@JuddLegum Like Podesta's old line from Clinton White House: If the legislative plan depends on moderate Republicans, get another plan.
— billmon (@billmon1) September 30, 2013
Light entertainment, for the interval. The Huffington Post has video of Troutmouth Bob Woodward, hustling to be on the right side of history:
“Let’s call it what it is, they are trying to blackmail the president and say, ‘Look, we’re going to shut down the government or default on our debt unless you — we go back, rewind the clock, on Obamacare and delay it or somehow cut off the funding,” he said. “You can’t govern that way. It will not work. It will be exposed.”
(Of course, Both Sides Bob immediately pivots to explaining how Obama should be “talking with” the blackmailers, because after fifty years of undercover work it’s not just a pose, it’s a neurological tic.)
Alex MacGillis at TNR profiles one of those lemmings, now occupying George H.W.Bush’s old seat:
When this chapter of the Republican Party’s descent into radicalism is written, the representative quote may go not to Ted Cruz, who managed to say little memorable in his 21-hour talkathon, but to his fellow Texan, Rep. John Culberson. It was Culberson, a seven-term member from Houston, who, recounting how House Republicans voted Saturday to make a delay of Obamacare a condition for funding the government, declared, “The whole room: ‘Let’s vote!’ I said, like 9/11, ‘let’s roll!’”
Yes, in Culberson’s mind, holding hostage the federal government for the sake of denying health insurance to millions of the working poor (a disproportionate share of them Texans) is apparently sorta like heroically attempting to overcome terrorist hijackers armed with boxcutters, as the passengers aboard Flight 93 did on September 11, 2001 after one of them, Todd Beamer, uttered that succinct call to action…
I remember the Teahadist dropping their iconization of the Flight 93 defenders when it turned out one of them was gay, but then, I’m just a DFH cynic…
Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader
Holy shit, could this whole shutdown thing turn on the outing of one Republican congressperson?
Suffern ACE
Next round “ok. I give in. I’ll take away the health care subsidies for Congressmen if you vote to lift the debt ceiling until the end of my term. I’m do mad, I promise never to speak with you again”
Obama is gonna cave.
dmsilev
So apparently Steny Hoyer dared John Boehner to bring the Senate CR to the floor of the House for a vote. My recollection of the proper parliamentary procedure is a bit fuzzy, but I believe that after the dare has been seconded, the Democrats can escalate to a triple dog dare and force the vote.
Spaghetti Lee
@dmsilev:
“You can’t triple-stamp a double-stamp!”
Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader
@dmsilev: Nope. Gotta move through a Dog Dare and a Double Dog Dare before you can use a Triple Dog Dare.
Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader
@efgoldman:
We’ll just do one for Friday, Saturday and Sunday to balance it out.
IowaOldLady
John Boehner is like the parent who let his kid get away with tantrums and now he has to live with this awful child. He has a terrible job, but he created it himself. I can’t imagine Nancy P. putting up with the crap Boehner has enabled.
dmsilev
@Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader: Well, sure you have to jump through the intermediate hoops, but I was more interested in the end result.
Spaghetti Lee
Question: The defunding PPACA/government shutdown thing is an either/or, right? All the PPACA stuff that was supposed to go live tomorrow still will? Or are the people who are supposed to implement that also being put on hold by the shutdown?
NotMax
Run, Toto, run! It’s a Teanado!
Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader
@IowaOldLady:
John Boehner is enduring all of this grief BECAUSE of what Nancy Pelosi accomplished as Speaker of the House. She almost singlehandedly rallied the House to a majority vote on the ACA after Obama and Rahmbo threw in the towel.
tybee
@Spaghetti Lee:
PPACA cannot be defunded. it will roll on regardless of what the tea pity does.
IowaOldLady
@Spaghetti Lee: My understanding is it will happen. The ACA is funded as mandatory spending, not discretionary spending, like Medicare and Social Security are.
The effect of a debt ceiling breach in a few weeks is a different matter. That’s unchartered territory. With a CR, that’s just having a budget in place to decide where the money goes. With the debt ceiling, that’s not having the money.
PsiFighter37
@Spaghetti Lee: It goes live, as it’s mandatory spending and not discretionary spending.
I wonder if the Teabaggers will figure this out and subsequently self-immolate in one last desperate maneuver.
