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You are here: Home / The Cantor next time

The Cantor next time

by Tim F|  March 21, 201310:11 am| 23 Comments

This post is in: Seriously

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Ezra, who understands such things, thinks that the GOP might skip shutting the government down through budget buffoonery so they can take another shot at the debt ceiling. A red doomsday button does grant some extra negotiating leverage, if you can convince the other guy that you really are bugfuck crazy.

This raises a question that has stuck with me since the last debt ceiling crisis. As I understand it the last compromise did not lift the debt ceiling but rather set back the date when the government would have to deal with it. The annoying but not-end-of-the-world result of this decision would be that Congress has to raise the debt ceiling by some amount more than it otherwise would have done. That makes it harder to get the Congressional Branch Davidian caucus on board but no biggie since Boehner seems to have misplaced the stone tablets on which they etched the Hastert Rule. On the other hand, it might be a good idea for someone to check whether this makes the the Cantor Gambit a bit more risky, this being the negotiating ploy where Congress lets the formal deadline lapse and counts on creative bean counters at Treasury and Fed to save us all from certain doom. If Cantor tries his gambit this time, would the extra back-pressured debt make it harder for the bean counters to keep armageddon at bay?

Just thinking out loud here. No need to panic since I am sure the GOP understands what they are doing and have every intention of negotiating in good faith.

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Reader Interactions

23Comments

  1. 1.

    Grumpy Code Monkey

    March 21, 2013 at 10:26 am

    No need to panic since I am sure the GOP understands what they are doing and have every intention of negotiating in good faith.

    BA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA <gasp wheeze> HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!!!

    /wipes tears from eyes

    Thanks, I needed that.

  2. 2.

    Baud

    March 21, 2013 at 10:26 am

    Obama should continue the policy of not negotiating on the debt ceiling, and all us need to support him on that policy.

  3. 3.

    Hill Dweller

    March 21, 2013 at 10:29 am

    The wingnuts are feeling good right now because they think they won the sequester fight, thanks in no small part to the Village carrying their water and blaming it all on Obama. But, as Greg Sargent points out, local media is reporting on the sequester effects in real time, and it’s only going to get worse in the coming months. Let’s see how the wingnuts act after their constituents start hammering them.

  4. 4.

    Omnes Omnibus

    March 21, 2013 at 10:31 am

    They are trolls. (h/t to whoever said it first) They have no interest in governance. I can handle people who have a different view of how things should work as long as I think they are trying to actually make things work. These assholes are not trying to make things work. They are trolling.

  5. 5.

    PIGL

    March 21, 2013 at 10:31 am

    Two solutions:

    Change the filibuster rules

    or

    Declare the Second Republic

    In the honourable tradition of the Anglo-French Enlightenment, I suggest try door #2.

  6. 6.

    c u n d gulag

    March 21, 2013 at 10:32 am

    Tim,
    That last line there – that them thar’s some pure f*ckin’ comedy gold!!!

  7. 7.

    PIGL

    March 21, 2013 at 10:35 am

    @Omnes Omnibus: Well, worse than trolling, as it has actual constitutional consequences in Washington and, you know, real live consequences in the real world.

    Cromwell would have known what to do: “get you gone, and give place to honest men.”

    The GOP have abrogated to themselves the permanent governance of the United States. They can suffered to win, or they can be removed from power by force. I think you are past electoral solutions to this problem. The solutions I hear amount “to wait a generation for demographics to do it for us”. Sadly, eternity is not available.

  8. 8.

    Grumpy Code Monkey

    March 21, 2013 at 10:38 am

    @PIGL:

    So, basically, a 2nd Amendment solution?

  9. 9.

    Omnes Omnibus

    March 21, 2013 at 10:42 am

    @PIGL: If we want to use Cromwell, this is fun:

    Weeds and nettles, briars and thorns, have thriven under your shadow, dissettlement and division, discontentment and dissatisfaction, together with real dangers to the whole.

  10. 10.

    PIGL

    March 21, 2013 at 10:45 am

    @Grumpy Code Monkey: Nope, thinking more coup of one faction against another. That`s how it usually happens. A third-world peasant uprising (that could involve what y’all call 2nd amendment solutions) requires an engaged peasantry.

  11. 11.

    PIGL

    March 21, 2013 at 10:47 am

    @Omnes Omnibus: a learned man, I see.

    Of course I am mostly joking about all this. Except…how long will the GOP be allowed to continue like this? Forever? Until they themselves declare the 3rd Republic?

  12. 12.

    Omnes Omnibus

    March 21, 2013 at 10:49 am

    @PIGL: They are basically in the process of disappearing up their own asses. Hopefully, they work assiduously at doing it faster.

  13. 13.

    Zifnab25

    March 21, 2013 at 10:57 am

    The annoying but not-end-of-the-world result of this decision would be that Congress has to raise the debt ceiling by some amount more than it otherwise would have done

    Oh please. Like Congress actually gives a shit about what the debt numbers are.

