I think it’s too early to tell what this will look like at the end, but this is the NYTimes on the current state of the deal. I pulled out the sections that appear substantive:
There seemed to be broad agreement that any deal reached would include at least $2.5 trillion in spending cuts over the next 10 years, of which $1.2 trillion would be approved now. But there was intense jockeying over the terms governing the next steps, including the work of a new bipartisan Congressional committee whose members would be charged with finding more deficit reductions in time for a second increase in the debt ceiling in just a few months.
Failure by that committee would trigger automatic cuts in programs beloved by Democrats and Republicans, respectively, unless Congress later this year passed a Constitutional amendment requiring balanced budgets.
Under the framework that negotiators were discussing today, half of those cuts would come in defense spending, while the other half would be a combination of other domestic spending, like discretionary programs and farm subsidies. Cuts to Medicare would not make up more than 3 percent of the non-military cuts.
We’d need a total number for non-military cuts to know what “not more than 3 per cent” means.
And negotiators agreed that any deal would not include language that could lead to a new formula for the annual cost-of-living adjustments for Social Security beneficiaries, a change that could save more than $100 billion in the first 10 years. While many economists have long said the existing formula overstates inflation, many Democrats oppose any change that would reduce benefits from current law. Dropping the proposal from the White House-Congressional talks reflected in part the influence of Representative Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic minority leader, whose negotiating hand has been strengthened, since she will have to deliver a significant number of Democrats votes for House passage of any solution, given the likelihood that Mr. Boehner will face a significant loss of Republican votes.
And it looks like the proposed changes to Social Security are off the table, for now.
Discuss.
WereBear
Can the Tea Party be required to write “I shall not crash the economy” a million times?
Might help them understand math better.
LongHairedWeirdo
I’m sorry, but… this is *STUPID*.
Do you really think the Republicans aren’t going to play “the anti-American liberals are *trying* to cut defense!” game?
There’s only one thing that would make them negotiate in good faith and that’s tax hikes. Pretending that they care about cuts in defense so much that they’ll negotiate in good faith is asinine. They’ll just demagogue them.
JenJen
First gut read: “Triggers” are where they’re filing all the sacred cows for both parties, right? The big ones, anyway? If memory serves, triggers don’t ever get pulled in Congressional politics.
Where does keeping this unnecessary, clownish nonsense out of the 2012 elections stand?
If I wanted drama, I’d watch “Basketball Wives” or the Cincinnati Bengals front office. I don’t think I can look at this stuff anymore on TV, so I appreciate any and all updates here!
Yutsano
Looks like a legal settlement to me: no side goes home happy. Which means Nancy needs to whip her side hard. Which means she might get a few more progressive gems out of this yet.
aisce
i’ll believe that there’s a deal when 217 democrats and republicans in the house vote for it, and not a minute before.
in the mean time, i expect obots and firebaggers to retreat to their individual corners and scream at each other incoherently. chop chop.
Bort
This is the perfect compromise between Republicans and batshit crazy Republicans.
CaseyL
It will die in the House, and it’ll be the Tea Party thugs who kill it… precisely because it isn’t as bad as we’d feared.
The Sheriff's A Ni-
@aisce: Now, now, we’ll have none of this logical and sensible thinking here!
Ben W
The strange thing is that I like Harry Reid more each time there’s a fight between Senate and House.
Cat Lady
I’m so exhausted and whipsawed by manic progressivism that I’ve limited my contact with the unfolding events to reading what Pelosi says, what kay says and what Booman says, and whoever mentioned TarheelDem’s comments at Booman – thanks. Everyone else can bite me.
West of the Rockies (formerly Frank W.)
I hope you’re right, Yutsano #4 — it would be great to see one or two progressive carrots in what looks to be conservative stick stew so far. (That’s an arcane reference to the proverbial sticks and carrots one uses to motivate people, just in case I’m not being clear….)
As an aside, does anybody want to see a giant shit-pie go flying into Eric Cantor’s smug-yet-wimpy face? Maybe Rand Paul can be standing beside him and get his curly locks besmirched as well!
Baud
@LongHairedWeirdo:
As opposed to the “the anti-American liberals are trying to raise your taxes game”?
And extending the Bush tax cuts were not part of this deal.
lamh34
It’s Not the End of the World
by BooMan
Sun Jul 31st, 20
4tehlulz
No BBA, which means it will fail in the House.
mrmobi
I’ve been taking a news break, didn’t watch any of the political shows this morning, but in the back of my mind I’ve been waiting to see what the shit sandwich would look like.
It’s horrible, of course, and extremely ill-timed, given the news on the state of the economy in the past two days, but it’s not as bad as a default would be.
One thing it definitely is not, and that is an example of Obama’s 11th dimensional chess abilities. Lawrence O’Donnel, I’m talking to you. But what does anyone expect when the other side is certifiably insane?
So, next year, unemployment will be above 9 percent, foreclosures will be zipping right along, and I’ll be working to re-elect my representative (Mike Quigley, a solid progressive) and to re-elect Obama.
Our politics are really depressing.
robertdsc-PowerBook
I am sick of the whole fucking thing. I am glad the Pentagon gets a nice chopping, though. As much as I enjoy all things US military (and as an employee of a contractor that works with the military), we spend far too much on defense. Time to bring it down.
lamh34
Casual Observation
by BooMan
boss bitch
@LongHairedWeirdo:
That doesn’t have the same weight it used to.
WereBear
All day I’ve been thinkng of that Planet of the Apes movie where the mutant underground dwellers worship their nuclear weapon without knowing what it is.
Reminds me of Tea Partiers.
jnfr
It’s not about the details of SS vs. Defense cuts, it’s that all this shrinking spending is going to send us into a second recession which is the last thing we need right now.
Mark S.
I don’t understand how the Super Congress works. They come up with their $1.5 trillion, and it goes into effect immediately or does it have to be approved by Congress? Is any of that shit constitutional?
Nancy, don’t get me all hot.
Ash Can
@aisce:
I agree. And I’ll add that I’ll believe it when it passes the Senate as well, and Obama actually signs it. In the meantime, it’s all noise.
JGabriel
Kay @ Top:
I think it sucks, at least as outlined so far. It may be better than some of the worst proposals, like switching to chained CPI, but it’s still bad enough to make one question whether it’s any better than default. Especially over the course of the next few years.
.
Baud
@Mark S.: I believe the Super-Congress will propose certain changes (last I heard, both cuts and tax reform), their recommendations will get a fast track, up or down vote in Congress, if it passes, that’s it; and if it fails, then the triggers take effect.
Linnaeus
The problem that I have with any deal is that, no matter what, our government has embraced austerity economics. Which means our job gets that much harder in 2012.
Kay
@jnfr
I agree with that, but I do think you have to wait and see when the cuts kick in, if the argument is we need to continue current spending levels to prop up a fragile economy.
I think that’s vitally important, timing, if that’s the argument. If they’re backloaded, into 2013 0r 2014 and thereafter, I think we need a different argument.
LongHairedWeirdo
@Baud,
People are willing to accept tax hikes. It’s the Republicans that are screaming about them. Defense cuts are going to be much easier to demagogue. Besides, I would not, in any way, consider tying the Bush tax cuts to this. I’d talk about something modest that would be in addition to those.
As for the Bush tax cuts, we *already* know how that’s going to play out. The economy will be doing poorly, so TAX HIKES KILLING US IN A POOR ECONOMY or the economy will be doing better so TAX HIKES KILLING US IN A STILL FRAGILE ECONOMY or the economy will be *booming* so TAX HIKES KILLING OUR VIBRANT RECOVERY.
Davis X. Machina
@Mark S.: Yes that shit is constitutional, and has been going on for decades.
NR
Sorry, but Booman’s full of shit. Specifically, this line right here:
$2.4 trillion in cuts during a recession with no revenue, and we came out ahead politically? I’ll have some of what he’s smoking, please.
Felanius Kootea
@4tehlulz: Which is why they’ll need Pelosi to get Dem votes in the House. And if they need her votes, it’s going to get a bit better than what we’re hearing. The Tea Party will lose some influence over the process if the balanced budget amendment is their line in the sand.
Brachiator
I get so tired of the Democrats playing this insipid game of “we must protect Social Security at all costs,” especially when it means agreeing to other stuff which will harm it anyway.
Unfortunately, Obama is stubbornly clinging to the idea that what is more important than pursuing a coherent Democratic Party agenda is to make sure that you compromise, make sure that both sides get something, and both sides lose something. This is stupid.
The Democrats are also building the GOP platform for them. They get to run on three very simple to understand themes. They will promise to kill health care reform, make the Bush tax cuts permanent, and pass a balanced budget amendment. The Tea Party People are already printing up their bumper stickers.
Meanwhile, the Democrats will explain how they will fight to oppose all the shit that they signed off on, while waiting for the Republicans to back them into another corner.
We’re Democrats. Compromise means always having to say that we’re sorry.
JGabriel
@Yutsano:
Nancy doesn’t agree yet:
.
Davis X. Machina
The House still originates money bills. The Senate still has a filibuster rule.
Something very much like this was inevitable the moment the polls closed in November, and anyone who thought otherwise was whistling past the graveyard.
JGabriel
@Linnaeus:
Jobs get harder immediately. Elections get harder in 2012.
.
lamh34
@NR:
BooMan is very good at explaining and defending his position. If you really wanna u should discuss it over at the tribune
PreservedKillick
Shit sandwich. *IF* it passes, not only does it screw the current economy, but it does nothing to re-establish the full faith and credit of the united states. I doubt we’ll be the world’s reserve currency for long. That’s going to be a problem of simply epic proportions. And it will make the current and coming economic malaise seem like the good old days.
Thanks, Teatards.
Emma
JGabriel: the people who get their social security checks would tell you it’s a thousand times better than default.
Jesus. We’re supposed to be the “bleeding hearts.” Hah!
Baud
@LongHairedWeirdo: I happen to think taxes are easier to demagogue, but we’ll see, since they’ll both be demogogued.
The tax cuts fight will be interesting. They are set to expire after the election. My guess is that the GOP house will pass a bill to extend all of them permanently, to try to set up a tax fight for the election. If so, we’ll see how committed the people are to tax increases.
Davis X. Machina
A ‘coherent Democratic Party agenda’ implies a coherent Democratic party. Go into the Senate (and to a lesser degree the House) and find me one.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Linnaeus: It would be nice if we could run a commercial explaining why batshit crazy should never be elected to office again. But it would fly over the heads of most voters, who would sit out the 2014 elections anyway.
JGabriel
@NR:
I think that’s kind of shit none of us wants to smoke.
.
Kay
@JGabriel:
Right,but I do want that addressed. If the cuts are backloaded, I think we have to fold that in, because then the stimulus argument becomes less persuasive.
It’s been bothering me, reading commentary, here and elsewhere, where cuts over ten years are being portrayed as immediate.
If that’s not true (and we don’t know yet) if they’re in fact backloaded, I think that makes the “austerity during a severe recession” argument less valid.
It’s been bothering me that I haven’t seen it, because it seems obvious to me. Backloaded (2014, 15, etc.) is different than 2012,again IF the argument is “continue spending levels to prop up a fragile economy”.
I don’t know why timing isn’t mentioned.
lamh34
cnn alert, POTUS speaking at 8:40pm EST tonight.
Linnaeus
@Belafon (formerly anonevent):
Sad, but likely true.
WereBear
President on in 10 minutes!
Baud
@Davis X. Machina:
I dare you to find me a coherent Democratic blog.
NR
The argument that $2.4 trillion in cuts with no revenue increases is a victory for our side is so completely disconnected from reality that there’s obviously no point in arguing with the person who made it.
Keith G
Question for Iamh34/Booman: So when did this picking up of balls and going home happen?
KCinDC
Baud, Congress could always pass a bill preventing the trigger from taking effect. It can’t tie its own hands to keep itself from passing new bills.
Felanius Kootea
I’m not seeing anything about having a debt ceiling debate again in a few months (which the Republicans wanted). If we have to go through this process again in a few months, won’t the ratings agencies downgrade the US?
Listening to Mohamed El-Arian this morning it sounded like the US would get downgraded no matter which way things go because any deal that cuts spending immediately without raising any revenue will hinder growth and cause more uncertainty, widening the income inequality that already exists. So thanks Republicans. I must say they weren’t joking about making Obama a one-termer. And they will try this against any other Dem President ever elected because Dems actually care about governing and Republicans only care about power. That’s their leverage. And people still go out and vote for them. If someone can figure out a way to get the House and Senate away from Republicans in 2012, that would be awesome. They have no business being in a position to hurt so many.
Sly
@JenJen:
Generally speaking, true. Two of the biggest “triggers,” if you want to look at them that way, are the Alternative Minimum Tax and the Sustainable Growth Rate formula in Medicare. Every year they threaten to impact their respective systems more than intended, every year someone says the system should be reformed in one way or another so that it won’t do that, and every year Congress just patches it until the next year.
Unless I’m mistaken, the plan takes a cue from what McConnell proposed and gives the President authority to borrow a second wave before the election, subject to a meaningless vote in Congress after which Republicans can run ads calling him a shiftless negro who doesn’t know how to handle money. So it does very little to keep it out of the press in a practical sense, but the hostage is essentially gone.
@Mark S.:
It’s basically the Simpson-Bowles Commission but made up entirely of current elected representatives and a the super-majority requirement for issuing a final report is done away with. So their recommendations are fast tracked. No amendments, just an “upperdown” vote.
It’s constitutional, since the only rules governing legislative voting in the constitution relate to quorums.
Davis X. Machina
@Baud: F*cing coalition politics. How do they work?
General Stuck
OBAMA SOLD US OUT!
wE’RE ALL GOONNA DIE
You think this is bad, wait till they find that Whitey Tape, again.
JGabriel
I know it’ll never happen, but, hey, here’s an idea:
Why don’t Senate Democrats take the investor class hostage in the same way that Republicans are holding a knife to the throat of the rest of us? Why don’t Senate Democrats tell the GOP, “Fine. Either way the rich are paying: through tax increases or defaulted bonds & unpaid contracts. Pick your poison. You want a banana republic, we’ll give you one.”
Oh, right. Because most of the Senate Democrats are in the investor class themselves.
Still, a boy can dream.
.
Baud
@KCinDC: Oh, I agree. But they would have to act affirmatively in one way or another.
Hell, this “deal” is supposed to be for 10 years. Do you think if the GOP took control of Congress and the White House in 2012, they would keep to its terms? They wouldn’t, and frankly neither would the Dems if they took control of the House.
JenJen
@Sly: Excellent summary, thank you. And I LOL’d too. :-)
President coming on the teevee in just a few minutes. And, for the record, I still think the House GOP nutters have the potential to sink this on the first try, a la TARP.
Kay
@NR:
That isn’t, actually, true, or you don’t know it to be true.
It’s over ten years. That could or could not be some cuts “during a recession”, but it is definitely not 2.4 trillion in cuts during a recession.
Ten years is 2011 to 2021.
KCinDC
I understand that once the tea party folks came in after the 2010 election there wasn’t much hope for anything good happening. My problem is with Democrats, including Obama, embracing the idea that spending cuts in the middle of a recession are not just unavoidable but actually a good thing. What exactly is their argument supposed to be when the economy gets worse after they’ve said that this sabotage will actually make it better? At least if they were criticizing the Republican insanity they could argue that Republicans were the ones responsible for killing the recovery.
The Sheriff's A Ni-
@Linnaeus:
To quote Davis from over at Booman’s: “The moment the polls closed last November the only operative question was ‘how bad?'”
CaseyL
@JGabriel: The deal as initially reported, I was inclined to agree that default would not be much worse, and might have the salutary effect of destroying some plutarchs as well as the rest of us.
But the deal as currently described is… bearable (which is why the GOP will kill it in the House).
It’s quite possible that, in order to get a deal through the House, Obama will make it as bad as initial reports suggested.
This is like what happened after we invaded Iraq: there are no good options, just least-awful ones.
JPL
Thanks for letting me know about the Presidents’ plan to speak.
Is Josh Marshall going to have an update that asks what would Hillary of said?
In the magic land where fairies reside, I guess someone will fill us in.
Davis X. Machina
No! Not my Plutarchs!
CaseyL
Breaking on MSNBC: Obama will address the nation;like, now.
(This is a hell of a time for my cable to be on the fritz! Someone live blog this, please!)
Davis X. Machina
@JPL: Ten bucks says he doesn’t mention the public option once.
Corner Stone
Anyone still want to say there will be no deal?
4jkb4ia
Kay, it says that $900 billion is cut now, and $1.5 billion is up to SuperCongress, so you don’t know how much of the whole deal is going to be cut now. You only know about the $900 billion.
