Looks like I should have chilled the fuck out, they got this.
After five years of bitter clashes, Republican congressional leaders and President Obama on Monday night appeared to settle their last budget fight by reaching a tentative deal that would modestly increase spending over the next two years, cut some social programs, and raise the federal borrowing limit.
What exactly does “cut some social programs” mean?
increases would be offset by cuts in spending on Medicare and Social Security disability benefits, as well as savings or revenue from an array of other programs, including selling oil from the nation’s strategic petroleum reserves. The Medicare savings would come from cuts in payments to doctors and other health care providers.
Seems minor-ish to my amateur eyes. Naturally I want to know what more expert opinions think. They also found a way to get the Export-Import Bank past Jeb Hensarling (R-Tx), whose committee had held it hostage for whatever reason the fringe right does anything.
As for the timing, THANKS Obama. Really. I literally just wrote what I thought was a great post about how the whole situation looks hopeless and then you do this. I guess in the future everyone gets to be Bill Kristol for fifteen minutes. This could be my Peak Wingnut, may god have mercy on my soul.
One other thought: love the man or don’t love him, I think John Boehner finally earned that 10-to-3:30, four day a week job the Chamber O’ Commerce will find for him somewhere. Considering how it will almost certainly involve some lobbying, I propose that just maybe they find someone else to handle outreach with the Freedom Caucus.
kped
From what I read last night, the “cuts” to the social programs are more cuts to doctors/hospitals in how much they can increase prices the next two years, aka, accounting gimmicks.
At least i hope.
Mudge
Every Republican congresscritter who votes for this will mostly likely be primaried by a nuttier wing nut.
rikyrah
Once again, cleaning up Bill Clinton’s shyt.
…………..
Obama to Present His Case for Overhauling Sentencing Laws
By MICHAEL D. SHEAROCT. 27, 2015
WASHINGTON — President Obama will make his case on Tuesday for an overhaul of the nation’s sentencing laws, telling a gathering of top law enforcement officials in Chicago that putting large numbers of nonviolent drug offenders in prison is neither fair nor an effective way of combating crime, White House officials said.
Seizing on a rare issue that has attracted support from conservatives and liberals in Washington, Mr. Obama is hoping to keep the pressure on Congress to produce legislation that would turn back parts of the tough-on-crime approach of the 1980s and ’90s.
“The president is convinced that if we continue to pursue these policy priorities in bipartisan fashion, that we’re much more likely to yield both a positive result, but also, most importantly, a result that can actually be signed into law,” Josh Earnest, the White House press secretary, told reporters on Monday.
The president will address the International Association of Chiefs of Police in a city that has struggled in recent months with a sharp rise in murders and other violent crimes. That increase has come as a series of shootings of unarmed black men by officers across the country has contributed to increasing mistrust between African-Americans and the police.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/28/us/politics/obama-sentencing-laws.html?_r=0
Just Some Fuckhead
Fuck John Boehner. Just because someone crazier comes along doesn’t mean he’s suddenly sane. He’s a drunk, a philanderer and a corrupt ideologue. Any time he wanted to be a normal human being, he could have tossed out the Hastert Rule and done his job for all the people, not just his wealthy paymasters.
rikyrah
I believe it happens ALL THE TIME!!
Alycee
@jazziz2
Former St. Louis prosecutor admits to covering up brutal police beating of a suspect http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/562eb7e2e4b00aa54a4af1a5 … via @HuffPostPol
https://twitter.com/jazziz2/status/658996090788818944?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Tim F.
@Mudge: The Chamber has gotten increasingly aggressive about primarying Republicans who get too destructive with their wingnuttery. It has the Freedom Caucus pretty spooked, actually.
Just Some Fuckhead
Who names their kid the oxymoron Josh Earnest?
JPL
@Just Some Fuckhead: This! Boehner created the Debt Ceiling crisis in 2011, for political reasons.
Cermet
So, President Obama rides to our rescue – he’s the Man!
C.V. Danes
Seems kind of silly to sell petrolium when prices are at rock bottom, similar to not rebuilding infrastructure when bond holders are litterally begging to give you free money to do it. But whatever works.
Bobby Thomson
Key word is tentative. Boehner has played good but incompetent cop more times than I can count.
NorthLeft12
@Tim F.: Really? Unfortunately, the Teahadists appear to have the votes. At least in the primaries and [even worse] in the gerrymandered districts. Perhaps the Chamber needs to do something else…..like actually support Democrats?
Germy Shoemangler
The GOP made demands for changes to Social Security. Washington Post says “both sides compromised”
House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) had pushed for “structural entitlement reforms” during weeks of talks with the White House, according to a source familiar with the talks.
“This would be the first significant reform to Social Security since 1983, and would result in $168 billion long-term savings,” the source said.
The GOP had particularly pushed for reforms to the Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI), which would see stronger penalties those charged with fraud and abuse, stronger oversight and reporting requirements.
The disability trust fund is facing a major budget shortfall early in 2016. This summer’s grim Social Security trustees report found that the fund would be depleted by the fourth quarter of 2016, meaning that the government could only pay out about 80 percent of what’s owed to beneficiaries.
Both parties have acknowledged problems with the 50-year-old program. Conservatives argue that the system is flawed because of outdated definitions of disability and instances of fraud and abuse, while Democrats have tried to protect beneficiaries from harsh work requirements or extra requirements.
Mudge
@Tim F.: We’ll see. The chamber hasn’t been able to get the I-E Bank reauthorized. And let’s see who replaces Boehner, a Boehner clone or some crazy, the Un-Boehner (the Viagra candidate).
Punchy
At a Georgetown tanning salon or Chevy Chase liquor store?
Cervantes
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Well, technically, they named him Joshua.
debbie
So typical of the GOP to think a simple fix like this will make everything go back to the way it was.
Meanwhile, Ben Carson better be looking behind him. Glenn Beck says he heard Carly speak at some huge church over the weekend and a number of attendees told him they saw the Holy Spirit in her. Good grief!
OzarkHillbilly
@Germy Shoemangler: Some Dems have been making demands for changes to Social Security too (to stabilize it financially into the future by making small increases in the contributions to the fund). Seems to me a compromise would have been to leave it alone.
Reality is that SS Disability is seen by way too many as a giveaway to goldbrickers too lazy to get up and go to work, not the small stipend to people who for various physical reasons are unable to work a full time job capable of supporting them.
sharl
@Cermet: Cermet, Cermet, Cermet…it’s in our national DNA to celebrate the rescuing Hero – who doesn’t love a Hero story! It’s why I like Bruce Willis movies.
Taking preventative measures, as manifested by stuff like community services (social, health, etc. – boring stuff), tends to be a lengthy and complicated affair, and is for weak, low-T losers. And really, how do you render stuff like that into an exciting narrative with a clean, happy ending?
Just Some Fuckhead
@debbie: we may need to have a God-off as described in I Kings 18.
Ryan
@C.V. Danes: Exactly my thinking. It’s precisely the wrong time to sell oil, and precisely the right time to borrow money. Of course, the right wing doesn’t actually believe in economics, or any other field of science.
debbie
@Just Some Fuckhead:
The next Republican debate!
Belafon
@OzarkHillbilly:
I would definitely consider Ayn Rand an example of this.
GregB
Can we start a Delicate Flower Caucus for Paul Ryan, Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio.
Their jobs are so hard and they need family time in order to keep their precious minds at ease.
Flying in jets, talking to people and having a large expense account and a staff at your beck and call is the new coal mining.
Belafon
@Just Some Fuckhead: The scientific method!
scav
@debbie: maybe it’s a tacit acknowledgment that they’re going to definitely need some sort of divine intervention to make any candidate coming out of that lot of alternatives look palatable, let alone electable?
jake the antisholul soshulist
@debbie: Actually, she was possessed by the demon sheep, but they could not tell the difference.
debbie
@scav:
At this point, I don’t think even the Goddess can help them.
EconWatcher
[email protected]OzarkHillbilly: @Just Some Fuckhead:
I’ve seen the philanderer reference a few times; was there a news story I missed?
