Issue link: https://www.epageflip.net/i/548715
ByEricaWerner and Andrew Taylor The Associated Press WASHINGTON When Re- publicans took full con- trol of Congress this year, they were determined to show voters they could gov- ern responsibly. Instead they've been tearing each other apart in extraordi- narily public displays, de- lighting Democrats and giv- ing some in the GOP heart- burn as the party aims for the White House in 2016. Just a few days ago, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz took to the Senate floor to accuse Re- publican Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of lying, provoking a public dress- ing-down from top GOP senators. A second tea party- backed senator, Mike Lee of Utah, had to dispense mea culpas to McConnell and others after an aide's email surfaced suggesting outside groups should punish fellow Republicans for their votes. And in the latest episode of Republican vs. Republi- can savagery in less than a week, a conservative law- maker, Rep. Mark Mead- ows of North Carolina, filed a resolution Tuesday eve- ning aimed at unseating GOP House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio. Meadows' move, which infuriated House party leaders, is highly unlikely to oust Boehner. The speaker dismissed it as of little con- sequence and made clear he would not allow it to come to a vote. "You got a member here and a member there who are off the reservation," Boehner told reporters. "No big deal." But the effort was en- thusiastically cheered by some conservative groups that promised to use Con- gress' upcoming August re- cess to pressure House Re- publicans to support it — a period Republican leaders had hoped to use to build unified opposition to Pres- ident Barack Obama's nu- clear deal with Iran. As with the incidents in- volving Cruz and Lee, the episode underscores the divisions and discontent within a fractured GOP that's struggled all year to balance its promises of good governance with the demands of frustrated ac- tivists clamoring for action to thwart Obama. Democrats haven't es- caped their own intramural disputes this year, particu- larly when a major trade bill divided Obama from most of his allies on Capitol Hill. And they are clearly enjoy- ing the GOP discomfort. "With apologies to the elephants, when the ele- phants around here lock tusks it certainly isn't go- ing to be dull," said Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore. It all comes at the very moment when Republican leaders hoped to send law- makers home for a month with a positive message and maybe even some re- sults, ahead of what prom- ises to be a challenging fall stacked with economic deadlines, fiscal cliffs, showdowns with the White House and the threat of a government shutdown. In- stead they find themselves contending with party con- troversies far afield from the economic issues dear to most voters — similar to the way Donald Trump has overshadowed the more mainstream GOP presiden- tial candidates and forced them to respond to his pro- vocative pronouncements. "What people are doing is basically creating an is- sue within the party that distracts us from focusing on winning in 2016, that fo- cuses us away from the real big issue, and that is the de- terioration of national secu- rity, Iran's bad deal, Hillary Clinton's problems," said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R- S.C., who like Cruz is run- ning for president. Alluding to Meadows, Graham said: "I would say to the gentleman from North Carolina, the biggest beneficiary of your actions has been Hillary Clinton and the ayatollah." The recent episodes are only the latest manifesta- tions of turmoil within the congressional GOP. Clashes between Republican lead- ers and their conservative flank brought the Depart- ment of Homeland Security to within hours of a par- tial shutdown earlier this year and resulted in a brief lapse in the National Se- curity Agency's eavesdrop- ping authorities thanks to procedural maneuvers by Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., yet another presidential can- didate. CONGRESS OnCapitolHill,GOPfighting itself instead of Democrats By Sadie Gurman The Associated Press CENTENNIAL, COLO. James Holmes' mother in- sisted Wednesday that she would "have been crawl- ing on all fours" to reach him had she known he was talking about killing peo- ple weeks before he am- bushed a crowded Colo- rado movie theater. Arlene Holmes said her son's campus psychiatrist never told her that James Holmes had homicidal thoughts when she called that June and revealed that he was quitting ther- apy and dropping out of school. "We wouldn't be sit- ting here if she had told me that!" Holmes' mother said, her sobs rising to an- ger. "I would have been crawling on all fours to get to him. She never said he was thinking of kill- ing people. She didn't tell me. She didn't tell me. She didn't tell me!" "He was not a violent person. At least not until the event," Holmes' father, Robert Holmes, said ear- lier Wednesday. "The event" is a phrase he used several times to refer to his son's attack on the audience inside a darkened Colorado movie theater on July 20, 2012, which killed 12 people, in- jured 70 others and makes James Holmes eligible for the death penalty. Arlene Holmes also complained that the Uni- versity of Colorado psychi- atrist, Dr. Lynne Fenton, didn't respond to a mes- sage seeking more details about their son. They hadn't known he was getting therapy, and thought perhaps he was depressed, or was suffering from Asperger's syndrome, Robert Holmes said. Fenton testified earlier that she had called James Holmes' parents, overrid- ing her concerns that she was violating her client's privacy, because she was trying to decide whether he posed a danger to him- self or others. A campus security offi- cial had offered to detain him for an involuntary hospital mental health commitment, but Fenton declined, in part because she said the parents told her he had always been withdrawn. "Schizophrenia chose him; he didn't choose it and I still love my son. I still do," Arlene Holmes said Wednesday, choking up on the stand. Before she took the stand, the couple held hands in the courtroom gallery, their fingers in- tertwined. James Holmes looked up at the screen as his childhood photos were displayed, but he and his mother didn't appear to look at each other. "People said to me that when your kid turns 18 you're done. And that's not true. We're not done. We are never done and that's why we're sitting here. We're not done," she said. Holmes had enrolled in a prestigious neuroscience postgraduate program at the university in 2011. TROUBLE IN SCHOOL Co lor ad o sh oo te r' s mom: Silence was his loudest cry for help JamesHolmes SUSANWALSH—THEASSOCIATEDPRESS House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio arrives for a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington on Wednesday. An effort by a conservative Republican to strip Boehner of his position as the top House leader is largely symbolic, but is a sign of discontent among the more conservative wing of the House GOP. | NEWS | REDBLUFFDAILYNEWS.COM THURSDAY, JULY 30, 2015 12 A