… too soon?
Dave Weigel at Slate on the “Deal-Curious Republicans Added to Supercommittee“:
… From the Boehner file: GOP Conference Chairman Jeb Hensarling, R-Tex. Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp, R-Mich., Energy and Commerce Chairman Fred Upton, R-Mich. From the McConnell file: Minority Whip Jon Kyl, R-Ariz., Sen. Rob Portman, R-Ohio, and Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa.
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The Portman pick is the single greatest reason for liberals to hope that revenue ends up in a supercommittee plan…
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Kyl, meanwhile, has nothing to lose: He’s retiring. If the Democrats couldn’t get a Snowe, a Collins, or a Gang of Six-er on the committee, this is about as good as they could have done. Toomey, the elder statesman of the Tea Party freshmen (he’d served three terms in the House before his 2010 comeback), so of the Republicans who voted “no” on the debt deal, he’s the one Democrats can do business with. (There’ll be no Ron Johnson or Rand Paul to toss grenades in the pond. Also, that rumor that “no” voters would be denied supercommittee slots was just that. A rumor.)
So, maybe we get a choice of tire rims or anthrax with our cat food. Props to Mr. Weigel for “deal-curious“, though!
mai naem
Jon Kyl has been absolutely nasty to Obama and the Dems so if somebody thinks that Kyl is somebody you can make a deal with, I want to find out what you are smoking in that crackpipe of yours.
Martin
Wut? Pat Toomey, President of Club for Growth? Uh…
Corner Stone
Why would we want one of the Maine Sisters? They talk much shit then vote hard R.
Listen. This is pretty simple politics. A deal will be reached. The triggers will never be engaged.
eric
It does NOT matter if they get anything out of the committee. To do so means getting one Dem vote and WHATEVER it took to get that one vote will be anethma to the House GOP. And I don;t think Pelosi could get Dem votes for a plan put forward by six GOPers. We just saw this trainwreck.
eric
@Corner Stone: Even if there is a deal in the Committee, the House GOP will never go along with the items that the dems on the committee required.
Hunter Gathers
Get ready for a big huge nothing burger to come out of this White Middle-Aged Male clusterfuck. Triggers, anyone?
Corner Stone
What difference does it actually make? Kyl or any other R. We’re getting a deal with a D breaking ranks, or multiple Ds voting for it. I’d be surprised if it ends up 7-5. More like 9-3.
Swishalicious
Weigel’s analysis is profoundly flawed, especially considering his normal near-realism (coupled with occasional bouts of really grating Broderism).
Kyl is a flamethrower who hates Democrats, passionately. He doesn’t fetishize bipartisanship. I doubt that he will want his legacy to be “that one Republican senator who actually voted to raise taxes.”
Portman, as GWB’s OMB chair, oversaw a doubling of the debt, tax cuts ad nauseum, and so on. It is highly doubtful he’s going to play nice.
Calling Toomey the “elder statesman” is true, purified horseshit. If the 2010 elections hadn’t featured secessionists, overt race-baiters, and card-carrying members of the McCarthy Resurrection Club, Toomey would have been the craziest sonofabitch out there. There is no way in hell he would go for any tax increases.
So, great analysis Weigel. Keep on fucking that chicken.
Corner Stone
@eric: I disagree. We’re going to see another, “We HAD to” deal. “Adults in the room or spooky triggers!”
The Worst Person In the World
Super Congress. Super Committee.
Pundit whores and the blogosphere lending legitimacy to the absurd with their breathless chatter about who’s in, who’s out and what it all means.
My god, the U.S. political system is FUBAR.
eemom
@Corner Stone:
what is the deal you think we’re going to get?
Zifnab
If the Republicans were serious, they’d have seeded the committee with what remains of their moderate caucus – Luger, one of the Maine girls, maybe Lindsey Graham. These picks won’t do anything except issue press releases telling everyone how mean the Democrats are behind closed doors.
It’ll be nothing but screaming and wailing and gnashing of teeth. And come next November, the Republicans will be screaming about how Obama’s deficit committee is slashing Medicare and hates the troops because he didn’t sign on to cuts to Medicare, the VA, and troop pensions.
John O
This is going to be instant replay, for sure. Down to the wire, the GOP refusing to budge on taxes unless they’re lowered for everyone until stuff starts bludgeoning them with poll numbers and the market dives, again, and they’ll wind up toying at the edges (except about stuff the Dems want) and putting the real pain off some more.
