Will we start defaulting on October 17 if John Boehner does shoot the hostage? Maybe. Some very smart people figured out that date, but these guys are not gods. They just took current expense rates and extrapolated it forward. However, things happen. Maybe hurricane Karen hits Louisiana this week a little harder than expected, or the San Andreas fault drops a big surprise on LA. Maybe some terrorist yokels get lucky at an inconvenient time. The point is, bills get passed or renewed on a schedule. The government has its funding authorized or it shuts down on a schedule. When it comes to our spending authority, something unexpected happens and we will default with John Boehner still holding his jock. Or am I missing something?
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[…] Only questions remaining for me are 1) will the GOP sack up before or after Oct. 17, and 2) will the world wait for October 17 to roll around or will it decide that the mere threat of a US default is good enough for government work and move the date up without lettin’ Crying John in on the know? […]
ArchTeryx
We wouldn’t default in the scenario of an unexpected disaster. What would happen is that the area hit by the disaster would get zero (federal) government aid. None. Zip. Nada. Which is close to what the reality already is, with the government shut down.
They’d be utterly on their own. Y’know, like New Orleans was immediately after Katrina.
dmsilev
Nope. In fact, Treasury’s letter to Congress explicitly said that the 17th was just an estimate and that things could vary a bit depending on exactly what inflow and outflow there was leading up to that date.
Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader
It’s pretty difficult to predict what will happen because Republicans are not acting rationally but a very few of them are capable of doing so at any time and without warning.
I’m usually pretty good at analyzing a situation and making outcome predictions – it’s what I do for a living- but it would be foolish to even try here. Republicans don’t know what they are going to do next and so there is no way for us to know.
J.D. Rhoades
Tell you what, next year, let’s let a few progressives hold up funding for the entire government unless the Patriot Act., drones, and the NSA spying programs are completely defunded. I mean, if it’s a legit tactic now, let’s let the left use it, too.
srv
Krugman said this could be fun.
No worries.
Suffern ACE
An earthquake in California would only matter if Congress decided to authorize emergency funding for aid. Of course, it will do no such thing right now so that Republicans can go on TV and call it Obama’s Katrina and whine that he isn’t helping the people of California because he is inflexible about spending on the good people of California because he cares more about the poor layabouts than salt of the earth middle class taxpayers, many of whom are from Texas and Louisiana and other backwards states. And because Obamacare doesn’t stop earthquakes, it is a failure and a luxury we can’t afford.
wvng
Well, outflows will clearly be down BECAUSE NO ONE IS GETTING PAID! We just received notice that no funding requested on USDA-Forest Service grants will be paid until after the shutdown – because there are no staff to review requests.
MattF
The question is whether, e.g., hurricane damage, produces a legal obligation on the Federal government to respond.
Bill E Pilgrim
@srv: What? No he didn’t.
? Martin
The 17th is Jack Lew’s date. Since it’s his job to do this, then that’s the date.
shelly
But October 4 is National Vodka Day!
http://www.foodrepublic.com/2013/10/03/friday-national-vodka-day-who-fk-cares-about-natio
Arclite
It’s completely unacceptable the Congress gets paid during the shut down.
Schlemizel
I really thought that the baggers were not this stupid, that they would hold the government hostage for a day or two and then play chicken with the debt ceiling. But listening to them and seeing how they are reacting to the bad press they are getting for the current stunt I think we may be fucked. I think they really mean to kill the country on the 18th. I hope I am wrong but I don’t see any evidence that I will be
max
Some very smart people figured out that date, but these guys are not gods.
That was an estimate, and thanks to the shutdown, that date has probably moved back a bit, so it’s the 18th or 19th, according to Goldman Sachs. Theoretically, if the shutdown goes on for the whole month, the date could move all the way back to Halloween, and then there are a bunch of big payments to be made on the 1st. Unexpected essential services could maybe move things up if they were quite large, but that’s unlikely.
At any rate, Boehner, according to his signals, is going to surrender the good ship Debt Limit.
max
[‘We’ll see. Boehner doesn’t want to see his personal fortune go up in flames, I expect.’]
sharl
Ah, hurricane headed towards the northern Gulf. Lovely. I guess I know what Harry Shearer will be talking about on his next episode of Le Show.
And hey, did you know the Army Corps of Engineers has (or at least once had) a theme song? I learned that from Shearer. Based on their agency motto “Essayons” (that’s French, y’all), it’s called “Let Us Try” (starts at about the 1m10s point at this Soundcloud link), and Harry uses the opening bit from this song to introduce the latest cover-up/incompetence/atrocity to occur where the USACE is involved.
Such a sweet, lovely tune. Sounds like Karen Carpenter, though I don’t know if it’s actually her. She was still alive in the mid-70s though, when this piece was commissioned for the USACE’s bicentennial.
The Dangerman
Anyone else see the shit poll Fox just put up? The question was “who do you blame”; the numbers were Boehner 25%, Obama 24%, Cruz 17%, and the rest was fill.
In Summary, per Fox, people blame the GOP 25% and Obama 24%, basically a tie. I guess Cruz doesn’t count as GOP any longer.
Elizabelle
From the New York Times: Look out Park Rangers!
scav
@Bill E Pilgrim: well, maybe, kinda, sorta, if one ignores words and dates and nuance and economic context / conditions and subtext. If she said yes to dessert last month, hubba hubba hubba! it’s all green to go! principle.
Redshirt
@The Dangerman: I’m actually impressed that a Fox News poll blamed the Repukes that much.
Kay
@Schlemizel:
I’m wondering where the Tea Party faithful are with this right now. Not the funders or the professional political people, but ordinary base Republicans (“the Tea Party”)?
Are they reconciled even to the fact that they’re not able to stop Obamacare? If they are, can Republicans then move them off Obamacare and onto rabid screeching on the debt ceiling?
Republicans have been putting off a reckoning with the Tea Party and Obamacare since 2010. How long can they put it off ?
scav
@Redshirt: More, that such a result was reported on Faux.
Violet
@Schlemizel:
You’ll never go wrong overestimating the stupidity of teabaggers.
The Dangerman
@Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader:
What I do for a living, too, and I don’t see an end game that doesn’t include someone going in for a paddling and saying “thank you, Sir, can I have another?”.
/animal fucking House
ETA: The stakes are only the future of the Republican Party (if they cave, they are done) and the future of the Republic (if Obama caves, we’re pretty much done). I say drink heavily.
Belafon
@Elizabelle: I won’t be surprised when someone spraypaints the Lincoln Memorial.
schrodinger's cat
Test
Roger Moore
@Suffern ACE:
ITYM that earthquakes are God’s way of punishing us for defying his will by passing Obamacare.
The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik
The very fact that we have to ask this and discuss this in earnest is terrifying in its own right. Just what the fuck happened to bring us this far?
@Elizabelle:
Oh Jesus, Neugebauer wasn’t just some vanity go-getterism from an asshole? This is an actual party-wide vetted strategy? What the green eggs and fuck you is this?!
