Anyone who is surprised by this should never comment about politics again. Ever:
A serious case of fiscal amnesia may soon be sweeping the GOP.
For eight years, Republicans hammered President Barack Obama for exploding the national debt. But now a GOP-led spending spree is coming, with Donald Trump riding to the White House on trillion-dollar promises and a Republican Congress that looks likely to do his bidding. It’s a potential echo of the last time Republicans ran Washington, when then-Vice President Dick Cheney memorably remarked, “Deficits don’t matter.”
Trump campaigned heartily on a spending splurge and nothing he’s said since his shocking election suggests he will reverse course. Republican leaders on Capitol Hill, meanwhile, are papering over divisions with the man who frequently tossed party orthodoxy aside on the trail.
“There is now a real risk that we will see an onslaught of deficit-financed goodies — tax cuts, infrastructure spending, more on defense — all in the name of stimulus, but which in reality will massively balloon the debt,” said Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
Everything he does is going to explode the deficit and debt, from tax cuts to building the wall to deporting millions to the infrastructure grift to his cronies to dismantling ACA and so on, and what makes it even better is that they will attempt to gut SS and Medicare at the same time under the guise that they are unaffordable. Ryan’s already lying about that shit:
When Baier asked Ryan about the Republican plans for entitlement reform, the Speaker took the conversation back to their plans to repeal Obamacare and said:
If you’re going to repeal and replace Obamacare, you have to address those issues as well. … Medicare has got some serious issues because of Obamacare. So those things are part of our plan to replace Obamacare.
Ryan went on to say that, “Because of Obamacare, Medicare is going broke.” That is a lie.
Health reform, along with other factors, has significantly improved Medicare’s financial outlook, boosting revenues and making the program more efficient. The HI trust fund is now projected to remain solvent 11 years longer than before the Affordable Care Act was enacted.
In other words, repealing Obamacare would mean that Medicare would become insolvent 11 years earlier than is currently projected by those who manage the Medicare trust fund (here is a link to their latest report). In terms of timing, it is important to note that right now the trust fund projects that Medicare will remain solvent until 2028. If Obamacare is repealed, that happens in 2017. So the plan is to roll back the savings that extended its solvency and simultaneously generate fear that the program needs to either be privatized or begin reducing benefits to current seniors.
Democrats should do everything in their power to protect SS and medicare, but I doubt they will be able to do anything because the Republicans will either use reconciliation to do these things without requiring the super-majorities they demanded of everything in the Obama era (I know they can do tax cuts, but am unsure if they can do medicare and SS reform that way), and if the Democrats filibuster, I have no doubt they will nuke the filibuster. They feel emboldened.
And if they do that, the only thing Democrats can do is oppose vocally and try to insert poison pills. Like, for example, any changes they make to Medicare and SS can not godfather current recipients. If privatization is so good, the people who de facto voted for it, our selfish elders, should get to experience it for themselves. None of this phasing it in bullshit so the people currently on get to benefit as everyone always has while those younger than them get fucked.
All Democrats should be focused on doing is fighting and shouting No. And, btw- that’s how we will find who the real leaders in the party are and who we should follow on our way forward.
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
Knock me over with a feather.
rikyrah
No less than The Evil One himself told you long ago…
DEFICITS DON’T MATTER
Ryan
To the fainting couch! My stars!
Steve M.
I understand the principle of saying “No phase-in – everyone suffers if anyone suffers.” But doesn’t that just give Rs a juicy opportunity to say “DEMOCRATS WANT TO TAKE AWAY GRANNY’S MEDICARE!!!!!!” – yes, even as Rs are taking away everyone else’s? We know that Rs always win those messaging wars.
Jeffro
These guys kill me (literally)
Hey President Obama, I think I have a theme for your departing address to the nation: it’s called, “Republican Lies”
(don’t worry folks – if Obama’s busy, I have a funny feeling Harry Reid is giving this exact same speech in 3, 2, 1…)
Lurking Canadian
In a sense, the only thing we have to look forward to is several years of being able to say “I told you so”.
Ksmiami
Nope phase it out for all or keep it no exceptions. Then shout the GOP wants to kill Americans because it’s the truth.
kindness
The Media circus killed Obama’s ability to get us all nice things. The very same media gave us Trump, because Trump had better viewer ratings and clicks. Now that same media, which happily parroted Republican Talking Points is going to do a 180 and ignore what was the most important thing (deficits) not 2 months ago.
So….I submit, maybe the lawyers should not go first in my Shakespeareian view of things. I would say the Money Daddies should be #1 & the Vische Press should be 2nd.
Ksmiami
Ps Ryan is a sick sociopathic collection of cells. Not sure there’s a human being inside that flesh covering
это курам на смех
If lobbying our congress critters will help, what do we tell them to do?
kindness
@Steve M.: No, we don’t know that Republicans will win those messaging wars. When it’s Republicans demanding it be cut, they might try to blame Democrats but outside of Fox I don’t think they’d be successful. We have to fight. There is no option not to. – Why don’t I have permission to edit my comment? That’s happened a couple times.
patrick II
Elaine Quijano will be surprised since the democrats loose ways with the precious national debt seemed to be her main concern during the vp debate. And yes, she should never comment about politics ever again.
Villago Delenda Est
“Reagan proved deficits don’t matter” – Dick “Dark Lord of the Sith” Cheney.
Chat Noir
Paul Waldman has a post up at the Plum Line about the fight to save Medicare and how it can help rally Democrats.
SiubhanDuinne
QF damn T.
Listening, as usual, to the BBC Newshour, but will have to cut it off soon, because they are going to interview Bernie Sanders about “what went wrong.” So tired of him. But et tu, BBC?
3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike)
This:
We have to make the assholes own the whole damn thing. All of it. When MeMe and PawPaw have to move into the doublewide with them, they might change their minds. And they still won’t have jobs, or a beautiful wall, and people with slightly darker skins and funny religions will remain citizens.
Plus, the FP story in WaPo this morning – many evangelicals think they have just ushered in The Holy Millennium, and all us DHFs will be forced to participate in their sanctimonious bible-humping, or else. We can’t let them run the place, and they need to be resisted at every turn in their need fling this country back to the Salem Witch Trials.
I live in holy-roller central, and they are going nuts out there. I feel I now have to carefully choose what t-shirt I wear when I go to the grocery, just for my own safety…
David Hunt
I kept telling my friends. No one spends money without paying for it like Republicans in control of both Congress and the Presidency.
schrodinger's cat
@SiubhanDuinne: Katie Kay is a Villager, the other hosts are better, I like Laura Trevelyan.
Это курам на смех
@SiubhanDuinne: Did you see Sanders’ editorial in the NYT on Saturday in which he effectively took the side of President-Elect Shitstain as a fellow populist? Fuck that guy.
Patricia Kayden
Since this is surprising to absolutely no one, the only question is how many of Trump’s promises he will even pretend to implement. This whole thing would be laughable if Trump and his sycophants weren’t so damn dangerous.
Pogonip
Every time Republicans get in they suddenly forget about the deficit.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Villago Delenda Est: just gonna point that out, it wasn’t just that Cheney said it, it was that he cited the Reagan administration as the example and authority. Cheney was, not surprisingly, far more lucid that 99.8% of the people you see on your TeeVee solemnly frowning and wagging their fingers about “fiscal responsibility”
@SiubhanDuinne: he’s a character, he makes for good media, the accent, the affect– A risk for him that a BBC reporter might bring up Eichenwald’s article, if they’ve seen it.
