Obama Calls Boehner, Draws Line In Sand

Talk about throwing a drowning man an anchor! The President has told the hapless House Speaker, whose out-of-control Tea Party caucus has decided to take the debt ceiling hostage, that the matter is non-negotiable:

Later on Friday, Obama called House Speaker John Boehner, to reiterate he would not negotiate on another bill that will soon be before Congress: one to increase U.S. borrowing authority, which is rapidly approaching its $16.7 trillion limit.

House Republicans said they were considering a series of controversial initiatives to attach to that bill, which likely prompted Obama’s phone call.

A White House official said Obama told Boehner in the call that the American people had worked long and hard to dig the country out of the financial crisis and the last thing they needed was another politically motivated, self-inflicted wound.

Obama, who would veto any bill that stripped funds from his healthcare law, hit the road too, as he has in past fiscal showdowns. “They’re not focused on you,” he said of the Republicans as he spoke at a Ford plant in Liberty, Missouri. “They’re focused on politics. They’re focused on how to mess with me.”

Jeff Wright, a United Auto Workers officer waiting for Obama, commented, “They’re completely dysfunctional.”

By: dave-dr-gonzo

David Hirsch, a.k.a. Dave "Doctor" Gonzo*, is a renegade record producer, video producer, writer, reformed corporate shill, and still-registered lobbyist for non-one-percenter performing artists and musicians. He lives in a heavily fortified compound in one of Manhattan's less trendy neighborhoods.

* Hirsch is the third person to use the pseudonym, a not-so-veiled tribute to journalist and author Hunter S. Thompson, with the permission of his predecessors Gene Gaudette of American Politics Journal (currently webmaster and chief bottlewasher at Liberaland) and Stephen Meese at Smashmouth Politics.