Kay
From the perspective of the rabid base, Obamacare has been a real roller coaster ride. They almost stopped it in the Senate with Kennedy’s death and Brown’s election. Then they almost stopped it in the SCOTUS. Then the Presidential election. Then whatever this thing was supposed to do.
But October 1st has come and gone and it’s still here.
No matter what Republicans say, at some point the base has to realize they lost on Obamacare. Partial victory, I suppose, they did manage to deny a lot of poor people Medicaid, but Medicaid is still here and they weren’t opposing “Medicaid” anyway.
I just think this inevitable let-down has to come, and putting it off by shutting down the government isn’t going to work for long.
becca
Out of curiosity, just how many concessions have the GOP made,on any issue, in the recent past?
Serious question.
Elizabelle
@The Dangerman:
I love that they couldn’t even get 27% to blame Obama!
Seriously though: was Boehner’s assurance yesterday that he would not allow a debt default a signal to the relatively sane Republican congresscritters to stick with him? They must despise the Tea Party caucus.
Chyron HR
@becca:
Obama’s still ALIVE, isn’t he?
The Dangerman
@Elizabelle:
I’ll repeat what I said yesterday; that was a trial balloon to see which way the Tea Party winds were blowing.
becca
@Chyron HR: Oy.
drkrick
@becca: They allowed Obama and other Dem elected officials to actually take office. They seem to think they deserve a BIG cookie for that.
Anoniminous
WaPo has the first poll out and the GOP are losing the Blame Game. 72% of responders disapprove of shutting down the government over ACA.
I’d link but FYWP keeps eating my comment
Elizabelle
@The Dangerman:
Ah. Missed that. Was there any indication?
Bill E Pilgrim
@scav: He wrote “this is fun”, referring to coming up with fantasy theories about what might happen in a default, and he meant it pretty much tongue in cheek, and wrote that actually going through default to test them would be anything but fun and not something he’d like to do.
So yes, ignoring context, not to mention words having meaning and definitions rather than just being random symbols that can mean anything anyone wants, sure why not.
Belafon
@becca: The one serious concession was allowing taxes on those making over 400K to go up, while keeping the rest of the tax rate at Bush era levels. As someone will point out, this did not affect the payroll tax break we were getting, which rose back up to the level before the stimulus.
schrodinger's cat
Thread needs kitteh, click my blue name because WP is eating my comments with links. Kthx
Berial
You can’t fix stupid.
With that out of the way, how do we fix our country’s political system? The crazy, moronic, completely tribal right will not change. I would love to hear suggestions about what would make them change their minds(or their ways) but I don’t see anything that could. These are people that take pride in ‘their side’ standing up to the President and shutting down the government, and at the same time pissed off the President shut down parts of government. If they can make those mental gymnastics work, they aren’t coming back to political reality any time soon. Theirs is a simple world: Everything good = them, everything bad = not them, forever and always and never questioned or reflected upon.
Working with THAT, how do we prevent them from destroying our country? They will not stop. They will not learn. Even after a total global meltdown they will stand in front of everyone and declare ‘It was their fault”, while pointing at any random group that they decide isn’t them. Will the President simply have to have treasury create a 1Trillion coin? Will that buy us enough time to reach another election? Will another election actually fix anything?
I don’t see how we get out of this mess if the Republicans in the house won’t send a clean bill. And lets face it, their political futures DEPEND upon them not sending a clean bill. I don’t trust this house to put country in front of personal power or party.
John O
I realize the Speaker has made some comments that would indicate that he’s not going to default us, but I’m still down on the default side until I hear him say it publicly.
Too many Irrationals in the House.
Cermet
@The Dangerman: Except that such a default would cause a massive loss in 2014 by hordes of insane retirees’ calling thug’s offices in savage anger; caving come Oct 17 (and I’ve read could delay until 1st of Nov, even) will cost nothing once they spin it as victory – sorry, but no default on the debt ceiling people. We will only get a short extension (three months or so) but no default.
Omnes Omnibus
@Berial:
If there actually are 20-25 GOP House members who would vote for a clean CR, there should be that many to vote for raising the debt ceiling. Boehner just needs to allow the bill to come to the floor. Thus far he won’t do it on the clean CR, but he may well be signalling that he will do so over the debt ceiling.
Villago Delenda Est
Given that the current terrorism crisis is a fully owned by the cretinous teatard movement, I’d say their luck is running out, fast.
DecidedFenceSitter
@John O: Yeah, I’ll believe it when he says it and Cantor nods along, cause I’ve seen that scenario play out before. Boehner does something approaching reasonable, and Cantor and the Tea Party yank it back.
Belafon
@Anoniminous: Hey, imagine that. ~27% of the people approve of the shutdown.
Matt McIrvin
@Schlemizel: The Tea Partiers, and apparently Rand and McConnell, think that everybody thinks that this is Obama’s shutdown. They honestly believe they are winning the PR war.
I think the reason is that their supporters at home do.
Carnacki
http://blogs.rollcall.com/218/republicans-used-to-like-clean-crs/ Republicans were for clean resolutions to avoid shutdowns and keep politics out of it before they were against them. Bunch of flip floppers. Flip flop flip flop flip flop
Anoniminous
@Berial:
Trying to change the minds (assuming facts not in evidence) of the TeaBaggers is futile. The persuadable are the majority of non-TeaBagging GOP Representatives. I find it hard to believe they will let the US go into default and risk a total melt-down of the US and global economies.
Either Boehner will weep and wail his way to bringing the Senate Bill ending the shutdown and a debt ceiling raise to the floor of the House or a Discharge Petition will force both to the floor. When these will happen is anybody’s guess.
PurpleGirl
@ArchTeryx:
@Suffern ACE:
Special funding for disaster victims wouldn’t mean anything to Republicans period. Remember a lot of them didn’t want to help the NY and NJ areas so badly hit by Superstorm Sandy. They’d just want to do another hostage taking of what program loses funds so as to fund disaster relief.
Villago Delenda Est
@Kay:
Kay, I love you very much, but this assumes a connection with reality that simply does not exist for these people.
They’ll never accept it. They’ll go to their graves (hopefully, soon) never accepting it.
NotMax
Recommended for front page: Sen. Elizabeth Warren, from yesterday.
Schlemizel
I was not as clear as I should have been – I know the baggers are this stupid but I thought there were some adults still left on the GOP side that would control these demented children.
AS for the debt ceiling:
World serves it’s own needs listen to your heart bleed
Tell me with the rapture and the revered and the right
Right you vitriolic, patriotic, slam, fight, bright light
Feeling pretty psyched
It’s the end of the world as we know it
It’s the end of the world as we know it
It’s the end of the world as we know it
And I feel fine
Watch your heel crush, crush, uh, oh, this means
No fear, cavalier, renegade, steer clear
A tournament, a tournament, a tournament of lies
Offer me solutions, offer me alternatives and I decline
It’s the end of the world as we know it
It’s the end of the world as we know it
(It’s time I had some time alone)
It’s the end of the world as we know it
(It’s time I had some time alone)
And I feel fine, I feel fine
The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik
@Anoniminous:
44% vs. 35% is still not a number I can get enthusiastic about, especially with 17% going ‘BOTH SIDES SAME THING’.
