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What is it with these Republicans who just can't stop themselves from coming just a hair shy of calling the President of the United States "uppity?" Last week, Bill-O was calling him "cocky" during his Talking Points Memo segment on Fox. Now we've got Lady McCheney Mary Matalin on Mrs. Greenspan's show calling him too "self-reverential" and "self-righteous" and that he wants Republicans to go along with him and pretend they care about doing their jobs and legislating, he'd better start acting nicer to them.

Andrea Mitchell reminded her that he didn't exactly have much good will from the other side, what with them immediately plotting on how to obstruct everything he tried to do from the day he got elected --during that now-famous meeting with Frank Luntz and Newt Gingrich. We also had Mitch McConnell out there just stating openly that his "single most important" goal was to make Barack Obama a one-term president. Matalin feigned ignorance and pretended she had no idea what Mitchell was talking about. She said the GOP leadership didn't attend meetings and the last time she checked, neither Luntz nor Gingrich were in office at the time of that meeting.

Thankfully, Mitchell did remind her that a good deal of the leadership was there, but that didn't stop her from going right back after President Obama and complaining that he wasn't talking nicely enough to those poor sensitive Republicans.

Here's a little reminder of just what went on during that meeting from James Wolcott: The Conspiracy to Commit Legislative Constipation:

In a scene reminiscent of the summit meeting of mob bosses in The Godfather, Republican House leaders were summoned by evil marshmallow and message-crafter Frank Luntz to hash out a strategy to cope with the defeat of their party in 2008 and the election of the newly inaugurated President Obama, according to Robert Draper's just published book Do Not Ask What Good We Do: Inside the U.S. House of Representatives.

From a report on Draper's revelation by Ewen MacAskill in the Guardian UK (the bolding is mine):

During a lengthy discussion, the senior GOP members worked out a plan to repeatedly block Obama over the coming four years to try to ensure he would not be re-elected.

In his book, Draper opens with the heady atmosphere in Washington on the days running up to the inauguration and the day itself, which attracted 1.8 million to the mall to witness Obama being sworn in as America's first black president.

Those numbers contributed to a growing sense of unease among Republicans as much the defeat in the White House race the previous November. The 15 Republicans were in a sombre mood as they gathered at the Caucus Room in Washington, an upscale restaurant where a New York strip steak costs $51.

Attending the dinner were House members Eric Cantor, Jeb Hensarling, Pete Hoekstra, Dan Lungren, Kevin McCarthy, Paul Ryan and Pete Sessions. From the Senate were Tom Coburn, Bob Corker, Jim DeMint, John Ensign and Jon Kyl. Others present were former House Speaker and future – and failed – presidential candidate Newt Gingrich and the Republican strategist Frank Luntz, who organised the dinner and sent out the invitations.

The dinner table was set in a square at Luntz's request so everyone could see one another and talk freely. The session lasted four hours and by the end the sombre mood had lifted: they had conceived a plan. They would take back the House in November 2010, which they did, and use it as a spear to mortally wound Obama in 2011 and take back the Senate and White House in 2012, Draper writes.

"If you act like you're the minority, you're going to stay in the minority," said Keven McCarthy, quoted by Draper. "We've gotta challenge them on every single bill and challenge them on every single campaign."

The Republicans have done that, bringing Washington to a near standstill several times during Obama's first term over debt and other issues.

Their locked-shut buttocks will unclench of course should Mitt Romney be elected, at which point they'll be passing legislation like street hawkers handing out strip-club flyers. Every bill will be named after Reagan or some other sentimental favorite.

I don't know about anyone else, but I've about had it up to here with these Republicans and their supposed hurt feelings as an excuse for obstruction when they've disrespected President Obama and called him every name in the book for years. Matalin's pearl clutching is growing tiresome --to put it mildly.

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I don't think David Gregory can make it through an interview without pushing the Villagers' favorite theme during these so-called "fiscal cliff" negotiations, which is that Democrats had better be willing to inflict some pain on the elderly and the working class, or they're just not being "serious." He was at it again this Sunday when he asked President Obama about whether he was going to just have to "talk tough" to seniors about Social Security and Medicare.

Of course no such tough talk or pain is ever required of the rich or of our bloated military industrial complex. Gregory also did his best to try to place the blame for Republican obstruction during these negotiations on President Obama's back, asking him "What is it about you, Mr. President, that you think is so hard to say yes to?" About him... really David Gregory? We've got one party that's lost its mind and cares about obstruction above all else and is willing to take us down in flames to get what they want and another party that's willing to bend over backwards to try to negotiate with them, and you want to know why the side that's too willing to compromise hasn't done enough to make the Teahadist happy? Spare me.

Obama: ‘Pressure’ on Congress, blames GOP as deadline nears:

President Obama said Sunday that the "pressure is on Congress" to reach a compromise and resolve the so-called “fiscal cliff,” sharply criticizing GOP leaders for the unresolved talks.

