Andrea Mitchel interviews Cantor who blames Dems for the Tea Partiers’ extreme signs. I assume this was before he decided to criticize Rush. See the previous post. Watch:
Posts Tagged ‘Eric Cantor’
Cantor Blames Dems for Extreme Signs
Saturday, November 7th, 2009Cantor Criticizes Rush!
Saturday, November 7th, 2009Cantor who was at the Tea Party on Thursday and was silent on the hateful Dachau imagery and comparison of Nazis to Obama. However, he now critizes Limbaugh. Will he take it back? This was on Bloomberg News today:
Cantor Calls for Inclusive Party, Criticizes Limbaugh Rhetoric
By Lorraine Woellert
Nov. 7 (Bloomberg) — The second-ranking Republican in the U.S. House, Eric Cantor, criticized some comments by talk-show host Rush Limbaugh as inappropriate and said his party needs to be inclusive.
“The Republican Party in its roots is a party of inclusion and we ought to be promoting that and making sure that voices are heard,” Cantor, of Virginia, said in an interview on Bloomberg Television’s “Political Capital with Al Hunt,” airing this weekend.
Hateful images at Tea Party
Cantor, when asked about Limbaugh’s comments that “Adolf Hitler, like Barack Obama, also ruled by dictate,” and his comparison of the administration’s health-care logo to a swastika, said the comparisons were wrong.
“Do I condone the mention of Hitler in any discussion about politics?” Cantor said. “No, I don’t, because obviously that is something that conjures up images that frankly are not, I think, very helpful.”
He also took issue with some of the harsher rhetoric of House Republican colleagues.
Cantor, 46, said Republicans must stay unified if they are to win elections. “That’s the lesson learned” from the Nov. 3 Republican gubernatorial victories in New Jersey and Virginia and the loss of a New York congressional seat in a race that divided the party, he said.
For more go here.
Cantor at Tea Party: “Not One GOP Vote”
Saturday, November 7th, 2009Cantor was at the Tea Party Protest Thursday. He made no mention of the Dachau imagery. This was in TPM:
Cantor Promises Tea Partiers: ‘Not One’ GOP Vote For Health Care
Christina Bellantoni | November 5, 2009, 1:13PM
Cantor at the Tea Party
House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-VA) made it clear at the tea party “House Call” this afternoon that President Obama won’t be getting his party’s health care vote.
“Your efforts to stop this bill are being heard loud and clear,” Cantor told the thousands gathered at the base of the Capitol in what some billed as a smaller reunion of the 9/12 rallies.
“Be assured not one Republican will vote for this bill,” Cantor said, to big cheers and shouts of “Kill the bill.”
The crowd, pulled together to try and influence conservative Blue Dog Democrats before Saturday’s vote on the House health care bill, said the Blue Dogs were critical.
Cantor told them “we will try to pick up” as many Democrats as they can to defeat the bill.
Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) told them he was “standing with freedom-loving Americans” against the bill.
Rep. John Shadegg (R-AZ) called the crowd “freedom fighters” who will stop the bill.
When He Hears the Roar, Cantor Trembles
Thursday, October 22nd, 2009In a post yesterday in politico about how few Republicans stand up to the extremist voices like Glen Beck and Rush Limbaugh, Cantor had this to say:
“We need more voices,” said House Minority Whip Eric Cantor of Virginia, one of the party’s up-and-coming leaders. “Our party’s challenge has been that we need to be more inclusive — we need to attract the middle again. … When one party controls all the levers of power in Washington, they’re going to try and villainize whoever they can on our side. It gives us an opportunity now to try and harness the energy and point it in a positive direction, so that we can attract the middle of the country to the common-sense conservative views that we have been about as a party.”
It sounds like he wants it both ways. He talks of attracting he middle but is unwilling to stand up to the right wing and somehow blames the Democrats for the Republican extremists. Read the article in Politico.
Cantor is Trying to Kill Internet Neutrality
Monday, October 5th, 2009In a familiar refrain from previous regulatory wars over the Internet, House Minority Leader John Boehner and House Republican whip Eric Cantor tell Obama new network neutrality rules proposed by Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski will stifle investment in networks.
The House Republican leadership warned President Obama Oct. 2 that expanded network neutrality rules and the formal codification of those rules will jeopardize future broadband network investment by carriers. Moreover, the minority leadership claimed, Federal Communications Commission Chairman Julius Genachowski is inserting politics into the National Broadband Plan the FCC is preparing for Congress.
“We believe that network neutrality regulations would actually thwart further broadband investment and availability, and that a well-reasoned broadband plan would confirm our view,” House Minority Leader John A. Boehner, R-Ohio, and House Republican whip Eric Cantor, R-Va., wrote in a letter to Obama. “So to hastily begin the process of adopting network neutrality rules months before issuing such a plan implies that politics are driving the FCC?s decision-making process.”