    “Bazillion Trillion! Million Zillion! Big numbers are biiiiiiig and have I mentioned about how a family budget totally wouldn’t work this way?!”

  14. 14.

    jl

    March 21, 2013 at 11:09 am

    Fear not, Tim F. If I understood news report this morning, the deal is done. No gummint shutdown. Bill passed with some provisions to give some departments more flexibility in deciding what to cut under sequester. Overall sequester remains in place.

    I guess the GOP R learning. Defeat does that.

    It’s been the devil’s own day year, on gummint funding.

    Well, we’ll lick em’ tomorrow next midterm.

  15. 15.

    ThatLeftTurnInABQ

    March 21, 2013 at 11:15 am

    @PIGL:

    The GOP have abrogated to themselves the permanent governance of the United States. They can [be] suffered to win,

    Sad but true.

    …or they can be removed from power by force. I think you are past electoral solutions to this problem.

    Fun to joke about, but realistically we all know this is never going to happen.

    The solutions I hear amount “to wait a generation for demographics to do it for us”. Sadly, eternity is not available.

    And yet this is how is has always worked in the US political system. Political revolutions only happen briefly and at times of very acute crisis. Our quasi-consitutional crisis today is a different sort of problem, because in the hands of Obama and the Dems the country remains governable, albeit not at a very high level of quality. This isn’t 1932. And so yes, it will take time. Not geological spans of time (although it may feel that way), but in human terms, a lot of time. Realistically, we’re waiting for another decade’s worth of old people to die off before we can do much better than we are doing now.

  16. 16.

    Tim F.

    March 21, 2013 at 11:19 am

    @jl: Not having the government shutdown is what Ezra is worried about.

  17. 17.

    Michele C

    March 21, 2013 at 11:28 am

    @Zifnab25: Of course it’s not the same. No one is willing to lend families money at negative real interest rates.

  18. 18.

    Villago Delenda Est

    March 21, 2013 at 11:30 am

    No need to panic since I am sure the GOP understands what they are doing and have every intention of negotiating in good faith.

    And in other news, Lucy swears this time she won’t pull away the football.

    Fortunately, it doesn’t seem that Charlie Brown is the guy who’s doing the kicking. It’s Franklin, and he’s not as naive as Charlie Brown.

  19. 19.

    Villago Delenda Est

    March 21, 2013 at 11:32 am

    @PIGL:

    So, you’re proposing a Glorious Revolution?

    Where’s William III and his Dutch Army when you need him?

  20. 20.

    David in NY

    March 21, 2013 at 11:41 am

    Do I misunderstand, or didn’t the Republicans just win the game with no further stuff necessary? OK, they agree we can have a government. But the sequester continues, except stuff that Republicans like will be excepted from it. And everyone thinks this is peachy. But it will, of course, be the baseline for the next budget. http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/house-approves-resolution-to-keep-the-goverment-running-bill-heads-to-white-house/2013/03/21/b06e0e92-922e-11e2-9cfd-36d6c9b5d7ad_story.html

    WTF??? Or am I missing something here?

  21. 21.

    David in NY

    March 21, 2013 at 11:41 am

    Do I misunderstand, or didn’t the Republicans just win the game with no further stuff necessary? OK, they agree we can have a government. But the sequester continues, except stuff that Republicans like will be excepted from it. And everyone thinks this is peachy. But it will, of course, be the baseline for the next budget. http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/house-approves-resolution-to-keep-the-goverment-running-bill-heads-to-white-house/2013/03/21/b06e0e92-922e-11e2-9cfd-36d6c9b5d7ad_story.html

    WTF??? Or am I missing something here?

  22. 22.

    Michele C

    March 21, 2013 at 12:02 pm

    @David in NY: This really freaked me out, too. Am I missing something? I have a friend out of work for two months because she was supposed to start a government job that now will not be filled b/c of these cuts. I have another friend who just found out that the job he wanted to get in the federal government will not be hiring at all this year–though luckily he has a current job. These are anecdotal evidence, but I’m positive that things are bad.

    Also, the pay freeze applies for a third year. So, 2.8 million people, most of whom earn less than $75,000/year, find their wages continue downward in relation to inflation. But, we’ll hear about how government employees make too much money, because the tax accountant working for the IRS makes more than a WalMart greeter, so s/he should be grateful.

  23. 23.

    PIGL

    March 21, 2013 at 3:01 pm

    @Villago Delenda Est: That wouldn’t be a bad idea. Better than what the Republican Freikorps and their Kongressional and Stadt House enablers have in mind.

    The Clinton and Bush-era policies of blocking all Democratic appointments, no matter how innocuous, while madly packing every corner of bench and department with rabid extremism continues unabated, almost unremarked.

    Local law enforcement is becoming unmoored and unaccountable. Where does it end?

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