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Judd Gregg Is a Wimp!
Ron Edmonds / AP Photo
The surprise withdrawal of the Commerce nominee is another blow for Obama. But The Daily Beast's John Batchelor says it's the GOP that should be embarrassed.
Senator Judd Gregg abandoned President Obama's nomination to be Secretary of Commerce just nine days after receiving the nod, not for any mysterious fever of principles, but rather because Gregg is good example of what is wrong with the Republican Party after Karl Rove and President George Bush turned it into clumsy crybabies. Why did Gregg quit? Was it because White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel means to strip the Census Bureau from Commerce and turn it into an election tool, or allow it to be run by a Republican, which was Emanuel’s idea in the first place? Or was it because Gregg couldn't stand up to the tantrum he was hearing from the enraged GOP over the Emanuel plotting? Yes to both, but then again, more importantly, why did Gregg agree to join up with the Obama administration to begin with?
When Obama uses the word “bipartisan,” does he mean an absence of conflict, giving a hug to a co-worker, a chorus of cheerful mates like the Seven Dwarves?
The answer is that Gregg is not a bipartisan-minded Republican conservative. Gregg is a nothing, not conservative, not liberal, not partisan or bipartisan: a blank, a cipher, an empty cabinet, to be pushed and pulled by bullies like Rove once upon a time and Emanuel now. If Gregg was unique in this role as party busboy, we would be safer, but he represents a sizeable amount of what is left in the Republican Senate and not a few of what passes for leadership in the House. RINO? Republican In Name Only? Worse. In this present global crisis, these politicians without a backbone are parasites, sycophants and in the worst instances like now, cowards. More Greggs? After the stimulus folly, they may be all Greggs, weak-kneed creatures to be rolled by Rahm Emanuel, who rolled himself in the end.
Judd Gregg was always an insignificant journeyman Republican politician. At 62, the tall, craggy, and dull New Hampshire scion has been in public office since 1978, all his adult life on the public payroll, as a state officer, congressman, governor and senator. His father was also a governor of the Granite State before him, and Gregg has no claims on originality—another Exeter-educated Ivy Leaguer who drifted into politics like some drift into bridge playing—a man without need of principles as long as he used his father's name and his elitist tone. Greggs's undistinguished congressional career—30 years of chumminess and obtuseness—has produced no credible record of achievement but it has most recently produced failure after failure for the party and the country. Not just because Gregg was the chair of the giveaway Senate Committee of Health, Education, Labor and Pensions, and then the chair of the giveaway Committee on the Budget, overseeing the ghastly Bush spending sprees to bribe the public for the 2004 victories and then for the 2006 losses, but also because when the country needed him the most, during the stock market crash of last September and October, Gregg turned yellow.
When Bush’s Secretary of the Treasury Hank Paulson misled the public and the Congress about the TARP plan last September, the so-called bailout of the big, insolvent banks by buying their toxic waste with taxpapers billions – Gregg was a lead figure for the Republican minority to go along with the shenanigans. Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell put Gregg in the position of negotiating with the Democrats as they worked to overcome the resistance of the Republican House members who had defeated the TARP on September 29. Gregg took to the microphones to repeat nonsense: "This is about Main Street. It's about America."
Afterward, Gregg became a supervisor of the TARP swag, a post he quit in early December, when it was laughably obvious that Paulson had fibbed and that TARP was being used to bolster Paulson's friends on Wall Street, starting with Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of Goldman Sachs, and John Thain, CEO and office redecorator of Merrill Lynch, and the other heroic rich men who wanted their bonues as rewards for losing billions and wrecking the planetary economy.
Gregg's 30 years of failures and meaningless polite back-scratching now come to this pointless farce of his announced withdrawal, when he tells the president one thing and then the next day says, “I made a mistake,” and that his nomination is "a bridge too far."
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The GOP hates America. Who ever runs the census should make sure that Republicans are not counted.
Judd Gregg has never had an independent thought. He merely does what he is told to do. He is a placeholder--an empty suit whose one responsibility is to add another "Republican" vote on whatever issue is at hand. Good riddance. Bring on a better candidate for Commerce Secretary!
Nominate Michael Bloomberg, he was a Democrat when it meant nothing and became a Republican when it was fashionable and convenient for election and when it no longer suited his needs he became an Independent. That covers all the bases on the political front. Then he also made a few dollars and could give Obama's cabinet a sense of entrepeneurship combined with government experience. Instead, the government has either career politicians, career government employees and career academics. Maybe its time for someone who has had a little business experience.
Most likely Gregg realized Obama spoke of bipartisanship but acted quite differently. Like a lot of Obama's words vs. actions.
Lotto1 typifies leftist thought. They won't be happy until we have one-party rule and staged elections. Their model is the old Soviet Union, the direction Hugo Chavez is going.
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As opposed to Obama who did what in the Senate? Obama's version of bipartisanship is smiling at you while you do what he wants. Maybe Gregg heard Catipiller would start hiring again if he withdrew.
Gregg is a "fiscal conservative" and a "republican" that is my friends is the definition of an oxymoron Here is a chart of debt compared to GDP under democrats it goes down under republicans it goes up nuff said about fiscal conservative republicans
http://zfacts.com/p/318.html
Listen, Mr. Batchelor! Gregg's problem had nothing to do with the Census or Emanuel or Obama or anything else in this silly assessment of yours. It's simple. Gregg couldn't handle the pressure from the Right to be obstructionist. Period. So, instead of being independent or fighting for a bi-partisan tone, he decided to do nothing. End of story. Buh-bye.