Genachowski proposed Sept. 21 new network neutrality rules that would require carriers to deliver broadband in a non-discriminatory manner and to disclose their network management policies in a transparent manner. Genachowski also said the FCC would explore whether or not to extend network neutrality rules to mobile carriers.
The FCC currently enforces network neutrality on a case-by-case basis through four principles the agency approved in 2005. The principles prohibit broadband carriers from blocking lawful Internet content, applications and services and allows users to attach legal devices to the network. The FCC network neutrality principles are currently under legal challenge by Comcast.
“As Americans wade through the current economic situation, a decision by the FCC to discourage broadband investment would be irresponsible,” Boehner and Cantor wrote. “The United States needs broadband providers to increase investment and create jobs. This will not occur if broadband providers are saddled with unnecessary, burdensome requirements that interfere with their ability to manage their networks and create innovative broadband products that maximize consumer choice and benefit.”
In what is becoming a political tit-for-tat over network neutrality, groups supporting network neutrality quickly responded to Boehner and Cantor’s letter to Obama.
“It is truly unfortunate that the House Republican leadership has put itself in the position of trying to slow down the greatest economic engine for job creativity and innovation ever created. Under the neutral, non-discriminatory Internet, thousands and thousands of new businesses were created and millions of dollars were invested,” Gigi B. Sohn, president and co-founder of Public Knowledge, said in a statement.
Added Markham Erickson, executive director of the Open Internet Coalition: “The Internet existed for more than 25 years under a neutral regime. During that time, a national data network was built out by telcos and cable providers, despite a neutrality requirement. To suggest that a return to that status quo threatens broadband investment is not borne out by experience. In fact, it is critical to investment that this issue be addressed sooner rather than later?further delay in addressing this core policy issue will harm investment flows into new and innovative technologies.”
Obama supported network neutrality during his campaign for the White House, and his appointment of Genachowski, who wrote the president’s communication policy, is widely seen as an endorsement of network neutrality.
On the same day Genachowski proposed to expand the FCC’s network neutrality rules, Obama said in a speech: “FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski is announcing a set of principles to preserve an open Internet in which all Americans can participate and benefit. I am pleased that he is taking this step. It is an important reminder that the role of government is to provide investment that spurs innovation and common-sense ground rules to ensure that there is a level playing field for all comers who seek to contribute their innovations.”
Editors: Does Eric really understand this issue? Net Neutrality has been the defacto status quo. All the tremendous growth in the internet has been in a free internet. It is just recently that carriers and providers of “last mile” connections are trying to block some traffic types as they try to tilt things toward their own content or the content from affiliated providers.
White House Responds to Cantor Who Says Obama is “endangering” Troops
Monday, October 5th, 2009White House disputes lawmaker’s Afghan war comment
By PHILIP ELLIOTT (AP) – 5 days ago
WASHINGTON : A senior Republican congressman said Wednesday that President Barack Obama was endangering U.S. troops in Afghanistan by spending time weighing his next move in Afghanistan. The White House called the lawmaker’s comment a “bunch of game playing.”
Rep. Eric Cantor, R-Va., said he does not understand the delay from Obama, whose top commander in Afghanistan made his recommendation to the president more than a month ago. Cantor, the No. 2 Republican in the House, told The Washington Times that he doesn’t understand why the United States has commanders if the civilian leaders ignore their advice for weeks on end.
“Listen, you’ve got American lives on the line over there,” Cantor said on the same day that Obama held a meeting at the White House to discuss the war with his national security team. “As long as they are delaying, that puts in jeopardy, I believe, our men and women.”
Gen. Stanley McChrystal, in his assessment of the conflict, has said the United States would likely lose the war if the administration did not send more troops. While McChrystal has not made a public call for a specific number of additional forces, he is widely believed to want between 30,000 and 40,000 more troops.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs disputed Cantor’s comments, adding that Obama is moving deliberately on the recommendations.
“And I would say this to Congressman Cantor and everybody else: the American people deserve an assessment that’s beyond game playing,” Gibbs told reporters during his daily briefing.
“The men and women in Afghanistan that we’ve sent to serve and protect our freedom deserve that. The men and women that might be sent to Afghanistan to serve and protect our freedom deserve that, as do their families and every other American.”
Obama, top military officials, diplomats and members of the Cabinet met shortly after Gibbs’ remarks to continue studying the McChrystal report. Officials said the meeting was the second in a series of five that Obama had tentatively scheduled.
The White House also noted that Cantor didn’t criticize President George W. Bush when he didn’t act on Gen. David McKiernan’s request for more troops. Obama replaced McKiernan with McChrystal.
“I don’t recall Congressman Cantor saying that when Gen. David McKiernan’s request for 30,000 additional troops sat on the desk of the previous commander in chief, I don’t remember him going to a newspaper or on television saying that that commander in chief was endangering the lives of men and women in Afghanistan,” Gibbs said.