Betty Cracker
From the NYT account of the deal:
It’s a complex deal, of course, but as the conflict over the budget has unfolded over the last five-plus years, it seems like the rough contours have been Democrats arguing for domestic spending increases / cuts avoidance and Republicans lobbying for domestic spending cuts and the military held harmless.
If that’s the case, how is this deal not a win for Republicans? I get that it had to be done to keep the irresponsible assholes in the House from blowing up the economy they’ve intentionally hobbled for the better part of a decade. But it’s hard to see this as a “win.” What am I missing?
Amir Khalid
I cannot believe the Freedom CaCa will let this budget deal pass unchallenged. There is no end to the malice and stupidity of their ilk. I wonder what they will do, to try to disrupt it.
jake the antisholul soshulist
The big theme I hear now is Obama and Democrats are all about crony capitalism. The Import-Export Bank is part of that.
The Bank lends to the favored businesses and shuts out the ones Obama and the Democrats don’t like or don’t pay tribute
to their liberal masters. I get some version of that from raving Teahadists, pro-business Christianists and semi-sane conservatives.
Marmot
Don’t beat yourself up about it. They’re fanatical idiots with gasoline and a lifetime supply of matches, after all.
Oatler.
He remembers what happened to Robespierre.
debbie
And now Glenn’s on to thinking there may be some truth to the story about Planned Parenthood selling dead babies for energy.This is like the RWNJ version of blood libel!
JCJ
@debbie:
Yeesh. That is frightening.
The spirit of members of the Hewlett and Packard families seeking revenge maybe.
rikyrah
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Tell me how you REALLY feel…LOL
Belafon
@Betty Cracker:
I think it also raises the debt ceiling for a couple of years. But beyond that, it’s a compromise, the very thing our government was designed for. This might be a win for Republicans in the sense that they get some military spending increase, but their “shut down the government to control spending and never compromise” caucus is going to be pissed.
dogwood
@Betty Cracker:
With the large majorities that Republicans hold in Congress, there aren’t going to be any real “wins” for democrats for the foreseeable future. Averting catastrophe is the best any president can do right now. Elections have consequences.
Mike in NC
Eugene Robinson thinks Paul Ryan’s tenure as Speaker will be short and unhappy, as he gets devoured by the radical Fruitcake Carcass and replaced by one of their own.
pamelabrown53
@Betty Cracker:
Hi Betty,
Read Greg Sargent’s morning Plum Line. It may answer some of your questions and allay some fears. (Hopefully).
HAH!
@Betty Cracker: Not destroying the recovery and keeping us from having a showdown in an election year is a win on all sides. It’s not great; but not completely screwing ourselves given the crazies in the house counts as a win IMO.
cmorenc
@Mudge:
QUERY: Does “Peak Wingnut” have a finite limit similar to that which relativity principles in physics dictate that nothing can move faster than the speed of light – because mass increases with speed and approaches infinity as speed approaches that of light (and therefore requires an amount of energy approaching infinity to further accelerate?) Translated to political “Peak Wingnut” – as the rantings and efforts approach true destruction of governance, what further is there to wingnut-demand or rant about, except to shout louder?
Keith G
Exactly…As some of us noted on your original post. But that’s okay as you are just fulfilling the through-line of FPers here “Focus on the bad shit”. In fairness there is a lot of it out there, but there are also good things happening and decent ideas being explored. Here is a list of the last 10 posts. All but one is political (as it should be) and that one is about generating support for a friend in need – very cool.
Late Night Open Thread: Freedumb Caucus – Curses, Foiled Again!
Help a Brother Out
Being Quiet and Minding Your Own Damned Business While Black
Schrödinger’s Derp
Is Hillary Clinton Committing Benghazi on Bernie Sanders?
Alan Grayson Was Right
Halperin’s Kiss of Death
All of your family had to kill to survive
Buyer’s Remorse From Topeka To Salina
**And my personal favorite of the 10…
I Was Wrong; Ben Carson May Be Genuinely Dangerous
I don’t know if there is a problem that needs fixing and if so, what that might be, but I do know that my sense of political aggravation increases with time spent here. Thus I have been limiting that and spending more of my surfing time at places that tend policy oriented, less categorical, and not emotionally hair-triggered.
Just an observation. Your mileage will likely be quite varied.
ThresherK
@Bobby Thomson: Yez plays a role long enough, and it’s no longer pretending, goes the axiom.
Was Boehner ever competent? If Peter Principled to the Speakership, what level should he have stopped at?
amk
@dogwood:
Yup, you want a win? Then, you better move your asses to the voting booth.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Betty Cracker: Nancy’s on board. RollCall:
The devil’s in the details, as always, but Teabagger senators are screaming about it, so that’s a good sign.
Cheers,
Scott.
Belafon
@Belafon: as an example:
dedc79
Anyone have a link to a good explanation of the EX-IM Bank and its pros/cons?
benw
@Belafon: as you say, this seems like a real compromise. It’s not that Obama gave away some cuts to get the debt limit suspended for two years (which everyone is focusing on because a default would have probably been pretty bad), he was clearly never going to negotiate over that. What he really got was a two year lift on the stupid sequester spending caps, which will amount to about $80 billion in domestic spending (the Times points out that this doesn’t include the extra money to the military), which the US really needs right now. To get that Obama had to give up some cuts. It sucks that the Republicans are such assholes that we have to screw over disabled people to get that, but since every single cut that Republicans demand is cruel on the face of it, hopefully Obama went for the least bad option.
sherparick
Overall, a long term win for Republicans in that there are no tax increases & they get entitlement cuts with no tax increases to fund discretionary spending & war spending. But short term boost to economy since it prevents another turn of the austerity screw by killing sequestration in 2016 & increases the odds of steady economic growth in 2016, lower unemployment, & higher wages, which will boost the odds of Democrats winning the White House & Senate, hence Obama’s incentive to protect the economy from Republican sabotage. Right wing Freedom Caucus % Right-wing Media/Think Tank/ Grifting Infotainment Complex will treat as another dastardly RHINO betrayal & defeat at the hands of O’Bummer.
MattF
I don’t mind giving Boehner some credit– the path to a deal led through him, and the deal happened. And, as a happy bonus, all the right-wing maniacs are pissed.
LAC
@Belafon: well said. I do not know why this isn’t apparent to ms. Cracker, but well said.
Betty Cracker
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: I get that the Obama admin, Pelosi and the rest of the Democrats see this as a better alternative to a government shut-down, renewed trashing of the US credit rating, etc., and I understand that the teaturds take the limited amount of pain and suffering that will result from the deal as personal a affront to Ayn Rand and Baby Jeebus. My question is whether we’ve lost sight of the forest while hacking through this underbrush.
MattF
@LAC: She’s feeling poorly right now.
Cervantes
@Betty Cracker:
Ever play chicken with nihilists?
Betty Cracker
@dogwood: Okay. That makes sense too. It just seems like it is being spun as a victory by Democrats (read Nancy Pelosi quote above). Maybe we should call a shit sandwich a shit sandwich so people don’t start to think that’s what’s on the menu at Democrat Bistro?
NonyNony
@Betty Cracker:
I think this oversimplifies the Democratic position too much. The Dems have never been about avoiding all spending cuts – they’ve been about avoiding spending cuts that will hurt the elderly and the middle class and poorer people. Obama has long been willing to allow Republicans to make cuts to Medicare if it involved “cuts” to spending increases in payouts to hospitals over a limited window (mostly I suspect because those kinds of domestic cuts hurt Republicans as much as they hurt Democrats – the hospital lobby is certainly not a natural ally for Democrats. Like military spending it’s one of the places where there really is some bloat in the budget because it’s one of the places where there’s long been a bipartisan consensus that there should be bloat).
I’m worried about the cuts to SS Disability Insurance, and I’m annoyed at the idea that we’re going to be selling oil from the reserve to pay for things that we could easily be raising taxes to pay for (because right now is about the worst time to be trying to make money off of oil) but the rest of it sounds like the standard bargaining chips that the Dems would prefer not to lose if they don’t have to, but have always been willing to bargain with if the Republicans would just come to the table and bargain.
rikyrah
Michael Hargrove @MichaelHargrov1
Read Gloria Stienem article in guardian. Obama was elected because he was Black, Blacks liked Hillary more but voted skin color.
