Is Grover on his way to being Gone?

Grover Norquist is losing his grip - his grip on Republican members of Congress.  Republicans are beginning to bow to the reality of the majority of Americans, who want an increase in taxes on the wealthy to more equitable levels like those of the Clinton era (which are far lower than the 70% rate on the wealthy of the Reagan era; Secular right wing Saint Ronnie Ray-gun raised taxes more than he cut taxes).
As the Hill noted:  

Norquist tax pledge takes election hit

By Russell Berman - 11/13/12 05:00 AM ET Republicans might have held the House, but Grover Norquist’s majority in Congress is all but gone.

Fewer incoming members of the House and Senate have signed the pledge against tax increases run by Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform, in a reflection not only of the seats that Democrats gained but of the success they’ve enjoyed in vilifying Norquist.

About a dozen newly elected House Republicans refused to sign the anti-tax pledge during their campaigns, and another handful of returning Republicans have disavowed their allegiance to the written commitment.

With Democrats picking up seven or eight seats, that means the pledge guides fewer than the 218 members needed for a majority. In the Senate, where Republicans lost two seats, just 39 members of the chamber are pledge-signers, according to the group’s records. That is a drop from 238 members of the House and 41 senators  who committed to the pledge at the start of the 112th Congress.Norquist’s diminished clout could have ramifications during intensifying negotiations over the so-called “fiscal cliff” and a grand bargain on taxes, spending and entitlements that leaders in both parties want to strike in the coming months.

The right is facing hard choices - abandon their extreme anti-abortion positions, including their plank in the party platform that does not allow any exception for abortion, including not allowing abortion for rape, incest, or the health of the mother.  The right is facing having to drastically change their position on immigration.  The right is facing having to change their position on homosexuality. And right wing positions, at least those expressed by neo-cons from the Bush administration who were the Romney/Ryan advisers were highly unpopular.

There really are NO positions that the right has used to define their differences from the Democrats that are remaining to them if they have a prayer of winning a future election.

That Grover Norquist is well on his way to being Gone-er Norquist was clear from the recent article in the National Journal, where the right wing opposition to Climate Change is taking another hit. The Koch Brothers appear to have issued their dictate, and like a good sock-puppet, Norquist is obliging, but first he agreed.  When the big money boys yank on the strings, good little puppets dance and flip flop to their wishes; true of Norquist, true of Romney.

From TPM:

The National Journal reports today:

In a step that may help crack open the partisan impasse on climate change, Grover Norquist, the influential lobbyist who has bound hundreds of Republicans to a pledge never to raise taxes, told National Journal that a proposed “carbon tax swap”—taxing carbon pollution in exchange for cutting the income tax—would not violate his pledge.
Norquist’s assessment matters a lot, and could help pave the way for at least a handful of Republicans to support the policy. Over the past six months, a growing number of conservative voices, including former Republican officials and renowned economists, have amped up pressure on their party to finally address climate change.

Lots of folks have been jumping on the carbon tax band-wagon (see “Bipartisan Support Grows for Carbon Price as Part of Debt Deal“). The Washington Post editorial board boarded this weekend.
Even a modest carbon tax can deliver serious revenue (see “20 Dollar Per Ton CO2 Tax Could Reduce Deficit By $1.2 Trillion In 10 Years“).
But here is the reality -- Grover has been steadily LOSING his ability to deliver any pressure whatsoever on that tax pledge of his.  So the reality is that the Republicans will have to come to the table to talk about cap and trade AND raising income taxes on the rich, whether Grover Norquist or the big money bags behind the Republican party like it or not. Because the reality is -- we the people want the taxes on the rich to be raised.  We have a grossly unfair playing field tipped in favor of the rich, in which the tax system is a significant part of why it is we have a terrible income and wealth gap between the 99% and the 1%.

As also noted by TPM -

First Grover was for it, then he flipped to the opposite position, like a Cirque de Soleil acrobat.

