2014 can't happen soon enough. Accelerationism! Burn it all down!
Gonna guess at least three people will post saying its the Democrats fault for not "compromising" with the Republicans and their hostage taking.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
I don't find anything funny about the matter. It's a bloody tragedy about to happen. And I hope I'm wrong.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
To be honest, I'm on Blayne's side, and I've held that position for a long time.
I actually hope the default happens next month too and the economy crashes.
I think the system is so fundamentally broken at the moment that the only way to fix it is to have it totally fail and create massive devastation. It's the only way to convince people they need to get actively involved.
So I hope the shutdown happens, and I hope the Republicans are their usual ridiculous selves in a couple weeks and the default happens.
And I'm completely serious.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
Bill Bishop (niubi) on Twitter https://twitter.com/niubi GOP nutjobs r again helping to make Beijing's case against democracy… unbelievable the damage they have done to America (& i m no obama fan).
Posted by James Tiberius Kirk (Member # 2832) on :
I suspect the impending shutdown makes a debt ceiling fight considerably less likely, but in the latter case the White House shouldn't come to the table. They did that once, and the WH coughed up the ransom: the sequester. The House learned that the technique was effective, and the White House learned not to do that again.
So you don't negotiate, for the same reason we (generally) don't negotiate with terrorists: it is not really a 'negotiation' if the other guy is holding a bomb.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
Bipartisanship doesn't work when one side is literally insane, deluded and destructive to the country's interests. If I want to eat turkey and Bob wants to kill me, it isn't "reasonable" to "compromise" by splitting the difference and letting Bob eat my arm.
So yes, it is a tragedy, but its one that thankfully means the death of the modern Republican Party and the delegitimization of American Conservatism.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Why do you think the government shutting down makes the debt ceiling fight less likely? Ted Cruz has already said it would be good for the government to shut down for awhile.
His clique cannot vote for any budget that doesn't defund Obamacare, and the Democrats are not going to pass any budget that does that.
So we basically have to hope that Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, and the rest of the Tea Party are able to find a way to let Obamacare happen, without their extremely conservative gerrymandered constituencies recalling them next election. Not to mention their bluffing and getting called on it.
Unless some really powerful lobbying groups read these Congressman the riot act, I don't see any other force getting them to bend.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
Boehner could always side with the democrats with moderate house GOP'ers. There goes his Speakership but whatever.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Fallows about nails it. This is what people need to be paying attention to.
And no, I did not cheekily rename this title to take a dig at Geraine. Fallows is aware of and addressing the modern day prominence of equivocation of any sort as a shield for extremist behavior on one side.
Your False-Equivalence Guide to the Days Ahead _
Two big examples of problematic self-government are upon us. They are of course the possible partial shutdown of the federal government, following the long-running hamstringing of public functions via "the sequester"; and a possible vote not to raise the federal debt ceiling, which would create the prospect of a default on U.S. Treasury debt.
The details are complicated, but please don't lose sight of these three essential points:
- As a matter of substance, constant-shutdown, permanent-emergency governance is so destructive that no other serious country engages in or could tolerate it. The United States can afford it only because we are -- still -- so rich, with so much margin for waste and error. Details on this and other items below.*
- As a matter of politics, this is different from anything we learned about in classrooms or expected until the past few years. We're used to thinking that the most important disagreements are between the major parties, not within one party; and that disagreements over policies, goals, tactics can be addressed by negotiation or compromise.
This time, the fight that matters is within the Republican party, and that fight is over whether compromise itself is legitimate.** Outsiders to this struggle -- the president and his administration, Democratic legislators as a group, voters or "opinion leaders" outside the generally safe districts that elected the new House majority -- have essentially no leverage over the outcome. I can't recall any situation like this in my own experience, and the only even-approximate historic parallel (with obvious differences) is the inability of Northern/free-state opinion to affect the debate within the slave-state South from the 1840s onward. Nor is there a conceivable "compromise" the Democrats could offer that would placate the other side.
- As a matter of journalism, any story that presents the disagreements as a "standoff," a "showdown," a "failure of leadership," a sign of "partisan gridlock," or any of the other usual terms for political disagreement, represents a failure of journalism*** and an inability to see or describe what is going on. For instance: the "dig in their heels" headline you see below, which is from a proprietary newsletter I read this morning, and about which I am leaving off the identifying details.
This isn't "gridlock." It is a ferocious struggle within one party, between its traditionalists and its radical factions, with results that unfortunately can harm all the rest of us -- and, should there be a debt default, could harm the rest of the world too.
_
The debt-ceiling vote, of course, is not about future spending decisions. It is about whether to cover expenditures the Congress has already authorized. There is no sane reason for subjecting this to a repeated vote. And there is no precedent for serious threats not to honor federal debt -- as opposed to symbolic anti-Administration protest votes, which both parties have cast over the years. Nor for demanding the reversal of major legislation as a condition for routine government operations.
In case the point is not clear yet: there is no post-Civil War precedent for what the House GOP is doing now. It is radical, and dangerous for the economy and our process of government, and its departure from past political disagreements can't be buffed away or ignored.
All Republicans Want in Exchange for Not Destroying the Economy Is Everything
Republicans gave The National Review a draft of their starting point for negotiations with President Obama on the debt ceiling. It's jaw-dropping.
A quick reminder: the debt ceiling is the amount the government is allowed to borrow in order to pay bills accrued by Congress. Here is what the Republicans offer:
- Suspend the debt limit until December 2014.
- Delay Obamacare for a year.
- Include tax reform measures along the lines of the Rep. Paul Ryan principles.
- Agree to a slew of environmental issues: Approve the Keystone pipeline, kill EPA clean air and climate regulations, increase drilling.
- Approve "regulatory reforms" including the REINS Act, which would basically gut the executive authority to make any regulations.
- Implement spending cuts, including reforming retirement programs, the child tax credit ("to prevent fraud"), and, of course, ending Dodd-Frank.
- Reforming health spending, including tort reform.
This is literally every policy priority of the Republican Party. This is hostage-taking, not politics. "We have been unable to pass our core priorities because voters keep electing Democrats to the Senate and the White House so we are asking that in order to prevent the economic catastrophe of a debt ceiling default, you sign off on doing everything we have ever wanted, is that OK with you, yes / no?"
Some of these things, we will also note, are complete non-starters from a legal perspective. The EPA climate regulations, for example, are essentially mandated by the Supreme Court. George W. Bush dragged his feet on implementing regulations, but lawsuits from various environmental organizations helped force the issue. Adding that to a completely unrelated political measure is pure denial.
We understand that the point of negotiations is to start from an extreme position and then navigate toward a compromise. But it is helpful if you also enter negotiations appearing to be rational.
Obama, for his part, has staked out an extreme position as well: no deals. And he probably means it; a few weeks ago, he said this to ABC's George Stephanopoulos, via Crooks and Liars.
"[I]f we continue to set a precedent in which a president — any president, a Republican president, a Democratic president — where the opposing party controls the House of Representatives, if that president is in a situation in which each time the United States is called upon to pay its bills the other party can simply sit there and say, 'Well, we're not gonna pay the bills unless you give us what we want,' that changes the constitutional structure of this government entirely."
Which is exactly what the Republicans are advocating. Unable to win elections to regain the Senate — ironically in part because the deeply conservative base supported unelectable Senate candidates in primaries — they've created their Amazon wish list of things, presumably hoping that the president might buy one or two. But unfortunately, he's at his credit limit.
Posted by James Tiberius Kirk (Member # 2832) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: Why do you think the government shutting down makes the debt ceiling fight less likely? Ted Cruz has already said it would be good for the government to shut down for awhile.
His clique cannot vote for any budget that doesn't defund Obamacare, and the Democrats are not going to pass any budget that does that.
So we basically have to hope that Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, and the rest of the Tea Party are able to find a way to let Obamacare happen, without their extremely conservative gerrymandered constituencies recalling them next election. Not to mention their bluffing and getting called on it.
Unless some really powerful lobbying groups read these Congressman the riot act, I don't see any other force getting them to bend.
You hit my point with your last line, and Ezra Klein (quoting some analysts from Goldman Sachs) explains it better than I can:
quote:As Alec Phillips put it in a research note for Goldman Sachs, "If a shutdown is avoided, it is likely to be because congressional Republicans have opted to wait and push for policy concessions on the debt limit instead. By contrast, if a shutdown occurs, we would be surprised if congressional Republicans would want to risk another difficult situation only a couple of weeks later. The upshot is that while a shutdown would be unnecessarily disruptive, it might actually ease passage of a debt limit increase."
One way a shutdown makes the passage of a debt limit increase easier is that it can persuade outside actors to come off the sidelines and begin pressuring the Republican Party to cut a deal. One problem in the politics of the fiscal fight so far is that business leaders, Wall Street, voters and even many pundits have been assuming that Republicans and Democrats will argue and carp and complain but work all this out before the government closes down or defaults. A shutdown will prove that comforting notion wrong, and those groups will begin exerting real political pressure to force a resolution before a default happens.
If Boehner shuts down the government and loses - and I'm not sure how else a shutdown would end, to be honest - then he goes into the debt limit fight with a weakened hand. Eventually Boehner will have to put a CR on the floor that will can pass the Senate. A clean CR could probably pass both houses, but he'd have to break the Hastert Rule to bring it to the floor in spite of the Tea Party opposition to it. The Right will insist that he's "folded" to Obama once again. Everyone else will see that he's unable to lead the House.
Only then can he move on to the debt ceiling fight. He will publicly insist that Obama has to "negotiate" over the debt ceiling, but if Boehner loses the shutdown fight there will be no one left in his corner. The Tea Party wing won't back him up. So as a result Boehner will be unable to deliver any votes from the GOP side, so why would Obama negotiate with him then? He'd almost certainly have to run to the Democrats again.
On the other hand, if a shutdown happens and Boehner wins the fight/Obama backs down, then there's no point to fighting again over the debt ceiling.
This is the situation that the Speaker was trying to avoid by letting the House pass a 'clean' CR. Of course, the folks that initiated and insisted upon this confrontation are not concerned about Boehner's speakership; rather, they are more concerned about 2014 (and in Cruz's case, 2016).
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
I don't see why the Republicans wouldn't also fight over the debt ceiling, you outline the inevitable result yes but there's still a "fight" of some form.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I'm feeling confident that Obama means what he says when he says ZERO negotiation over the Debt Ceiling. When he negotiated with Boehner in 2011, he thought they were having an honest to goodness budget negotiation, but it turned into a hostage situation. He knows that was a tactical error and he knows the ONLY way to solve it is to settle this here and now by refusing to budge. Otherwise the rest of his presidency will be hostage crisis after hostage crisis.
The bizarre point of this whole thing is that the GOP has managed to convinced the country that raising the debt ceiling is a concession. They've got people thinking they should have to give up something in exchange for it and that only Democrats want it, even as they publicly state not raising it would crash the economy.
But even after Boehner basically attached the ENTIRE GOP platform onto the debt ceiling debate, the Tea Partiers STILL said it didn't go far enough to slash spending.
I'm less than optimistic about most of these scenarios, because it looks more and more like Boehner is putting all his eggs in the Default basket. He's trying to get his party to avoid a shutdown to force the issue on the default, but they balked and now we're headed to a default for sure. It's impossible to avoid now unless the Senate can return a clean bill by midnight tomorrow and Boehner simply approves it, but that seems unlikely.
If the shutdown ends without a conclusive victory for Boehner, that will put ALL the pressure on the Default crisis.
As for guesses he will break the Hastert Rule, I really don't see it happening. Can you impeach a Speaker in the middle of his term? I don't know, but if he makes a deal with Dems and moderate Republicans, then his speakership is over. And, judging from the fact that the Tea Party has already forced his hand a half dozen times in the last couple days alone, I just don't see it happening.
I think the shutdown happens for sure. I have no idea how long it will last. And I think there's a 50/50 chance of the default happening. I think that fight depends entirely on how well Obama can convince Boehner he means it this time.
I also think that, while Obama is going to "win," he's bungling the PR. He should be blitzing the media 24/7 on this issue. He should be doing daily press conferences. He should be doing highly publicized phone calls to Boehner and McConnell. Instead he makes one or two speeches and then submerges himself in the White House. He's determined to win the fight and lose the war, because if the GOP manages to write the history on this, he'll come out looking awful. Whoever is in charge of White House Communications should be fired.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
Dems have generally been awful at messaging.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Yes, they have, and they continue to be.
It's just incredibly frustrating, not necessarily because I want the Dems to win, but because it creates a disparity that hinders the overall functioning of the government.
Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
Since the Republicans (the Tea Party ones, anyway) basically run on the premise that government is bad and doesn't work, a government that fails is a feature, not a bug.
Posted by Marlozhan (Member # 2422) on :
I think we should just switch to a tribal system. If we are going to go back to our traditional roots, we might as well do it right.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by kmbboots: Since the Republicans (the Tea Party ones, anyway) basically run on the premise that government is bad and doesn't work, a government that fails is a feature, not a bug.
As I've said before: they keep doing this national self-sabotage act since they are rewarded by ‘vindication’ when the government does not work (thanks to their policies), they have an incentive to ensure that government does not work, and it has become principally vital to the future of the party that they not let non-conservatives prove that government works, (this is why stopping Obamacare is so vital to their future) so they try to keep government from working. They have advanced this to an undeniably overt level. They are about to shut down the government and cause extreme harm to the nation, and sell up to their dwindling core that it's Obama's fault because he's not participating in their economic hostage-taking, or that Obamacare 'disregarded the will of the people*' or whatever.
There's practically nothing more to say. This event is the fundamentally solid and beyond-farcical extension of their self-preservation in practice, and they're willing to make the entire nation's prosperity some collateral damage in trying to save themselves from cultural and ideological irrelevance.
They're also just .. dead in a ten to twenty year timeframe if government actually shuts down. Go ahead and hold the gun to your head, morons. Say hi to the Whigs on the way down.
*
quote:Rep. Marlin Stutzman (R-Ind.) said on Saturday: “Obamacare is based on limitless government, bureaucratic arrogance and a disregard for the will of the people.” Except Congress passed Obamacare, the president signed it, the Supreme Court upheld it, Obama campaigned on it a second time and was reelected. So in what manner was the will of the people disregarded?
haha nope Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:A government that works, some conservatives fear, is dangerous stuff. It gives people ideas. Universal health care isn't just a bad idea for their buddies in the insurance business; it's a gateway drug to broader state involvement in the economy and hence a possible doomsday scenario for conservatism itself. As two fellows of the Ethics and Public Policy Center fretted in the Weekly Standard in May, "health care is the key to public enmeshment in ballooning welfare states, and passage of ObamaCare would deal a heavy blow to the conservative enterprise in American politics."
On the other hand, government fails constantly when conservatives run it because making it work would be, for many of those conservatives, to traduce the very laws of nature. Besides, as we can now see, bungling Katrina recovery or Pentagon procurement pays conservatives huge dividends. It gives them potent ammunition to use when the liberals have returned and are proposing another one of their grand schemes to reform health care.
This is the perverse incentive that is slowly remaking the GOP into the Snafu Party. And in those commercials and those proclamations we should also discern a warning: That even if Democrats manage to set up a solid health-care program, conservatives will do their best, once they have regained power, to drop it down the same chute they did the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
Maybe they will appoint a tobacco lobbyist to run the thing. Maybe they will starve it for funds. Or antagonize its work force. And as it collapses they will hand themselves their greatest propaganda victory of all. They will survey the ruins and chide, "You didn't really think government could work, did you?"
this was literally written in 2009
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
Time to short the USD!
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
Next stop: debt ceiling, how are people here calling whether that's going to go through or not?
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
I put odds at 30/70 right now.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
So, anyone feel like a small bet on what the bad effects will be? Make a prediction that can be measured some reasonable time from now, give odds, and I'll offer to bet on it.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
sup everybody is there a happy super fun times list of things that have been completely shut down by republicans today
does the list include things like all national parks, nasa, etc
isn't it like nasa's birthday or something? happy birthday nasa we got you a big fat shutdown go USA
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Your purpose, then, plainly stated, is that you will destroy the Government, unless you be allowed to construe and enforce the Constitution as you please, on all points in dispute between you and us. You will rule or ruin in all events. This, plainly stated, is your language…
In that supposed event, you say, you will destroy the Union; and then, you say, the great crime of having destroyed it will be upon us! That is cool. A highwayman holds a pistol to my ear, and mutters through his teeth, "Stand and deliver, or I shall kill you, and then you will be a murderer!"
To be sure, what the robber demanded of me - my money - was my own; and I had a clear right to keep it; but it was no more my own than my vote is my own; and the threat of death to me, to extort my money, and the threat of destruction to the Union, to extort my vote, can scarcely be distinguished in principle…
-Abraham Lincoln
Posted by ambyr (Member # 7616) on :
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: So, anyone feel like a small bet on what the bad effects will be? Make a prediction that can be measured some reasonable time from now, give odds, and I'll offer to bet on it.
Prediction: I won't get paid.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
Bets on good effects would be interesting as well.
Posted by Geraine (Member # 9913) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: Fallows about nails it. This is what people need to be paying attention to.
And no, I did not cheekily rename this title to take a dig at Geraine. Fallows is aware of and addressing the modern day prominence of equivocation of any sort as a shield for extremist behavior on one side.
Your False-Equivalence Guide to the Days Ahead _
Two big examples of problematic self-government are upon us. They are of course the possible partial shutdown of the federal government, following the long-running hamstringing of public functions via "the sequester"; and a possible vote not to raise the federal debt ceiling, which would create the prospect of a default on U.S. Treasury debt.
The details are complicated, but please don't lose sight of these three essential points:
- As a matter of substance, constant-shutdown, permanent-emergency governance is so destructive that no other serious country engages in or could tolerate it. The United States can afford it only because we are -- still -- so rich, with so much margin for waste and error. Details on this and other items below.*
- As a matter of politics, this is different from anything we learned about in classrooms or expected until the past few years. We're used to thinking that the most important disagreements are between the major parties, not within one party; and that disagreements over policies, goals, tactics can be addressed by negotiation or compromise.
This time, the fight that matters is within the Republican party, and that fight is over whether compromise itself is legitimate.** Outsiders to this struggle -- the president and his administration, Democratic legislators as a group, voters or "opinion leaders" outside the generally safe districts that elected the new House majority -- have essentially no leverage over the outcome. I can't recall any situation like this in my own experience, and the only even-approximate historic parallel (with obvious differences) is the inability of Northern/free-state opinion to affect the debate within the slave-state South from the 1840s onward. Nor is there a conceivable "compromise" the Democrats could offer that would placate the other side.
- As a matter of journalism, any story that presents the disagreements as a "standoff," a "showdown," a "failure of leadership," a sign of "partisan gridlock," or any of the other usual terms for political disagreement, represents a failure of journalism*** and an inability to see or describe what is going on. For instance: the "dig in their heels" headline you see below, which is from a proprietary newsletter I read this morning, and about which I am leaving off the identifying details.
This isn't "gridlock." It is a ferocious struggle within one party, between its traditionalists and its radical factions, with results that unfortunately can harm all the rest of us -- and, should there be a debt default, could harm the rest of the world too.
_
The debt-ceiling vote, of course, is not about future spending decisions. It is about whether to cover expenditures the Congress has already authorized. There is no sane reason for subjecting this to a repeated vote. And there is no precedent for serious threats not to honor federal debt -- as opposed to symbolic anti-Administration protest votes, which both parties have cast over the years. Nor for demanding the reversal of major legislation as a condition for routine government operations.
In case the point is not clear yet: there is no post-Civil War precedent for what the House GOP is doing now. It is radical, and dangerous for the economy and our process of government, and its departure from past political disagreements can't be buffed away or ignored.
Fallows certainly has an interesting, yet biased take on the whole thing. Interesting article.
I am seeing the effect Obamacare is having on small businesses I work with, and even more so among their employees.
Most normal people like the IDEA of the Affordable Care Act (No lifetime maximums, children can be on insurance until 26, no pre-existing conditions) until they find out that their hours are being cut to part time because the company can't afford to pay the premiums.
Premiums have gone up drastically (some companies as much as 70%, meaning a $100 payment is now $170) and companies can't afford to pay the 50% ER . They may go down in the future (one can only hope) but right now people are only feeling the sticker shock.
Is it something that should be talked about? Yes, absolutely. Is it worth shutting down the government for? Hell no.
One minor complaint about the Senate: If they really wanted to get this done, why on earth did they take the weekend off instead of negotiating with the House? Yes, the members of the House were acting like morons for letting it get this far, but why not work with them, if not for politics? Before you say anything Sam, no, I'm not trying to say the Democrats are to blame at all for the shutdown, just pointing out something that I thought was interesting.
In the short term this hurts the Republicans. If this continues and the economy collapses, history may see it differently. Bob Woodward said it best: "He (Obama) said he will not negotiate on the debt ceiling. A reasonable position. “I will not be blackmailed” he said. But he should be talking. They should be meeting, discussing this, because as I think Steve Ratner showed earlier, the American economy is at stake and the president, if there is a downturn or a collapse or whatever could happen here that’s bad, it’s going to be on his head. The history books are going to say, we had an economic calamity in the Presidency of Barack Obama. Speaker Boehner, indeed, is playing a role on this. Go back to the Great Depression in the 1930s. I’ll bet no one can name who was the speaker of the House at the time. Henry Thomas Rainey. He’s not in the history book it’s on the president’s head. He’s got to lead. He’s got to talk. And the absence of discussion here, I think, is baffling element."
[ October 01, 2013, 12:02 PM: Message edited by: Geraine ]
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
quote:Originally posted by ambyr:
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: So, anyone feel like a small bet on what the bad effects will be? Make a prediction that can be measured some reasonable time from now, give odds, and I'll offer to bet on it.
Prediction: I won't get paid.
Didn't the government issue back-pay after the last shut-down?
Hobbes Posted by Geraine (Member # 9913) on :
quote:Originally posted by Hobbes:
quote:Originally posted by ambyr:
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: So, anyone feel like a small bet on what the bad effects will be? Make a prediction that can be measured some reasonable time from now, give odds, and I'll offer to bet on it.
Prediction: I won't get paid.
Didn't the government issue back-pay after the last shut-down?
Hobbes
They did, but back pay doesn't pay bills that are due now. Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
No question; but if you're going to bet on it I'd imagine that's a distinction you'd have to iron out before hand.
Hobbes Posted by kmbboots (Member # 8576) on :
What would negotiating do except encourage this behavior? We give now and then again at the debt ceiling and again, and again...
We "negotiated" on the law (not bill now, law) to its detriment and it passed. They shouldn't get to re-negotiate the law over and over again.
Our only hope at this point is that people will wake up and decide not to vote for these schmucks anymore. It is a faint hope due to safely gerrymandered districts, but the only one I see.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
the last 'negotiations' were also, appropriately, a farce.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Why not work with them? Well, it's certainly not the highest road, not the statesman's path, but come on. How *do* you expect someone to 'work with' a party that takes hostages, so to speak? How does the senate go about working with the house?
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Put a note certifying that the man/woman who manages to leave the chamber with that note will never have to be reelected so long as they wish to remain in office.
They will solve the problem for us.
Posted by Darth_Mauve (Member # 4709) on :
Negotiating with the Tea Party folks is like Negotiating with an Assassin. He says, "I am going to shoot you, OK?"
You say, "No."
"OK. Let's negotiate. How about I use a bomb."
No
"Ok. A good poison. Not so much pain and you get to live a few extra minutes."
No.
"That's not fair, you aren't negotiating."
Posted by Wingracer (Member # 12293) on :
Well thanks to the shutdown, my career change would appear to be on hold. I have been out of work since Easter but I have been putting the time to good use. I have taken the classes, passed all the tests, met all the requirements and last week, submitted all the paperwork to get a Coast Guard Captain's license. The moment my license arrives, I have a dream job waiting for me. Just one problem, everyone in that department of the USCG stayed home today.
Posted by SenojRetep (Member # 8614) on :
quote:Originally posted by Elison R. Salazar: Dems have generally been awful at messaging.
To the contrary, as is evident in these Twitter word clouds, Democratic Reps (and their staffs) are being significantly more disciplined on messaging than their Republican counterparts.
Subjectively, I think this has generally been true for several years. Democrats have had a much more disciplined conference than Republicans, largely due to the virtual extinction of Blue Dogs after the 2010 wave election.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
As an outsider, I would have thought consistent != effective messaging. For example, they could just have been consistently giving the same ineffective message.
Posted by Aros (Member # 4873) on :
Sam --
Sweet Lincoln quote.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:Originally posted by ambyr:
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: So, anyone feel like a small bet on what the bad effects will be? Make a prediction that can be measured some reasonable time from now, give odds, and I'll offer to bet on it.
Prediction: I won't get paid.
Where do you work, and which paycheck (ie what date) did you have in mind?
Posted by SenojRetep (Member # 8614) on :
quote:Originally posted by Mucus: As an outsider, I would have thought consistent != effective messaging. For example, they could just have been consistently giving the same ineffective message.
That's true to a degree, but in public perception consistency is extremely important (see: Head On! ads). Furthermore, the message the Democrats are unified behind (#GOPShutDown) seems like a pretty effective one to me; the shut down is extremely unpopular, and cementing people's preheld bias to blame the GOP for it is good politics.