Patricia Kayden
@SiubhanDuinne: Sanders is free to pontificate about what he believes went wrong but I really would love to see him rally Senate Democrats to oppose Trump’s agenda by filibustering every chance they get. Otherwise, his opinions on why we lost aren’t worthy anything. It’s time for action now.
Pogonip
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike): what happens if you wear the wrong shirt?
If “Wapo” means Washington Post, I’m locked out of it for the rest of the month. Can you please summarize the article? (typing in the headline on Google doesn’t work on this phone.)
cmorenc
As someone who is now 67 and just within the last year was the beneficiary of a too-long-delayed total knee joint replacement courtesy of Medicare and can now elect any time to begin collecting SS – it’s really painful to have to agree that we must insist on holding the GOP to an all-or-nothing approach to both along the lines you said: if privatization is so great, then there’s no need to insulate the current generation of seniors from the consequences – because it’s GREAT, so you tell us Paul Ryan. Walk like you dalk, dick-head.
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
Where’s Adam,
TPM has the story.
Patricia Kayden
@Pogonip: Because deficits are only bad when Democrats are in the White House. Makes perfect sense somehow.
Steeplejack
@Это курам на смех:
“It hens on laughter”? Nym translation, please.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
Brian Beutler:
3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike)
@Pogonip: I subscribed this weekend. It’s worth it.
I hope this isn’t too long a quote, but this is the gist of the attitude. They are gloating about the power they now think they have to force us to do “the Lawd’s bidding”…
That, quite literally, scares the ever-loving shit out of me.
mkro
Use #NotNormal … winning the presidency by kicking up our country’s ugly racist bee hives needs to be illegitimatized http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/attytood/Trumps-first-moves-are-NotNormal.html
schrodinger's cat
Jeff Sessions for the DoJ? My blood runs cold.
liberal
Is that really so obvious?
I mean, I’m sure Trump doesn’t give a flying fuck about the deficit/debt, but what about the Teahadists in the House?
Sure, in principle, I agree that most Republican officeholders have the capacity to be complete hypocrites about the deficit. But many of the Teahadist Caucus are true ideologues. Like the one idiot who during the debt limit showdown “did the math” to show that we could get by without extending the debt limit.
It could be very, very bad for Dems if the Republicans agree on a huge infrastructure bill. I just can’t imagine them doing it, though. Something in the low hundreds of billions, maybe, but not O($1T).
One question—what do the Dems do if the Republicans tie Medicare destruction to an infrastructure bill? (I’m not sure if they can do that, but let’s assume they can.) My own opinion is that the Dems have to vote “no”.
liberal
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike):
As my dad said:
Pogonip
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike): Why?
Davis X. Machina
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: How many times did he mention the public option?
NotMax
The Ryan “budget plan” in three easy lessons.
1) Give me my share
2) Give me your share
3) Now piss off
Wyrm1
@Pogonip: If you cut the link and then paste it in incognito mode on Firefox you can avoid the pay wall because incognito doesn’t keep cookies
Oldgold
We have an election that goes on for well over a year. During that time no one mentions ending Medicare. Too busy worrying about a server in up state New York. A week after the election we hear they plan to end the governments most successful program. What a shameful political system we have.
schrodinger's cat
Hillary Clinton won in NH. So all New England states went for her, including WWC in those states.
Monkeyfister
All I know is that every time I have ever come eligible for something the Boomers all enjoy, the door gets slammed in my face while I’m stepping into the line. They preserve THEIR benefits for themselves, and stiff the rest of us. Every single fucking time.
I was hoping to retire and get the hell out of Armpit, TN, and back home to Michigan in four years. Right now, I don’t see much of a future, save for just working until I die. I have zero faith that the Dems in Minority will do anything to stop the steamroller. They never do- save to carve-out the lucre for themselves.
LAO
@schrodinger’s cat: Wait, what?
3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike)
@liberal: Smart man, your dad. He has critical-thinking skills that are sorely lacking in the group he’s talking about. They will never make the connection that their new “leader” is not one of them, and he sure doesn’t see them as a part of his group.
Actually, he (the Yam) is a group of one.
Pogonip
@liberal: If I were a Dem politician, I would vote No, and make sure to explain to my constituents why.
schrodinger's cat
@Oldgold: We broke Russia in the 90s and so many Latin American and African countries during the Cold War. This is Putin’s revenge.
LongHairedWeirdo
Dismantling the ACA will take more than reconciliation. That doesn’t mean they won’t fight tooth and nail to make if fail. For example, by coincidence, health insurers had high rate increases during a Presidential election year. I’m sure the Republicans never suggested ANYTHING to them regarding this, in violation of price-fixing laws, because Republicans respect the law and pftBWAHAHAHAHA!
I’m sorry, I tried.
But seriously, they can wipe out spending on it, but they can’t break down all parts of the law that don’t deal with the budget.
Pogonip
@Wyrm1: I can’t cut and paste on a touch screen. Thanks anyway.
schrodinger's cat
@LAO: That’s the name that’s being floated around, I think I read it on TPM.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
OT, if anything is OT: The woman who posted the Facebook picture of her meeting HRC while walking in the woods near Chappaqua is getting death threats
Pogonip
@Steeplejack: Betty Cracker speaks Chicken.
LAO
@schrodinger’s cat: Ok. Thanks. I’m still not able to surf the web without hyperventilating (kinda, sorta kidding) — Guliani as Secretary of State has left me a raging mess this am. Sessions as AG, just icing on the shit cake.
schrodinger's cat
@LAO: You and me both. I accidentally clicked on a link that someone had posted here.
LAO
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: And — forgive me if this has already been covered — a male Trump supporter punched a 49 year old woman in the face in Brooklyn last night. Brooklyn.
geg6
@SiubhanDuinne:
He’s been going around on a victory lap for days now. And he’s also running around claiming that only he can save the Democrats from themselves and so we must follow Bernie now. Of course, since he’s not a Democrat, I’m not sure how well that message is being received by anyone but me. As for me, Bernie can just go fuck himself. I wouldn’t follow him out of a burning building.
The Truffle
Aren’t small-government, balanced-budget type of conservatives going to be PO’ed about this? Isn’t this one of those glorious moments where we can let them eat their own?
The Tea Party must be steamed.
I imagine a lot of corporate, small-government types getting angrier and angrier over these plans. Not just the Tea Partiers. The insurers who got new people on their plans (and more money) are going to be concerned about their profits.
Fcb
Ni shagu Nazad!
Patricia Kayden
@schrodinger’s cat:
I’ve heard that Michigan is still too close to call. So WWC are reachable after all.
SiubhanDuinne
@Это курам на смех:
Yeah. Someone (here?) noted that he reached out to Trump in a lot less time than it took him to reach out to Hillary. I think that’s very telling.
And where does he come off telling the Democratic Party what it needs to do to fix itself? He was never a member of the Democratic Party.
ETA: Or what geg6 said at #54.
3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike)
@Pogonip: Why what? That I subscribed to WaPo or that the bible-humpers scare the shit out of me?
The WaPo thing was they seem to have some of the final threads of actual journalism amid the crap, and I need that.