Anyways, this is a huge waste of time. It also makes the GOP look stupid – they keep tweaking it over and over again, but the one constant is some kind of delay of Obamacare.
They know once people get a taste of the good Kenyan socialist life, they’ll never come back. This phenomenon may be explained in a more colloquial fashion, but to be honest I’m not sure if it’s something appropriate for me to utter.
Older
Speaking of lemmings:
Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) sharply criticized his fellow House Republicans on Monday, saying it’s “moronic” for them to let the government shut down over their opposition to Obamacare and calling them “lemmings with suicide vests.”
“They have to be more than just a lemming,” he said. “Because jumping to your death is not enough.”
elftx
so where the fk did Rep. King hide on this vote?? Big Man he is LOL
dmsilev
Looks like the Senate is getting set to vote to table the House’s latest temper tantrum and send it back. Then we’ll see if Boehner can make one more go at it before midnight.
Frankensteinbeck
@PsiFighter37:
I see what you did not do there.
Ash Can
@Spaghetti Lee: My understanding is, yes, it’s going into effect tomorrow no matter what. I saw a tweet somewhere earlier this evening from Michelle O about how military families will be able to buy insurance starting tomorrow. Furthermore, I’m thinking that, since the insurance marketplaces/exchanges are administered by the states and not the Feds, they won’t be affected by a Fed shutdown. I certainly invite others who know more than me to correct me and/or provide additional, and better, information.
ETA: Aaaand beaten to it by many. So much the better.:)
dmsilev
@Older: And then, of course, he voted with the bulk of his GOP colleagues to go jump off that cliff anyway.
Cervantes
@PsiFighter37: It also makes the GOP look stupid
I’m trying to think … Is there anything that doesn’t?
Anoniminous
@Suffern ACE:
Looking at his history, the TeaTards have every reason to believe he will.
If he does he can kiss his signature Bill goodbye and they will force even more pain come Debt Ceiling time.
I don’t think he will. I’ve been wrong before.
muddy
@Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader: Nuclear option.
MomSense
I’m so sick of this. Can’t we just have a normal, functioning, modern government and some healthcare?
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
@PsiFighter37:
Sometimes it is very hard for stupid people to avoid looking stupid.
Anoniminous
@tybee:
If they win this one they can make defunding ACA a condition of raising the debt ceiling.
Howard Beale IV
If the government shuts down, the BATF can’t issue squat.
‘Just sayin’ .
JPL
@MomSense: NO…
Get off my lawn
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
@Older: I’d be more impressed if he’d joined Peter King and Charlie Dent in voting against the rule. Instead, he basically said, “My fellow Republicans are a bunch of lemmings with . . . excuse me a second. Let me strap this thing on.”
Spaghetti Lee
@PsiFighter37:
Once you go ACA, you never go back-a.
raven
@MomSense: You should be watching Rachel. These motherfuckers are giddy about this shit.
Baud
@raven:
Ratings. They needs it.
mai naem
@IowaOldLady: I’m not sure it’s Boehner. For sure, it’s not Boehner alone. Boehner did try and discipline his idiots early on this term. This is Mittman, Paul Ryan, Fox, Bill Kristol, Breitbart and all the other apparatchik of the Right. And of course, let’s not forget the Kochs, Adelson, the Hedgefunders and all the other republican big business folks who encouraged this crap for their own purposes(i.e. less regulation/even lower taxes/no climate change regs.)
JPL
Chuck Shumer looks tired and is ready for the shutdown. It’s kinda sad because so many people will be put out of work while the Koch brother faction laughs.
raven
@Baud: I meant the pukes.
Amir Khalid
Why are the Big Giant Heads of the Beltway media urging Obama to negotiate with the Tea Party, when the Tea Party won’t even negotiate with Republican leaders? What is there for him to say to people whose only reply has ever been, and ever shall be, “fuck you”?
Baud
@raven:
Oh, they’re just insane.
dmsilev
@Amir Khalid: Because the Big Giant Heads are willful idiots.
eemom
@Anoniminous:
I don’t think so either.
Always before when he’s caved, there was some kind of quid pro quo that came out of it besides not shooting the hostage. This time there isn’t. It is pure gun to the head terrorism and it is there for all the world to see.
Also too, and I guess unlike many here, I don’t think most people are fooled by the emmessemm bullshit, this time around.