Villago Delenda Est
@Matt McIrvin:
The Faux Noise bubble is where they get ALL their information from.
They have fallen for their own propaganda, not realizing that 70% of the country doesn’t buy their propaganda, pays no attention to it, and supports “that one.”
aimai
Can the Senate send a new, 1 year clean CR and the debt legislation over to them all bndled into one and demand they sign it? Or does it have to originate in the house?
Omnes Omnibus
@Anoniminous: Exactly. The hardcore teapeople are not a part of the discussion. The question is when do the fellow traveler but nonbeliever Republicans in the House jump ship.
Suffern ACE
@The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik: So that 72% breaks into – Don’t shut down and proceed with ACA (blame the Republicans) and Don’t shut down and delay Obamacare (Blame Obama).
The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik
@Suffern ACE:
Pretty much. Still a huge chunk of those disapproving the shutdown acting like it’s the evil evil dirty Dems’ fault, or just going ‘Pox on both houses’. And that’s rather sobering and saddening.
DecidedFenceSitter
@aimai: All spending originates in the House, but what the Senate could do is take whatever the House sends over and amend it, then send it back.
Va Highlander
Only slightly off-topic…then there’s this asshole over here:
Government Shutdown: A Pox on All Their Houses
Our tax dollars put food in this man’s mouth. Any chance of changing that?
Omnes Omnibus
@NotMax:
Red meat.
PurpleGirl
@Arclite:
I heard on NY1 last night that Rep. Sean Maloney (D-NY) has proposed a law to keep the Congress from getting paid during shutdowns (paraphrase). It is ironic because Maloney is one of the Democrats who voted with the Republicans. Moron.
Matt McIrvin
Well, 70% of the country doesn’t support “that one”; he’s stuck somewhere around 45% job approval. But they don’t live in the epistemological bubble either.
JPL
According to NRO this is the latest thinking
It hasn’t been announced, and you won’t hear about it today, but the final volley of the fiscal impasse, at least for House Republicans, is already being brokered. And according to my top sources — both members and senior aides — it won’t end with a clean CR, or with a sprawling, 2011-style budget agreement. It’ll end with an offer — a relatively modest mid-October offer that concurrently connects a debt-limit extension, government funding, and a small, but strategically designed menu of conservative demands.
Sorry no linky but you can find it yourself.
Omnes Omnibus
This from Boehner.
Belafon
@Matt McIrvin: I’m curious how your numbers work.
schrodinger's cat
@JPL: They want to burn down the place because that one, won the election twice.
Botsplainer
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/report-closed-door-gop-meeting-with-cruz-turned-into-lynch-mob
In many ways, this reminds me of the bullshit gyrating around Schiavo. In that instance, a relatively small group of agitators convinced the idiot staffs of idiot wingnuts that there was this huge groundswell of public opinion mandating Congressional intervention. Nobody on the right bothered to check the provenance of the messaging or noticed just how repetitive it seemed nor did they bother reviewing polling data to figure out why there might be a disparity between the flooded congressional switchboards and public opinion.
Concurrently with Shiavo and shortly after, once again ignoring clear public opinion, they went all in on an anti-immigrant crusade, ignoring the disparity between the polling and what they were hearing from their switchboards and public opinion.
They got their asses handed to them in two separate election cycles – 2006 and 2008, primarily by ignoring the public and going instead with the goals of their most vitriolic opinionmakers and supporters.
Then 2010 happened. Once they were back in a position of control, instead of acting responsibly, they tripled down on the ratfucking, essentially handing the reins over to the very same assholes that cost them 2006 and 2008.
What we’re seeing now is entirely predictable due to the personalities of the people that are still leading GOP messaging despite the fact that they should have been shoved completely aside in 2008.
StringOnAStick
I know nearly all congresspeople are in the “quite well-off” category, with the majority in the millionaire club, but that isn’t rich enough to be insulated from and economic shock like, say, the way the Koch bros et al are. Average people make the mistake of thinking most of the wealthy are entirely invested in the stock market (carefully managed via hedge funds); sure, they have a big chunk there but the really rich live off interest/rents. The stock market getting slammed just doesn’t scare them the way it does Joe Middle Class 401(k).
Interest rates are seriously low right now, but with enough millions even low rates make a nice, safe, drama-free income. I just don’t think most of the Teahaddi’s in the house are in that exclusive club so that gives me a bit of hope that they won’t kill the economy, but then I realize they get all their money from people like the Kochs who are both rich enough to not feel much economic pain, and ideological enough to not care about any losses they may suffer. They’ve been conducting a hostile takeover of our government for years, and now that the going’s gotten much rougher, they aren’t going to toss that investment down the well. So, full speed ahead as far as that part of the political donor class is concerned. My dad the ultra-winger claims to be so out of hard core patriotism, funny how the people he’s following are doing more to hurt the country than any foreign terrorist ever did. China is laughing at us today since we’ve had to admit we aren’t at equal stature to them in the far east (POTUS had to bail out of a trip there in order to deal with our toddler-congress).
Matt McIrvin
@Belafon: Actually, Villago Delenda Est’s 70% is probably high all around. The 45 comes from Gallup, which is Gallup, so trust only to the appropriate degree.
Kay
@Villago Delenda Est:
I disagree. I think professional Republicans have kept them all whipped up for years, and there will be an inevitable crash. The only questions for me are 1. when, and 2. whether Republicans are able to smoothly transition them to some other issue.
For the Democratic base, it would be as if Republicans passed a law to privatize SS, and then Democrats ran on overturning that for one special election and then two cycles. And then it went in anyway.
I’m not talking about any rational analysis of the “merits” of the policy. I’m talking about the effect of the huge loss on the base. They can’t glide by it. At some point they’re going to have to reckon with the fact that the reason the Tea Party came to into being was to stop Obamacare. They didn’t stop it. That’s a huge loss.
Anoniminous
@Omnes Omnibus:
It’s been reported 27 (that number, again) GOP Reps have declared they are in favor of passing the Senate Bill, ending the shutdown. If they do jump they can expect to be primaried. Given primaries are a base election and the GOP base are knuckle-dragging mouth breathers they are risking re-nomination.
What they aren’t seeing, I think, is the fact they probably won’t be re-nominated if the Shutdown doesn’t end and the US Federal government goes into default and their constituents are living under a bridge and eating cat food. (To be hysterical about it.) Going into default opens the door to crashing US Treasury paper (bills, bonds, notes, etc.) and these directly or indirectly underlie $50 to $100 trillion – nobody knows the exact amount – derivative markets. Crashing the derivative markets means every single FIRE sector business in the world goes bye-bye from a cascade failure.
