Beyond all the sturm und drang, the basic reality is that pretty much everything the Republicans have been doing all year has been bullshit. They don’t know how to get their party unified enough to make a deal with the president on the budget. That’s why they tried to compel the president to make a deal under duress, so they could avoid actually spelling out their demands in any specific way.
Here’s the best rule for determining what John Boehner will do in any situation: If there is a way for him to delay a moment of confrontation or political risk, he will do it. That’s why Boehner’s current plan is to raise the debt ceiling for six weeks while keeping the government shut down.
Business is freaked out and will be furious with him if he triggers a default. So he’s raising the debt ceiling for long enough to get them off his back. And tea-partiers will be furious if he abandons their quest to defund Obamacare by shutting down the government. So he’s leaving that part in place.
Is there a plausible strategic logic to this plan? None that I can see. The putative reason for delaying the debt limit is to open fiscal negotiations with Democrats. But Republicans have been dodging fiscal negotiations with Democrats for most of the year. Why? Because they don’t want to compromise on the budget. They want unilateral concessions.
Obama won’t give Republicans unilateral concessions. Any deal Boehner strikes with Democrats will have to contain some concessions to Democrats, which will further enrage the tea party. So there’s no deal Boehner can cut on the budget that won’t anger the base, which brings us back to the same stalemate — waiting until the next debt-limit hike, when he needs to prevent catastrophe again.
Meanwhile, he’s keeping the government shut down because a shutdown, while damaging, carries no hard-and-fast deadline like the debt limit. The damage is cumulative. But the damage is also very real, both to the country as a whole and to the GOP’s image. Since there’s no particular moment when he absolutely has to confront his own crazies, Boehner will just wait.
When your base is riding around on Medicare scooters, you don’t want to make slashing Medicare and Social Security your number one priority. But it is their number one priority. Everything we’re witnessing is a consequence of this simple fact.
So what does Obama say when Boehner and his Wild Boys waltz into the Oval Office and plop down their latest plan to avoid eating their own shit sandwich?
My guess is he’ll say sure, and perhaps ask why the fuck Boehner would want to put his caucus through all of this again in 6-8 weeks. I really don’t get the Republican eagerness to go through two painful votes where one would suffice.
They’re sabatoging the economy as much as possible. They’re trying to trigger a recession. They need at least 6 more weeks of shutdown to ensure that.
Obviously, the are just looking to stall so they can try and come up with some way to un-paint themselves out of their self induced catastrophe.
that too
… and three.
The problem with triggering a recession now (as opposed to 2011) is that President Obama got re-elected last year. A recession in 2014 will only hurt incumbents running for re-election.
“IMPT: the GOP plan also forbids extraordinary measures on the debt ceiling.”
~Jake Sherman
Tell them to get bent.
Yeah, I just saw that. So not only do they want to continue holding the gun to the head of their hostage, they now also want a Do Not Resuscitate Order with the President’s signature, just in case they decide to shoot the hostage in the future.
The more Boehner talks to his caucus the more things actually move in the wrong direction. Imagine that.
“When your base is riding around on Medicare scooters, you don’t want to make slashing Medicare and Social Security your number one priority. But it is their number one priority. Everything we’re witnessing is a consequence of this simple fact.”
You know, I don’t think this would be that hard to explain to them, if any Republican was actually motivated to do so. They are in fact losing the support of seniors every day for this very reason, I mean seniors whose IQ is above room temperature.
“When your base is riding around on Medicare scooters, you don’t want to make slashing Medicare and Social Security your number one priority. But it is their number one priority. Everything we’re witnessing is a consequence of this simple fact.”
Which is why the GOP’s big priority is to get the DEMS to do the dirty work of cutting SS & Medicare for the GOPsters.
…and Obama is just the man to do it. Sure, he’s tough when they threaten credit ratings, but he melts like an ice princess in Arizona when then talk about putting America’s finances on a secure path.
So you’re saying . . . he’s gonna C A V E ?
How original. Meanwhile he’s beating the republicans to a bloody pulp.
Oddly enough, most statements that are correct are not original.
If I had a nickel for every time somebody has said he’s about to cave, and he didn’t do anything of the kind, I’d be a millionaire.
It rather strange to say Obama’s about to cave when he’s just spent the last two weeks kicking the shit out of Republicans.
What makes you think that cutting SS would be caving? I never said anything about caving. It’s been quite clear for a while that Obama is more than OK with it.
So queue up the All-Cuts-No-Taxes rhetoric and shove the We-Ought-to-Compromise rap down the memory hole.
Lol so today on the bus this old guy kept yammering very loudly about how happy he is with the Republicans and Speaker Boehner, thanking God for them. So the bus driver almost kicked him off after he said, “A gentleman like me identifies with the Republican Party, unlike these low class Democrats.”
Keep going, old dude. I’m sure you’ll be happy with your Speaker when he folds.
Reminds me of the old man in front of me in line in a california supermarket years ago, who was crowing about how he was going to vote to recall Gov Davis and how that was going to save california. That guy’s probably dead now, but Jerry Brown and california dems will spend years more cleaning up his mess. Fantasies are powerful things.
Especially when everyone around you is living in the same fantasy.
