everything delayed, because they don t have the votes. and that is the bottom line. the hard, cold truth of what s going on, that the republican caucus is still fractured. what they are hoping that they can do is to figure out a way to find enough consensus to at least move forward procedurally tonight and at least begin debate tomorrow morning. i m told that there is a lot of pressure coming from the white house, from officials there, who hope that at least by scheduling votes, that that will kind of get the ball moving. and a little bit of tension with some house republican leaders who have done this before, who have experience in pushing too hard before the votes are there, only having to pull the bill. and with something like this, the president and the republican s top legislative priority, the promise that they made in election after election since obamacare was passed into law, it is not something that republican leaders here want to mess with in terms of having
mind as he s home with his family and with all of this pressure? for one thing, thinking about his family. is this something with three young kids and a wife back in wisconsin he wants to take on? he likes to go home on the weekends to wisconsin to spend time whip those kids, that element, and trying to think whether or not this is a job he really wants. paul ryan is a numbers guy, ideas guy, the kind of congressman he s been his career and speakership, administrative stuff. meeting with various delegations and the architect of the capitol, scheduling votes, things paul ryan isn t interested in. can he unite the various members of the house republican conference, they ve got to be all swimming around in his head as he tries to make a decision. certainly the freedom caucus on his mind. those 40 or 50 very conservative member whose pushed out boehner basically and kevin mccarthy.
associated press reported today, mr. boehner quickly exited, saying off stage, quote, i can t believe i just said that. right! nobody can believe you just said that! read my lips. read my lips. right! this week we have put forth the hiypothesis that john boehner, speaker of the house, is bad at his job. not that he is a bad man or even that he has bad ideas, but that when it comes to doing what a speaker of the house does, he is bad at doing those things. mr. boehner is bad at counting votes. what? we lost that? mr. boehner is bad at passing legislation. he blew three things in 24 hours last week. mr. boehner is bad at scheduling votes. the republican freshman telling the press he didn t even know what the patriot act vote was about before boehner made him vote on it. a freshman? mr. boehner is bad at making rules for the house that the house can keep to. a constitutional citation in every bill except for when we forget it all the time. mr. boehner is bad at talking to
read my lips. read my lips. right! this week we have put forth the hypothesis that john boehner, speaker of the house, is bad at his job. not that he is a bad man or even that he has bad ideas, but that when it comes to doing what a speaker of the house does, he is bad at doing those things. mr. boehner is bad at counting votes. what? we lost that? mr. boehner is bad at passing legislation. he blew three things in 24 hours last week. mr. boehner is bad at scheduling votes. the republican freshman telling the press he didn t even know what the patriot act vote was about before boehner made him vote on it. a freshman? mr. boehner is bad at making rules for the house that the house can keep to. a constitutional citation in every bill except for when we forget it all the time. mr. boehner is bad at talking to the press, in that he keeps saying things to the press that are really, really off message, off his own message. if some of those jobs are lost, so be it? yeah. but as we have b
speaker of the house, is bad at his job. not that he is a bad man or even that he has bad ideas, but that when it comes to doing what a speaker of the house does, he is bad at doing those things. mr. boehner is bad at counting votes. what? we lost that? mr. boehner is bad at passing legislation. he blew three things in 24 hours last week. mr. boehner is bad at scheduling votes. the republican freshman telling the press he didn t even know what the patriot act vote was about before boehner made him vote on it. a freshman? mr. boehner is bad at making rules for the house that the house can keep to. a constitutional citation in every bill except for when we forget it all the time. mr. boehner is bad at talking to the press, in that he keeps saying things to the press that are really, really off message, off his own message. if some of those jobs are lost, so be it? yeah. but as we have been reporting on all of this stuff this week, and as we have been looking into and documenting the thin