To prevent that door from opening there are international institutions, e.g., IMF, World Bank, who would jump in to buffer the global economy from a US crash. One likely result of this would move the global commodity trade from being denominated in US dollars to something else … most likely a basket of currencies. Meaning JP Morgan & etc. wouldn’t be the major players in the global markets anymore.
I agree this is speculative but I submit it is the most likely course given the rest of the world isn’t going to go into bankruptcy to save the GOP.
Sloegin
Seems the real question is; if it does get to the point where the President is forced to say “14th amendment, bitches!”… will the Roberts court go along or decide to tank the world economy.
Omnes Omnibus
@Kay: Fundamentally though, some of these people are still fighting to keep the Articles of Confederation in place.* A functioning and active federal government is anathema to them and has been since the late 18th century.
*Their alleged reverence for the Constitution is complete BS as far as I can tell.
Roger Moore
@Va Highlander:
Sure; just shut the government down so it isn’t putting food in anyone’s mouth.
The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik
@Kay:
I think you’re missing a bit of something there, Kay.
The Tea Party didn’t come into being to stop Obamacare. They came into being to stop OBAMA. “Obamacare” was just the excuse to come together, the weakness they perceived and attacked at.
schrodinger's cat
@Anoniminous: Notional amount of the currency and interest rate derivatives is around 200 Trillion.
Villago Delenda Est
@Omnes Omnibus:
Boner should have thought about that before he started playing.
dmsilev
@JPL: “Small but strategically designed menu of conservative demands” means, what, they’ll settle for just strangling a basket of kittens instead of their original hope of strangling a basket of kittens, a litter of puppies, and a panda cub?
Roger Moore
@JPL:
IOW, the moon, the stars, all the planets, and us kissing their asses for not asking for the sun.
Omnes Omnibus
@Villago Delenda Est: That was my thought. Only one side seems to think this shit is a game and it ain’t Obama and the Dems.
Matt McIrvin
@The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik: And no matter what happens, in late January 2017, Obama will no longer be President. VICTORY!
scav
@Kay: Tea Party origins more mired in housing crisis I think, although I’m not sure when the big shapers started in, nor over which issue(s). I do remember this early inchoate period of different groups screaming about slighly different things. Not that it makes their potentially losing this battle any more palatable.
JPL
@dmsilev: Contraception, abortion and no child care will top the list.
Suffern ACE
@Anoniminous: Nope. Then again, if we default, we probably shouldn’t be claiming that universal currency position. If we were a smaller country, we would have european and chinese bankers sending gunboats to help convince our government to function.
It will be painful, but if the our institutions continue to produce gridlock, then we shouldn’t be a superpower. The institutions were designed to make change slow and cumbersome even in the best of times.
Villago Delenda Est
@The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik:
This.
The teabaggers came into existence right around 8PM PST on 4 November 2008. Right after the networks announced that a ni*CLANG* was going to be the next President of the United States. The tell was their concern about the budget deficit that didn’t exist when the deserting coward was borrowing and spending to give his millionaire buddies tax cuts and planning and carrying out his grand adventure in Mesopotamia.
Kay
@The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik:
I still think you’re confusing “the professionals who whipped up the frenzy” with “the people who took part in it”.
Just as an example. Paul Ryan’s libertarian dream-state budget was lock-step supported by the base within the context and with the purpose of repealing Obamacare.
If Republicans drop repealing Obamacare, we get back to looking at what Republicans are proposing, which is vouchers for Medicare, cutting and then privatizing SS and huge tax breaks for wealthy people.
I think it changes the political field. There’s no authentic energy for stripping the New Deal. Obamacare was what they were rallying around. I’m not sure what happens without it as a galvanizing issue.
The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik
@Kay:
Not sure that changes much. Like I said, Obamacare was the catalyst, but the behavior, both from the professionals whipping up the frenzy and the people who took part in it, makes it hard to deny that the only real thing wrong with “Obamacare” from their perspective, once you get past the bullshit, is the “Obama” part.
Rathskeller
@Arclite: Of course it is, but it’s explicitly part of the constitution that their salary be paid, no matter what.
Here’s a Republican congressman being intensely shit-headed about it: http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/gop-rep-says-dang-straight-he-ll-collect-his-paycheck-during-shutdown
Higgs Boson's Mate
@JPL:
My relatively modest mid-October offer is that the GOP House members should shove small, but strategically designed firecrackers up their asses and then light them.
Rathskeller
@The Dangerman: Credit where it’s due, they’re really good at creating propaganda. I would not have thought of dividing the people involved, so as to split the poll numbers like that. Note that they didn’t divide the Democrat side: if it had been Obama and Reid, the numbers wouldn’t have worked out.
But in the “if you’re explaining, you’re losing” vein, their cleverness in the poll cannot really be analyzed without boring the low-information voters it is intended to dupe.
TAPX486
@Anoniminous: IMF, World Bank, etc. may not be big enough to stop the bleeding. The US economy and the world’s dependency on dollars and T-bills give a whole new meaning to ‘to big to fail’
Villago Delenda Est
@Kay:
The R professionals have lost control of the monster they created.
They are now paying the price for their folly.
EconWatcher
I really don’t think Boehner will allow a default, or even allow us to get close enough to a default to cause a major dive in the markets. The money boys don’t want that.
He’s letting the Tea Party have their shutdown, and he’ll use its unpopularity as reason to ditch the Hastert rule to avoid the debt limit.
NonyNony
@JPL:
Translation: We’ll give you the debt-limit extension and start the government up again if you kill Obamacare and have some tax cuts for rich people.
Unless the “strategically designed menu of conservative demands” is basically “stop us from hitting ourselves” I don’t think they’re going to pull this off. They pushed it too far. If they had dealt with Reid and Obama in March I’ll bet they could have plucked a few cherry concessions from the two of them. But they didn’t, and now that they’re backed into the corner I don’t see how they can possibly expect to get ANYTHING. Especially with as bad as they look right now.
NonyNony
@EconWatcher:
It doesn’t matter because Obama won’t allow a default anyway. If Boehner and his TP caucus push it that far, Obama will just issue the debt and say “if you don’t like it, impeach me assholes”. And then the House will impeach him, the Senate will laugh, and in 2014 the GOPers will crow on their reelection tours about how they impeached Obama and you need to send them back so that they can do it again.
If Boehner doesn’t stop the default himself some of his own voters in Cincy might abandon him, but that’s where it stops.
John O
The GOP is NEVER going to drop Obamacare. At least for the foreseeable future. They’ll whip up the nutbags like nobody’s business in ’14, when no Dems bother to vote, and last I saw had a 50-50 chance of taking the Senate. (At some point Dems will be glad it takes 60 votes over there now, in any case.)
This particular batch of GOP is still whining about SS and Medicare. Hard, and loud.
I miss my grandfather’s Republican Party. At least they played the same game.