See also, Joe Manchin's flip-flop on whether he'd vote for a CR that delayed Obamacare implementation for a year. Had he held to his original statement, it would have given the GOP something to crow about ("Dems divided" "Democratic Senate votes down bipartisan budget"). But Harry Reid and Dick Durbin whipped effectively, and none of the vulnerable Dem Senators are breaking ranks. Instead, it's fiscally moderate Republicans in the House like Peter King who've been trying to break Boehner's resolve, leading to conflicted messaging. The result: Democrats can hold the line without suffering significant blowback (except, perhaps, President Obama since the President's approval suffers no matter what when things go badly), people will (rightly) blame the Republicans, and Boehner gets burned. As long as the Democrats remain united and stay on message that this is all the GOP's fault (or "Tea Party anarchists" to use the Democratic PR-approved line that Reid, Carney, and others have been trotting out), they'll win the political fight.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Geraine
Give historians a little more credit. We're a lot more nuanced in our view than regular people are. When we think Depression, we don't just think the president. We think Smoot and Hawley and a lot of other things. If you're just talking about popular perception, well, that's something completely different than history, since popular perception is often incredibly wrong about a lot of things.
The thing is, if Obama gives in and allows the Republicans to hold him hostage again, historians will write that Obama destroyed his presidency and put a nail in the coffin of democracy by allowing a minority in a single house of Congress to pass legislation by threatening to derail the nation. I think both options have serious longterm implications for the country, but history isn't so blind or forgetful that they'll take Obama's actions in a vacuum.
Posted by Geraine (Member # 9913) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Geraine
Give historians a little more credit. We're a lot more nuanced in our view than regular people are. When we think Depression, we don't just think the president. We think Smoot and Hawley and a lot of other things. If you're just talking about popular perception, well, that's something completely different than history, since popular perception is often incredibly wrong about a lot of things.
The thing is, if Obama gives in and allows the Republicans to hold him hostage again, historians will write that Obama destroyed his presidency and put a nail in the coffin of democracy by allowing a minority in a single house of Congress to pass legislation by threatening to derail the nation. I think both options have serious longterm implications for the country, but history isn't so blind or forgetful that they'll take Obama's actions in a vacuum.
Right, but the majority of American voters AREN'T historians. Most voters look at who was president at the time, and blame them. Look at Carter for example. Was the mess he had during his four years really his fault? Nope. But to the average voter during that time, it WAS.
In 20 years, people aren't going to remember Boehner or McConnell. They ARE going to remember Obama.
We might realize how big of a deal the last government shutdown was with Gingrich and Clinton. Most people think this is the first shutdown we have ever had. Part of that is the media's fault, part of it is just being uninformed. They are told who to blame, and they blame. (It's even warranted)In the short term that works. It may work for the 2014 election. Will it work past that?
Who knows.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I'm not sure if that's true. I was only like 10 when the last shutdown happened but I still remember that it happened, and I remember that it was a budget fight.
But either way, while it might take some time, history will remember Obama more favorably than the afterglow. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn't really matter what voters think right now. Obama doesn't have to run for anything again, so their perception is sort of superflous.
Just look at how Bush's favorability ratings have changed dramatically. Presidents get remembered more fondly as time passes, whether it's justified or not. A lot of it also depends on the overall arc of his presidency and what the media chooses to talk about for the next two decades.
And while I think the general populace is full of morons, I give them a little more credit for nuance in understanding one guy isn't to blame for everything that happens during his term.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by SenojRetep:
quote:Originally posted by Elison R. Salazar: Dems have generally been awful at messaging.
To the contrary, as is evident in these Twitter word clouds, Democratic Reps (and their staffs) are being significantly more disciplined on messaging than their Republican counterparts.
Subjectively, I think this has generally been true for several years. Democrats have had a much more disciplined conference than Republicans, largely due to the virtual extinction of Blue Dogs after the 2010 wave election.
No. Just No.
Democrats are godawful at the messenging war to the point that significant portions of people think the law is actually called "Obamacare" say they dissapprove of it, but the same people when polled actually love the Affordable Care Act (spoilers, they're the same thing).
Between Republican misinformation of the "Big Lie" told over and over again is easier to believe than the rather complex truth which the Democrats have repeatedly bungled in order to not seem "partisan" and rarely take to the offensive. If they're actually doing something coherent "now" thank god but it would've been more useful starting in 2009. and 2010.
The simple proof of this is the extent that Democrats tend to not turn out for congressional midterm voting except in wave election years.
quote: and cementing people's preheld bias to blame the GOP for it is good politics.
The GOP are at fault, this is so true its essentially self evident to anyone who has been paying attention.
quote: until they find out that their hours are being cut to part time because the company can't afford to pay the premiums.
Because of a loophole that wouldn't have existed under Single Payer, remind me again where you stand on Universal Healthcare?
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Geraine: In 20 years, people aren't going to remember Boehner or McConnell. They ARE going to remember Obama.
We might realize how big of a deal the last government shutdown was with Gingrich and Clinton.
If I were applying your logic consistently here wouldn't the response be "gingrich who?"
because gingrich's Great Leap Forward was just about exactly 20 years ago, and yet we still remember what he did.
Also nothing of what you are saying matters, if instead of remembering Boehner of McConnell, they remember the Tea Party and what they did back when they were a Thing. Which they will, and which doesn't leave Obama holding the bag.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by Geraine: In 20 years, people aren't going to remember Boehner or McConnell. They ARE going to remember Obama.
We might realize how big of a deal the last government shutdown was with Gingrich and Clinton.
If I were applying your logic consistently here wouldn't the response be "gingrich who?"
because gingrich's Great Leap Forward was just about exactly 20 years ago, and yet we still remember what he did.
Also nothing of what you are saying matters, if instead of remembering Boehner of McConnell, they remember the Tea Party and what they did back when they were a Thing. Which they will, and which doesn't leave Obama holding the bag.
Will you please to at least TRY to read my entire post before you respond? Those that are keep up on politics certainly remember Gingrich and the last shutdown. That is the vast majority of those on this site.
I'm saying the majority of American voters probably couldn't tell you anything about it, if they remember it at all. Of those that do, I'd bet a dollar tha majority of those don't even know what led to the shutdown.
As for the Tea Party, I guess time will tell. Generally it is presidents that are looked at, not the political groups at the time. In a couple of hundred years perhaps history books will talk about the Tea Party the way we talk about Whigs today. In 50 years though? People are really going to be looking at who the president was, the same way most people blame Hoover (And to a lesser extent FDR for extending it) for the Great Depression
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Will most voters even remember this shutdown in ten years then? Evidence would suggest that, like the Clinton-era shutdown, most people won't even remember this as a blip on the radar in the future.
And most people, with or without historical training, generally associate FDR with getting out of the Depression, not extending it.
And for that matter, most people don't have a clue who was president in 1929.
I'm curious as to what you think your generic, average American really knows. Your impression of his/her knowledge is a little spotty.
Also, the Whigs aren't the political historical comparison you want to make. They were a legitimate major party for 50 years and a critical half of the two-party system with the Democrats.
You want something more like the Populists. That's the closer comparison.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Will you please to at least TRY to read my entire post before you respond?
I read your entire post, and then I responded. So, I succeeded at more than just trying.
To further mill down the point: if this ends up being a political event so pivotal that it's still in the common american memory of important american political events, whether people remember Boenher or McConnell will be irrelevant because if it is remembered it will be remembered not in terms of when individuals caused the shutdown of the government, but when a movement, the Tea Party, got the government shut down.
quote:People are really going to be looking at who the president was, the same way most people blame Hoover (And to a lesser extent FDR for extending it) for the Great Depression
Most people do not blame FDR for extending the great depression. You might think so, though, if most of your political history filters through conservative interpretations of history and conservative editorial on presidential legacies.
The absolute most common layman perception of FDR is that he 'ended the great depression.' That the 'new deal' got us out of the depression, etc
Posted by Wingracer (Member # 12293) on :
The most common perception to me is that WWII got us out of the depression. But then I am from the south Posted by Boris (Member # 6935) on :
quote: Most people do not blame FDR for extending the great depression. You might think so, though, if most of your political history filters through conservative interpretations of history and conservative editorial on presidential legacies.
I will resay what I said a little bit clearer so that you can understand why that is an irrelevant rebuttal, Borisl.
Most people do not blame FDR for extending the great depression. You might think that most people blame FDR for extending the great depression if most of your political history filters through conservative interpretations of history and conservative editorial on presidential legacies that purposefully or accidentally transmits the idea that most people blame FDR for extending the great depression. When in reality the common sentiment is that the common historical perception of people is that they largely think FDR ended the great depression.
Posted by Boris (Member # 6935) on :
So how is your point that most people don't believe FDR extended the great depression relevant, considering historical evidence that he actually did?
More to the actual point here...how many people actually remember any of the fallout of the last government shutdown? I mean...don't we all remember the great recession of 1996? Wait...
Posted by Dan_Frank (Member # 8488) on :
I'm with Sam. Most people buy the leftist line that FDR ended the Great Depression with the New Deal.
Sam, you didn't specifically argue with him but it bears mentioning that Wingracer is right, too. Most people also think that the military spending during WW2 helped, and that means there's something called a military industrial complex. This is also pretty commonly accepted.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by Boris: So how is your point that most people don't believe FDR extended the great depression relevant, considering historical evidence that he actually did?
More to the actual point here...how many people actually remember any of the fallout of the last government shutdown? I mean...don't we all remember the great recession of 1996? Wait...
Historians of the period pay a lot more attention to 1937 when Roosevelt ended his stimulus program and the country plunged back into the Depression again. Before that, he'd cut unemployment by 14% and brought industrial production back up to pre-Depression levels. When he cut spending to try to balance the budget, it sunk the economy again until he reinstituted the policies.
A lot of economists think that the reason FDR only got us halfway to recover is that he never spent enough. So the Depression didn't end until spending went through the roof during WWII. Whenever someone says "stimulus didn't save us from the Depression, WWII did," they must not understand WHY WWII had an ameliorative effect. It was because we spent huge sums of money. It was stimulus on steroids.
Regardless though, if you look you can find an historian or economist who supports just about any position regarding FDR and the Depression. There's a difference between that and historical consensus, and there's a difference between historical consensus and popular memory, the last of which is what Sam is referencing.
Popular memory and actual history are often wildly divergent.
Posted by stilesbn (Member # 11809) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: Most people also think that the military spending during WW2 helped, and that means there's something called a military industrial complex. This is also pretty commonly accepted.
Strangely enough most people also think that military spending in the past 10 years caused a lot of the economic problems (or at least debt problems) we have today.
Posted by Boris (Member # 6935) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn:
quote:Originally posted by Boris: So how is your point that most people don't believe FDR extended the great depression relevant, considering historical evidence that he actually did?
More to the actual point here...how many people actually remember any of the fallout of the last government shutdown? I mean...don't we all remember the great recession of 1996? Wait...
Historians of the period pay a lot more attention to 1937 when Roosevelt ended his stimulus program and the country plunged back into the Depression again. Before that, he'd cut unemployment by 14% and brought industrial production back up to pre-Depression levels. When he cut spending to try to balance the budget, it sunk the economy again until he reinstituted the policies.
A lot of economists think that the reason FDR only got us halfway to recover is that he never spent enough. So the Depression didn't end until spending went through the roof during WWII. Whenever someone says "stimulus didn't save us from the Depression, WWII did," they must not understand WHY WWII had an ameliorative effect. It was because we spent huge sums of money. It was stimulus on steroids.
Except that there were a lot of other changes that occurred during WWII that would have impacted the economy. Changes in monetary policy, increases in industrial capacity, large-scale rationing, etc.
If anything, WWII forced the nation to fully transition from mostly agrarian to heavily industrial. The new deal did not address the needs of a changing world. The changes necessitated by WWII ultimately did.
But you also should realize that there was a massive recession following WWII in connection with the sudden end of heavy government stimulus. This recession lasted less than a year, but resulted in a 12% drop in GDP. However, that recession ended with no government intervention.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
WWII didn't force that change, though I'd agree that it cemented a trend that already existed.
People had been flocking from farms to cities since the 1880s, a process that dramatically accelerated in the 1920s and was cemented by the time WWII started. The biggest role the war probably paid was in ensuring that young men who came off the farms didn't go back to the farms when the war ended.
And the reason the recession ended was because of an historic outpouring of domestic spending from regular people who hadn't been able to buy personal luxury items since before the war began. They spent years saving up with nothing to buy. There was also a huge construction boom the likes of which we haven't seen since. You're talking about a situation that's unlikely to ever happen again in American history unless we're invaded.
Posted by ambyr (Member # 7616) on :
quote:Originally posted by King of Men:
quote:Originally posted by ambyr:
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: So, anyone feel like a small bet on what the bad effects will be? Make a prediction that can be measured some reasonable time from now, give odds, and I'll offer to bet on it.
Prediction: I won't get paid.
Where do you work, and which paycheck (ie what date) did you have in mind?
The U.S. government, obviously.
I will be getting a paycheck on October 15 for time worked before the shutdown. I don't expect to get one on October 28, and I won't be surprised if I don't get one on November 12 either.
Past Congressional decisions aside, we have been strongly advised not to expect any backpay this time around.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: WWII didn't force that change, though I'd agree that it cemented a trend that already existed.
People had been flocking from farms to cities since the 1880s, a process that dramatically accelerated in the 1920s and was cemented by the time WWII started. The biggest role the war probably paid was in ensuring that young men who came off the farms didn't go back to the farms when the war ended.
And the reason the recession ended was because of an historic outpouring of domestic spending from regular people who hadn't been able to buy personal luxury items since before the war began. They spent years saving up with nothing to buy. There was also a huge construction boom the likes of which we haven't seen since. You're talking about a situation that's unlikely to ever happen again in American history unless we're invaded.
Not true, the US could also strive to rebuild its entire aging transportation and energy infrastructure. Or build that crazy North American waterway canal project I've seen floated around.
quote:Originally posted by Boris: Except that there were a lot of other changes that occurred during WWII that would have impacted the economy. Changes in monetary policy, increases in industrial capacity, large-scale rationing, etc.
If anything, WWII forced the nation to fully transition from mostly agrarian to heavily industrial. The new deal did not address the needs of a changing world. The changes necessitated by WWII ultimately did.
But you also should realize that there was a massive recession following WWII in connection with the sudden end of heavy government stimulus. This recession lasted less than a year, but resulted in a 12% drop in GDP. However, that recession ended with no government intervention.
Virtually everything that happened can be explained by "The US needed a whole lot of stuff to destroy a whole lot of other's people's stuff and then after the war the whole world needed a whole lot of American stuff."
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:Originally posted by ambyr:
quote:Originally posted by King of Men:
quote:Originally posted by ambyr:
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: [qb] So, anyone feel like a small bet on what the bad effects will be? Make a prediction that can be measured some reasonable time from now, give odds, and I'll offer to bet on it.
Prediction: I won't get paid.
Where do you work, and which paycheck (ie what date) did you have in mind?
The U.S. government, obviously.
That's like saying you live in North America. Which department, organisation, TLA?
quote:I will be getting a paycheck on October 15 for time worked before the shutdown. I don't expect to get one on October 28, and I won't be surprised if I don't get one on November 12 either.
Ok. I've 10 dollars for each of those dates that say you get a paycheck. (Not saying anything about the back pay, just that you get some sort of check for a nonzero amount.) What odds will you give me?
So, the bet, should you choose to accept it, is thus:
If ambyr gets no paycheck on October 28th, KoM pays him ten dollars; if he does, ambyr pays KoM 10*X dollars, where X are the odds to be specified by ambyr. (KoM will refuse the bet if X is too low.) Then, the same for November 12th, with a different X.
Posted by ambyr (Member # 7616) on :
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: That's like saying you live in North America. Which department, organisation, TLA?
That is exactly none of your business.
quote:If ambyr gets no paycheck on October 28th, KoM pays him ten dollars; if he does, ambyr pays KoM 10*X dollars, where X are the odds to be specified by ambyr. (KoM will refuse the bet if X is too low.) Then, the same for November 12th, with a different X.
1) I am female 2) No. In case you missed the entire point of this subthread, I don't have any extra money to gamble; I am already out three days wages, and I have bills to pay.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by Elison R. Salazar:
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: WWII didn't force that change, though I'd agree that it cemented a trend that already existed.
People had been flocking from farms to cities since the 1880s, a process that dramatically accelerated in the 1920s and was cemented by the time WWII started. The biggest role the war probably paid was in ensuring that young men who came off the farms didn't go back to the farms when the war ended.
And the reason the recession ended was because of an historic outpouring of domestic spending from regular people who hadn't been able to buy personal luxury items since before the war began. They spent years saving up with nothing to buy. There was also a huge construction boom the likes of which we haven't seen since. You're talking about a situation that's unlikely to ever happen again in American history unless we're invaded.
Not true, the US could also strive to rebuild its entire aging transportation and energy infrastructure. Or build that crazy North American waterway canal project I've seen floated around.
You're talking apples and oranges. Yes, rebuilding American infrastructure would lead to a construction boom that would create a ton of jobs and spread a lot of money around, but that still pales in comparison to the spending boom that followed WWII. You're talking about one sector of the economy getting an injection of cash vs the ENTIRE ECONOMY going bonkers from half a decade of pent-up demand and spending being released all at once.
A huge construction burst would put money into the hands of a lot of households that currently don't have much, but unless you gave every American a check for twenty grand and took away most of their debt, it wouldn't even be a dent.
And that's not including the gazillion dollars that the US government spent through the GI Bill.
Posted by Dan_Frank (Member # 8488) on :
The idea that an increase in GDP during/after wartime means a wealthier society is just the Broken Window fallacy writ very, very large.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Boris: So how is your point that most people don't believe FDR extended the great depression relevant, considering historical evidence that he actually did?
Uh, because we're quite clearly talking about potential outcomes of historical memory about events such as this AND it is directly relevant to how it corrects something which was said but which was not true
Posted by Destineer (Member # 821) on :
God, why didn't I sell stock yesterday?
These animals are actually going through with this.
Posted by T:man (Member # 11614) on :
Now it's the time to buy stock Posted by Geraine (Member # 9913) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:Originally posted by Boris: So how is your point that most people don't believe FDR extended the great depression relevant, considering historical evidence that he actually did?
Uh, because we're quite clearly talking about potential outcomes of historical memory about events such as this AND it is directly relevant to how it corrects something which was said but which was not true
Sam is right Boris. Whether historians agree or not isn't the issue. Its how the common person perceives history. Sam is also right in how people perceive it based on how they were brought up or learned about it.
A simple Economics 101 class showed me FDR was actually part of the problem, but others may interpret that time period differently. That's fine, and was probably not the best example.
Both parties are playing a dangerous game. While Republicans have more to lose and will most likely take the brunt of the backlash, there is a still a slim chance this could backfire on the Democrats. Republicans are being crafty by trying to fund the government piece by piece.
Advantages for the Republicans? If they succeed, they may still be able to defund Obamacare, fund the government. If they don't succeed, they will try to show that they tried to fund the government and programs such as the NIH, but that Democrats would rather play politics than help kids with cancer. You can already see some of the rhetoric with complaining about some of the comments Harry Reid made yesterday when speaking about the NIH.
The chance they are taking is the American people calling bullshit, which is the likely scenario.
This is also how it could backfire on the Democrats. If the American people come to believe that the Republicans are trying to fund the government but that Democrats are being too stubborn by requiring a clean spending bill instead of passing pieces to get people back to work now, it could hurt them. I think the President made a HUGE mistake yesterday by inviting the leaders of Congress to the White House yesterday and telling the Republicans there will be no negotiations. That is probably the worse thing he could have done. It would have been better for him to either speak from the sidelines or tell the two sides that they need to work together. Calling everyone to the WH just to tell everyone there will be no negotiations just gives the Republicans more ammo to lob at the Democrats.
Something kind of funny....The national hotline for Obamacare is 1-800-318-2596 (when made into letters spells F*#K YO) .... Someone didn't think that one through.... I don't think its that big of a deal, but I did smile.
[ October 03, 2013, 01:19 PM: Message edited by: Geraine ]
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Geraine: I think the President made a HUGE mistake yesterday by inviting the leaders of Congress to the White House yesterday and telling the Republicans there will be no negotiations.
source please
Posted by Geraine (Member # 9913) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:Originally posted by Geraine: I think the President made a HUGE mistake yesterday by inviting the leaders of Congress to the White House yesterday and telling the Republicans there will be no negotiations.
source please
I'll try to find an internet link, but that was what was being reported on CNN, FoxNews, and MSNBC this morning.
I should add that Reid said the Republican leadership said the same thing that the President did, so it looks like neither side is budging for the time being.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Ok, so he's saying that he's not going to engage in the attempted piecemeal passage or extorted 'concessions' with the entire government and default of the american debt being held hostage for it.
That's not a mistake, geraine. He'd be a complete and utter fool to have changed his position on that today.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
the big spoiler alert here is that there is going to be a difference of opinion on to what extent the movement republicans driving this whole thing are making available as reasonable compromises. Right now, they are not. They are not offering compromises worth selling out into their system of holding the economy and the debt limit and the government hostage in order to coerce what they want from a gerrymandered majority in one half of one branch of government. What's going on here is that they're saying "Can I burn down your whole house? No? Okay how about just the second floor? Alright how about just the garage and that buys you six months before your house comes back to the table to be burnt down? No? YOU'RE NOT COMPROMISING."
We already know what their version of 'compromise' is. This should be re-read in the interim.
No, seriously, I think we can skip the whole idea of presenting what 'huge mistakes' Obama is making until he is concertedly actually doing things that don't work out of necessity for him while the republicans are doubling down on a course of action that the vast majority of americans blame them for and which the vast majority of americans hate.
/edit 2 -
and now capitol hill is in lockdown after a shooting
[ October 03, 2013, 03:01 PM: Message edited by: Samprimary ]
Posted by GaalDornick (Member # 8880) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: the big spoiler alert here is that there is going to be a difference of opinion on to what extent the movement republicans driving this whole thing are making available as reasonable compromises. Right now, they are not. They are not offering compromises worth selling out into their system of holding the economy and the debt limit and the government hostage in order to coerce what they want from a gerrymandered majority in one half of one branch of government. What's going on here is that they're saying "Can I burn down your whole house? No? Okay how about just the second floor? Alright how about just the garage and that buys you six months before your house comes back to the table to be burnt down? No? YOU'RE NOT COMPROMISING."
We already know what their version of 'compromise' is. This should be re-read in the interim.
No, seriously, I think we can skip the whole idea of presenting what 'huge mistakes' Obama is making until he is concertedly actually doing things that don't work out of necessity for him while the republicans are doubling down on a course of action that the vast majority of americans blame them for and which the vast majority of americans hate.
/edit 2 -
and now capitol hill is in lockdown after a shooting
Out of necessity? You do realize this is the first time a president, during a government shutdown, says that he will not negotiate with the other side of the aisle? In my view everyone in government right now is too arrogant and too stubborn. I understand that any concessions on Obamacare would be bad for the Democratic base, and more specifically for the president.
I do find it discouraging that the president was willing to delay the employer mandate in an attempt to provide an incentive for businesses to keep full time jobs, but is unwilling to delay the individual mandate. It wouldn't stop the exchanges, it wouldn't stop those that need it to obtain coverage. The extent of the effect would be delaying a "tax" (the penalty) from being levied for a year on those that do not obtain health insurance. We know that the majority of these people will be the poor, as the penalty is 1% or $95 per household, whichever is greater.
Why WOULDN'T you delay the mandate like the republicans are asking? I can understand not negotiating on the defunding effort. Republicans came back and asked for a delay in the mandate and was still turned down.
Your article smacks of bias and has a lot of its facts wrong. It generalizes by saying "A one year delay in Obamacare" when what was asked for was a delay in the individual mandate. That means the tax penalty. That's it.
The only other piece of the ACA that would be struck down is the Congressional subsidy for the exchanges.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote: I understand that any concessions on Obamacare would be bad for the Democratic base
It's worse than that. Any concessions now would be bad for the president and the majority party for all time, because it would create a precedent in which the minority party would feel free to hijack the budget any time they wanted to force through changes to the legislation.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote: In my view everyone in government right now is too arrogant and too stubborn.
Ah, and here it is at last. I refer you back to the fallows article that hamstrung, in advance, this attempt at false equivalence.
quote:Why WOULDN'T you delay the mandate like the republicans are asking?
"[I]f we continue to set a precedent in which a president — any president, a Republican president, a Democratic president — where the opposing party controls the House of Representatives, if that president is in a situation in which each time the United States is called upon to pay its bills the other party can simply sit there and say, 'Well, we're not gonna pay the bills unless you give us what we want,' that changes the constitutional structure of this government entirely."
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:Why WOULDN'T you delay the mandate like the republicans are asking? I can understand not negotiating on the defunding effort. Republicans came back and asked for a delay in the mandate and was still turned down.
Why would you? That's a serious question. I can't understand why someone would think this was reasonable. I don't get how people look at this situation and not see what the Republicans are doing as crazy and incredibly irresponsible. I really would like for someone to explain their view on how this is not the case.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
the answer typically involves one of two things the base has been fed
- this is a failure on BOTH sides to be REASONABLE and COMPROMISE! Obama isn't COMPROMISING! Equivalence equivalent everyone is at fault here equivalate!
- we were forced to do it because Obamacare went against the WILL of the PEOPLE!