The humpers want a theocracy, and my Buddhi-pagan-athiest butt prefers to sleep in on Sunday mornings. ;-D
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
@geg6: I’ll just repost what I said about this in another thread.
Excusing every bad thing coming down the pike, a quote from Bernie:
HE’S NOT EVEN A FUCKING DEMOCRAT, HE DOESN’T GET TO MAKE EXCUSES FOR ME.
FUCK HIM
FUCK HIM
FUCK HIM
schrodinger's cat
@Patricia Kayden: Most of the WWC dudes that I have worked with have been Dems. I knew a couple of Obots too, believe it or not.
Elmo
I like you guys. I really do.
But I don’t and can’t understand why you all still care.
I keep trying to. I remember a week ago that I cared very much, about the direction of the country, about my fellow Americans, about the world.
And now I don’t. At all. Can’t find it.
It’s more than a little weird, and it reminds me a great deal about how I felt for years after my mother died.
She died in January of 91, about five months before I graduated from law school, and I came very close to flunking out because I stopped going to class, like ever. It took years before I was interested in world events or politics again; the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Desert Storm, Clinton’s election in 92, Waco, the 94 wave, are all things I lived through but mostly know about from later reading.
Anyway, I know it was OT, but I wanted to express the sentiment. You guys are getting energized and organized and active, and all I can do is shrug. Doesn’t matter. Don’t care.
Sorry. As you were.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
It’s not going to be good, but it may be interesting
JMG
Could the Republicans steamroll the complete dismantling of the safety net? Sure, if they have 50 votes in the Senate to do it. That means it only takes three defectors to block it. The Medicare plan needs constant screaming attention from every Democrat. Tell your Republican relatives about it during the holidays. Make them own it. Make them own, “so I’ll die prematurely for your politics.”
Pogonip
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Doesn’t surprise me. I remember when a family that got lost in a corn maze got death threats. There are a lot of jerks out there.
A 2nd Amendment activist I knew got a lot of death threats. He would invite the person over to have a sandwich and talk about it. With one exception, he would never hear from the person again, probably because his low-key private response took all the fun out of it. The one exception who actually did come over to talk about it apologized–he was a liberal who’d been having a bad hair day–and they had a lively discussion.
danielx
Deja vu all over again, as my man Yogi Berra once noted. As several have already noted, nobody in DC gives a flying fuck about deficits except when there’s a Democrat in the Oval Office. And once again – assuming we still have free elections at that point – some hapless Dem will be elected who has to clean up the mess.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Pogonip: Good perspective, kinda like our resident troll who urges other people to take the fight to the cops
I just think Facebook is such a swirling maw of hate, I worry about people I know who engage in heated discussions and don’t think about how exposed and vulnerable they are
Origuy
ITYM, grandfather current recipients. To godfather them would be to leave horses’ heads in their beds.
sherparick
Glenn Kessler and the Washington Post have discovered that Paul Ryan lies. Write your local paper, call your local Congressman (especially if he is a Republican) and tell him that President Elect Trump promised hands off Social Security and Medicare.
By the way, as Paul Krugman noted, all this Fiscal stimulus will perk up the economy next year. So expect Republicans and their friends to take the same monthly job figures they have been disparaging under Obama to start pumping as the Trump boom. However, the Yellen Fed, starting next month will start raising interest rates modestly (and long term rates are already rising in anticipation of the next year’s spending spree). This will have the effect of strengthening the dollar and creating a bigger trade deficit (and hurting the manufacturing sector). What I am curious is about is next summer and who Trump will name to replace Yellen as Chair of the Federal Reserve.in early 2018 as well as Trump’s appointments next year. If he fills it with hard money and gold bugs, I will wonder how long the economy will continue to grow in the face of high interest rates? http://www.marketwatch.com/story/trump-can-quickly-put-his-stamp-on-the-federal-reserve-2016-11-09 I expect that it will be this adherence to ideology of in the face of facts that will blow the Republicans up.
daveNYC
@liberal: There might be some bare minimum who will get all harrumphy about X, Y, or Z; but I doubt that enough of them will get angry at one single item all at once to the point that they actually stop it from passing.
And the big spending bills are going to be for things they tend to like, defense, da fence, crap like that. Smaller ticket items, like say the EPA and OSHA inspectors, all that job killing regulation stuff, those will get nuked from orbit, never mind that the dollar amounts aren’t that big.
JMG
@Origuy: Except for the animal murder, an idea with a certain appeal. Paper-mache heads maybe?
Pogonip
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike): Don’t be a drama queen. You know darn well no one’s going to drag you to the local mega-church at gunpoint.
This applies to all of you. If you really want to organize the populace, stop being drama queens. It annoys people. I am sure someone will say “But the Deplorables were drama queens about Obama!” They were indeed. And it was annoying. And if you hate white Deplorables so much, why would you want to emulate them at their worst?
I don’t want Paul Ryan running wild either. People will get behind the protests you’re planning. But not if you act like jerks.
hovercraft
@Steve M.:
They win because they stick to their message, we are all over the place because so much of what they do is egregious. We need to pick a couple of things to hit on and stick with them. A big reason the Shitgibbon won is because everyday it was a different thing with him, whereas the story on Clinton was the same every single day, one sticks and the other just glances off. We need to learn how to focus on just a couple of things and repeat them day after day, till they penetrate. It’s the only way we’ll win.
CarolDuhart2
Good News:
3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike)
@Pogonip: I’m sorry – I didn’t answer your question about the wrong shirt. (Now I’ve got Wallace and Gromit in my head…)
I have been confronted by perfect strangers before when I wear certain t-shirts – in one specific incident I was wearing what I considered to be a rather innocuous shirt with a graphic of Stonehenge, captioned with “Give me that old-time religion”.
It was deemed by a group of three white women to be blasphemy. One apparently knew what Stonehenge was, which surprised me. They called me a dirty heathen in the frozen-food aisle at Kroger.
(And I’m a 60-year-old white woman myself.)
sherparick
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I avoid discussing politics on Facebook with “friends.” Yes, I am pretty unhappy with my fellow citizens who voted Trump, mostly out of tribal identity politics, but they know not what they have done. Neither the Republicans or the mainstream media believes in bothering their silly heads with policy things like getting rid of Medicare. As Chris Cilliza mindlessly chants, the American People (at least 47% of them did) voted for “change” and boy are they going to get it the next two years at least.
SiubhanDuinne
@Steeplejack:
I’m thinking Betty Cracker.
Edit: Curse you, @Pogonip
3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike)
@Pogonip: Sorry I offended you. I’ll know better next time. I was making a poor attempt at humor, apparently, working from personal experience in the area I live in. My own mother would be more than happy for there to be laws forcing everyone to attend the proper “church”.
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike):
One of the features of Orthodox liturgy has always included a litany of prayer for all civil authority, naming the president specifically. It is a aprt of the formula, and cannot be taken out.
I can’t attend and do that – especially not thinking about Christianity how I think now. Christians ruined my ancestral family religious history for me, and are really keeping me away from a church of happy, tolerant, pretty secular people, many of whom are part of my extended family.
Soylent Green
@Steeplejack: old Russian idiom. Literally “That’s for chickens to laugh at.” Meaning: “That’s ridiculous.” It’s also how you turn off River Tam.