Spaghetti Lee
@Anoniminous:
Why do they have ‘every reason’ to believe he will? I’m honestly asking. The Tea Party has made a lot of noise, but they’ve not actually extracted that much. And their previous attempts to take the debt limit hostage turned into a flop. Why wouldn’t this one?
I assume the bet on the Obama side is that the shutdown will end, embarrassing the GOP and leading a new round of Republican infighting and bloodletting, before the debt limit vote happens. I like the odds on that.
JPL
@mai naem: It is Boehner. He doesn’t have the guts to bring forward a clean bill. no excuses
mai naem
@MomSense: Where do you think you live? Canada eh?
Johnnybuck
@Anoniminous: It’s simple, he can’t. If he does it will be the end of his presidency.
it’s that simple.
Jeremy
@Anoniminous: He has already indicated that he will not negotiate so I don’t know why some “allies” want to start attacking the president and saying he will cave. There are no negotiations going on so all this talk of caving is ridiculous.
Anya
My MIL and her MIL are a life long Republicans (Rockefeller Republican), but the last 10 years they’ve been drifting from the GOP “party of Lincoln”. They still support some candidate and donate but they’ve both voted for Obama twice (because McCain was an “unstable man with a twit for a running mate,” and Romeny “unprincipled,” but they still considered themselves proud republicans. Today though, I am certain they will never, ever vote for another republican. I am almost certain they will either register independent or go Dem. They’re both disgusted by the antics of the teahadits. I am guessing a lot of people are coming to that conclusion.
Violet
@Johnnybuck: Agreed. He can’t cave. It won’t just be the end of his presidency, but it will affect all Democrats. He’s got to stand firm on this one.
dmsilev
@JPL: Basically this. A clean CR would almost definitely pass the House if Boehner would allow a vote.
Roger Moore
@efgoldman:
Except for the military, which can only be funded for two years at a time.
Cacti
So, when does the Senate vote to table the latest offering shat out by the teabaggers?
Roger Moore
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
“It’s not the dress that makes you look fat, honey.”
dmsilev
Senate just (as expected) gave the House the middle finger again. Back to Boehner-land.
Anya
@Suffern ACE: Why now, when he’s never caved before? In the past, he negotiated and like all negotiations got some things, and gave away some stuff. That’s not caving.
Villago Delenda Est
We’re going to need more pianos to “accidentally” drop on Village scum. Booby needs a baby grand on his noggin.
dmsilev
@Cacti: Just finished now.
Cacti
@eemom:
Yup.
It’s straight up extortion this time around. The only “offer” the House is making is not to throw a wrench in the national government.
And the POTUS pointed out earlier that keeping the people’s government functioning is not a concession to him.
Baud
@Anya:
Forget it, Anya. It’s Chinatown.
mai naem
@JPL: If Boehner does bring a clean CR to the floor, and it passes, can the teabagger reps revolt and vote in a new Speaker? Or does he have the Speaker’s job for the whole session pretty much no matter what happens? My assumption is that he gets kicked out by his caucus like Newt did but I don’t remember if Newt got kicked out before or after the session started. Boehner might be a POS but he’s better than Cantor.
eemom
@MomSense:
Srsly fellow Mom — you been reading the young ‘uns fairy tales again? : )
pseudonymous in nc
51 votes on the Senate table. Back to the House.
OGLiberal
I only wish the Dems were as in-line with their party line as the fucking tea bagger party. 6 GOPers voted against the non-crazy bill, and four of those voted against it because it wasn’t fucking crazy enough. Wouldn’t it be great if the Dems could get this kind of obeisance, if somebody like Joe Manchin would vote whatever way his party’s fucking craziest folks wanted him to vote. As I believe Greg Sargent noted, John Boehner could get a non-defunding Obamacare spending bill passed by just bringing a vote on it to the floor -enough GOPers would defect. But he won’t because he’s scared shitless of the tea baggers. I love Nancy Pelosi but she and Hoyer would never do the same if their seat was threatened by a far lefty challenger.
Suffern ACE
@Anya: snarky. I’m being snarky!
Hill Dweller
@Cacti: They’re doing it now.
TheMightyTrowel
@Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader: Mike Rogers tried, but no one’s biting yet.
drkrick
@Cacti: About a half hour ago.
