Boehner to shake things up

Two reports of note this morning following yesterday's news about John Boehner's leadership in the House compared to the lack thereof in the Senate...the first from Congressional Quarterly:

As a feisty, ambitious backbencher in the “Gang of Seven” in 1994, John A. Boehner worked with his top aide, Barry Jackson, to develop a list of conservative principles that would become the “Contract With America.”

Now House minority leader, Boehner has once again turned his attention to devising a conservative manifesto, with ending earmarks as its centerpiece. And again, there is input from Jackson, who is now a top political adviser to President Bush.

“We’ve had conversations for weeks,’’ said Boehner, R-Ohio. “Barry and I worked closely together back in the 1990s. And we’re working closely together now. We know each other. We trust each other. And we’re open with each other. He’s a perfect bridge for the administration for dealing with Congress.”

One would hope Jackson's role in this could help the White House avoid this impending disaster, but I digress.

The second report comes from the Politico:

The Republican plan to slam the minority over wasteful spending is far from novel — it’s a trick often used by the party out of power.

But with many conservative activists still fuming at record spending under President Bush, Republicans are planning to make this a staple of their agenda for all of 2008.

Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio), one of the new leaders to swear off earmarks consistently, is aggressively pushing the plan over the objection of many appropriators.

At the same time, Bush is threatening to target what he calls wasteful spending in his final year.

He has asked Budget Director Jim Nussle to review options for dealing with earmarks, and members from both sides of the aisle are waiting nervously to see if he’ll follow through on his cost-cutting threat...

...While Democrats in the House cut earmarks by a significant measure, once the spending bills were reconciled with the Senate, much of the targeted spending was restored.

That left some lawmakers committed to cutting spending feeling cheated.

“What they said they did, they didn’t do. It’s a sham. There has been no reform to earmarks in the Senate,” said Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), a fierce budget hawk.

And attempts by Bush and his conservative allies to turn them into a partisan issue will likely be muted by their own party’s history on the matter and their continued use of them.

Ahhh...but this is simply untrue. If the President swings for the fences and issues an executive order deleting all the earmarks in this year's appropriations bills he will be lauded as a hero by the conservative base and he will be supported by Boehner, a handful of Senate conservatives and many rank and file members who are beginning to see that earmarking was a central enabler of the corruption of the GOP.

Democrats are just as addicted to earmarks as Republicans (some more so because they have been waiting so long to have the power of the majority and they don't want to give it up now).

Yes there will be bipartisan backlash against such a bold move. But the result of that bipartisan backlash will be to give the conservatives the moral high ground. Conservatives will rightly be seen as the future of the GOP, while the old bull appropriators and other pork-addicted Republicans will be seen as a dying relic of the past who are simply hanging on to old times. It would be the beginning of the end of the GOP inside-the-beltway establishment, and it would be welcomed by conservatives across the country.