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
Well, if I'm going to trust anyone to give me a fair and complete account of what people who believe things different than what that person believes, it would be you Samp, but I'm pretty sure I'll wait for Geraine to reply.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
I can say it without any mocking sarcasm and you're still looking at what it is. it's typically either a message that Obama is not compromising in a manner equivalent to or greater than the house republican intent and availability for compromise, or it's a sentiment that the republicans' hand was forced because Obamacare is against the will of the people.
etc etc etc
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Geraine...c'mon man, I know you know it's not somehow unreasonable much less hypocritical or arrogant to do one thing on a freely made choice, but to balk and even outright refuse to consider the same or a similar thing when someone attempts to put a gun to your head and take it by force. You *can't* reasonably attempt some equivalence of blame on this.
Personal example: my job (UPS) is tied in with United Way in a substantial way-every year they speak with employees and see what, if any, amount of their paychecks-a one time donation, a weekly deduction, biweekly, what have you-they want to give. I choose one of those options, and have since I started there, and didn't think anything of it-a small percentage every week is something I don't notice and often forget about until the renewal time. One year, for some reason-perhaps he had me confused with another employee who made a stink, maybe he was incompetent, I don't know, but the phrase 'You have to give' was uttered.
He may well have meant 'you have to decide now how much' or something, but in that moment the phrase registered it made me consider just for a moment never giving a dime again through UPS-even though if the supervisor had actually meant it, he had no way at all of making it stick.
How much more, then, when it's *not* a misunderstanding? When someone demands you abruptly lose a fight you won fairly years ago, not because minds have changed or the strategy is different but only because the same tiny minority that already lost in multiple fair fights now simply tells you 'I don't care about the process, you WILL do it my way or to hell with everything!' And they don't even make a secret about it.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky:
quote:Why WOULDN'T you delay the mandate like the republicans are asking? I can understand not negotiating on the defunding effort. Republicans came back and asked for a delay in the mandate and was still turned down.
Why would you? That's a serious question. I can't understand why someone would think this was reasonable. I don't get how people look at this situation and not see what the Republicans are doing as crazy and incredibly irresponsible. I really would like for someone to explain their view on how this is not the case.
I can't speak for the other side, but I have heard them saying Obama has already delayed the employer mandate by executive fiat, so why can't the individual mandate also be a negotiable element.
[ October 03, 2013, 07:27 PM: Message edited by: BlackBlade ]
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:Originally posted by ambyr:
quote:Originally posted by King of Men: That's like saying you live in North America. Which department, organisation, TLA?
That is exactly none of your business.
quote:If ambyr gets no paycheck on October 28th, KoM pays him ten dollars; if he does, ambyr pays KoM 10*X dollars, where X are the odds to be specified by ambyr. (KoM will refuse the bet if X is too low.) Then, the same for November 12th, with a different X.
1) I am female 2) No. In case you missed the entire point of this subthread, I don't have any extra money to gamble; I am already out three days wages, and I have bills to pay.
I asked for predictions specifically to make bets on. If you didn't want to bet, you might have kept your prediction to yourself.
This aside, as the bet is structured, you'd only have to pay if you got paid. Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade:
quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky:
quote:Why WOULDN'T you delay the mandate like the republicans are asking? I can understand not negotiating on the defunding effort. Republicans came back and asked for a delay in the mandate and was still turned down.
Why would you? That's a serious question. I can't understand why someone would think this was reasonable. I don't get how people look at this situation and not see what the Republicans are doing as crazy and incredibly irresponsible. I really would like for someone to explain their view on how this is not the case.
I can't speak for the other side, but I have heard them saying Obama has already delayed the employer mandate by executive fiat, so why can't the individual mandate also be a negotiable element.
I'm not talking only about delaying the the individual mandate, but the whole situation.
Posted by capaxinfiniti (Member # 12181) on :
Also mentioned on the Diane Rehm Show today was the fact that Obama has a serious credibility problem, highlighted in the very recent past by the Syria/chemical weapons situation. That ended his foreign policy charade and left everyone (including many in his own party) wondering what the hell he means when he says 'red line'. Because he's don't it so often in the past, Republicans have good reason to believe Obama will capitulate. It's just a matter of waiting out this blame-game frenzy.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Except the scenarios aren't really analogous, setting aside your blatant partisanship. In the case of Syria, Obama did come off with a serious competence and credibility issue-not that Americans typically think much of foreign policy. But in that instance, it came about because he made tough talk threatening something that would be politically...difficult is ubderstating it quite a lot. The cost to keep his word was much, much greater politically than to break it.
Here with Tea Party hostage taking, all signs point to it being politically disastrous if Obama changes his mind and capitulates, with all signs pointing to political advantage if he doesn't. Republicans were blamed for the last shut down, an the last threatened shut down, and the default, and have set themselves up to be blamed for this one.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
That and seriously, this Obama's legacy at stake here. Obamacare has been providing coverage to millions of Americans and has already lowered the cost curve. It works, its widely popular, and is the primary thing people will remember of his Administration.
Domestic politics is entirely different from Foreign Relations.
quote: Geraine's many posts ignoring the question later
I don't I recall you answering my question, if you don't like the parts of Obamacare that are "confusing" for small businesses, would you support Single payer?
Posted by James Tiberius Kirk (Member # 2832) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade:
quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky:
quote:Why WOULDN'T you delay the mandate like the republicans are asking? I can understand not negotiating on the defunding effort. Republicans came back and asked for a delay in the mandate and was still turned down.
Why would you? That's a serious question. I can't understand why someone would think this was reasonable. I don't get how people look at this situation and not see what the Republicans are doing as crazy and incredibly irresponsible. I really would like for someone to explain their view on how this is not the case.
I can't speak for the other side, but I have heard them saying Obama has already delayed the employer mandate by executive fiat, so why can't the individual mandate also be a negotiable element.
Very true, but that still doesn't answer the question: what exactly would the US get out of a delay, except for another year of the GOP trying to defund/repeal it? If GOP congressmen really think this is the worst law ever passed, why should we believe that they just want to work out the law's kinks and let it take effect in October 2014? It's far more believable that the GOP House just wants a political victory here - so why would Obama be motivated to sign such a bill?
[ October 04, 2013, 05:46 PM: Message edited by: James Tiberius Kirk ]
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
so i guess the fda ain't inspecting food anymore, i guess we'll just let the invisible hand of the market figure all that stuff out for us
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Geraine: Out of necessity? You do realize this is the first time a president, during a government shutdown, says that he will not negotiate with the other side of the aisle?
Skipping over the dubiousness of the claim that this is the "first time" a President has done such a thing (really Geraine, the definition of a shutdown is a refusal to continue negotiations), let's get to the "other side of the aisle" part.
1. This is NOT a negotiation. There are no legitimate bargaining chips here. The legislation passed the house and senate. It was signed into law. It survived a challenge in the supreme court. It is law. It is the legal duty, in fact, of the congress to meet that fiscal obligation and pay for the Affordable Care Act. It would actually be *unlawful* in the broadest sense, not to fund it, as it is law.
2. This is NOT a negotiation. The House cannot, and no House in the history of our country has *ever* exacted the price of killing legislation in exchange for the passage of a budget. Ever. It is a bridge too far. It is a price that cannot, and would *never* be payed.
3. This only looks like a negotiation to you. And to some other people who have been hoodwinked, lied to, promised more than could reasonably be offered or expected, and/or are deluded and possibly ignorant of the facts. This is a dangerous, cowardly attack on the rule of law. Plainly speaking. It is an attempt to use the power of a majority in congress to exact a change in legislation passed lawfully, signed into law, and campaigned on by a President who won re-election on the strength of this as a basis of his platform. It is an attempt to do this by reeking real and measurable havoc upon the processes of government, and exacting real world, lasting damage to our governmental institutions, to weaken them, and to weaken our nation in the pursuit of a political objective.
This is the farthest thing, the farthest possible thing, from the democratic process. And there is NO form of negotiation that can work. There is NO form of negotiation that the Republicans can demand on this issue. There is no standing for them to exact *any* price for passing a spending bill. None, when it comes to Obamacare. That is the position in which this situation begins and ends. It will end when they pass a budget. They have the power to do that. And they will.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
You have to look at the long game. If this tactic results in one molecule of victory for the Republican party, expect it to immediately becomes par the course for the regular business of government. Not only will the Republicans have to deal with a future minority Democratic party that refuses to fund the things Republicans think are important, the Republican party will in during THIS administration, continue to do this. They might pass a funding bill for a few months, maybe even a year if we are optimistic, but they will do this again. The establishment GOP won't want to but their large Tea Party caucus just played this game, they got them all on board, they have no reason not to threaten another shutdown because they actually want the government to shrink.
The only way to establish order is to not give one single inch.
Not one.
If not one inch is given, the legislators will move to another strategy, and honestly this strategy *is* the result of their trying other legitimate levers of government and not getting the desired result. Think about how presidential appointees used to be rubber stamped by Congress, until one day, Congress tried using it to secure concessions, and it worked. It's now par the course to challenge EVERY single appointee.
The idea of us using the threat of government collapse or shutdown every few months in a sordid game of chicken as the means to pass routine legislation, not even new things, scares me. I hate that idea. Hate it.
[ October 07, 2013, 03:45 PM: Message edited by: BlackBlade ]
Posted by Geraine (Member # 9913) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: You have to look at the long game. If this tactic results in one molecule of victory for the Republican party, expect it to immediately becomes par the course for the regular business of government. Not only will the Republicans have to deal with a future minority Democratic party that refuses to fund the things Republicans think are important, the Republican party will in during THIS administration, continue to do this. They might pass a funding bill for a few months, maybe even a year if we are optimistic, but they will do this again. The establishment GOP won't want to but their large Tea Party caucus just played this game, they got them all on board, they have no reason not to threaten another shutdown because they actually want the government to shrink.
The only way to establish order is to not give one single inch.
Not one.
If not one inch is given, the legislators will move to another strategy, and honestly this strategy *is* the result of their trying other legitimate levers of government and not getting the desired result. Think about how presidential appointees used to be rubber stamped by Congress, until one day, Congress tried using it to secure concessions, and it worked. It's now par the course to challenge EVERY single appointee.
The idea of us using the threat of government collapse or shutdown every few months in a sordid game of chicken as the means to pass routine legislation, not even new things, scares me. I hate that idea. Hate it.
Except this is exactly what happened in the 70's, 80's, and the 90's. It was a regular ocurrance for decades, but since we have gone a while without having one, it is all of the sudden a huge deal now? If negotiations during shutdowns never took place during other shutdowns, Clinton would have never balanced the budget, Medicare funding would have never been allowed to be used for abortions in cases of rape or incest, and we would have never gotten welfare reform.
I understand the negative impacts of a shutdown. What I do not understand is the blatant effort on the administration's part to make it as painful as possible. Today two elderly people were kicked out of their home near Las Vegas because the house falls on government land.
There are cones going up on a highway so people can't park and look at Mount Rushmore. Parking your car, getting out, and taking a picture obviously costs the government a ton of money, yet having someone police the area doesn't.... Right?
Earlier the Amber Alert website was taken down while the First Lady's "Get Moving" website was left up. (Following a number of complaints the Amber Alert site is now back up.)
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
Weren't the previous negotiations over relative funding levels of various programs in the bill, not whether to defund a law unrelated to the funding bill?
quote:Earlier the Amber Alert website was taken down while the First Lady's "Get Moving" website was left up.
There's no central Federal web sites control panel with little buttons to flick the various sites on and off. Each department decided what to do with their sites. The response by Federal web sites has been all over the map. Some are up, some are down, some have a notification that they will not be updated or that actions requiring human interventions will not be possible. Finding one seemingly critical one that happens to be down and one seemingly superfluous one that happens to be up is great for political theatre but is ultimately meaningless.
In this case it's trumped-up outrage as the Amber Alert website that was down was just a static collection of information about the program. Actual Amber Alerts were unaffected.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:What I do not understand is the blatant effort on the administration's part to make it as painful as possible.
That's because said blatant effort doesn't exist and is a conspiratorial hallucination of right-wing news sources.
Posted by Dan_Frank (Member # 8488) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:What I do not understand is the blatant effort on the administration's part to make it as painful as possible.
That's because said blatant effort doesn't exist and is a conspiratorial hallucination of right-wing news sources.
I genuinely haven't been following the shutdown news on any of my usual blogs or news outlets, so I am mostly in the dark about this. Barring maybe a few things I've heard in verbal conversations. So the following is a sincere question and in no way a partisan trap or whatever:
The thing Geraine described at Mt Rushmore seems like political theater intended to make the shutdown "hurt." I've heard a few similar claims about other unattended monuments like a veteran's memorial (WW2 memorial maybe? I can't recall).
Are these claims just right wing lies? Or did they happen?
Or is there an alternative explanation for why they happened, but they are reasonable actions and not the petulant ones they appear to me to be?
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
There are no park services personal available at the Mall other than a handful of police officers. That leaves any of the normally staffed sites subject to vandalism, injury (they mentioned difficulty finding wheelchair ramps), accumulation of garbage (which can lead to an accumulation of vermin), etc. If they have any sort of insurance or maintenance arrangement with a private firm they may even be contractually obligated to close the area down when it is not being staffed.
Personally I don't think it was necessary to shut down that monument, but I also don't think it is blatantly ridiculous based on at least the reasoning I can come up with and not knowing the full context.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:a majority in congress
the farthest possible thing from the democratic process
I seem to remember somebody or other saying something like "elections have consequences". Probably some dang [strike]fascist[/strike] Republican.
Posted by theamazeeaz (Member # 6970) on :
Daniel Webster Henry Clay John C. Calhoun.
Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :
The "make it hurt" angle is right wing propaganda. Choosing to keep certain appropriations-funded sites or parks open would be a violation of the Antideficiency act.
There may be a line between passively not staffing a monument and barricading it, but Matt has covered the reasons why such the latter might be the most reasonable course of action. Without appropriations, even paying for garbage removal could be in violation of the law.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank: Or is there an alternative explanation for why they happened, but they are reasonable actions and not the petulant ones they appear to me to be?
That would be it. The shutdown contingency plan that has been put into use now (as well as the designation of furloughed personnel) has been clearly lined up for years, and are closely tied to a number of things, including
1. what the national parks are literally allowed by law to do or pay people to do in the event of a shutdown, and 2. liability issues wrt public on grounds owned and nominally managed by federal park personnel. who are not there.
The rules governing what has to be shut down and why they have to be shut down actually largely predates the Obama administration, so it's been quite a laugh to watch right wing news sources collect images of things like scenic overpasses and dockway parks and say "they're closing them even though they require no money to maintain! they're just trying to make us hurt!" when in reality they are just following the rules for what happens when you must furlough the staff required for oversight, and without appropriations issues for oversight, maintenance, security, garbage removal, and liability issues, you have to make sure the area is closed off and clearly marked as closed.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: You have to look at the long game. If this tactic results in one molecule of victory for the Republican party, expect it to immediately becomes par the course for the regular business of government. Not only will the Republicans have to deal with a future minority Democratic party that refuses to fund the things Republicans think are important, the Republican party will in during THIS administration, continue to do this. They might pass a funding bill for a few months, maybe even a year if we are optimistic, but they will do this again. The establishment GOP won't want to but their large Tea Party caucus just played this game, they got them all on board, they have no reason not to threaten another shutdown because they actually want the government to shrink.
The only way to establish order is to not give one single inch.
Not one.
If not one inch is given, the legislators will move to another strategy, and honestly this strategy *is* the result of their trying other legitimate levers of government and not getting the desired result. Think about how presidential appointees used to be rubber stamped by Congress, until one day, Congress tried using it to secure concessions, and it worked. It's now par the course to challenge EVERY single appointee.
The idea of us using the threat of government collapse or shutdown every few months in a sordid game of chicken as the means to pass routine legislation, not even new things, scares me. I hate that idea. Hate it.
Except this is exactly what happened in the 70's, 80's, and the 90's. It was a regular ocurrance for decades, but since we have gone a while without having one, it is all of the sudden a huge deal now? If negotiations during shutdowns never took place during other shutdowns, Clinton would have never balanced the budget, Medicare funding would have never been allowed to be used for abortions in cases of rape or incest, and we would have never gotten welfare reform.
I understand the negative impacts of a shutdown. What I do not understand is the blatant effort on the administration's part to make it as painful as possible. Today two elderly people were kicked out of their home near Las Vegas because the house falls on government land.
There are cones going up on a highway so people can't park and look at Mount Rushmore. Parking your car, getting out, and taking a picture obviously costs the government a ton of money, yet having someone police the area doesn't.... Right?
Earlier the Amber Alert website was taken down while the First Lady's "Get Moving" website was left up. (Following a number of complaints the Amber Alert site is now back up.)
You ever gonna answer the question? I'll repeat it for you, if you believe Obamacare to be a bad law that hurts businesses, would you support instead Single Payer?
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Is it possible Geraine forgot the question, or hasn't had time to answer all the remarks pointed his way in the middle of the week? Just a thought.
Posted by Dan_Frank (Member # 8488) on :
Or he just didn't think Blayne was worth answering. What's the point? It's a non-sequitur.
Posted by umberhulk (Member # 11788) on :
one time was enough blayne
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: Is it possible Geraine forgot the question, or hasn't had time to answer all the remarks pointed his way in the middle of the week? Just a thought.
If you check the date for the first time I asked, it was over a week ago.
quote: Or he just didn't think Blayne was worth answering. What's the point? It's a non-sequitur.
Ha, it's not a non-sequitor because Geraine brought it up first, that "Obamacare is flawed" and the 'Democrats should have compromised in order to make it better for small businesses by delaying it further.' Is a point he made, so challenging that point is perfectly fine.
We had this discussion before with your and capax's hypocrisy regarding how apparently gun ownership is some sort of inalienable constitutionally granted right that shouldn't be infringed upon in anyway that would make it difficult for poor people to own a gun; but the right to vote is completely different because this situation is different OH LOOK A SQUIRREL, this conversation is a non-sequitor!
You claim any contradiction is a non-sequitor.
quote: one time was enough blayne
Why? Repeating the question when evaded is something many posters here have done before.
quote: John Boehner on ABC's This Week: "We are not going to pass a clean debt limit increase."
LETS GET READY TO RRRRRRRRRRRUMBLE!
And for the collapse of western civilization because Republicans can't stop being crybabies and Democrats chose an awfully bad time to grow a pair of balls.
Posted by umberhulk (Member # 11788) on :
so?
Posted by The White Whale (Member # 6594) on :
Thomas Friedman actually has two insightful columns. I stopped reading him awhile ago, but these ring true.
quote: What we’re seeing here is how three structural changes that have been building in American politics have now, together, reached a tipping point — creating a world in which a small minority in Congress can not only hold up their own party but the whole government. And this is the really scary part: The lawmakers doing this can do so with high confidence that they personally will not be politically punished, and may, in fact, be rewarded. When extremists feel that insulated from playing by the traditional rules of our system, if we do not defend those rules — namely majority rule and the fact that if you don’t like a policy passed by Congress, signed by the president and affirmed by the Supreme Court then you have to go out and win an election to overturn it; you can’t just put a fiscal gun to the country’s head — then our democracy is imperiled.
This danger was neatly captured by Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank, when he wrote on Tuesday about the 11th-hour debate in Congress to avert the shutdown. Noting a shameful statement by Speaker John Boehner, Milbank wrote: “Democrats howled about ‘extortion’ and ‘hostage taking,’ which Boehner seemed to confirm when he came to the floor and offered: ‘All the Senate has to do is say ‘yes,’ and the government is funded tomorrow.’ It was the legislative equivalent of saying, ‘Give me the money and nobody gets hurt.’ ”
quote: In other words, the only thing standing between mainstream Republicans and a hellish future of kowtowing to Ted Cruz, never seeing the inside of the White House and possibly losing the House is President Obama’s refusal to give in to the shutdown blackmail that Cruz & Co. have cooked up. The more pragmatic Republicans, who know that this is a disaster for their party but won’t confront Cruz & Co., have settled on this bogus line: “Well, sure, maybe Cruz and the Tea Party went too far, but it’s still President Obama’s fault. He’s president. He should negotiate with them. He needs to lead.”
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
quote:Originally posted by Elison R. Salazar: And for the collapse of western civilization ...
Every cloud has a silver lining
quote:According to the Washington Post, a debt default would have some clearly positive outcomes. Specifically it told readers that it would weaken the United States position as a financial safe haven for the rest of the world.
This would have two beneficial effects. If less money flowed from elsewhere in the world to the United States this would reduce the value of the dollar relative to other currencies. This has in fact been a stated goal of both the Bush and Obama administration, which both claimed that they wanted to end "currency manipulation." Currency manipulation means that other countries are deliberately buying up dollars to raise the value of the dollar against their own currency.
The effort to end currency manipulation is an effort to lower the value of the dollar. If investors stop buying dollars because it is no longer a safe haven, then this would lower the value of the dollar in the same way that if foreign central banks stopped buying dollars to "manipulate" the value of their currency, it would lower the value of the dollar. In other words, people who would applaud the end of currency manipulation should also applaud the ending of the dollar as the world's safe haven currency.
The other positive part of this story is that such a shift would lead to a downsizing of the financial industry in the United States. This would allow the resources in the sector to be reallocated to more productive sectors of the economy. It would also reduce the power of the financial industry in American politics.
A debt default may still be a bad story, but the vast majority of people in the United States have little to fear from the ending of the dollar as a safe haven currency.
That sounds remarkably like, "Weight loss is a good thing for the overweight US, so they have nothing to fear from these tube worm parasites."
The benefits of a weaker dollar are not offset by the uptick in interest payments the US will incur attendant to the increase in risk.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by The White Whale:
quote: In other words, the only thing standing between mainstream Republicans and a hellish future of kowtowing to Ted Cruz, never seeing the inside of the White House and possibly losing the House is President Obama’s refusal to give in to the shutdown blackmail that Cruz & Co. have cooked up. The more pragmatic Republicans, who know that this is a disaster for their party but won’t confront Cruz & Co., have settled on this bogus line: “Well, sure, maybe Cruz and the Tea Party went too far, but it’s still President Obama’s fault. He’s president. He should negotiate with them. He needs to lead.”
Salient.
The numbers are coming in and this is, unsurprisingly, a complete disaster for republicans. Three polling groups doing 'generic' analysis already show Republicans losing the house over the shutdown. It's really been that bad. It's pitted Republicans against, at minimum, 70% of the country.
It's a bit much to bear, even with their gerrymandered buffering against proportional representation.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
They won't lose the house. Americans don't have long enough political memories.
It might allow the dems the hang on to the Senate though.
And I don't want them to lose the House. Even if the dems win it back, they still can't govern with a GOP filibuster in the Senate. Better to have a whipping boy to blame for when Hillary runs.
[ October 09, 2013, 06:02 PM: Message edited by: Lyrhawn ]
Posted by Geraine (Member # 9913) on :
quote:Originally posted by Elison R. Salazar: You ever gonna answer the question? I'll repeat it for you, if you believe Obamacare to be a bad law that hurts businesses, would you support instead Single Payer?
I did answer your question, albeit in another thread. I see no reason I need to answer it again in this one.
Posted by Geraine (Member # 9913) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:Originally posted by The White Whale:
quote: In other words, the only thing standing between mainstream Republicans and a hellish future of kowtowing to Ted Cruz, never seeing the inside of the White House and possibly losing the House is President Obama’s refusal to give in to the shutdown blackmail that Cruz & Co. have cooked up. The more pragmatic Republicans, who know that this is a disaster for their party but won’t confront Cruz & Co., have settled on this bogus line: “Well, sure, maybe Cruz and the Tea Party went too far, but it’s still President Obama’s fault. He’s president. He should negotiate with them. He needs to lead.”
Salient.
The numbers are coming in and this is, unsurprisingly, a complete disaster for republicans. Three polling groups doing 'generic' analysis already show Republicans losing the house over the shutdown. It's really been that bad. It's pitted Republicans against, at minimum, 70% of the country.
It's a bit much to bear, even with their gerrymandered buffering against proportional representation.
Which really isn't any different than the last time the threat of a government shutdown was looming.
Lyrhawn is right in that they probably won't lose the House. They may lose a few seats, but I don't think they will take the majority. What they DID do though is screw their chances at taking back the Senate, which before the shutdown they were in a decent position to do.
It's not just the Republicans losing favorability though. Obama's approval ratings have dropped almost 7% since the shutdown, down to 37%. The Democratic Party has also dropped to just over a 40% approval rating.
The president isn't doing himself any favors either though, especially with closing open area locations. Not letting WWII vets have access to the National Mall but allowing an immigration rally a few days later isn't really a smart thing to do. Either close it completely (from what I have read it actually costs more to keep these open areas closed than to keep them open) or let everyone have access.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
It's not as simple as the President deciding 'these things stay open during a shutdown'. I'm not sure why people seriously offer that, as though all that would be necessary is for someone in government to will it done, and it's done. It's even been explained in this thread how the process of shutdown isn't, once started, as arbitrary and easily modified as you think.
I'm deeply frustrated when I hear stuff like 'the President isn't doing himself any favors'. It skips entirely over the part where his opposition is the one that has forced this scenario. A minority of them think it's important enough-well let them own up to it then!
Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :
Just to give an example -
Garbage removal = not an essential service, it's probably illegal (see here) to pay for it during a shutdown.
Guarding federal property = essential service, it's okay to continue this during a shutdown.
This is why you end up with barricades and guards around "open air" stuff. It's not because Obama wants to make it hurt.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
There are also safety and liability concerns for many things like federal roads and national parks which explains why they are closed.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by Geraine:
quote:Originally posted by Elison R. Salazar: You ever gonna answer the question? I'll repeat it for you, if you believe Obamacare to be a bad law that hurts businesses, would you support instead Single Payer?