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floverland, Obama is President, he won. Of course he should do what he wants. Did Repugs love Bush the Decider. The difference is that Obama actually courts dissenting opinion before he makes a decision. This is such an alien idea to fixed ideas Repugs that you have no idea how to respond.
Judd could not handle the pressure from his senate colleagues so he jumped ship. Everyone knows that the senate definately did not want to lose another Republican.
Just wait until 2010.
Some enterprising reporter should look a little closer at the Abramoff angle in this story.
Banjo1 how INTOLERANT of you to criticize Lotto1! He/she is just expressing their opinion. Never mind that they are trying to exclude a group of people that they don't agree with from the political process. Remember, it's you to the right who are the intolerant ones. Lotto1 and crew are the most tolerant of others.......as long as they agree with Lotto1 & co.
G.O.P. = Cowards....
Obama is a Democrat, so yes he leans LEFT, of course "compromise" is not in the Republican vocabulary, so of Gregg dropped out, chicken SH%$T!.
Obama inherited a turd from the last bozo's so the current troubles are to be expected, let the G.O.P. sit it out like a bunch of cry babies, when your leaders are Limbaugh, Joe the Plumber and Sara Palin, you know your days are numbered....
Gregg has been my senator for years, and he has not been a train wreck. His stance in climate change & the environment, plus support for our local PTV station made me respect him, even if he was republican. This morning, however, I wrote him a letter expressing my disgust.
Thanks for nothing, Judd. With the world economic crisis now exceeding Al Qaeda in threat to the U.S, your choice is not to join in a help with the solution, but to join together with band of bozos to hold your breath until your face turns blue. Bad form, and good riddance.
Is it just me or is this article unreadble nonsense? Of course, I'm saying that in a fully non-partisan way - I just couldn't follow any of the points Batchelor was attempted to make. If he is a radio commentator (as his photo would imply), I would suggest he sticks to what he knows or maybe write in all caps so we can at least get the full thrust of his rant.
I haven't heard one good thing about this guy. Why was he picked to be Commerce Secretary in the first place? Could it have anything to do with adding one more Democrat to the Senate? Gregg was no doubt doomed as soon as he negotiated for a Republican replacement. Given the shenanigans of the Grand Obstructionist Party, it's a good thing Rahm Emmanuel is watching our backs.
Send Batchelor to Alaska
Judd, you are a looser like the rest of your party. I am glad that you backed out of the cabinet, we don't need some mediocre repug we can't trust.
Ya know that old saying "If you can't stand the heat, get out of the kitchen?"
Without his fellow Repubs to tell him what to do, clearly Gregg wouldn't know how to run the department. And with his tender nature, he just couldn't stand to become a pariah to his party buds by joining a Democratic administration.
Republicans are not generally known for their independent thought. They slavishly followed Bush as he lurched and stumbled, driving the country toward war, diplomatic and financial ruin. Take, for example, that late, great "Maverick" Republican candidate John McCain, who voted with Bush 95 percent of the time. After his exquisite demonstration of a total lack of economic understanding during the campaign, he is now falling into line with his fellow Repubs to try to scuttle the Stimulus Package. So much for independent thinking.
Good riddance to Gregg, who was, at best, a puzzling choice. Hopefully, Obama will find someone who is actually smart, independent and doesn't have tax problems who can run the department intelligently--although if he's looking to add another Republican to his team, he'll find the pickin's pretty slim.
Well said Mr. Batchelor! And to Muddog...DITTO...couldn't have said it better!! And to all you GOPers...Go back to church and pray for your hedgefund manager.
You just had to listen to Obama's first press conference to realize the he is the "Peter Principle" personified.
This guys is in over his head, trying to use a bunch of Clinton retreads and increasingly looking like a fool. But while that is going on, the Democrats are rushing to enact and initiate all their pet projects before this house of cards collapses.
Want an example??? Geithner says he is throwing trillions at this, they are going to try a whole number of things and hope like heck that something works... LOL
Not their money (unless they all pay their taxes) but our money they are devaluing....
when the **##** hits the fan because of these trillions floating around and devaluing the US dollar and inflation starts up big time, who are you going to blame??? not the Republicans... not Bush... it is going to be Obama and his "we don't know what we are doing" political hacks
He didn't suddenly come to a realization that he has differences with Obama. The guy lobbied for the job.
I think it was his Abramoff connections coming to light. From WaPo:
A former top staff member to Sen. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.), who is President Obama's choice to be commerce secretary, has come under the scrutiny of federal prosecutors investigating the Jack Abramoff gifts-for-favors scandal, according to public records and sources.
Kevin Koonce, 37, who served as Gregg's legislative director and counsel for two years until 2004, is referenced, though not by name, in a plea deal outlined in court papers filed last week, according to people familiar with the circumstances of the events described in the documents.
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/washingtonpostinvestigations/2009/02/fo rmer_gregg_staffer_may_be_li.html?hpid=topnews
"Republicans believe that government doesn't work and they continue to get elected to try and prove it."
Here's a plausible conspiracy theory for you- Bush and the Republican leadership (now there's an oxymoron!) intentionally bankrupted the country while padding their own coffers, thereby crippling the incoming Democratic administration. It would explain why they ran that poor old man and the Alaska whack job on their ticket. Gregg is just more evidence of the plot.
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