A North-South split surfaces among Republicans in Congress
To understand the depth of the Republican dilemma that continues to brew in Washington, you only needed to listen to two voices last week.
One belonged to New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie. The primal scream he aimed at his fellow Republicans in the 112th Congress, who on their final day refused to take up a $60 billion relief bill for Hurricane Sandy victims, rumbled across the right-left spectrum of cable TV news.
Most outlets focused on Christie’s criticism of John Boehner. The House speaker was to face re-election by his GOP caucus the next day. But the New Jersey governor dropped large hints that his real target was the dominating right wing of the House GOP caucus, peopled primarily by Southern conservatives.
“New Jersey and New Yorkers are tired of being treated as second-class citizens,” Christie said. “New Jersey deserves better than the duplicity we saw displayed last night.”
“[The bill] just could not overcome the toxic internal politics of the House majority,” the governor said. Christie was asked to identify the culprits. “They know who they are,” he said.
On that same Wednesday, only a few hours earlier, U.S. Rep. Tom Price, the Republican from Roswell, had dialed into a radio talk show in Washington. The topic was the House vote on the “fiscal cliff” agreement, and Price did more than hint at the regional split in his caucus.
“If you look at the votes that were ‘yes’ on the Republican side – there were 85 of them. Seventy of them come from blue states,” Price said. Nearly 90 percent of House Republicans from the South and border states voted against the Senate measure that was produced by negotiations between Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and Vice President Joe Biden.
A similar percentage of Northeastern Republicans (far fewer in raw numbers) voted yes.
“I think this is a red-state, blue-state issue,” Price said. “It’s a different conversation that we need to have within our own conference as we move forward.”
When the time came, Price would endorse Boehner’s re-election. But he was clearly dangling himself as rallying point for his caucus’ most conservative members.
Price ended the interview with this thought: “I think we need red-state representation in both our leadership as well as the organizing committees that we have.” Boehner, of course, is from Ohio. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor represents Virginia, which has slipped into swing-state status.
Disregard the fact that Price, despite his years in the Georgia General Assembly, is a Michigan import. The Roswell congressman was declaring the need for House Republican leaders who are not just more conservative, but more Southern as well.
This is an important point, because Republicans have nearly maxed out in the South. Future gains will come from elsewhere, in states with districts less solidly Republican. So Price’s argument could be interpreted as one of consolidation of the House GOP majority, not expansion.
Larry Sabato, the University of Virginia political scientist, was among the first to spot last week’s regional split. Price is far from alone, he said.
“To get a bunch of Republicans from the Northeast or even some of the urban-suburban Midwestern states is to guarantee that the moderates have more weight. They don’t want that,” Sabato said. “They would prefer to have a smaller majority. I think some would prefer to be in the minority.”
Remember that former U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina, who just left to head the Heritage Foundation, famously declared that he’d rather have a group of committed conservatives in the Senate than a majority.
It is a peculiarly Southern trait, as many of our ancestors can attest, to prefer principle – whether right or wrong – over what might be considered natural self-interest. “There’s nothing in the law or Constitution that says a party has to win,” Sabato said.
On Friday, a chastened but re-elected Boehner put the first of three Hurricane Sandy aid bills up for a vote before the newly seated 113th Congress. It passed easily, 354 to 67. All votes in opposition were cast by Republicans. Thirty-one came from the Deep South, including five from Georgia. Price’s vote was among them.
- By Jim Galloway, Political Insider
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192 comments Add your comment
Buckhead Boy
January 5th, 2013
6:42 pm
Its “Southern Strategy” sowed the seeds of the Republican Party’s demise, and its Tea Party wing has applied the Miracle-gro. Please proceed, Republicans.
Hiram
January 5th, 2013
6:47 pm
@ Buckhead Boy
What strategy?
Hiram
January 5th, 2013
6:47 pm
@ Buckhead Boy
What strategy?
td
January 5th, 2013
6:47 pm
Hiram
January 5th, 2013
6:28 pm
Nope. I have all the guns I need for now.
Serious Robuck
January 5th, 2013
6:49 pm
Hiram, as you pointed out to me a couple of nights ago, you can’t influence td and CC and their buddies with facts and logic. They prefer Fox and Limbaugh and their local snaggle-toothed preacher.