I did answer your question, albeit in another thread. I see no reason I need to answer it again in this one.
edit: found it.
quote: The answer is complex. There are numerous things in the ACA that are wonderful like no lifetime maximums, preventative care, deductible caps, etc. From 2010-2013, this was a massive step up over the status quo. From 2014 going forward however, I would (and I can't believe I am going to say this) prefer a Single Payer / Universal Healthcare system as opposed to the Affordable Care Act.
I argued against it quite a bit back when it was passed simply because it was backed by Democrats. Yeah, I know. Now however that we have had some time to digest it a bit more, I am torn. I think there are some VERY positive things in the bill that will genuinely help people. On the other hand, there are numerous parts of this bill that are downright horrible for job growth.
I work primarily with small businesses with 25-100 employees. What I have seen so far, at least here in Nevada, are that rates are skyrocketing. We are seeing increases as high as 70% from Aetna and Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield. Many of my clients that have less than 50 employees are thinking about dropping their plans entirely and having their employees go through the exchanges, as it is becoming too cost prohibitive. Those employers teetering on 50 employees are cutting hours and changing employees to part time due to the Full Time Equivalency rule. Even if you have 60 employees, cutting 40 of them to 20 hours a week will keep you under 50, and you won't have to provide health insurance.
Employers now have to pay at least 50% of the employer only coverage of health insurance. If a plan was $400 a month, your employer had to pay $200. I just saw a client whose premiums jumped to over $650 a month, for an increase of about $175 a month to the employer. They currently have 40 full time employees, which means an increase of $84,000 in 2014 over 2013.
One of my clients has over 100 employees, and they are cutting 70 positions to part time. Even though they do have provide health insurance to their full time employees, you don't have to provide it to part time employees. The part time employees can still go to the exchange, and the company does not get penalized.
This is one of the reasons 90% of the new jobs that have been created over the past few years have been part time. Employers see these massive increases and are cutting wherever they can.
My brother worked for a pizza chain as an assistant manager, and the franchise owner cut every single person on his payroll, including managers, to 28 hours a week and classified them as part time. Yes, he has to provide health insurance since he has over 50 FTE employees, but since all of his employees are part time they don't qualify. Essentially he has a plan with nobody on it. Luckily he just got a full time job at Amazon. (Good thing too, he is getting married next month!)
Currently that loophole is there, and employers are taking advantage of it. The problem is there really isn't a good way to fix it.
I think part of the down trend in support for the bill is due in part to these cuts in full time positions.
Here is what I predict will happen:
1) Employers will continue to cut full time positions in favor of part time
2) The part time employees will go through the exchanges for their coverage.
3) The part time people in the exchanges will not be able to afford the premiums, resulting in their premiums being subsidized.
4) Legislation to ammend the bill to either raise taxes to fund the subsidies or force employers to hire more full time employees will be introduced. The tax bill will probably pass.
5) The exchanges will continue to grow and more and more people will be subsidized until it becomes too expensive to maintain again.
6) At this point, a Single Payer System will be introduced in order to "fix" everything. Republicans will argue that we should keep portions of the ACA but get rid fo the rest, which will give an incentive to employers to hire more full time employees. Democrats will argue that if we did that it will cause people to lose their insurance. Gridlock will commence but eventually we will get Single Payer.
Found it, just so we're clear, you know that the ACA is all that could've been accomplished with the "healthcare is socialism" angle played by the GOP right? Its so that people will realize they like healthcare, see that it works, and then the progressive caucus can lobby for singleplayer. The ACA is a transitive step.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: That sounds remarkably like, "Weight loss is a good thing for the overweight US, so they have nothing to fear from these tube worm parasites."
The benefits of a weaker dollar are not offset by the uptick in interest payments the US will incur attendant to the increase in risk.
An uptick in interest payments isn't an unambiguously bad outcome. There are winners from higher interest rates and there are losers from higher interest rates. Be one of the winners.
Posted by capaxinfiniti (Member # 12181) on :
quote:Originally posted by Elison R. Salazar: We had this discussion before with your and capax's hypocrisy regarding how apparently gun ownership is some sort of inalienable constitutionally granted right that shouldn't be infringed upon in anyway that would make it difficult for poor people to own a gun; but the right to vote is completely different because this situation is different
Either that's an embarrassing effort to misrepresent my position or you must have misremembered what was said in that discussion.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Geraine: Lyrhawn is right in that they probably won't lose the House. They may lose a few seats, but I don't think they will take the majority. What they DID do though is screw their chances at taking back the Senate, which before the shutdown they were in a decent position to do.
Hallucination no. 2 of right-wing news sources. They were not at all going to take the senate back.
And if the shutdown proceeds all the way to the elections, they will probably lose the house. The short memory spans of Americans and their tendency to vote against their best interests notwithstanding.
quote:The president isn't doing himself any favors either though, especially with closing open area locations. Not letting WWII vets have access to the National Mall but allowing an immigration rally a few days later isn't really a smart thing to do. Either close it completely (from what I have read it actually costs more to keep these open areas closed than to keep them open) or let everyone have access.
"the president is not doing himself any favors with this thing that is actually not the fault of decisions he made but is actually the inevitable result of republican obstructionism."
sure. See the two responses after yours for clarification as to what's actually going on.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Mucus:
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: That sounds remarkably like, "Weight loss is a good thing for the overweight US, so they have nothing to fear from these tube worm parasites."
The benefits of a weaker dollar are not offset by the uptick in interest payments the US will incur attendant to the increase in risk.
An uptick in interest payments isn't an unambiguously bad outcome. There are winners from higher interest rates and there are losers from higher interest rates. Be one of the winners.
I'm honestly curious as to why a higher interest rate for the government to borrow money can be a good thing.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Wouldn't it mean the value of the dollar drops? That's a boon for American exports. Might mean the price of oil drops too since petroleum is traded in dollars.
That's not going to help when you want to get a house or car loan, so, hope you already locked those in.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Yes, a weaker dollar is good for exports. But I'm not seeing the benefits of a higher interest rate when the government needs to borrow money and is already finding it hard to service its debt.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
Trivially, people who still loan money to the US government would earn a higher interest rate due to the risk. As an example, pension plans and retirees with money saved up would benefit.
Higher interest rates for the US government would also imply that investment would be moving elsewhere such as other countries which may very well have more productive uses for the money or could benefit from lower interest rates.
And yes, the dollar would drop as that article indicates, "In other words, people who would applaud the end of currency manipulation should also applaud the ending of the dollar as the world's safe haven currency."
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Well, call me selfish, but that doesn't help ME.
Therefore I disapprove.
Posted by Jeff C. (Member # 12496) on :
Can someone please explain to me what will happen if they don't reach a deal soon? I keep seeing this countdown on CNN, but I don't really know what it is or what will happen. I don't know if this has already been covered, but a quick rundown would really be helpful to me.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
A quick Googling will reveal about a gazillion articles on what would happen if we breach the debt ceiling.
On the one hand, no one really knows. It's such an unlikely, bizarre, catastrophic scenario that no one is really sure except that it would be bad.
But, off the top of my head some of the guesses:
People stop buying treasuries. That's actually already happened. Financial companies are dumping short term treasuries that are due to come due because they expect they won't be paid later this month. Lots of people think it will lead to a massive sell-off in treasuries and that it will forever damage the bond market because T-Bills, universally and globally agreed upon as the safest possible place to park money, will no longer be so. That means borrowing costs for the US government and average US citizens will forever be higher than they currently are, and our standard of living will take a hit.
The Treasury also isn't sure, at a basic technical level, what would happen when they run out of cash. They'll be able to spend taxes that come in on a monthly basis, but that could lead to a shortfall of hundreds of billions. Some Republicans are saying that's easy, you just pay the interest on the debt, sate the bond holders, and don't pay domestic bills like Social Security or federal salaries and such. But the problem is that the US Treasury sends out literally millions of payments a day. It all happens automatically. Computer wire money around the globe to people we owe it to and the system is not designed to pick and choose where to send payments. In fact, the system was never designed to do anything but automatically make the payments.
Many aren't sure if, within a span of literally a week, they can devise a way that would allow the Treasury to make individual payments to some but not others. They also aren't even sure if it's legal.
Others are arguing it's actually illegal NOT to raise the debt ceiling. The 14th amendment says that it's illegal to call into question the debt, which basically means the Constitution says we always have to pay our bills. Some say that Obama has a Constitutional obligation to do something to raise the debt ceiling if Congress doesn't act, maybe by ordering the Treasury to mint a trillion dollar coin and deposit it in our coffers. It might drive up inflation, but it'd kick the can down the road.
This whole thing would also (and already has) scare the living crap out of the rest of the world, because we basically prop up the entire global economic system, and a debt default would have ripple effects across the world markets. The more unstable we look, the less people will want to do business with us.
In some way, shape, or form, problems arise when we hit the debt ceiling if they don't raise it. Even if we pay the interest on the debt, we're going to be short hundreds of billions. The only way out is to do one of two things: dramatically increase taxes by double digits to make up the short fall, or enact draconian austerity the likes of which even Europe hasn't seen. Social security checks would not go out. Medicare payments would not be made. Soldiers would not be paid. Unemployment checks would not go out. Food stamp cards would not be recharged.
Also, the stock market would probably crash, but many suspect the market might have a series of mini crashes in the run up to the debt ceiling because the markets won't wait for the crash before they freak out. Wall Street might also hope a crash would jolt Congress into action.
Basically, it's a huge charlie foxtrot, and no one is sure what will happen, but it won't be as simple as Rand Paul's "all we're really doing is balancing the budget."
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Is that really what rand paul said
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Well, call me selfish, but that doesn't help ME.
Therefore I disapprove.
Right?
------
Mucus: That still all seems mostly beneficial to other entities, not the US government. I actually like my government and want it to be successful. It paying more and more of its budgets in interest payments is bad news bears to me.
Posted by Geraine (Member # 9913) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:Originally posted by Geraine: Lyrhawn is right in that they probably won't lose the House. They may lose a few seats, but I don't think they will take the majority. What they DID do though is screw their chances at taking back the Senate, which before the shutdown they were in a decent position to do.
Hallucination no. 2 of right-wing news sources. They were not at all going to take the senate back.
And if the shutdown proceeds all the way to the elections, they will probably lose the house. The short memory spans of Americans and their tendency to vote against their best interests notwithstanding.
Except, you know, other news sources that aren't right wing were saying the same thing. MSNBC and the Huffington Post both said they had a good shot. But hey, they are about as right wing as they come, right?
quote:
quote:The president isn't doing himself any favors either though, especially with closing open area locations. Not letting WWII vets have access to the National Mall but allowing an immigration rally a few days later isn't really a smart thing to do. Either close it completely (from what I have read it actually costs more to keep these open areas closed than to keep them open) or let everyone have access.
"the president is not doing himself any favors with this thing that is actually not the fault of decisions he made but is actually the inevitable result of republican obstructionism."
sure. See the two responses after yours for clarification as to what's actually going on.
Yet he obviously has the power to decide who the shutdown applies to and who it doesn't. When you arrest vets for being on the property but allow an immigration rally, you are making a bad decision. Pelosi, at the rally, thanked the Administration for allowing them to use the National Mall for the rally.
He may not have caused the circumstances that caused the shutdown, but the decisions he is making with the power he does have are very poor. There is no reason to shut down private businesses or farms that use no federal funds. In some cases, closing the parks are costing MORE money than they do to actually operate.
Republicans are responsible for the shutdown, no doubt. They should be blamed for it. The administration however is trying to make it more painful than it needs to be. For that, they should be blamed.
When Bush's approval rating dipped to 36% it was all over the news. Wolf Blitzer was talking about how Bush was in over his head and how he didn't know how to lead. Obama's approval rating is now 37%, but somehow that is the republicans fault too.
ETA: Republicans are now only asking for a 1 year delay for the individual mandate in exchange for passing a clean CR. This would simply mean that the 1% or $95 penalty per family (whichever is greater) for not having insurance would be delayed a year. Sounds pretty reasonable to me.
[ October 10, 2013, 11:58 AM: Message edited by: Geraine ]
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
Blackblade: Of course I was responding to Blayne who was talking about the death of western civilization and responding to your requests for clarification. There's an awful lot of western civilization which is not the US government.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: Is that really what rand paul said
That's not a direct quote, but he said something awfully damn similar. I can't remember the exact wording.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Geraine: Yet he obviously has the power to decide who the shutdown applies to and who it doesn't.
I'm sorry, what's obvious about this? What has Obama done, specifically, which is not in accordance with the law? Because Obama can decide (sort of, and in a far more limited fashion than you are implying) how to spend money the government *has*. He cannot decided how to spend money the government does not have. This means that money not allocated or remaining in budgets *cannot* be spent by Obama. And any work that he can order done without pay (or with the promise of later reimbursement) has to be covered by legal statute. Has to. That's the end of it. That is the nature of the antideficiency act. There are laws about what you can do without paying people. If Obama breaks them, trust me, you'll hear all about it.
quote: In some cases, closing the parks are costing MORE money than they do to actually operate.
This has been addressed directly, several times.
Obama does not get to make this decision. These decisions are written into law that he must follow. This means, and yes it is bizarre and unfair (but it is also NOT his decision), that in some cases Obama is legally allowed to let government agencies spend more than they would normally spend doing normal operations, stopping those normal operations from happening. That is the law. Would it be nice to change the law? Yes. Is it Obama's decision whether he gets to follow the law or not, or whether the heads of his agencies have to follow it? No. You are blaming him for doing his job, because he don't like the result. You are ignoring that his duty is to the law, and not to do what he or you would like him to be doing.
quote: The administration however is trying to make it more painful than it needs to be.
This is unmitigated crap.
Posted by Geraine (Member # 9913) on :
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro:
quote:Originally posted by Geraine: Yet he obviously has the power to decide who the shutdown applies to and who it doesn't.
I'm sorry, what's obvious about this? What has Obama done, specifically, which is not in accordance with the law? Because Obama can decide (sort of, and in a far more limited fashion than you are implying) how to spend money the government *has*. He cannot decided how to spend money the government does not have. This means that money not allocated or remaining in budgets *cannot* be spent by Obama. And any work that he can order done without pay (or with the promise of later reimbursement) has to be covered by legal statute. Has to. That's the end of it. That is the nature of the antideficiency act. There are laws about what you can do without paying people. If Obama breaks them, trust me, you'll hear all about it.
That's fine, however how do you explain him allowing an amnesty rally but denying WWII vets access to the same location? Pelosi thanked him during the rally for allowing them to meet. Was Pelosi just full of hot air, (Likely) or did the administration ok the rally?
Just heard on the news: Chuck Schumer said they are ready to deal with Republicans on the shutdown, and Obama is meeting with the Republican leadership. Apparently he is going to offer sweeping welfare reform in exchange for more tax revenues. When asked about the revenues Schumer said that they didn't want to raise rates, but close loopholes. Republicans would be completely stupid to say no to that, though the way they have been operating lately I wouldn't be suprised if they passed.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Geraine: That's fine, however how do you explain him allowing an amnesty rally but denying WWII vets access to the same location? Pelosi thanked him during the rally for allowing them to meet. Was Pelosi just full of hot air, (Likely) or did the administration ok the rally?
I don't know the details of this event. Perhaps you could share where you heard it from.
I could offhandedly (and this is offhandedly) suggest an explanation: one is a matter of free speech, and the other of normal federal park operation. But I don't know the situation of which you're speaking, so I can't qualify myself to comment.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:That's fine, however how do you explain him allowing an amnesty rally but denying WWII vets access to the same location? Pelosi thanked him during the rally for allowing them to meet. Was Pelosi just full of hot air, (Likely) or did the administration ok the rally?
I suspect she's either full of hot air or is acknowledging a situation where Obama actually has some discretion.
Large-scale rallys on public land generally require a permit and a condition of the permit is that the rally organizers provide adequate security, sanitation, clean-up, etc. It's doubtful that any NPS personal are required to work to support a rally, though some may be employed directly by the event organizers. Security is often provided by off-duty police officers hired by the organizers.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn:
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: Is that really what rand paul said
That's not a direct quote, but he said something awfully damn similar. I can't remember the exact wording.
yikes.
although I did also just read that a senator was on NPR saying that the shutdown was ok because they could just end federal travel compensation for employees so that they could keep medicare funded, so satire is dead and I can't keep up anymore.
Posted by Geraine (Member # 9913) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP:
quote:That's fine, however how do you explain him allowing an amnesty rally but denying WWII vets access to the same location? Pelosi thanked him during the rally for allowing them to meet. Was Pelosi just full of hot air, (Likely) or did the administration ok the rally?
I suspect she's either full of hot air or is acknowledging a situation where Obama actually has some discretion.
Large-scale rallys on public land generally require a permit and a condition of the permit is that the rally organizers provide adequate security, sanitation, clean-up, etc. It's doubtful that any NPS personal are required to work to support a rally, though some may be employed directly by the event organizers. Security is often provided by off-duty police officers hired by the organizers.
And I've no problem with that, as long as it is equally applied. The WWII memorial has always been an unmanned outdoor memorial that has remained open during every other government shutdown. Why is it closed now? Why weren't WWII vets allowed to go there? And if they were not able to go, why was the amnesty rally allowed?
Private businesses are also being shut down despite not receiving one cent of federal funds. One company, "Recreation Resource Management" was shut down, and they actually provide money to the Treasury.
The owner said:
quote: "[T]oday, we have been told by senior member of the US Forest Service and Department of Agriculture that people ‘above the department’, which I presume means the White House, plan to order the Forest Service to needlessly and illegally close all private operations. I can only assume their intention is to artificially increase the cost of the shutdown as some sort of political ploy. The point of the shutdown is to close non-essential operations that require Federal money and manpower to stay open. So why is the White House closing private operations that require no government money to keep open and actually pay a percentage of their gate revenues back to the Treasury? We are a tenant of the US Forest Service, and a tenant does not have to close his business just because his landlord goes on a vacation."
Again, no other government shutdown caused any of this. Did the rules for the government shutdown change between the 90's and today? I am sincerely wondering, as I admittedly do not have much knowledge on how things are funded. I know at times programs are funded due to different appropriations. It may be that, and if so I get it. If not, why is it happening this time?
This is a separate argument from WHY the government shutdown, I'm wondering why this shutdown is being handled differently than the others. If it is my own misunderstanding on how things work that's fine.
[ October 10, 2013, 01:39 PM: Message edited by: Geraine ]
Posted by Risuena (Member # 2924) on :
quote:Again, no other government shutdown caused any of this. Did the rules for the government shutdown change between the 90's and today? I am sincerely wondering, as I admittedly do not have much knowledge on how things are funded. I know at times programs are funded due to different appropriations. It may be that, and if so I get it. If not, why is it happening this time?
When the shutdowns in the 90s occurred, 13 appropriations bills had been passed. Agencies and departments funded by those bills were able to continue operations. Others were limited to essential personnel. I assume the National Park Service was one of those that was funded.
With the current shutdown, no appropriations bills have been passed, so no agency or department that depends on appropriations has funding including the National Park Service.
(Also, just as a factual note, the WWII Monument was not open during the 1995-96 shutdown. It did not exist at the time.)
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote: Financial companies are dumping short term treasuries that are due to come due because they expect they won't be paid later this month.
Then you have to wonder who is buying the things. After all they aren't literally being dumped into landfills.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
Probably short selling at lower margins?
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
quote:And I've no problem with that, as long as it is equally applied. The WWII memorial has always been an unmanned outdoor memorial that has remained open during every other government shutdown. Why is it closed now? Why weren't WWII vets allowed to go there?
It's not "unmanned". It's part of a larger complex of monuments which normally have ~300 staff members which have all been furloughed. The staff provide a number of services including maintenance and assistance to law enforcement. Without their presence there are liability, sanitation, and security issues. The monument could be vandalized, for instance. It's notable that the NPS is allowing some Federal facilities to open again if the states in which they are located are willing to pay for the staff and operations. If this was just about making it as painful as possible they wouldn't have offered that compromise.
quote:And if they were not able to go, why was the amnesty rally allowed?
Because the rally likely provided all of it's own staff under the terms of its permit.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote: The WWII memorial has always been an unmanned outdoor memorial that has remained open during every other government shutdown.
The WWII memorial opened in 2004. It didn't exist for any other government shutdown.
quote: One company, "Recreation Resource Management" was shut down, and they actually provide money to the Treasury.
If their business involved the use of federally owned park land, you already know from this thread why they had to be closed, regardless as to how it's being spun.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
You may have your "facts" but we have the truth.*
*Literally what Republicans have said.
Posted by King of Men (Member # 6684) on :
quote:Originally posted by Elison R. Salazar: Probably short selling at lower margins?
You missed the point. The precise form that the selling takes is irrelevant. Every transaction has two parties: A buyer and a seller. It was asserted that such-and-such is selling because of fear that the bonds won't be paid. The question is, who is buying? Presumably the buyer believes that the bonds will be paid; or alternatively that he'll be able to sell to someone who does tomorrow. At any rate he is willing to take that risk in exchange for a discount, while whoever is selling is not willing.
In every panic except the one that occurs just before the market genuinely ends - and yes, this does happen; Russia 1917, Germany 1923 - there's a lot of people selling and someone is buying at a discount. That guy tends to make out like a bandit. Except, of course, that one time in a century when he loses everything; but then again so does everyone else, because the market stops existing. And then the intelligentsia are rounded up and shot. So losing your investments are really the least of your problems at that point.
Posted by Reticulum (Member # 8776) on :
The seemingly irreparably fractured Republican Party is just trying to ruin Obama's presidency. It's really that simple.
Posted by umberhulk (Member # 11788) on :
I'm really glad the gop is finally getting the reaction they deserve.
[ October 11, 2013, 01:44 AM: Message edited by: umberhulk ]
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Except they aren't. The ones that matter the most here, the ones that are utilizing terrible hostage-taking terrorism politics that would change everything for the worse if Obama capitulates to them?
They tend to be from heavily gerrymandered districts. They don't have to care about the record gulf in favorability ratings between the parties granting huge leads to liberals, and the fact that approval ratings for the GOP just tanked to 28%, because their districts have been rewritten to assure them nearly complete job security.
quote:The vast majority of GOP lawmakers are safely ensconced in districts that, based on the voter rolls, would never think of electing a Democrat. Their bigger worry is that someone even more conservative than they are — bankrolled by a cadre of uncompromising conservative groups — might challenge them in a primary.
quote:The prevailing wisdom ahead of the government shutdown was that tea party lawmakers who agitated for it would fold within a few days, once they got an earful from angry constituents and felt the sting of bad headlines. House GOP leaders called it a “touch the stove” moment for the band of Republican rebels, when ideology would finally meet reality.
But there’s another reality that explains why that thinking may well be wrong, and the country could be in for a protracted standoff: Most of the Republicans digging in have no reason to fear voters will ever punish them for it.
quote:The congressional map is far more gerrymandered today than it was 17 years ago during the last shutdown, when House Speaker Newt Gingrich was negotiating with President Bill Clinton. According to David Wasserman, who analyzes House races for the Cook Political Report, 79 of the 236 House Republicans serving during the last shutdown resided in districts that Clinton won in 1992. Today, just 17 of the 232 House Republicans are in districts that Obama won in 2012.
“Is redistricting a big deal in the sense that there is a greater threat from a primary than a general election? The answer to that is yes,” said David Winston, a Republican pollster and adviser to Boehner. “It’s clearly an element.”
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Geraine:
quote:Originally posted by MattP:
quote:That's fine, however how do you explain him allowing an amnesty rally but denying WWII vets access to the same location? Pelosi thanked him during the rally for allowing them to meet. Was Pelosi just full of hot air, (Likely) or did the administration ok the rally?
Large-scale rallys on public land generally require a permit and a condition of the permit is that the rally organizers provide adequate security, sanitation, clean-up, etc. It's doubtful that any NPS personal are required to work to support a rally, though some may be employed directly by the event organizers. Security is often provided by off-duty police officers hired by the organizers.
Why is it closed now? Why weren't WWII vets allowed to go there? And if they were not able to go, why was the amnesty rally allowed?
I notice, and I doubt I am the only one, that these questions are answered in the quote that they are responding to.
Is it that you don't like the answers? That you don't understand the answers? That you don't accept the answers? Because you have BEEN GIVEN the answers by me, by matt, by Lyrhawn, and by others as well, and you don't acknowledge them as actual answers, and I don't see why that is.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Unironic, unsarcastic answer: it is literally because it does not match the narrative being sold from the sites he gets the interpretation of the "intentionally damaging" shutdown from.
Related news: Utah just pulled off an incredible bit of legal wrangling just to manage to get the national parks in that state reopened on the Governor's dime using "site-specific" personnel that satisfies the restrictions of the 2011 shutdown system plan, and once they had worked this out, Sally Jewell (Secretary of the Interior) immediately jumped on board to get the parks opened.
Note that this doesn't fit the "intentionally damaging" narrative (if that were true, they'd continue to stick it to Utah, which be losing hundreds of millions of dollars during optimum season revenue) but this will be intentionally used for that narrative anyway by misconstruing (intentionally) the legal nuance that Utah worked to get the national parks reopened again in spite of the shutdown.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
In other news, as a salmonella outbreak occurs during the shutdown, the CDC has been spontaneously relabeled as all-essential and they're trying to get that department back to work as soon as possible.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
The whole essential/non-essential division captures something about the US. So having safely inspected food, making sure pollution doesn't poison people, and controlling disease outbreaks? Non-essential. Continuing to spy on your own citizens and bomb foreigners? Totally essential.