7:34 PM – 26 Oct 2015
……………………………………….
Gloria Steinem: why the White House needs Hillary Clinton
Clinton has faced all manner of hate since entering frontline politics – often from women just like her. Why? In an extract from her new book, the activist-writer looks at the hopes held for the 2016 presidential frontrunner
http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/oct/19/gloria-steinem-hillary-clinton-white-house
kc
Are you fucking kidding me?
Paul in KY
@Belafon: You can imagine what ‘fiscal reforms’ Rep. Price was working on…
danielx
Right. Next up: primary challenges for various members of the Freedom Caucus because they have proven themselves to be RINOs. After all, anyone who actually allows the business of government to proceed without suicidal obstruction has to be a closet liberal, amirite? Looking forward to the paeans of praise from the likes of David Brooks, because bipartisanship. Speaking of which, my man Dave’s latest opus, entitled A Sensible Version of Donald Trump, starts out like this:
Yeah, imagine if. Imagine a world wherein Republican voters had been spared constant apocalyptic warnings by the likes of Rush Limbaugh for the last several decades, a world without the Southern Strategy, a world without Newt Gingrich, a world without neocon warmongers. A world in which one is not forced to choose between Italian cuisine and tire rims and anthrax as dinner entrees. A world in which the word ‘bipartisanship’ – yes, he goes there – refers to a means for getting shit done rather than as a synonym for date rape.
Yeah, me neither. As someone once wrote in another context, Dave:
You don’t live there.
Grow the fuck up.
Also too, kittens, because Marc hasn’t given us an update recently.
benw
@Cervantes: Betty has shown us repeatedly that she has a fine flock of chickens to play with. The chickens may be nihilists.
Cervantes
@benw:
Not if they’re laying.
benw
@Betty Cracker: actually, the specific Pelosi quote is not exactly a declaration of victory and IMO rightly points out that the success for Democrats is lifting the sequester cuts for two years – not the debit limit suspension (also for 2 years):
@sherparick has a “big picture” summary that I think is pretty correct.
kc
@Betty Cracker:
Bingo; it IS win for Republicans and it sets a precedent of cutting SS to appease them.
I guess after all these years I shouldn’t be surprised that 1) Obama would agree to this & 2) his adoring fans would hail it as a victory, but Jesus Christ …
Belafon
@NonyNony: This is probably what any spending bill would look like with Republicans in charge of Congress and the president being a Democrat. It just took 5 years to get there.
Betty Cracker
@rikyrah: I hope Michael Hargrove’s Twitter followers take his advice and actually read Steinem’s piece in the Guardian instead of accepting his bullshit summary. I don’t agree with everything Steinem says in the piece, but to reduce it to “Obama was elected because he was Black, Blacks liked Hillary more but voted skin color” is flat-out dishonest, IMO.
Belafon
@Paul in KY: “You know, if Seniors would just give up an arm or a leg, they wouldn’t need as many calories to get through the day.”
elmo
I am going to keep beating this drum – the easiest fix in the world to Social Security is to remove the income cap. The cap makes no logical sense. Removing it will literally hurt nobody who can’t afford it.
Germy Shoemangler
@elmo:
I agree. But congress doesn’t want to fix it. Congress wants to starve it to death.
Cervantes
@elmo:
This fix you have in mind … What do the various presidential candidates say about it (if anything)?
NonyNony
@Belafon:
Ayup – for those touting this as a Republican “win” – the Republicans could have had almost all of this in 2011 in exchange for not having a sequester then.
This is the kind of compromise budget we should expect from a divided government. This is only a Republican “win” in the sense that both sides at the table get something, and both sides at the table give something up. If you want better results, go work to get Democrats elected to a majority in the House.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Betty Cracker: Without seeing the details, we can’t know the details. But there is this, also in the RollCall linky above:
As others have said, the cuts seem to be in areas other than direct to beneficiaries areas. (Yes, I see that quote doesn’t mention the disability side.)
Obama’s been very good about protecting the vulnerable in these negotiations over the years. Not perfect, of course, but very good. I expect that he (and Nancy) have done well in this case, too.
We’ll see.
Cheers,
Scott.
Betty Cracker
@benw: Fair enough. I guess when a hostage taker moves the barrel of the gun from the victim’s temple to his or her ass instead, that’s a species of improvement worth trumpeting.
FlipYrWhig
@kc: I too am appalled that a Republican House and Republican Senate continue to have influence on the course of politics and budgeting in the USA.
gene108
If French Fries = Freedom Fries and French Doors = Freedom Doors, then the Freedom Caucus = the French Caucus.
Clearly paving the way for turning us French, circa Louis (insert Roman numeral here) rule.
Germy Shoemangler
Germy Shoemangler
amk
@FlipYrWhig: LOL.
FlipYrWhig
@elmo:
I would say the same, but the cap is tied to the notion that the program isn’t “welfare.” And many people have expressed concern that a more uniform (re)distribution of old age benefits would start down a slippery slope of welfare-shaming.
benw
@Betty Cracker: I guess in this case the hostage taker has agreed to take the gun away but promises to come back in two years?
Paul in KY
@Belafon: Also be less taxing on circulatory system (not having to pump blood thru the superfluous arm & leg)!
schrodinger's cat
@gene108: There is a certain similarity between how the Freedom Caucus eats its own and the Reign of Terror that followed the French revolution.
Paul in KY
@Betty Cracker: Good analogy, Betty! Wish I had thought of it.
rikyrah
-‘Hamilton’ to Gift 20,000 NYC Public School Students with Show Tickets — -:>)
– – – – -The hottest tickets in town are headed to New York City’s public schools.
Hamilton — the sold-out, critically-acclaimed Broadway musical that follows the life of Alexander Hamilton with hip-hop music and colorblind casting — is partnering with The Rockefeller Foundation
to provide 20,000 NYC students each year with tickets to the show, via $1.46 million grant.
http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/hamilton-student-tickets-show-gifts-834814?utm_source=twitter
benw
@gene108: Sacre bleu! I feel the urge to eat cheese and surrender already.
Sasha
Post it anyway. ;-)
Paul in KY
@FlipYrWhig: The riches don’t want the cap raised, as they feel they can invest that money better (get higher yields) than SS.
MomSense
@rikyrah:
I love the show, cast, producers, and theater so much. I hope they win all the awards this year.
schrodinger's cat
@Betty Cracker: The Republicans hold a better hand since they control the Congress, Dems have an inherently weaker hand when it comes to budget/debt negotiations. This is not ideal but best of a really bad situation.
schrodinger's cat
NYT tells me that somnolent Ben Carson leads the pack of the GOP crazies.
rikyrah
@Betty Cracker:
I read it, and came to the same conclusion. Because, of course, Black people didn’t vote until Barack Obama ran for President. Because, that’s all Black people can vote for is other Black people, which is why we voted for Al Sharpton and Carol Moseley Braun …except, we didn’t. Once again, the whole vote for Hillary because she’s a woman…uh huh.
bystander
From Ben Carson’s campaign website concerning the greatest issue facing America, keeping faith in America:
Bolding my own. Not zealously. Jealously. Of course it takes an even bigger idiot than Trump to beat Trump.
Frankensteinbeck
@Betty Cracker:
The first report I saw on this had more details. Assuming it was correct, which is a big assumption on the internet, this is a win for us because what we’re reading here is oversimplified to the point of deception.
Basically, there are two differences. First, the increased spending is not ‘offset’ at a 1-to-1 ratio. We end up with much greater domestic spending. Second, this article gives you the impression that the offset includes significant cuts to disability payments. Instead, most of what the Republicans got was extra spending on the investigative arm for disability fraud, which is apparently ludicrously rare. It’s a fig leaf so Republicans can say they got tough on lazy moochers, without affecting much of anything.
The one cut to SSDI was a change in how disability pays to people who are earning money over and above disability. That’s definitely a ‘devil is in the details’ thing.
Matt McIrvin
@OzarkHillbilly: One of the big problems we have is that there is no dole intended for people below retirement age who, for whatever reason, have become persistently unemployed and are unlikely to ever gain the skills and credentials necessary to be employable.