(As long as I am here, I was grimly satisfied to see Catherine Rampell, an actual economics blogger, mention “austerity measures” in her story yesterday. I was also grimly satisfied to see the whole NYT pitch in on the “No one knows what will happen if we default and this is terribly scary” tip. Maybe it had some effect. Who knows.)
Corner Stone
BALANCE!!
CaseyL
never mind I got it on-line
Corner Stone
SUPER COMMITTEE!!
Kay
@KCinDC:
Obama never actually said that. What he said was that he wanted a deal that cut spending in such a way as to not “harm the recovery”. That means he was looking at timing.
You can argue that his broader message was wrong, austerity, etc. but I don’t know that he ever endorsed cuts in the middle of a recession.
But we’ll see what the timing looks like.
boss bitch
@NR:
the cuts happen over 10 years and the expiring tax cuts will supply the revenues.
Corner Stone
Turn that fucking cel phone off! How rude!!
lamh34
@NR: well then that’s the end of the discussion then.
CaseyL
Still not a goddamn word about the fucking Tea Party traitors.
Corner Stone
@boss bitch: HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!
CaseyL
Well, that was quick. I missed hearing him say whether it would pass the House, what if any last minute changes have been or will be made. Did he mention that at all?
arguingwithsignposts
That statement was weak shit.
Corner Stone
@lamh34: Booman is a fluffer of the highest order. It’s like asking someone to go read RedState on the winger side for reinforcement.
Frankensteinbeck
Listen. I keep hearing this ‘we’ve embraced austerity economics’. This is absolute bullshit. We are stuck in a situation where, because the GOP is insane and controls the House, we cannot PASS any of the additional stimulus that the Democrats want – and that, among others, Nancy and Obama have both said they want. We can’t get it. Period. All we can do is fight off the constant attempts of the Tea Jerks to gut spending even further, which they will use every hostage-taking moment to demand. This is different than ’embracing’ anything. The 2010 midterms fed us this shit sandwich, and that sandwich is the Tea Party. The Democrats at the top don’t like it any more than you do.
Mark S.
Yeah, the cutting 10 cajillion dollars over ten years is all bullshit, because there’s nothing preventing the next Congress from undoing all of it (you know, when we have supermajorities in both houses (man, this is some good crack)).
But there will be no tax increases next year. If Super Congress puts any in, every gooper will vote against it and the $1.5 trillion in spending cuts take effect (well, sort of).
Baud
Prez says leaders of both parties in both chambers have agreed to deal. That contradicts earlier reports indicated that Pelosi might not support it.
Linnaeus
@The Sheriff’s A Ni-:
That’s pretty much the only question I’ve been asking ever since then. Now it’s time to plan a way out.
NR
Over at the GOS, Hunter points out that this “compromise” includes everything the far-right wanted:
But keep going on about how this is a win for our side.
Emma
KCinDC: they’re not embracing it. They have to deal with a bad reality, which is, the Tea Party managed to get a whole bunch of wingnuts into the House and the Senate’s Blue Dog democrats are to the right of moderate Republicans. Not much leverage for progressive democrats.
Frankensteinbeck
@Baud:
Let me also point out that ‘we’re going to cut spending a few years from now’ has a GREAT track record of actually happening in our government.
General Stuck
At this point, if the wingers can’t muster the votes to pass this with a GOP majority in the House, whatever happens after that is plastered to the rumpus of the republican party.
Corner Stone
God, Luke Russert apparently can’t read English.
arguingwithsignposts
Totally off the budget topic, I notice that in this thread, it is *K*ay. In other places, it is *k*ay. Are there two “kay” bloggers?
(just kidding, but something to lighten the mood)
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Hell, we couldn’t get it in the fall of 2010 when the Dems controlled both houses, theoretically.
NR
Are you seriously naive enough to believe that the tax cuts are going to expire?
Kay
@4jkb4ia:
I think we’re reading two different articles.
Approved now. The whole fight on the 1.2 T is over timing. When. Not what.
CaseyL
@Baud: Thanks, Baud. If Nancy has agreed to it, the Dems will back her. But Boehner can’t speak for his caucus, most of whom want to shiv him almost as much as they want to shiv the country.
Amy
It’s a crappy deal. It would be crappy if the president was a Republican and it’s crappy now.
And I’m not going to defend it in any way.
Because it’s, you know, crappy.
lamh34
@Corner Stone: I don’t agree with you on that but the fact that we dont’ is probably no surprise to you or I..
Corner Stone
@Frankensteinbeck: How would we ever know? No one is even trying.
At least the crazy fucking nutters are trying for a BBA.
Our side will never actually know the results.
Baud
@Frankensteinbeck: If the Republicans sweep in 2012, I promise you neither deficits, nor debts, or spending will be a national issue anymore.
burnspbesq
Our Lost Decade is going to be much worse than Japan’s.
Corner Stone
@lamh34: Nah, no surprise. He’s infamous for it. Far and wide across the toobz.
And I’m not crying any crocodile tears about reporting this to you either.
fasteddie9318
Don’t worry about revenues, folks! Ezra says the Democrats might totally take a hard line on the Bush tax cuts, since they’ll have all the leverage at that point, and I totally believe that’s what they’ll do! #iliveinanalternateuniverse #alsotooidropashitloadofacid
WereBear
I can only hope that a bunch of fancy underwear in expensive digs got threatened this past week. The banksters made this monster; they should be thinkng about going out with some torches and hunt it down.
General Stuck
@NR:
Hunter is wrong or has a memory or cognitive problem. The wingnuts don’t care about spending cuts, they don’t even care about the economy, and certainly not the welfare of the American people. They started out with the firm declaration of destroying “obamacare” and making Obama a one term president.
And if they could lop off some of the innards of the other dem New Deal crown jewels, then that would be gravy. They didn’t get that. So actually, they didn’t get a single thing they really wanted, unless you want to be dumb and insist they wanted to lower the debt. That was just the weapon they were trying to use to get at the ACA. and or medicare. medicaid, etc…. The closest they came was with “possible” cuts to medicare providers, which isn’t all that bad an idea, overall. Next question
OzoneR
@JGabriel:
because their base would never back them up.
Corner Stone
@NR:
Her super very special mental communications have told her that her boyfriend will let the tax cuts expire.
Corner Stone
What the hell is the “defement” ?
Russert keeps saying that.
Mark S.
@Corner Stone:
2010! 2010! 2010!
/OzoneR
Linnaeus
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Right. I’m definitely not of the view that Republicans = Democrats; there is a clear difference, and the Republicans are far worse. But there are enough Democrats who are buying into austerity such that the power of the Republican majority in the House is magnified , and that’s one reason why I used the term “embracing”. It’s a trend that’s been going on for years.
Frankensteinbeck
@Baud:
I agree, actually. Unfortunately, they’ll focus on more wars, massive deregulation and lowering taxes on the rich, making abortions illegal, gutting the safety net to funnel that money into more tax cuts, rigging the election laws so that another black man can never become president, and then they’ll get ambitious…
CaseyL
Obama rushed in with an announcement that makes bare bones look nicely fleshed. It’s 9:00 back East; I’m thinking he wanted this to be the last word on the subject before the markets open in Asia and here.
Not sure what happens when/if the “deal” goes bust.
Reality Check
Luke Russert=nepotism of the worst kind.
General Stuck
Well, crappy
OzoneR
@NR:
if Obama doesn’t bring them up again, they expire. If he decides to do some bullshit trying to end them for the rich and continue them for the middle class, he’ll get rolled and be forced to sign them for another extension. It’s always been that way.
Barack Obama will never win a negotiation in the way to please some partisan liberals. It will never happen and that was clear before the Iowa caucus.
boss bitch
@Corner Stone:
still hear that sound when you look in the mirror do you?
JenJen
Via WaPo, here’s Boehner’s presentation, errrr, pitch, which accompanied his caucus conference call.
PK
Yep. Don’t think think there is a final deal here – doubt very much they have the votes in the house – but they had to reassure the world.
MomSense
Oh man, I am sick to death of the “Obama caved” meme. Do jr high and high schools not teach basic civics classes anymore? I either need to turn “Obama caved” into a drinking game or just avoid the internets all together because the sky is falling and poutrage are off the charts right now.
Corner Stone
@CaseyL:
He’s trying to Big Truck the deal and put his stamp on it to make sure it can’t be undone.
If people here think he would come out and say what he did without almost 100% understanding that it’s done…hell, I don’t know what to say to that.
JGabriel
@CaseyL:
It’s possible you and Kay are right. I don’t know. I’m not ready to accept that yet. Right now, the infuriated lefty in me is dominating over the thoughtful intellectual.
Maybe I should postpone commenting on this stuff a little while, until I feel less ranty.
.
Corner Stone
@boss bitch: bitch, you’re about the most naive and deluded individual here.
And laughingly, you keep proving it, time and again.
boss bitch
@NR:
I believe the tax cuts for the top will expire and Obama will extend for the middle class.
And if you don’t believe they will expire then why the hell where you expecting them to be in the debt deal now?
NR
@OzoneR:
FIFY.
Scott P.
And this is the difference between Republicans and Democrats. The Tea Party has threatened to primary any Republican who votes for any tax increase. And everybody from Boehner on down is scared.
Meanwhile, the left sputters, but cannot provide an analogous threat to primary any Democrat who votes for either an austerity package or for renewal of the Bush tax cuts.
You want leverage, you’re going to have to go out there and get it.
4jkb4ia
That wasn’t clear. They are going to arrange for $1.2 trillion now. You know how much of the $1.2 trillion is going to be cut in one year. You know nothing about the additional $1.2 trillion because they haven’t found it yet.
Even if this means that my husband could get laid off, I am so relieved. This might have meant he didn’t get paid at all in the near future. I may go and buy the 16-dollar pizza–and have a beer. It’s Rosh Chodesh as it is.
(The 16-dollar pizza has mushrooms, black olives, and some other things)
(Yesterday I also learned that the only alcohol you have to stay away from during the 9 Days is wine. Beer is OK.)
The preceding is contingent on leadership actually whipping votes.
Corner Stone
@PK: If the deal doesn’t get done after the president comes out and says this…why would anyone ever listen to him again?
SensesFail
I was just reading some firebagger comments over at the Daily Kos. I couldn’t take it for very long. “Obama’s weak”, “He’s a one-term president”, “He sold us out”, blah blah blah…
Aside from punching every Tea Bagging Congressman/Congresswoman in the neck, what the fuck was the President supposed to do?
Someone had to be the adult, and President Obama stepped up and assumed the role.
OzoneR
@boss bitch:
How is that getting through Congress?
Cat Lady
I’m no longer able to get out of the boat. Will it pass the House with Pelosi’s group or Cantor’s?
PK
After reading Boehner’s presentation, no way they have a deal and doubt this thing staves off a downgrade even if they do.
Look at the mechanism for the next round of debt ceiling hikes. Look at the hijinks they can play around that.
This thing is a shit sandwich on steroids.
Corner Stone
@boss bitch:
Again you mean? Like the last time?
MikeJ
@4jkb4ia:
Shhh. Herman Cain will assume you’re trying to institute sharia law.
Corner Stone
@SensesFail: Only Adult!
Felanius Kootea
@Felanius Kootea: Just listened to what Obama said. $1 trillion in cuts spread out over 10 years doesn’t sound that bad. And maybe the congressional commission will be able to close tax loopholes no matter what the Republicans say today, since most Americans (Repubs and Dems favor tax increases as well as spending cuts).
Jeffro
Just watched our Prez deliver his quickie speech…couple of thoughts:
It appears (and I use that word hesitantly)
– the debt limit will be squared away through Nov 2012
– no hit to Soc Sec
– $1T in cuts over 10 years, back-loaded (he said something about the cuts not hitting ‘during our fragile recovery’)
– No tax increases of any kind, even closing loopholes
– something about the Super Congress or whatever having to come up with a ‘sustainable path to paying off the debt’ etc etc or else spending cuts come in for both sides
So…conversation amongst the talking heads on MSNBC switched quickly, and rightly so (and frankly, even Luke Russert caught this, so I have to rethink whether or not I am really all that insightful around the family room yelling at the TV anymore) as to whether or not the Orangeman is going to be able to deliver enough R votes to get this passed.
LOL
$100B in cuts a year in a $3T budget is a rounding error, especially with troop drawdowns and savings from Obamacare.
Given how reluctant Obama was to take it to the Rs, and how much I thought we were potentially about to lose to the hostage-takers, I’m good with this.
OzoneR
@SensesFail:
At least two people told me yesterday on another blog that he should have let the country default to protect “the very vulnerable”
no, seriously.
Kay
@JGabriel:
I’m not saying it’s bearable or unbearable.
I’m saying “cuts in the middle of a recession” have to be cuts in the middle of a recession.
If they’re not in the middle of the recession, then that argument needs to be altered to fit with reality, because that whole line of thought hinges on when.
If I say to you, “1.2 T in 2016”, you can’t come back with “in the middle of a recession”. You can come back with something, just not that.
General Stuck
@JGabriel:
If you want, I could call you a firebagger. That might snap you out of it. Or, unless there’s a Unicorn handy to hug.
JGabriel
@Corner Stone:
I don’t know about that. Obama acknowledged that it could still fall through.
Making the announcement before the House is on board, though, seemed likely to guarantee that the House GOP will oppose it. Was that Obama’s goal, or was his goal to force the House Dems to support it?
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Baud
@Jeffro:
BURN THE HERETIC! :)
Lolis
It is good Medicaid is protected. As for Medicare, provider-side cuts are usually changed by the so-called “doctor fixes” aren’t they? Medicare has doctors with power and money who will lobby to make sure they get paid more. They will be able to fight any cuts and win. Medicaid has poor, disabled, and generally disenfranchised people who need someone to fight for them. This deal sucks, no doubt about it, but I am pleased Obama fought for Medicaid recipients.
CaseyL
@Cat Lady: If it passes, I think it’ll be Pelosi’s leadership that puts it over the top. I expect the Traitor Party to all vote “No.” (They don’t like the defense cut triggers.)
OzoneR
Well, first off, we’re not in a recession, the economy grew at over 1%, that’s not the definition of a recession.
If you think the cuts could trigger a recession, well, ok, maybe. i don’t particularly think so and actually I think if anything does, it’ll be the defense cuts, which appear to be pretty big.
Frankensteinbeck
@Linnaeus:
Who are these Democrats who are buying into austerity? We had a small handful of Blue Dogs who bought heavily into being the Democrat who doesn’t stand with Democrats in the last congress. Most of them are gone now, anyway. The Democrats as a party don’t stand for austerity. Whether or not the deficit has to be fixed eventually is a separate issue, and everybody important on our side has said that.
Nobody buys into ‘austerity’ in our government. Half our government buys into ‘Use the power of the purse strings to strangle Obama’. The MEDIA believes in austerity totally, that I’ll grant.
JPL
Does anyone remember why the President accepted the extension
of the Bush Tax Cuts?
Personally, I am disappointed in President Obama. How dare he, interrupt programing in order to calm the markets. I thought he was going to speak to me.
NR
@General Stuck: The Republicans get two more debt ceiling votes, they get the “Super Congress” with automatic spending cuts if nothing is agreed upon, they get no new revenues. Except for the BBA, that is everything they wanted.
You can’t spin this. This is a complete victory for the right.
El Tiburon
So dems control the WH and the senate yet this on the tea baggers?
Sorry.
This is all on Obama and the dems.
Period. We all got rolled again because Obama insists on negotiating with terrorists.
This will never end. He refuses to lead. He is a failure.
Long live lilly Ledbetter. That’s all he got. Oh, and the Heritage Foundation healthcare plan.
Mark S.
@OzoneR:
Is there some reason why the Republicans can’t bring them up?
MikeJ
@Jeffro:
I’m reminded of the budget deal that caused howls of pain from the manic progressives until the grown ups figured out Obama rolled the GOP.
$500 billion in military cuts sounds like a good thing to me. It will be interesting to see what the rest is.
NR
@boss bitch:
That’s exactly what he said the last time. Why should anyone believe that this time will be any different?
Jeffro
@Baud: Too reasonable?? I could always take it up a notch…just not sure which direction…lol
I’m loving the thought of Teabagger congressmen trying to figure out which way to vote here. So many conflicting priorities! The Kenyan wants it…but it has spending cuts…but Obamacare is still preserved…but…but…
Ok, with that in mind I am another 2% heretic ;)
boss bitch
@Corner Stone:
zzzzzzzzzzz
PK
If that presentation is correct, they have a path to getting the BBA. If the commission cannot agree on cuts…no second debt ceiling raise *unless the BBA goes to the states*.
Wanna bet on that BBA?
boss bitch
@Corner Stone:
zzzzzzzzzzz
you’ve made that same comment to several others here.