In an exclusive interview with NBC's “Meet the Press” on Sunday, his first appearance since the healthcare debate in 2009, Obama seemed intent on putting the blame solely on Congressional Republicans, if lawmakers fail to reach the pivotal year-end deadline.

"I offered not only a trillion dollars in -- over a trillion dollars in spending cuts over the next 10 years, but these changes would result in even more savings in the next 10 years, and would solve our deficit problem for a decade," Obama said, in the interview . “They say that their biggest priority is making sure that we deal with the deficit in a serious way, but the way they're behaving is that their only priority is making sure that tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans are protected. That seems to be their only overriding, unifying theme.”

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The Senate is broken so badly due to GOP obstruction that, as Ezra Klein pointed out in the segment above, they're less popular than the idea of the United States becoming a communist country, so hey, why fix anything? Right? It seems Grandpa McGrumpy is getting some help from a Democrat in the Senate to undermine Jeff Merkley's attempt at filibuster reform.

Dueling Filibuster Proposals Leave Reformers Scrambling:

The two leading champions of weakening the Senate filibuster on Friday criticized a bipartisan proposal that was unveiled in the afternoon with scaled-back reforms, and they pushed for their own package to make more sweeping changes to the rules.

Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) and Tom Udall (D-NM) promptly said the alternate proposal put forth by Sens. John McCain (R-AZ) and Carl Levin (D-MI) is too weak and does nothing to prevent senators from filibustering quietly and escaping public accountability for their obstruction — the centerpiece of the Merkley-Udall “talking filibuster” plan.

The McCain-Levin proposal, unveiled Friday after bipartisan negotiations, would make it easier for the majority leader to bypass motions to proceed and guarantee the minority two amendments on legislation regardless of relevancy, Steven S. Smith, an expert on Congress at Washington University in St. Louis, told TPM. It would also remove obstacles on motions to go to conference and approve minor presidential nominations.

Levin told reporters in the Capitol that the plan “will hopefully overcome the gridlock that has so permeated the U.S. Senate.” He added: “It is a bipartisan proposal.”

The Merkley-Udall proposal, by contrast, essentially eliminates the ability of senators to block debate on legislation and forces senators who want to prevent a vote on a bill to speak ceaselessly on the Senate floor until one side gives in. [...]

The pro-reform Fix The Senate Now Coalition also called on Reid to say “thanks, but no thanks” to the McCain-Levin plan.

“Instead of a serious reform effort, today’s offering is little more than a status quo, business as usual, recipe for continued Senate gridlock,” the organization said in a written statement. “[W]e hope the Senate Democratic caucus rejects today’s salvo outright.”

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Here's one more thing we can thank the House Republicans for. Milk Prices Likely To Soar In January After Republican Obstruction Blocked The Farm Bill In The House:

House Republicans let the five-year farm bill expire at the end of September without a new law to replace the massive measure covering billions of dollars in programs, including food stamps and agriculture subsidies. The Senate passed its own bipartisan, 10-year farm bill in June, and House Democrats and farm state Republicans attempted to force the House to consider a bill to replace it. But the GOP leadership steadfastly refused to vote on it.

As a result, milk prices could jump as high as $6 to $8 per gallon after Jan. 1, when the government will revert to following antiquated 1949 regulations without a farm bill in place: [...]

In the short term, farmers would see a windfall by selling to the government at a higher price, but as the New York Times reports, that would lead to higher prices in stores and less milk available for manufacturing butter and cheese. “I don’t think customers and food processors are going to pay double what they are paying now for dairy products,” said Dean Norton, a dairy farmer and president of the New York Farm Bureau.

These people have absolutely no interest whatsoever in actually governing or any concern for what damage they do to the American public and our economy. As David Cay Johnston noted in the clip above, Boehner doesn't have any control over his caucus and this is what we're going to get to look forward to for the next two years.

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This has to be one of the more ridiculous things I've heard out of a Republican in a while and that's saying a lot given the amount of lies that come out of most of their mouths most of the time their lips are moving. Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl appeared on Meet the Press this Sunday and actually tried to blame outsourcing by corporations on taxes, regulation and "Obamacare" when asked about the dust up over Mitt Romney's outsourcing at Bain Capital.

It's pretty bad when even hack David Gregory has to point out that it's pretty hard to be blaming "Obamacare" or the Affordable Care Act for companies shipping jobs overseas since the practice has been going on for decades now. The truth of the matter is companies ship jobs overseas for cheap labor for one reason and that's to maximize profits. It's not for any concern for American citizens or the American economy. And because they're rewarded and not punished by our tax laws for doing so, we're not going to see the practice stop until our laws are changed.