Posted by umberhulk (Member # 11788) on :
ok fine sam I'm glad they're getting something
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: Except they aren't. The ones that matter the most here, the ones that are utilizing terrible hostage-taking terrorism politics that would change everything for the worse if Obama capitulates to them?
They tend to be from heavily gerrymandered districts. They don't have to care about the record gulf in favorability ratings between the parties granting huge leads to liberals, and the fact that approval ratings for the GOP just tanked to 28%, because their districts have been rewritten to assure them nearly complete job security.
For what it's worth, a new poll shows that 51 percent of Utahns now disapprove of Mike Lee, a swing of 10 points from just four months ago. And most of those who disapprove strongly disapprove.
Of course, he's a senator, so there are no gerrymandered districts to keep him safe. But we'll see whether Utahns still disapprove of him enough to vote in someone different next time.
Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :
quote:Of course, he's a senator, so there are no gerrymandered districts to keep him safe.
I dunno, the shape of the area where his supposed constituents live looks strangely arbitrary to me.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
well, good to hear about mike lee, I guess.
other news part of the post: so how about that utter and complete disaster of a snowstorm in the dakotas, right when there wasn't a government around to do jack-all about it. you know, that one you totally haven't heard about? i totally didn't.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
HEY READ A CARTOON, A VERY STRANGELY INFORMATIVE ONE
quote:In 1914, cheering throngs all over Europe sent their boys off to war confident that victory could be achieved in a few months with limited casualties. Instead, for the next four years, armies on both sides endured horrible death tolls in the trenches of France. And, increasingly, soldiers found it impossible to recall what they were fighting for.
So it was when the House Republicans shut down the government confident that they could win major concessions from the White House in a few days. Now they are hunkered down in the trenches, with public opinion turning against them, desperate for any rationale to abandon the battlefield. But they cannot simply surrender because … well … that would mean that they have been bleeding in the polls for nothing. Rarely has a political party lost so much so rapidly from a series of strategic blunders.
Posted by Jeff C. (Member # 12496) on :
Since a lot of you seem to know way more about this than I do, let me ask you this:
My roommate says he believes that this whole fight is a good thing because he thinks Obamacare is evil and needs to be abolished. However, if I'm understanding it right, Obamacare doesn't affect him at all, since he already has insurance. Am I right about this or will it really affect everybody? I don't think we'll be getting taxed by it, and I've tried explaining that to him, but he insists that we will. What do you guys think?
Also, that video on the debt ceiling was very informative. Thank you.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
The answer to that question is somewhat nuanced. Insurance premiums have been spiking ever since Obamacare was announced in 2009. There are cost controls in place now that don't let them raise rates past a certain point, though I think they're very laxly enforced.
Premiums for a lot of people will be less than what they otherwise would have been, like individuals, small businesses that have only a small handful of employees, older people and those with pre-existing conditions. Young people are the only ones who really get hit with huge premium hikes because we're essentially subsidizing older people.
But if you already have insurance through your work? It's difficult to say. If he's an hourly employee, it's possible they could cut his hours to get him below full time to kill his health care benefits. Large companies have to pay either taxes or insurance premiums now where before it was largely optional. But I've talked to a few people who are in charge of their work's insurance plans and a lot of them say that the rates are going up left and right.
Is that Obamacare's fault? Yes and no. Obamacare mandates that all plans offered in the country meet a minimum standard of criteria that's higher than what many plans used to cover. Since all plans must now offer that standard, the price for many low cost plans has gone up, but so too has their level of coverage. More is being paid for more and better services. But a lot of it is also price gouging on the part of the insurance companies. They're managed to create a narrative that Obamacare costs more because they're charging more. It's pretty clever, really.
As far as the cost to your room mate? Doubtful he'll even notice. If he already has insurance, there's no direct tax effect on him. His insurance rates might go up, but that only affects what his work pays for his premium if they cover the whole premium. That could affect him eventually if they decide to dump him and pay the penalty, but he'll face no direct tax from Obamacare.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jeff C.: Since a lot of you seem to know way more about this than I do, let me ask you this:
My roommate says he believes that this whole fight is a good thing because he thinks Obamacare is evil and needs to be abolished. However, if I'm understanding it right, Obamacare doesn't affect him at all, since he already has insurance. Am I right about this or will it really affect everybody? I don't think we'll be getting taxed by it, and I've tried explaining that to him, but he insists that we will. What do you guys think?
Also, that video on the debt ceiling was very informative. Thank you.
There's a nuanced argument to be had that while well intention-ed the ACA has a number of flaws that wouldn't exist either by extending Medicare-for-all or adopting singlepayer like a number of other industrialized first world nations.
What the ACA has done is lower the cost curve, the rate in which medical costs are increasing in the United States, as well as preventing those with pre-existing conditions from being denied coverage.
Though, I'm likely thinking your roommate thinks its the path to socialism and doesn't support his taxes supporting people he doesn't want to support because those people think his success is evil in some weird siege mentality.
Hard to determine without knowing how he's evaluating "evil".
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Actually, ACA has NOT lowered the cost curve of overall medical costs. That curve had slowed in the years before the ACA all by itself, and recent reports I've read show that there's a decent chance it's actually increased the rate somewhat.
ACA isn't an overall cost control mechanism. It's an attempt to level the playing field by creating the first honest to goodness health insurance marketplace in the hopes that competition drives down insurance rates, but it doesn't directly address what drives up prices. Part of why it's actually driving premiums up is that forcing companies to take on expensive customers they used to deny coverage to and limited what they can charge those customers means everyone else has to directly subsidize their cost. Previously, it was an indirect subsidy.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
That's not an accurate description of the video. House Republicans changed the rule so that only the Speaker of the House or his assigned depute can initiate a vote to reopen the government. Whereas in the past anybody could have passed that motion.
It's a weasely thing to do, but that's a far cry from forcing the government to shutdown by changing procedural rules.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
If I understand right, it's just forcing the government to stay shut down.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Blackblade,
That strikes me as a distinction without a difference. If you believe that he House was likely to vote to reopen the government using a combo of democratic and moderate Republican votes, then that rule change made it impossible for Dems to force the voice and therefore ensured the government would shut down and stay shut down.
So in essence, yes, the rule change did in fact mean the shut down and stayed down.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
That strikes me as a distinction without a difference. If you believe that he House was likely to vote to reopen the government using a combo of democratic and moderate Republican votes, then that rule change made it impossible for Dems to force the voice and therefore ensured the government would shut down and stay shut down.
So in essence, yes, the rule change did in fact mean the shut down and stayed down.
Forced it to stay shutdown sure. Forced it to shutdown no. This mechanism does not make the shutdown happen.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
But without it the shutdown would have lasted a matter of hours. The senate passed their clean funding bill the next day.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
If things are happening about the way I think they are happening, the effort to throw Ted Cruz under the bus has probably already begun in earnest.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: But without it the shutdown would have lasted a matter of hours.
And you don't see any difference between causing a shutdown that would have lasted a matter of hours and ensuring that a shutdown already in effect stayed in effect?
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: But without it the shutdown would have lasted a matter of hours. The senate passed their clean funding bill the next day.
Well there's Jon Boy's response which is what I wanted to say as well, but there's something else in your post.
I seriously doubt the shutdown would have lasted hours. Even if the Senate passes 1,000 appropriation bills reopening the government, they would have to get through the House, and they wouldn't have with the GOP ultimatum that the individual mandate of the ACA be pushed back one year.
It was that ultimatum and Democrat refusal to capitulate (rightly) that caused the government to run out of money and force a shutdown. This mechanism we are talking about now makes it harder to end the shutdown. That's what it actually does.
I can guess that it's designed to make it impossible for Democrats or more moderate Republicans to publicly lay bare the fractures in the GOP that are forming, or publicly create a spectacle of Democratic Congressman voting over and over to end the shutdown. Sorta like the trick the GOP finished using weeks ago, where they voted to repeal the ADA a gazillion times, and called it trying to save America.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Except people have been doing whip counts since the DAY this thing began, and it's almost universally agreed that if a bill actually came to the floor to re-open the government, the Dems would have voted as a bloc to approve it, and they probably would have peeled off about 17-25 GOP congressmen as well from the moderate wing, like Peter King (can't believe he passes for moderate these days) who have said from the start that they want to re-open the government and that this entire endeavor is stupid.
Your scenario only works if the GOP actually has a lock step bloc that refuses to join the Dems, but that's never been true during the shutdown. There have always been at least a dozen Republicans willing to break ranks and vote to end the shutdown.
So yes, not allowing the Dems or for that matter any moderate Republican (there's a reason he limited it not only to the majority but to the Speaker and his immediate subordinate) to call the vote is a pretty big deal, because it probably would have ended the shutdown, rather than leading to dozens of ineffective party line votes.
quote:Originally posted by Jon Boy:
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: But without it the shutdown would have lasted a matter of hours.
And you don't see any difference between causing a shutdown that would have lasted a matter of hours and ensuring that a shutdown already in effect stayed in effect?
As far as I'm concerned, an eight hour shutdown wouldn't have been a shutdown. National Parks wouldn't have closed. Workers would not have been furloughed. Barricades wouldn't have gone up. It would have been a blip on the radar. It simply wouldn't have been that big a deal. The media would have said they narrowly avoided a shutdown, because a shutdown that only takes place overnight isn't really much of a shutdown at all.
But passing a rule change that allows a shutdown to continue for two or more weeks? That's considerably different.
So yes, as far as I'm concerned, the rule change allowed the shutdown to happen, because had they not changed it, the shutdown likely would have ended by now, and very possibly never would have gone past the wee hours of the morning on Oct. 1.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: As far as I'm concerned, an eight hour shutdown wouldn't have been a shutdown. National Parks wouldn't have closed. Workers would not have been furloughed. Barricades wouldn't have gone up. It would have been a blip on the radar. It simply wouldn't have been that big a deal. The media would have said they narrowly avoided a shutdown, because a shutdown that only takes place overnight isn't really much of a shutdown at all.
But passing a rule change that allows a shutdown to continue for two or more weeks? That's considerably different.
You said that causing a shutdown versus prolonging a shutdown was a distinction without a difference, but I think you just clearly articulated the difference.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
I think perhaps what Lyrhawn is getting at, or part of it, is that at this point-in the present-it's fair to say this procedural change is instrumental to continuing the shutdown, and that it wouldn't have continued without it-and that those who enacted it knew or should have known these things.
Given that-and it sounds like both of you agree, Jon Boy and BlackBlade, how unfair or inaccurate is Lyrhawn being really?
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
I wouldn't say that Lyrhawn is being unfair, but I do think it's inaccurate to say that this change is the cause of the shutdown. I'm just a little baffled by the "distinction without a difference" argument, because it seems pretty clear to me that there's a difference. But I certainly agree that this change was instrumental in continuing the shutdown and that this change seems to have been implemented specifically for that purpose.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
I'm all about faulting the GOP for the shutdown, and even more for keeping the government shutdown. But this change to parliamentary procedure very clearly did not cause the government to shutdown. You can argue it was all part of the GOPs master plan, or that some Democrats knew about this GOP move before the shutdown happened, and decided it was as sign of bad faith at the negotiating table, but that still doesn't make it mechanically responsible for the shutdown.
Which is what Blayne asserted in his link without any nuance. And nuance isn't exactly aplenty in politics these days.
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
It may not be a cause of the shutdown, but I think it's fair to say it was a component of a premeditated plan to cause a shutdown and control how long it lasted, further cementing culpability with the Republican party.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP: It may not be a cause of the shutdown, but I think it's fair to say it was a component of a premeditated plan to cause a shutdown and control how long it lasted, further cementing culpability with the Republican party.
This.
There's a lot of calling the dog a wagon these days in the Republican Party. And I think this is because they realize that the media will give them their share of airtime *no matter* what their messaging is. So they might as well swing for the fences every single time. I think this is core to the reason the Republicans have become so far detached from reality in the past few years especially.
If their narrative says the President caused the shutdown, the talking heads will be too afraid not to give that air. If they say they want to end the shutdown, even as they work against the possibility of a shutdown, again, the talking heads are *too afraid* to call BS on this or simply not to give it air, in the absurd fear that the base who wants to hear this BS will be angry if it isn't said. It's very frustrating- particularly in a case in which the Republicans have done very little except lie their pants off the whole time, and Dems have done very little but be brutally honest.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: If their narrative says the President caused the shutdown, the talking heads will be too afraid not to give that air. If they say they want to end the shutdown, even as they work against the possibility of a shutdown, again, the talking heads are *too afraid* to call BS on this or simply not to give it air, in the absurd fear that the base who wants to hear this BS will be angry if it isn't said. It's very frustrating- particularly in a case in which the Republicans have done very little except lie their pants off the whole time, and Dems have done very little but be brutally honest.
quote:false equivalency in the news has been very much, in fact, in the news lately – thanks to reporting on the US government shutdown that characterizes the impasse as the consequence of two stubborn political parties unwilling to compromise on healthcare. For instance, this was the final paragraph of a Washington Post editorial:
quote:Ultimately, the grown-ups in the room will have to do their jobs, which in a democracy with divided government means compromising for the common good. That means Mr Boehner, his counterpart in the Senate, Harry M Reid (D-Nev), minority leaders Sen Mitch McConnell (R-Ky) and Rep Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif) and the president. Both sides are inordinately concerned with making sure that, if catastrophe comes, the other side takes the political hit. In truth, none of their reputations stands to benefit.
Mutually obdurate pols – it's a fetching narrative, since Republicans and Democrats are undisputedly more polarized than they've been in a century, yielding endless posturing and partisan gridlock. Except, the narrative is wrong. The shutdown is not the result of the divide between Republicans and Democrats on Obamacare: that issue has been legislated, ratified by two presidential elections, affirmed by the US supreme court and more than 40 times unrepealed by Congress.
No, the shutdown is the result of the divide between mainstream, center-right Republicans and Tea Party extremists. The latter are wrapped in suicide belts and perfectly willing to blow the GOP and the economy to kingdom come if they can: a) kill Obamacare (as if); or b) guarantee campaign windfalls from likeminded anti-government crackpots.
This is not gridlock. It is a hostage situation.
Others, however, see things differently. In a recent post calling for Obama's impeachment, headlined "Barack Hussein Obama: The New Leader of al-Qaida", the website Tea Party Nation accused the president of treason. As US Representative Virginia Foxx (Republican, North Carolina) warned the House upon passage of Obamacare in 2009:
quote:I believe we have more to fear from the potential of that bill than we do from any terrorist right now in any country.
Haha, not kidding. Those quotations are real – and why not? There has never been a shortage of paranoia in politics. What has changed is the press's willingness to give it oxygen.
As an institution, the American media seem to have decided that no superstition, stupidity, error in fact or Big Lie is too superstitious, stupid, wrong or evil to be disqualified from "balancing" an opposing … wadddyacallit? … fact. Because, otherwise, the truth might be cited as evidence of liberal bias.
Thus do the US media aid and abet Swiftboaters, 9/11 "Truthers", creationists and "Birthers"
Posted by Hobbes (Member # 433) on :
quote:quote: I believe we have more to fear from the potential of that bill than we do from any terrorist right now in any country. Haha, not kidding. Those quotations are real – and why not? There has never been a shortage of paranoia in politics. What has changed is the press's willingness to give it oxygen.
Well... my opinion is that the minutia of the ACA is vastly more important to this country than any terrorist group in any country. So in a way I agree. But I doubt the original writer would agree with my reasoning. Maybe we could use this logic to shift money from our various, overpriced efforts to fight terrorism over into paying for our citizen's healthcare. That way instead of the NSA reading my e-mails, I get preventative care. Seems like a win-win to me.
Hobbes Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP: It may not be a cause of the shutdown, but I think it's fair to say it was a component of a premeditated plan to cause a shutdown and control how long it lasted, further cementing culpability with the Republican party.
Agreed.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP: It may not be a cause of the shutdown, but I think it's fair to say it was a component of a premeditated plan to cause a shutdown and control how long it lasted, further cementing culpability with the Republican party.
Sure, which is why I said, "You can argue it was all part of the GOPs master plan..."
Posted by Geraine (Member # 9913) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: If things are happening about the way I think they are happening, the effort to throw Ted Cruz under the bus has probably already begun in earnest.
I remember another republican that the establishment threw under the bus. He ended up getting elected for two terms, both with landslide victories. Not that I think Cruz has a chance in hell though.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Geraine:
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: If things are happening about the way I think they are happening, the effort to throw Ted Cruz under the bus has probably already begun in earnest.
I remember another republican that the establishment threw under the bus. He ended up getting elected for two terms, both with landslide victories. Not that I think Cruz has a chance in hell though.
Welcome back! It's been a few days since your last post where your refusal to acknowledge questions answered was answered with the answers to those same questions again, so you're now almost safe to ignore that whole thing entirely, and ask those questions all over again.
Ready? I'm ready.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by Geraine:
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: If things are happening about the way I think they are happening, the effort to throw Ted Cruz under the bus has probably already begun in earnest.
I remember another republican that the establishment threw under the bus. He ended up getting elected for two terms, both with landslide victories. Not that I think Cruz has a chance in hell though.
Is this like when you thought the Historical Footnote* would win?
*Romney if this isn't clear to non-Daily Show viewers.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
how is that relevant. he's saying that historical parallel notwithstanding, cruz is not going to be making a comeback if the party tosses him to survive the next election
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: how is that relevant. he's saying that historical parallel notwithstanding, cruz is not going to be making a comeback if the party tosses him to survive the next election
If the GOP turns away from him and ignores what he started to make a deal with Obama, Cruz will spend millions for the next two years making himself out to be Republican Jesus, true defender of the faith, sacrificed by Washington politics even as he tried to destroy Obamacare.
He'll crush the primaries and get crushed in the general.
Posted by Jon Boy (Member # 4284) on :
The cynical part of me has been wondering if some Republicans had this in mind. They paint the president into a corner where he has to break the law one way or another, then they impeach him.
Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :
They will also attack any other choice Obama makes. If, as some on the right are saying, there's enough revenue to service the debt without raising the debt limit, but overall budget exceeds revenue, and no more borrowing is possible, there will have to be something else that doesn't get funding. And if Obama has any say in that, the GOP will attack him, painting it as one more way that he is pushing his own agenda.
I don't think this is going to work, but I can see how some of the nuts thought it was a perfect trap.
Posted by Mucus (Member # 9735) on :
quote:Originally posted by Hobbes: Maybe we could use this logic to shift money from our various, overpriced efforts to fight terrorism over into paying for our citizen's healthcare. That way instead of the NSA reading my e-mails, I get preventative care.
+1, Like, whatever
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
The Court has also said the debt ceiling is a 'political matter' and won't advise on it.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:Originally posted by scifibum: They will also attack any other choice Obama makes. If, as some on the right are saying, there's enough revenue to service the debt without raising the debt limit, but overall budget exceeds revenue, and no more borrowing is possible, there will have to be something else that doesn't get funding. And if Obama has any say in that, the GOP will attack him, painting it as one more way that he is pushing his own agenda.
I don't think this is going to work, but I can see how some of the nuts thought it was a perfect trap.
Speaking for myself, I'm nearly at the point where before I'm willing to take any self-named conservative or Republican seriously, or at least regard them politically without contempt, just about anything short of unqualified denunciation of these hostage-taking jackasses is required.
Posted by Jeff C. (Member # 12496) on :
Did anyone see the protests today? There were some veterans protesting and Sarah Palin came up and started talking, turning it into an anti-Obama rally. Someone yelled out over the crowd "You're an idiot!" and she paused to listen, but then rolled her eyes and kept talking. The whole time she was babbling on, I couldn't help but think, He's right, you know. Posted by Jeff C. (Member # 12496) on :
If you don't have time to watch it, it basically shows one congressman detailing why the government can't just be reopened without the Republican leader's go-ahead, which is only possible due to a recent thing that was passed. I think this is especially interesting because if it just comes down to one man, doesn't that essentially mean we've entered a state of dictatorship, at least to some small degree? I mean, one guy is basically holding the cards and isn't being checked by anyone else.
Is this legal?
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
Didn't I link that?
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jeff C.: Has anyone seen this video yet? It seems to be making its way around the net. What do you guys think of it?
If you don't have time to watch it, it basically shows one congressman detailing why the government can't just be reopened without the Republican leader's go-ahead, which is only possible due to a recent thing that was passed. I think this is especially interesting because if it just comes down to one man, doesn't that essentially mean we've entered a state of dictatorship, at least to some small degree? I mean, one guy is basically holding the cards and isn't being checked by anyone else.
Is this legal?
Yeah we were just talking about this on the last page.
Is it legal? I don't know. On the face of it, sure, it's a procedural rule and the House can make their own rules.
But it sure as hell doesn't sound right.
Why the Dems aren't screaming bloody murder about this is beyond me. If the roles were reversed, you better believe they'd have pictures of Steny Hoyer all over the news with a crown and a "King Hoyer" label.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Is it legal? I don't know.
It's certainly legal enough in the sense that they got away with it.
We've already watched them engage in unprecedented abuse of the filibuster in the senate, fundamentally changing how government works in order to preserve the interests of their party. That they would engage in a similar (if oddly converse) abuse in the house in obvious premeditation of holding the nation and even the world economy hostage to get what they want ... should be unsurprising.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:Is it legal? I don't know.
It's certainly legal enough in the sense that they got away with it.
We've already watched them engage in unprecedented abuse of the filibuster in the senate, fundamentally changing how government works in order to preserve the interests of their party. That they would engage in a similar (if oddly converse) abuse in the house in obvious premeditation of holding the nation and even the world economy hostage to get what they want ... should be unsurprising.
"Legal," when you talk about how Congress works with its own rulebook is a bit of a misnomer of a concept. There are no hard and fast rules (rules that Congress can't change itself, effectively making them fluid) on the structure of the congress itself outside of the Constitution, except for a selected set of enumerated powers and limits.
And while the constitution doesn't specifically say that, for example, the procedural rules of the house must not to be altered to not allow the proposition of bills by house members, it may be that there are other sections of the constitution that limit congresses' ability to do so:
From Article 1 Section 8: Enumerated Powers of Congress
"To make all Laws which shall be necessary and proper for carrying into Execution the foregoing Powers, and all other Powers vested by this Constitution in the Government of the United States, or in any Department or Officer thereof."
Now there may be some wiggle room on "necessary and proper." It may be effectively argued that an effective end of parliamentary democracy is NOT necessary and proper. I would lend some weight to that argument.
Then there is the 14th Ammendment
Selected Quotation:
quote: 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. (...) 5. The Congress shall have power to enforce, by appropriate legislation, the provisions of this article.
Section 4 and 5 are at question here. Now, Congress may have enacted a rule which interferes with its own constitutional duty to protect the public interest by the service of debt. Section 5 specifically states that congress SHALL have the power to legislate provisions for this article, and the enumeration of that duty in section 4 indicates that servicing the debt is a duty that congress has. Now, if Congress's internal rules limit legislator's ability to engage in parliamentary democracy, I would say that the constitutionality of that situation is in question.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
When I'm talking about "legal enough," I'm talking about what practically matters in terms of what they will be able to get away with.
If the GOP is hellbent enough to actually do this to pursue their agenda no matter the detriment to the country (and above the protests of people who still presume good faith or some sense of equivalency with american conservatives, they are), and the government is essentially forced to deal with it and can't stop them from deciding that these are the new rules, then it's effectively "legal."
They've decided on what the law actually is for themselves, and — by extension — the rest of us have to deal with the consequences of both their willingness and ability to effectively end the representational democracy idea of Congress.
Thankfully, their ruin is also a self-inflicted one. This is already accelerating the permanent decline I've talked people's ears off about already.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
I'm just ever so slightly concerned that someone in Congress, not naming names, decides he's a king or at least a king maker out of this. Hitler had the Reichstag set on fire to justify its dissolution (among many other steps).
Posted by capaxinfiniti (Member # 12181) on :
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: I'm just ever so slightly concerned that someone in Congress, not naming names, decides he's a king or at least a king maker out of this. Hitler had the Reichstag set on fire to justify its dissolution (among many other steps).
Well, Harry Reid is a real asshole but I don't think he has a shot at king, even if that's his aspiration.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
WHOA GODWIN but yeah the current situation has pretty much fast-tracked us to a shitty situation.
1. a really seriously long stretch of years where it's very possible liberals will have no credible challenge to their power or competition that would nominally inspire them to play straight and not become too indolent, and
2. the legacy of a timeframe in which the conservatives brutally and blatantly abused tools of legislature, courts, and districting that 'protected the minority' or 'prevented the minority from being steamrolled with a simple majority' — which could all but totally result in the end of these potential controls on the majority
3. when the power system switches, the democrats could just as easily inherit and twist these abuses to their own ends. If the Democratic Party was gerrymandered in the way conservatives have gerrymandered themselves in today, it would be an indefinitely untouchable majority (like, they would have the house for as far into the future as you can demographically predict, without challenge) and it would inspire the same horrid dysfunction.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:Originally posted by capaxinfiniti:
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: I'm just ever so slightly concerned that someone in Congress, not naming names, decides he's a king or at least a king maker out of this. Hitler had the Reichstag set on fire to justify its dissolution (among many other steps).