NR
@Scott P.:
“The Republicans fear their base. The Democrats hate theirs.” -David Frum
Cat Lady
@CaseyL:
Thank you. I’ve got my fingers over my eyes.
General Stuck
The wingers are already scheming to weaken the enforcement trigger of the deal they just agreed to. Folks of the left underestimate the love for mil spending from the wingers. It is at least as passionate as liberals have for social programs. But except for medicare service providers, every other dem sacred cow has a fence around it. But nothing like that for the mil cuts. If anything sinks this deal it will be winger rejection of the military cuts, that they are hand and glove with the MIC.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@El Tiburon: Blah fucking blah.
JPL
NR.. The Republicans do not want to cut defense. That’s the poison pill in the debate. Unless that is stripped from the bill, I’m not concerned. The Bush tax cuts will expire. The President agreed to the first extension because for him and a lot of the unemployed, it was a tradeoff.
JGabriel
@Kay:
The deal is being struck in the middle of a recession/depression which we don’t know will be over by 2016.
I think it’s a fair enough formulation. Making any plans for austerity measures on specifically dated schedule — rather than depending on a variable like once GDP is growing at X% — seems like a risky path to embark upon.
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KCinDC
Jeffro, to get the debt limit to go through Nov 2012, doesn’t that require the second hostage-taking later this year, where the Super Committee’s recommendations need to be implemented?
boss bitch
Democrats don’t hate their base they just know that they all don’t read and/or care for The Daily Kos. And its pretty hypocritical to call Boehner weak for running to Rush Limbaugh for approval and then want Dems to do the same with prominent liberals.
fasteddie9318
WHY THE FUCK IS PISSANT PIECE OF SHIT ERICK ERICKINGTON ERICKBLOOD ERICKSON THE ERICK BEING QUOTED EVEN ON NETWORKS WHOSE MONEY HE ISN’T STEALING?
Baud
@NR: Jesus, they “get two more debt ceiling votes”?? They wanted to make Obama do this again in 6 months. How are meaningless votes a complete victory? The Super-Congress gets to consider tax reform. The Republicans didn’t want that. Half the automatic spending cuts comes from defense. The Republicans didn’t want that either.
OzoneR
The November elections were a complete victory for the right, everything else is just table dressing.
Anyway, they have to contend with huge defense cuts, which I don’t even think is a good idea, and no cuts to entitlements. Any cuts won’t be until FY2013. That’s not a victory for them. Also, the debt ceiling is raised, first at all, and then till 2013, also not a victory for them.
This isn’t a victory for anybody. You don’t “win” these scenarios, you just solve them. The only real victory the right has is they successfully demoralized the liberal base by forcing this whole thing to begin with.
4jkb4ia
@Kay:
And there may not be any fight over the $1.2T at all. This $1.2T might be what both sides agree would have to be cut anyway, and the second $1.2T might be what they are afraid of taking back to their base.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
Here a little sample of Janey’s blog, Senor Tiburon
MomSense
@Senses Fail
Apparently in the fdl/daily kos land, there is no need to secure the votes to pass legislation.
They think that somehow the President can just shout ultimatums at Congress people and dazzle them with his toughness and they will cave and vote for perfect legislation. Of course there are no special interests, lobbying money, campaign concerns, conservative Congressional Districts in this magical land.
JGabriel
@fasteddie9318:
Because PISSANT PIECE OF SHIT ERICK ERICKINGTON ERICKBLOOD ERICKSON THE ERICK is a mainstream Republican.
.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
“The chattering class of both extremes are going to go nuts on this tonight”
Luke Russert
Uncle Clarence Thomas
@lamh34:
.
.
Good point. Here’s a perfect example of that –
That quote is from some babbling idiot named “Booman.”
.
.
Frankensteinbeck
@boss bitch:
It’s a good point. The Dems don’t hate their base. The Dems have a ludicrously small whiny rump of people who scream that the sky is falling and are sure they’re right because they can remember twelve other times they screamed the sky is falling so there must be a pattern. Those people are disproportionately loud, but they’re very few.
Jeffro
Take a second folks and think about what it means, strategically, for the Rs to have to accept defense cuts and tax increases, if that’s what happens down the road (which frankly Obama make more likely and quite likely, respectively).
Since they have made balancing the budget such a do-or-die thing, worthy of US default and worldwide panic n’ all.
I’m not quite ready to drink the 11-dimensional chess kool-aid yet, but I’m not really seeing a path to Republican resurgence here.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Raven (formerly stuckinred): Really? Because he made his base so happy trying to get reelected. Somehow I think this whole thing shows he’s not trying to get reelected.
Cat Lady
@Raven (formerly stuckinred):
Both sides do it!
SiubhanDuinne
I truly hate the new buzzword “Super Congress.”
Hateithateithateit.
Emma
El Tiburon: listen, you moron, that “Heritage Foundation health plan” will allow my best friend to buy insurance after living on charity for years. AND another friend to keep her severely asthmatic child insured while she goes to college.
And all the gays in the military thank you for your caring.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@Belafon (formerly anonevent): I just cut and pasted it. The block quote format sux.
Frankensteinbeck
@Baud:
NR does not grasp that on those votes we hold the hostage. Although I guess it’s possible, somehow, that the Senate will vote against raising the debt ceiling. Seems pretty damned unlikely.
OzoneR
@NR:
That because the Republican base owns the party, the Democratic base always tries to and then fails and then brings the whole party down with them.
JGabriel
@General Stuck:
Nah, that would either enrage me more or get me complaining about hippie-punching again — which is ironic, since, when it comes to actual dress, I tend to be a khakis & button-downs type and not so much the DFH.
But thanks for the offer. I know you meant well.
.
KCinDC
JPL, if the Bush tax cuts expire, then Obama will have broken his pledge not to increase taxes on those under $250k. There’s no way he’s going to do that, so he’s going to extend the tax cuts for those under $250k. The Republicans will once again hold that hostage to make sure the cuts are extended for those above $250k also, just like last time, and plenty of Dems will be arguing for that too, just like last time.
Can you explain how you expect it to turn out differently?
General Stuck
@NR:
Obama gets to raise the debt ceiling on his own signature, and the congress gets to do meaningless votes to whine about it. That cannot stop the debt ceiling from being raised.
The super commission was a desperate measure Mcconnell came up with to rescue the House wingers that were taking the party down with them toward a certain default they would get blamed for. And anything the commission decides on can be vetoed by the president, and nearly all of the social safety net is off the table. But mil spending cuts are not.
And the commission debate will be an excellent venue for wingnuts to advocate more for entitlement cuts and dems can rub their noses in it, and holler they want to destroy medicare, and point at them for protecting the rich from paying higher taxes.
The more I read about it, the better I like it. And it nukes the wingnuts raving about tax and spend liberals meme.
Mark S.
@fasteddie9318:
Because he’s the only rightwing blogger who owns a shirt with a collar.
Kay
@4jkb4ia:
I have to think about this whole “Congress passes the balanced budget amendment”. I don’t think one session of Congress can bind the next. If I’m elected as a brand-new House member, am I BOUND by this deal? I have to “pass” a balanced budget amendment?
I don’t think so. What are they going to do? Throw me out for not voting to pass a balanced budget amendment in a deal I had no part in?
I don’t know that the Tea party can over-write our whole system of government with their fucked-up invented law.
Frankensteinbeck
@General Stuck:
Oh, and really, don’t forget that all the cuts that are already specified are in the distant future. Seriously, does congress EVER follow through on future spending cuts?
Mr. Poppinfresh
Yeah I must be a “firebagger” who wants to see the “whitey tape” because I think it’s fucking ludicrous that the Democratic party’s default position throughout these negotiations has been to accept massive social service cuts in the middle of a recession. “Eat your peas”, elderly!
Never mind for one minute that the fucking 11-dimensional supergenius president you people adamantly refuse to criticize got us into this fucking position in the first place by extending the fucking Bush tax cuts in return for a pittance in unemployment benefits. Now those benefits are gone, and with that huge gaping hole in revenues blown into the budget we’re suddenly “forced” to cut even more critical core parts of the social safety net.
I don’t know what’s worse- the fact that we have zero leverage, or the fact that even if we did Obama quite clearly wouldn’t use it since he is a fucking mainstream corporatist Democratic Wall Street fluffer, just like fucking Clinton before him, happy to put Bernanke and Geitner in charge of the economy and to make little old ladies pay for the privilege of his benevolent bipartisanship.
And now they’re horse-trading away the most vital components of the “trigger” clause, too, so that when the Catfood Commission is finally done and releases its findings, Republicans can refuse to adopt any of it because it requires $.01 in tax increases for Fabrice Tourre and his buddies, so the “trigger” goes into effect gutting social programs further because why the fuck not if you’re a Republican. It’s not like Obama is going to go after them for it, either, since it seems to be his preferred solution too!
Who the fuck needs a Republican president when Obama’s pulling a fantastic Nixon-going-to-China for them in the name of “compromise”. After all, selling out bedrock Democratic principles and snidely referring to it as eating one’s peas won’t catch you the least bit of heat from the people, apparently.
This is going to deepen the recession, hurting millions of poor people. It’s trillions of dollars that will come out of the EPA, Medicaid, school meal programs for poor kids, and a host of other stuff that’s going to devastate people all over the country.
But I guess I should just shut up and eat my fucking peas, because to do otherwise makes me a dirty Firebagger (extra funny, since I have never read a main-page FDL article in my life). I’m glad I left the fucking country and plan never to return, because if you assholes and Obama are the ‘left wing’, the United States are going to shit even faster than I’d have thought possible, and I want nothing to do with it.
4jkb4ia
@MikeJ:
Definitely. I have to eat a big meal because Ramadan is starting tomorrow.
Mark S.
You know, even though we’ll save well over $500 billion in military spending over the next ten years if we just get out of Iraq and Afghanistan, I could see a bunch of goopers voting against this deal because it might just maybe cut defense spending. I’m not sure this thing is going to pass.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
.
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History, and History’s doormats – balloonbaggers – will record this as President Obama’s finest hour.
.
.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Raven (formerly stuckinred): I realized you didn’t write it. Don’t take my statement as being in response to you, just the quote.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
@Mr. Poppinfresh: How bout no body gives a fucking rats ass what you do? Stay where you are.
Zach
So the kick-the-can-down-the-road option is passing a Balanced Budget Amendment out of Congress? That’s genuinely scary and hopefully not reflective of the actual deal. I can easily see a Balanced Budget Amendment securing enough states’ approval for ratification given how easy it is to game low-turnout off-year elections in most states.
Jeffro
@KCinDC: Isn’t the Super Duper Congress supposed to recommend a path to a balanced budget, or else automatic cuts to entitlements AND cuts to defense kick in? Which lobby’s going to put more pressure on Congress, do you think?
Also, since letting the Bush tax cuts expire solves half of the deficit problem itself, when 2012 rolls around that should be a no-brainer. Heck, you might even start to split the under-$250K Rs away from their party by then, since…
…no wait, that’s enough Kool-Aid for one night =)
Reality Check
I hope you all learned one thing from this–
The GOP always wins in the end. Always.
Davis X. Machina
@Raven (formerly stuckinred): Figured as much. Sort of sad to read, though.
Baud
@Zach: Last I heard, the deal requires a vote in Congress on the BBA. The vote will fail. It needs 2/3 of both houses to pass.
Frankensteinbeck
@Zach:
The details I saw said they just get a vote on it. It doesn’t have to pass.
Raven (formerly stuckinred)
Reality Check
Yea, just tune in to the teabag cocksuckers and listen to em whine.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Mr. Poppinfresh:
Aren’t you glad you get to sit and write responses like that rather than govern?
I forget, who controls the House? And which body is charged with creating any bills that declare funding? And did you read the article above? Who got screwed?
robertdsc-PowerBook
The Rethugs held up a lot of the agenda at the end of the last Congress. In exchange for the extension, we got a year’s unemployment insurance, ARRA tax credits extensions, DADT repeal, food safety, and an arms control treaty with the Russians.
On a side note, my refund was bigger this year due to that agreement. The extra $400 from ARRA tax credits was Ok, but I knew it was Rethug blood money. Fuckers.
Arclite
This story needs tags:
FUCK THE POOR
FUCK THE MIDDLE CLASS
boss bitch
@NR:
What happened last time was that Democrats up for reelection didn’t want to decouple the cuts. So they put it off until after the election. More than a month passed before they took it up again and it died in the Senate. Obama stepped in and made a deal that benefited a lot of people. A fact that is left out when the liberals bring up the deal.
I personally think its absurd for liberals to complain about the tax deal while telling Obama that he shouldn’t be worried about the deficit.
Zach
@Baud: The excerpt says that the deal gives three options:
1) The bipartisan compromise plan is passed
2) Triggered cuts to defense and entitlements
3) BBA passed out of both Houses
My fear is that, if this is true, Congress will take the third option since it leaves the mess for someone else to deal with.
Edit: I understand that most of the compromises floated say that there must be a vote on the amendment; I think this requires that it actually pass to stop automatic cuts… of course, a simple majority (assuming no filibuster) in both Houses could just repeal this bill so it’s sort of a farce anyway.
Baud
@boss bitch:
Coherence and outrage don’t mix.
KCinDC
Jeffro, tax increases would be quite a lot for the Republicans to swallow. Fortunately for them, there are no tax increases in the deal.
The Super Committee that’s allowed to consider “tax reform” is half Republicans, and if it has 6 Dems then at least one will be a conserva-Dem, so I don’t think there’s much chance it’ll recommend any tax increases. If somehow it does, then the GOP will just ignore its recommendations and work on a bill for avoiding the trigger, or in the worst case they’ll just accept the Defense cuts, which they’re already working to lessen.
Look, I’m glad that the deal is not as bad as what people were fearing earlier (and that’s probably because it improved after the screaming about the trial balloons), but let’s not pretend it’s something it’s not. There are no revenue increases in the deal. It’s all cuts.
OzoneR
@Mr. Poppinfresh:
The odd thing about this analogy is that Nixon going to China is seen to this day as a high point of his presidency.
I wonder if what frustrates liberals is the possibility this could end up being a high point of Obama’s presidency.
agrippa
If there is a deal, the tea party hotheads will holler that they were betrayed.
if there is a deal, progressive hotheads will holler that they were betrayed.
If there is a deal.
JPL
@KCinDC: I don’t know but if I can speculate, he will call for middle income tax cuts and dare the house not to pass them.
He extended the Bush tax cuts for a few reasons, one being extending the unemployment insurance. At the time, that was the major bargaining chip.
agrippa
If there is a deal, the tea party hotheads will holler that they were betrayed.
if there is a deal, progressive hotheads will holler that they were betrayed.
If there is a deal.
agrippa
If there is a deal, the tea party hotheads will holler that they were betrayed.
if there is a deal, progressive hotheads will holler that they were betrayed.
If there is a deal.
NR
@boss bitch: Since you didn’t answer the question, I will ask again: Why should anyone believe that this time will be any different?
JGabriel
@Reality Check:
Regardless of what Fox News tells you, Reality Check, that thing at your end is called ass, and what comes out of it isn’t called win.
It’s called shit.
.
boss bitch
@Zach:
can you show me where it says the BBA will pass. All I’ve seen is that it will get a vote.
Felanius Kootea
@Kay: Was it “passes” or “votes on”? I don’t think the tea-partiers are crazy enough to think they can *force* congress to pass a balanced budget amendment and *force* two-thirds of states to ratify. They can propose it and it can be adopted or fail.
General Stuck
Now Ms P, things are not always as simple as they seem at first blush. And I suspect you are worried about stimulus to the economy, like we all are. But did you know, that the Bush tax cut extensions, along with a number of other stimulative measures that went along with the renewal, that Obama added, will keep about 500 billion bucks staying in the economy, from those cuts being spent by the middle class and poor? So letting the Bush tax cuts expire would have pulled that stimulus out of the economy when it was needed most, And would be an anti stimulus or sorts.
The wealthier cuts likely wouldn’t have that same stim effect, but it was not possible to decouple them from the middle class cuts. Plus, Obama promised to extend the middle class cuts for now in his campaign, and a lot of people would likely be not too thrilled to have their paychecks shrink at this difficult time. And it would have a minimal effect on our overall debt, for those two years.
dollared
Obama is doing his nonviolent resistance thing. he is showing the Republicans beating him and stealing his lunch money, live on national TV. He is hoping that this will cause the public to realize the immorality and illegitimacy of the Republicans’ rule over all of us, and we will rebel and put the Republicans out of power.
That makes him a moron. I’ve got to agree with Peggy Noonan. Obama the loser will be the theme of 2012. You can’t call people hostage takers and then negotiate with them. You can’t lose every game of chicken and say you are the brave one.
You can’t spend all your time preventing the damage that Republicans threaten. There is no reward for that. NONE. Clinton understood that and allowed the government shutdown. Two years from now, people will understand that that is why Clinton was re-elected, and Obama was not.
