I am sure that the Tea Partiers are heartbroken to learn that the GOP’s first order of business was to cut a deal with the president to add $900 billion to the debt and then to select a hypocritical earmarking lover of federal health care to be their chairman of the House Appropriations Committee.
After an internal struggle within the House Republican caucus, the GOP Steering Committee voted to select Rep. Hal Rogers (R-KY) as the new Chairman for the Appropriations Committee yesterday. Rogers campaigned for the position promising to carry out the wider Republican agenda of defunding popular progressive policies, particularly with a pledge to “stop” money from being spent on health reform. Despite a pledge to be a fiscally responsible chairman, Rogers has one of the worst records in Congress when it comes to reducing the deficit: he voted for both the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, trillions of dollars worth of Bush tax cuts, and is affectionately known as the “Pork King” for requesting nearly half a billion dollars worth of earmarks. However, earmarking and these votes are fairly common within the Republican caucus.
As Rogers postures as the greatest opponent of Obama’s health reform plan — calling it a “monstrosity” and “socialistic” — he has taken a very different tone in private. Using a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request, ThinkProgress has obtained a letter from Rogers to the Health Resources and Services Administration, a bureau of Health and Human Services, seeking money from health reform.
But if any of those tea partying morons actually thought that the GOP gave a crap about rubes like them, they are getting exactly what they deserve.
