I admit to thinking that the Republican leadership has to be some of the nastiest, whiniest, most asinine, most unprofessional people out there. However, when the Republicans showed up for their press conference after the failed bailout vote, I absolutely could not believe my ears. I watched in utter disbelief as John Boehner, Eric Cantor and Roy Blunt whined that they couldn't get the votes they'd committed to bring to the House today because of the speech Nancy Pelosi gave. They blamed Nancy Pelosi. They said she didn't have the leadership to get the votes.

Unfortunately for them, she did get enough Democratic votes, so those pesky little facts are getting in the way of their cover story. The problem is, it is the Republicans who failed to vote for this supposed bipartisan bill. Democrats were able to round up 60% of their members to vote for the bill. The rest was up to the Republicans. Roy Blunt, Minority Whip, simply didn't do his job. Only 33% of House Republicans voted, Yay. This after Boehner and Blunt bragged prior to the vote how they had saved the bill with the changes they insisted on.

So, prior to the vote they were setting themselves up to take credit for its success and immediately after the vote failed they wasted no time placing the blame on Pelosi and the Democrats.

The commentators on CNN had a hard time hiding their disgust that the Republicans would come out and state very clearly that they couldn't get their members to vote for the bill because of something Nancy Pelosi said in her speech.

It is hard to believe. Somebody hurt their feelings and they were willing and ready to sell out Americans. Americans are hurting and they wouldn't vote to help them because Nancy Pelosi criticized their precious "free market" that had run out of control? Wow, just wow. This isn't junior high.

A few minutes passed and the Democratic leadership came out. As they spoke I was amazed at the fact that after what the Republicans had said, the only thing I heard Pelosi say was that Democrats had more than brought in their share of the vote and it was the Republicans who failed to support the bill. While she certainly made sure to direct attention to the failed Republican efforts, it is an accusation borne out by the facts. It was the Republicans who failed to pull their weight when it came to passing this bill.

When Barney Frank opened the floor to questions I could hear a faint sound that must have been coming from the back of the room. Frank's face looked incredulous as he listened. It was obvious from his reply that he had just been told of the Republicans' accusations. Barney Frank said that what he heard was something that not even the Democrats would have dreamt up to accuse them of and he couldn't believe the House Republicans would punish the American people because somebody hurt their feelings.

[edit] I found the video of Barney Frank's comments, so am including the video in place of my quote.

Barney Frank also mentioned that House Democratic leadership had been willing to negotiate on and accept other changes Republicans had asked for, but it was Bush who said that wouldn't work.

I don't necessarily support this particular stimulus package, but I do know we need to do something. Here's the problem. According to the Republicans, they didn't fail to support this bill because it is a bad bill, they failed to support it because somebody said something they didn't like. In other words, they aren't looking for changes in the bill, they're looking for Nancy Pelosi to kiss their collective asses.

I am just completely and thoroughly disgusted - not because the bill failed - but because House Republicans lack the maturity to do this job. As soon as it got tough out there they decided to play the blame game instead of buckling down and figuring out how to make the bill work. House Republicans failed the American people because instead of leaving the door open to fight for changes in the bill that might make it stronger, they felt it was more important to join in a chorus of, "Blame Pelosi and Run."