Cantor Delenda Est [ArthurK]

Since Cantor popped up in the news yesterday in a way that detracted from Obama... Today He Must Be Destroyed.

Look at the references to Cantor in this article - almost everyone is, at best, subtly negative.

Eric Cantor has become both a key player and big pain

"Eric, don't call my bluff," ... a dramatic back-and-forth with the Virginia Republican that made some in Cantor's party wince.

Cantor, second-in-command to Speaker John Boehner who is widely assumed to aspire to the House's top job.

... whether the self-styled "young gun" had shot his own credibility in a roomful of political veterans.

...explaining that he was only trying to understand a difference in spending cut proposals.

In contrast to Wednesday's tiff, the White House meeting Thursday was described as "composed and polite" ... Cantor did not speak during the day's session, ...

... has made a career of confrontation with a brash Southern style

... has strained his relationship with Boehner.

Cantor is building support among the no-compromise faction of Republicans ...

By all accounts, he has almost no hobbies

His tough partisanship in the 2004 campaign...

In 2007, it was Cantor who offered an amendment to draw attention to then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi's request for a "luxury jetliner," ... Pelosi's staff staunchly denied that, saying the House sergeant-at-arms had requested that she fly in the same military aircraft as her predecessor, former Speaker Dennis Hastert.

But their styles are very different, and their staffs are not close. Boehner is a cigarette-smoking, golf-playing dealmaker from a blue-collar background who is regarded with deep affection by members on both sides of the aisle.

Pressed by Cantor this week for details, Obama said he had given them to Boehner.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, initially impressed with Cantor's honesty but now "disappointed" by his behavior ...

Reid said through a spokesman that Cantor had been "nothing but a disruptive force over the course of these negotiations."

I'll hand it to the writer, Laurie Kellman, that was a smooth hostaet job. She doesn't have to worry about toiling in the underground sugar caves!

posted by Open Blogger at 11:48 PM

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