Usually, these are people whose realistic employment would have been manual-labor sorts of jobs, but are just too old to do that any more. So if you squint at it right, you can say they’ve got long-term physical disabilities and should be pulling Social Security disability payments. And that’s exactly what people have done, in areas where this is a big problem.
But to Republicans, that’s fraud, and the correct program for these people is “sorry, sucks to be you”.
schrodinger's cat
@rikyrah: By that logic all black people should be flocking behind Cray Cray Carson. I agree with you, it is offensive and stupid.
Paul in KY
@bystander: When he says ‘abstaining from private prayer’, he means some religious nutter who ONLY wants to pray in public.
Belafon
@bystander: Actually, I would agree with him about being able to (or not able to) pray privately. It’s the publicly that’s the problem.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Frankensteinbeck: Thanks.
Cheers,
Scott.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
@Frankensteinbeck: Kevin Drum has more.
Cheers,
Scott.
dogwood
@rikyrah:
Gloria Steinem, Jesse Jackson, Ralph Nader. All people who at one time did important work that should be recognized, but who turned themselves into self important, narcissistic assholes who refuse to leave center stage.
Matt McIrvin
Keep in mind, Boehner is just keeping the monster he helped create from getting in one big whack. Giving the crazy caucus the ability to take the economy hostage this way was his doing.
Germy Shoemangler
some guy
Looks like our allies want to join in the fun. They refuse to let US military have all the fun:
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/28/world/middleeast/doctors-without-borders-yemen-airstrikes.html
Admiral_Komack
@Betty Cracker: No, it isn’t.
WereBear
Mr WereBear, who is on disability and cannot reliably tell from one day to the next if he has the energy to go out and get groceries, is facing having his already small disability check being cut to 80% of what we get now. And we aren’t doing well now, since his Disability Insurance Company (UNUM of one of its many names it uses to dodge responsibility for keeping all the money) had to be sued into settlement by us and we no longer have that check coming in monthly.
I’m sure, translating from Wingnut to English, that the conservatives in Congress will use the same criteria we read about UNUM using: telling people who had gone blind that they could become telemarketers, telling people with paralysis that businesses hired people in wheelchairs all the time, and sending us wrongly dated forms that, if we hadn’t caught the traps in them, signed them, and sent them back, we would have been “held in non-compliance” and had the disability payments taken away entirely.
So I’m just alerting you that we are still not sure that we, the humblest and most vulnerable, will not get our disability payments cut. Because picking on the ones least able to fight back is the Republican Way.
Which reminds me, we are still running the Way of Cats Fund Drive. This goes to the blog security and hosting fees, and the rather high bandwidth costs.
Popularity has its price :) Thanks to all BJ fans of the kitties!
jl
Ryan is making process criticism and promising to make sure ‘we’ do better in the future. So that is a sign Ryan won’t do much to stop it and hope that he gets a pass since not officially Speaker yet.
Paul Ryan On Budget Deliberations: ‘I Think The Process Stinks’
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/paul-ryan-budget-deal
The only loss for Obama and Dems I see is that this is not the ‘clean’ bill that was demanded. But on substance it is a big win.
The talks have been criticized as being secret, but the Freedom Caucus admitted that they did not have time to rally around a proposal, which is a laughable claim, since while the exact date the ceiling is reached is very uncertain, it would certainly be sometime this Fall.
Looks like the Freedom Caucus simply had nothing to bring to the table and were out of the negotiations because they were useless bluffers with nothing.
Brachiator
@Betty Cracker:
The dirty secret, which even pundits know, but don’t talk about, is that pragmatists from both parties work these deals in private. It is then a question of whether hard core Tea Party ideologues will work to halt or undo the compromises that have been made.
Without a Democratic majority in the Congress, the president has opted once again for stability and modest protection of federal social programs, which Republicans always talk about cutting back.
And as usual, there is a package of tax cuts that was negotiated on in private in mid July. These cuts apply retroactively to 2014 and must be approved before the end of the year. Again, stupid obstructionism is best avoided.
This may all be overall a modest “win” for the Republicans. But it avoids stalemate and economy-damaging gridlock, and neutralizes the zealots and any opposition that may have come from the new leadership. The president throws the GOP a bone to keep the government running. I think Obama is playing the long game, but as always, your mileage may vary.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
OT: I guess Marco wants to explain trickle-down economics to Him
Mnemosyne (tablet)
@rikyrah:
One commenter on here says that he remembers going to a high school matinee of “1776” and getting yelled at from the stage by Howard da Silva, who played Ben Franklin.
I’m about three-quarters of the way through the Ron Chernow bio and I’m reading through the Hamilton Project on Genius.com, which has annotated many of the lyrics from the show.
Other Broadway shows have tried to use hip-hop (there was one about Tupac) but I think the problem there was that they were trying to take existing pop songs and write a show around them, which is always a tough proposition. Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote everything himself, so it all works together as a seamless piece of art, which is why he is winning (and deserves to win) all the things.
rikyrah
Pretty Foot
@PrettyFootWoman
FBI director concedes he has little evidence to support ‘Ferguson effect’ http://gu.com/p/4djmm/stw
Germy Shoemangler
@Mnemosyne (tablet): That was my anecdote. Howard da Silva didn’t yell at me personally. I was up in the cheap seats with the rest of my class (I guess my high school had a tight budget). The kid that got yelled at was seated almost in the front row, and apparently was talking through the whole thing. Maybe from an expensive private school.
It was my first Broadway play, and I was amused at how… interactive it could be.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
OT, again: from an otherwise not terribly informative article about why Huckabee, Paul and Christie won’t give up (answer: Cause they won’t)
Hey, Vern!….
Gin & Tonic
@Germy Shoemangler: Uh, linkies, please. You know how.
rikyrah
waltb31
@waltb31
Hair-on-Fire Left Gets it Wrong Again: Budget Deal Helps Medicare, Disability Beneficiaries http://www.thepeoplesview.net/main/2015/10/26/hair-on-fire-lefties-get-it-wrong-again-budget-deal-helps-medicare-disability-beneficiaries …
Iowa Old Lady
@jl: Also they had to repeal Obamacare some more, again. And Planned Parenthood and Benghazi needed some hysteria sent their way. So busy, busy, busy.
PurpleGirl
@cmorenc: I believe Peak Wingnut is stochastic, it approaches but never crosses the limit. It goes on into infinity.
Germy Shoemangler
@Frankensteinbeck:
Yes, but what it means is that everyone collecting, or trying to collect, will be treated like a potential fraud.
Joel
@rikyrah: Your take is your own, but I don’t read the excerpt that way:
jl
@Brachiator: I see it as a GOP win only in that it is not the ‘clean’ debt raise bill Obama admin demanded.
If I understand correctly, debt limit taken off table through election and relaxation of sequester so more spending kicks in soon, with mostly minor symbolic BS future cuts to social insurance that can be reversed if they cause problems, and most of which are not on budget anyway.
in comments last night I went so far as to say that the Freedom Caucus were pantsed by this proposal, and all they had to say was that they did not have time to rally around their own proposal, which is a laughable excuse. They admit that they had nothing to bring to the negotiating table.
I suppose opinions may differ on who ‘won’ this one. Seems to me that the most important thing is that the Freedom Caucus lost and looks like a ridiculous bunch of incompetent losers right now. I hope the deal passes and the current situation sticks.
Barb
Thehill.com article posted last p.m. Indicates that disability benefits will be based on Fed. Poverty level rather than what beneficiaries paid into it. Sen. Tom Cole republican on budget committee seems to confirm this when he stated that benefits will be “linked to the poverty level” on CSPAN’s National Journal this a.m. These cuts will be devastating to those of us on SS disability.
ruemara
@Betty Cracker: I guess the problem is that we have to consider survival versus thriving. If we don’t lose anything, we’ve thrived. If our tormentors walk away with a digit, we’ve survived. How is it a win? We made it to fight another day and there may be administrative hacks to mitigate the damage and even improve the functionality of those prpograms
Gin & Tonic
@PurpleGirl: That’s “asymptotic”, not “stochastic.”
mdblanche
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Bad idea, Marco. Jesus didn’t put up with shit at the dinner table. “One of you here will betray Me, one of you here will deny Me, and one of you here is just using Me for a photo-op.”
ruemara
@rikyrah: sigh. This wave of non intersectional feminism needs to go.