Omnes Omnibus
@EconWatcher: I am tending to think the same way. If the CR gets solved too easily, the Tea Party will still have energy to throw a tantrum over the debt ceiling. If he lets this play out, he has a better chance of surviving as Speaker. Boehner is an old-fashioned political bag man. He isn’t a true believer. I don’t think he wants to be the guy who presided over the US defaulting on its obligations; OTOH he wants to keep his job. Small needle, thick thread.
TAPX486
For the past couple of days there have been critter counts trying to add up the number of sane republicans in the House. Is it 10, 15 30? Who knows. These ‘sane’ critters keep telling the counters they will vote for a clean CR but they never seem to be around when its time to actually vote.
Well Nancy and the ‘D’s are about to make them put their money where their mouths are. The ‘D’s are going to introduce a discharge petition to force the Senate version of the CR to the House floor. It will take 218 votes – 200 Dems and 18 ‘sane’ Republicans. It will be interesting to see what happens. The betting is the coward wing of the GOP will continue to hide under their desks.
FlipYrWhig
@Kay: Of course, and I know you know this, it’s not really the reality of Obamacare that offends them, it’s the caricature they’ve created, which is that the whole point is to take what was earned fair and square by God-fearing white people and give it to freeloading colored folks. It’s clarifying to me to think of it as though “Obamacare” = “the deficit” = “welfare” = “government spending.” It’s all confiscation that benefits Those People and curries favor with the white wussies who love them.
scav
rather a laugh, seeing what turns up googling for dates on the Santelli rant — look who’s cited at the NYT in Feb 09? One flashback for those needing the break of revisiting earlier rants and trolls.
Kay
@Villago Delenda Est:
They did. I do think that now that the law is operational the political calculus around it changes.
I was thinking today that if it is successful (even in some but not all areas) incumbent Republicans in the House will have to either continue to run against it or just drop it completely as an issue. We won’t necessarily even know the districts until we see who signs up, because it may not line up red/blue. What if Kentucky turns out to be the big upset Obamacare success state?
They’re going door to door in southern Ohio. What do the sitting GOP House members do about that next cycle, if people sign up? Continue to oppose?
JPL
@NonyNony: Boehner is more concerned with being speaker than he is with jobs and the economy. Unless there is a way for the democrats to join with the moderate republicans, to bring the bill to the floor, we are screwed.
JPL
@TAPX486: haha you just answered my comment at 104. I doubt that it works .
gogol's wife
@schrodinger’s cat:
Adowable!
Omnes Omnibus
@TAPX486: Good.
@JPL: Take a look at TAPX486’s comment..
Kay
@FlipYrWhig:
I know, but to them it isn’t a caricature. No one admits, even to themselves, “I’m opposing this because it’s going to those people”.
That isn’t what they say. They say it’s “government run health care” or they say (less now, since the SCOTUS) “it’s unconstitutional!”
They believe that while they’re saying it. We’re seeing this whole broad picture of astroturf and buried motives and all that , but for them, they’re the base of a political party and they wanted this law stopped. That didn’t happen. Eventually, at some point, Republicans will have to answer to their base on why they didn’t stop Obamacare.
Villago Delenda Est
@JPL:
Another THIS. Right now, this is about Boner’s ego, not about anything else. He, for some inexplicable reason, loves being Speaker, even of this dysfucntional bunch of mewling three-year-olds. It’s all he cares about, and it shows, badly.
He is precisely the wrong person to be in that position. His lack of vision as to where this is going is his undoing. The teatards are waving their stilettos in his face prior to plunging them in his back and he can’t see them.
max
@Omnes Omnibus: I am tending to think the same way. If the CR gets solved too easily, the Tea Party will still have energy to throw a tantrum over the debt ceiling. If he lets this play out, he has a better chance of surviving as Speaker. Boehner is an old-fashioned political bag man. He isn’t a true believer. I don’t think he wants to be the guy who presided over the US defaulting on its obligations; OTOH he wants to keep his job. Small needle, thick thread.
Just so. Exactly correct. And the usual shitheads are having their propagandistic fun and should be ignored, if they can’t be run over with a truck.
If we reach the real, hard deadline, Boehner will move a bill to raise the debt ceiling cleanly. It’s up to the Dem leadership to hold their nerve until then.
The shutdown ends, on the other hand, when the accumulated political losses become so high that even the bagger-friendly chowderheads are willing to roll over and play dead.
@NonyNony: Unless the “strategically designed menu of conservative demands” is basically “stop us from hitting ourselves” I don’t think they’re going to pull this off.
The whole play is basically ‘please make us stop hitting ourselves’. If T-Bills go in the toilet, all those rich guys who want lower taxes lose a lot of money. If the government doesn’t get funded the usual contractors don’t make money. Etc.
It’s all down on the Dems, and just how long they can keep saying, ‘No no, fuck YOU.’
max
[‘At some point, Obama will have to start adding demands that he probably won’t get, just to force the R’s to concede.’]
Omnes Omnibus
@John O: I haven’t seen anything from Nate Silver since July on this (anything that old has been superseded by events) and Sam Wang doesn’t seem to have weighed in. I wouldn’t get too worked up about losing the Senate yet.
TAPX486
@JPL: II agree it probably won’t work. However it is the put up or shut up moment and the ‘sane’ (or cowards wing, take you choice) will be shown to be just as guilty as the crazies. Isn’t there anb old cliché – all it takes for evil people to flourish is for good people to remain silent
John O
I’m 0-2 in accessing IL’s healthcare.gov website. They need to get that shit fixed, and I know in the private sector people would be pretty much working 24/7, because I used to be involved in fairly large production installs, though nothing near THIS scale. I wonder if that happens in the public sector?
gogol's wife
@NotMax:
Excellent.
schrodinger's cat
@gogol’s wife: Thanks! I wonder why WP is eating my comments with links to my blog (also on WP)
John O
@Omnes Omnibus:
Honestly that’s the last evaluation I’m going with, too, but you can bet it is still near 50-50. The math favors the GOP this cycle, but that is turned around and then some in 2016.
scav
@John O: 24/7 during a shutdown?
Belafon
@NonyNony: Actually, one of Obama’s statements is that he’s not going to invoke the 14th, printing a platinum coin, or anything else, because it’s not his job to save Boehner from doing his constitutional duty. And I agree with that sentiment.
Just a thought: If Obama carries through with his threat, and let’s it go over without doing anything even though it would be a short term fix, I, as the world leader of any country Obama looks at, should be pretty scared if he starts making threats.
JPL
@TAPX486: True. They will probably vote with Nancy on the debt limit increase though.
catclub
@NonyNony: ‘ Obama will just issue the debt and say “if you don’t like it, impeach me assholes” ‘
I doubt it. He values his reputation as law abiding very highly. I would think that being impeached for saving the country from fiscal disaster seems like something worth doing, since it makes those impeaching look like fools, but Obama does not.
Villago Delenda Est
@Omnes Omnibus:
Well, it’s that, or they insist that the Constitution was delivered on stone tablets by an angel to the Constitutional Convention of 1787. The notion that Madison had anything to do with it is dismissed out of hand. I guess that nasty “no religious test” clause in Article VI is a typo or something.