Buckyblue
I never watch Morning Ho, but did this morning and heard woody, and others complain about the presidents “lack of leadership”. As if the prez could get his Muslim ass to convince some jesus loving teahadist to change his vote. I knew there was a reason why I never watched the show.
Anne Laurie
@elftx:
If you’re talking about Pete King, I’ll repeat myself: Pete is an old-fashioned Irish mucker, and if he’s badmouthing the Teahadists in public, that means the Permanent Party has decided the Teahadists have become more trouble than they’re worth.
As my fourth-grade parochial school teacher explained, St. Peter is the patron saint of muckers — a guy who was an untrustworthy friend, quick to violence, and incapable of following orders until he’d burnt his fingers at least once. But he was, according to the mythology, the guy chosen to lead the enterprise after its founder’s removal from this plane… not the guys who showed up at the cruxifiction, not the guys who wrote the books, but “The Rock”. Pete King sees himself as ‘the rock’ for the current GOP.
Hill Dweller
@pseudonymous in nc:
Is that the total number of “yeas”?
Villago Delenda Est
@Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader:
The most vocal homophobes are, inevitably, deep in the closet, and for good reason. They make a gay pride parade look like a West Point cadet review.
pseudonymous in nc
@mai naem:
The Speaker is elected by a majority of the whole House, not a majority of the majority. So, unless the teabaggers have 217 votes out of 232 GOPers for their preferred ‘bagger, no.
Jeremy
@Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader: I don’t recall the President throwing in the towel. There were discussions among advisors on which direction to go after the Brown victory but the President did not give up.
pseudonymous in nc
@Hill Dweller: Nah, they got 54 again, I think. I stopped counting at 51, as did C-SPAN2.
eemom
@Jeremy:
This, too.
Another thing I don’t get is how doing this now, does NOT totally wreck the bugfucks’ chances of pulling it again over the debt ceiling. Can someone explain that to me please?
Villago Delenda Est
@pseudonymous in nc:
What this means is that it’s quite possible (however unlikely) for Boner to be deposed by a coalition of only marginally insane GOPers and the Dems.
The teatards have no chance of advancing say the Bachmann bint to the Speakership. She’s one of the head lemmings.
JPL
There is no Republican party as we know it. It has been hijacked by the Koch brothers, who joined with the evangelicals to create a new party. Can we call it for what it its.. faux evangelical libertarians.. I’m sure there are many on this site that can come up with a new term. Myself, I call them assholes.
Hill Dweller
@Buckyblue:
That’s their standard fallback position. The Republicans are undeniably crazy, but saying so wouldn’t be “balanced”. So they always have to throw in the silly leadership criticism.
johnny aquitard
@MomSense: As long as we have old white people with a sense of entitlement, bitter resentment and a fear of Those People, no, we won’t.
A sane government is gonna take another 10 years to tip over to where they are few enough to be treated like the mean dirtbag crazy people they are. We’re already on the road to the healthcare youare thinking of. And it’s gonna be a whole different ballgame in 20.
I’ll be lucky to live much beyond that by much, but I am hopeful for my kids and the families they may one day raise.
Villago Delenda Est
@Hill Dweller:
Yes, it’s basically the Morning Ho “both sides do it” meme. They can’t call it what it is, so the ni*CLANG* has to take some blame for the situation. After all, he’s a ni*CLANG*, which is grounds for impeachment all by itself.
Spaghetti Lee
@eemom:
Well, what they’ll tell themselves is “We defeated Obamacare once with the government shutdown, let’s kill it for good with the debt ceiling! YES WE CAN!” What I think/hope every non-teabagger is saying by then is “Jesus Christ, shut up and go away you fucking assholes.”
I think if the fake Peter King Rebellion had actually happened, a clean bill snuck through the house at the last minute with the Dems and establishment Republicans, we’d be seeing the Tea Party self-destruct for good right before our eyes, which is why I was rooting for it. I personally think shutting down the government helps the teatards if only because it gives them a scalp and keeps them in fighting mode, but maybe I’m wrong.
pseudonymous in nc
@Villago Delenda Est:
Yeah, but the Dems are going to vote for Nancy Smash! unless she releases a few at a time to vote for GOPers in order to fuck with them. Though I wouldn’t put it past her to do that, if the opportunity presents itself, because she is the canniest of politicians when it comes to vote counts.
Anya
@Suffern ACE: It’s hard to tell these days. I guess I should know from the comment history.