Betty Cracker
@rikyrah: It would of course be offensive if Steinem had actually said or implied any of those things in that piece. I don’t think she does. In fact, she does the opposite, chiding the media for setting up the 2008 Clinton vs. Obama contest as a gender vs. color thing.
I am honestly puzzled at how you could come away from reading that piece thinking that Steinem said or implied that “Black people didn’t vote until Barack Obama ran for President. Because, that’s all Black people can vote for is other Black people,” etc. If you think it’s worthwhile to discuss it further, I’d be interested in which specific sentences Steinem wrote that you interpret as saying or implying that.
jl
@Joel: I sure agree about the media. And they are at it again with HRC and Sanders. In clips re the supposed HRC slam on Sanders re shouting, Tapper ginned up a loaded question to the max, egging Sanders on to get pissy and personal on air. Which Sanders wisely declined, though his campaign flacks gave more (IMHO unwise) push back in other interviews.
Edit: Tapper’s standard MO now in interviewing candidates and moderation of debates is to load up questions with BS assumptions and egg people on to personal piss contests. I think he comes off like a snot nosed punk doing so, but I guess there is an audience for it.
shell
That video of the teen girl being body-slammed by the cop has been all over the news this morning. Already theres been blow-back in the ‘shes no angel’ kind of vein. She refused to put away her cell phone and/or leave the classroom? Yeah, cause teenagers often act like jerks and assholes. Theyre teenagers! We’re adults and are supposed to be a little better. And not see that as an excuse to beat down on a teenage girl like she was a punching bag.
Mandalay
@Tim F.:
You can read bloviating articles from Villagers claiming that, but where is the actual evidence that it means anything?
It took Ryan about 24 hours to crumple like a cheap suit last week when the Freedom Caucus told him to piss off and shove his demands for becoming speaker up his ass.
les
@dedc79:
James Fallows has done some good stuff on ex-im, not all one sided.
Betty Cracker
@ruemara: Here’s Steinem’s response when asked what she’d say to women of color who don’t feel that the feminist movement includes them or is about them:
We need more of that, not less.
les
@kc:
Please to be pointing out the “SS cut.” Remedial reading line forms on the left. No, no, your other left.
patrick II
No plaudits should be given to Boehner McConnell except for doing what is practical for them to keep Republicans from getting killed in the next election by moving most of the open manhole covers until after the elections. The good of the country had nothing to do with it. Of course by Republican standards not destroying the government is somehow laudable, but forgive me if I hold my applause.
Tommy
@shell: I had CNN on earlier and they had “experts” on that said what was done to that girl was legal. I question if that is true. I don’t have any children but if I did and that was done to them I’d want that person arrested.
Mandalay
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: From your link, Rand Paul said this:
The man should be in a padded cell.
trollhattan
@Mandalay:
Skip the padding and I’m in. For a small-gummint dude li’l Rand sure has a ginormous sense of self-worth.
Brachiator
@jl:
Yep. Unless the new GOP House leadership does something stupid, they don’t have this aspect of the debt as a campaign issue. And they may engender hostility if they propose deeper cuts.
They were aware of the outline of these negotiations, and everyone in Congress knows about the July tax extenders negotiations. As I noted, the Freedom Caucus is engaging in political theater.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Mandalay: I was looking for someone to offer a rationale for Christie. I’m thinking he’s ready to go back the “designated loudmouth bully” role he played (not well, but I’m trying to gauge how a pathological narcissist sees himself) for Willard pre-Sandy, probably because he thinks a couple years as AG is just what he needs to make his next WH run a sure thing (he’s barely fifty, IIANM)
kc
@les:
It’s in the OP. Read it again.
geg6
@pamelabrown53:
Yeah, I was pretty upset until I read Sargent’s piece. Not so upset anymore.
Peale
@jl: I don’t know how to count this. Short term, the global markets don’t panick and I guess that is good. Long term, though, it still doesn’t take away this stupid “debt ceiling” governance. How convenient that Congress gets to leave town to campaign for a year to keep their jobs. And then we’re back to the same old hostage situation after the election. I’d almost want them to have to return in September of 2016 to solve this situation again. They’d hate that because they couldn’t go home to campaign. But at some point Congress needs to stop scaring us with their inactivity on the ceiling.
geg6
@Betty Cracker:
Yes, it is. A slander, IMHO.
Lord Baldrick
Pierce:
“All around the country, the parents of handicapped children on SSDI are terrified. They are waiting for letters in the mail that they dare not open. In Washington, though, there’s a “deal” that might even pass the Congress. So it’s all good.”
Amir Khalid
@shell:
It’s on the CNN International and BBC sites too. It’s gone global.
Paul in KY
@Mandalay: What you don’t know is he created his own debate scoring panel, which declared him the winner of the first 2.
It’s not a lie if you believe it….(or can document it with your personal panel)
Paul in KY
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I would say he’s angling for a veep spot. He can’t deliver NJ, so I guess ‘attack dog’ would be his mission.
Germy Shoemangler
@Paul in KY: He’s self-certified as winner of the debate.
Linnaeus
I don’t see this as a win for Democrats, but more as a tie. And a tie is about the best we’re going to get with this Congress.
Amir Khalid
@Paul in KY:
For whom would Chris Christie make a good Veep? Dr Ben? The Donald? Jeb? Marco? I’m just not feeling it.
geg6
@Betty Cracker:
I’m with you, Betty. I learned something over this past year that I never knew. My African American friends absolutely despise Gloria Steinem. None of them can actually tell me why except that they seem to think she is a bigot who hates Obama and has personally kept down black feminists. None of which seem to fit with the facts of Steinem’s history as I know and lived it. She’s been my hero since about age 9, so I’m pretty familiar with her history and writing and don’t really get the hatred for someone who is, actually, a person who wishes to be an ally to the African American community, but perhaps someone can explain and provide actual evidence of her wrongdoing. I’m willing to listen, but not to willful misreadings of what she has said or written.
Frankensteinbeck
@Germy Shoemangler:
From @I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet above.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Germy Shoemangler:
See, I knew if I mentioned it, the correct person would step forward. :-)
I’m sure the kid who got yelled at never forgot it, either.
Belafon
@Linnaeus: If you don’t control all three branches, can you get anything but a tie?
Melody
@Betty Cracker: Completely agree with Betty. What is this reflexive knee-jerk need to thank Obama for giving away the store?
Matt McIrvin
@Frankensteinbeck: I’ll believe it when I see it. The history of measures against “welfare cheats” and “voter fraud” (which mostly function as burdens and humiliations for people who are doing nothing wrong) is not encouraging.
tazj
@geg6: Agreed. Steinem’s piece is a negative critique of the press and how, in her opinion, they tried to divide the Democratic party. She gives examples of black people who supported Hilary Clinton in her presidential campaign. Her harshest criticism is for white women, those most like Hilary Clinton, privileged and highly educated, who Steinem feels were Clinton’s greatest detractors.
She’s angry because she feels that sexism isn’t taken seriously by the press. The press doesn’t take racism seriously either, but I don’t think she was criticizing black people for voting for Obama.
boatboy_srq
@Tommy: Someone please explain why “legal” trumps “ethical” and/or “civilized”. I’m tired of people in power misbehaving simply because there’s no (enforceable) law against what they’re doing.
Linnaeus
@Belafon:
I don’t think that was always the case, but I think that’s more the case now because of 1) the increasing polarization of the parties and 2) the parliamentarization of Congress that is related to that.
Let me clarify also that when I said this was a tie, it was not a dig at either the president or congressional Democrats. It was an acknowledgement of the political situation as it exists in Congress, which puts considerable constraints on creating and enacting progressive policy, as I’m sure you well know.
Paul in KY
@Germy Shoemangler: ‘Self Certification’ is the answer to many of life’s problems, dontchaknow!
Mandalay
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Well Trump owns that market, but it’s not necessarily a winning approach anyway, since soft-spoken Carson is soaring in the polls. (Have we had a loudmouth bully as president since Johnson?)