Well, Harry Reid is a real asshole but I don't think he has a shot at king, even if that's his aspiration.
Hehe, well at least for the time being we don't have to spend time treating your opinion as though it's anything but the tiny minority zealot voice-going by multiple polls and all. I know it's got to just majorly chap your ass, how bad your team is looking and how competitively good they're making democrats look, but seriously best just adjust.
Put another way: it ain't Harry Reid who has decided that the a minority segment of the minority party of one house of one branch of a three branch government should shut down the whole show over a law that's been passed by two elections and both houses of Congress and the executive and the Supreme Court.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Now, all of that said, yeah the Godwin was silly. Godwins aren't even necessary when the people fueling this shutdown attend rallies with people saying Obama needs to 'put down his Koran'.
Funny thing to note: remember how people have been saying for over four years how dangerous it is to allow this lunatic fringe to gain so much power and respect? How when you hear stuff like Qorans your response shouldn't simply be 'each side has their fringes'? Man, well at least it's gratifying to w shown to be so right.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: WHOA GODWIN but yeah the current situation has pretty much fast-tracked us to a shitty situation.
Godwin applies to participants in a discussion and is in reference a fallacy of argument (ad hominem or association fallacy). This is a valid reference to historical events. Put it back in your pants Sam. Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: Now, all of that said, yeah the Godwin was silly. Godwins aren't even necessary when the people fueling this shutdown attend rallies with people saying Obama needs to 'put down his Koran'.
And here I didn't even know that Obama was a Korean. Go figure...
quote: Funny thing to note: remember how people have been saying for over four years how dangerous it is to allow this lunatic fringe to gain so much power and respect? How when you hear stuff like Qorans your response shouldn't simply be 'each side has their fringes'? Man, well at least it's gratifying to w shown to be so right.
I can't say I find it that gratifying. The guy you beat has to know you beat him for it to be gratifying. It's the kind of thing winning is all about really: the actual respect of your opponents, in the face of undeniable triumph. There's no respect here. No sense of a game, because there are no rules that they respect- no end to what they'll do.
I don't win if I pull out a gun and shoot the quarterback and run the ball into the endzone. And if I'm the offensive side, I'm not exactly gratified if it turns out those 6 points don't count. My quarterback just got shot.
For me, and man it's hard to say this, politics stopped being fun in the last few years. Because before I always thought everybody was playing the same game: how to win and do it better. Now I see that some people are actually trying to end the game. Like, really just end it. Kick the ball over the fence kind of thing. And so now I look at it all with a lot of dread, and little excitement. What is winning now? Not being cheated? That's not fun- it's not what we should be worrying about.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
But but but, the law had to go to the Supreme Court! That means its unconstitutional. /What a GOP Spokesperson actually said.
Rome is the more congruent example anyways, of grid lock resulting in a dictator.
Comparison is more valid with Hitler when you look at the Nazi Party doing the same tactics the GOP is doing to CAUSE gridlock to get major concessions.
Speaking of, I like the WWI analogy of the GOP being people stuck in the trenches with no way out.
Posted by Xavier (Member # 405) on :
I've been pretty optimistic that a deal would get done this week and we wouldn't default.
Until today's headline says that the house GOP has their own plan, and it AGAIN tries to mess with Obamacare.
So there goes my hope for avoiding calamity. Goodbye, retirement savings.
Honestly, if we default and the government remains entirely locked down, all sorts of things that seemed unthinkable weeks ago become plausible in my mind. A government that doesn't fulfill its fundamental obligations is a government that gets replaced.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Lauren Windsor, a reporter for The Young Turks asked Rep. Gohmert if he would support any deal to raise the debt ceiling. He answered, “It just depends on what it is,” he replied. “The word ‘deal’ concerns me… if it’s good for America.” She followed up by asking, “Would you allow us to default on our debt?” Gohmert replied, “No, that would be an impeachable offense by the president.”
ha ha ha ha ha these utter clowns
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
Idiot talking heads on CNN: "Both sides are gonna give up something.."
let's repeat the words BOTH SIDES 100 more times and it will somehow make sense.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
'both sides' is so fundamentally irrelevant right now, jesus
the house GOP is not even able to make a bill acceptable to their own membership Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Well, to be fair, there are two sides: a side invested in the continued operation of government, and the drooling loonies.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:“We’re not going to be disrespected,” said Congressman Stutzman during an interview with the Washington Examiner on Tuesday. “We have to get something out of this. And I don’t know what that even is.”
amazing, amazing
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
In the senate, I believe there's close door meetings to the effect of the GOP signing the terms of their surrender...
However in the house... It's like the Japanese Imperial Army's hardliners sharpening their katana's.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Fitch ratings has just stated that our credit rating is now on rating watch negative.
The republicans in the house may just be insane enough to be trying a stall to a last-minute deal to try to say "THIS OR NO DICE" and in so doing try to sell the narrative that it's the democrats who are pushing us over the edge
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
What This Cruel War Was Over
because i guess it won't link or w/e
quote:Ta-Nehisi Coates for The Atlantic
On Sunday, a group of conservative radicals held a protest in Washington. Eventually they walked to the White House. One of these radicals felt it was a good idea to wave the flag of slavery, treason, and terrorism in front of the home of America's first black president. Lone idiots are often drawn to protest action. The behavior of such idiots, while alarming, should not necessarily be taken as an indicator of the aims and thrust of the protest. On the contrary, it is not so much the behavior of the lone idiot that matters—but the tenor of the crowd around him.
If, for instance, you witness a march against military action in Syria and see a Nazi flag among the protestors this should disturb you. But you would be heartened to see the protesters snatch the lone idiot in their midst, eject him from their party with great vigor, and give him some blows for good measure. The flag would still disturb you, but perhaps you might be able to see it as a fringe action, and not the heart of the protest itself.
It is the wisdom of the crowd that matters. The wisdom that marked Sunday's crowd was the idea that the president "bows down to Allah" and needs to "put the Qu'ran down." The wisdom that marked Sunday's crowd was the notion that Obama was not the president of "the people" but the president of "his people." The wisdom of Sunday's crowd held that the police, doing their job, looked "like something out of Kenya." It's not so much that a man would fly a Confederate flag, as Jeff Goldberg notes, in front of the home of a black family. It's that a crowd would allow him the comfort of doing it.
I was in a crowd once. It's been almost 20 years. But I remember most is how emphatically we were drilled, that day, on the politics of respectability. Our wisdom was conservative—too conservative for my tastes, frankly. But I obeyed the edict of the day which held that had any black man who came to the Million Man March and so much as stole candy bar would doom us all. That was our wisdom. It's a good memory. But I fear that it is no match for the wisdom of Sunday's crowd. The blue period is upon us.
MORE: I don't know if I am effectively communicating what is wrong with that picture and why it is deeply infuriating. If a patriot can stand in front of the White House brandishing the Confederate flag, then the word "patriot" has no meaning. The Nazi flag is offensive because it is a marker of centuries of bigotry elevated to industrialized murder.
But the Confederate flag does not merely carry the stain of slavery, of "useful killing," but the stain of attempting to end the Union itself. You cannot possibly wave that flag and honestly claim any sincere understanding of your country. It is not possible.
[ October 15, 2013, 07:49 PM: Message edited by: Samprimary ]
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
just sharing this, bros and girls, in case anyone tries to pull selling this crap here
quote:From reading the Atlantic blog, they are apparently trying to run out the clock so that they can quickly pass a bill, send it to the Senate, and then adjourn so the Senate has to choose between either accepting the bill as written, or forcing a default.
It's "A-ha, its yours, no takebacks!" politicking.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
I knew someone once who I played D&D with for a bit who swore up and down the confederate flag was a symbol of states rights and not racism whatsoever oh no.
Though he was quite racist in every other way...
quote: The House proposal also would forbid the Treasury from taking what it calls extraordinary measures to prevent the government from defaulting as cash runs low, in effect requiring hard deadlines to extend the federal debt ceiling.
How can anyone possibly claim that this is "Both sides at fault" when its clear that this is the GOP forcing a default now.
Not to relevant to the thread but holy cow.
quote: Scalia, J., at pg. 41 posted: JUSTICE SCALIA: My goodness, I thought we've -- we've held that the 14th Amendment protects all races. I mean, that was the argument in the early years, that it protected only -- only the blacks. But I thought we rejected that. You -- you say now that we have to proceed as though its purpose is not to protect whites, only to protect minorities?
Can't make this up.
[ October 15, 2013, 08:35 PM: Message edited by: Elison R. Salazar ]
Posted by capaxinfiniti (Member # 12181) on :
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: Hehe, well at least for the time being we don't have to spend time treating your opinion as though it's anything but the tiny minority zealot voice-going by multiple polls and all. I know it's got to just majorly chap your ass, how bad your team is looking and how competitively good they're making democrats look, but seriously best just adjust.
A) You're taking my comment much too seriously. I knew he wasn't referring to Harry Reid. Calm down.
B) No amount of reasonable and honest discussion will stop you from whinging about how I represent some "tiny minority zealot-voice" and yet the more you insist upon that point the more insular your position is revealed to be. You need to reassess the current political spectrum in America.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote: HuffPost Politics @HuffPostPol Imminent Senate deal: -CR to 1/15 -Debt ceiling to 2/7 (extraordinary measures) -Budget framework by 12/13 -Obamacare income verification
We still have the USS Missouri around to accept the terms of their surrender right?
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
The latest Play by Play seems to be that the House can't put something together for the same reason they haven't been able to for weeks. The Republicans are fighting each other, and Democrats will not negotiate over the debt limit, they've learned how much that doesn't work.
So my predictions.
The Senate is probably going to punt us down to January or so, in exchange for a concession on the new tax on medical devices being pushed back a year. But Obamacare being funded. They will send that to the House, Boehner will be embarrassed that the House didn't originate the legislation, and even more when huge numbers of the normally unified GOP vote no. But default will be averted.
But remember only Boehner can initiate a vote on this Senate plan, per their weasel rule change, so he is going to have to go against the Tea Party clique in his party and bring the motion to floor, there may be serious backlash to it. Sure would have been nice to let a Democrat bring it to a vote.
[ October 16, 2013, 12:23 AM: Message edited by: JanitorBlade ]
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
The senate plan based on those dates is a complete defeat for the GOP, quoting from a different forum: " they want the CR to expire before sequester hits so the budget baseline is slightly better for them, and they want both the debt ceiling and the CR to be after Jan 1st so that Republicans can't hold them hostage over Obamacare implementation.
By contrast, Republicans want a longer CR (so that any budget fight is based off of sequester budget cap numbers instead of the current numbers) and a shorter Debt Ceiling (so that they can repeat this trick again before Obamacare Exchange plans take effect on Jan. 1st)."
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade:
So my predictions.
The Senate is probably going to punt us down to January or so, in exchange for a concession on the new tax on medical devices being pushed back a year.
The ACA is toast without that tax. It's a major funding source. I don't believe postponing it will be in any proposal that passes the senate.
Posted by Jeff C. (Member # 12496) on :
Are any of you out of a job right because of this? I know several people who are and I recently learned that, being in the military, I can't receive my education benefits until the senate figures all this out.
On a side note, only about 26 hours left on CNN's countdown clock....tick tick tock...
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
dkw -
The Senate plan wasn't a repeal, it was a one or two year push back. And the ACA isn't toast, it's an automatic spending program. If Congress nixes the Medical Device Tax, the money for the ACA still gets spent, it just has to come from somewhere else or needs to be borrowed. It's not a dedicated tax or a sole source of revenue.
I was given to understand that the tax is largely unpopular in Washington and is in trouble regardless of how this goes down. Many Dems want to kill it and replace it with something else.
But given how much Obamacare actually costs, while still a lot of money, it doesn't seem like a killer amount.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jeff C.: Are any of you out of a job right because of this? I know several people who are and I recently learned that, being in the military, I can't receive my education benefits until the senate figures all this out.
On a side note, only about 26 hours left on CNN's countdown clock....tick tick tock...
I don't know anyone out of work because of the shutdown, but I know several people who have been warned they may be fired if we breach the debt ceiling.
Posted by dkw (Member # 3264) on :
Lyrhawn, by "toast" I mean set up to fail. Yes, it would still happen, but it would be operating at a huge deficit, which it's critics would then point to to say "see, it's not sustainable."
Posted by JanitorBlade (Member # 12343) on :
quote:Originally posted by dkw:
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade:
So my predictions.
The Senate is probably going to punt us down to January or so, in exchange for a concession on the new tax on medical devices being pushed back a year.
The ACA is toast without that tax. It's a major funding source. I don't believe postponing it will be in any proposal that passes the senate.
I was not aware of that connection. You may be right, though the tax as Lyrhawn said is pretty unpopular among both parties.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by dkw: Lyrhawn, by "toast" I mean set up to fail. Yes, it would still happen, but it would be operating at a huge deficit, which it's critics would then point to to say "see, it's not sustainable."
Eh, I'm not convinced of that. Democrats want to axe it, by and large, just as much as Republicans, but they'd never agree to a full on repeal without replacing the revenue.
And even if they did, $20 billion is a rounding error in the budget. Since it's not a dedicated tax, funding for the ACA via the medical device tax is irrelevant. They were packaged together originally to sell it as effectively a neutral cost that wouldn't raise the deficit, but no one would look at the ACA and say it's running a $20 billion deficit because the excise tax was repealed, it's not like Social Security or Medicare where a dedicated tax supports a finite budget. As an entitlement, the ACA simply costs whatever it costs, and that money comes out of the General Fund.
Now, I think that ACA's detractors will have plenty of firepower when it comes to calling it a failure. As it stands, it might bend the cost curve of long term growth in insurance premiums downward, but it does absolutely nothing to address the underlying drivers of health care costs. It's designed to become unsustainably overpriced in time.
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
quote:Originally posted by Jeff C.: Are any of you out of a job right because of this? I know several people who are and I recently learned that, being in the military, I can't receive my education benefits until the senate figures all this out.
On a side note, only about 26 hours left on CNN's countdown clock....tick tick tock...
I can't get my new dream job until it ends. Waiting on the coast guard to get back to work so I can get my license.
A friend works for the Defense Department. His division runs out of money Thursday night so if it's not over by then, he will be staying home.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Senate has reached a deal. Pretty much Senate GOP waiving the white flag.
Posted by Darth_Mauve (Member # 4709) on :
Note, pushing ACA back one year to get the ceiling raised sets up a continuing pattern--Time to raise the Ceiling? Time to push back ACA. The only way it will be safe from a Republican deconstruction of it, is for people to use it and discover its benefits. If its never used, benefits will never be discovered, so eventually a Republican party can tear it down.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
We're not pushing the ACA back one year, though?
Posted by MattP (Member # 10495) on :
Nope. It's looking (cross fingers) like the Republicans completely lost this one.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I haven't seen the details yet. Is the Congressional staff pay cut still included?
Posted by scifibum (Member # 7625) on :
quote:Originally posted by MattP: Nope. It's looking (cross fingers) like the Republicans completely lost this one.
I'm just annoyed that the can has only been kicked a few months down the road. I'm not sure that there's any intention to avoid another round of brinksmanship.
Posted by Destineer (Member # 821) on :
quote: Right now, with the shutdown, we’ve already reached the point at which the government is breaking very important promises indeed: we promised to pay hundreds of thousands of government employees a certain amount on certain dates, in return for their honest work. We have broken that promise. Indeed, by Treasury’s own definition, it’s reasonable to say that we have already defaulted: surely, by any sensible conception, the salaries of government employees constitute “legal obligations of the US“.
...
And here’s the problem: we’re already well past the point at which that certainty has been called into question. Fidelity, for instance, has no US debt coming due in October or early November, and neither does Reich & Tang:
While he doesn’t believe the U.S. will default, Tom Nelson, chief investment officer at Reich & Tang, which oversees $35 billion including $17 billion in money-market funds, said that the firm isn’t holding any U.S. securities that pay interest at the end of October through mid-November because if a default does take place, “we’d be criticized for stepping in front of that train.”
The vaseline, in other words, already has sand in it. The global faith in US institutions has already been undermined. The mechanism by which catastrophe would arise has already been set into motion. And as a result, economic growth in both the US and the rest of the world will be lower than it should be. Unemployment will be higher. Social unrest will be more destructive. These things aren’t as bad now as they would be if we actually got to a point of payment default. But even a payment default wouldn’t cause mass overnight failures: the catastrophe would be slower and nastier than that, less visible, less spectacular. We’re not talking the final scene of Fight Club, we’re talking more about another global credit crisis — where “credit” means “trust”, and “trust” means “trust in the US government as the one institution which cannot fail”.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by scifibum:
quote:Originally posted by MattP: Nope. It's looking (cross fingers) like the Republicans completely lost this one.
I'm just annoyed that the can has only been kicked a few months down the road. I'm not sure that there's any intention to avoid another round of brinksmanship.
I openly and sincerely WELCOME the opportunity for the conservatives to crowbar themselves in the head by trying this stunt again.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:Originally posted by scifibum:
quote:Originally posted by MattP: Nope. It's looking (cross fingers) like the Republicans completely lost this one.
I'm just annoyed that the can has only been kicked a few months down the road. I'm not sure that there's any intention to avoid another round of brinksmanship.
I openly and sincerely WELCOME the opportunity for the conservatives to crowbar themselves in the head by trying this stunt again.
I honestly doubt it. The real victory here for Democrats wasn't not giving up concessions in this particular instance, it was in discrediting the entire fiasco as a successful strategy. The Republicans didn't just take a political hit, they took a political hit for zero gain. Why would they repeat the strategy again in 3 months when they know exactly what will happen at the end of it? Dems will stay rocksteady and it'll come down to the wire, markets will get spooked, billions of dollars will be wasted, and they'll get the same result.
There will still be a ton of hemming and hawing, and it might come down to the wire, and it might even mean a one year CR instead of a real new budget, but it'll get done. Boehner finally broke the Hastert Rule on a crucial vote. Does that mean he will continue to do so all the time? No, but I think the lesson a lot of people learned from this is that the Tea Party is a mess.
A couple months ago it looked like hitching the GOP cart to the Tea Party horse was a vehicle to victory, but then Ted Cruz grabbed the reins and led them into a ditch (though he managed to hop off before it hit the ground). Too many moderates were burned by this to let it happen again, especially seeing as how they didn't even get anything out of it. I think the divisions within the GOP will only widen, but I also think moderates will actually be more pressed to compromise on THEIR terms, because the Tea Party is just too extreme for them.
And for that matter, arias will be written and sung about Democratic unity in all this. No one on the right expected the Dems to behave the way they did. And a lot of them complained in the news, without irony, that they couldn't believe the Democrats were being so unreasonable by refusing to compromise. You have to love that. They've convinced themselves that the status quo means Dems giving up and them winning.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Ted Cruz honestly is an afterthought regarding why the conservatives (and the tea party especially) are completely ignorant and off the rails. It's no one individual. It's the culture of a political party that is straightforwardly deluded. Remember how Romney & Co went into election night expecting victory? The same bubble of misinformation continues unabated.
The Tea Party threw conservatives down this path because they believe what they want to believe and they are part of a cult and a system that actively feeds them nonsense and misinformation — which becomes the basis upon which they make "informed" decisions regarding policy and political strategy.
It allows them to simultaneously have greater control over narratives while simultaneously making their proposals, actions, and ideology more deluded and dangerous. SEE: The Wonk Gap Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
Don't underestimate the role Cruz played. You have to look at what he did behind the scenes. He directed a ton of money through Heritage and other groups to Republican districts. He spent six months before this showdown airing ads in those districts convincing people that the Tea Party plan was the only way to go. Then when October rolled around, the entire party faced an angry horde of constituents who'd been fed Cruz's screed for half a year.
He didn't just start spouting crazy one day, he pulled the rug out from under the GOP months ago, but most of them didn't realize at the time it would come back to hurt them.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Right, I'm just saying that what Cruz did works on his party because this is the sort of supremely deluded bullshit that american conservatives have become completely susceptible to. They are isolated in a misinformation bubble they created for themselves.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
The GOP spend more money running ads against other Republicans than against the Democrats.
quote: The Republicans didn't just take a political hit, they took a political hit for zero gain. Why would they repeat the strategy again in 3 months when they know exactly what will happen at the end of it?
Because they know nothing Jon Snow.
They key word here that's in question is "know", they don't in fact know. As Sam is suggesting and using Jon's colourful language the GOP now is a permament resident of Bullshit Mountain and are convinced that this strategy didn't work, not because its crazy, deluded and self destructive stupidity. But because they didn't go far enough; or there weren't enough REAL CONSERVATIVES elected to the House, (and hence the incoming primary challenges by the further right) that the media was one sided or biased (hahahaha) against them etc etc etc.
They'll believe what they want to believe, compromise with the Democrats means letting them "win" and so its possible, maybe probable, they will try it again because to not do so means stepping off Bullshit Mountain and getting crushed by the avalanche of refuse that will come down on them.
Because now there's new residents, and they live further up and have a lot of shovels and a clear view.
[I love how I'm referring to Samprimary and Jon Stewart it still comes off as a ASOFAI reference.]
Posted by Jeff C. (Member # 12496) on :
Well the bill passed and you know what that means...
The government is fixed forever!
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
standard and poor estimates that the Party of Fiscal Responsibility has cost us 24 billion dollars with their antics.
We also got a rating downgrade out of the deal and a hit to faith in the american markets, so economic recovery will probably slow some!
good job conservatives!
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by capaxinfiniti: [QUOTE]Originally posted by Rakeesh: [qb]B) No amount of reasonable and honest discussion will stop you from whinging about how I represent some "tiny minority zealot-voice" and yet the more you insist upon that point the more insular your position is revealed to be. You need to reassess the current political spectrum in America.
Someone correctly identifying your general ideological position as a fringe doesn't reveal them to be more 'insular'
Posted by capaxinfiniti (Member # 12181) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:Originally posted by capaxinfiniti: [QUOTE]Originally posted by Rakeesh: [qb]B) No amount of reasonable and honest discussion will stop you from whinging about how I represent some "tiny minority zealot-voice" and yet the more you insist upon that point the more insular your position is revealed to be. You need to reassess the current political spectrum in America.
Someone correctly identifying your general ideological position as a fringe doesn't reveal them to be more 'insular'
Except my general ideological position isn't 'fringe' so he's not correct. For you to believe so you must be intentionally ignoring what I've said on this forum or you live in an ideological and cultural bubble.
Posted by SenojRetep (Member # 8614) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: standard and poor estimates that the Party of Fiscal Responsibility has cost us 24 billion dollars with their antics.
We also got a rating downgrade out of the deal and a hit to faith in the american markets, so economic recovery will probably slow some!
good job conservatives!
I can't find a link to the S&P analysis; just articles about it. Generally I'm suspect of these economy-wide 'loss' estimates, because the necessary levels of abstraction often elide important context.
Also, while Fitch pushed short-term debt to the negative watch list (where long-term debt already was), that didn't actually downgrade the credit rating. A determination should be made sometime by the end of the year, and I doubt we'll get downgraded given the deal that was eventually reached, although if there are signs we're going to do it all again next January, that could certainly change.
Also, if Democrats had swallowed the medical device tax (something lots of them wanted to do, but the President and Harry Reid didn't), this would've been over a week ago, long before most of these negative impacts. Republicans were certainly at fault, but Democrats could have easily softened this blow. They chose not to in order to make an ideological point. Good for them politically, and maybe good for us all long term if it changes the way we treat the budgeting process, but by the short-term metrics you're pointing to that intransigence was unhelpful.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
The ideological point of "don't give incentive to the crazies to continue hostage taking."?
[ October 17, 2013, 12:00 PM: Message edited by: Elison R. Salazar ]
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:Also, if Democrats had swallowed the medical device tax (something lots of them wanted to do, but the President and Harry Reid didn't), this would've been over a week ago, long before most of these negative impacts.
I don't know that this is true. A lot of the economic damage cited is not direct (although there is a great deal of that), but due to losses in global confidence in the U.S. stability and internal consumer confidence. You don't get to throw tantrums like insane, spoiled children and continue to have people treat you like an adult.
A lot of the damage is being attributed to people realizing that there is no way to know when the Tea Party will throw more tantrums and inflict completely unnecessary unknown economic harm to the U.S. That there was even a chance that we would consider not paying our debts, not because we can't be because it's the center of their tantrum, because of these idiots is very bad. If things continue as they have been, it seems likely that they'll eventually go through with it.
The only thing that is saving the U.S. from having these antics prompt changes like the dollar not being the world reserve currency is that there isn't currently another currency that is more reliable.
But there will be. We can't continue enjoying the privileged economic position that we have if the Tea Party continues to be able to pull this sort of nonsense. I think that the Democrats giving in to them again could have accelerated the economic losses.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by SenojRetep: Also, if Democrats had swallowed the medical device tax (something lots of them wanted to do, but the President and Harry Reid didn't), this would've been over a week ago, long before most of these negative impacts. Republicans were certainly at fault, but Democrats could have easily softened this blow.
Please examine this statement. They should have relented to this abuse of the process in order to lessen its effects.
Analogies to battered wives seem superfluous, but maybe I'm wrong- would you like a battered wife analogy?
I'll give you one: eventually, no matter how often the wife apologizes to the man who beats her for making him do it, and promises to concede things that she should not, in a sane relationship, concede, he will eventually kill her. That is the end of the cycle of abuse: you stop it, or you die. It doesn't get better once one side realizes that the abuse gives them power.