Cantor’s spokesman brushed off the criticism from the White House podium.
“When President Obama said that the mission in Afghanistan was a war of necessity, Mr. Cantor was one of the first to support him,” Brad Dayspring said. “The fact is that our commanders in the field have conveyed a clear sense of urgency that a timely decision by the commander in chief could ultimately determine the success or failure of the mission. Mr. Gibbs knows that.”
Copyright AP Newswire
NJDC Response to Cantor’s Comment on Obama
Sunday, September 27th, 2009The NJDC responds to Cantor’s remark
Cantor Plays Partisan Politics with U.S. – Israel Relationship
Aaron Keyak – September 23, 2009 – 11:46 am
Today, Ira N. Forman, CEO of the National Jewish Democratic Council (NJDC), released the following statement in response to Representative Eric Cantor’s (R-VA) remark that President Barack Obama seems not to be a “‘true friend’ of the Jewish state” as reported in Politico today:
Representative Eric Cantor (R-VA) has decided to position himself as the arbiter of who is and who isn?t pro-Israel in this country. Setting aside Cantor?s lack of sterling professional foreign policy credentials, is it wise for him to set himself up as such a figure? This is a particularly salient question considering the fact that President Barack Obama is on the record repeatedly praising Israel and committing himself to its security needs throughout his administration. Moreover, Cantor should understand that these types of partisan attacks damage the longstanding tradition of bipartisan support for the U.S.-Israel relationship.
At least one columnist has speculated that Cantor wants to modify his extreme partisan image to reveal a “newly civil Cantor.” Cantor?s insulting characterization of Speaker Nancy Pelosi as well as his willingness to play the cheapest kind of partisan politics with the U.S.-Israel relationship call into question whether Cantor wants to turn over a more “civil” leaf.
Cantor’s Answer on Israel – Palestine
Sunday, September 27th, 2009This is from the JTA:
Cantor: Obama not ‘true friend’ of Israel
September 23, 2009
WASHINGTON (JTA) — The only Jewish Republican in Congress said President Obama does not seem to be a “true friend” of Israel.
In an interview with Politico, House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.) said he was opposed to Obama’s “disproportionate focus” on a settlement freeze instead of dealing with the “existential threat” to Israel from Iran.
“If you look at the policy that this White House has followed, it certainly does not seem as if we are dealing with a true friend” of Israel, Cantor said in the interview.
Politico
Eric’s answer to those that lost their health insurance
Sunday, September 27th, 2009Charity!
At the forum held with Bobby Scott and Eric Cantor, Eric says to appeal to charity if you lose your health care!
Style Weekly reports Charlie Diradour will run in 2010
Tuesday, September 15th, 2009This appeared in Style Weekly today.
Charlie Diradour to Challenge Cantor
by Scott Bass
Charlie Diradour, a longtime Democratic political adviser and self-described fiscal conservative, is running for Congress.
A local real estate developer who became one of the leading opponents to the Shockoe Bottom ballpark proposal earlier this year, Diradour hopes to unseat Republican Rep. Eric Cantor, R-Henrico, the minority party’s whip in the lower house.
Diradour is a Fan resident who got his start working as a volunteer on former Attorney Mary Sue Terry’s political campaign in 1985. He advised former City Council President William J. Pantele in his bid for mayor last year.
More recently, Diradour launched a Web site for supporters of keeping minor league baseball at The Diamond on the Boulevard, and became a vocal critic of Highwoods Properties’ plan to build a $363 million, ballpark-anchored development in the Bottom. Highwoods, facing harsh public criticism and questions about the project?s financing, pulled out of the project in July.
Bringing down Cantor, a rising and well-funded GOP star, won?t be so easy. The 7th District, which stretches from the Richmond?s West End to Rappahannock County in the north, and includes portions of Henrico and Chesterfield counties, is considered a Republican stronghold. Cantor is up for reelection in November 2010.
“It’s always good to have competition, but the climb is steep in a solidly Republican district,” says Daniel J. Palazzolo, professor of political science at the University of Richmond. “I don’t see the kinds of conditions that would make a Republican in the 7th District vulnerable.”
Diradour says he’s up to the challenge. He says he’s already raised “substantial pledges,” and figures he’ll need at least $1 million to mount a credible challenge. A tireless pol with years of campaign experience, Diradour is hitting the campaign trail and has launched a campaign Web site, www.charlieforthe7th.com. He says the reception from regular voters and campaign donors has been encouraging.
Diradour insists that he?s not running a sacrificial campaign. “If I run, I want to see a clear path to victory,” he says, “not just be a token, somebody who gets 35 percent.”
But after an unprecedented presidential election a year ago — after 40 years of Republican dominance in presidential elections, Obama comfortably won Virginia — the pendulum is swinging back to the GOP.
The political environment doesn’t