Christie is a big fish in a small pond in NJ, but nationally he’s a minnow. And as for a future run, time and again he has revealed his “human” side, and shown that he is a really nasty piece of work. The closest he will ever get to the White House is a visit to the Smithsonian.
Paul in KY
@Amir Khalid: Whichever one would like a loudmouth, blustery dude to say things about Hillary (probably) that they themselves would consider too unseemly (for them). Think Spiro Agnew.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Amir Khalid: He’s electoral poison, Willard’s team knew that in 2012, and that was before David Wildstein and Bridget Kelly were potential anvils over his head. But I and I suspect Paul were talking about his own mind, where his ascension may be slowed but never stopped.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@geg6:
I sometimes wonder if Steinem is being made to pay for the sins of Betty Friedan, who really was dismissive of the concerns of women of color and working women (basically, anyone who was not white and upper-middle-class like Friedan).
benw
@Paul in KY: I give your comment a Bronze Certificate of Excellence and my reply to your comment a Silver Certificate of Excellence.
Paul in KY
@tazj: Ms. Steinem doesn’t really expound on what caused Black voters (who she mentioned that in an early poll liked Hillary better than Pres. Obama) to go decisively for the Pres (in the excerpt). Absent an explanation/conjecture, one could surmise she thinks Pres. Obama’s skin color was decisive.
Paul in KY
@boatboy_srq: Someone back in the Dumfuckya days, would have labeled your lament ‘quaint’.
Paul in KY
@Mandalay: Batshit McChimpy was certainly a bully.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Good god.
Paul in KY
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I’m just saying he’s angling for it. Don’t think he would get it (veep spot).
boatboy_srq
@Paul in KY: Most of the Shrubbery seemed to believe that obeying the law was quaint, so that’s not exactly revelation.
Paul in KY
@benw: Well, my panel gave my initial response to Germy: ‘The Grand Commenter Cross of Excellence, 1st Class’!
Yours got a fruit basket….
dogwood
@Melody:
You sound like a member of the freedom caucus.
benw
@Paul in KY: When Obama uses Jade Helm to rip up the US constitution and sell America to the Kenyan Muslims, us resistance fighters can use an edible fruit basket a lot more than some dumb cross. SO THERE
MomSense
@Paul in KY:
She also makes it sound like it was just the media making it race vs gender and completely skips over the dog whistling and outright racism from the Clinton campaign. I really don’t care to ever hear Bill Clinton campaign again after the BS he pulled in 2007-08. I do recognize that this opinion is not widely shared and will now perform the obligatory will vote for Democratic Nominee no matter what.
Brachiator
@Betty Cracker: I am just getting to the Guardian piece by Steinem. Looks like it is meaty enough to be its own thread, to augment the interesting comments here.
ETA: the photo of Obama with Steinem as she was awarded the presidential medal of freedom says much about the solidarity of American activist movements.
Paul in KY
@benw: Wolverines!!!
Mandalay
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Some interesting trivia on why Romney ditched Christie as his potential VP:
http://swampland.time.com/2013/11/02/the-hunt-for-pufferfish/
les
@kc:
No, again, please to be reading actual deal. Try this:
Or please to be confining stupid to quiet thoughts.
RSA
@Germy Shoemangler:
That’s already the case. Here’s a Web site explaining the steps to getting SSDI benefits, a reasonable match to my experience:
You fill out an application.
Three or four months later, you get a decision.
If it’s a denial, you can hire a lawyer to help with the appeal to an Administrative Law Judge; it takes a few more months to collect information.
Your lawyer requests a hearing (average wait time: 16 months).
If you get denied again, you can appeal to the Appeals Council (up to a year).
If you get denied again, you can appeal to at the federal level (8 months).
I was told that our 18-month wait was a very good result. It seems to me that there are enough check points in the system to prevent widespread fraud.
Mandalay
@Paul in KY:
In public? (I’m sure all presidents, including Obama, have been bullies in private from time to time.)
Germy Shoemangler
@RSA: I can only imagine it will get worse.
WereBear
@rikyrah: Thanks, I was tremendously relieved to read this:
And yes, I was trusting President Obama.
WaterGirl
@rikyrah: :: shudder :: Please don’t make me actually read that article.
What I read from your short snippet had me flashing back to how what’s-her-name said that Obama’s being black gave him an advantage in the election.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Pure class, Our Willard.
I think it was Alec MacGillis who wrote an article that was pretty well sourced about Team Willard’s oppo research on Christie. A petty grifter, a bully and an opportunist (I know, we’re all shocked)
Mandalay
@Paul in KY:
I can’t see that as even a remote possibility with Bridgegate hanging over him. We don’t know the extent of his involvement, and I suppose he might even be completely innocent, but the mere possibility that he could have been in it up to his neck makes him toxic as a VP choice.
(I am assuming that Bridgegate will drag on for months/years.)
Brachiator
@benw:
I swear, whenever I see “Jade Helm,” I think of a mystical object in a Chinese kung-fu film, or a porn star.
MomSense
@Brachiator:
It’s my secret ninja code name.
Betty Cracker
@Paul in KY: I think Steinem offers at least two explanations for that in the piece. She attributes voters’ early preference for Clinton over PBO to the fact that Obama was relatively new to the scene back then. Then she observes that female voters were more likely than men to conclude HRC couldn’t win and black voters were more likely than whites to think at first that Obama couldn’t win. As Steinem put it, “Each group was made pessimistic by the depth of the bias they had experienced.” When Obama won Iowa (lily white Iowa!), his supporters began to believe he could win.
benw
@Brachiator: I know, it just adds to the silliness of the whole thing.
dogwood
@Mandalay:
Christie wasn’t just late for events. He was chronically late in submitting information to the vp selection committee, and what he did get around to submitting,was woefully incomplete.
Another Holocene Human
@Just Some Fuckhead: A live human being willingly had sex with him?
RSA
@Germy Shoemangler:
Right. I guess I wasn’t really disagreeing with you…
gene108
@RSA:
Patricia Kayden
@Betty Cracker: “including a $32 billion increase included in an emergency war fund.”
Why is there a need for an emergency war fund? Is the U.S. planning to go to war soon? Democrats need to get military spending down.
gene108
@RSA:
Widespread fraud yes, there are checkpoints, but this does not allow for the complete elimination of fraud and therefore everyone must suffer because a small minority of people take advantage of the system.
I think a big test between conservatives and liberals is how to view guilty / innocent screw-ups on a court of law.
In my experience conservatives would prefer that every guilty person goes to jail, even if you have to jail some innocent people along the way because otherwise the guilty could escape justice.
Liberals on the other hand feel a few guilty people not being sentenced is acceptable to make sure you do not wrongly lock up an innocent person.
mdblanche
@Mandalay:
Don’t sell Christie short. If he doesn’t get winded he can make it as far as Lafayette Park.
Paul in KY
@Mandalay: If you count press conferences & demeaning them in a public setting (outside a building, etc.), as public!
mclaren
@rikyrah:
I think you mean “Once again, cleaning up Vice President Joe Biden’s shyt.”
Joe Biden was the prime mover in the legislation that lengthened prison sentences for minor drug crimes. If you want to know why America’s prisons are chock-full of people who shouldn’t be there, Vice President Joe Biden is the answer. Joe Biden is the guy who in 1990 called for a “D-Day in the War on Drugs.” Joe Biden is the guy who introduced a bill to create a Drug Czar. Joe Biden is the guy who, as senator, introduced the bill that created a huge disparity in sentencing for people caught with crack as opposed to powdered cocaine.
Bill Clinton signed the legislation, but Joe Biden wrote that legislation.
Patricia Kayden
@jake the antisholul soshulist: So is President Obama a Marxist Communist Socialist or a crony Capitalist? You cannot be both at the same time. Just shows how truly silly and confusing rightwing memes are.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Betty Cracker:
Fun fact I just discovered yesterday — Iowa was one of only 4 states where Obama won the white vote in 2012:
http://elections.nytimes.com/2012/results/president/exit-polls
The other three states were Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New Hampshire. It was a tie in New York, 49 to 49.
The white voter margins were better in 2008 — Obama got a majority of the white vote in those 4 states plus NY, CA, WI and CO.