And that's all this is: the Tea Party is out to destroy the federal government. I mean this not by the way of hyperbole, but literally: they are on a course that ends with the destruction of the federal government. Because their power, and everything that defines them as an organization (which is not much else btw), is in the promise of destruction. That is the instinct that their philosophy primarily services: the destruction of all obstacles. In a way, it's worse than National Socialism or International Communism, both amorphously unspecific agendas of power; because these agendas were actually constructive. They were trying to construct something horrible, but they were trying to construct *something*. The Tea Party hasn't proven as insidious, but it may yet prove as destructive.
[ October 17, 2013, 12:31 PM: Message edited by: Orincoro ]
Posted by SenojRetep (Member # 8614) on :
quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky: I don't know that this is true. A lot of the economic damage cited is not direct (although there is a great deal of that), but due to losses in global confidence in the U.S. stability and internal consumer confidence. You don't get to throw tantrums like insane, spoiled children and continue to have people treat you like an adult.
A lot of the damage is being attributed to people realizing that there is no way to know when the Tea Party will throw more tantrums and inflict completely unnecessary unknown economic harm to the U.S. That there was even a chance that we would consider not paying our debts, not because we can't be because it's the center of their tantrum, because of these idiots is very bad. If things continue as they have been, it seems likely that they'll eventually go through with it.
The only thing that is saving the U.S. from having these antics prompt changes like the dollar not being the world reserve currency is that there isn't currently another currency that is more reliable.
But there will be. We can't continue enjoying the privileged economic position that we have if the Tea Party continues to be able to pull this sort of nonsense. I think that the Democrats giving in to them again could have accelerated the economic losses.
I was talking specifically about Standard & Poor's $25 billion estimate Sam was referencing. I doubt (but can't verify because I can't find the core analysis) that it took any consideration of the long-term consequences you're pointing to here. And, as I said, it may be (but I don't feel it's a given) that long-term we're better off due to the President's intransigence on the medical device tax. But I'm guessing if he'd acquiesced, S&P's estimate would have been half of what it was, and Fitch wouldn't have put US short-term debt on negative watch. That's all I was saying.
Posted by SenojRetep (Member # 8614) on :
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro:
quote:Originally posted by SenojRetep: Also, if Democrats had swallowed the medical device tax (something lots of them wanted to do, but the President and Harry Reid didn't), this would've been over a week ago, long before most of these negative impacts. Republicans were certainly at fault, but Democrats could have easily softened this blow.
Please examine this statement. They should have relented to this abuse of the process in order to lessen its effects.
Analogies to battered wives seem superfluous, but maybe I'm wrong- would you like a battered wife analogy?
I'll give you one: eventually, no matter how often the wife apologizes to the man who beats her for making him do it, and promises to concede things that she should not, in a sane relationship, concede, he will eventually kill her. That is the end of the cycle of abuse: you stop it, or you die. It doesn't get better once one side realizes that the abuse gives them power.
And that's all this is: the Tea Party is out to destroy the federal government. I mean this not by the way of hyperbole, but literally: they are on a course that ends with the destruction of the federal government. Because their power, and everything that defines them as an organization (which is not much else btw), is in the promise of destruction. That is the instinct that their philosophy primarily services: the destruction of all obstacles. In a way, it's worse than National Socialism or International Communism, both amorphously unspecific agendas of power; because these agendas were actually constructive. They were trying to construct something horrible, but they were trying to construct *something*. The Tea Party hasn't proven as insidious, but it may yet prove as destructive.
See my response to Squick. You can feel that it's in our long-term interest but still recognize that the short-term effects Sam pointed to were exacerbated by the President's stance. Personally, I feel like there's more than enough uncertainty about the future to question whether it truly was in our long-term interests; if you don't, that's cool, your model for how the world works could be much better and clearer than mine. But my response was specifically about the short-term metrics Sam was pointing to and not about those long-term measures.
<edit>Said differently, if the President had primarily cared about S&P's estimate of the cost to the economy or Fitch's placing us on the negative watch list, he could have done something about it a week ago. That he didn't suggests he cared about something else more. His rhetoric suggests he feels similarly to Squick and Orincoro, that a pernicious habit of using debt limits and government shut-downs as moments for coercive bargaining was such a long-term threat it was worth the short-term pain to hold an absolutist stance. Personally, I think there was a healthy dose of legacy-burnishing and political gamesmanship as well, but I don't really doubt the core of why he claims he did it. But the truth is he could have ended the shut down a week ago if he had wanted to, thereby mitigating much of the short term pain, possibly at the expense of increasing the probability of having to endure such painful experiences in the future.</edit>
[ October 17, 2013, 01:06 PM: Message edited by: SenojRetep ]
Posted by Thesifer (Member # 12890) on :
Short-term pain is worth cutting down on extended long-term pain. If I could take 2 weeks of substantially increased pain, to not have aches and pains for years to come.. I'd do it in a heartbeat.
Of course there were other valid arguments made - that as long as you have people willing to tear down the government (Tea Party), it doesn't matter what you try to do to get rid of the pain. They'll just stab you in the face until you can't take the pain any longer.
Posted by SenojRetep (Member # 8614) on :
quote:Originally posted by Thesifer: Short-term pain is worth cutting down on extended long-term pain. If I could take 2 weeks of substantially increased pain, to not have aches and pains for years to come.. I'd do it in a heartbeat.
Of course there were other valid arguments made - that as long as you have people willing to tear down the government (Tea Party), it doesn't matter what you try to do to get rid of the pain. They'll just stab you in the face until you can't take the pain any longer.
Short-term pain can be worth it, depending on how likely and how intense long-term pain is. Seeing the future is tough, though, and I'm skeptical that anyone really knows how the President's decision will materially impact budget negotiations beyond 2014.
If you don't think the President's response will have any impact on the Tea Party's behavior (i.e. they're going to keep "stabbing us in the face" no matter what he does) than that only decreases his reasons for choosing to endure short-term pain. Again, that doesn't mean I like, approve of, or support the Tea Party's agenda; it just means that if the President didn't believe he was avoiding any long-term pain, it should have decreased his willingness to allow us to endure the short-term pain Sam pointed to.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
That makes absolutely zero sense.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote: was talking specifically about Standard & Poor's $25 billion estimate Sam was referencing. I doubt (but can't verify because I can't find the core analysis) that it took any consideration of the long-term consequences you're pointing to here.
I think you misunderstood me. I was talking about short term consequences. The loss of confidence in the U.S. that came about because people saw that the Tea Party was behaving irrationally and irresponsibly and that they have a strong influence in American politics. This leads people to believe, besides the direct effect of pissing money away that they had, there are likely to be times in the future when they are again going to throw tantrums and try to take the country hostage, which is going to lose us even more money. There is the impression that the previously unthinkable insanity of America not paying its debts is now a possibility.
That loss in confidence has immediate effects in the short term and these effects are included in the estimates of how much this whole episode cost the country. Giving in to the Tea Party like you suggested would increase the likelihood of more disastrous moves by them in the future, so it would lead to a greater loss in confidence which would in turn cause more short term, as well as long term, financial damage.
---
It seems unlikely that the Tea Party will change, but the fact that they caused massive economic damage throwing a childish tantrum and got nothing for it will hopefully 1) not embolden them into doing more of this in the future and 2) diminish their overall influence in the American political process. Both off which are good for the long term stability of the country.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by capaxinfiniti: Except my general ideological position isn't 'fringe' so he's not correct. For you to believe so you must be intentionally ignoring what I've said on this forum or you live in an ideological and cultural bubble.
The problem is actually that we paid attention to what you've said on this forum, and we've noted how conspicuously you've often supported hacky fringe views with weak logic, run from questions and pretended you answered them, been a faithless arguer, etc.
There are parts of your 'general ideological position' that I certainly wish were more fringe, but time will fix that. Oh, and yes, we observed the distinction!
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Also, if Democrats had swallowed the medical device tax (something lots of them wanted to do, but the President and Harry Reid didn't), this would've been over a week ago, long before most of these negative impacts. Republicans were certainly at fault, but Democrats could have easily softened this blow. They chose not to in order to make an ideological point. Good for them politically, and maybe good for us all long term
You say 'maybe,' I'm stuck on "absolutely without a doubt"
the precedent had to be set in order to keep the tea party from holding the entire country's well-being hostage to force concessions from a fraction of a minority of one house of one branch of the government.
Posted by Dan_Frank (Member # 8488) on :
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: And that's all this is: the Tea Party is out to destroy the federal government. I mean this not by the way of hyperbole, but literally: they are on a course that ends with the destruction of the federal government. Because their power, and everything that defines them as an organization (which is not much else btw), is in the promise of destruction. That is the instinct that their philosophy primarily services: the destruction of all obstacles. In a way, it's worse than National Socialism or International Communism, both amorphously unspecific agendas of power; because these agendas were actually constructive. They were trying to construct something horrible, but they were trying to construct *something*. The Tea Party hasn't proven as insidious, but it may yet prove as destructive.
Whether you mean it as huperbole or not doesn't change that it's hyperbole. They aren't actually trying to destroy the entire federal government.
Regardless, you seem to have internalized a belief structure that really fascinates me. The concept that having the government do something, even if it is something bad, is somehow better than it doing nothing.
Look at your words. You literally just said the tea party is "in some ways worse" than Naziism. Because it trying to destroy a government, and at least the Nazis were trying to build a government. That's amazing, and revolting.
Your thinking seems devoid of any real moral framework. Just a destruction/creation dichotomy which you seem to think has all the inherent morality you need.
You're wrong. Doing something bad is worse than doing nothing. Creating a monstrous government is a terrible action. Much worse than destroying a flawed one.
Edit: It also amazes me that I'm the first one to criticize this.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
Not really, people can recognize that sometimes good things come from shitty things. The United States is a "good thing" but it was born from genocide, slavery, ethnic cleansing, aggressive expansion and to not pay taxes.
Yes, the tea party is trying to destroy the federal government, in so far as they want it so ineffective and its responsibilities delegated to the states that it cannot interfere with their state level fiefdoms and regressive policies and voter suppression.
quote: Your thinking seems devoid of any real moral framework.
It's a framework of "maybe people should have their resources pooled together so they can more optimally help people who are in terrible circumstances."? The observation of "even X and Y accomplished something" is just that, an observation to contrast just how empty and devoid of merit or credibility Tea Party Libertarian philosophy is.
Though, not sure where Orincoro is saying "Doing something is better than nothing even if its bad", maybe you can get there through inference but I doubt Obamacare is "bad", that might just be the false dichotomy your presenting through your flawed "government is never the answer" world view.
quote: Edit: It also amazes me that I'm the first one to criticize this.
Notice that you're operating under a warped ethical framework?
Posted by Dan_Frank (Member # 8488) on :
You've ignored what I raised an issue with in favor of trying to argue with topics I have no interest in.
He said that the tea party was, in a way, worse than Naziism, because Naziism was constructive and the tea party is destructive.
Either he is attributing inherent morality to being constructive, regardless of whether what you are doing is good, or he thinks Naziism was kind of good. I'm actually giving him the benefit of the doubt in regards to what I am criticizing him for.
Here's the thing: Even if you assume the federal government is a significant net positive, and the tea party is completely wrong, what he said is still repugnant. They're not worse than Nazis. Saying that they are is stupid and offensive.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote: He said that the tea party was, in a way, worse than Naziism, because Naziism was constructive and the tea party is destructive.
Your ignoring the meaning behind his words, also note worthy you focus on national socialism and not Communism to focus on the one with the most knee jerk emotional baggage.
His point is not that they're "constructivism" was in fact good, but that even two relatively evil ideologies managed to have had a overall positivist goal that at least left something behind in evidence of their ideology. That the Tea Party lacks even this basic minimum shows how utterly bankrupt they are.
They are the Ouroboros, a snake that can only consume itself until there is nothing.
Absolutely nothing about how "government doing something bad is better than government doing nothing."
quote: Here's the thing: Even if you assume the federal government is a significant net positive,
This is why arguing with you is like punching a brick wall, except the brick wall would actually bend a little.
Your a priori assumption is that government can only be a net negative, despite all evidence to the contrary. Even worse, you actually ignore the evidence instead arguing purely the ideology of "restraining liberty bad even if it helps people."
quote: and the tea party is completely wrong, what he said is still repugnant. They're not worse than Nazis. Saying that they are is stupid and offensive.
Under the lens he is analyzing them he is absolutely right to conclude this, in the same way I conclude that libertarianism is absolutely without merit because there has yet to be a single nation on the face of the earth or throughout all of history that is libertarian. While Communism is MORE credible because it at least brought two nation's to the status of being Great Powers and there are examples of successful communes.
Under this logical framework, libertarianism is worse Communism because it isn't as practical.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
the tea party is literally hitler.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
I think godwin himself would have voted for a combination tea party third reich communist structure.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Nothing ted cruz said about obamacare today was true. shame, that.
Posted by capaxinfiniti (Member # 12181) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: The problem is actually that we paid attention to what you've said on this forum, and we've noted how conspicuously you've often supported hacky fringe views with weak logic, run from questions and pretended you answered them, been a faithless arguer, etc.
There are parts of your 'general ideological position' that I certainly wish were more fringe, but time will fix that. Oh, and yes, we observed the distinction!
That's blatantly disingenuous. You don't pay attention, you manipulate and distort. You ask irrelevant and childish questions and are therefore ignored. You enter discussions with less sincerity than anyone else on this forum but expect the total opposite from others. Get off your high horse. You look pathetic.
You obviously have your own definition of 'fringe' as well as wacky metrics to deduce the political standing of people who don't agree with you. Anyone who's not a foaming-at-the-mouth progressive probably seems like the right-wing fringe. I'll welcome you back to reality when you get here.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
I think its kinda self evident that if you actually think the Democrats are at fault for the shutdown, for not 'compromising', self identify with Rand or Ron Paul's libertarianism, or identify with/support the Tea Party, think Obama is actually "left wing", think Fox News is "fair and balanced" news organization, or that government [anything] is a 'bad' idea....
You're probably fringe.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by capaxinfiniti:
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: The problem is actually that we paid attention to what you've said on this forum, and we've noted how conspicuously you've often supported hacky fringe views with weak logic, run from questions and pretended you answered them, been a faithless arguer, etc.
There are parts of your 'general ideological position' that I certainly wish were more fringe, but time will fix that. Oh, and yes, we observed the distinction!
That's blatantly disingenuous. You don't pay attention, you manipulate and distort. You ask irrelevant and childish questions and are therefore ignored. You enter discussions with less sincerity than anyone else on this forum but expect the total opposite from others. Get off your high horse. You look pathetic.
"You ask irrelevant and childish questions and are therefore ignored."
Funny, you didn't seem to be ignoring me in any of the recent exchanges in which you are asked relevant questions and then you pretzel around them and pretend you answered them.
See, this is the problem for when you make stuff up and go on a predictable beef about how it's other people who are acting disingenuous. You're predictable, you have a referenced history, and you project wildly (especially with the "You enter discussions with less sincerity than anyone else on this forum" — hahahahaha)
quote:I'll welcome you back to reality when you get here.
Is this your reality where gays should be kept out of standard public restrooms and segregated to gays-only restrooms? I don't like your reality, capax. It's a twisted little dark place full of phobias and delusions that I have to remember every time you pop up canards about how it's actually other people who are twisting reality, not you.
please keep feuding with me, ya nut! get out all that frustration!
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Republican Rep. Mick Mulvaney of South Carolina voted against the debt deal Wednesday night for a great many reasons, and one of those reasons is that he thought that the bipartisan legislation to reopen the government included funding for the Lord’s Resistance Army, a Ugandan militant group led by exiled war criminal Joseph Kony.
This is not true. But that didn’t stop Mulvaney from including it in his statement denouncing the deal!
“Finally, the ‘deal’ is full of pork,” Mulvaney said. “A dam project in Kentucky got extra money; the state of Colorado got money to help with its flooding; and the ‘Lord’s Resistance Army’ received special funds. Those may be worth discussing, but that will never happen now, as they were crammed into this ‘deal’ in order to help it pass. So much for the ‘clean’ bill that my Democrat colleagues said they wanted so badly.”
As noted by the Huffington Post, the money in the deal will actually fund the Pentagon’s efforts to support African forces currently conducting a manhunt for Kony.
Posted by capaxinfiniti (Member # 12181) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: See, this is the problem for when you make stuff up and go on a predictable beef about how it's other people who are acting disingenuous. You're predictable, you have a referenced history, and you project wildly
I was hoping you'd use 'predicable' a third time for a total strike out. Hahaha.
You've obviously abandoned the whole 'fringe' argument in favor of a more elaborate circus act. That's fine, bro. It must be hard to stick to one attack when its premise is patently false.
Posted by Jeff C. (Member # 12496) on :
Lol wtf? Did this guy seriously think that the US government was trying to send money to Kony? How delusional is he?
Posted by SenojRetep (Member # 8614) on :
quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky:
quote: was talking specifically about Standard & Poor's $25 billion estimate Sam was referencing. I doubt (but can't verify because I can't find the core analysis) that it took any consideration of the long-term consequences you're pointing to here.
I think you misunderstood me. I was talking about short term consequences. The loss of confidence in the U.S. that came about because people saw that the Tea Party was behaving irrationally and irresponsibly and that they have a strong influence in American politics. This leads people to believe, besides the direct effect of pissing money away that they had, there are likely to be times in the future when they are again going to throw tantrums and try to take the country hostage, which is going to lose us even more money. There is the impression that the previously unthinkable insanity of America not paying its debts is now a possibility.
That loss in confidence has immediate effects in the short term and these effects are included in the estimates of how much this whole episode cost the country. Giving in to the Tea Party like you suggested would increase the likelihood of more disastrous moves by them in the future, so it would lead to a greater loss in confidence which would in turn cause more short term, as well as long term, financial damage.
---
It seems unlikely that the Tea Party will change, but the fact that they caused massive economic damage throwing a childish tantrum and got nothing for it will hopefully 1) not embolden them into doing more of this in the future and 2) diminish their overall influence in the American political process. Both off which are good for the long term stability of the country.
I doubt S&P, or any of the other snap analyses*, included the indirect but short-term costs you're talking about. I can't say for certain, because I can't see the analysis itself, but I would be surprised if they did. And given how amorphous and difficult to precisely quantify that sort of harm is, that's probably for the best.
*Other analyses came in distinctly lower than S&P's, more in the $10-15 billion range. It's statistically depressing that the most extreme number gets the most play, but that's the way of the world I suppose.
------ I don't really understand what you mean. You don't think the Tea Party will change, meaning they're just as likely to use such tactics in the future. But at least they weren't emboldened; so they'll be less likely to try this stuff in the future than they would otherwise have been. I can kind of squint and get meaning from that, but it seems a bit contradictory to me.
(2) I can understand, although I personally think it's somewhat unlikely. I think that the politicians who were really harmed in this ideological battle were the moderates in both parties, not the ideologues. If the President had wanted to decrease the influence of the Tea Party I think (and I think political science literature on dealing with extremists largely backs this up) the best he could have done was work to promote moderates within the GOP as valid partners. So instead of focusing his rhetoric on blasting Ted Cruz, he should have focused on promoting Susan Collins. I believe that any time you engage in partisan absolutism, as the President chose to do here, it tends to strengthen the extreme elements of both parties and weaken the moderate elements. And, again, I'm not saying engaging in partisan absolutism is wrong; there are distinct advantages, and this was a great situation for the President to do it in (especially if you're a Democrat, or believe Obamacare not running a deficit is really important). I'm just saying I think the idea that this episode diminished the Tea Party's overall influence is somewhat uncertain.
Posted by SenojRetep (Member # 8614) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:Also, if Democrats had swallowed the medical device tax (something lots of them wanted to do, but the President and Harry Reid didn't), this would've been over a week ago, long before most of these negative impacts. Republicans were certainly at fault, but Democrats could have easily softened this blow. They chose not to in order to make an ideological point. Good for them politically, and maybe good for us all long term
You say 'maybe,' I'm stuck on "absolutely without a doubt"
the precedent had to be set in order to keep the tea party from holding the entire country's well-being hostage to force concessions from a fraction of a minority of one house of one branch of the government.
Well, at least you're certain.
Personally, I hope you're right and we're able to get back to the sort of budgetary process we had in the mid-1980s, but I don't feel the same degree of certitude you do; I think it's more than likely that we'll do this all again next year, precedent notwithstanding. Probably not in January, but probably soon after the 2014 election, especially if the results aren't great for the Democrats.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
Well, t dispute Samprimary's certainty don't you need to believe that a hastier negotiation by Democrats wouldn't have validated the shutdown hostage taking by far-right Republicans? That it wouldn't have been used as a tool by the people who effectively sponsored this shutdown and past threatened shutdowns and defaults as a means of obtaining their political objectives?
It seem pretty straightforward to me that it would, since already even with the past dubiously effective rounds of Tea Party prompted brinksmanship they were held as effective tools among those who used them. Given that, doesn't it stand to reason that to negotiate quickly here would (again) be used as a sign that since the Tea Party cannot win at the polls outside their tailor-made districts (not that gerrymandering is their unique province), this is how they should get their fill at the national level?
That reasoning seems pretty fair to me, Senoj, but I'm eager to hear how it doesn't fit together or which party aren't valid of themselves.
----------
(See, capax, this is how conservatives-or even those who espouse a more conservative position and/or one critical of liberals and/or democrats-this is how they are interacted with when they haven't built up your reputation. I mention this because you're continuing in your 'lone wolf of fairness' narrative, and persisting in behaving as though the scorn you receive is blanketed onto all conservatives. I mention this here specifically in this context because the last time, Geraine, another dude 'round here who often takes a more conservative stance, pointed out that your perceived anti-conservative conspiracy was bunk and you didn't seem to notice or care.)
Posted by SenojRetep (Member # 8614) on :
quote:Originally posted by Rakeesh: Well, t dispute Samprimary's certainty don't you need to believe that a hastier negotiation by Democrats wouldn't have validated the shutdown hostage taking by far-right Republicans? That it wouldn't have been used as a tool by the people who effectively sponsored this shutdown and past threatened shutdowns and defaults as a means of obtaining their political objectives?
It seem pretty straightforward to me that it would, since already even with the past dubiously effective rounds of Tea Party prompted brinksmanship they were held as effective tools among those who used them. Given that, doesn't it stand to reason that to negotiate quickly here would (again) be used as a sign that since the Tea Party cannot win at the polls outside their tailor-made districts (not that gerrymandering is their unique province), this is how they should get their fill at the national level?
Do you think that if the President had embraced Collins' plan the Tea Party would have claimed victory, especially if it had happened quickly and cleanly? Personally I doubt it. As it is, they can spin this to their donors as having lead a noble fight, one which garnered tons of publicity (albeit negative, but publicity is publicity) for their views. The President had to address their issues! Ted Cruz is Obama's nemesis!
In the other scenario, they would have been largely irrelevant to the process, and their stature among the donor class would have taken a hit.
I'm also aware that the way I originally cast this was about the President; that's partisan and unfair of me. Boehner had at least as much ability to marginalize the extreme elements of his party by denying the 'defund and delay' tactic from the outset in favor of either a clean CR and debt limit increase, or (if there weren't enough moderate Republicans on board with that) something more akin to what Collins' eventually proposed. He chose not to for what I believe to be personal political gain, even though it hurt both his party and the nation as a whole. To me, that's pretty craven.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by capaxinfiniti:
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary: See, this is the problem for when you make stuff up and go on a predictable beef about how it's other people who are acting disingenuous. You're predictable, you have a referenced history, and you project wildly
I was hoping you'd use 'predicable' a third time for a total strike out. Hahaha.
See, that's just it. I used "predictable," and then posted links to your history of being predictable, and really substantiate my point about you, and you act like my just using a word (in a sense of accurate description) as a 'strike out' and act like you've got some ground to have an intellectual victory.
You are ably permitted to afford yourself as many of these self-proclaimed victories as you want, but when they don't mesh with reality, its like printing currency that nobody else accepts and calling yourself rich on account of it.
DO CONTINUE.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
quote:Do you think that if the President had embraced Collins' plan the Tea Party would have claimed victory, especially if it had happened quickly and cleanly? Personally I doubt it. As it is, they can spin this to their donors as having lead a noble fight, one which garnered tons of publicity (albeit negative, but publicity is publicity) for their views. The President had to address their issues! Ted Cruz is Obama's nemesis!
I do in fact, though that's an issue we won't be able to verify so it'll remain open. But I think it's telling that even when they suffered what was unquestionably a major political defeat, and inflicted substantial loss of face to the country as a whole before the world (that's before we get into the uncertain but potentially dire outcome they were risking with forcing a default-again)...even when these things happen they *still* hold it up as a 'noble fight' as you say. They brush off where they lost and focus on their 'nobility'.
In the face of such a vain willingness to deny reality as to behave as though they didn't suffer a pointless, embarrassing loss when they clearly did...yeah, I think if the Democrats had negotiated promptly that would've been held as a validating victory, particularly since wasn't forcing negotiation via brinksmanship the point of the exercise? I fin jt difficult to credit they actually believed they could defund or delay the ACA-regardless of what they said to voters.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
I can. I could expand on that pretty significantly, but the core of the idea is that the exact same knowledge and unbiased information gaps that in general led to Romney going into election night pretty much expecting to be the next president (when in reality he had not had a chance for weeks) is the same thing that 'informed' these lawmakers about the 'reality' of what the public demanded of them and of the ACA.