Formerly I was a food product made from old people.
hovercraft
@Jeffro:
Obama will not take that route unfortunately. I wish he would speak out against the Shitgibbon, but I expect he will follow tradition and refrain from speaking out against his successor. If he took the Cheney route and was critical of this POS, the media would squeal like stuck pigs about how unprecedented it was for him to trash the Shitgibbon, never mind that his actions will beyond dumb, dangerous, and unprecedented.
Pogonip
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: I have nothing to do with Facebook. Sounds like that was a good move on my part.
Death threats that you think may be serious should be reported to the cops. They will not be able to do much unless someone acts on the threat. That is why it is important to have self-defense plans in a swirling maw of hate.
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
@CarolDuhart2:
Hold the applause. They’ll probably use it to assure access to municipal facilities for Klan and Nazi rallies in blue cities in blue states because priniciples. Racist fuck Glenn Greenwald and his client Gluteus Maximus approve.
Seems to be all that is in their wheelhouse.
Note how strikingly ineffective they were at ensuring ballot access – most of that work was done by the NAACP and smaller groups.
It is better to donate to the NAACP and SPLC.
cokane
not surprising but
the bottomless cynicism of this party and their ability to get away with it…
JMG
@hovercraft: He may not want to, but events may force his hand. And I think he would have less compunction about speaking up about legislation in the Congress.
O. Felix Culpa
@Elmo:
Oh friend, I appreciate how disheartening the results of this election are. I alternate between tears, rage, and despair. And yet, I recall that the majority of voters chose Hillary. We are not alone. And I feel a responsibility to my children, my wife, our GLBT friends, our immigrant neighbors, the members of our own BJ community who need Obamacare, not to give up, but to organize and to fight. We may not (probably won’t) win every battle, but we can and must prevail. There are enough people of good will to do this. Please join us when you can.
old_owl
Republicans will nuke the filibuster and do whatever the shit they want. They could care less about anyone else, because they have a propaganda machine that will get voters to the booth and pull the lever for them.
Democrats will be able to do nothing unless they get voters to the polling booth and vote for them. Everything else is bullshit. Makes you feel good or angry or let off steam.. whatever. Without the machine to manipulate people to the polls, and pull the lever for them, Dems have no future.
Bringing a knife to a gunfight is not a winning strategy. Build the propaganda machine.
Davebo
@Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class: Well, that is what they are there for.
You can’t really be for just some civil liberties, that would make you a modern Libertarian. Hence their opposition to banning gun purchases by people on the ridiculous no fly list. Due process still counts.
hovercraft
@patrick II:
All of the questions were framed from the Peter G. Peterson Foundation talking points, pushing their worldview, which is working to find fiscal solutions to help secure our country’s economic growth. Or in plain English, working to eliminate Social Security and Medicare and Medicaid as we know them, through privatization.
WereBear
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Sweet holy crap.
Patricia Kayden
@CarolDuhart2: I hope Planned Parenthood has also received a boost in donations since Trump’s election because reproductive rights, from contraception to abortion, are going to be under heavy attack. I expect Republicans to cut funding for PP ASAP.
rikyrah
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike):
Nobody’s playing with them.
NOBODY.
WesternPALurker
I am a straight “olds” white woman who has been voting democratic for over 50 years. I contributed every penny I could afford this cycle – including to the Balloon Juice ActBlue. And I just cut back expenses as much as I could in order to make monthly ongoing contributions to three progressive organizations. So please don’t put all of us in the same “I got mine” basket.
“Like, for example, any changes they make to Medicare and SS can not godfather current recipients”
The purpose of grandfathering in general is to allow people time to prepare and adjust. Even my evil big bank employer grandfathered those over 58 when they eliminated their fixed income retirement plan.
Yes, it really sucks for those under x age, but for most of us over x age, it’s be pretty hard to make adjustments. Back to work at 75?
hovercraft
@JMG: I hope that you are right, hearing his voice out there would help rally our side to keep fighting.
dexwood
@Patricia Kayden:
Over the weekend, my son and daughter-in-law informed us they do not want Christmas presents this year. Instead, they requested donations, in their names, to Planned Parenthood and the ACLU. They see this as a way to “fight Trump”. Once more, they made us proud parents.
gvg
@The Truffle: No the Tea Party was not really against deficits. Obvious for some time. They are radical republicans and are against anything the democrats want, updated daily. Notable especially for not knowing anything factual and disliking facts.
The Moar You Know
@The Truffle: No. They love it so long as the GOP does it.
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
@Davebo:
Bullshit.
Sobbing about racists getting parade permits and using public facilities has been mostly what they’ve been about for the past 15-20 years. NARAL has been doing the abortion thing with scant help from the ACLU. Lambda works on LBGT issues. SPLC and NAACP on voting rights. I mean, it is striking to see the amount of mediocre activity coming from the ACLU.
There’s a reason why Griftwald started his imbecilic “civil rights lawyer” career working for murderous prick Gluteus Maximus. The ACLU is just part of that whole sorry-assed show.
3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike)
@Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class: I have friends who are “real” Christians – the ones who feed the hungry, clothe the naked, and minister to the sick – like Jesus taught. We work joyfully together for the common good, and they don’t care one whit that I am not a “believer” in the sense that they are. I am open to their goodness, as they are open to mine. We can work together.
They are less vocal that the ones who are more attached to the holy thunderer-smiter of the Old Testament. I can’t work with that faction. I grew up in it. I know them. I will stand in their way every chance I get.
Matt McIrvin
@Elmo: I have a ten-year-old daughter. Maybe having a child was a mistake, but it’s done.
I want her to have the ability to grow up and live a decent life, for a while at least. I also want her little friends who aren’t white Anglo to have that opportunity. Maybe this is too big an ask.
If I were single and childless I could just retreat and figure, I’ve lived enough of a life already. Provided I didn’t care about anyone else’s kids, which seems unlikely, but, eh, I’m no saint.
Pogonip
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike): No, you didn’t offend me; I was making a point. Liberals are our main line of defense against Paul Ryan and friends. Don’t blow chances at organizing the populace by needlessly annoying them. Liberals needlessly annoying people are one reason this mess is in place. Let us have a short review (for everyone, not just Jane):
–few people, with the possible exception of Isis, are interested in forcing you to practice their religion. Few people, in any group, want to listen to you insult their religion.
–if you’re trying to gain the support of a particular group, e.g. whites, it is a good idea not to talk about how much you hate them.
–subpoint: feminists who wish to get an audience among white non-professional women should stop insulting their male relatives. People get annoyed when you talk about how much you hate their fathers, brothers, sons, and husbands. This is especially true when you’ve never even met the guy you are insulting and know nothing about him except his sex and his skin color.
It must, somehow, be possible to resist Ryan and friends without doing these few counter-productive things?
I think the most counter-productive of the above is drama queening. People will think, in the matter of Ryan for example, “Oh, it’s just those liberals having hysterics again; somebody probably prayed in school in Bugpiffle, Texas.” And they’ll blow you off. And Ryan, who’s evil, not stupid, takes advantage of such thinking. Work with the voters, don’t insult them. You can always insult them when you’re back in power.
Adam, are you there? What say you?
trollhattan
@gvg:
Tea Party was their version of the currently antiTrump protests, only 100% less spontaneous. My go-to when I’m informed “these people” should behave and accept the People’s will.
Applejinx
@liberal:
They lost first.