ETA: I realize that not all 50 states were polled, but does anyone really wonder how Mississippi voted?
Mandalay
@dogwood:
Christie would argue that it was “meticulously incomplete”.
mclaren
The 20% cut to disability benefits will be brutal. I personally know some very sick people who may become homeless because of these cuts.
Disability payments pay for things like housing for people who are so injured or so sick they can’t work. A 20% cut means some of these people won’t be able to afford the skyrocketing rents in today’s cities. These sick injured people will wind up on the streets, living in cardboard boxes.
Shame on you, Obama. For shame.
Seanly
My wife is on SSDI currently. She’s improved enough that she is considering going back to work. Since her immune system is still compromised following the bone marrow transplant, her doctors didn’t want her to go back to work right away. She’s bored and depressed staying home all the time so she was the one to talk about going back to work.
It’d be great for her to go back to work before the disability system runs out of money. She should also qualify for the incentives to go back to work which allows for still getting the SSDI while getting paid for working for a few months.
Yes, I know that SSDI won’t run out of money, but will only be able to pay 80% of benefit. I’d rather get her back to work and not be relying on 100% SSDI and only getting 80%.
Elie
@Betty Cracker:
I agree, Betty. We need to be careful with too easily accepting things we know have bad downstream costs that set us up on the continually slippery slope — it might actually help pass it, making the Freedumb carcass happy that we Democrats are unhappy with it.
I dunno anymore. We are just in such crazyland that we can only dream of sitting down and making policy that is good for the country from both parties — like fixing our infrastructure and expanding health care coverage to all Medicaid — not just states where there is some sanity remaining.
Elie
@Seanly:
My best wishes to your wife and you! I can imagine the challenge of it but it is soooo important for her to recover her immune system. Is there some volunteer phone banking she can do or other assistance to a not-for-profit where she can do phone work?
I wish you both the best!
Doug R
@C.V. Danes: One big reason the Libs won in Canada, going into deficit for a few years rebuilding infrastructure while money is so cheap makes sense. That, and we were sick of Harper’s crap.
Doug R
@C.V. Danes: One big reason the Libs won in Canada, going into deficit for a few years rebuilding infrastructure while money is so cheap makes sense. That, and we were sick of Harper’s cr*p.
Seanly
@mclaren:
The SSDI & SSI system has been relying for years on payments out of Social Security system. In the past, it was standard for Congress to go ahead & transfer the funds without a fuss. It was the Republicans who made this a big issue. They’re the ones who pretend that the 0.1% who might engage in fraud is some huge drain on the system and therefore we need to screw over the infirm and disabled. So go fuck yourself.
Paul in KY
@Mandalay: If he’s toxic for a Veep slot, certainly he’s toxic for the Pres. nomination. I guess he’s just grifting then.
geg6
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
I think that might be a large part of it, come to think of it.
Paul in KY
@Brachiator: A robot porn star who is a kung fu master. Our resident filmmaker needs to pitch this stat!
ruemara
@Betty Cracker: yeah, I know. She’s normally quite good on this issue.
RSA
@Seanly:
Best of luck, Seanly. But while all of the news articles this past summer were talking about a 20% cut, the latest news suggests that this issue may have been resolved:
Seanly
@Elie:
Her last job was admin work (staffing related) at a hospital. She’d love to get that job back because the pay was good, but we’re both well aware that a hospital isn’t a healthy environment. Her pay was good and the charge nurses who she talked with a lot all loved her. She’d love to go back but there’s a host of issues. Besides working in the hospital, the position had oddball hours and was usually a 12 hour day. She’s not sure she could do the 12 hour shifts.
mclaren
@Seanly:
I’ll tell that to the disabled woman I know who is in chronic pain and can’t work. I’ll tell her you said “so go fuck yourself” when she becomes homeless.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
So I’m quickly scanning the draft text of the budget deal bill (144 page .pdf). What’s the bottom line on all the Partnership stuff at the end (Title XI)? Is Burns around?
Anyone?
Oh, and the very last provision merits a chuckle. I’m sure the Teabaggers can feel justly proud:
Victory!!11
Cheers,
Scott.
Doug R
@Germy Shoemangler: Senator Al Franken’s doughnut hole idea.
Germy Shoemangler
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: They’re so big on symbolism! It’s like they’re kids playing “Statesman” or something.
DTTM
@mclaren: On Medicare and Social Security: Nancy Altman, the president of Social Security Works, a group that strenuously opposes benefits cuts and argues for their expansion, tells me that the deal “doesn’t actually cut benefits or really hurt beneficiaries who aren’t gaming the system.”
Altman says the Medicare cuts are all on the provider side, which could harm beneficiaries at some point, but it’s not a major concern. “On the Medicare side, they limited their cuts to far in the future, and to providers,” Altman says. “There’s time to correct that.”
On the change to Social Security, Altman says: “They stiffened the penalties for fraud, they extended nationwide efforts to make sure that payments are accurate and they closed a loophole in which people were gaming the system. They didn’t change eligibility requirements or reduce the level of benefits.”
Belafon
@mclaren: You mean the disability cuts that aren’t going to happen?
http://www.thepeoplesview.net/main/2015/10/26/hair-on-fire-lefties-get-it-wrong-again-budget-deal-helps-medicare-disability-beneficiaries
RSA
@gene108:
This is very much my own experience, too. From the conservatives I know, I often sense a moral outrage about someone getting away with something, far out of proportion to what that person might or might not be getting.
Paul in KY
@Betty Cracker: Thank you for the response. Will have to reread the excerpt.
NonyNony
@mclaren:
Um, mclaren? This deal is supposed to prevent the 20% across the board cut in SSDI.
http://www.latimes.com/business/hiltzik/la-fi-mh-social-security-medicare-20151027-column.html
The changes to SSDI to placate Republicans was to spend more money on trying to find people gaming the system and punishing them. Its stupid, but it’s the kind of stupid their voters respond to (i.e. their voters don’t what their disability payments to get cut but they’re damn sure that someone else is gaming the system and they want it stopped). In exchange, the 20% cut isn’t going to happen.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@mclaren:
Then it’s a good thing the 20 percent cut was avoided, isn’t it?
Bill
@Belafon:
Patricia Kayden
@Seanly: I must have missed the sentence in Mclaren’s comment where he supported the cuts to SSDI and SS that prompted your need to curse at him.
Brachiator
@gene108:
I recall the host of a conservative talk radio show dismiss the unfairness of a person who had been wrongly convicted of a crime and released.
“He probably committed other crimes even if he was innocent of this one.”
NonyNony
@Patricia Kayden:
I believe it’s the part where mclaren blames Obama rather than Republicans. The fuck you was earned.
Even more earned when it turns out that mclaren is wrong (big surprise) and the 20% cut isn’t happening because of this deal.
Seanly
@mclaren:
My own wife is disabled right now thanks to leukemia and then almost dieing from a lung infection post-transplant. The “fuck you” was directly to you for blaming Obama when the entire issue about transferring funds is entirely a product of Republicans’ typical BS blame game against anyone unfortunate enough to draw a check from the government.
I do know better than to feed trolls… my apologies to everyone except mclaren.
Germy Shoemangler
@NonyNony:
They will do this by harassing everyone receiving benefits and everyone applying for benefits.
Patricia Kayden
@NonyNony: Okay. Thanks
catclub
@Brachiator:
why not both?
catclub
@NonyNony:
You know, if they felt the same way about the tax system and funded IRS higher to catch more tax cheats, now THAT would pay dividends. Funny they don’t, though.
dogwood
@DTTM:
Why would anyone believe Nancy Altman when we have mclaren to give us the real scoop? Deciding that Obama or the democrats have sold them out doesn’t make them angry, it makes them happy. As Marilynne Robinson said in her conversation with the president- We are living in a time where the worst thing said is assumed to be the truest.
NonyNony
@Germy Shoemangler:
They’ll actually probably do it by making everyone fill out more paperwork, and making them wait longer to receive benefits. Probably more yearly paperwork to fill out to justify retaining benefits too. It’s messed up and stupid. And also likely to be a huge waste of money because the amount of money spent to do this stuff will be unlikely to matched by what they recoup for the handful of people they actually manage to find gaming the system. Because the big gains on that were fixes that were put in place years ago, and IIRC even those didn’t recoup as much as proponents thought they would. Likely because most people aren’t nearly as dishonest as the proponents believed them to be.