Suffern ACE
@EconWatcher:
You know, Koch, Adelson, Scaife and the like aren’t money boys. We actually don’t know where a lot of their money goes. I don’t think the bankers have as much power as they think they do over the Republican Party.
John O
@scav:
Essential government workers, in a sane world.
Frankensteinbeck
@The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik:
White evangelical racists stopped being a majority. They’ve been getting vicious for decades as it crept up on them, but then a black man was elected and they knew it was over. They completely flipped their shit.
Tommy
@Kay: I am as white as you can get, and I have come to think this is true.
I live in a rural town that is 98.7% white. My town is amazing. I often joke you can’t walk a few blocks in any direction and not stumble upon a park. I mention this to folks and often told, well you “white people” like to buy nice things for you “white people.” Try that if the person getting the aid isn’t white and see how that works.
Mnemosyne
I know everyone keeps saying we’re dealing with three-year-olds, but right now I feel more like we’re dealing with a group of 14-year-old boys who want to blow something up with firecrackers just to see what happens.
Villago Delenda Est
@Belafon:
He’s right about that. The Executive is a co-equal of the Legislative. It’s up to the Legislative to keep their own house in order, not the Executive.
Roger Moore
@Kay:
This. I think a lot of people are still confused about this, including the professionals who whipped up the frenzy and their elected servants. They truly think the teabaggers are completely on-board with the whole MOTU program, including gutting Social Security and Medicare. This is lunacy, because by far the most effective part of their anti-Obamacare propaganda has been the implication that it’s a dire threat to Medicare. It’s a basic point of disagreement between the oligarchs and the teabaggers, and it’s bound to blow up if/when the oligarchs actually try to do anything to Medicare.
Anoniminous
@schrodinger’s cat:
Could I get you to give me your reference? My figure was from people I know who work in the industry. They tell me they’ve been deleveraging since the Lehman Bros. fiasco.
@Suffern ACE:
IF the US default – and I think we won’t – the rest of the world has two choices:
1. Go down with us into the economic abyss
2. Don’t
The IMF, World Bank, and etc. can move in concert and quickly in an emergency. The over-the-weekend collapse of Indonesia in the 90s is an example. The 2007 crash of Lehman Bros. is another.
@TAPX486:
The global money supply is theoretically infinite, but the amount of US dollars in circulation is large enough to stem the crisis. US corporations alone have $21 to $31 trillion in off-shore accounts. Add the couple of trillion of China’s holdings and the couple of trillion Japan has, toss in the rest of the world and … a trillion here, a trillion there, pretty soon we’re talking real money.
:-)
Omnes Omnibus
@John O: I tend to think current events will will have an effect on polling.
scav
@John O: yes, sane world, ability to pay OT, people being professional and taking pride in their work. Under those conditions, my hazarded guess would probably be yes.
MomSense
It seems like the tea party Republicans in the House know just enough post-Reaganism to be dangerous. They certainly remember the demagoguery of the nine most terrifying words in the English language, but they don’t remember that Ronald Reagan raised taxes or raised the debt ceiling 18 times, etc.
Then you throw in the Birch Society, supply side “let them eat cakeonomics”, and years of fear mongering about Muslims and you end up in the world of stupid we are all now forced to inhabit.
They talk about our American way of life but they never stop to consider that it has been largely based on the ease with which we borrow money which is the result of years of being seen as stable and responsible. They don’t realize that the American dream,that is so elusive now, was based on access to education, a strong middle class (thanks to unions!!) steady waves of new immigrants, and post WWII investment in infrastructure that we have been coasting on for decades. They don’t realize that people have tremendous confidence in our food supply and exports because of our food inspection regimes which are also suffering. The things that have made America great are not inherent qualities but decisions and investments that serious people have made over generations. We can’t keep neglecting our infrastructure and systems indefinitely!
I know I’m rambling but I’m just sick of the tea partiers saying they love America in the abstract while systematically and ignorantly dismantling all of the components that actually can make America great.
fuckwit
A@Anoniminous: the pain that would cause would be enormous, but denominating commodities in a basket of goods, rather than currencies, wouldn’t be a bad idea.
This whole thing is freakish and scary. Gives me a powerful instinctivde reflex to pull my money and my family out of this country ASAP, and I do not like feeling that way. But it’s likehearing the whistle of incoming mortar fire to me.
Joel
@Kay: It’s time for those fuckers to strap on their Nike Decades and get the whole ordeal over with.
Mnemosyne
@Rathskeller:
That’s why I think it’s a valuable strategy to point out that Congress is getting paid during the shutdown while they’re requiring other people to work without pay (and without any guarantee of getting their back pay once the shutdown is over). Let the Republicans be the ones to explain why. Don’t do them any favors and pre-explain it away for them. Let them defend it themselves, because they’ll say the same kind of assholish shit that guy did.
Villago Delenda Est
@Mnemosyne:
This implies an acceptance of the scientific method that I don’t think exists with these assclowns.
Mnemosyne
@Villago Delenda Est:
Shooting a jar full of rotten mayonnaise with a shotgun isn’t really what I’d call a demonstration of the scientific method, but YMMV.
Kay
@FlipYrWhig:
I was half-way listening to professional Republicans who were talking about taking the medical equipment tax as a scalp. It seems they’ve moved on to Scheme 47, but at the time I was thinking “that won’t do it for the base”, and it won’t. The Tea Party rank and file don’t really give a shit about the medical equipment tax. They were told there was this huge moral and constitutional issue here. The medical equipment tax as a Big Win against Obamacare? Really? Talk about a let down.
MikeJ
@TAPX486: Politico is already calling the DP a “procedural trick”. They say:
Where’s a meteor when you need one?
Villago Delenda Est
@MomSense:
No they’re not.
We’ve been blessed by God himself. We are His chosen people (fuck the Jews). Our faith is what sustains us. Works are irrelevant.
Suffern ACE
@Roger Moore: The GOP has also been pretty effective at branding itself as against “bail-outs.” I will find that funny if we have another derivatives market run and the financial institutions need to be bailed out once again. I think the New York bankers would find that the Republican party does not love them as much as bankers love gutting Dodd Frank reforms.
Omnes Omnibus
@MikeJ: Politico. What did you expect?
Villago Delenda Est
@MikeJ:
The assclowns at The Politico need to be nuked from space.
Only way to be sure.
fuckwit
@Mnemosyne: there’s definitely a teenage testosterone aspect. The whole dare double dare, dick-waving, macho, ego thing too, in combination with nihilism and inabillity to think of consequences or others, smells very teenage boy ish.
Nina
How is Boehner staying so tan during this? Is he drinking himself to sleep inside his tanning bed every night?
Gex
@Villago Delenda Est: The bitter irony is that we are keeping so much of the GOP base alive with Social Security and Medicare. In my darkest moments this fact makes me question my values.
MikeJ
BTW, the discharge petition has to be filed by Monday. They’re only considered on the second and fourth Mondays.
