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Just over a week ago, MSNBC's Joe Scarborough touched off a mini-media firestorm when he discussed how often Republicans on Capitol Hill tell him that House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) "is not a hard worker," and is "disengaged," and "does not have a work ethic."
Boehner's spokesman Michael "Not To Be Confused With The Other Michael Steele" Steel, shot back by pointing out how hard Boehner worked at partying hard, with mega-donors (and successfully so: raising $117,000 per event).
All of which raised the question as to how hard Boehner was willing to work to actually craft a policy agenda for the GOP to maybe run on, in 2010. Well, as it turns out, that's precisely the area where all the disengagement and lack of a work ethic comes into play. But never fear! Boehner has outsourced this responsibility to heroic lobbyists, who will create the agenda for him, just as they do for everybody!
Per Roll Call:
House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Rep. Peter Roskam (R-Ill.) have invited senior Republican lobbyists and top officials from several large trade groups to the Capitol next week to provide their suggestions for a new GOP agenda.
The meeting is part of the House leaders' initiative called America Speaking Out, which is intended to draw broad input to create a new policy agenda for the party to launch in the fall.
An e-mail invitation sent to more than 20 trade representatives and obtained by Roll Call summoned guests to Boehner's second-floor office on July 16 "to discuss House Republican efforts to produce a new policy agenda with a small group of trade association leaders."
As ThinkProgress points out, this is all pretty much par for the course:
As the Wonk Room's Pat Garofalo has documented, congressional Republicans have "organized a pow-wow with lobbyists in order to devise a strategy" for nearly every piece of major legislation over the past year, from health care reform, to Wall Street reform, to climate change, to a jobs bill.
And the Democrats do this as well. It's like the policy-making process is corrupt beyond repair, or something!
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