Republicans Refuse to Pass Boehner’s “Plan B”

In an attempt to get everyone to blame the president (for a change) for the failure to get a deal done on the fiscal cliff, Speaker Boehner proposed a bill he called: “Plan B”. This plan would have kept the Bush tax cuts for most Americans, and President Obama would have had to veto it, essentially putting his signature on an enormous tax increase for most of the country, falling right into the Republicans’ trap. (Mwa ha ha!)

Oh, but Speaker Boehner made a simple but very serious mistake here, stymieing his goals: he called the proposed bill “Plan B”. And Plan B is also the name of the “morning after pill”, which Republicans consider to be baby-murder. So they wouldn’t vote for it, thinking it to be some sneaky pro-choice bill. So, rather than trick Democrats into looking bad on taxes, they fell into a trap of their own making, and all because of their innate inflexibility on reproductive freedom. Or at least, that’s what I’m choosing to read into it.

Here’s the fiscal cliff diving story:

http://www.npr.org/blogs/itsallpolitics/2012/12/20/167753329/house-postpones-vote-on-boehners-plan-b