It’s all pretty hopeless, IMHO. Once a certain amount of momentum has been attained…
John O
@Zifnab:
Right on.
eemom
@The Worst Person In the World:
agreed. Just another horse race for the gentlefolk to peruse without particular concern for the outcome.
Martin
@Zifnab: Yeah, the only GOPers that are going to budge are those that the Defense spending threat will carry weight with. They have to love their DOD dollars more than they hate taxes, and that’s a damn small club right now.
General Stuck
The initial deliberations by the committee, will need to be voted on to happen. Every single House republican, I think, has signed Grover’s no new taxes pledge. They are all terrified of that little Nazi, so I seriously doubt there will be any tax increases this go around.
And that pretty much nixes the committee agreeing on a final package to be voted on, as this entire charade over the budget deficit is because of nothing else other than gutting entitlement benefits, or killing the ACA.
And then the auto cuts kick it, and the screaming and knicker twisting over mil cuts will be deafening, from both sides of the isle, but all of the wingers. And that will either be dealt with by a repeal or amending the triggered cuts, either permanently , or as some kind of yearly fix nonsense. Most likely it will end up a wash.
But it will be great theater with both side claiming victory and the other side as being unreasonable and entrenched, with the usual red meat sermons on each parties core beliefs in the run up up to the election. Feeding their respective true believers, whilst the independents and others stand on the sidelines with their mouths open, sucking a thumb, wondering why we can’t just get along.
bkny
@The Worst Person In the World:
i so fucking agree… i’m sick to death of these bullshit configurations — the gang of six; the superduper committee to solve all our problems…
do your fucking job that you were elected to do. 81 members of congress are currently in israel being given their orders — all courtesy of aipac. did you hear that on the news today; or happen across it buried deep inside the wapo…
lacp
@General Stuck: General, that’s about the way I see it playing out, too, with all the players getting a chance to chew a little scenery.
And Weigel’s been smoking them banana peels again.
Mnemosyne
Isn’t Kyl gunning to be governor of Arizona after he’s done in Congress? Yeah, not seeing him swinging to the middle in order to get that job.
becca
Shouldn’t this really be the Gang of 7 instead of 12?
6 democrats and Grover Norquist are the actual make up after all.
Redshift
@General Stuck: Considering that this bit of theater was the way get through the debt ceiling negotiations without more draconian cuts, if the end result is nothing, I’d consider it a good ploy.
Villago Delenda Est
@General Stuck:
Counsel for the ghost of Adolph Hitler on line two, complaining that no matter what you think of the tenets of National Soshulism, at least it was an ethos, unlike the outright Nihilism of Grover Norquist, thank you…
RandyH
Doesn’t matter if Kyl is “retiring” to the lobbyist community where he can make millions. He is an absolute prick who will NEVER give the Democrats one inch. No way.
Zifnab
@Redshift:
There is no “nothing”. Either the committee cuts $1.2 trillion or the budget deal that created the committee auto-cuts $1.2 trillion, with $500 billion coming from defense and $700 billion coming from Medicare provider payments.
It’s lose-lose.
General Stuck
@Villago Delenda Est:
Grover is no nihilist, but he will gladly use the tea bag tool now in his toolbox of greed. He is a pure bread corporatist, that is willing to starve the goose just to the point it can keep laying the golden egg.
The problem is, there are no signposts where the point of diminishing returns drops off a cliff, but he, an unelected jackass, gets to lead us all down that Primrose Path, anyways, until the voters catch on, which may or may not be too late.
Villago Delenda Est
@General Stuck:
He’s not really a corporatist.
He’s a trust fund baby protecting his unearned stash.
General Stuck
@Villago Delenda Est:
No law says he can’t be both
DS
Apart from the fact that Portman was Bush’s CBO chief (I swear to fuck you cannot make this shit up) he and Toomey are odd choices from the Senate. Two freshman Senators? What the fuck? Maybe it means that there will be fewer special interests trying to give them a handjob under the table but it doesn’t look good. Not that it matters because nothing was going to come of this commission anyway. Time to start drinking.
mai naem
@DS: Thank you thank you thank you for pointing out that Rob freaking Portman was the CBO under Bush. Are you freaking kidding me? And Reid serves up Baucus? Are you freaking kidding me. Seriously, Baucus who either played the dumb fool as the finance committee chair last year on HCR or was an actual fool. And Patty Murray? Why are they not all rock solid liberals. Why couldn’t Al Franken(he is good with numbers), Rockefeller, Kohl, Boxer, Sherrod Brown, Chuck Schumer, Durbin, Levin, Harkin or Leahy be on the committee. It isn’t like the Repubs put up Scott Brown, Snowe or Lugar. Hell, Snowe may have been a good one being that her hubby is the big man behind the For Profit College Outfit thats being sued by the Obama Justice dept. Also too, let me repeat again Jon Kyl is a nasty petty piece of scum who will not only not contribute to a compromise but will walk away like he did on the finance committee. Just once, I want our side to stop looking like Statesmen and look more like a banana republic dictator.