Democrats have been trying to get Republicans to actually do something about this problem as Sen. Dick Durbin pointed out in his reply to Kyl's nonsense. Sen. Debbie Stabenow has introduced legislation that would "eliminate tax breaks allowing companies to deduct expenses associated with moving operations overseas, while still encouraging them to assist displaced workers. It also would provide a tax credit to corporations that bring jobs back to the United States."

So far the response from Republicans has been for John Boehner to refuse to allow it to come to the floor for a vote in the House and we're looking at the Senate voting on the bill later this month. Naturally when Durbin was trying to elicit a response from Kyl on whether the Republicans in the Senate would vote for the bill or not, David Gregory managed to change the subject so he had no chance for follow up with him.

Instead Kyl was allowed to spout his "we can't raise taxes on the job creators" nonsense with Gregory leaving him unchallenged on their B.S. talking point as well. For once I'd like someone to ask Kyl and his ilk why, if cutting taxes supposedly created jobs, we weren't at full employment while Bush was in office, or given his latest ridiculous argument here, why we didn't see outsourcing under Bush end or at least be reduced as well. If we had an actual journalist instead of a Republican water carrier hosting this show, we wouldn't even see the likes of Kyl show up as a guest, because it would not take a whole lot of follow up to make him look extremely foolish with the arguments he was trying to make here.

Transcript below the fold.

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On this Monday's Morning Joe, Hardball host Chris Matthews decided to go on a full blown tear at President Obama for not being bold enough with confronting the Congress and not getting out there and publicly demanding that the obstructionist Republicans do more to get people back to work and cooperate on investing in our public sector. While I agree with him on some of what he was ranting about here, I've got some issues with it as well.

Here's some of Raw Story's coverage of Matthews' appearance: Chris Matthews hits ‘pusillanimous’ Obama for ‘thinking small’:

MSNBC host Chris Matthews on Monday accused President Barack Obama of being too timid in his rhetoric and political agenda.

“I don’t understand why he thinks small,” Matthews, who is generally supportive of the President, said on MSNBC’s Morning Joe.

“Why doesn’t he say, ‘Look, we brought back the auto industry. Why don’t we bring back the highways?… Why is everything falling apart? Why don’t we invest in our public sector while interest rates are practically zero, and all of these unemployed people out there, this is a good time to do stuff.’” [...]

“You have an auto industry,” he continued. “Where are you going to run the car? I mean, he has to be big and noisy and loud like me, I guess, instead of this pusillanimous talking about Bain. That’s below him. Talking about Massachusetts? Who cares about Massachusetts 20 years ago? He’s got to focus on the future.”

Matthews was doing what we've seen so many in the media do when it comes to the Obama campaign going after Romney's time at Bain Capital, which is to be dismissive of whether those sort of ads might work and carp about the campaign being too negative.

What the Raw Story article did not include is one of Matthews' suggestions for Obama to campaign, which is embracing the now defunct Simpson-Bowles plan put out by their co-chairs after the committee could not come to an agreement, because we all know raising the retirement age, means testing and cutting Social Security benefits will be so popular with the public.

Matthews even acknowledged that what he was pushing for the President to run on would not be popular but thinks he should have done it anyway:

MATTHEWS: You know, you go back over the steps. Why didn't he back the Simpson-Bowles and say look, I hate it. I hate it. It does stuff I don't like, but we've got to start somewhere. I got eleven votes. I wish I had fourteen, but dammit I don't care about what votes I got. You've got my vote. He could have done that.

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House Democrats pushed back this week at Republican obstruction and the likelihood of a transportation bill having any chance of being passed, something that used to receive bipartisan support and at the Republican Party's unwillingness to do anything to solve the problems with job creation in the United States if it might mean that heaven forbid President Obama is reelected.

House Democratic leaders blame poor jobs numbers on GOP obstructionism:

Blaming GOP obstructionism for the lingering jobs crisis, Democratic leaders on Friday called on House Republicans to bring a long-term highway bill to the floor.

The Democrats — led by House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) — noted that Friday's dismal jobs numbers included a steep decline — by 28,000 jobs — in construction employment. Reauthorizing transportation spending for two years, they argued, would help put those workers back on payrolls and stabilize the economy.

"With today's jobs report, it's clear that we have work to do," Pelosi said at a press briefing in the Capitol. "We have an answer to this, and that is to pass the [Senate] transportation bill."

Hoyer echoed that message, noting that the Senate-passed highway bill was supported by 75 senators — a rare show of bipartisanship in an upper chamber that's practically defined by gridlock.

"That bill has the votes on the floor of the House of Representatives," Hoyer said. "But unfortunately the Republican leadership won't put it on the floor."

The Senate approved a two-year transportation reauthorization proposal in March, but a number of House conservatives have objected to its size, and GOP leaders have declined to consider it on the floor. Instead, House Republicans passed a short-term extension to authorize highway funding through Sept. 30 — a bill President Obama has vowed to veto because it would automatically approve the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline that's currently under environmental review. [...]