MikeBoyScout
Congratulations to the teabagging House Republicans, its testicular challenged “leader” who would not could not in the House allow a vote on a clean CR! With the Senate’s completely unpredictable 3rd rejection of the House CR we Fk! the nation!
Baud
@Villago Delenda Est:
Brian Williams and NBC Nightly News were pushing the same meme big time. And they butchered an interview with Sebelius.
Suffern ACE
@JPL: who owns the Rrpublican ™ name? And the elephant? And the color red?
mai naem
@pseudonymous in nc: Yes, but would a Dem vote for Boehner? Wouldn’t they automatically vote for Pelosi or a Dem? I don’t know that much about Repub factions in the House but I don’t think its out of the realm of possibility to see 217 Repubs voting for Cantor.
ira-NY
This will do harm, but nothing compared to what failing to increase the debt limit would do.
If this blows up in their face, we may be spared the catastrophe of failing to increase the debt limit.@eemom:
JPL
Raven.. you still around? Broun voted against Boehner and Barrow broke rank and voted with him.. WTF
dmsilev
@Hill Dweller: No, final was 54-46 like all the other votes. Senate is now in random-Senator-babbling mode and will reconvene for reals at 11 PM Eastern.
Southern Beale
This was a kick in the pants:
Sorta boggles the mind. Bachmann, Gohmert, Gingrey and the other nutballs voted with the anti-shutdown Peter King because the latest House funding bill isn’t mean enough to Obamacare.
I mean, is this bullshit or what?
Baud
@Suffern ACE:
Satan.
Southern Beale
Stock market is tanking. There goes the retirement.
JPL
@Suffern ACE: nbc owns the color red and if they use the rear end, the evangelicals libertarians can still have the elephant. The ears belong to dumbo. The anal belongs to Cruz/
BillinGlendaleCA
@Suffern ACE: We really need a snark font.
raven
@JPL: Barrow is a fucking skunk. I had a conversation with the former head of the GA democratic party and she told me all about how he was the ONLY white congressman in the entire south and he voted with Obama 90% of the time. Having known him when he was on the Athens city council I don’t really care, the dude is a douche bag.
IowaOldLady
You know, what’s truly mind-boggling is that all this is to maintain spending at sequester levels. I have a friend who’s an FBI agent. They’ll keep working even during a shutdown because field agents are deemed essential. She says the sequester is just killing them. You can furlough people for only so long before you have to start doing actual layoffs and letting personnel slots go unfilled.
pseudonymous in nc
@JPL: Barrow is what you might call the Minimum Viable Democrat. I get that he’s been whacked by redistricting into tighter and tighter corners, but dear me, it’s sad to behold.
raven
@Southern Beale: It won’t hurt that skyrocketing Nashville real estate market!
Jeremy
@eemom: I think all of this government shutdown nonsense will make it harder to act up when it comes to the debt ceiling. Boehner actually wanted the republicans to use the debt ceiling to negotiate but the tea baggers wanted an immediate fight.
Hill Dweller
HuffPo is saying on twitter the House chamber reeks of alcohol.
fuckwit
Projection projection projection. The Teabaggers are terrorists hijacking the country, and they are projectiing that the Democrats are somehow like terrorists hijacking planes.
Rethug projection. It’s so predictable, you can set your clock by it.
JPL
@Southern Beale: Today it fell less than a percent.. not exactly a tank… If they shut down, it will fall. The real story will be the debt ceiling. Who knows what will happen since that has never happened.
also too…. I have options that i don’t have to cash in until next year….hmm rethinking that.
IowaOldLady
@fuckwit: Ooh, clever. I was just thinking the other day that projection is always the first place to look for an explanation with them.
Cacti
@IowaOldLady:
I work for a federal agency that has lost 10,000 employees through attrition since the 2010 Congressional election.
Johnnybuck
@JPL: Broun is running for Senate, and Barrow is basically a shitstain
raven
@pseudonymous in nc: He’s a fucking asshole no matter what bullshit district he tries to run in. His ex is one great doggie eye doc though.
dmsilev
@Hill Dweller: I think that’s just John Boehner.
Suffern ACE
Btw. How did the Dems manage to get the ACA in as non discretionary spending? I didn’t know that they did that. Horrible negotiators that they are.
raven
The damn fish inspectors are still going to be on the job when I hit the gulf this weekend. . . damn it!
