House GOP and Senate GOP are different breeds apart

Resisting the Fiscal Deal

By JONATHAN WEISMAN, NYT

WASHINGTON — Just a few years ago, the tax deal pushed through the Senate in the early hours on Tuesday would have been a Republican fiscal fantasy, a sweeping bill that locks in virtually all of the Bush-era tax cuts, exempts almost all estates from taxation, and enshrines the former president’s credo that dividends and capital gains should be taxed gently.

But times have changed, President George W. Bush is gone, and House Republican leaders had to struggle on Tuesday to quell a revolt among Republicans who threatened to blow up a hard-fought compromise that they could have easily framed as a victory. Instead, they were in danger of putting themselves in position to be blamed if the nation’s economy goes into a tailspin under the weight of automatic tax increases and spending cuts.

The latest stalemate on Capitol Hill surprised even many Senate Republicans, who just hours before voted overwhelmingly for a deal hashed out in large measure by their leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. The bill passed 89 to 8, with only 5 of the Senate’s 47 Republicans voting no.

But House Republicans have again proved themselves to be a new breed, less enamored of tax cuts per se than they are driven to shrink the government through steep spending cuts. Protecting nearly 99 percent of the nation’s households from an income tax increase was not enough if taxes rose on some and government spending was untouched.

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