Joseph Nobles
@General Stuck: The problem with killing the ACA in Extra Congress is that it also lowers the deficit and debt. So by killing the ACA, you’re adding to the target amount that must be cut before the triggers don’t fire.
Tonal Crow
Meanwhile over at HuffPo, Lawrence Lessig — who, BTW, has very good ideas about the proper scope of copyright — proposes a Constitutional Convention to fix our broken political system. Can you imagine what a debacle *that* would be in the present political climate? I can only conclude that he’s gone emeritus.
JPL
Rumor has it that Lindsay likes to hide behind doors..
maybe Lindsey Graham.
JPL
@Tonal Crow: I’m not big on reading Huffington but Boortz has been spouting the need for a Constitutional Convention since Obama was elected. He is just falling in line.
FlipYrWhig
@mai naem: What makes Patty Murray not a “rock solid liberal”? I don’t know her political career, but I don’t recall her name ever coming up among the list of problem children.
dollared
Agree with all that this is a hopeless list of R’s. But the game theory got much more complicated. If they don’t come up with a revenue deal, we could see another massive market drop, and maybe even a Moody’s or Fitch’s move.
The negotiation now clearly has a third player – Wall Street. Boehner/McConnell have a choice – they can go get a public permission slip from Big Business/Wall Street/Grover going into the negotiations and signal a compromise, or they can ride out another 20% drop in the Dow over Christmas and have the R’s take 100% of the blame.
Maybe they are that crazy – but if I were them I’d get the debt deal done with minor revenue increases pencilled in, and double-dipping revenue cuts as soon as possible, and count on the double dip to make Obama a one term President.
FlipYrWhig
@dollared:
True. And Wall Street appears to want pretty much what Obama and the Dems were saying they wanted: balance, new revenue, the whole shebang. Would Republicans go through the motions of giving them what they want, then pointing fingers at the dire results? Or would they still refuse to give them what they want because of their crusading, kamikaze mentality? I’m not sure how to make that call.
Little Boots
Kyl’s gotta line up some serious corporate sugar daddy cash now that he’s leaving the Senate. he’ll be the skankiest most desperate whore in the brothel.
Davis X. Machina
@mai naem: Durbin voted for the Simpson/Bowles commission report, and Baucus didn’t.
JC
What in the world causes Dems to be so obtuse? Charlie Brown committing to kick that football with Lucy, would not be so stupid.
It’s happening even with good progressives – this TPM article on how Sherrod Brown think Portman is open to revenue hikes, as an example.
It’s so clearly, blindly, staggeringly, completely OBVIOUS, that these are fakeouts.
The Obama admin and the Democrats are not going to AGAIN, pretend otherwise, are they?
JC
@FlipYrWhig: Assume what has happened the last year will continue to happen – anything that might enhance Obama’s rep, anything with new revenues, gets voted down, Wall Street pressure or no.
arguingwithsignposts
@JPL:
One more reason not to let that monster out of the hellhole (constitutional convention)
Little Boots
what in the past year would give anyone the idea that any Republican is “open” to “revenue hikes.” These are fanatics and whores. That is all. Deadlock is inevitable, and then, well, what exactly? The Defense complex steps in? not sure.
JC
You know, if this AGAIN ends up going down to the last second, a Kabuki play, the mean Republicans get their way – this happens a third time, we know without doubt that Obama and the Demsis going along to get along with regard to revenue going to the elite and less to everyone else.
dollared
@FlipYrWhig: I really don’t know if they are that crazy. Their brand is taking a beating and they still have one asset: most people don’t understand the need for stimulus.
So, if they are not crazy – just really good at playing crazy on TV – then my R side play would be to 1) get cover from Wall Street in a huge public show of responsibility and patriotism, 2) give the minimum on the revenue raise, 3) hit hard on cuts and 4) make sure there is absolutely nothing to raise GDP or create jobs at all.