JPL
@raven: haha
edit.. the pups going..cage and all
scav
Will be interesting to watch what the plan B of rabid lemmings could possibly be.
scav
Will be interesting to watch what the plan B of rabid lemmings could possibly be.
ETA I thought I’d get a nice warning against this. Oh No! the safeties are off in the holodeck!
Suffern ACE
@JPL: yep. I have to say, unlike 2011, though, with the “fiscal cliff” countdown clock running on cNBC and CNN 24/7 for two months, this has been kind of sedate.
The local radio news channels up here 1010 WINS and WCBS were barely covering it. If you listened to Bloomberg Radio, it was a non story. It was a quiet commute.
fuckwit
@Anoniminous: No caves here. He made his stand in that presser today, and it sounded pretty clear to me. Trying to extract ransom for doing your jobs is not OK. Mr. Flexibility is putting his foot down at last. This shit ends here. I loved his line about one faction of one party in one house of one branch of government trying to hold the whole country hostage.
Oh, and hearten yourselves with this too:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZC8C_JH2eQc
schrodinger's cat
But the folks at Washpost told me that both sides do it.
raven
@JPL: Yea, we had a re-check today. He’s better but we’re just going to play it safe and have him be cool. Lil Bit is just goofy and doesn’t know what’s going on except COOKIE!
Johnnybuck
@raven: Heading to Apalachicola myself in 2 weeks, hope the trout are biting.
gogol's wife
@Hill Dweller:
This really does sound like something that could have happened in the 1850s.
Suffern ACE
@efgoldman: they only kept their seats for ten more years. Yeah. That sucked.
James E. Powell
@Spaghetti Lee:
The Tea Party has made a lot of noise, but they’ve not actually extracted that much. And their previous attempts to take the debt limit hostage turned into a flop.
I would call the reduced size of the original stimulus in 2009 to be a major Tea Party victory. Also, the failure to do any more stimulus since even though long-term unemployment is a debilitating disease in this economy.
The whole sequester was a major Tea Party victory. Without them, we wouldn’t have it or anything like it.
But their greatest victory, the thing they extracted that matters the most, is that they have convinced the whole of the corporate press/media, along with more than half of the American voters, that Obama is engaging in unprecedented, runaway, massive increases in spending that must be stopped now, right now, or America as we know it, the last best hope of mankind, will perish from the earth. None of this is true, of course, but all of it is widely believed.
GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)
@Spaghetti Lee:
PPACA is on tomorrow. It is mandatory spending and HHS has said it proceedes.
Anya
@Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader:
I love this revisionist history. Nancy Pelosi is awsome and she did a lot of heavy lifting to pass the ACA but when did the president threw in the towel exactly?
Some links to refresh your memory:
Obama rallies worried Democrats on healthcare reform
It is Time to Pass Health Care Reform (this was not a prepared speech)
raven
@Johnnybuck: You know there is a supplemental red snapper season for 3 weeks? The trout ought to be good on the live shrimp walked on the bottom. You staying on St George?
mai naem
@Suffern ACE: There has to be some article somewhere which gives a summary on how the ACA was passed but my guess is that 1/the negotiations were so damn long, they screwed up or 2/the law was passed as a tax law or 3/ the WH and Congressional Dems didn’t expect the GOP opposition to be so obstinate.
raven
@Johnnybuck: Here’s this weeks report:
NotMax
@IowaOldLady
The Social Security program is funded indefinitely by statute, not annually (and is in a technical sense off-budget), so would not truly fall into the category of discretionary spending.
Suffern ACE
@efgoldman: you should sell the foreign use rights to Larry Flynt.
Anoniminous
@Spaghetti Lee:
Turn it around.
When has he ever “gone to the mattress?” When has he ever even thrown an elbow? In politics you have to prove you’re a son-of-a-bitch by taking some slob to the cleaners. Just because you can. Obama has never done that. It may be because he’s not that kind of guy. It may be it’s because he’s been talked out of it by his staff and advisers. I have no idea.
@Johnnybuck:
I agree and the big reason I think he won’t back down.
@eemom:
To a sociopath – Cruz, etc. – compromise is a signal of weakness.
eemom
@ira-NY:
@Jeremy:
Yeah, that’s what makes sense to me…..and it also apparently makes sense to those of them that are not, in fact, arrested at the development level of a pants-wetting toddler.