Grover Norquist Abruptly Changes Position On Carbon Tax After Facing Criticism From Koch-Backed Group

By Stephen Lacey on Nov 13, 2012 at 1:27 pm

Anti-tax crusader Grover Norquist raised a lot of eyebrows on Monday when he told National Journal that a carbon tax might be on the table if it were swapped with a cut to the income tax.
“It’s possible you could structure something that wasn’t an increase and didn’t violate the pledge,” he reportedly said.
As president of Americans for Tax Reform, Norquist has convinced hundreds of members of Congress to sign a pledge that they will never raise taxes. While his influence appears to be waning in Washington, Norquist’s tax pledge is still considered gospel for many Republicans. That’s why his willingness to consider a tax on global warming pollution is a big deal in political circles.
But one day later, after being criticized by the American Energy Alliance, the advocacy arm of a Koch-supported energy think tank devoted to promoting fossil fuel development, Norquist has completely reversed his statement, saying there virtually “no conceivable way” he could support a tax on carbon.
“Grover, just butch it up and oppose this lousy idea directly. This word-smithing is giving us all headaches,” wrote AEA in its newsletter, while promoting a newly-published study labeling carbon taxes “political cronyism.”
Americans for Tax Reform issued this statement this morning:

Americans for Tax Reform opposes a carbon tax and will work tirelessly to ensure one does not become law.
Taxing American energy consumption not only opens up a new revenue stream for proponents of big government, but threatens to forever damage the American economy.
Americans for Tax Reform President Grover Norquist describes a carbon tax this way:
“The creation of any new tax such as a VAT or energy tax — even if originally passed with offsetting tax reductions elsewhere — would inevitably lead to higher taxes as two taxes would be at the disposal of politicians to increase taxes. Two smaller tapeworms are not an improvement over one big tapeworm. Tapeworms and taxes grow.
There is no conceivable way to add an energy or VAT tax to the burdens American taxpayers face that would not violate the pledge over time.  If someone first passed and implemented a constitutional amendment with 2/3 of the House and Senate and 3/4 of the states concurring to forbid the restoration of the income tax, we might more safely consider passing a VAT or energy VAT. And then it would be foolish and economically destructive thing to do.”

Meanwhile, conservatives who understand the threat of climate change continue to discuss the prospects for pricing carbon in Obama’s second term, possibly as part of a grand bargain on a deficit deal. While some consider taxing carbon pollution a “pipe dream,” others believe it’s one of the only opportunities to get Congressional Republicans to support a carbon reduction policy....

I suggest popcorn while enjoying the acrobatic performances of Republicans.  What doesn't get done in the 2012 Congress is more likely to get done in the 2014 election cycle.  So long as Republicans are roiling about their failed policies as well as their failed candidates with unpopular and out of date ideas, an continue to deny science as more and more voters see the validity of climate change with fires, drought, and flood, they will continue to lose ground with voters and lose power in positions of government at every level.

 Wow - look at little Grover flip over and over and over there!  He's very flexible. No, that's not really Grover Norquist; the film footage is from 1904, which is much more recent than where Republicans want to go in history. And the acrobats are Japanese; the right doesn't appeal to Asians, who overwhelmingly voted for Obama and the Democrats.

Now we get to see if they are capable of adapting to more successful policies.  Who was the advocate for that being necessary to survival, again? Oh yeah -- DARWIN.  And the Republicans can't decide on what to do.  We have this from Slate.  Businessweek notes the defeats - and the continuing intransigence, the belief on the far right that the solution is more of the same (a refusal to learn from failure, which usually results in more failure). We have this from the AtlanticWire:

The Tea Party's National Ambitions Are Finished

...It's not just that Mitt Romney lost, as did several Republican Senate candidates who should have won easily. The election was a victory for all kinds of big city liberal values: Weed was legalized. So was gay marriage. The rape apologist candidates lost. The first openly gay woman was elected to the Senate. The first black president was reelected -- on a platform of Obamacare, immigration, and raising taxes.
On the Republican side, the most energetic part of the party is also the most opposed to these ideals. While the Tea Party won Republicans a majority in the House in 2010, election night 2012 showed the party's message is toxic at the national and statewide levels. While house races are local in character, Senate and presidential races are held statewide. And that is where the Tea Party did worst last night. Tea Partier Richard Mourdock picked off moderate Republican Sen. Dick Lugar in the Indiana primary, and then lost the election. Todd Akin proved he really was too conservative for Missouri, as Sen. Claire McCaskill claimed in primary ads intended to trick Republican voters into picking him as her opponent. Three other Tea Partying Senate candidates met the same fate in 2010. But while Tea Party's passionate activist model works best locally, sometimes that even fails at the congressional level when the race gets lots of attention -- Tea Partier Allen West lost in Florida, and former presidential candidate Michele Bachmann held onto her seat by about 3,000 votes in Minnesota.
Some Republicans want to blame Romney for being a bad candidate. "JUST A THOUGHT...Next time, GOP might want to think about nominating a conservative," radio host Laura Ingraham tweeted. A "GOP operative" told Politico's Jonathan Martin a few days ago, "A Romney loss would be solely based on class and personality: middle class, affable and emotional former governor would be up by 5." But Romney was the best candidate Republicans could have possibly had. The people Romney ran against -- Rick Santorum, Michele Bachmann, Newt Gingrich, Herman Cain -- would have been destroyed in a national election. Many better potential candidates decided not to run, in part because they couldn't win the Republican primary. Tim Pawlenty wasn't willing to say what the Tea Party wanted, and he dropped out. Jon Huntsman wouldn't either, and he lost badly. Romney couldn't stop running in the Republican primary until the first presidential debate October 3. He was the only candidate with decent credentials who was willing to say all the things the Tea Party wanted to hear in order to be elected.
That came back to bite him throughout the campaign. He got no bounce from the Republican National Convention, which was entirely built around what was essentially a Tea Party inside joke -- Obama's "you didn't build that" semi-gaffe. He defeated Rick Perry by adopting the language of the most extreme immigration opponents: "self-deportation." He was caught on tape riffing on a Tea Party meme about the 47 percent who don't pay income taxes. And, in the very last week of the campaign, he was haunted by his ridiculous Tea Party pander at a June 2011 debate, when he suggested FEMA should be dissolved, its powers returned to the states and the private sector.
The demographics look bad for Republicans. Late-stage poll denialism argued that there's no way young people, Latinos, and black people would be a bigger portion of the electorate compared to 2008. Of blacks and Latinos, House Speaker John Boehner said in August, "These groups have been hit the hardest. They may not show up and vote for our candidate but I’d suggest to you they won’t show up and vote for the president either." (Boehner was half right.) At The Washington Examiner, Michael Barone predicted Romney would win Ohio because the Democratic electorate would be smaller and social conservatives showed more "intensity." (Obama won Ohio.) Battleground Watch blared the headline "The Folly of David Axelrod’s Turnout Model" on October 29, saying the idea whites would only be 72 percent of the electorate was nuts. (Whites were 72 percent of the electorate.)
But the Tea Party isn't just scary to minorities, it's scary to enough white people for Obama to win. It's crazy to young people, who will slowly replace the more-Republican old people. Outside of the South, Democrats are quite competitive among whites. But if the polls can no longer be denied, there's denial about what the vote means. According to Politico's Mike Allen, an anonymous Republican Senate aide doesn't sound like he realizes he lost: "It's a status quo election. House reelected, Senate status quo, Obama re-elected = reset. We'll start 2011 over again and hope the President engages." Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said something similar in a statement: "To the extent [Obama] wants to move to the political center, which is where the work gets done in a divided government, we’ll be there to meet him half way." One of the most glaring example came from Laura Ingraham, who tweeted, "'Tonight u voted for action, not politics as usual.' --Barack Obama. PULEEZE...amnesty, tax increases, climate change legislation." Yes! That, aside from climate change, was Obama's platform. And he won!

I predict that instead of picking up new seats in the house and senate, in the mid-term, as it looks now, especially if the right doubles down, AGAIN, or goes even more to the extreme right, they will lose, again, bigger. It is up to the right if they learn, or continue to try vainly to spin reality, or simply continue to deny it. The right is grossly out of step with the majority, and is falling more out of step and more behind with every new day, every new voter turning 18, as our culture and society continue to evolve on their failed policy positions and issues. They can be like the horses that run back into a burning barn as the place they believe is safe for them.....or they can scrap the crap and completely revise their present positions into more moderate, more sane and sensible positions.