Normally the bill has to have been stuck in committee for 30 days. They’re going to swap out the language in an existing bill that’s already been in that long.
Villago Delenda Est
@Gex:
We’d betray our most deeply held values if we did otherwise.
It’s part of our lot that we have to suffer these ungrateful, selfish wretches in our midst, who can’t grok the concept of paying it forward.
Elizabelle
@MomSense:
Terrific comment.
Jim C.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/ncaaf/2013/10/04/condoleeza-rice-college-football-playoff-selection-committee/2923367/
Just when you thought there was nothing left that wasn’t already fucked up that Republicans couldn’t find a way to get in on and likely make worse.
This sure isn’t going to help my old MBA school, University of Oregon, get into any college football playoff given how politicized the Bush Admin made everything else.
NotMax
What a thoughtful line (and from a Doris Day movie, no less, on in the background as I’m working):
“The difference between what’s right and what’s practical is the continuing shame of the human race.”
The Dangerman
As I see it, there are around 20 House Members who have no future in the Republican Party; when the cave comes, they will be primaried from the Right, guaranteed. I don’t know what name to give them, but for the pain they are causing, let’s call them Blue
DogBalls Republicans (Ladies, the Men of BJ need your sympathy here)……so maybe the way out is to bribe the shit out of those 20, have them flip parties over to the Democrats, and, presto, it’s Speaker Pelosi. Yes, that would take huevos grandes, but, like I said, they are done in the Republican caucus, might as well make the best of it that they can.
Kay
@Roger Moore:
Exactly, and that’s what I mean by “changes the political calculus”. It’s great to join up with Paul Ryan when he’s fighting the Obama-beast, but what happens when it’s just Paul Ryan’s shitty 1% wish list and the Tea Party?
I mean, they can continue to FOLLOW the health care law and make shit up and celebrate each failure and glitch, but if it basically succeeds, they’ll just be “those people who snipe about that program” in the same way they bitch about every program.
TAPX486
@Anoniminous: Hope your right. Better yet hope we never get to the point that we have to find out
schrodinger's cat
@Anoniminous: Actually I misremembered, the notional value of interest rate derivatives is 500 Trillion and that of currency derivatives is 60 Trillion.
Here is the link, the information is at the end of the first paragraph.
http://people.stern.nyu.edu/mbrenner/research/derivatives.pdf
Roger Moore
@Omnes Omnibus:
The Senate is a real worry in 2014, if only because it’s 6 years after the Democratic wave of 2008. There are going to be 21 Democratic seats up for election (assuming Cory [FYWP] wins the NJ special election) vs. only 14 Republicans. Those Democrats include some very vulnerable looking seats, including Alaska, Arkansas, Louisiana, Montana, North Carolina, and South Dakota. The only Republican who looks remotely close to that vulnerable, at least based on demographics, is Susan Collins in Maine who probably isn’t very vulnerable in the general election. The best hope for the Democrats is that the teabaggers will continue to fuck things up for the Republicans by mounting primary campaigns from the far right in otherwise winnable states.
Tommy
@Villago Delenda Est: I want to scream. My family came here in 1876. From Scotland. We didn’t so much like the Brits. Everybody has seen the movie Braveheart. Those were my family members from generations ago. But we got tired of fighting so we came here.
I also come from a family of letter writers. Oh the letters I have.
That first family member here talked about “digging coal” and “working the rails” until he got to southern IL, where my family has lived since the 1880s. I always think to myself, if maybe an immigrant from another nation wanted to come here, how much I’d like that to happen.
This nation has been good to my family, I want that for others.
Villago Delenda Est
@Jim C.:
The thing here is, Rice was one of the relatively sane voices in the deserting coward malassministration, who is hated by the Dark Lord for successfully blocking some of his more wild and crazy ideas.
Of course, that’s “relatively sane”. Sort of like how Albert Speer was “relatively sane” compared to those around him.
JordanRules
@Villago Delenda Est:
So well put! I’m saving this one for reference, to remind myself why we keep on keeping on.
MikeJ
Three straight k’s to start the first for Lester.
Cain
@EconWatcher:
And what happens when he gets kicked out as Speaker and we get a teabagger fora speaker and they tried to do the same thing next year? (It’s possible they won’t, being an election year, but then we are not dealing with a rational bunch of people)
NonyNony
@Belafon:
Sure. And that’s exactly what I would say too right up until the deadline passes for raising the debt ceiling.
And when that point passes you say “circumstances have changed, I didn’t realize this group of terrorists were willing to destroy the country that they claim to love, so with a heavy heart I give the middle finger to the debt ceiling and invoke the 14th amendment/platinum coin/whatever rationale it takes”. Then impeachment proceeds in the house, a hearty “Fuck You Guys” emanates from the Senate, and we prepare to do this all again in 2014.
(Sadly this would assist with the long term ambition of the GOP to destroy the power of the legislature while enhancing the power of the executive branch. It’s what they do, even when they hate the executive in power I guess.)
@catclub:
But this is a situation where no matter what he does, he violates the law. If he does nothing the House will impeach him for allowing the full faith and credit of US debt to come into question.
The idjits in the House have set themselves up with a situation where if they don’t do their jobs, they’ve set Obama up to be impeached. So why not be the guy who gets impeached for doing something to save the country instead of being the guy who gets impeached for doing nothing? If the GOP is counting on Obama doing nothing – no matter what he’s said in public – they’re barking up the wrong tree.
fuckwit
@Kay: the analogy made ealier to Roe v Wade is useful here too. For decades the plutocrats have been stringing along the base by pointing to a boogeyman and promising to get rid of it, but always leaving it alive at the end of the movie to serve as the villain in the sequel, like Freddie Keuger. They have done this with abortion sincce Reagan. They maybe thought they could do it with Obamacare this time around.
MomSense
@Villago Delenda Est:
There but for the largesse of the American taxpayer are the tea party ingrates.
schrodinger's cat
For comparison,white the notional value of interest rate and currency derivatives is around $560 Trillion, world GDP is 72 Trillion.
Villago Delenda Est
@Tommy:
I’m reminded of an episode of Star Trek: Voyager where the crew of Voyager encounters a saurian race that DNA shows originated on Earth. Unfortunately, this evidence goes against millennia of “doctrine” about the origins of the race. Chakotay tries to explain that this heritage is to be celebrated…it’s a testament to the bravery and ingenuity of their ancestors that they departed from a devastated Earth and went on to colonize the stars and advance to levels far beyond those of the Federation. His arguments are rejected as heresy. We were never rag tag fugitives from some devastated planet 50,000 light years from here! No!
The establishment of that race denies their own past in pretty much the same way that the Catholic Church denied heliocentrism, because it got in the way of dogma.
Seanly
@Anoniminous:
Hmmm, 100% minus 72% leaves 28% approving of the shutdown – that seems pretty close to a certain number…
Tommy
@fuckwit: It took me the better part of a few hours to get into healthcare.gov. Hours of trying. But I work for myself and honestly, I can get some government aid, but without that aid, my health care will fall by about $100/month. I was running around yesterday gitty that this was the case.