Both Pelosi and Hoyer noted that the Senate bill was backed by a broad range of senators, highlighted by its sponsors, the liberal Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and the conservative Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.).

"You'd almost have to be a contortionist in order to cover the expanse of opinion between Sen. Boxer and Sen. Inhofe, and yet they've come together in a bipartisan way," Pelosi said.

Full remarks of their statements in the clip above via Pelosi's site:

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From CNN's The Situation Room, even Sen. John McCain admitted that this gridlock over the payroll tax holiday extension is damaging the Republican Party. It looks like the House Republicans and John Boehner aren't earning themselves any friends in the Senate now that Boehner has caved to his obstructionist caucus that would prefer gridlock to giving working Americans a break on their taxes.

BLITZER: Very quickly on another subject, the payroll tax cut, the extension. You were among the 89 senators who voted to continue it for another two months. Your Republican colleagues in the House, they say they're not going to go along with that. Why are they wrong and you and your Republican colleagues in the Senate right?

MCCAIN: I think we have to recognize reality and that is we are not going to see the payroll tax cut expire on the first of January. And we have to accommodate to that reality. It would not be fair to the American people at this time.

And so, it seems to me that Republican leaders and Harry Reid and the speaker and Congresswoman Pelosi should sit down together with the administration and figure out a way through this. It is harming the Republican Party.

It is harming the view if it's possible anymore, of the American people about Congress and we've got to get this thing resolved and with the realization that the payroll tax cut must remain in effect. Not to mention the doc fix and unemployment insurance, yes.

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Heaven forbid CBS's Bob Schieffer might want any of their viewers to have to think too hard about who is actually mucking up the works when it comes to the gridlock and gamesmanship being played over the extension of this payroll tax holiday.

Here we go with the Villagers favorite game of "both sides" are equally at fault when it's the Republicans obstructing and making it impossible to govern -- Schieffer: "Dysfunctional" Congress does nothing -- again:

If you ever needed any proof that the congress is totally dysfunctional and unable to do anything - even something it wants - their failure to agree on a payroll tax cut extension is it.

Forget who is at fault. They all are for letting it go this far. Both sides are so determined to undermine the other that they can't even figure out how to do something they both want: Extend the payroll tax cut.

If this gridlock continues, it will be a fitting end to a year in which Congress accomplished absolutely nothing.

Nothing, unless you want to give them credit for not allowing the government to shut down. I give them no credit for that because I think that is the least we should expect of the people we send to Washington. Yet, that was what they spent most of their time arguing about.

What made this latest episode more odious than usual, is that by sending the legislation to a conference committee, House Republicans killed Senate legislation but did not have to go on record as saying they had voted to give people a tax increase. But make no mistake. That is exactly what they have done if this stands.

There is a reason that Congress has a 9-percent approval rating, and today's antics are like putting up a neon sign to remind people of it.

So he admits it's the Republicans who are playing games, but still wants to treat both parties as being equally unreasonable. Way to keep things "fair and balanced" there Bob.

I've got a chart for Bob to take a look at if he thinks all sides are equal with their responsibility for the gridlock in Washington from Kevin Drum at Mother Jones -- Chart of the Day: Republicans and the Filibuster.

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As unhappy as I am about how this whole debt ceiling hostage taking is going and wondering what we're in for after we get more details on what's being agreed to right now, I was glad to see someone finally push back at this Republican talking point I hear them repeat day after day, week after week -- Democrats never passed a budget and so that makes the horrid Ryan budget passed by the House somehow "responsible."

Sen. Dick Durbin finally shot that one down on Fox News Sunday this morning and explained why they never got anything passed -- 60 votes -- or in other words, Republican filibusters and obstruction.

BAIER: Senator Kyl, when you hear the president say this no way to run the government, you know, that we'll likely also face another standoff at the end of September when the continuing resolution runs out and government funding -- you know, we're up against another government shutdown. You know, former White House chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, once famously said, "Never waste a crisis."

Do Republicans now risk become the -- becoming the party that's always pushing up to the cliff, always using that cliff to try to extract concessions? I mean, do you fear the American people will have crisis fatigue, if they don't already, and that it will hurt your party?

KYL: You mentioned the possibility of a continuing resolution. Why would Congress have to pass a continuing resolution? Because the Senate Democrats now, for the third year in a row, will not have passed a budget. That's their job.

The House Republicans have passed a budget. Senate Democrats said no to that budget. So I think it's very unfair to suggest that Republicans are responsible.

We don't have the votes in the U.S. Senate. But where they do have the votes, in the House of Representatives, they've done their job.

BAIER: Senator Durbin, why haven't the Senate Democrats passed a budget?

DURBIN: It's called 60 votes. And what it boils down to is this: we have 53 Democratic senators.

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