A lot of the people who are going to have to go through this rigamarole will be Republican voters too. They probably won’t even connect their extra hours of stupid BS with their idiot reps in Congress at all.
catclub
@RSA:
Bankers and OSHA violators excepted.
Brachiator
@Mnemosyne (iPhone):
In California, White men voted for Romney 56 to 41%.
White women voted for Obama, 50 to 49%
Latino men voted for Obama 68 to 30 percent. Latino women, Obama, 75 to 24 percent.
In Mississippi, 88 percent of white men, and 89 percent of white women voted for Romney
In New York and a number of states, the majority of white women voted for Obama.
http://elections.nbcnews.com/ns/politics/2012/all/president/#.Vi–Mn7nu73
catclub
@NonyNony: Charlie Pierce regularly reprints his story on the kid who was arbitrarily thrown off the rolls when one of theses ‘reforms’ rolled through town, and died to due to health problems that were being held in place while he was on the program. I think it was SSDI.
catclub
@Mnemosyne (iPhone): Not Vermont? I am surprised.
redshirt
@catclub:
Yeah, how aren’t VT, NH, and ME not on this list? They are all like 96% white and all voted Obama the winner in 2008 and 2012 by good margins, so it must be a majority of white votes.
dogwood
@redshirt:
Those states weren’t polled.
NonyNony
@catclub: Yup. This is one area where I’d certainly be willing to put up with more wastefraudandabuse because the folks who are out on the edges and get caught up in these kinds of purges end up being hurt far more than the benefits of saving a few dollars nets us. (Food assistance programs are the same way – beyond a certain minimum level to chace out the grifters, money spent on hunting down “cheaters” is better spent just providing the service to more people instead).
And honestly – any politician who is pushing for upping the investigations for wastefraudandabuse in SSDI but isn’t pushing to do the same thing to military contractors needs to be laughed out of town.
Mandalay
@Paul in KY:
That, and/or he is using this as a dress rehearsal for a 2020 run, like Paul, Cruz and Rubio.
Campaigning doesn’t make you more qualified to be president, but it should make you a much better campaigner next time around. (Rick Santorum has actually learned nothing from past experience, but he is the special snowflake exception that proves the rule.)
Tom Q
@Brachiator: And implicit in this philosophy is the conviction that neither this person nor anyone he cares about could possibly be implicated in a crime.
As someone once said, if a conservative is a liberal who’s been mugged, a liberal is a conservative who’s been arrested.
Brachiator
@catclub: Overall, Obama got 66 percent of the white vote in Vermont.
59 percent of the white men, 72 percent of the white women.
Mandalay
@Brachiator:
It”s not just wingnut shock jocks who embrace that mindset. The news editor of the NYT today justified a blatant lie in a news article by Amy Chozick about Joe Biden’s son:
The news editor of the NYT embraces and defends truthiness. We are so fucked.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
@Brachiator:
A lot of people don’t seem to realize how regional most voting trends are, and white women’s voting patterns are one of those that are strongly affected by region. White women in blue states vote Democrat; white women in purple and red states vote Republican. The redder the state is, the more white women vote Republican.
@catclub:
They only polled a limited number of states for that story, and it looks like they tried to pick ones that would represent their regions well.
mclaren
@Belafon:
Thanks for that info. I admit I am now confused.
If the news reports and Obama describe this as “a 20% cut to disability,” how is it not a 20% cut to disability?
It sounds as though someone is lying.
Do we have any HARD evidence to show who is lying?
mclaren
@dogwood:
Good thinking. By all means, let’s believe a hearsay report of what some random person says, rather than asking for documented facts and evidence.
Elie
@Seanly:
Totally hear that — it is hard to really like your work and be unable to do it –not least of which is that it is more high risk environment for her health.
NonyNony
@mclaren:
Provide a link to the story claiming that this deal makes a 20% cut to disability.
I suspect you’re misreading the story. Or mishearing the newsreaders.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Whereas you have first hand reports from well known voices in your head!
By the bye, what color is the sun today?
someguy
The Export-Import bank primarily underwrites foreign arms, airplane and heavy equipment sales. It’s part foreign aid, part defense / aerospace / heavy manufacturing company handout. Defense contractors sometimes call it the Boeing Bank.
The Eeeevil Republicans oppose it, or at least the ones not getting donations from Boeing, General Dynamics and the like.
I'mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet
NYTimes: Obama won in budget deal.
FWIW.
Cheers,
Scott.
mclaren
@NonyNony:
You first. The burden of proof is on the person who makes the assertion — provide a link to hard gov’t numbers proving that disability will not be cut, or stand revealed as a liar.
mclaren
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Provide links with detailed citations of posts showing that I provide “first hand reports from..voices in [my] head” or stand revealed as a liar.
mclaren
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Let’s look at the evidence:
Source: “A cut to Social Security disability benefits may be around the corner,” The Washington Post, 23 July 2015.
Is The Washington Post a “voice in [my[ head”?
You are lying..
mclaren
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Let’s look at yet more evidence:
Source: “Social Security Disability Benefits Face Cuts in 2016, Trustees Say,” The New York Times, 22 July 2015.
Is The New York Times a “voice in [my[ head”?
You are lying again.
mclaren
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
Let’s study some more evidence:
Source: “Social Security Disability checks face 19 percent cut in 2016 unless solution found,” The Post and Courier, 22 July 2015.
Is The Post and Courier “a voice in [my] head”?
You are lying over and over again. You are telling lie after lie after lie.
The evidence suggests that you are compulsive pathological sociopathic liar. Why should anyone pay any attention to anything you say after this display of your flagrant dishonesty?
dogwood
@mclaren:
Your sources are fine. They are accurate as to the situation in July. But now it’s October and the budget deal will stop those cuts. What about that don’t you understand?
Brachiator
@Mandalay:
Dean Baquet was kicked out of the LA Times (a paper I once worked for long ago). NY can have him.
Cewrmet
Victory is hearing the lamentations of the wailing repug-a- thugs like little girls who have hurt their knee’. Sweet, sweet victory as President Obama rides that lame duck to victory after victory. The Daily KOS outlines the details of the budget deal and it is Demorat friendly and thug ugly!
Karen
@Betty Cracker:
When Obama won Iowa (lily white Iowa!), his supporters began to believe he could win.
And there are Dems in the party that have never forgiven him for that. They never forgave him for daring to not believe the unwritten rules that a black man could never win. Clinton kept speaking about how “unelectable” Obama was and gave a dogwhistle implying Obama either should be assassinated or would be. I remember it all.
Admiral_Komack
@I’mNotSureWhoIWantToBeYet: Now you’ve gone and done it!
You have disappointed the “Obama has sold us out!!!” chorus.
Admiral_Komack
@Karen: Yo! We not only remember…we have receipts!
Chris T.
@kc: I think in part it gets spun as “Republicans voted to cut Social Security”.
J R in WV
@RSA:
THIS!!
Mrs J eventually was awarded total and permanent disability, but it took a labor lawyer and months and months (a couple of years at least!).
Thank FSM that at the time I was becoming a more highly paid software guy! That really helped.
The Disability process needs much improvement and healing, most people can’t live for 2 or 3 years with no source of income.
J R in WV
@mclaren:
For about the fourth time in this thread, part of this budget deal does away with the 20% cut in funding for social Security Disability payments… so please stop crying about something Obama has already fixed for us.
Thank you.
J R in WV
@Patricia Kayden:
People are angry with mclaren because mclaren continues to attack Democrats in general and Obama in particular for something that is not going to happen. That seems pretty obvious to me.
No one thinks mclaren is in favor of cutting SSDI benefits.
Another Holocene Human
This thread is awesome.
hugely
@Brachiator:
sorry I have the daniel carver drop from HWS going through my head. As a white dude in Cali I voted for Obama so I guess I get a cookie or karma or something?
hugely
@mclaren: DUDE – answer the question – why are you so evasive?
What is the color of the sun today?
FFS