Tea Party Zealots Hold U.S. Congress Hostage

by John M. Curtis
(310) 204-8700

Copyright September 25, 2013
All Rights Reserved.                                      

             Threatening to block raising the national debt ceiling and shutting down the U.S. government Oct. 1, Tea Party Republicans seek to put Obamacare on hold by de-funding the federal establishment.  Taking the lead for feisty Tea Party and practically throwing his hat into the ring for 2016, 42-year-old Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) disgraced his office reading Dr. Seuss into the Senate record, finishing a futile 21-hour attempt to filibuster  President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act set to implement Oct. 14.  Once viewed as a possible 2016 presidential candidate, Cruz’s foolishness prompted his fellow Tea Party Senate colleague Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) to note the fiasco.  “Obamacare is the biggest job-killer in this country and when Jason put on his hockey mask and swung that machete, both there was carnage like nothing else,” said Cruz comparing Obamacare to the “Friday the 13^tth” horror film.

             Wearing tennis shoes and sporting a stubbly beard, Cruz read one non sequitur after another into the Senate record.  His objections to Obamacare make no sense.  Obamacare promises to create the largest jobs boom ever witnessed in the $3-trillion-plus health care industry, running nearly 20% of U.S. Gross Domestic Product.  Obama’s Treasury Secretary Jack Lew estimates that the government needs a $16.7 trillion dollar increase to the national debt ceiling to avoid a government shutdown.  Needed to pay U.S. troops, operate border patrols, federal student lunches for the poor, etc., shutting down the government could toss thousands of folks out of federal jobs.  When the GOP last tried to block the debt ceiling in 2011, S&P downgraded U.S. credit Aug. 5, 2011, sending Wall Street and U.S. economy into a nosedive.  Teetering on another recession, the Tea Party could push the economy over the edge.

             If Cruz stopped pandering to ultra-conservatives, he’s be forced to admit that Obamacare actually adds more stimulus—and jobs—to the economy.  Calling Obamacare the ruin of the nation, Cruz won’t admit it’s a good thing to provide health care to some 40-million uninsured citizens.  Threatening to shutdown the U.S. government for the purpose of sabotaging Obamacare couldn’t be more reckless and irresponsible.  Cruz offers not one shred of evidence against Obamacare other than that’s the official position of Tea Party conservatives.  None can say why they object to Obamacare other than it costs the government money.  “This is the highest risk I’ve seen because I see the least willingness to do what is absolutely essential in democracy and that is to work together,” said ranking Democrat Steny Hoyer (D-Md.), concerned about the impeding government shutdown.

             When S&P downgraded U.S. credit in 2011, they cited dissension between Democrats and Republicans.  Allowing the U.S. government to run out of money shows the extremes to which conservatives like Cruz will go to de-fund Obamacare.  There’s very few concrete explanations from conservatives of how Obamacare hurts the U.S. economy.  “We’ll deal with whatever the Senate passes when they pass it.  There’s no point in speculating before that,” said House Speaker John Boehner’s spokesman Michael Steel, referring the Senate’s urgent legislation to boost the debt ceiling $16.7 trillion.  Tea Party folks object to raising the debt ceiling, citing servitude to the Federal Reserve Board or U.S. debtor nations, like China.  Tea Party zealots aren’t concerned about damage to the U.S. economy from a government shutdown, only imposing an extreme ideological agenda.

             When you ask Tea Party mouthpieces like Cruz why they oppose Obamacare they have no answers or some cliché about government subsidies destroying the nation’s health care system.  Cruz knows that all the American Medical Assn. and the American Assn. of Health Insurers all support Obamacare, not because of some leftist agenda but because they see more dollar signs.  Cruz flippantly talks of Obamacare as a job-killer, knowing full-well that shutting down the government would toss thousands of federal workers and government contractors into unemployment.  Tea Party folks also know that insuring some 40 million more citizens will create the largest expansion of the health care industry since Medicare in 1965.  Cruz and his Tea Party friends oppose Obamacare because they don’t want to see the government spend money on hard-working Americans, only publicly-traded companies.

             Reading Dr. Seuss’ “Green Eggs and Ham” into the congressional record shows how bereft Cruz is of any rational arguments to de-fund Obamacare.  “Obamacare isn’t working,” Cruz said, in between recitations about his Cuban father and Dr. Seuss.  Cruz knows that Obamacare is working so well that a number of large employers, including Trader Joe’s markets, believe their part-time employees can save at least 50% or pay nothing at all by signing up at Obamacare insurance exchanges.  Scoring points with the Tea Party, Cruz hopes his feeble-minded filibuster ingratiates himself enough to eclipse Rand Paul when they line up behind presidential candidates in 2015.  Reciting Dr. Seuss shows that Cruz has lost much of his academic pedigree from Princeton University and Harvard Law School.  His only argument against Obamacare is that the Tea Party told the first-term senator to oppose it.

John M. Curtis writes politically neutral commentary analyzing spin in national and global news.  He's editor of OnlineColumnist.com.and author of Dodging the Bullet and Operation Charisma.