OzoneR
Well at least you admit he used the bully pulpit.
Mary G
Could be worse. Could be much better. Smells like gimmicky accounting like we have here in CA, but I hate the idea of default.
Linnaeus
@Frankensteinbeck:
The Blue Dogs are specifically whom I’m talking about, and the fact that they were in the position that they were at all is indicative to me that there’s a problem in the Democratic Party.
In a sense, you’re right. Whomever’s in power likes to spend; it’s more of an issue of what you spend on. And I should say that “austerity” is a heavily coded term in our current political context; we have austerity for those who have the least power to do anything about it and favored treatment for those who have the most.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that it’s enormously frustrating to me that the deficit is an issue at all at this point in time. Obviously we need to see more details about whatever deal that will emerge in the next day or so and it may not end up being as bad as it could have been. But this whole process has been a frustrating mess to me as a voter.
ChrisNYC
Emanuel Cleaver head of the Cong Black Caucus just said Medicare is “out of control financially.” Heresy. I guess he’s a Republican too. He needs to read DKos so they can teach him about being a Democrat.
Davis X. Machina
@Zach: Most state legislatures are full of chowder-heads who are taking a break from selling real estate, mortuary services or used cars, but most states have provisions in their constitution that their budgets be balanced — and they pull this trick off only because of what the fed gives them, or takes over the doing of from them.
They may like it in theory, but not be able to square it with their own state budgets. There are morons out there like Walker and Scott and LePage, but there are sane governors out there too, like Gov Heineman, (R-NE) already crying uncle.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
@SiubhanDuinne:
.
.
Me too. However, as the soul and Unitary Chief Justice of the new Super Supreme Court, I will enjoy ruling every bill they pass that I don’t like as unconstitutional even more than I enjoyed slapping down the pitiful regular Congress. My prestige and universal acclaim can only increase.
.
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Frankensteinbeck
@OzoneR:
That’s weird, but I wonder too. Will historians look back and say ‘For two years a batshit crazy reactionary party held control of the House of Representatives and used every critical vote as an excuse to try and gut the country – and Barack Obama snookered them again and again and again.’? He’s done it once. If this passes, it looks like it’ll be twice. I’m really not sure it’ll pass. The more I look at this, the more it seems like the joke is on the Tea Party, and they don’t accept anything but killing the hostage right now.
SiubhanDuinne
@4jkb4ia:
Ramadan Mubarak!
Baud
@KCinDC:
Some of the prior revenue increases that were being negotiated would have done something about the Bush tax cuts. At the time many people were saying the proposal was a bad deal because the Bush tax cuts wouldn’t automatically expire. Now that this deal is out and the Bush tax cuts were not touched, they are being ignored as part of the revenue side.
Felanius Kootea
@Reality Check: Yeah. That’s why we have President McCain, Vice-President Palin, a 15% flat tax across the country and the EPA and Department of Education have been abolished.
agrippa
Mr poppinfresh
get a grip.
Whether you do or do not is your affair.
And, stop whinng.
Elections have consequences. The GOP won the election in Nov 2010. fact of life.
There is another election in Nov 2012. Will you continue to whine until then? Your call.
OzoneR
This might be the most absurd thing I’ve read ever.
WereBear
I want to wake up in the morning and nobody has blown up the deal.
Emma
Jesus Christ. Does anyone here knows what it takes to pass an amendment to the Constitution? Congress passes it and it goes to the States. The time limit on passing one is 7 years, IIRC. The other way is for 2/3 of the states to call for a Constitutional convention.
Congress can pass whatever the hell they want. Until it’s passed by the states, it’s paper you can wipe with.
JPL
@SiubhanDuinne: I really hate ABC News trying to sloganize the partisanship that is occurring in the house… They have labeled it Countdown to Crisis and Deadline to Crisis.
BTW, I’m hoping sloganize becomes a word according to Websters. Of course I don’t have as much clout as Sarah so my hopes are set that high.
CaseyL
@OzoneR:
I freely admit I have no idea how this will shake out. But if this deal is the beginning of the end of the Traitor Party, it will rightly be seen that way.
Davis X. Machina
@Mary G:
You weren’t looking forward to the joys of reconnecting with the soil, learning a new skill set via subsistence farming, and generally enjoying a simpler life, sweetened with the cries of banksters losing their shirts?
Because that’s the worst that could happen. Really. Gotta trust me on this.
Frankensteinbeck
@Linnaeus:
I don’t like that the deficit is a talking point issue right now, either, but the media loves it, so it’s a talking point issue. The only question is how you play that game. Ignoring it never works either. I’ve liked Obama’s ‘blame Bush and the Republicans for squandering a surplus’, but between the MSM and the liberal blogosphere, no one’s willing to repeat it.
Mike in NC
@SiubhanDuinne:
Think of it in terms of the “superfund” programs that the EPA has used to clean up toxic waste sites. Makes much more sense then.
Reality Check
@Felanius Kootea:
I didn’t say we win every election, I said we always win in the end. Even when losing elections, we control the narrative, and we make it so Democrats can’t govern as Democrats.
Blow it out your ass.
boss bitch
@NR:
I can’t think of anything Obama would want badly enough that would make him agree to extend them again.
Mr. Poppinfresh
@OzoneR: The high point of his presidency will be cutting trillions of dollars of government spending during what is now probably a full-blown depression? O.K. then.
Honestly, some of you clearly haven’t thought through the ramifications of this and are merrily spinning this in the best possible light. You cannot wall of Medicare/Medicaid cuts by saying it will “only target providers”, because as has been shown to be the case in Florida, if you target the providers they just download the pain by refusing to accept people. If you wall off Defense spending, you are going to take a massive chunk out of every other functioning part of the government.
This is an unmitigated fucking disaster. Cuts of this size being pushed in a more or less bipartisan way during the middle of a depression is so laughably insane it’s like something out of Mark Twain’s nastiest satire. I never thought I’d live to see a self-inflicted gunshot wound of this size, let alone here so-called progressives applauding it.
Am I mad? Fuck yes I am mad. This is fucking awful. If you aren’t mad I don’t know what the fuck you could possibly be thinking. Saying “who controls the House?” as if that is a counter argument to Obama’s clear cooperation with the worst aspects of this process (EAT YOUR FUCKING PEAS ARE YOU KIDDING ME) is basically confirming to me that as of today I am officially a newly minted, hardcore accelerationist.
Corner Stone
@boss bitch: Oh honey, is your mental communication cutoff from your boyfriend?
Let us know when you get jacked back in.
4jkb4ia
@Kay:
I don’t think they do. The Boehner presentation said that they have three choices–
They can accept the Joint Committee proposal
They can send a BBA to the states
Or they can turn down any permission for Obama to increase the debt ceiling at all.
KCinDC
@Baud, the expiration of the Bush tax cuts isn’t being counted as part of the revenue side in the deal because it’s not in the deal. Why on earth would it count, especially since there’s absolutely no assurance that it’s going to happen?
Narcissus
Let me get this straight, but did the Tea Party just demonstrate that they control the country via blackmail? How is this not what is happening?
Emma
Mr. Popping Fresh: But you are so glad you left the country and you’re planning never to come back, so what’s bothering you? You won’t have to deal with the fallout in whatever nice safe place you will spend the rest of your days.
NR
@Baud: Stupid straw man arguments and reality don’t mix. The progressive position is not and never has been “Don’t worry about the deficit.” The progressive position (which is backed up by economic data and history, btw), is that the government needs to spend money to get the economy going again, and that tax cuts are not an effective form of stimulus.
Arguing from ignorance: It’s not just for conservatives anymore.
JPL
@Davis X. Machina: Not really. During a default, someone would not get paid. Right now the federal government pays additional weeks for the unemployed. When you look at the numbers, if bond holders, military and social security recipients were paid, there is not a lot left. Include Medicare and then you start to get stretched. That leaves Medicaid, and the unemployed who happen to be the neediest among us. The computers are not set up to send partial checks to social security recipients so that’s not an option.
boss bitch
@ChrisNYC:
those Black folks need to be reeducated.
General Stuck
@Mr. Poppinfresh:
Slow down, you move too fast
got to make the evening last
Mr. Poppinfresh
But I guess it’s basically just me and Krugman on a lonely island together arguing over who gets to commit suicide first. I’m sure the rest of you will be just fine with absolutely nobody looking out for your interests because they conflict with what the richest people in America want.
CaseyL
@4jkb4ia: But if I understand the thing correctly, Obama won’t need their permission. They can pass a resolution saying We Disapprove – but it has no force of law.
dollared
@Emma: Are you that fucking stupid? If it passes Congress, it will be ratified. The state legislatures have to balance budgets – they have no rhetorical tools to oppose the balanced budget.
The cycle is this simple: passes 2012, ratified 2015, recession 2016, depression 2018, ten fucking years of re-teaching Keynes, repeal 2030.
By that time we will be getting food assistance from Africa.
CaseyL
Hypothesis confirmed:
MikeJ
@JPL:
I will help repeatulate it.
Baud
@KCinDC: I agree it shouldn’t be counted as part of the deal. There reason it is important to take account of, however, is that, because the tax cuts automatically expire under current law, their expiration is part of the baseline used to calculate deficits over the 10-year horizon.
Anyway, I’m a little tired so if I’m not being coherent, I apologize.
Davis X. Machina
@Narcissus:
Quick! To the time machine! Undo the results of the mid-term elections while there’s still time!
General Stuck
A BBA needs a 2/3 majority vote out of both houses, and then ratified by 3/4 of the States. It will never make it out of congress, not the insane one the house wingers put together.
Mr. Poppinfresh
@Emma: Yeah fuck me for wanting to see my friends and family still in America do well, right? I’m such a dick for wanting to live in a country that reflects my values and doesn’t routinely engage in war crimes (and elects war criminals to the House, no less!)
Emma
dollared: Maybe I’m not as defeatist as you are. Maybe I think democrats in the states will have something to say about it. IF we don’t then we deserve it, don’t we?
MikeJ
@dollared:
Just like the ERA.
Baud
@NR: Thanks, NR! Now I know who to go to for the official progressive position on policy issues. Have a good night.
Davis X. Machina
@JPL: Shoot, I was going to raise llamas, and quinoa and embrace the simple life. Now it’s back to work in the fall, I guess.
Can you put a yurt on Craigslist? Or do you call a realtor?
PeakVT
@JenJen: Is it me or does the deal in Boehner’s presentation sound like a very different deal that what TPM previously reported?
Maybe Boehner is lying to his caucus, but “authorized to request” is not the same as “subject to a vote of disapproval”.
CaseyL
As much as I prefer to ignore firebaggers, I do idly wonder how many of them voted in ’10, and how many decided to “send a message” by sitting that one out…
… and whether they intend to repeat that spectacularly successful experiment in ’12.
JPL
In an ideal real, the house would pass a clean bill to extend the debt ceiling. They were holding us hostage but those who wanted to chance the default were not thinking about the neediest among us. Unless the treasury decided not to pay veterans or social security recipients, there was not enough money for everyone. The default would itself cause a trillion in spending cuts.
Am I happy about the situation, hell no but it is better than the alternative.
Elie
@boss bitch:
This.
thanks
cleek
@dollared:
and you’re gonna do what you can to make it so?
Emma
Mr Popcorn: Hey, I guess your friends and family, unlike mine, aren’t dependent on those social security and disability checks and would rather not have to beg while progressives such as yourself explain why their pain is worth it.
Lucky them and lucky you.
dollared
@MikeJ: You gotta do better than that. The exact reasons why ERA couldn’t pass are the reasons why BBA will. States are reactionary except for about 10 – and I used to count Minnesota, Michigan and Wisconsin among the 10.
Mark S.
@boss bitch:
Re-election.
Seriously, agreeing to let them expire so close to a presidential election was incredibly stupid, unless Obama wanted to extend them all along.
JPL
@Davis X. Machina: Follow your dream. If your dream is raising llamas, I say go for it and good luck.
boss bitch
O.M.G.
@dollared:
You need to calm the fuck down. BBA is going nowhere.
Call Obama and Dems weak all you want. Liberals are the most chicken shit defeatist cowards I have ever come across. As soon as a Republican opens their mouth you fold up in the corner and slit your wrists. You condemned the media but run around like lunatics at everything they say. Not only are some of you removed from reality but you’re complete morons as well.
Mr. Poppinfresh
…wow, that is a metric fuckton of attribution of motive to me with zero source, retard. Where the fuck did I ever suggest eliminating social security? If anything, I’m talking about saving it.
But whatever, you are clearly content to stand there and take whatever you are given from your wealthier betters. Hope that works out for you! I’m sure eventually some of that will trickle down to you through the Red Cross or whatever international humanitarian assistance agency replaces the soon to be deceased federal government.
MikeJ
@dollared: I’m still not convinced it will pass the either the house or the senate. There simply aren’t 2/3rds either place.
cleek
so, how are we hating Obama this hour?
dollared
@cleek: Uh, no, he’ll get my checks, my phonebanking, my public support. Did any of that help Walter Mondale? Jimmy Carter?
MomSense
@El Tiburon
So the problem is that President Obama negotiated with Republicans not that they were willing to let the US default? The problem is that we elected a bunch of crazy people to Congress. For that I blame all of the Dems who stayed home in Nov. 2010, our corporate media, the Citizens United decision, and the unprofessional left who have no understanding of the legislative process and instead just stomped their feet and felt betrayed and told people to teach the President a lesson and stay home in Nov.
dollared
@MikeJ: I agree. That is the firewall. I’m saying that if you let it past the firewall, it will be ratified.
Davis X. Machina
@JPL: Ran a spreadsheet — llamas only viable in a post-apocalyptic context.
Mnemosyne
@dollared:
You may want to look up the history of the ERA if you think it’s so easy-peasy to get the states to pass a constitutional amendment.
Joel
I haven’t had a single clue about what’s been negotiated in these cuts, the previously proposed cuts, or the ones before that, going on until eternity.
Honestly, I’m not sure I’ll have an idea even after they’re finalized.
Mr. Poppinfresh
From Boehner’s presentation, here are a few of the particulars:
“cuts government spending more than it increases the debt limit”
“Would cut & cap discretionary spending immediately, saving $917B over 10 years”
“no tax hikes”
“Requires baseline to be current law, effectively making it impossible for Joint Committee to increase taxes.”
“Failure to remain below [budget] caps triggers automatic across-the-board cuts (‘sequestration’).”
Second, $1.5 trillion tranche if Super Congress cuts adopted, or both houses pass a Balanced Budget Amendment.
If Super Congress fails to achieve at least $1.2 trillion in cuts, “across-the-board spending cuts would apply to FY’s 2013-2021, and apply to both mandatory and discretionary programs.”
“Total reductions would be equally split between defence and non-defense programs.”
Medicare not exempted from across-the-board cuts. Medicaid, Social Security, veterans, civil & military pay exempted.
Second tranche of the increase tied to the Catfood Commission’s recs being passed = lol fuck the poor.
Emma
So we’re all agreed? As soon as the Congress passes a BBA, then all the states will fall in line and EVERY DEMOCRAT AND PROGRESSIVE will turn lemming and commit suicide?
We are fucked. But the problem is us.
OzoneR
@Mark S.:
But I thought the public agreed with us on this issue?
cleek
@dollared:
see any Reagans in the GOP bullpen?
mr. whipple
@boss bitch:
This.
JPL
@Davis X. Machina: The House Republicans are in control at least until the next election and who knows what will happen then so keep your plans in your back pocket.
TenguPhule
Anything less then 80 teabagger heads mounted on poles outside the Whitehouse is capitulation.
Concerned Citizen
the dems need to let it all crash. leverage is lost if you negotiate with terrorists.
Brian R.
I thought that needed repeating.
If you’re bitching about how Obama sold you out, let me ask you first — did you work for a progressive House or Senate candidate in the last election? Did you volunteer? Did you call? Did you canvass?
No? Then kindly shut the fuck up.
PeakVT
@dollared: A large amount of federal spending is programmatic transfers to the states, which actually put the money into the economy. A BBA would put a huge dent in their revenues. So 3/4 of the states are not going to pass it. 1/2? Probably, in part because they know it’s a free vote. But not 3/4.
NR
@cleek: You should be a lot less concerned about disloyal lefties and a lot more concerned about the fact that this deal is going to lead to higher unemployment and a worse economy heading into an election year. If Obama loses next year, it will be because of that, not because a few people on a blog didn’t clap loudly enough.
cleek
@Concerned Citizen:
you might be surprised to learn that most people want nothing at all to do with your glorious cleansing economic misery.
OzoneR
@CaseyL:
Who cares? If Obama’s presidency relies on these emo cynical attention whores voting (it doesn’t), then its not worth it because they’ll be as much an obstacle to him as teabaggers. we’ll regroup with real liberals in 2016.