? Martin
@The Dangerman: It won’t be 20. It’ll be 150. There will be 20 that commit to doing it and organize it, if at least half the caucus comes along. It’s a bit like recruiting a bunch of buddies to go do something stupid, it was your idea and you’re working to make it happen, but you won’t do it alone, and your buddies won’t do it without you, but you kind of talk each other into it and do it as a group.
Richard Mayhew
@John O: It does happen in the public sector. Remember the Federal Exchange got contracted out to a Beltway Bandit, so their IT and troubleshooters are probably pulling 7x16s right now.
fuckwit
@TAPX486: Nancy Smash will end up the hero in all this, showing real leadership and getting shit done.
You don’t fuck with Italian Nonnas. They’ll chase you around with a rolling pin, or pinch your ear and drag you through the house by it.
JPL
I don’t apologize even if this has been posted before, it appears that this ad will air during a football game Sunday. link
We need someone to put it on the front page.
Thanks go to Huff Post
MikeJ
@JPL: Reminiscent of this.
Jim C.
@Villago Delenda Est:
As you say, “Relatively sane” is not exactly a glowing endorsement. Me personally, the qualifications for selecting for the college football playoff should be more than “she’s a big fan and relatively sane compared to the rest of the Bush Administration”.
Suffern ACE
@fuckwit: You know, the reason that Roe v. Wade has taken so long to overturn has had a lot to due with the ability of people to slow change in our political institutions. I do not want to give the plutocrats credit for things that liberal democrats do. Liberal democrats have not strung their constituents along claiming that they wanted to overturn RvW at the behest of the plutocrats and no, I don’t think they take that position because Plutocrats want them to. The reason that RvW is still around is not because Republicans are feckless and cynical, but because there have been a lot of Democrats who favor that bill.
pluege
short post: boehner and the crazy caucus are playing Russian Roulette with the credit of the US.
how patriotic of them.
priscianus jr
@max: Boehner, according to his signals, is going to surrender the good ship Debt Limit.
Yeah, I read that too, so, OK, if he’s not going to let us default, then what’s the point of this bullshit? He was just kidding? Just to see if he could make the Democrats sore?
TAPX486
@fuckwit: Heck I’ll buy the largest rolling pin I can find!!!
priscianus jr
@fuckwit: You don’t fuck with Italian Nonnas. They’ll chase you around with a rolling pin, or pinch your ear and drag you through the house by it.
The Wasps don’t know from that. But she needs to have a little talk with Scaglia and Alito. Oh, I forgot — separation of powers.
Ash Can
@Sloegin:
If Roberts cast the deciding vote in favor of upholding the ACA because he didn’t want his SC legacy to be one of blatant partisan activism, there’s no way in hell he’ll want his legacy to be as the guy whose vote brought down the global economy.
liberal
@Frankensteinbeck:
Nah. They’ve always been vicious. I don’t have first hand experience, but I’m sure African-Americans could attest to that.
Roger Moore
@fuckwit:
I don’t think they believe that about Obamacare. Their worst fear is that Obamacare will be a success, because that would be one more government program that people will depend on. Obamacare is going to be a lot more like gay marriage than like abortion; once it gets solidly established it will be impossible to repeal.
liberal
@Suffern ACE:
Maybe I didn’t see the context, but it’s not a bill, but rather a constitutional right.
liberal
@NonyNony:
No. The coin is entirely legal and constitutional, which is why it’s the best option.
catclub
@schrodinger’s cat: But if it consists of countervailing bets, the net would be much smaller.
max
@priscianus jr: Me: Boehner, according to his signals, is going to surrender the good ship Debt Limit.
Yeah, I read that too, so, OK, if he’s not going to let us default, then what’s the point of this bullshit? He was just kidding? Just to see if he could make the Democrats sore?
The point of the bullshit IS the bullshit. It’s all about uh, ‘raising consciousness’ and rallying the troops and keeping the baggers happy and getting whatever concessions Boehner can squeeze out. Just like 2011. Hey, it worked last time.
It isn’t going to work this time, Boehner has figured that out, and is now trying to bullshit his way to victory. It isn’t important that he actually win, only that he can plausibly claim to have won to the usual gang of morons. (Saying he won’t default amounts to saying, ‘No, I’m actually not crazy, so you business types relax and don’t jog my elbow while I try and screw the liberals’. Sadly, saying he won’t default amounts to conceding the real threat.)
Real threats are off the table and it’s all kabuki now.
max
[‘Which is why we should keep kicking them in the nuts. So the kabuki becomes ineffective. Otherwise, the lesson will not be learned.’]
TAPX486
The GOP critter who came out in favor of the clean CR and called his fellow gop critters ‘lemmings’ has just announced he will not sign the discharge petition because that would be co-operating with the democrats. He then put on his yellow shirt and crawled back under his desk. Earlier in the thread some one referred to these people as rabid monkeys. That is an insult to both the monkeys and the rabies virus!
Mike E
@Elizabelle: Munchausen’s by proxy is the technical term for this Syndrome, iirc.
Herbal Infusion Bagger
What’s the difference between the Taliban and the Tea Party?
One is a group of hyper-conversatives with ideology rooted in the medieval era, hostile to modernity, modern education, and women’s rights, who see the U.S. government as an enemy and long to destroy it and replace it with a theocratic state.
The other guys wear turbans.
Suffern ACE
@max:
So we’ll just keep the government shut down indefinitely? Maybe he figures that is enough to get what he wants.
NonyNony
@liberal:
Except that it doesn’t matter if it is legal or constitutional, the House will impeach him anyway if he does it. Because they will have been outwitted by the stupid black guy who uses a teleprompter, and their egos will require them to impeach him for the misdemeanor of using a law they passed to save the country from them, and the high crime of Presidentin’ While Black.
(And frankly, I don’t think that the press will report it as legal or constitutional. It will be a “clever trick”. On the other hand, if he takes the “fuck you, 14th amendment bitches” route the press won’t be sympathetic to that either, though Chris Matthews may swoon at his manliness. I don’t think it matters – if the House does nothing he’ll do something and once he decides to do something he’ll be impeached for it.)
Villago Delenda Est
@Jim C.:
You’ll get no disagreement from me on that point :)
Villago Delenda Est
@TAPX486:
It’s a good thing this guy probably wasn’t in Vietnam, because he’d go the way of Doug Niedermayer.
Rathskeller
@Mnemosyne: I agree completely.
In a related note, that congressman’s facebook stream is an unending list of pissed-off people. Click on Recent Posts to see them.
Elizabelle
@Herbal Infusion Bagger:
well done!
schrodinger's cat
@catclub: Possibly, but these derivatives are not exchange traded they are OTC (over the counter), and only the banks involved know what the exact bets are.
Chris T.
@MomSense: They love forests, and they’re going to cut down all these damned trees so that they can see those forests!