You’re absolutely right, many of them are ideologues. Trump is not. And the country desperately needs REAL infrastructure spending: that goes completely beyond party lines, we’ve been starved like Granny for years thanks to those same ideologues.
I see merit in driving big-ass wedges between Trump and the Republicans. Let them abandon all their bullshit Ayn Rand ideology. I realize I’m pretty hard on Dems who perpetuate the neoliberal con job, but they didn’t make it up: the Republicans did it first, so hard that Democrats had to go along for political cover, and meanwhile you had the UK and Thatcher doing it, and then New Labor over there, and now you literally have to be as narcissistic as Donald Trump to imagine anything else.
So be it. Let’s watch the Chicago School dream die, to the glory of Trump’s wishes to gold-plate everything and never pay for it. We KNOW austerity doesn’t work, we KNOW deficits don’t matter when they’re inevitably a factor of GDP, and we even know we’ve been hobbled for years by the ideologues. Let them be forced to go full hypocrite, bring on the infrastructure spending we so desperately need.
Kay
Boy, it’s gonna be hard out there for women in Trumpland. His fans are really riding high. It’s all “he Trumped that bitch!” in white working class world. The dopes believe he’s getting rid of child support.
Good job, white women voters. Excellent work. You absolutely screwed your own daughters.
Every work environment will be like the sewer that is Fox News for women, except these women won’t be able to sue for millions of dollars.
Grabbing women by the pussy is not only acceptable, it’s encouraged! After all, look what it did for “Mr. Trump”.
Patricia Kayden
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike): Actually, it’s good that the Evangelical Church has come out in favor of a thrice married, cussing, philandering, bigoted tax dodger. Now when any of these Christianist open their mouths to talk about morality (i.e., gays are icky), the rest of us can laugh in their pious faces. It goes without saying that Trump is less Christ-like than our current POTUS who many Christianists accuse of being a Muslim.
Enhanced Voting Techinques
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike):
Oh for the love of the FSM – they tried this under GW Bush and unbelief when from nothing to 22% of the population is eight years. Further more I’ve seen studies that say the reason why the kids turn away from religion at some staggering number like 80% is precisely because they’ve had it force feed to them for years. There are whole groups of people who made careers mocking and debunking their lies, if anything Obama was good for them because the Obamas are good people and believers. Instead they chose Donald “send me the next teen” Trump as their standard bearer.
The want to associate Evangelicalism with outright racism and the moral depravity of the Trumps, let them and frankly shows them for the viscous hypocrites they are. I would just love it for the god bothers to try and put lipstick on Trump’s pig, the mockery would long, hard and never ending.
Pogonip
@Elmo: I was out of it for a while when my father died. Becoming an orphan, even at an advanced age, seems to be something the human mind can barely cope with. You can’t go home again, ever. It takes some longer than others to pull out. I am glad you did.
Davebo
@Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class:
Bullshit? Yes. You haz it!
Matt McIrvin
@trollhattan: I always remember that the Tea Party movement began with a rant by Rick Santelli on CNBC about how the irresponsibility of poor people had ruined everything for rich investors. It was explicitly a punching-down movement.
hovercraft
@geg6:
THIS.
STFU. Nobody cares what you have to say.
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
@Applejinx:
The projects you speak of will be riddled with graft and corruption, Trump’s buddies will be rich, these projects will not help America. Read this.
Democrats who enable Trump are cutting your throat, and their own.
catclub
If it is budget related it can be done via reconciliation. I suspect SS is budget related.
I am not sure about what the rule is that made them do the tax repeal in 2001 for only ten years – but that is some reconciliation rule.
‘rule’ might be more like a suggestion.
SiubhanDuinne
@sherparick:
In his rallies, and some of the GOP debates, Trump routinely claimed that the job numbers were made up, that unemployment figures were not 5.6 or whatever but 42.0 (or whatever number he farted out). Yet when he announced Pence as his running mate, one of the great assets Pence would bring to the ticket, he said, was that Indiana’s unemployment numbers were 5.5, “below the national average!”
Must find my copy of Darrell Huff’s How to Lie With Statistics and keep it close to hand. I have a feeling we’re going to need it just about every day with this gang in charge. (If I had the resources, I’d give a copy to every reporter in the country.)
schrodinger's cat
@hovercraft: Bernie is full of shit, economics was his signature issue and he had no idea how he would regulate banks if he came to power.
SatanicPanic
We’re going to be hearing a lot of about infrastructure spending soon, and he’s my prediction- it will result in a lot of money going to companies that are owned by Donald Trump and the results will be shoddy crap.
Enhanced Voting Techinques
@liberal:
Trump doesn’t give a shit about paying debts and the banks agree, that’s why he had to go to the Russian mob, the same with the TeaTards. They love spending on their stuff, they hate paying for it.
All their pipe dreams like some massive wall accross the American southwest going to be the same problem the Teatards have with the defense industry – for some reason American buisness won’t do work without getting paid for it. Watch they vote for this stuff and then it fall appart over funding.
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
@SatanicPanic:
Link
Barbara
Susan Collins
Pat Toomey
Shelley Moore Capito
Rob Portman
Marco Rubio
Jeff Flake
John McCain
Joni Ernst
Chuck Grassley
All live in states with huge retirement populations. We only need three. I am convinced that Maine, West Virginia, and Central Pennsylvania would go belly up without the infusion of Medicare dollars. Florida and Arizona have more growth from younger populations and won’t be quite as decimated. Iowa is probably somewhere in between.
And the remaining Democratic candidate for Louisiana Senator should be creating advertising that is as ugly and accusatory as it gets about the Republican plans to repeal Medicare. Louisiana has one of the highest proportion of SSDI recipients in the country.
SatanicPanic
@schrodinger’s cat: The other day Bernie was ranting about how Democrats don’t talk to the white working class. He just had to say white.
Goblue72
@Tilda Swinton’s Bald Cap: Your team lost. And incompetently so across the board. Your opinion ain’t shit at this point.
So for us Democrats who are tired of losing, why the heck should we care about your fee-fees? “Oh, he’s not ‘real’ Democrat! Waaaaa!!!” There’s a whole lot of lifelong registered Dems who are far less “real” Democrats than Sanders. Rahm. Manchin. Bob Rubin.
WATB. Feel free to go pout in a corner. There’s a number of us out here who are done taking no for an answer from Clintonland centrists. It’s time to flush the deadweight from the party and build a new one.
Steeplejack
@Pogonip:
You can copy a link (or other text) on a touch screen. Press and hold some part of the text, and tools should pop up to allow you to specify the exact text and then whether to cut it and/or copy it to the clipboard.
Redshift
@Patricia Kayden:
Deficit hawkery has never been about debt, it’s been about preventing Democrats from enacting government programs that help people. “The Two Santa Clauses” has been the guiding principle for decades. If you’re a conservative, you’re enough of an asshole to believe that programs to promote the general welfare are “gifts” that Democrats are giving (mostly poor) people to “bribe” them into voting for them, which makes it perfectly okay for you to openly bribe your side with tax cuts. Wailing about deficits is a way to stop Democrats, even as you benefit from feeding the problem with tax cuts.
The real problem is that we have a whole industry of Very Serious useful idiots who have decided that deficits are a major problem for reasons they can’t quite explain, and only one side that pays any attention to them.
SiubhanDuinne
@Soylent Green:
Similar to the English expression “It’s enough to make a cat laugh.”