Elie
sigh — all the faux revolutionaries — wanting someone else to make the sacrifice while they get to hold the “principled” position/s.
You are so borrrring…
But of course, these are hard times and some of you are picking up spare change from your owners to come here and demoralize, minimize and otherwise disrupt under the guise of your ideological perfection…
Y’all have no leadership or management skills — have probably never done any large project or undertaking that required working with a lot of people to get something complex done — independent of something as fraught as politics. But you are doggedly stupid. Not unable to learn but unwilling to accept any evidence against your ideological point of view. You clog the blog with the same ol same ol ideological diatribes — like so much dead hair — you aint on someone’s head looking good or protecting the scalp, just plogging up the drain, waiting for the next DRANO treatment but really happy that no water gets through till then…its the least you can do, right/
Mr. Poppinfresh
@NR: Holy shit this.
How big of a partisan fucking asshole do you have to be when you apparently aren’t even blinking at the dismantling of the New Deal right in the middle of a depression said New Deal was designed to cushion.
Sang froid much?
OzoneR
@Concerned Citizen
Leverage is also lost when you let it all crash.
No, you’re right, the only terrorists we should negotiate with are Islamic terrorists.
It’s amazing how different liberal policy on terrorism changes between Al Qaeda and the Republican Party.
Mnemosyne
@Mr. Poppinfresh:
Good thing Boehner has been an honest broker and has always told the truth throughout this entire process. Clearly you can believe every word he says about the deal.
Davis X. Machina
@cleek: But then I get the llamas! Yay, llamas!
cleek
@NR:
is there anybody here who can change the deal ?
no?
looks like i’m left with laughing at firebaggers.
cleek
@Mr. Poppinfresh:
get a fucking grip.
reports say that SS is not part of this deal. Medicare wasn’t a New Deal program, neither was Medicaid. and neither are in danger of anything but tweaks – which would not be the first time they’ve been tweaked.
Mr. Poppinfresh
“Never mind this unprecedented attack on the poorest people in the country- I’d like to instead attribute a bunch of insane character flaws to people who disagree with me! They are probably dum dums who have never done anything with their lives.”
Honestly, you had me at “Y’all have no leadership or management skills”. Flawless lack of self awareness.
I’m sure your drinking water will be fine with no EPA, as long as I’ve been made to feel bad about my career choices.
JGabriel
@Emma:
Unless specified in the bill itself (as it sometimes has been), there’s no limit on passing a Constitutional Amendment. In fact, the last amendment to the Constitution, the 27th, was originally proposed in 1789 and passed in 1992 — 203 years later.
.
OzoneR
@NR:
Since the cuts don’t take effect until the election, I don’t see how that’s true.
different church-lady
It’s the internet, a place where any information you want is available for reference at any time, but nobody wants any of it.
Brian R.
Oh, and whoever thinks the Balanced Budget Amendment will pass Congress needs to put down the bong and go lie down in the Freakout Tent.
Cut, Cap and Balance only got 234 votes in the House. Show me the 55 members who didn’t go along with that idea as a law, but think it should be a constitutional amendment.
And then show me the 67 Senators who would vote for that too. Every Republican, plus Lieberman and Nelson and … who? Where are you going to get the other 18 Democrats who’ll defect?
Not. Going. To. Happen.
Davis X. Machina
@Mr. Poppinfresh:
What it is seems to depend on whom you ask.
Elie
@Concerned Citizen:
leverage for what you fool!? what is left if you crash the system to leverage for what? We are going to hold you hostage for your home worth zero and your empty savings account? whoa there, watch out for the goats and chickens in your yard since you can’t find food otherwise…but we are going to leverage this…
Moran. Good god, is this the best that the “LEFT”can do? You are dumber than the tea partiers. almost.
Brian R.
I’m sorry … do what now?
Did Boehner sneak in a repeal of the minimum wage? Or, you know, any kind of cut to Social Security?
Calm the fuck down.
CaliCat
I think it’s time to retire the phrase “shit sandwich”. It’s been done to death. How about barf burger or poo panini?
MazeDancer
If this deal passes, big if, we don’t default. This is what the country wants. Me too.
All 87 TParty House members think voting to raise the debt ceiling at all, even with it attached to the BBA, was a compromise. They like default. Michele Bachmann thinks default doesn’t matter.
The TParty thinks this deal is terrible. If it passes, the biggest immediate trigger will be Republican Wars. The Republicans candidates will all be yelling stuff at each other about betrayal and how default should have happened to set the country on its right course and how Boehner sold them out and RINO’s and all their stuff.
How does that help their Presidential candidate?
One commenter at RedState said something about how much they liked default because it meant an automatic 40% reduction in gov spending.
Americans don’t want default. The media has made it clear that default is a crisis. The mainstream Republicans have all signed on to default is bad. The TParty hasn’t. How is default is good going to win a Presidential election?
If no “balanced” approach has happened over the next year and no corporate loopholes closed and the rich are still getting off scott free, Americans will be pissed. And if the reason this happened is because of Republican Wars, and Republicans blocking any attempt at “balance”, this is not going to help their retaining Congress.
And if the Republicans prevent “balance” and the President doesn’t use “The Republicans are protecting the rich” as a talking point, then both he and David Plouffe will have lost their minds.
zzyzx
Here’s my initial reaction:
I’m looking at the details of the budget deal, and – yes – it looks like a Republican win. They got a lot of their demands in there and there’s no equivalent Democratic details in there. However, when I look closer, the one thing that I don’t see is who will be hurt by this. This reminds me of the budget deal that was a Republican win… until people started looking at it.
That’s the one thing that I really like about Obama, and what drives a lot of my political allies completely crazy; he doesn’t really care about winning. What concerns him is how to let the other side win, but to do so in a manner that takes away what would be bad about that. If we can get out of this imposed crisis with the damage being done mainly to the military budget and the profits of the health care industry (which is how I read this), I’ll be quite happy with it, regardless of how many victory points Republicans get to mock Democrats.
Ultimately it’s not about having points to attack the other side with (as much fun as that can be), it’s about making things better for people (or in this case, minimizing how much worse things would get). Quite a few times, it’s looked like Obama was using stupid tactics only to end up with a nice prize (e.g. Don’t Ask Don’t Tell). Fingers are crossed that a few years from now, we’ll look back on this as another example.
Mr. Poppinfresh
@Brian R.: Let’s see how blaze you are when the Catfood Commission’s findings are shockingly rejected by Republicans and across the board cuts go into effect.
Which will happen, just as the extension of the Bush tax cuts brought us here.
jon
Obama signed an extension of all the Bush tax cuts because he said he wanted to extend them for 98% of all taxpayers. He ran on that, and when given the option of screwing 98% of the people on a tax pledge or not screwing 2%, he decided not to screw 98% of us. I didn’t vote for him for the tax cuts, but he did make that promise. I wish he could have held his ground and let all the tax cuts expire, but I’m in a minority on this.
I’m not angry about the extension of the Bush tax cuts. I’m not happy he ran on it. I’m not happy it was used against him. And I’m not happy he will have it used against him again. But it’s the GOP that wants so desperately to preserve those tax breaks for the rich, not the Democrats.
NR
@OzoneR:
Wrong. According to what Boehner is pitching to his caucus, the deal “Would cut & cap discretionary spending immediately.”
Emma
JGabriel: I stand corrected. And absolutely gratified. We can drag it out for another 200 years. Well, technically not us…
danimal
I suspect this bill will squeak by in the Senate….and get crushed in the House (with an abundance of Republican Nos and quite a few Dem nos as well). Then an international panic will ensue as Wall Street finally figures out that we are governed by crazed nihilists.
Then, and only then, we’ll see a much scaled-back deal sail through both houses.
Phoenician in a time of Romans
There seemed to be broad agreement that any deal reached would include at least $2.5 trillion in spending cuts over the next 10 years, of which $1.2 trillion would be approved now.
[…]
Discuss.
Get ready for a long, hard recession. As in “Japan”.
Comrade Luke
Four more years!
cleek
@zzyzx:
i don’t get it. how does that generate the blissfully pure white-hot hatred of Obama that all good lefties are supposed to have?
just getting the job done without being able to proudly wave his cock from atop a pile of GOP skulls seems like a half-assed victory.
i need more.
my feefees need more.
my feefees.
me.
NR
@jon:
This analysis relies on the flawed premise that it was impossible to cut taxes for the poor and the middle class without also cutting them for the rich.
It’s easy. All you do is let the Bush tax cuts expire, then you propose the Obama tax cuts for everyone except the rich. You think the Republicans are going to vote against tax cuts?
NR
@cleek: Well, at least you admit that you’re being an asshole just for the sake of being an asshole. That’s something, I guess.
L. Ron Obama
With respect to the Bush tax cuts expiring and why Obama would want to extend them again — their extension will be a condition of raising the debt ceiling the next time. The only way this will not happen is if the 2012 Congressional elections are a massacre in reverse, and Dems are swept back into power with a convincing majority in both houses.
zzyzx
@Comrade Luke: well yeah, and that’s the downside of that strategy. It’s not conducive to winning elections.
Mr. Poppinfresh
@cleek: Please, please keep writing off trillions of dollars in government cuts during a depression as no big deal because firebaggers suck etc. etc.
It’s definitely helping to differentiate your form of partisan assholery from theirs!
OzoneR
@NR:
Oh Good God you’re an idiot, he’s lying. Ezra Kein, Dave Weigel and Meredith Shiner all said he was lying just now, and had a Twitter laugh over how he’s desperately trying to sell this to the tea party by lying.
That’s how I found out the cuts wouldn’t take effect until FY 2013.
Bruce S
#291 elie – so glad you’re not here to demoralize or minimize…
L. Ron Obama
So, to conclude, make it fucking happen, people.
Mnemosyne
@zzyzx:
It kind of amazes me how that “deal” has gone so completely down the memory hole, at least on the left. It totally neutered the Republicans and … crickets.
Now, of course, the new End Of The World As We Know It is here with no reference at all to the old End Of The World As We Know It having been a total bust. But I guess that when one is looking forward to the EOTWAWKI, one just ignores the countervailing evidence and plays up the remaining bits so you can crow about how you’re totally going to be right this time.
Brian R.
If by “across the board” you mean the targeted cuts that are specifically spelled out in the trigger legislation that only apply to defense and the provider end of Medicare, then yes, you’re right.
And by “the dismantling of the New Deal,” if you mean unwanted Cold War weapons programs at the Pentagon and insurance companies who act as middlemen for a Great Society program, then yes, you’re right.
Chad N Freude
@dollared:
You might want to rethink that.
Bruce S
Anyone who thinks the Dems are “winning” in the context of this debt ceiling deal is on crack.
OzoneR
@NR
Of course the Republicans will vote against tax cuts, now you’re going to insist they’re sane?
Brian R.
Well, that seals it. Boehner has never been wrong before.
NR
@L. Ron Obama:
They had that last time and still extended the tax cuts for the rich. Why should anyone believe that next time will be any different?
different church-lady
Well, why on earth are you doing THAT? Don’t you understand that snap judgments are the engine of the netroots?
Mnemosyne
@NR:
Because, of course, John Boehner has always told the truth and been completely trustworthy through this entire process. That’s why we have to rely on his reports to find out what’s really going on.
CaseyL
Firebaggers have no more credibility with me than teabaggers, so watching them go up in smoke over this actually makes me think it’s a good deal.
Now the stupid SOBs are again talking about primarying Obama.
As someone else has noted, working against the official standard-bearer of the Democratic Party worked out really well in 1968, 1972, 1980, and 2000.
I was one of the people who worked against Carter in 1980 (first for Ted Kennedy, then for John Anderson), and it was a lesson I will never ever forget, and a mistake I will never ever make again.
But Firebaggers? They never fucking learn.
Emma
NR: They have repeatedly voted against things they themselves have proposed as soon as Democrats, especially Obama, supported them.
They would vote against the Second Coming if it meant Obama would be going to heaven.
cleek
@Mr. Poppinfresh:
details, shmeetails. “cuts” are bad, no matter where they are!
what, fully half of them must come from defense spending ? SS; Medicaid; civil, military and veterans pay – all excempt ? nightmare. total nightmare. end of the new deal, end of the republic. good night Gracie. hand me my Mandarin primer.
OzoneR
@Bruce S: Nobody thinks the Dems are “winning”
karen
Firebaggers are really Tea Partiers. Firebaggers hate whatever they don’t control
They are Tea Partiers.
Firebaggers are willing to hold the country hostage to get what they want.
They are Tea Partiers.
Firebaggers act on orders they get from their masters.
They are Tea Partiers.
Firebaggers are in bed with Grover Norquist.
They are Tea Partiers.
Firebaggers hate Obama because they don’t get what THEY deem important.
They are Tea Partiers.
Firebaggers either pretend or have no idea how government works.
They are Tea Partiers.
Firebaggers believe that teaching their party a lesson is more important than what’s good for the country.
They are Tea Partiers.
Firebaggers would be fine with dictatorship and Presidency by Fiat as long as it’s THEIR views and values being espoused.
They are Tea Partiers.
There is no fucking difference between them.
There is no difference.
Mnemosyne
@NR:
I think you missed a few events in 2010. Like, say, the midterm elections.
Mr. Poppinfresh
@Brian R.: As I pretty clearly laid out above, there is no such thing as a “provider cut” for Medicare that spares recipients. None. Zero. It is a Medicare cut, period.
Specific parts of defense spending are being exempted, so that when all is said and done that money is going to come from the fucking VA or whatever else Republicans are willing to see be-shat by cuts. Frankly at this point I expect defense spending to be pulled from the trigger altogether, but we’ll see.
If you don’t think the trigger clause going into effect will result in more social service cuts (specifically the reaming of Medicare), you aren’t reading any of this.
On the other hand, the trigger NOT going into effect will just mean completely gutting the IRS, EPA, Interior, etc. etc. I can’t even decide which is worse, frankly.
Trillions of dollars of cuts in a depression. That’s what this is.
Trillions. Depression.
OzoneR
@Mr. Poppinfresh:
I see you’ve been out of the country long enough that you don’t know Defense and VA are two completely different cabinet departments and two completely different budgets.
Brian R.
This? Your fevered ramblings? No, I’m not going to read any of this.
I’m reading the details of the deal, as reported on TPM, and it sounds nothing like what you’re pissing your pants about.
But by all means, continue to freak out, and I’ll just start ignoring you.
Mr. Poppinfresh
You guys don’t give a shit how much this hurts millions of poor people as long as it infuriates some hazy concept of “firebaggers”. After all, “fully half” of those cuts might kind of sort of be good!
The rest? Uuh…
You have literally become what you purport to hate: so blinded by your fucking retarded internet partisan treehouse cootie-fight that you can’t see this for what it is. As long as Those Forum People are mad, I get a semichub! Hooray!
I’m done arguing, you guys win, you can go back to your fucking disgusting echo chamber of self-congratulatory crowing and calling me a cultist dedicated to a website I never read and don’t like. Good job, high five. I’m out.
Uncle Clarence Thomas
@karen:
.
.
Karen, not one thing you said is true. That makes you a liar, and therefore a potential teabagger.
.
.
Hound of Ulster
Liberals are wholly to blame for this outcome…because they, unlike conservatives, don’t punish their reps. for compromising. If guys like Baucus, Conrad, and Dan ‘douchebag’ Boren, knew that if they even had the prospect of a serious challenge from the left if they cut deals like this with the chuckleheads on the right, shit like this simply would not happen.
The Right owns this, and similarly to how forced busing, Roe v. Wade, the EPA, and affirmative action (all supposed triumphs of liberalism) occurred under a conservative president, and ultimately rebounded against liberalism in the 1970s, leading to Reagan, this austerity drive, a triumph of conservatism occurring under a liberal president, and which will not work, will rebound against conservatism.
and Obama will win re-election, as his opponent will be Bachmann.
zzyzx
The thing is that no one likes this deal. It’s just for me it seems better than a default/fairy dubious 14th amendment argument followed by impeachment hearings.
OzoneR
@Mr. Poppinfresh:
Really, you’re making my head hurt, poor people are getting hurt anyway, whether we default or whether we cut the budget. None of us want to be in this position, but we are, and we’re making the best of it until we can get ourselves out of it.
Bruce S
http://economistsview.typepad.com/economistsview/2011/07/sanctioning-blackmail.html
Brian R.
Wait, which ones are the millions of poor people? The defense contractors or the insurance companies milking Medicare?
cleek
@Mr. Poppinfresh:
hey look: irony.
NR
Yep. People here like anything that pisses off progressives, no matter how bad it is for the country. In that respect, they’re a lot like both Obama and the teabaggers.