Told you not to pull the stopper on that champagne.
Folks who are high on their own supply have to hit bottom.
They haven’t done that yet.
When they start proffering what Democrats want and do that voluntarily, they might be ready for the 12-step program.
Just for relaxation, re-read O’Henry’s “The Ransom of Red Chief.” That’s how it works.
I am befuddled! Everyone expects them to be patted on their pointy heads for finally coming to their senses.
I want them to hurt. Make them pass a tax on the 1%. There needs to be a price for the hurt they have put on this country. Not f..king indulgency.
They can’t hurt until they come off of their propaganda high.
That tax on the 1%. It’s called a financial transaction tax. And the grassroots voter won’t feel the tax at all. Simple. No loopholes. Money changes hands for financial securities; there’s a tax. Could even index it to the national debt as percent of GDP or even better index it to the unemployment rate.
I want them to hurt for doing this. Losing elections is the kind of hurt they are going to deserve.
So my guess now is that from this moment until Nov. 2014, they will keep the government shut down. At the same time, they will keep passing clean debt ceiling bills every 6 weeks or so letting it get close enough so people panic but never getting to default. This will create the “new” normal as we exist in a new level of crisis.
In reaction to certain events such as a natural disaster or terrorist attack they may authorize money to deal with it. I.E. their partial funding bills but linked to storm relief or something.
That’s why the first negotiation has to take away the debt ceiling completely. The precedent for that is called the Gephardt Rule. It also forces Congress to have a budget document.
However, there is no deal yet as the House GOP still wants to put conditions on what they do.
So the shutdown is a super-sequester, eh?
Steve M. seems to think so too but I can’t tell if he’s serious:
http://nomoremister.blogspot.com/2013/10/tell-me-why-i-shouldnt-expect.html
He also implies — as I do — that Obama agrees with SS/Medicare cutting/reform on the merits.
I think it’s unquestionable that Obama agrees with cutting social programs on the merits. He’s tried to do it every single time under the mantle of reform. It’s been our good fortune to have Republicans who can’t see the gift he wants to give them.
That’s snark, right?
Nope. Had Repulicans not been insane, social security and possibly medicare would have cuts. Or at least been degraded in the form of Chained CPI and means testing.
I feel that whatever they do, they will not change direction, and that only means their position gets less tenable every day. So I don’t know where this is going to end up, but I think maybe it will end up with them being treated like the crazy uncle at the Thanksgiving table, and eventually with the House Sergeant-at-Arms calling the Men in the White Coats to come and take them away for a nice long vacation. Maybe around November of 2014.
But seriously folks, It’s just possible that the signals from the Koch Bros. and the world of business and finance mean that Boehner doesn’t have to worry about them quite as much. And that might give Nancy a little more to do.
Okay, I’m not trying to piss you off. Good start right?
But why do you call her “Nancy”? Isn’t using her first name a sign of over-familiarity? Wouldn’t it be more respectful to use her last name?
We went to school together.
well,not really — but now that you’ve raised the issue so politely, I suppose I owe you some sort of explanation.
In actual fact, I almost never refer to her as “Nancy”, but it just seemed to fit the style of that particular comment. I was actually about to refer to her as “Nancy Smash” but refrained from doing so on the grounds that I had never called her that before, largely because I don’t even know what it’s supposed to mean.
In closing, let me put it like this: My wife’s from MN too. But having lived in TX a long time, she’s lost some of the full “Minnesota nice”. Her sister has it, though. So I understand.
Me, I’m from Brooklyn.
Well thank you for that honest answer. 🙂
I think it sounds more intimidating if it’s a Pelosi Smash! And I do so want her to crush republicans.
“I do so want her to crush republicans.”
Well, that’s very nice of you. Seriously.
I’d love to see her pop ’em in the snot locker myself.
Cantor accused the president of ignoring “the will of Congress” in this whole episode. While I’m glad the Republicans have had enough at last of mouthing “the will of the people,” it’s not clear to me what Cantor was talking about.
What is “the will of Congress” when bills don’t even get to the Oval Office for signing or vetoing? The Speaker says he doesn’t have the votes for a clean continuing resolution or to pass vote raising the debt ceiling, but everyone who can count as high as 217 (which leaves out Fox, naturally) knows that’s utter nonsense.
Remember all that Republican yammering about “up or down votes” a few years ago? Whatever happened to that notion among the GOP? It’s a safe bet nobody in the popular media will be so churlish as to bring that up, but it really shouldn’t stop us from mentioning it in every other breath.
Easy. The will of Congress is to do absolutely nothing, and the president is ignoring that.
When talking about Congress, only the house that’s controlled by the Republicans counts. Just like only votes cast by white people count.
“… only the house that’s controlled by the Republicans counts.”
True. And only the Republicans in that house count. And only the Tea Party back benchers in that Republican caucus count.
That’s why I throw up my hands when the pollsters find that only 5% of Americans have a favorable opinion of “Congress”.
“When your base is riding around on Medicare scooters, you don’t want to make slashing Medicare and Social Security your number one priority. But it is their number one priority. Everything we’re witnessing is a consequence of this simple fact.”
OK, hyperbole. But close enough to the literal truth as to force us to wonder how people so stupid managed to live so long.