CC, I’m a Georgia native, and I think Hiram may be, too. My family is here. This is my home. I’m a proud old white liberal Democrat, just like my parents were and like my sons are. Why should we leave and let individuals like you, so often ignorant and racist, remain in control. I hope to live long enough to see Georgia turn blue…about 12 more years is my guess.
td, you were touting your god-fearing neighbors earlier this week. I guess it doesn’t bother you or them that slavery involved human beings owning other human beings. I wonder who this god is that you fear. He’s not mine, I assure you.
Hiram
January 5th, 2013
6:49 pm
All you need, or all you think you need?
Hiram
January 5th, 2013
6:53 pm
@ serious
Can trace both maternal and paternal lines, excluding the Native American fraction, to Colonial Georgia. We probably crossed paths at UGA.
Voter
January 5th, 2013
6:56 pm
@Serious Roebuck – Concerning GA turning Blue. Dream on.
Slaves have been around for 1000’s years. I agree there is no place for it now doesn’t make the person who used and owned slaves a bad person.
And if we had more God fearing people around, we would have less issues and a better Country.
td
January 5th, 2013
7:02 pm
Serious Robuck
January 5th, 2013
6:49 pm
I am a GA native as well. Thank God my parents and Grand parents were good conservative Democrats (Blue Dogs) as I was the first time I voted for Sam Nunn, Bubba McDonald and Joe Frank Harris. I am a firm believer as Zell said the national party left me. Their was no room in the national party for conservatives and the Republicans reached out and I switched parties in 1984 and voted for Reagan and Newt.
As far as slaves are concerned there has been slavery in most of the world since the beginning of time. There still is slavery today in parts of this world. Is slavery right? no but it is a fact and looking at it through a analytical lenses instead of emotional helps to understand it.
BTW: My relatives came over here as indentured servants. Do you really think it was any better then slavery?
td
January 5th, 2013
7:05 pm
Hiram
January 5th, 2013
6:49 pm
All you need, or all you think you need?
I think I need a couple more weapons but unfortunately they are illegal for me to own right now. I have enough right now to provide some protection for me and my family.
Hiram
January 5th, 2013
7:05 pm
@voter/td
It’s a safe bet that your ancestors didn’t own slaves.
Hiram
January 5th, 2013
7:06 pm
@td
Protection from what?
Serious Robuck
January 5th, 2013
7:11 pm
Voter, Georgia voted 45% blue in November (with NO campaign presence here from the Obama campaign), behind only North Carolina as the closest red state. Why don’t you enlighten us all, Voter, with your theory of how Georgia can remain red much longer. Have you looked at demographic trends, my friend? Are you aware of the impact the Georgia legislature is having on party identification among Georgia’s rapidly growing minorites? Or are these issues not discussed on Fox or at your local evangelical ministry?
Sorry, Voter, but you’re the dreamer…just like td was dreaming of a Romney win the night before the election.
Serious Robuck
January 5th, 2013
7:16 pm
Hiram, my family was in Wilkes County in the 1790s. I had a Cherokee great-grandmother. My great-grandfather died in the Civil War fighting for the South. My ancestral home in Jones County was burned to the ground by Sherman a few weeks later. CC and td can try, but they can’t tell me to leave. As you would say CC, dream on.
Serious Robuck
January 5th, 2013
7:20 pm
td, thank goodness my family has always valued education and reading and critical thinking. Reading your posts, td, it’s a safe bet yours did not.
johnatl
January 5th, 2013
7:23 pm
Dave 6:10pm
Jan. 5, 2013
Dave, we must be neighbors as I too was carved out of the old 4th District and plopped into the new 6th. Congressman Price does not represent my interests, nor any of my neighbors. We collectively find him beyond embarrassing, actually. I don’t know one single person that actually voted for this divisive idiot from Michigan.
I am also a middle aged gay, white, center-left Dem that happens to love the South. And just so everyone knows, there are thousands and thousands just like me in the metro and across this region. We are everywhere.
People on both sides need to remember that the South is NOT monolithic – no region is.
Serious Robuck
January 5th, 2013
7:34 pm
johnatl, I’m glad you’re here. Don’t you ever leave this state to the td’s. Don’t you ever!
Voter
January 5th, 2013
7:38 pm
It’s amazing how Democrats and liberals result to insults and “look where I’m from” to justify their position.