Barbara
@3Jane Tessier-Ashpool (a/k/a Lorinda Pike): Even Baptists under the age of 30 won’t follow their parents into the sanctuary anymore. The elevation of a person who is so diametrically the opposite of what they claim to value and what they would try to impose on others is just too obvious.
hovercraft
@Elmo:
What you are experiencing is grief, we all are, but we cope in different ways. You seem to need to jut shut down and tune out, which is fine for you, it’s your way of coping. For some of us fighting is our way of coping. We all do what we have to do, but one thing for sure is that the other side never gives up, no matter how many times they are beaten, they keep coming back. They are counting on us giving up and we mustn’t, so if you can’t fight right now, we will. For many of us in this country it’s not just a matter about caring about politics, it’s life or death, we ourselves, our kids, family, friends are endangered by this thing that has happened, so we will keep fighting. So hopefully after a few days, weeks or months you will rejoin the fight, because we need everyone we can get. Take care of yourself.
Goblue72
@SatanicPanic: because the African American working class voted for Dems overwhelmingly. We don’t have a problem getting the votes from that voter group.
Jesus fucking Christ. If you aren’t prepared to actually talk about the specific problems without pulling out your high horse, you aren’t serious about fixing things.
WereBear
I know how badly Trump voters think: if they hear the words “repealing Medicare” their brains are likely to collapse in a panic and then melt down the phone lines to their reps.
They don’t do well with complicated policy parsing, as we all know.
GrandJury
The good news is they will probably screw up so badly, and the country will be in such poor shape because of it so quickly, that even voter suppression will not be able to stop massive political loses.
At least one can hope. That kind of goes against G Dubya being re-elected in the midst of the Iraq quagmire. Nixon being re-elected in the middle of the Vietnam quagmire with the Watergate investigation just starting to become more mainstream in the media.
That is about the worst possible type of good news….but that’s the reality of the new world order now.
Cain
@JMG:
That never works with those types. They’ll think you’re being dramatic. More than that, they seem to believe that somehow magically the Republicans won’t do anything. To some extent that is true, because that didn’t happen during Bush either.
The worse thing is watching the press make this into another horse race. I fail to understand how they are not concerned by this turn of events?
SatanicPanic
@Tilda Swinton’s Bald Cap: Yup. Easiest cash grab for the Donald. He already knows how to navigate the federal bidding process, having managed to get that Old Post Office contract despite his wildly optimistic projections (that several of his competitors rightly pointed out at the time). His kids are running his company so you know there will be no concerns about conflicts of interest. Democrats need to stand up and call this what it is.
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
@WereBear: Most of ’em don’t even know what Medicare is vs. Medicaid and that they’ve been paying in to Medicare their adult working lives. Americans are mean and stupid, get used to it.
Applejinx
@Goblue72:
Dude, you suck at politics. What gives you the idea that now is the time to carry on in this way, and how exactly are you acting ANY DIFFERENTLY from the people you decry? Fuck you and your ‘go away and pout in a corner’.
There is no such thing as deadweight. We just passionately disagree on important stuff, and we’re not in command anyway. Fuck you, ALL hands on deck. No such thing as deadweight, no tactic off the table. I still want to see Trump drive huge wedges between himself and what used to be the Republican party. It’s going to be chaos out there and everyone from the right-center to the commie-left is needed.
SatanicPanic
@Goblue72: When you come up with a plan to talk white people out of their whiteness you let me know.
GregB
Good Lord.
These monsters are overreaching and it is exactly one week after the election.
The truth will be re-written daily by Trump’s right hand Minister if Inflammation.
The Trump family is descending on America like the South American dictators of yore.
It’s Somoza Time.
Gelfling 545
Just wondering. Are there any, just a few, Republicans in Congress who are, well certainly not liberal, but perhaps not entirely, irredeemably batshit who might join with Dems just to hold the line against the rampant destruction?
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
I won’t directly engage, but my opinion counts the same on this blog just like everyone else. In the real world that number would be 0.
Pogonip
@Steeplejack: Thank you! How do you paste it?
WaterGirl
@Elmo: Everybody grieves at their own pace.
Enhanced Voting Techinques
@SiubhanDuinne:
Trump’s razor – Trump is dumb, he says dumb things that his dumb base agrees with.
This Your Dumb and Lazy Dad demographic. The gut matters to Your Dumb and Lazy Dad, facts bore him and he thinks it’s one those things that turns men to homosexuality. You point out unemployment is 5.1 nationally and Pence could only do 5.5, Your Dumb and Lazy Dad thinks your just trying to pull a sneaky on him with teh maths.
Anyway, what are they going to do- point to California and say “look, Trumps’ magic. unemployment is 4.5 there!” when out in exaburbs and rural American, were Your Lazy and Dumb Dad lives, the economy still sucks and the only people are doing good are those minorities who might be terrorists.
Peale
@Gelfling 545: Nope. Didn’t happen under Bush. Won’t happen under Trump. it hink we’re going to spend four years jumping between hoping that Trump saves us from Congress and that Congress saves us from Trump to no avail.
catclub
@The Truffle:
ha ha. the same ones who were FURIOUS about Bush blowing up the budget deficit – they all said so in 2009 that they had been VERY angry all
along.
WaterGirl
@WereBear: There was not one single thing in that article that surprised me. I thought that was a very good article, though. Can you say more about your thoughts?
I’m glad someone took the role of Obama translator now that Luther appears to be out of that business. Perhaps we need to bring Luther back?
Applejinx
@SatanicPanic:
He’s a narcissist. At this point he doesn’t have to care about money. He wants love, and to be the hugest success in the history of ever, and for everything to go just awesome because that would reflect well on him and mean he was the greatest man ever.
And he thinks Democrats do economics and success better than Republicans do, and he’s rightly suspicious of sabotage by ideologue Republicans riding an economic hobbyhorse that he genuinely doesn’t give a fuck about or even understand. It’s all personal with this guy. He doesn’t really think, he just promises and makes stuff up. Unexpectedly he’s thrust into a position where he needs his ideas actually to work, so he’s trying to put ‘his crew’ central to everything. And he’s turning to Obama for help with the transition, because again he thinks Democrats actually do economics and jobs and etc. better.
GregB
It is important to keep the people who are apathetic and ambivalent towards your ideas from the people who hate your ideas is important.
Therein GoBlues’ desire for an internal purge is madness.
Grow the ranks.
Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class
@Gelfling 545:
Corker, Graham and Flake come to mind on national security stuff. McCain, too, probably.
GregB
The above should read keep those ambivalent to your ideas away from those who hate your ideas.
SatanicPanic
@Applejinx: Maybe so, but I suspect Donald wants to be the richest man in the world and that’s a solid possibility for him now. Then again, I don’t want to spend any more time in that idiot’s head that I have to, so maybe you’re right. Who knows. I don’t even think he knows.
liberal
@sherparick:
Yeah, he’s stupid enough to not realize that there’s a contradiction between strong dollar types and wanting to grow the economy.
cokane
@GregB: yep, purges are stupid. The last time the Dems won a midterm election — 2006 — they had freaking pro-life blue dogs in some House races. And they won. I dunno if I want to hear about “corporatist dems” or “bernie bros” as a criticism of any particular candidate for 2018. we desperately just need anti-Trump anti-Ryan Dems at this point.
