Double talk on the sequester

Jamelle Bouie cries foul on Republican attempts to portray the looming sequester as the Democrats’ fault:

A key part of the GOP’s strategy on the sequester is to blame President Obama for the fact it exists at all. One good example is House Speaker John Boehner’s op-ed in today’s Wall Street Journal:

With the debt limit set to be hit in a matter of hours, Republicans and Democrats in Congress reluctantly accepted the president’s demand for the sequester, and a revised version of the Budget Control Act was passed on a bipartisan basis.

Ultimately, the super committee failed to find an agreement, despite Republicans offering a balanced mix of spending cuts and new revenue through tax reform. As a result, the president’s sequester is now imminent.

The big problem with this narrative is that it directly contradicts Boehner’s rhetoric at the time. After the deal was crafted, in July 2011, Boehner told GOP House members that “There was nothing in this framework that violates our principles.” Later, in an interview with CBS News following the House vote on the bill, he described the deal as such: “When you look at this final agreement that we came to with the White House, I got 98 percent of what I wanted. I’m pretty happy.” And, as a whole, the House GOP was fine with the deal too—it passed 269-161, with 174 Republicans voting in favor.