Emma
The facts, here, if anyone is interested.
Bruce S
Then why all of the bullshit telling us this is the best of all possible worlds.
I’m disgusted with the creeps on this blog who yell “Firebagger” at anyone who has a bone in their body that won’t bend over for the most Teatarded “deal” and actually thinks independently of the latest email from Jim Messina. Infantile at best…
Mnemosyne
@Mr. Poppinfresh:
Given that you seem to think that John fucking Boehner is the honest broker in this situation who’s giving you 100% accurate information, I’m not quite sure why you expected us to do anything other than point and laugh.
cleek
@Emma:
(link is hosed)
Mnemosyne
@Bruce S:
There’s a difference between “the best of all possible worlds” and “the best we could hope for given the 2010 midterm results.”
We were pretty much fucked as soon as the House was turned over to Boehner and his band of Teatards. The only remaining question is how much the Democrats can manage to mitigate the inevitable pain of the fact that the purse strings for the whole fucking federal government are controlled by crazy people.
Emma
Cleek. Damn. Let me try again: Here?
OzoneR
@NR:
Really, this is what you’ve been reduced to, pathetic self-victimizing? Wow
OzoneR
@Bruce S:
best of all possible worlds does not mean winning.
Mike Jones
Discuss? What’s to discuss. Fuck the Republicans with a cactus. Apologize to the cactus afterward.
different church-lady
More people to point and laugh at.
Parrots don’t know they’re saying hello.
Bruce S
” OzoneR – July 31, 2011 | 10:25 pm · Link
@Bruce S: Nobody thinks the Dems are “winning” ”
“Brian R. – July 31, 2011 | 10:40 pm · Link
“You guys don’t give a shit how much this hurts millions of poor people”
“Wait, which ones are the millions of poor people? The defense contractors or the insurance companies milking Medicare?”
Get the stories straight…either we’ve defeated the defense contractors and the insurance companies with this deal or we’ve been f-ed in the a**, but so gently that we should only make joyful noises. I love it how the “You’re a Firebagger!” crowd both deny that anything bad has happened and then tell us that what has, in fact, happened isn’t so bad ‘cuz…uh…something or other.
I don’t expect the Democrats to be able to “win” what we should under this political circumstance, but anyone who thinks that’s grounds to keep your mouth shut and rationalize what is, in fact, a worst-case scenario for the country when even Larry Summers admits that we’ve got a jobs crisis, not a deficit crisis, is so neutered and irrelevant I truly don’t understand why they just don’t kick back with Real Housewives and let the adults do politics. Terminal apologetics is pathetic.
El Tiburon
I know I shouldn’t be amazed at how most of you accept this new reality, but I am. That the majority of you can rationalize this and collectively agree, “what could we do?” shows how pathetic and weak you really are.
At least Hamsher is standing on her convictions whereas most of you have none.
You realize that every inch we give up we are never getting back, righ? So when e debt ceiling is raised with nary a peep under Bachmann, we will all go through this again if and when a dem is elected.
but carry on knowing you are all caving like a cheap fucking tent.
srv
Impeachment did wonders for Clinton’s ratings. Just saying.
Bruce S
“best of all possible worlds does not mean winning.”
I feel so much better…
(Don’t ever try being a parody of yourself.)
MomSense
@Mnemosyne
“There’s a difference between “the best of all possible worlds” and “the best we could hope for given the 2010 midterm results.”
We were pretty much fucked as soon as the House was turned over to Boehner and his band of Teatards. The only remaining question is how much the Democrats can manage to mitigate the inevitable pain of the fact that the purse strings for the whole fucking federal government are controlled by crazy people.”
Yes, this is the unfortunate situation we find ourselves in the real world. This is why anyone who wants to primary Obama, doesn’t want to work and vote to elect more Dems, or spreads poutrage about all the ways Obama has sold us out/caved/just like Bush is aiding and abetting the crazy people/Republicans. I am all for honest critique–but this sky is falling madness when they don’t even know the facts or details and when it is divorced from legislative reality is just more craziness.
cleek
@El Tiburon:
1. wave fist
2. ???
3. glorious progressive victory
karen
@Uncle Clarence Thomas:
Really….?
Firebaggers (You) won’t settle for anything less than the whole pie, don’t want to listen to reason and rattle your primary Obama saber every time he dares to do something you don’t approve of ….even if it’s the lesser of two evils. Firebaggers (You) stayed home during Election 2010 to teach the Democrats a lesson and Jane Hamsher has said that it would be better for the country to fall to the Republicans because it will move the “Overton Window” back to the left. She also teamed up with Grover Norquist in the past.
What’s not true?
Thymezone
We said about a week ago that there were three possibilities:
A hybrid senate-house contraption that did debt limit for next year.
A clean debt limit raise.
Fourteenth Amendment as temporary solution.
In all cases, no default.
All three possibilities are still open as far as I know, since the passage of the “deal” is far from certain at this hour.
There will be no default. That’s not me talking this time, it’s actually a quote from Mitch McConnell from this morning.
So much for the short term. Long term, I am applying for the job of Obama’s campaign strategist for next year. I advise that he double down on debt reduction and make it a campaign centerpiece with a plan that also eliminates future debt limit hijacks forever. With some good management and a strong out year recovery, he can have a surplus back before the end of his second term.
But the big motivator is this: There is nothing more critical to the future of progressive policy than sound fiscal policy as its foundation. Without debt to demagogue, the attackers of progressive programs have little to work with. Take the debt away from them as an issue, and progressive policy is free of this shit.
Emma
El Tiburon: I’m tired and what the hell, I feel like being less of a bitch I usually am. So I am asking this not to be snarky, but to really, really understand.
Considering the political realities of a Republican House controlled by Tea Party nuts and a Senate democratic majority that includes a the Blue Dogs, how do you suppose the President could win this one? Legitimately and constitutionally?
Chad N Freude
Hey, it’s all good.
Brachiator
@jon:
Sorry, this is not true. The bipartisan tax plan proposed by the so called Gang Of Six, which includes Democrats, sacrifices the middle class in order to preserve tax cuts fir the rich.
The amazing thing is that the GOP has not only made out well here, but will continue to press their advantage. Posters will debate whether cuts will kick in now or later, but no matter how you slice it, the Democrats have agreed to cuts and yielded on revenues.
With the elections coming up, let’s see how well the Democrats can sell themselves as the party that is ineffectual, but full of good intentions.
CaseyL
I have a theory that one reason the GOP has become so stunningly insane and nihilistic is that, deep within the festering crevasses of their brains, never spoken of or consciously acknowledged, is an awareness how their unwavering loyalty to Dubya resulted in immeasurable death, despair, and destruction. They had to somehow make the ruination someone else’s fault, or not ruination at all, and the effort drove them completely over the edge into CrazyLand.
I think the firebaggers might have a touch of the same guilt insanity. They stayed home in 2010, to “teach Obama and the Democrats a lesson.” The rise of the Traitor Party is in some measure their doing. In the hidden dark recesses of their minds they know this, and it’s driving them insane the same way.
Bruce S
“The only remaining question is how much the Democrats can manage to mitigate the inevitable pain of the fact that the purse strings for the whole fucking federal government are controlled by crazy people.”
And with folks bent on rationalizing worst cases at all costs, there’s really not much question regarding “mitigating” anything other than how wide your grin is going to be for the duration. The persistent assaults and insults toward anyone who shows any sign of being deeply concerned that we’ve come to this is disgusting. I don’t feel like I’m being “victimized” – I welcome the clarification of who gives a shit about the Democratic Party getting off of life support and who doesn’t.
Bruce S
I’m so glad Thymezone isn’t teaching my kids economics 101…
MomSense
El Tiburon, what the hell do convictions have to do with it?? It is a simple matter of votes–the votes that put the crazies in office and the votes in the legislature.
If I ruled the world things would be much different. I’m as lefty as it gets without being righty but I do not rule the world and the US does not elect a benevolent dictator. How would you have dealt with this Congress? What was your path to 217 votes in the House or 60 in the Senate?
And Jane Hamsher has never helped to elect more progressives with convictions to any elected office. She lost me with her Lieberman in blackface fiasco. And explain to me how her teaming up with the driver of the tax cut madness Grover “drown the government in a bathtub” Norquist demonstrates that she is a progressive of conviction?!
OzoneR
@Bruce S:
This isn’t an “either or” solution. Some of this is good, most of it is bad, and we averted an even worse crisis.
Stop looking at this through the guise of “winning and losing”
Chad N Freude
@Thymezone: Narvy wants to know “where you been?” Assuming, of course, that you are a member of the ppGaz circle. If not — never mind.
Bruce S
Momsense – great straw man. Run with it…
Why not take on real critics rather than some easily conjured and utterly irrelevant characterization.
Thymezone
Narv — I have been around here the last couple weeks, off and on. Send me a message to my Facebook page “Ty Emzone” and say hello. Oliver and Krista are there too.
Bruce S
“Stop looking at this through the guise of ‘winning and losing’ ”
Who said anything about winning? We’ve been losing.
Sorry that I have a reality-based POV. Also sorry that I would like to build a coalition to take these fuckers out over time.
But enjoy!
Thymezone
This isn’t an economics problem, it’s a simple arithmetic problem. If you spend at 25% GDP and tax at 15%, which is where we are today, you set the stage for all manner of attacks with fiscal bases. To say nothing of running a government under the guise of a huge lie, which is that you can keep running that deficit forever because, you know, ponies and Shut Up That’s Why.
Americans have demanded upside down fiscal government for half a century and hired politicians who will lie to them and tell them it’s okay. It’s not, and the game is up. If that isn’t fixed, progressive policy dies, just like Norquist planned.
OzoneR
@El Tiburon:
Hamsher? CONVICTIONS? AHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
Yes, do tell me about Jane “I run a media company that sells ad for teabaggers” Hamsher’s convictions
WyldPirate
Uncle Clarence Thomas:
>@
Everything is Obama’s finest hour in the deluded eyes of the Balloonbaggger Obots.
President Capitulation is a fucking joke. He goes down by 5 pts in ’12 along with the Senate going big to the Rethuugs. Then you can kiss the ACA goodbye before it even goes into effect because the Rethugs will have the Presidency, House and Senate in ’12 (not like they need it now with Obama giving them what they want every swinging time because he gets rolled over and over.
it his own fault, too. this austerity bullshit–which Obama never seems to miss a chance to talk up—is going to guarantee that the economy is mired in the shitter.
MomSense
@Bruce S
I’m deeply concerned about how we got to this mess but I don’t think it is President Obama’s fault. I blame the crazy people/Republicans, the people who voted for them, and the liberals, progressives, and swing voters who didn’t. Also, too I blame the opinionators like Ed Schultz who told progressives to stay home in Nov 2010 to teach the President a lesson. Staying home meant losing many good House Dems who passed fantastic bills. Why punish the President and House Dems for the sins of the Senate?!
Check out the list and the specifics of the bills that passed the House. It is a crime that we didn’t reward the House for the good work they did–a crime. And it will be the most vulnerable who pay for that crime.
dollared
@CaseyL: Jackass. The firebaggers are a few dozen thousand people. They didn’t stay home, they voted like they always do, and they voted Demo.
The people that stayed home were the liberal leaning middle Americans and minorities that saw that the Democrats were not making any difference..
And the people that switched were white working class people who wanted their pain and insecurity to end, and they saw that Obama did not fight hard enough for them.
Brian R.
First of all, brilliant logic in arguing that might point is wrong because someone else has a different perspective on it.
I never said we defeated the defense contractors and insurance companies. I said that the cuts people are rending their garments over are coming down on services we don’t give a shit about.
No, we didn’t win here. But we didn’t lose either. Not by a long shot.
OzoneR
@Bruce S:
um, you
My response was we’re not winning, no one is winning.
Chad N Freude
@Thymezone: JF Christ! Does that mean I have to become a Facebookite? I see social networking as the downfall of civilization — well, after the Republican party, but downfall nonetheless. Howver, I could create a sufficently obscure alter ego so that my enemies couldn’t find me. I’ll work something out — I want to revive the Good Old Days(R).
ETA: I had an exchange with Krista a while ago and was relieved to learn that Oliver had not bailed on life or conversation. (I was worried.)
WyldPirate
@Thymezone:
Obama and the weak-assed Dems already stuck the fork in “progressive policy”. It’s done.
WyldPirate
@Thymezone:
Obama and the weak-assed Dems already stuck the fork in “progressive policy”. It’s done.
Emma
And WyldPirate is here. Time for bed. Night all.
Brian R.
So Obama is a joke who never accomplished anything … and we’re going to lose the incredible thing he accomplished … because he never accomplished anything?
Yeah, why don’t you sit down for a while there, champ?
OzoneR
@dollared:
Which is apparently something they do EVERY midterm election.
Also, this is wrong. Democratic turnout was where it was in 2006, another words high for a midterm election, Republican turnout was through the roof.
Those liberal leaning middle Americans didn’t stay home, they voted Republican.
Thymezone
Sound fiscal policy isn’t austerity. It’s balance. We can afford progressive govt that costs 20% of GDP with a tax scheme that gets 20% of GDP in revenue. That’s not austere, it’s just sensible. It’s the balanced approach that at least one guy in Washington talks about all the time. He’s the black dude in the White House. He knows better than anyone that the future of progressive politics rests on sound fiscal management. It’s the only paradigm that works both practically and politically, and it has the grand advantage of not requiring politicans to lie out their asses every day, no matter which side they are on.
Mnemosyne
@El Tiburon:
I completely believe that you find it hard to understand that some people prefer to deal with reality rather than living in the fantasy world inside your head.
You can spend your life wishin’ and hopin’ and prayin’ and being disappointed that life doesn’t actually conform to your fantasies, but I gave that up years ago in favor of dealing with the world as it actually is.
Thymezone
#391, I gotta go, but just wanted you to know that you are completely full of shit.
See ya tomorrow.
Chad N Freude
@OzoneR: On the other hand, a lot of people are whining.
Brachiator
@Emma:
He should have given the Congress two choices, debt ceiling rise with cuts and revenues, or debt ceiling rise by itself. Period. Even if the GOP held firm, the worst effect would only be for a short period of time. Both the Republicans and the Tea Party People would have been discredited and would quickly vote a deal.
Treasury obviously had a shitty but workable backup plan that would not have involved a constitutional crisis.
There are any other number of scenarios. The lie is that this is the best possible deal.
WyldPirate
@Brian R.:
sit back and watch, bitch.
Obama has taken it up the ass from the Rethugs over and over. He’ll get again and it will “count” in ’12.
Be patient.
FlipYrWhig
@NR:
Somehow your obvious solution was not so obvious to dozens of Democrats campaigning for election that year. Maybe they’re extremely stupid and like losing elections. Or maybe they gamed it out and didn’t like the looks of the results. Too late now.
Mnemosyne
@Bruce S:
Because there’s no better way to build a coalition than telling your potential allies that they all suck if they recognize the reality that the Republicans are currently in charge of the country’s purse strings.
FlipYrWhig
@Brachiator:
What is “period”? You mean a veto threat for anything that didn’t meet your litmus tests?
Uncle Clarence Thomas
.
.
@WyldPirate:
Don’t worry, be happy. President Obama has this.
.
.
WyldPirate
@Emma:
I’ll be laughing at you clowns as Obama’s presidency and re-election chances crumble over the next 15 months.
Rhoda
@jnfr: We’re not getting spending out of the Republican house; that ship sailed Nov. 4, 2010. This debt ceiling fight should have made that crystal clear. Until 2013 we’re going to be living with a Republican house and if Democrats don’t retake the house in ’12 we’re not getting any stimulus.
Bruce S
Brian –
“I said that the cuts people are rending their garments over are coming down on services we don’t give a shit about.
No, we didn’t win here. But we didn’t lose either. Not by a long shot.”
We lost when this debate started on these terms…
You guys are seriously delusional. And my guess is that you don’t give a shit about “services” because you won’t need them. This is pretty sorry apologia. We’re already hurting – badly – because the entire debate has been about what we cut, not what we spend on infrastructure or aid to state governments that are in crisis. Even Morgan Stanley’s research guys have stated that the economy continues to be stalled in large part because of cuts in government spending. Larry Summers knows we’re completely having the wrong “debate.” (The only times I’ve clicked on “FDL” have been when it’s linked or berated endlessly here, by the way.)
If you are a Republican, just cop to it. But don’t rationalize this stuff as “shit we don’t care about.”
This is perverse crap coming from the apologists. Why the hell does this “sit down and shut up” garbage make any sense at all? Who are you people? Why are you yammering on the internet? I could get this crap from watching Meet The Press…
Emerald
Hmmm. Nobody’s mentioned the real obstacle that this deal has to pass before it can pass:
What will King Rush say about it tomorrow? If he doesn’t stop it, he’ll lose power. Ergo, I predict he will be apoplectic.
