House GOP should be punsihed for childish antics on payroll tax cut extension

Every parent should recognize the childish antics of House Republicans on the payroll tax cut extension controversy.

When my nine-year-old doesn't want to do something, a familiar pattern emerges.

First comes the outright refusal. "No, I don't want to," she will say. It's almost always the most truthful part of the whole exchange.

When she sees that doesn't work, then she backpedals to find some other reason to support her position. "I can't do it now because I'm doing (something else)."

This often forces me to point out that what I need her to do is more important than what she is working on at that time. But seeing that it buys her time, she will push it some more. "I'm waiting for my friend to call," or something like that.

Once I close the door on that dodge, then comes the sabotage. For instance, if I want her to go walk the dogs with me, she will put on clothes or shoes that are totally inappropriate for the task. More delay.

Most of the time, my daughter's tactics don't work. But she keeps trying them anyway. Occasionally she will run out the clock, cause enough delay to get what she wants. Then she finds out the punishment for her tactics is worse than the task she worked so hard to avoid.

Crying is not uncommon at this point.

Let's now look at what the House GOP has done on this payroll tax cut extension issue.

First, they came out and said they didn't want to extend these tax cuts at all, which seems to be the most truthful expression of their real position on this issue.

When that position was shown to be politically unpopular, then they backpedaled into arguing about how to pay for it.

Next came the sabotage, as they joined it with the unrelated issue of the Keystone XL pipeline.

Eventually, the House GOP delayed action so long on this issue that it appeared they were able to kill it by refusing to vote on the two-month compromise that a majority of their more grown-up Republican brethren in the Senate supported.

The delays and deliberate sabotage gave them all of these made-up reasons to cover their true intent, which was to kill the payroll tax cut. Our representative to Congress, Rep. Mark Amodei, was trying to spin this delaying tactic as following procedure.

“This is going to be an interesting thing to see whether or not policy prevails or politics prevails,” Amodei said.

It's clear Amodei and his GOP buddies are praying for politics to win. Otherwise they would have worked this out months ago.

The American people aren't very happy with these petulant children running the House of Representatives. After fighting tooth and nail to protect huge tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans, they have gone to great lengths to kill cuts going to working people, feeding into the Occupy Wall Street 99 percent meme.

Some of their fellow Republicans aren't very happy with this turn of events. Voices on the right from Karl Rove to the Wall Street Journal editorial board are slamming House Republicans for screwing this up, afraid that voters will punish the party at the polls in November.

I'm sure House Speaker John Boehner will be crying very soon.

Voters need to not let themselves get confused over the side issues, delays and sabotage. The heart of this matter is that Republican lawmakers didn't like this payroll tax cut from the beginning, and they are just looking for a politically acceptable way to kill it.

These GOP politicians have dueling reasons for killing this tax cut. One, they believe that tax cuts should go to those at the top, that it will grow the economy and cause the wealth to trickle down, despite a decade of fruitless waiting for that trickle to begin.

And second, getting rid of the payroll tax cut will keep the sour economy limping along just long enough for the GOP to ride it to victory come November.

But only if they can avoid being blamed for it. And that's why Rove & Co. are furious with House Republicans for "(losing) the optics" of this debate. Notice that this criticism is centered on the political fallout, not about championing tax cuts for working Americans.

Speaker Boehner and his minions need to be taken to the woodshed in November and taught a lesson. Their job is to help the country, not to use political games to get reelected. If they really believe the payroll tax cut is a bad idea, then give it an up-or-down vote and stop playing these childish games.

Stop crying and get to work.