Little Boy Eric

House Republican leader Eric Cantor of Virginia has always come across as something of a snot-nose in the Republican leadership. Now his immaturity has gone beyond the pale. To those who complained about the diversity of the Democratic House majority leadership of the previous Congress being replaced by a GOP majority leadership full of conservative white men, the joke's on them. Cantor isn't a man. He's a boy in a two-piece suit. The tie is probably a clip-on.

Cantor always seemed like a whippersnapper, with that smug expression on his face and his mealy-mouthed defense of the Tea party's ideology, and now in the debt ceiling talks, he's proven himself to be a spoiled brat when it comes to not getting what he wants. He's held the line on keeping a tax increase on the wealthiest Americans off the table in the debt ceiling talks to the point where he's walked out of negotiations over the issue, and he's gotten into nasty verbal spats with President Obama. Cantor has done everything short of hold his breath until he turns blue.

Cantor is hoping to pull a power play against House Speaker John Boehner, who desperately wants a deal with the President and is eager to prove himself as more than a caretaker Speaker and as someone who can shape policy in a grandiose, lasting fashion. Cantor clearly wants the speakership. The idea of this punk being two heartbeats away from the Presidency should give all of us great pause.