Methinks we still could be looking at a either voice vote on a clean bill or the 14th.
WyldPirate
@Uncle Clarence Thomas:
Yes, I know, he’s the genius that is giving the Rethugs what Bush couldn’t deliver—an opening to knife SS, Medicare and Medicaid.
The Rethugs got their “inch” with this “deal” once it passes.
they take the “mile” beginning in 2013.
Mnemosyne
@dollared:
Exit polls:
Teabaggers won in 2010 because more of them showed up to vote. Full stop. So how’s that “I’ll show the Democrats they suck by not voting” strategy working out for ya?
gwangung
@Mnemosyne: I see there are very excellent coalition builders on this very thread!
WyldPirate
@Bruce S:
Exactly right. Even Obama is calling for austerity. and no, the timing doesn’t mean fuck now.
The US made these seem mistakes already in 1936.
Emma
Dearest Wyld: Not me, sweetie. I have an ace in the hole, a profession that can be transferred round the world. And speaking several languages, I think I can manage.
On the other hand, I am sure that Republican rule, wingnut edition, will be very salutary for you. Hell on wheels on the poor and the elderly, but hey, you’ll move the Overtown window to the left. Ten million starving to death, tops, and the country will be convinced it has to become a progressive paradise.
MomSense
@Bruce S
It is not a straw man argument. If we were having a discussion about policy and how we would deal with an anemic recovery that is pretty close to jobless, we would probably come close to consensus. Same for spending, the importance of the social safety net and funding it adequately. This discussion is not about policy but largely about tactics. If we had a filibuster proof majority of Dems with no blue dogs and a Democratically controlled house with no blue dogs, we would end up with very different (I would argue better) results. I get frustrated with the criticism of President Obama when it doesn’t seem to take into account the composition of the House and Senate. How would you get a better debt deal out of this Congress??? I don’t see a way to do it. That I don’t see a legislative path to a better deal doesn’t mean that I’m happy with this one. It also doesn’t mean that I think this deal is as bad as people are saying. I remember how the budget deal improved significantly once the details were released.
Am I outraged about the disparity of wealth, failure to act on climate change, and many other issues? Hell yes! I just don’t blame Obama. In fact, I think we were starting to push back and get some victories–until we let the crazies take back the House in 2010.
FlipYrWhig
@dollared:
Depends on where you put the baseline, dollared. If 2006 and 2010 have similar demographic composition, and 2008 is different, does that mean that the anomalous 2008 people decided to “stay home” because they were turned off, or does it mean that it was only a fluke that they didn’t stay home in 2008? I’ve never seen anything to indicate that “liberal leaning middle Americans” had a drop in turnout.
But you have to be very careful reading those stats anyway, because a spike in old white conservatives (which did happen) can overwhelm normal patterns of turnout for other demographics and create conflicting stats. F’rinstance, the percentage of {liberals} among {the people who turned out} could have dropped even as the percentage of {liberals who turned out} divided by {all liberal registered voters} could have stayed the same or even risen. Which one of those stats describes “liberal turnout”? It depends on the story you want to tell with those stats.
Bruce S
Momsense: “I blame the opinionators like Ed Schultz who told progressives to stay home in Nov 2010 to teach the President a lesson”
You’ve now simply descended into lies.
Please. Stop before you totally embarrass yourself. That’s truly a creepy, dishonest fabrication. And evidence of nothing more than your own ignorance.
dollared
I really wish I had the time to select some quotes from the Obots on this blog over the last two weeks. “Obama’s got this” is my favorite, but I also like “Obama is setting them up, ” and I also love “just wait until Wall Street yanks on the leash.”
I’ll also settle for John Cole’s “people are beginning to realize these Tea Partiers are crazy.”
Well, Obama didn’t call their bluff. He caved. Caved. Surrendered.
Now you’re calling him brilliant for caving. Wall Street never had to yank the leash.
Obama’s private negotiation strategy was stupid. Just stupid. He should have publicly set the baseline and the ratios at 50/50, and he should have publicly given ground until the R’s were at 70/30. If he had done that and gone to the brink, and I mean August 5-7, the market would have punished the R’s, and they would have gotten the blame. Instead, he caved before he could call the bluff. They publicly, visibly squashed him like a bug.
And we are all going to pay. The 50/50 cuts will happen. The perception that he’s ineffective is set. The economy will stay mired in “throw out the incumbents” territory. That means the Senate flips no matter what.
There is only one hope for his re-election: an all-out internal Republican war that ends up with the establishment nominee (Perry or Romney) massively bloodied. And be very clear: there will be no Bachmann win. R’s are not that stupid – they like to win, too much.
Emma
Brachiator: How long a time? Could you give me a time line so I can tell my two aunts and my uncle whose only means of support is social security, medicare, and a tiny little pension (less than $500 a month) how much they have to suffer? And how their suffering will usher in a new glorious period of progressive rule? I’m sure it would make their charity food go down really nicely.
different church-lady
@WyldPirate:
Al Gore invented the internet for this?
dollared
@Brachiator: This. August 1 was not the day to cave.
dollared
@Emma: How about a day or two? Obama never gave Wall Street a chance to yank on the R’s. It was a cave one week too early.
FlipYrWhig
@Bruce S: I remember it being said that Schultz was urging his listeners not to vote. After Googling it, this is the best example I could find — which seems to be more about his own not voting than anyone else’s.
stinkdaddy
@Brian R.:
And if we did all of those then are we allowed to have an opinion differing from yours?
FlipYrWhig
@different church-lady: WP has an unfortunate proclivity for anal imagery. And not the good kind.
Chad N Freude
There’s a lot of “should have” in this thread, some components contradicting others. I don’t want to be left out, so . . .
Obama should have played the FDR card*, explained (at an 8th grade level) the difference between the debt limit and the deficit, explained the possible consequences of not raising the limit, explained that this would be like a dangerous experiment in a sci-fi movie, explained that Congress still controls what we can spend and how it is allocated, and explained why the Republican/T-Party position would not benefit citizens who are hurting. But he didn’t and we have to live with that.
If you read that as Obama-Disappointed-Me-So-We-Have-To-Destroy-Him Syndrome, I can’t do anything about that beyond advising you to acquire some critical thinking skills.
*Playing a card seems to be the thing that makes you Bobby Fisher in the contest of the moment. Not to mix metaphors or anything.
Bruce S
Memosyne: “So how’s that ‘I’ll show the Democrats they suck by not voting’ strategy working out for ya?”
Straw man. Who the hell is counseling that? What pisses me off is that OFA has become such a neutered, sorry operation and that we didn’t build on the momentum of ’07 and ’08 (and yes I was “all in” in ’07, when my guess is that a bunch of you clowns berating people like me were sitting on your complacent asses) and challenge the Tea Partiers. I’ve had discussions with OFA folks locally and, frankly, they’re afraid of even thinking about anything that doesn’t have Jim Messina’s rubber stamp. That’s fine for “Obama ’12” but just don’t bullshit me with crap about “organizing for America.” The two aren’t in opposition, but the one has definitely been in “co-optation” of any independent energy among the movement that put Obama into office. I was part of that and am proud – but it’s not enough. We knew it then…but sat on our asses. The lack of a strong Democratic grassroots movement has hurt Obama immeasurably, as the Tea Party geared up and dominated “protest politics.” I’m also guessing many of you could care less about any such concept. I blame myself for complacency as much as anyone. But I also feel a paucity of leadership. That’s just a fact. And I’m certainly not proud of complacency or counseling it as a political strategy, God forbid – or simply derisive of people who make noises on Obama’s left flank as the fundamental danger to his Presidency or re-election, even when I don’t agree with a lot of them.
dollared
@FlipYrWhig: Conceding your stats (I recall similar ones), then why are people on this blog suggesting that Firebaggers stayed home and threw the 2010 election? It’s just a goddamn lie.
What really happened is the second richest political party in the world (after ChiCom Party) could not anticipate their opponents’ tactics and could not manage their message, and allowed blatant lies from the opposition to drive a new demographic. For about the ninth time in the last ten elections. So people on this blog blame Jane Hamsher, instead of the Barack Obama? The man who hired Tim Caine?
Talk about avoiding reality….
Kyle
All I can say is Fuck You, Teatards —
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Uz0trk-BFEk/TjXuvHObUfI/AAAAAAAARag/uJuuNxdfugE/s1600/teapartiers.jpg
FlipYrWhig
@dollared: Come on, man, there’s no way you would sit there after the announcement of a 70/30 deal and say, “Well played, Obama old chap!” You would say it was cutting spending in the middle of a recession and the amount of revenue was a token sum, Republicans had played him like a fiddle and you were very dispirited. Be truthful. It’s OK, it’s a valid reaction. But don’t pretend like there was a losing deal you would have counted as a noble failure or a moral victory.
stinkdaddy
@OzoneR: Fiscal year 2013 begins October of 2012. Probably won’t have time to affect the election, but outside of the narrow point of getting Obama re-elected or not the cuts will hurt the recovery. You aren’t seriously arguing the economy will be fine in 15 months..?
@cleek:
You’re confused. The committee can look at whatever it wants, including social security, medicare benefits, medicaid, etc. The carveouts are only in the triggers.
FlipYrWhig
@Bruce S:
True. But I’m not sure I’ve _ever_ seen a strong Democratic grassroots movement, except for Wisconsin this past year — which caught fire in the media at least, IMHO, because of Egypt. I think a liberal-to-left grassroots movement would be awesome. And it should be outside the Democratic party and push the Democratic party, even when the Democratic party would rather not hear it. And it should be able to put actual bodies on the streets, not just email petitions and donor solicitations. But it’s been a challenge for decades.
Emma
Dollared: I invite you to read through the financial press for the past two months. Please take notice of how many times the Chamber of Commerce, assorted millionaires, and other financial groups and gurus pleaded with Congress or bellowed at Congress. And that’s only the public stuff.
There this: there is now in the House of Representatives a not inconsiderable group of Congressmen who are more beholden to the Tea Party than to the Overlords. Mind you, the Overlords helped to get them there, thinking they could control them, so let’s not feel too sorry for the little bastards. But these are true believers holding tightly to their principles, twisted as they may be, and as Heinlein once put it, the first thing a principle does is kill someone.
Not negotiating with terrorists sounds all very macho, until you realize that it’s millions of people versus your principles. I suppose you could stand by your principles and let them all rot. Me, I don’t know that I could.
Bruce S
Flipyrwhig – listen to the entire show and context of the linked quote. He said that in August specifically in relation to the question of whether Dems would push for extending unemployment insurance. It was extended. Schultz did not simply counsel that Democrats boycott the mid-terms. I watch him off and on and he was very much into promoting voting in the mid-terms. He can be a blowhard and talks probably a couple of more hours a day than he should and says stupid things more than occasionally. But to simply characterize Ed Schultz’ position on the mid-terms as “don’t vote” is a lie.
OzoneR
yeah, none of us said any of this.
No one said he’d call their bluff. And he didn’t cave, he lost. He held out for weeks and lost. Losing and caving aren’t the same thing, and the fact you think so is why Democrats won’t fight, because losing would be seen as caving.
Not one person called him brilliant.
They already got the blame AND THEY DID NOT CARE. If he had gone to August 5-7, the country would have defaulted, the damage would have been done, and the Republicans would have won anyway.
FlipYrWhig
@Emma: Also, AFAIK, even the people who _say_ they don’t negotiate with terrorists actually _do_ negotiate with terrorists — they just keep it quiet and behind the scenes.
MomSense
@425 Chad n Freude
Here is some history on Social Security from good ‘ole wikipedia.
You tell me how the “Obama betrayed us/caved/bent over crowd would have reacted to the reality of the Social Security Act as first passed.
“Most women and minorities were excluded from the benefits of unemployment insurance and old age pensions. Employment definitions reflected typical white male categories and patterns.[13] Job categories that were not covered by the act included workers in agricultural labor, domestic service, government employees, and many teachers, nurses, hospital employees, librarians, and social workers.[14] The act also denied coverage to individuals who worked intermittently.[15] These jobs were dominated by women and minorities. For example, women made up 90% of domestic labor in 1940 and two-thirds of all employed black women were in domestic service.[16] Exclusions exempted nearly half of the working population.[15] Nearly two-thirds of all African Americans in the labor force, 70 to 80% in some areas in the South, and just over half of all women employed were not covered by Social Security.[17][18] At the time, the NAACP protested the Social Security Act, describing it as “a sieve with holes just big enough for the majority of Negroes to fall through.”[18]
Some have suggested that this discrimination resulted from the powerful position of Southern Democrats on two of the committees pivotal for the Act’s creation, the Senate Finance Committee and the House Ways and Means Committee.[citation needed] Southern congressmen supported Social Security as a means to bring needed relief to areas in the South that were especially hurt by the Great Depression but wished to avoid legislation which might interfere with the racial status quo in the South. The solution to this dilemma was to pass a bill that both included exclusions and granted authority to the states rather than the national government (such as the states’ power in Aid to Dependent Children). Others have argued that exclusions of job categories such as agriculture were frequently left out of new social security systems worldwide because of the administrative difficulties in covering these workers.[18]
Social Security reinforced traditional views of family life.[19] Women generally qualified for insurance only through their husbands or children.[19] Mothers’ pensions (Title IV) based entitlements on the presumption that mothers would be unemployed.[19]
Historical discrimination in the system can also be seen with regard to Aid to Dependent Children. Since this money was allocated to the states to distribute, some localities assessed black families as needing less money than white families. These low grant levels made it impossible for African American mothers to not work: one requirement of the program.[20] Some states also excluded children born out of wedlock, an exclusion which affected African American women more than white women.[21] One study determined that 14.4% of eligible white individuals received funding, but only 1.5% of eligible black individuals received these benefits.[18]”
The Sheriff's A Ni-
@dollared:
I think its fixed better this way, actually.
LongHairedWeirdo
It shouldn’t in the least bit push the Democratic Party. It should push progressive values, and try to build up enough numbers and excitement that the Democrats will court it… or, if they won’t, the Republicans will.
And it shouldn’t be “a” movement. It should be several. Don’t try to go “hey, here I fuckin’ am, at my fifth boring-ass building-a-movement meeting this month.” It should be multiple groups all pushing what excites and enlivens them. And they’ll probably have shouting and pissing matches about how one isn’t really progressive and so forth… but that nevertheless generate enough energy to do things.
Gus diZerega
The Corporatist Democrats aren’t worried about threats to boycott elections because they know sane Americans think Republicans are worse, as they are. The only thing that will work – the only thing – is a credible third party challenge, and under the circumstances the only way that will work positively is if we have majority vote elections.
Every state with an initiative process needs to have intelligent progressives push one establishing majority vote elections. That gives third parties that are not simply ego trip vehicles a chance to actually win.
I will contribute $500 to a decently drawn initiative to do that in my state.
OzoneR
@Bruce S: The tea party did not wait for leaders to organize, why are progressives?
The Sheriff's A Ni-
@Gus diZerega:
Just look at how positively it worked for the British, Canadians, and French.
OzoneR
I’m totally in favor of that voting system. In New York, we have fusion voting and that makes Democrats work to get liberal third party ballot lines they’d lose without.
Bruce S
“Because there’s no better way to build a coalition than telling your potential allies that they all suck if they recognize the reality that the Republicans are currently in charge of the country’s purse strings.”
Even better is having “realists” telling anyone who is discomfited by “the best of all possible worlds” that they suck if they doth protest too much. That worked out well for black folks. And gays. Oh. Wait a minute…
stinkdaddy
@Mnemosyne: So you cite an article that says liberal turnout was the same, the share of their votes going to Dems was up, and use it to bash firebaggers for staying home? Sure thing.
It’s an interesting trick: first make up that firebaggers were gonna ‘stay home and punish Obama,’ then mix up what you’re trying to prove and bust out stats showing they didn’t.
Of course to you it’s so impossible that the run-of-the-mill whites are mad about jobs or etc. that you have to attribute their GOP swing to racism out of hand, so I don’t even know why I’m bothering. You’re obviously a lunatic.
(Black folks have soured on Obama’s jobs performance by some 20 percentage points over the last 9 months or so. I guess they’re just racists too.)
OzoneR
Bruce during the 1940s and 1950s, blacks were always told that.
Scott P.
Then those people get picked up by HCR. Not that it’s likely to get that far: Medicare recipients are a big part of the GOP base. I mean, really, it looks like the triggers are both aimed squarely at conservative supporters: old people and the military-industrial complex.
OzoneR
@stinkdaddy:
No, he was mocking firebagger claims that they “sent a message”
Scott P.
Not enough to put people in the streets; you have to elect candidates. And I’m not talking about novelty third-party Presidential runs, I’m talking hundreds of candidates around the nation. Let’s make it a round thousand.