@Serious Roebuck – What’s your position on lowering the debt(16+ trillion)
and spending(1+trillion a year)?
td
January 5th, 2013
7:39 pm
Hiram
January 5th, 2013
7:05 pm
@voter/td
It’s a safe bet that your ancestors didn’t own slaves.
That is actually not correct for my ancestors. My mom’s side of the family had a plantation in Porterdale and owned over 100 slaves. My dads side was from the GA mountains and did not own any slaves.
Voter
January 5th, 2013
7:40 pm
@johnatl – I am also a middle aged gay, white, center-left Dem that happens to love the South. And just so everyone knows, there are thousands and thousands just like me in the metro and across this region. We are everywhere.
Just because your are everywhere doesn’t make you right, morally, ethically or politically.
Voter
January 5th, 2013
7:42 pm
Hey td, where’s Cherokee and liberallefty? A lot more liberals here than usual.
Voter
January 5th, 2013
7:44 pm
@Hiram – actually I don’t know whether my relatives owned any. I’m adopted so my family tree begins with me right now. lol
td
January 5th, 2013
7:49 pm
Serious Robuck
January 5th, 2013
7:20 pm
td, thank goodness my family has always valued education and reading and critical thinking. Reading your posts, td, it’s a safe bet yours did not.
It does not seem that your family taught you how to treat others but hey what do you expect from a people that came from counties that have not anything new come into the gene pool since 1790.
Voter
January 5th, 2013
7:50 pm
@td – Ouch
Voter
January 5th, 2013
7:51 pm
@td
Hiram
January 5th, 2013
7:51 pm
@serious
I had family in Wilkes County in the 1780s – the part that became Franklin County in 1790, my ggg grandfather was a Revolutionary War veteran.. My paternal gg grandfather was too old for the Civil War, and thankfully, my g grandfather was too young. Their farm, like others in the area, was ransacked – they lost livestock and crops to foraging soldiers, but the house survived. On my mother’s side, both of her maternal g grandfathers were captured at Vicksburg, and spent time in prison camps. My gg grandmother was half Catawba.
Serious Robuck
January 5th, 2013
8:02 pm
My mother, td, was registering black people to vote in my hometown in the mid sixties. She was the president of the PTA when I was a senior. She taught Sunday School. She loved almost everybody she ever knew. Her funeral was probably the biggest in a decade in my home county. She taught me to love almost everybody, particularly those who are less fortunate and different. Honestly, though, she did NOT teach me to love people like you. She and I and all my family saw you and continue to see your type as a curse on the South. Good night. Go polish your guns.
Voter
January 5th, 2013
8:05 pm
@Serious Roebuck – Honestly, though, she did NOT teach me to love people like you. She and I and all my family saw you and continue to see your type as a curse on the South.
Wow, that’s sad. Jesus would change that for you. You may not have to agree with everyone but that’s really sad. Do you need a hug?
Corey
January 5th, 2013
8:10 pm
TD, you are aware that one only had to own twenty slaves and he could be exempt from fighting in the Civil War. The “great cause” was the war of the rich bore by suckers who thought it was in their own best interest. Kind of like the “job creaters” deserve their tax cuts at the expense of the less fortunate, the elderly, teachers, fire fighters and police. You know the people who create demand so that the “job creaters” do not have to hire people to just stand around when what they’re selling isn’t being purchased.
Kris
January 5th, 2013
8:13 pm
Speaking of voting if the Devel were to pop up at the gold dome and announce I’m the Devil (R) and I want to take over Ga….All those stupid GOP slime bags would bow before him…
God Help us and God Bless President Obama.
td
January 5th, 2013
8:13 pm
Serious Robuck
January 5th, 2013
8:02 pm
“Her funeral was probably the biggest in a decade in my home county.”
Of coarse it would be since the whole town has very little gene diversity, especially if you take out the diversity of possible interracial marriage that did not happen before you were born. Truth hurts but you deserve the truth when you do not know how to treat others.
Hiram
January 5th, 2013
8:20 pm
td,
Of coarse. Do you own any hoarses? Did Kennesaw Jr. College have a golfcoarse? Weren’t you in the air foarse? Genes?
td
January 5th, 2013
8:20 pm
Corey
January 5th, 2013
8:10 pm
Well I know I had one GGG grandfather that was in the GA 65th and fought until he lost his leg at Kennesaw Mountain.
