Why the F% do they not want "Balanced Budget" Lew??!!

[w8liftinglady]

I have given up trying to understand Republicans.
http://trailblazersblog.dallasnews.com/2013/01/cornyn-on-jack-lew-treasury-nod-qualms-on-spending.html/

Sen. John Cornyn on Jack Lew: qualms on Treasury pick’s spending record

Sen. John Cornyn, the Texas Republican who serves as deputy GOP leader in the Senate, called for a “fair hearing” on White House chief of staff Jack Lew, the president’s pick for Treasury Secretary. But he also offered some qualms.

“Under Jack Lew’s leadership at the Office of Management and Budget, we saw trillion dollar deficits and no serious attempt to rein in spending,” Cornyn said in a statement issued moments after the president presented his pick at an East Room ceremony. “As President Obama’s Chief of Staff, we’ve seen on-going dilatory tactics as the nation stares down one fiscal crisis after another. While Mr. Lew deserves a fair hearing, Texans deserve to hear the President’s plan for cutting spending and balancing our budget.”

[Recursion]

1. It makes it procedurally easier to raise taxes

Revenues don't have to be a separate question.

[Cali_Democrat]

2. It's not about Lew. It's about Obama

The GOP will oppose anybody Obama nominates. The issue is with Obama's skin color and party affiliation. Until that changes, the GOPers will oppose pretty much all of Obama's nominations.

They essentially don't want him to govern. They can't handle the fact that Romney lost.

[gelsdorf]

5. SBB

Selected By a Black, no more no less

[spanone]

3. because the President wants him.

[hfojvt]

4. most people accept a balanced budget

as better than an unbalanced budget

but why is "cutting spending" the only way to balance a budget?

[1StrongBlackMan]

10. It's not ...

see: President Obama's proposal(s).

[TwilightGardener]

6. It's just noise, it won't mean a thing upon confirmation.

[Make7]

7. Didn't Cornyn vote for the Ryan budget plan?

A plan that increases the debt and doesn't balance the budget for the foreseeable future while using imaginary numbers to not do it? And I should listen to anything he has to say on balancing the budget because ...?

[babylonsister]

8. Because he's on to them and is too smart by half!

snip//

I suppose the first question after any nomination announcement is whether Senate confirmation is likely. In this case, the Senate Republican minority already hates him, but history is clearly on Lew's side -- not only has it been 169 years since a Treasury nominee lost a confirmation vote, but Lew has personally been subjected to the Senate confirmation process five times. The combined number of "nay" votes? Zero.

That said, it's worth considering why, exactly, the GOP has come to dislike Lew so much that some Senate Republicans started announcing their opposition to his nomination before he was even introduced.

The answer, it appears, is that GOP leaders see him as too competent and knowledgeable, which has gotten in the way of Republican plans.

The New York Times had a fascinating piece last year on the 2011 debt-ceiling crisis negotiations, and House Speaker John Boehner's frustrations that Lew had a "detailed knowledge of the budget" that "outpaced anyone else's in the room." It got to the point that Boehner kept trying to get Lew out of the room, in the hopes that it'd be easier to strike a GOP-friendly deal.

snip//

http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/01/10/16450460-obama-nominates-lew-for-treasury

[Mass]

9. Way too liberal and not a banker (only 2 years at Citigroup).

The finance industry is in arms against him.

[rbixby]

11. According to his logic

Cornyn is responsible for the deficits too