That’s what will need to be done. A thousand candidates elected to office in state legislatures and House races.
But the left can’t seem to do that. All they can do is focus on issues where Democrats disagree, rather than on issues and candidates where Democrats can agree.
Emma
Scott P: That’s what will need to be done. A thousand candidates elected to office in state legislatures and House races.
But the left can’t seem to do that. All they can do is focus on issues where Democrats disagree, rather than on issues and candidates where Democrats can agree.
Yes. Exactly. Republicans spent two decades or more getting conservatives elected to local and state political office. Millions (probably billions by now) of dollars in making sure they controlled the political strings. Until we have the discipline to do the same thing… we’ll keep having the same results we’re getting now.
stinkdaddy
@OzoneR: Are you feeling ok? ABL made on thread specifically to tell us Obama wasn’t going to cut Medicare (whoops) or Social Security and that “He’s got this.” She made multiple other threads for the express purpose of showing videos of Laurence O’Donnell being completely wrong about how this was going to play out. If you want to imagine that those threads aren’t full of people nodding sagely and cracking wise about how naive the firebaggers were, go for it.
stinkdaddy
@OzoneR: Firebaggers not staying home didn’t send a message?
Yeah, no fucking shit. That’s what I just said.
OzoneR
He didn’t cut Medicare or Social Security.
OzoneR
that’s not what others said
The Sheriff's A Ni-
@OzoneR:
But its going to happen any day now! Just give the Firebaggers another Friedman Unit, they’ll be proven right!
Gus diZerega
@The Sheriff’s A Ni-:
You are mostly describing parliamentary systems where party dynamics differ. And Britain has the same plurality rules we have now so it is not a valid counter example – it actually supports my argument.
The closest resemblance is the French, and they are doing one hell of a lot better than we or the Brits are.
gwangung
Well, the Congressional Progressive Caucus numbers 83 members. It’s the largest group of Democrats.
But you’re thinking that the number should be twice that, right? At least?
OzoneR
@gwangung:
Being the largest group of the smallest Democratic majority in 64 years doesn’t really mean much. Of course they’re going to be pretty far left.
The CPC is going to need 150-200 members before we see any real change. I don’t think that’s entirely impossible.
gwangung
@OzoneR: I think my point here is to put a few real numbers out there.
And I would submit that what the progressives around here want is simply not feasible with the numbers the Congressional Progressives now have.
Groucho48
Well, if the link to the WH site describes things accurately, it isn’t as bad as I thought. I have no way of knowing if we could have gotten a better deal. I do trust pelosi on this and if she doesn’t come out against it, I’ll figure it was probably a good a bill as we could get when dealing with suicidal maniacs.
It also seems that revenue increases ARE included…
“Bipartisan committee process tasked with identifying an additional $1.5 trillion in deficit reduction, including from entitlement and tax reform. Committee is required to report legislation by November 23, 2011, which receives fast-track protections. Congress is required to vote on Committee recommendations by December 23, 2011.”
Entitlements apparently don’t include…
“the sequester would be divided equally between defense and non-defense program, and it would exempt Social Security, Medicaid, unemployment insurance, programs for low-income families, and civilian and military retirement. Likewise, any cuts to Medicare would be capped and limited to the provider side.”
All in all, this seems better to me that Obama’s previous “Grand Bargain”.
Yutsano
@stinkdaddy:
Citation please.
Chad N Freude
@MomSense: Not sure what you mean other than “Your FDR reference sucks/ is historically wrong.” I was thinking of the Fireside Chats where FDR explained things to citizens huddled about their radios. I think political machinations are beside this particular point: Obama could have made some issues clear to the proles — Oops, I mean citizenry/voters.
dollared
@Emma: totally agreed. The trick is careerism. Wingnut welfare means thousands of Republicans can run for office and never miss a paycheck, win or lose. Media, think tanks, endowed chairs, military contractors, their frat brothers, whatever. The money is on the right.
Demos can’t do that, at least now with unions completely defanged. So we also have to work on our own gravy train. Progressive institutions need to be created and funded. How? That’s the hard part.
OzoneR
@Chad N Freude:
don’t think he could have. FDR didn’t have his fireside chats going up against Dancing with The Stars, nor did networks spend more time on punditry over his fireside chats rather than just broadcast them. FDR didn’t have to cut through the bullshit Obama does, if he did, he probably wouldn’t have ben nearly as successful.
WyldPirate
@Yutsano:
Base in the hole
Even black voters slip from prez
Black voters’ Obama blues
Clarence Page commentary: President Obama’s popularity among blacks is catching a chill
Certainly not 20%, but it looks like he is starting to take a hit among his staunchest supporters.
dollared
I do want to congratulate everyone for nearly reaching 500 posts on a non-ABL thread!
Mnemosyne
@WyldPirate:
Sorry to dash your hopes, but it was back up by June. Looks like the April poll may have been an outlier.
Last week’s approval ratings are worse, but still better than Congress’s.
WyldPirate
@Mnemosyne:
This is from my second link which was from a very recent ABC News poll:
It won’t matter with AA-voters too much. He’ll still get 90% of them. They will be offset by people who were complacent and didn’t vote in the ’08 elect who are pissed.
Obama won’t stand a snowballs chance in hell in North Carolina next year…and a lot of other places as well.
Groucho48
The first set of cuts don’t really lock in until after 2013. Maybe our economy can handle some cuts by then. SS, Medicare, Medicaid are off the table almost entirely. Military spending IS on the table. If the commission can’t come to an agreement, which is likely as it will be 6 Reps and 6 Dems, then, Congress will have to propose about 1.2 trillion in cuts in an election year. As the House initiates spending bills, it will be the Republicans who will get to list their cuts first. otherwise, military spending and discretionary spending get cut across the board.
“If the fiscal committee took no action, the deal would automatically add nearly $500 billion in defense cuts on top of cuts already made, and, at the same time, it would cut critical programs like infrastructure or education. That outcome would be unacceptable to many Republicans and Democrats alike – creating pressure for a bipartisan agreement without requiring the threat of a default with unthinkable consequences for our economy. ”
The smart thing for the commission to do would be to count cuts from winding down the Iraq and Afghan wars as worth 1.2 trillion and call it a day.
It’ll be interesting to see if Boehner puts any TP folks on the Commission.
jefft452
MomSense @436
FDR got about 20% of the black vote in 32
He got about 75% in 36
In the 30’s, if they wanted to restrict the New Deal benefits to only those who were 7/8th Caucasian, they could have
The fact that they didn’t was a vast improvement over the policies of the previous 40 yrs
Yeah, if I was around then I would have grumbled that it didn’t go far enough, its my right to grumble
But I would have been a lot happier pulling the lever for FDR in 36 then I will when I vote for Obama in 2012
Mnemosyne
@WyldPirate:
Hey, if you’re perfectly happy rolling over and letting the Republicans do to the rest of the country what they’re doing to Florida, Wisconsin and Ohio right now, that’s your business. Since you’re not willing to fight, then STFU, sit down, and let those of us who still give a shit try to save your sorry ass from itself.
Mnemosyne
@jefft452:
Uh, New Deal programs did discriminate against black Americans:
Even these crumbs were more than they got from the Republicans, so African-Americans did vote for Roosevelt in 1936, but it’s odd to pretend that the New Deal programs didn’t include some extremely severe discrimination against AAs.
FlipYrWhig
@LongHairedWeirdo:
A bit late on this, but I meant push it from the outside, not push it like a product.
FlipYrWhig
@dollared:
Error. And frustration.
gwangung
@FlipYrWhig: I would also say it needs to infiltrate the Dems, but not see it as the only instrument.
jefft452
OzoneR @463
“FDR didn’t have to cut through the bullshit Obama does..”
Sure he did
Check out some newspapers or radio broadcasts from the 30’s
Mayor Walker was the original “Fox News Democrat”, Wil Rodgers was the original “even the” liberal
The media loved to cover the fake scandals ginned up by astro-turf organizations financed by the wealthy – they didn’t even stop during the war
Lindbergh and the America Firsters were no better then the teabaggers
Owsley and the American Legion were far more dangerous then the gun nuts showing up at political rallies flashing their pistols and screaming about “2nd amendment remidies”
Hamilton Fish was just as big a nut case as Jim Dement
And of course through his whole first term the 4 horsemen on the SC were shooting down everything he tried to do
He did have Warner Brothers on his side though, Obama doesn’t even have that
jefft452
Mnemosyne @471
“…but it’s odd to pretend that the New Deal programs didn’t include some extremely severe discrimination against AAs.”
Oh, sure
But considering that the last D president had gone so far as to re-segregate government jobs that had been open to blacks prior to that.
And less then 10 yrs b4 the Klan held its biggest rally in DC so R and D politicians could kiss their rings
FDR gave blacks a lot more then “crumbs”
Does the gay community think Howard Dean is no better then Anita Bryant because the civil unions bill he got in VT wasn’t 100% = to heterosexual marriage rights?
Of course not, It was a radical move in favor or equality at the time
jefft452
Ps
When I said “if they wanted to restrict the New Deal benefits to only those who were 7/8th Caucasian, they could have”
I didn’t mean that they could put thumbs on the scales, or have biased rules,
I meant that they could have flat out banned black people from receiving ANY benefits
The CCC could have had a “whites only” hiring policy, like Wilson had for most civil service jobs
JC
You know, we all reach for metaphors, to describe this – Obama ‘caved’, Obama ‘lost’. Anyone who doubts Obama is a ‘firebagger’, etc.
Right now, the metaphor that makes the most sense to me, is Game of Thrones, and Obama as Edward Stark.
Edward Stark/Obama is called into/elected to government, to deal with a government crisis.
And Stark/Obama, start doing their best to make things right.
But, the rulling powers however, aren’t willing to give up their power, and use all means at their disposal, to ‘eliminate’ the new player.
Example, from above: “Let me get this straight, but did the Tea Party just demonstrate that they control the country via blackmail? How is this not what is happening?”
This requires a MUCH bigger response than ‘the election in 2010 guaranteed this’.
Let’s be very clear here.
What has just happened, is a willingness to blow up the government, that was capitulated to.
This is, and should be, a scary thing, and you guys need to realize this. This exposes the utter dysfunction of our current government.
While ‘it gets better’, in the realm of social understanding, gay marriage, etc, our political system is now at the point of complete breakdown.
This isn’t something the be papered over.
I was afraid of this, back with Bush, and the insanity of the Iraq War, and how we went crazy as a nation.
Again, we are seeing the total breakdown of the acceptance of rules and norms, at the political level. In states, and in the House Republicans.
Obama caved to a threat. He didn’t ‘lose a vote’. He caved to a threat.
The hostage takers won. This is a big big deal.
And it’s only going to get worse. If it works once, it works twice, these guys will continue to threaten to blow up the place, as long as it works.
And for voting? Take a look at what Wisconsin in doing. Getting rid of places to vote, in democratic districts.
By any means necessary. That’s how they play, that’s how they roll.
And they are winning. Even when they only control 1 of the 3 branches of the government.
That isn’t firebagging – that’s just the truth.
Who here wants to say NOW, “Obama’s GOT this”?
We all lose, by the way. Obama, democrats, the poor, the working class, seniors, and funny enough, even the 1% that put up the money to elect the Rethugs, and enable them.
Because a dead economy doesn’t benefit them, it actually cuts into their profits (unless they make more money investing in China/India/Brazil, etc). And neither do lax regulations, that encourage risk-taking, as 2008 showed.
But in ‘playing the game’, people don’t think about that – just their temporary advantage, by any means necessary.
JC
Isn’t it the case though, that one of the reasons these guys need to lock in cuts, is because SS is now not contributing to the surplus? So if they don’t lock in the cuts now, in some form, then we have to raise taxes, which the Rethugs hate?
Basically, isn’t this stealing the last 30 years, of paying into the trust fund, by making sure that the trust fund borrowed against for the last 30 years, is now made up by higher taxes on those that can afford it, but from taking it out of the hide of anything BUT taxes?
JC
There’s one thing I don’t want to hear on this site again – “Obama’s GOT THIS”.
We can retire that one, for awhile.
Norwonk
Thank FSM that Obama didn’t demand that raising the debt limit should be part of that tax deal in December! That would have deprived him of this triumph. Besides, using the Bush tax cuts as leverage would have been so gauche.
TuiMel
@Frankensteinbeck:
And they are responsible when the Dems fail at the polls.
Pouting Dems: So insignificant in victory and omnipotent in defeat.
TuiMel
@TuiMel:
s/b “And, yet, they are responsible…”
harlana
heh.
stinkdaddy
@Yutsano:
@OzoneR:
Keep telling yourself that. Super Committee will be looking at everything, including SS. If their recommendation doesn’t pass, Medicare is cut. There is no way out without entitlement cuts.
(Now you tell me how “provider side cuts aren’t actually cuts” and/or explain how Obama isn’t to be held accountable for the Super Committee.)
@OzoneR: I’ve noticed you tend to flail around a bit when you come up short, so you trying to hold me responsible for shit I haven’t said doesn’t surprise me.
harlana
That is AWESOME to know! They’ll have to work fast, won’t they?
I’m sure we must have a similar committee working as feverishly and diligently on the economy and jobs, right?
PreservedKillick
Your analogy is spot on, but, think, requires some actual intellectual engagement.
It might be simpler to say: “Your three year old just threatened to hold his breath until he turned blue unless you bought him a pony. You bought him a pony. What happens now?”
Except that my analogy implies some control and trivializes the situation. This is way, way scary and dangerous. A you note.
PreservedKillick
Your analogy is spot on, but, think, requires some actual intellectual engagement.
It might be simpler to say: “Your three year old just threatened to hold his breath until he turned blue unless you bought him a pony. You bought him a pony. What happens now?”
Except that my analogy implies some control and trivializes the situation. This is way, way scary and dangerous. A you note.
stinkdaddy
@The Sheriff’s A Ni-: How bout you guys take the Friedman unit yourselves and figure out how cutting the provider side doesn’t mean Medicare cuts?
As for SS, no, I know. Obama and the Dems have done such a masterful job of negotiating so far that it would be absurd to suggest that they’re going to get rolled again in the Super Committee fight right? Delusional optimism springs eternal.
(And you do realize that SS is on the table for the Super Committee, and that the stuff about how it’s been ‘protected’ is convenient spin that applies only to the trigger cuts… right?)
bob h
many Democrats oppose any change that would reduce benefits from current law.
SS colas in recent years have been zero, and under the new formula would still be zero.
I see the proposal failing in the House, and Obama going unilateral/Constitutional to save the day.
harlana
Does anyone know of a special committee appointed to solve our unemployment and economic crisis which, by the way, happens to be a real crisis, as opposed to the manufactured one we are living through today, frittering away valuable time and resources on this ridiculous, completely unnecessary fight?
harlana
bob h: For all my cynicism, I hope you are right, I sincerely do.
kay
@stinkdaddy:
It’s not true that acceptance of Medicare is going down. Actually, the reverse is true. Acceptance of private insurance is going down.
There were two studies that concluded that media had “exaggerated” the problem. Our media? Exaggerating a problem with a public program and ignoring access issues with private insurance? Mercy. I’m shocked.
The nice thing about Medicare is there’s loads of actual data, so we don’t have to rely on media re-printing lobbyist or Right wing press releases.
arguingwithsignposts
@kay: Wasn’t there a study in chicago recently about medicare (aid?) patients having to wait longer for appointments than patients with pvt insurance?
toledored
wow. 500 comments.
kay
@arguingwithsignposts:
Probably Medicaid.
Access issues are really complicated. It’s a big country. Where I live (w/rural poverty) there aren’t enough primary care physicians at any price. They won’t move here, because of quality of life issues (and I don’t really blame them). The same is true in poor urban areas.
Anyway, when you look at national stats, you have to consider that this is a very big and diverse country, and health care is complicated. The answer isn’t “spend more money on health care”. We spend more than anyone else on health care. It isn’t working.
I hate how narrow and frightened our health care “debate” has become. It’s all about scarcity and winners and losers. If there isn’t sufficient capacity at a price we can possibly manage, we’re going to have to deal with that at some point. I don’t see the point in pretending the underlying problem is going to go away. It isn’t.
licensed to kill time
just doing my part to bump this thread to 500
dollared
Likewise. It gives me the leg tingle to be part of 500 post thread that didn’t begin with an ABL attack on a fellow progressive.
Groucho48
So, who should we push for to be on the commission? Bernie Sanders? Someone from the Black Caucus? Who has been a strong advocate of SS and Medicare and such? people’s Budget folks? The commission should get plenty of media attention, so, a strong liberal voice on it would probably get more media attention than any strong liberal voice has gotten in recent memory.
jefft452
i cant leave it at 499 now can I?