After all, if they can keep things bad for most people, then win it all in 2012, their next move will be massive corporate tax cuts paid for by cuts to HUD and Medicaid. So why not give a bit on dividend and capital gains taxes now, and hope the double dip gives them both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue?
Mar
So 6 Republicans who have “vowed” not to raise taxes were appointed to the debt panel.
http://www.miamiherald.com/2011/08/10/2353879/6-republicans-who-have-vowed-no.html
The only way I can see these guys including closing tax loopholes or allowing the Bush tax cuts to expire in the deal is if we find a plethora of Arizona, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Texan, and Michigan voters to write to these guys all day, every day, letting them know that their constituents would prefer for federal taxes to be raised.
…anyone know of a plausible way this can be done? I live in California, so I’m no help
Martin
@Zifnab:
You know, I’d get over defense and medicare provider cuts pretty quickly.
JC
@Mar: No. And it wouldn’t matter anyway.
This has been another edition of simple answers to important questions.
Mnemosyne
@JC:
You mean like with the debt ceiling, where the Republicans basically agreed to a symbolic committee and didn’t get much else? Or with the budget battle in December where the only things that got cut were things like census workers who were going to be let go anyway?
Yep, those mean ol’ Republicans, getting everything they ever wanted: completely meaningless symbolic victories that don’t actually change anything. Damn them and their Kabuki victories!
(Not that we don’t need some serious revenue enhancing, but I think the “wins” by Republicans are greatly exaggerated and almost completely without substance.)
JC
Also, seriously guys, while this is news, isn’t the budget hostage negotiations in two months?
so we’ve got that deadlock, followed by the requirement to come up with a ‘balanced plan’ by the 12 Super Dupers, in November.
What’s happening with the budget battle, anyway?
Corner Stone
An all cuts, no revenue deal doesn’t exactly scream “WIN!!” to me.
JC
@Mnemosyne: Only immediately, but has been explained by Barney Frank, it’s a killer down the line. and it’s set up that way.
Corner Stone
@JC:
Not if you believe the people who bought into the “deem and pass” bullshit.
Or maybe that isn’t accurate after all?
Corner Stone
@JC:
Of course it will. I can’t understand why anyone could envision a different way this will play out.
JC
@Corner Stone: Was deem and pass for this upcoming budget negotiation? I thought that was for something else?
Fucen Pneumatic Fuck Wrench Tarmal
of course the superfriends committee is a huge moneymaker for both parties. they staffed it with people who are guaranteed to line both entrances to the hall of justice. they will get it in contribution, they will get it in bribes, they will get it in graft of all types. when you consider who was picked on both sides, that was the deciding factor. who could land this big of a crime. if the whole government might get cut, everyone with a slice of profitable quid pro quo, is going to be protecting their turf with cash.
if libs want to preserve the safety net, the best bet is to create a slush fund of contributions, to be distributed as party favors…sort of like the tip jar at a starbucks or a convenience store where no tipping is normally required.
Corner Stone
@JC: That’s what I keep getting told here.
Lots of people think we’re not going to have a fight over the next budget.
JC
@Corner Stone:Well, here is an article that says different.
This doesn’t address deem and pass, but perhaps it does set the level of funding for the next year – meaning the debt ceiling agreement -but there is still a budget battle.
Davis X. Machina
@JC: Deem and pass is used a couple of different ways. The usual way it is used is that when a budget is passed, the debt ceiling is deemed to have also been raised to the extent necessary to expend the sums budgeted, à la the Gephardt rule.
There’s another manouever called ‘deem and pass’ that’s more accurately called a self-executing rule, that was used in passing PPACA
Midnight Marauder
@dollared:
I’m sorry. This was written in reference to Republicans, correct? Republicans in the United States of America, right? I was under the impression we had long ago moved beyond the place where we say “if they are not crazy.” It was my belief that all reasonable people had agreed upon this salient fact many moons ago.
I mean, we’re talking about Republicans…and patriotism?!
The helicopters. They are laughing hysterically.
Dollared
@Midnight Marauder: You really need to understand that 75% of them are not crazy at all. And they are getting what they want.
The only thing that matters to the 75% is the 19% effective tax rate the rich are paying right now. It has not been that low since WWI. The entire mission of the 75% is to use the crazy 25% to keep that effective tax rate below 20%.
That is all.
bob h
I’m guessing that Twoomey is getting a big ration of shit from his old Wall St. buddies.