IowaOldLady
@NotMax: I didn’t think of it as discretionary (though I can see the sentence I constructed could easily be read that way), and because it’s theoretically funded differently, I can see how it goes in a different category even than simple “mandatory”. I did recall that during the Gingrich shutdowns, the SS checks still went out.
Johnnybuck
@raven: Yeah, we’ll be camping out at the State park in the stately shabby shack on wheels and slinging the live shrimp around the oyster beds in our Kayaks.Usually do well with the trout and the reds if the water is clear.
Suffern ACE
@mai naem: no. I think they knew the republicans would chip away at it. I think ACA would have died in 2009 otherwise.
IowaOldLady
@NotMax: I do have a question though and given your nuanced sense of Federal budgeting, you seem like a good one to ask. Do you think the congresscritters taking these votes understand how the budget works? Just a guess. What do you think?
NotMax
@BillinGlendaleCA
Not snark, but close. There is a font named Snidely.
Spaghetti Lee
@Anoniminous:
I think (and this is just my opinion) back the days of Lyndon Johnson, the patron saint of sons-of-bitches, being publicly slapped around and called an asshole by the President would be a source of shame and embarrassment, something you’d want to avoid even if you can’t stand the guy. Now, people like Bachmann and Steve King take it as a point of pride that the President can’t stand them, as do their supporters.
My hunch is that Obama prefers to win through skill and cleverness rather than anger. I think that’s overall a good thing. There are more situations in politics when fire-breating polemic hurts your cause rather than helps it.
Jennifer
Hey, Rick Santelli…where are you hiding, motherfucker? Come out, come out wherever you are so we can all give you the good hard kick in the nuts you deserve, you teahadi-encouraging motherfucker, you.
On another note, how sweet it would be to see big business lean on CNBC to fire Santelli’s stupid ass for starting this bullshit.
Mike in NC
@Hill Dweller: What, no hookers and blow?
Anoniminous
@Jeremy:
You mistake me. I don’t think he will.
Anoniminous
@Anoniminous:
Note to self: when using a highly charged emotive term make sure you define and restrict it.
Jeremy
@Anoniminous: I’m sorry I should have clarified that I was responding to those who believe he will cave.
Yatsuno
@Spaghetti Lee:
You’re pretty much spot on, but the scalp may turn into a monster on them that they can’t control. And this is just the appetizer: the main course will be the debt ceiling fight, where they will indeed want some kind of concession somewhere. Ugly, this will get.
eemom
@GHayduke (formerly lojasmo):
Yet another reason this blows up in their faces. Similar to Cruz’s clown show last week, they won’t have accomplished SHIT…..not even in the short term.
Look, I have as low an opinion of John Dumbass Public as anyone else…….but not even they are this stupid…..and for the gazillionth time, fuck what the emmessemm says.
Anoniminous
@eemom:
It does. That’s why the TeaBaggers are going crazy.
Johnnybuck
@Spaghetti Lee: I actually think his resolve emboldens his caucus to hang with him as well. I’d like to see, (and I have seen in some cases) members actually pushing back against the idea that we can continue to govern crisis to crisis.
Anoniminous
@Jeremy:
No biggie.
@Spaghetti Lee:
I was thinking of Johnson when I wrote that! :-) Mess with him and lose your highway funds, agricultural subsidies and other support, any federal buildings, SBA loans, etc.
Spaghetti Lee
@Anoniminous:
Johnson also had 68 Democratic senators and 295 Democratic reps in the 1965-66 session, where most of the famous stuff got done. And yeah, some of them were awful dixiecrats, but with majorities like that he could afford to tell them to fuck off.
I love Johnson, but comparing him straight up to Obama is just unfair. Swap their congresses and see who looks like the tough guy then.
Anoniminous
@Spaghetti Lee:
Believe me when I say I am NOT “pining for Johnson.” (the son-of-a-bitch)
someofparts
trout mouth ?
You folks at BJ are on a roll today with creative invective.
first freedumb, now this
someofparts
oh god –
“because after fifty years of undercover work it’s not just a pose, it’s a neurological tic.”
ROFLMAO
… and I’m at the office people
If you can’t reign in all this (admittedly marvelous) snark, at least label it NSFW..