Save your purity bullshit for the 2020 presidential nominee, if you must insist on it somewhere.
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
@cokane: When I read about the 50 state strategy I am reminded of the whining about all the Blue Dogs in congress. You can’t have a 50 state strategy without these guys, no matter how blue and liberal you go.
WereBear
@WaterGirl: I also believed every word and don’t know what else President Obama could do; he’s trying to warn us without coming out and saying how screwed we all are.
Trump is so far below the norm that you could put everyone over 35 in a big lottery and our chances of finding someone who could run the country better would probably be something like 95%.
But my biggest issue was that this should be screaming headlines and instead it is simply ignored by corporate media. They are totally co-opted and no longer have any sense of responsibility whatsoever.
They should have their FCC licenses yanked, but good luck with that one.
liberal
@Matt McIrvin:
Seven yo twins here. Feel the same way.
catclub
@SatanicPanic:
I remember that if we had offered $50B for somebody (but not the US Military) to take out Saddam Hussein, that would be FAR cheaper
than what we did instead. If we could offer Trump $100B to go away, that will also be far cheaper than having him as President.
Adria McDowell (formerly LurkerExtraordinaire)
@Patricia Kayden: I’m glad you mentioned contraception, because while everyone goes on about Roe v. Wade (for good reason), I wouldn’t be surprised at all if they go after Griswold v. Connecticut.
catclub
@Gelfling 545:
I was with you up until “might join with Dems ” . None.
liberal
@Enhanced Voting Techinques:
There’s some quote in an Alex Cockburn book that mandatory religious education is the best innoculation against any religious infection, or words like that.
Cain
@Barbara:
The people most fucked are the red states anyways. They don’t even bring in money. Once they put that place in, those populations are probably going to go belly up very quickly. I just hope that the Democratic base can take care of itself during this time. I know several people in this blog are going to be radically affected.
SatanicPanic
@catclub: crowd fund his retirement!
liberal
@Goblue72: I completely agree with the general principle, but I don’t see any real reason to think Bernie is the one to do it. Also, while I think it was fine that he ran for the Dem nomination, he really can’t be in charge of reorg’ing the party if he doesn’t belong to it.
liberal
@catclub: $100B for Mike Pence as prez? No thanks.
Peale
@Goblue72: But we will have trouble keeping their votes if our messaging is simply “white working class this” and “rural renewal” that and “please don’t talk about police brutality as it scares off the real voters we want.”
Chris
@SiubhanDuinne:
Sanders probably never expected to get this much attention. And he’s too fucking stupid to realize that the only reason he’s getting it is that the MSM and the rest of the chattering classes want soundbites of him throwing a “fellow” “leftist” under the bus.
Cain
@GrandJury:
That is a logical fallacy. The mind does a great job of denial. Don’t assume that at all. In fact, this kind of thinking is exactly what got us here in the first place. You’re making an assumption that people will fight for what benefits them. But as you can see, even those who rely on medicare will still ignore all this or even be open to blaming the democrat in some way because they can’t wrap their brains around the fact that their own party screwed them.
This is the first change in attitude we need to make when it comes to politics. We need to stop caring bout what the rest and start talking about our interests and our stories.
liberal
@cokane: It’s not about purging people. Of course, you want the most liberal officeholder you can get who can also win the election, and that will include some people who aren’t super liberal.
The problem, rather, is the party’s overall orientation.
Tilda Swinton's Bald Cap
@Chris:
So good I had to posted it again.
Peale
@Chris: And they want to pin Trump’s win on the White Working Class, to let those regular republican educated whites like themselves off the hook.
Another Holocene Human
@Peale: ding ding ding
Cain
@SatanicPanic:
Why bother? Do you think the house is going to investigate it? Or the press? The press will have many wonderful stories to showcase that is geared to clickbait. We are on our own.. maybe when the lack of access causes them to no longer able to generate content the public is interested is when they will turn against republicans. By then, most of these assholes will be reading breitbart instead, with great links like:
Hoist It High And Proud: The Confederate Flag Proclaims A Glorious Heritage
Trump 100% Vindicated: CBS Reports ‘Swarm’ On Rooftops Celebrating 9/11
Birth Control Makes Women Unattractive and Crazy
Bill Kristol: Republican Spoiler, Renegade Jew
There’s No Hiring Bias Against Women In Tech, They Just Suck At Interviews
The Solution to Online ‘Harassment’ is Simple: Women Should Log Off
Chris
@The Truffle:
What, both of them?
Another Holocene Human
@GregB:
Preach
tobie
@Applejinx: Thanks for this, Applejinx. Seriously. I often disagree with you passionately but am glad to see you defending the value of disagreements amongst liberals, who are the denizens of this blog.
gratuitous
In my self-appointed role of cheerful nuisance, I have shared this Politico article with folks on Facebook with the comment that if you voted for Trump because of concern about the deficit and how much debt we’re passing on to our children and grandchildren, it appears you may have been played . . .
Hopefully the campaign is not such a distant memory that the victors haven’t completely forgotten why they voted the way they did.
Fair Economist
@Gelfling 545:
There are three #NeverTrumpers in the Senate – Flake, Sasse, and Graham – who have to be aware their necks are at risk (literally) if Trump is allowed to disassemble the basics of legal restraints on the government. That makes 51 with the Democrats. On Medicare, Medicaid, etc., I’m not sure.
Villago Delenda Est
@liberal: They are not Christians in any way, shape, or form. They are Mammon worshiping offal.
Enhanced Voting Techinques
@Cain:
Sort of, it’s becasically when all these voters start realizing they’ve been screwed, again, we need to be there as the positive alterntive. They want infrastucture and health care reform. That’s something we agree with so we can go from there.
The Cal Democratic majority orbits arround infrastructure, education and law enforcement and that’s something moderate conservatives want too.
artem1s
@sherparick:
I have been wondering that too. given that all Shitgibbon knows is real estate, how is raising interest rates going to jell with big developers who want to borrow for the Giant Casino and Mall America Great Again? When the deplorables out in the sticks start defaulting on their adjustable rate mortgages, what happens then? No one is going to move or build a thriving manufacturing hub into nowhere OK or IN. You still need to be near a population center to ship goods and get qualified workers. How much of a stimulus bill can it be if it’s only paving roads between East Bumfuck Nebraska and West Bumfuck Nebraska?
Bex
@Elmo: You’re in shock. Talk to a counselor or therapist.
Enhanced Voting Techinques
@Villago Delenda Est: As Samatha Bee pointed out, this has always been about the tax excemptions for their mega churches.
Barbara
@Fair Economist: I would add Susan Collins to this list. I actually thought she was older than she is. She just turned 65. The whole reason she wins in Maine is because of all the older women who were dying to vote for female candidates like Hillary Clinton. I can’t remember where Portman came out on Trump.
Barbara
@Elmo: I care because I have children. I could most likely retire today and ski for a living. I choose to care for their future.
Lizzy L
Excuse me? I need my Social Security income, and would die w/o Medicare, because I can no longer afford to pay for private medical insurance unless I stop eating. I didn’t vote for T. I worked hard to get HRC elected. Why do you want to hurt me? If you mean this seriously, you are all kinds of suck and I am outa here. If you mean it rhetorically, re-consider. This is no way to get people to support you.
Enhanced Voting Techinques
@Elmo:
We care because history teaches us we should care.
