Shutdown Could Last Weeks
(snip)
The story detailed Boehner’s work to address confusion over how Obamacare would apply to lawmakers and congressional staffers, which now appears hypocritical given his full-fledged embrace of the GOP’s current proposal to eliminate the subsidy the executive branch decided to provide. One of the story’s more damning details was an e-mail from Sommers about how Boehner’s office could help lie about the purpose of a planned meeting with Obama on the subject.
But Republicans close to the process argue vehemently that the e-mails — leaked by Reid’s pugilistic chief of staff, David Krone — mischaracterize Boehner’s role.
For example, a senior lawmaker said internal conversations about the matter focused on Boehner’s efforts to resist a legislative fix to exempt lawmakers and staff and that the Ohio Republican personally came up with and championed in July the strategy of using the issue in a spending showdown over a funding bill or the debt ceiling.
“The only memory I have of him talking about this is about how we could screw them with it,” says a Republican House member.
The leak also deeply angered the class of senior GOP aides who interact with their Democratic counterparts in high-stakes negotiations over issues such as the debt ceiling.
“I’ve never seen anything like it before. I don’t know how David thinks anyone on either side of the aisle will ever be able to work with him again. I guess this is part of Harry Reid’s plan: He refuses to talk with Republicans so I guess his chief of staff figures he doesn’t need to be able to do so either,” says one longtime senior GOP aide.
“He’s a low-rent, self-dealing bagman,” a second senior GOP aide says.
Krone, for his part, is undeterred.
“Every time one of these anonymous Republican aides takes a look at their paycheck, I hope they remember it was Harry Reid who protected their employer contribution,” he tells National Review Online in a statement.