In his interview with a Pittsburgh newspaper this week, House Minority Leader John Boehner not only made a ridiculous comparison between the American Revolution and current anti-government sentiment, he also claimed that financial reform was like “killing an ant with a nuclear weapon.” Not surprisingly, President Obama is hoping to turn Boehner’s strange minimization of the Wall Street collapse into a political cudgel. From remarks Obama will make at a town hall in Racine, Wisconsin, this afternoon:
Most of our friends in the other party are planning on voting against this reform. In fact, just yesterday, I was stunned to hear the leader of the Republicans in the House say that financial reform was like using a nuclear weapon to target an ant. That’s right. He compared the financial crisis to an ant. The same financial crisis that led to the loss of nearly eight million jobs. The same crisis that cost people their homes and their lives savings.
He was stunned, but also ecstatic. Amid a terrible climate for the Democrats, guys like Joe Barton and John Boehner keep providing Obama with these golden opportunities to paint the GOP as out of touch and blindly loyal to big business. There may be some kind of deep psychological fear of success at play here.
How long can White House keep Boehner’s “ant” crack alive? [Plum Line/WP]