As far as your theory about taxes. Since I am a small business owner and my taxes are increasing then I am going to have to take a long hard look at the bottom line to make sure I can still afford all the people that work for me or if some of them are going to have to become unemployed soon so that I can still have a paycheck.
Voter
January 5th, 2013
8:23 pm
I’m amazed. If you liberal Democrats hate your fellow American’s, how do you feel about our enemies?
Voter
January 5th, 2013
8:24 pm
@Hiram – Of coarse. Do you own any hoarses? Did Kennesaw Jr. College have a golfcoarse? Weren’t you in the air foarse? Genes?
Good ole liberals. You can always count on name calling or insults or spell check to divert the subject.
Voter
January 5th, 2013
8:25 pm
@Hiram – Of coarse. Do you own any hoarses? Did Kennesaw Jr. College have a golfcoarse? Weren’t you in the air foarse? Genes?
Good ole liberals. You can always count on name calling or insults or spell check to divert the subject.
Must’ve learned that from Harvard or Columbia or maybe even hussein obama himself.
Serious Robuck
January 5th, 2013
8:31 pm
Voter, I honestly don’t think you know anything about Jesus. May I suggest that you read the Sermon on the Mount before you retire tonight. That would be Matthew 5, 6 and 7. That would be in the King James Bible.
Vashtai
January 5th, 2013
8:33 pm
Republican infighting is glorious. The moderates are gone. They are eating the seed corn.
td
January 5th, 2013
8:35 pm
Serious Robuck
January 5th, 2013
8:31 pm
And you support abortion rights so that eliminates your expertise in the Bible.
td
January 5th, 2013
8:41 pm
Voter
January 5th, 2013
8:25 pm
Our friend
Voter
January 5th, 2013
8:25 pm
Our friend Hiram is one of those old die hard southern Democrats. You have seen them. They are the ones that was involved in the Democratic party in Georgia since they were 18 and when the national party told them there was no room for the Blue Dog then they threw away all their mores and values to stay with the party because the party was more important then their soul.
findog
January 5th, 2013
8:47 pm
history buffs
Georgia was a democrat’s haven until 1994 for congress and 2002 for either senate seat or governor
GOP did not gain control of all state wide offices until 2006/2010
Our state motto includes “moderation”: what is wrong with being a moderate democrat?
Having to be the redest shade of red to belong sound kind of communist
Serious Robuck
January 5th, 2013
9:06 pm
td, your little bulb burns as dim as ever. Bless your heart. God help us all.
F. Sinkwich
January 5th, 2013
9:07 pm
Well, let’s see if I have the crux of this blog correct:
Non-Southerner: Cosmopolitan, Urbane, erudite, sophisticated, superior.
Southerner: Hick.
Got it.
Voter
January 5th, 2013
9:08 pm
@Serious Roebuck – You should try it also and add Matthew 18:21-22. King James Version
Corey
January 5th, 2013
9:09 pm
TD, my great, great, great grandma was a wash woman for the Confederate Army brass, and she also served as spy for the Union Army. She developed a system of arranging clothes and methodically rearranging them on the clothes line as a way of sending messages to the Union Army regarding troop movement etc. TD, there is no sin in learning a little black history. There is more to black history than MLK and Malcom X. Research the Blue Vein Society of Charleston and the Brown Bag Club of New Orleans.
Voter
January 5th, 2013
9:09 pm
@F. Sinkwich – Don’t forget liberal, die-hard liberal and obozo bin biden supporter
Point/Counterpoint
January 5th, 2013
9:12 pm
Redneck “bubbas” don’t see the need of higher education, and are chauvinistic and racist. Republicans just had to convince them that they are the “white” party and democrats are the “black” party. Fortunately, the more diverse population is growing and will overtake this bubba mentality in 2014 and save Georgia.
Voter
January 5th, 2013
9:17 pm
So let me get this straight, all you Democrats actually thought obama did a good job these past 4 years, so you voted for him again?
F. Sinkwich
January 5th, 2013
9:18 pm
“F. Sinkwich – Don’t forget liberal, die-hard liberal and obozo bin biden supporter”
Well, Voter, how could I forget you?
I guess we’re not in the same social circle.
Voter
January 5th, 2013
9:19 pm
16+ trillion in debt, 5+ trillion added in just 4 years, average 1+ trillion over spending each year. Just what do you Democrats think a BAD term looks like? Or are we about to find out these next 4 years?