Democrat Laughs in Do-Nothing John Boehner’s Face For Suing Obama

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Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI) seems to have found Speaker Boehner’s hubris hard to swallow today.

On the heels of Boehner’s announcement that the Republican Party will be doing what it always does when a Democrat is in office — sue and try to impeach (after obstruction and ginning up scandals) — Pocan laughed in Boehner’s face with a statement denouncing the Speaker for his historically lazy House that tried to shut the government down just last year.

“With Speaker Boehner and the Tea Party at the helm, this Congress has failed to act on vital legislation to help improve the lives of Americans. The same Speaker who allowed the government to shut down last October, now intends to sue the President of the United States for acting while Congress has not, instead voting to repeal the Affordable Care Act 54 times and turning the tragedy in Benghazi into a manufactured scandal.

“In fact, the least productive Congress in modern history – the so-called ‘Do-nothing Congress’ of 1948 – passed 350 bills in their first year; this Congress passed fewer than 100 bills in its first year. It is ironic the Speaker would sue the President for doing his job while the House of Representatives fails to do its job.

“Speaker Boehner is allowing the Tea Party tail to wag the dog. It is clear he has chosen to be the Speaker for the extreme right-wing of the Republican Party. Unfortunately, this Republican controlled House of Representatives has no intention of actually governing and will continue to block any effort by President Obama at the expense of our constituents.”

In July of 2013, I reported on the Double-Down-Do-Nothings for PoliticusUSA, “You might have thought the 112th Congress’ historic low of 23 legislative items passed at this same last year was the epic fail, but you’ll have to revise that. This 113th Congress has only passed 15 legislative items at the 6 month mark.” None of the 15 legislative items were of any significance, either.”

More about the Do-Nothings:

The 112th Congress made history as the most unproductive session since the 1940s (records only go back to 1947) for passing only 220 laws. For perspective, President Harry Truman labeled his Congress the “Do-Nothing Congress” for passing just 906 laws. I know math isn’t exactly the forte of Republicans, but 15 versus half of 906 is pretty basic.

And it’s not both parties:

Before Republicans took over the House, we had the same level of movement in Congress as prior to Obama taking office. “In 2011, Congress passed just 90 bills into law. The only other year in which Congress failed to pass at least 125 laws was 1995,” USA Today explained. That was another Democratic President, Bill Clinton, with a Republican Congress. “When Democrats controlled both chambers during the 111th Congress, 258 laws were enacted in 2010 and 125 in 2009, including President Obama’s health care law.”

On January first, House Republican leadership unveiled the new House work calendar revealing that the House would only be in session for 97 days prior to Election Day and 112 days through the end of the year. That’s a Do-Noting-Double-Down.

As Jason Easley pointed out earlier today, this lawsuit is all about impeachment proceedings against President Obama. Speaker Boehner denies this, but this is how the Clinton impeachment started. Boehner claims he’s doing this to keep Obama from destroying the integrity of the office, but that claim is laughable given how Republicans rolled out the red carpet for Bush’s gross expansion of executive branch power. It’s okay when other presidents do it, but it’s not okay when Obama does it.

Image Credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images

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