This country started with millions held in slavery by the law of land, Americans were imprisoned for opposing slavery, the Dread Scott Decision declared slavery constitutionally guaranteed and it slave system still failed and because people cared
Then it was segregation, and people who cared ended that.
When I was a teen, gays were hunted for sport in San Francisco like they were game animals. People who cared stopped that. Now they can get married.
G W Bush was supposed to be the permit Republican majority. G W Bush and his people were organized, competent and had the MSM in their pocket and they completely and utterly failed. A bunch of reactionary derp heads like Trump and company are going to screw up sooner or later and that’s when people care can get something done.
Miss Bianca
@O. Felix Culpa: word. all of it. (hey, someday when I’m down in NM again we’ll have to do a NM BJ meet-up!)
Barbara
@Lizzy L: My mother is on Medicare. I don’t want to hurt anyone. But nor do I want to be hurt. It is absolutely insidious to harness support for changes to entitlement programs by exempting current beneficiaries from cuts. Moreover, there is simply no way politically to maintain this exemption and require people who will never get benefits to continue to fund your benefits rather than saving to pay for their own. Social Security is nearly at parity, but Medicare requires large pay ins from current workers to make it solvent for current beneficiaries. However, I hope you do not lose your benefits. I just can’t sit here and say that I have more concern for current rather than future beneficiaries. I can’t do it.
Gindy51
@liberal: 27 year old daughter not thanking me at all for her being born…
Another Holocene Human
@Botsplainer, Cryptofascist Tool of the Oppressor Class: The ACLU of Florida has done great work. You can donate to ACLU of Florida and leave the national chapter out of it.
Another Holocene Human
@WesternPALurker: Isn’t that what you’re condemning the youngs to? Working at 75? Why is it bad for you but good for them?
Two tier wages is what destroyed the union movement. GOP knows this.
greennotGreen
@liberal: I was raised in church, and I actually paid attention in Sunday School and during the sermons, and I read the New Testament twice (couldn’t get past the “begat”s in the Old.) I first began to have doubts in college because it didn’t make sense to me that a loving God would give us sexual desire at a young age and then say it was sinful before marriage. But ever since then, one of the main things that’s kept me away from the comfortable familiarity of a church home is the hypocrisy. There are way too many “Christians” whose idea of loving one’s neighbor as oneself is an empty mantra. All 1.6 billion Muslims in the world should speak out against radical Islam, and evangelical Christians just voted for a man who promotes racial hatred, religious intolerance, and sexual abuse? Please.
Jews and Romans may have killed Christ 2000 years ago, but Christians have been crucifying him ever since.
Barbara
@WesternPALurker: Again, not wishing anything against anyone personally, but my mother who also lives in Western Pennsylvania just retired for good at the age of 80, when going back to work with a hip replacement became too onerous. But the main point is, the “youngs” can hardly be expected to both fund your current benefits and their future benefits out of the same pot. So, of course, you will likely be exempted from some cuts, but it is completely ridiculous for current beneficiaries to think that cutting any entitlement program will only take place prospectively.
LibraryGuy
@The Truffle: Small-government balanced budget types are NEVER bothered by Republican actions that could result in soaring deficits, because they believe (clap your hands!) in that damned Laffer Curve, and this time, really truly, cutting taxes will result in a wave of tax receipts to pay for more guns, more infrastructure, more corporate giveaways.
The glories of Kansas’ and Louisiana’s financial utopia lie there before us! Rejoice!!
/depressed, furious snark…..
hovercraft
@Gindy51:
Did you point out that it’s a little late to be thinking about choice now. The cutoff is usually about 20 to 22 weeks, lower if these fuckwits get their way. At this point she has to continue to fight fro herself, and children she may consider having in the future.
LibraryGuy
@Lizzy L: People are advocating for cuts to everyone because that poison pill will rally support from everyone, and there’s no way even the Freedom Caucus congressthings will be able to go forward knowing that their own constituents will be coming with the pitchforks for them.
TriassicSands
In fairness, the Republicans would have gotten behind Obama 100% if he had proposed massive tax cuts for the wealthy. He just refused to cooperate.
He also campaigned regularly on the deficit and how Obama was destroying the country with his outrageous deficits.
The gray adder
So when the dollar drops below 20 euro cents, then what?
Steeplejack (tablet)
@Pogonip:
You go to where you want it (comment box, browser URL address window, etc.), press and hold, and when the tool set comes up you select Paste. If you pressed and held a piece of text, your insertion will replace that. If you pressed and held a blank spot, your insertion will be placed there.
Try playing around with some random text in a comment box to get a feel for how it works.
NotMax
@The gray adder
HamburgerCat Food Helper.Mike R
@Enhanced Voting Techinques: Bulls eye, always follow the money.
chopper
@Tilda Swinton’s Bald Cap:
fuck along now, bernie, the democrats are talking.
O. Felix Culpa
@Miss Bianca: Yes! I’m here for the duration (except for Christmas) and would love to meet up!
P.S. I was in Co. briefly for a nephew’s wedding last month. My Hillary-stickered car got egged while parked in Longmont. I don’t regret it though. I’m proud to have supported her. My Hillary yard sign is still up for the week of sitting shiva.
WesternPALurker
I personally don’t expect to take no “entitlement” hits & I don’t want to get in a young vs. old pissing match here.
My point was only that a thirty-forty year old knowing what is coming at retirement in thirty+- years has a better chance at adapting their retirement plans now than a senior already in retirement.
I was/am only middle income but will probably be ok if I don’t exceed the average life span in my family or have a catastrophic or long-term illness. (And I did work for 50+ years & past normal retirement age to get to this point).
I’m really concerned what this will do to seniors living on social security alone. They have very little flexibility already.
Side question. Does the Republican plan of medicare tax credits to buy insurance still keep the same medicare payroll tax deduction? For employer and employee?
Ksmiami
@WesternPALurker: Easy, the seniors will die. GOP=GREED & DEATH. That should be the message.
lol chikinburd
@Soylent Green: Damn, I’d have thought that if anyone was going to know something about chickening on laughter it would have been me.
mr_gravity
@Applejinx: Definitely Agree on this: Trump no longer will use money as a yardstick to measure his greatness. For the time being he will content to basking in the adoration of His republican party and the debasement of the opposition. He looks now like the smartest guy in the room. I believe Obama may have dropped some truth on him in their meeting. Heavy is the crown, etc.Watch your back, etc.Trust your family and friends to keep you grounded, etc.
Unfortunately what we saw on the campaign trail was petty, spiteful, vindictive, short-tempered, ill-prepared, narcissistic, bully, etc. etc.
If he pivots now I will ride a cow on the moon.
Ruckus
JC
I’m of two minds here. First, let’s get this out of the way, I depend on SS for a decent portion of my income and it will be all of my retirement income. As it stands today, I do not know how much longer I can continue working, due to health issues so this is vital to me.
Secondly though, I agree with you. If the country is going to get it good and hard then the old white fucks who voted for this shit should have to suffer and suffer greatly. I don’t know what I’ll do without the income, maybe my friend who just moved to Mexico can take me in for manual labor on her farm. Maybe the commentator who offered a room in Canada will say OK. Of course that leaves a small matter of food. Anyone got a good recipe for sparrow? Oh well, I hear starvation under the stars isn’t all that bad.
The gray adder
@Steve M.: Then our side has to get better at messaging.