John Boehner bemoans loss of earmarks: 'I got no grease'

No earmarks is giving John Boehner a tear party House Speaker John Boehner touts nuking earmarks as keeping one of the GOP's key pledges, yet manages to whine about it in the same breath:

CROWLEY: Think you've done these things?

BOEHNER: No earmarks. Who can imagine. You know we've been through 16 months now with not one earmark. It's made my job a lot more difficult in terms of how to pass important legislation because there's no -- there's no grease. I got no -- no grease. So, no earmarks.

So even as Boehner touts nuking earmarks as one of his major accomplishments, he laments the fact that without earmarks to dispense, he has less ability to control his caucus. And that lack of control of his caucus is a key part of the reason why we've had to endure so much government by hostage crisis coming out of the House. If the return of earmarks were to make it easier to avoid those kinds of institutional breakdowns, it would be a small price to pay'and that's probably why Boehner is secretly plotting their return. But the best solution by far would be to dump Boehner and the Republicans entirely, and put the gavel back in Nancy Pelosi's hands.