too_liberal_22_say_it_s_too_conservative