It'd go back to the Wonk Gap part of this, but it would be a pretty straightforwardly thought-out and serious position, albeit "biased" in the same sense of nonequivalent proclamation.
I assume the forum is game?
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
*"I can" in that I personally easily credit the 'suicide caucus' with actually believing they could pull this off. I believe they sincerely, genuinely, expected they could do this.
Posted by Darth_Mauve (Member # 4709) on :
There are three things you need to get elected to Congress.
Money
The ability to show the people who vote for you that you agree with them.
More money.
Those with money would be those most hurt by defaults and government closings and other economic blackmail attempts. The uncertainties that are created by this cycle of crises are hurting the market, business, and investment.
If those with the money (or the Free Speech as the Supreme Court calls it) respond by refusing to donate to the campaigns of radicals from both sides, if they only fund the moderate, predictable government that is good for the markets, we could end this cycle of emergencies.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: And that's all this is: the Tea Party is out to destroy the federal government. I mean this not by the way of hyperbole, but literally: they are on a course that ends with the destruction of the federal government. Because their power, and everything that defines them as an organization (which is not much else btw), is in the promise of destruction. That is the instinct that their philosophy primarily services: the destruction of all obstacles. In a way, it's worse than National Socialism or International Communism, both amorphously unspecific agendas of power; because these agendas were actually constructive. They were trying to construct something horrible, but they were trying to construct *something*. The Tea Party hasn't proven as insidious, but it may yet prove as destructive.
Whether you mean it as huperbole or not doesn't change that it's hyperbole. They aren't actually trying to destroy the entire federal government.
No, actually. Me not meaning it as hyperbole means it *isn't* hyperbole. That's the way this works. I tell you how I mean it- you don't tell me.
How I mean it is, in fact, *essential* to understanding what I am telling you: I really believe, hand to my heart, that the Tea Party is on a course to destroy the federal government. Literally.
quote: Regardless, you seem to have internalized a belief structure that really fascinates me. The concept that having the government do something, even if it is something bad, is somehow better than it doing nothing.
No. Improve your reading comprehension. "In a way," means "in a way." it does not mean "definitively," nor "in general" nor "on the whole," nor, "in an objective sense," but rather "in a way." Which necessarily admits that there are other ways (in this case many) in which the others being mentioned are still worse. For one off the top of my head: they were smarter, better organized, and more motivated.
But keep in mind, I'm mainly making the argument that Tea Partiism is dangerous in similar ways to how Naziism is dangerous- not necessarily that they are both dangerous to the same degrees. While they are superficially, practically similar in some ways: lack of overall political direction, a platform that relies almost totally on outsider status to avoid blame for all failed ideologies, populism combined with a cynically corporate elitism at its uppermost levels, etc etc etc, they are different in too many ways to make comparisons much matter- except in that saying "some things" about either may be worse.
quote: Look at your words. You literally just said the tea party is "in some ways worse" than Naziism. Because it trying to destroy a government, and at least the Nazis were trying to build a government. That's amazing, and revolting.
Yes, I literally said that because it's literally true. If your knee-jerk reactionary streak can't allow you to countenance the idea that the Nazis ever did anything positive (they did by the way), then really we have nothing in the world to talk about.
This is not some exercise in semantics for me: The Nazis were one of the worst things to ever happen to humanity, but they also had positive accomplishments. Most evil bastards do.
quote: Your thinking seems devoid of any real moral framework.
That's funny. Your thinking seems devoid of thinking most of the time. For me, on the other hand, a moral framework is the product of carefully considered "thoughts," as we call them. They involve weighing the veracity and importance of different facts and opinions, and synthesizing a viewpoint that one believes encompasses the opposing argument and adequately neutralizes major conflicts. Try it sometime.
quote: Just a destruction/creation dichotomy which you seem to think has all the inherent morality you need.
No. In no way did I imply, nor do I believe, that "destruction vs. Creation," is the ultimate signifier of moral righteousness.
You just heard it from me. Right here. So we don't need to go over it again.
quote: Doing something bad is worse than doing nothing.
That is a very morally and ethically complex statement. One that I am not necessarily prepared to agree with. One that you should not be so prepared to say sans-qualification of any kind.
quote: Creating a monstrous government is a terrible action. Much worse than destroying a flawed one.
Again, you're delving into some very dicey philosophical and moral issues as if the answers to these problems are self-evident. They are not. Nor are they so black and white as you seem to imply.
See, this is where Tea Party philosophy is so inherently dangerous. It is an abrogation of the consequences of an act like this one: it's the idea that destroying a government you don't like is better than reforming it, in order at all costs to avoid allowing oneself to suffer some form of persecution (perceived or otherwise). It abrogates the very notion that destruction of persecution might, in itself, bear the moral fruits of worse persecution, of worse abuses of power, and of more chaos and destruction. It negates the notion that the destructive force is not inherently a creative one: and refuses to even consider the results of destructive action beyond the immediate political goals involved.
This is very remarkable, in that it formed the basis of the policies of non-other than Donald Rumsfeld during the first term of the Bush administration: by stating that the goals of a campaign are the defeat of obstacles lying within the realm of the "unkown unknown," Rumsfeld, and Bush, and really the whole country shrugged off the very *need* for a reason to fight a war. Assuming that a reason would be found later on. The Tea Party's plan of attack is remarkably similar: it assumes that injustice and consequent moral outrage amongst the population is a natural result of *anything* that the democrats do, and that in fighting against *anything* that the democratically elected government does will provide itself with a raison d'être as if by magic.
That's a very dangerous philosophical position to be in. It might even lead a party to oppose its own previous platforms for reform (as has been done in respect to Obamacare).
[ October 20, 2013, 02:34 PM: Message edited by: Orincoro ]
Posted by TomDavidson (Member # 124) on :
Throttle it back a bit, cowpokes.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
I don't think it's hyperbole to say that the Tea Party wants to destroy the federal government.
Haven't they more or less stated that's exactly what they want to do? It only comes off as a shocking statement if you work with the assumption that people want or need a government, and the Tea Party firmly believes that they DO NOT need a government, so destroying it is an endgame for them.
It's what makes them so dangerous right now. Because of a combination of how our government is structured and how Boehner runs the House, the TP congressman really can destroy the government if Boehner lets them. But I think the biggest danger comes from the fact that we have big problems that require big solutions.
Tugging on boot straps isn't going to fix America.
Posted by Dan_Frank (Member # 8488) on :
Orincoro, I don't think destroying a flawed government is preferable to reforming it. I've said as much here many times. I'm strongly opposed to the libertarian "smash the state" ideal. To the extent that this strain is common to the tea party, and it is, I'm also opposed to them.
Incremental reform is the best way to go. I suspect many people here who broadly disagree with me could confirm that I've said made my opinions on this issue clear many times.
I'm not too surprised that you've missed that, though. That's fine. You're not under any particular obligation to pay attention to what I've said in the past. But it might be useful to just respond to what I've said, instead of assuming that because I disagree with you it follows that I agree completely with those you're opposed to.
Most of the rest of what you said is based on that misunderstanding, so it's not very interesting to me.
Except to add that, in the context of your original post, the only thing you (and Blayne after you) posited as evidence that the Nazis are in a way better than the Tea Party is that they were at least trying to build something.
That's what you said. That's what I objected to. In the context of what you said, it asserts some measure of moral superiority to the act of creation over that of destruction, regardless of what the object is. If you didn't mean it that way and are retracting your previous words as sloppily phrased, that's fine by me.
Posted by Dan_Frank (Member # 8488) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: I don't think it's hyperbole to say that the Tea Party wants to destroy the federal government.
Haven't they more or less stated that's exactly what they want to do? It only comes off as a shocking statement if you work with the assumption that people want or need a government, and the Tea Party firmly believes that they DO NOT need a government, so destroying it is an endgame for them.
It's what makes them so dangerous right now. Because of a combination of how our government is structured and how Boehner runs the House, the TP congressman really can destroy the government if Boehner lets them. But I think the biggest danger comes from the fact that we have big problems that require big solutions.
Tugging on boot straps isn't going to fix America.
Nah, most of them have explicitly stated that they want to dramatically scale back the federal government. Actual anarchists are vanishingly rare in the tea party.
It's fine if you think that the extent to which they want to scale it back is tantamount to destruction. But then... Say that. It's a blatant falsehood to say they literally want the entire federal government dismantled.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Dan: I'd like to add you are one of my favorite voices on this forum specifically because you are an interesting mix of ideas that contains a lot of stuff I want*.
*Totally mean that in a platonic way.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: I don't think it's hyperbole to say that the Tea Party wants to destroy the federal government.
Haven't they more or less stated that's exactly what they want to do? It only comes off as a shocking statement if you work with the assumption that people want or need a government, and the Tea Party firmly believes that they DO NOT need a government, so destroying it is an endgame for them.
It's what makes them so dangerous right now. Because of a combination of how our government is structured and how Boehner runs the House, the TP congressman really can destroy the government if Boehner lets them. But I think the biggest danger comes from the fact that we have big problems that require big solutions.
Tugging on boot straps isn't going to fix America.
Nah, most of them have explicitly stated that they want to dramatically scale back the federal government. Actual anarchists are vanishingly rare in the tea party.
It's fine if you think that the extent to which they want to scale it back is tantamount to destruction. But then... Say that. It's a blatant falsehood to say they literally want the entire federal government dismantled.
It's the difference between saying someone wants to drink an entire glass of water and someone wants to drink 90% of a glass of water. I'll admit it's incorrect, strictly speaking, but no so much so that it's worth much of a fuss over.
They want to get rid of all entitlements, pare back the military to go into isolation mode, and seem to disapprove of about just about every dollar of discretionary spending. That's pretty much the entire government as we know it.
You're right on specifics, but I'm just not sure it's really worth quibbling over when it comes to general intent.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by Dan_Frank:
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: I don't think it's hyperbole to say that the Tea Party wants to destroy the federal government.
Haven't they more or less stated that's exactly what they want to do? It only comes off as a shocking statement if you work with the assumption that people want or need a government, and the Tea Party firmly believes that they DO NOT need a government, so destroying it is an endgame for them.
It's what makes them so dangerous right now. Because of a combination of how our government is structured and how Boehner runs the House, the TP congressman really can destroy the government if Boehner lets them. But I think the biggest danger comes from the fact that we have big problems that require big solutions.
Tugging on boot straps isn't going to fix America.
Nah, most of them have explicitly stated that they want to dramatically scale back the federal government. Actual anarchists are vanishingly rare in the tea party.
It's fine if you think that the extent to which they want to scale it back is tantamount to destruction. But then... Say that. It's a blatant falsehood to say they literally want the entire federal government dismantled.
They are perfectly happy with statism so long as its the states doing the statism; it isn't anarchism because they think the States should have the federal governments responsibilities, and by destroying the federal government, they intend to strengthen the state level government.
Posted by MrSquicky (Member # 1802) on :
quote:Originally posted by SenojRetep: I doubt S&P, or any of the other snap analyses*, included the indirect but short-term costs you're talking about. I can't say for certain, because I can't see the analysis itself, but I would be surprised if they did. And given how amorphous and difficult to precisely quantify that sort of harm is, that's probably for the best.
*Other analyses came in distinctly lower than S&P's, more in the $10-15 billion range. It's statistically depressing that the most extreme number gets the most play, but that's the way of the world I suppose.
I'm not sure how to address this. It seems like you've already accepted that there are significant financial damages (both short and long term) associated with the loss of consumer confidence and international faith in the U.S. economy. If that is so, whether or not these are included in analyses like the S&P one* is pretty much beside the point.
* - They are. Of course they are. It would be insane to intentionally leave out known economic effects.
quote:Originally posted by SenojRetep: I don't really understand what you mean. You don't think the Tea Party will change, meaning they're just as likely to use such tactics in the future. But at least they weren't emboldened; so they'll be less likely to try this stuff in the future than they would otherwise have been. I can kind of squint and get meaning from that, but it seems a bit contradictory to me.
I don't believe the Tea Party will start acting any more responsibly or intelligently. I don't think the core of the party has the capacity to and the people riding herd on them have committed to their approach. But I don't think that failing so spectacularly will cool their ardor for this particular tactic.
Think of like a dim, spoiled child. Things aren't going his way, so he throws a tantrum. If this tantrum works, he's going to do it again. If you don't give in, they're likely going to try some other tactic.
---
I've been seeing something among the more intelligent conservatives I know and/or read. They're aware that the Tea Party is to blame, but really really want to somehow pin something on President Obama. So they'll very quickly say, "Yeah, the Tea party was in the wrong....but let's talk a lot about how President Obama should have compromised anyway." I could be wrong, but it seems like you may be falling into doing this.
quote:Originally posted by SenojRetep: (2) I can understand, although I personally think it's somewhat unlikely. I think that the politicians who were really harmed in this ideological battle were the moderates in both parties, not the ideologues. If the President had wanted to decrease the influence of the Tea Party I think (and I think political science literature on dealing with extremists largely backs this up) the best he could have done was work to promote moderates within the GOP as valid partners. So instead of focusing his rhetoric on blasting Ted Cruz, he should have focused on promoting Susan Collins. I believe that any time you engage in partisan absolutism, as the President chose to do here, it tends to strengthen the extreme elements of both parties and weaken the moderate elements. And, again, I'm not saying engaging in partisan absolutism is wrong; there are distinct advantages, and this was a great situation for the President to do it in (especially if you're a Democrat, or believe Obamacare not running a deficit is really important). I'm just saying I think the idea that this episode diminished the Tea Party's overall influence is somewhat uncertain.
It's too early to see what the long term situation is going to be, but public opinion polling has shown the Tea Party at the highest unfavorable (and the large majority of that is strongly unfavorable) they've ever been. Also, several of the big money people who have been supporting the Tea Party have already publicly cut ties with them. Some of them are calling/laying the framework for campaigns to compete against Tea Party candidates in the coming elections.
If we're lucky, this will be the beginning of the end for the Tea Party. They'll stick around, but hopefully they'll fall to fairly insignificant. Even better would be if a more responsible, reasonable Republican party raises from this, one that relies more on principles instead of personal hatred, lies, and ignorance.
Posted by Rakeesh (Member # 2001) on :
I've often thought it strange though unsurprising when folks criticize Obama for not having gone out of his way to work with Republicans. Few but the most ardent partisans suggest he could've effectively worked with Tea Party republicans.
But it's funny to me because it's not as though the wider GOP was dragged kicking and screaming into collusion with the Tea Party in all its factions. While I'll agree more moderate Republicans weren't exactly thrilled to be pressed by political necessity into gladhanding with people who seem to try so hard to be obnoxiously ignorant...moderate Republicans were happy, when not facing challenges from their right, to take advantage of such energetic opposition to Obama. It's wasn't just the lunatic fringe who said, very early in Obama's first term, that their primary political goal was a one-term presidency. So-called 'Responsible Republicans' weren't very loud when it was time to say 'hey, enough with this Birther shot'. Was it Obama who made McCain hitch his wagon to Palin's star?
At what point in the last five years should Obama have thought, unless we're assuming he's a remarkably trusting and idealistic politician, that these purported opportunities to work with Republicans would be much more than bracketing which ribs in his back he wanted a far-right knife between?
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Once you have, I would advise one takeaway in particular, which can be built upon by similar observations and neutral analysis.
It speaks to how one of the primary differences between the American right wing and the left wing is that where the left wing has a built-up culture and network of wonks, the right wing has slowly drifted away to having a culture and network of hacks.
This is the result of many, many years of nonarticulated strategy or even just natural response to short and medium term advantage and stimulus. The right wing gets a 'hack' network and this inspires plenty of gains for them — left wing comes out with a disadvantage based on their 'hack deficit,' in the sense that their researchers and statisticians and policy analysts and think tanks and legal scholars are, in a pattern fashion, disinclined from giving their own side's representatives, or even the president, a pass because he's/they're on the same team. They will criticize their own side as well.
Right-wing politicians in similar situations would not receive the same quantity (by far) of criticism from their 'own side' of wonks. A right-wing president would not deal with the same issue of internal 'dissent,' — they would present a united front. They have been trained by their own system to 'march in step,' whether by creed (Reagan's 11th amendment, as a specific example) and by now they have a system that goes out of the way to reframe poll data, assessment of system or popular support, legal, historical, or other matters — in order to provide a unified bastion of vindicating "data" for the team.
And, increasingly, it seems less and less a directed and intentional process, and more or less the self-powered, independently momentous result of previous policy.
When they do this, and the left-wing is instead prone to self-criticism or sticking to what was once derisively noted as a facts-based narrative, it makes it so that the left wing cannot compete when it comes to the matter of creating narratives and propaganda, which is an immense advantage in our current democratic system, as it provides incalculable advantages in terms of convincing the populous to vote for you. From the infamous quote told to Suskind of the New York Times by a member of George W. Bush's presidential staff, what became the issue of being a Reality-Based Community:
quote:The aide said that guys like me were "in what we call the reality-based community," which he defined as people who "believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality." ... "That's not the way the world really works anymore," he continued. "We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out.
The right-wing can create whole cloth narratives at-will, but the left-wing is stuck with internal, factual, "reality based community" correction elements that make this far, far more complicated and ineffectual a process — even when they are actively attempting the ability to reframe facts and data to fit a narrative.
Cooper says: "when it comes to catchy slogans premised on their ideological assumptions (“job creators,” etc), lockstep message discipline, and mind-numbing repetition, liberals just can’t compete" — even when they are proud of self-criticism."
This gives the right wing great power when it comes to creating and selling a narrative to the masses. They have a huge benefit in our current climate, with our current primary voter bases, because they can (and did) use power they gained under this control of media and political narrative to wholly restructure the system wherever they could in their favor and lock down as much power as possible — proportionally representative or non.
But it has, apparently, come with long-term peril. That primarily targets themselves.
When they set themselves up in this tumbling, momentum-enhanced system of lockstep ideological support, they started to become as chronically misinformed and legitimately deluded as the voterbase.
They've created and nurtured a system that misinforms them as much as it misinforms their core demographics.
Conservatives, especially in the tea party, are now being fed hopelessly misinforming junk information by their own system. They're part of their own GIGO cycle. They're getting their information in the form of nonsense created by True Believers — which becomes the basis upon which they make "informed" decisions regarding policy and political strategy. The end result is a catastrophic disconnect from reality, which begins to implode their entire system.
Recall how Mitt Romney, with the "benefit" of his whole side's entire information gathering system, all the "specialists" and "wonks" and literally every resource they could mobilize for the benefit of the right's play for the most important, most central goal, the most powerful political post in America, went in on election night expecting to win. Their bubble of misinformation critically hamstrung their ability to realistically assess the actual circumstances of the progressing election, which drastically weakened their ability to process and react to conditions as they were, which further impeded their ability to attempt the Presidency, and which will progressively weaken their ability to manage regional races and governorships.
And this entire phenomenon is why the tea party just profoundly and profusely damaged the GOP as a whole, forced an almost unprecedented loss of face, popularity, and agenda-making power. The shutdown has been an unmitigated and complete disaster for conservatives, and they have suffered for nothing:
quote:Some day a Republican will occupy the White House again, and will thank Mr. Obama for saving the presidency from being turned into a perpetual hostage to Congressional extremists ... [The Tea Party], it observed, “picked a goal they couldn’t achieve in trying to defund Obamacare from one House of Congress, and then they picked a means they couldn’t sustain politically, by pursuing a long government shutdown and threatening to blow through the debt limit.”
quote:So what did Republicans get for shutting down the government for 17 days? Their poll numbers tanked. Their gubernatorial candidate in Virginia appears headed for defeat in next month's election. The business community is rethinking its support. Veterans and the elderly are ticked off. And any leverage they ever had to push their goals of reducing the size of government and chipping away at health-care reform is gone.
The very idea that they would have gone full ideologue in this case, that they would commit to something that would leave them known as the "suicide caucus" —
That they would commit to this, that Cruz is still talking about how he would do this debt crisis ploy again, today, in spite of everything that happened — this requires knowing the extent of their delusion in these affairs. When a Tea Party member says (and many did) something to the extent of stating that Obamacare is unconstitutional (when the challenge to the Supreme Court was cleared) — they believe this. When they say that Obamacare does not represent democracy (when it was passed in our democratic system and was the central pillar of Obama's presidency and subsequent re-election) — they believe this. Their think tanks and various foundations and policy and research systems are filling them with junk data and junk legal and sociopolitical interpretations which make this reality for them. They go into this absolutely really seriously expecting that this is something that will make them heroes in the public eye, that they will be celebrated for inflicting this debt crisis on the whole government in order to stop obamacare.
Krugman revisited the Wonk Gap in light of present effects and actions:
quote:On Saturday, Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming delivered the weekly Republican address. He ignored Syria, presumably because his party is deeply conflicted on the issue. (For the record, so am I.) Instead, he demanded repeal of the Affordable Care Act. “The health care law,” he declared, “has proven to be unpopular, unworkable and unaffordable,” and he predicted “sticker shock” in the months ahead.
So, another week, another denunciation of Obamacare. Who cares? But Mr. Barrasso’s remarks were actually interesting, although not in the way he intended. You see, all the recent news on health costs has been good. So Mr. Barrasso is predicting sticker shock precisely when serious fears of such a shock are fading fast. Why would he do that?
Well, one likely answer is that he hasn’t heard any of the good news. Think about it: Who would tell him?
My guess, in other words, was that Mr. Barrasso was inadvertently illustrating the widening “wonk gap” — the G.O.P.’s near-complete lack of expertise on anything substantive. Health care is the most prominent example, but the dumbing down extends across the spectrum, from budget issues to national security to poll analysis. Remember, Mitt Romney and much of his party went into Election Day expecting victory.
About health reform: Mr. Barrasso was wrong about everything, even the “unpopular” bit, as I’ll explain in a minute. Mainly, however, he was completely missing the story on affordability.
For the truth is that the good news on costs just keeps coming in. There has been a striking slowdown in overall health costs since the Affordable Care Act was enacted, with many experts giving the law at least partial credit. And we now have a good idea what insurance premiums will be once the law goes fully into effect; a comprehensive survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation finds that on average premiums will be significantly lower than those predicted by the Congressional Budget Office when the law was passed.
But do Republican politicians know any of this? Not if they’re listening to conservative “experts,” who have been offering a steady stream of misinformation. All those claims about sticker shock, for example, come from obviously misleading comparisons. For example, supposed experts compare average insurance rates under the new system, which will cover everyone, with the rates currently paid by a handful of young, healthy people for bare-bones insurance. And they conveniently ignore the subsidies many Americans will receive.
At the same time, in an echo of the Romney camp’s polling fantasies, other conservative “experts” are creating false impressions about public opinion. Just after Kaiser released a poll showing a strong majority — 57 percent — opposed to the idea of defunding health reform, the Heritage Foundation put out a poster claiming that 57 percent of Americans want reform defunded. Did the experts at Heritage simply read the numbers upside down? No, they claimed, they were referring to some other poll. Whatever really happened, the practical effect was to delude the right-wing faithful.
And the point is that episodes like this have become the rule, not the exception, on the right. How many Republicans know, for example, that government employment has declined, not risen, under President Obama? Certainly Senator Rand Paul was incredulous when I pointed this out to him on TV last fall. On the contrary, he insisted, “the size of growth of government is enormous under President Obama” — which was completely untrue but was presumably what his sources had told him, knowing that it was what he wanted to hear.
For that, surely, is what the wonk gap is all about. Political conservatism and serious policy analysis can coexist, and there was a time when they did. Back in the 1980s, after all, health experts at Heritage made a good-faith effort to devise a plan for universal health coverage — and what they came up with was the system now known as Obamacare.
But that was then. Modern conservatism has become a sort of cult, very much given to conspiracy theorizing when confronted with inconvenient facts. Liberal policies were supposed to cause hyperinflation, so low measured inflation must reflect statistical fraud; the threat of climate change implies the need for public action, so global warming must be a gigantic scientific hoax. Oh, and Mitt Romney would have won if only he had been a real conservative.
It’s all kind of funny, in a way. Unfortunately, however, this runaway cult controls the House, which gives it immense destructive power — the power, for example, to wreak havoc on the economy by refusing to raise the debt ceiling. And it’s disturbing to realize that this power rests in the hands of men who, thanks to the wonk gap, quite literally have no idea what they’re doing.
As if to dramatically emphasize the point that conservatives are increasingly becoming blinkered victims of their own cult of misinformation, Rep. Mick Mulvaney (R-S.C.), in describing his reasons for joining 144 house conservatives ... in attempting to vote the United States into not honoring its own debt, made some statements that indicated that one of the reasons he voted against debt resolution was because he thought the debt deal literally provided funding to the Lord's Resistance Army, a Ugandan rebel group known for the kidnapping of children and the sale of sex slaves.
It wasn't true, of course, but it's a perfect example of a statement which if it is not immediately politically injurious and made too embarrassing a piece of "reality" for the conservatives to stand behind, becomes the new conservative reality. About anything. Obamacare, or fundings appropriation, or literally even just a bill to have america not default on its debt obligations and experience profound economic loss and an erosion of our current position in the world economy.
Posted by Jeff C. (Member # 12496) on :
I pose this question to you folks:
Do you think, based on the last several years of activity, that the Republican Party is on its way out?
The reason I ask this is because it seems more and more young people are either Democrat or fall somewhere in the middle (i.e. they opt for no party). In thirty years, will there even be a Republican Party anymore? After all, it seems like most of them are old white people (with exceptions, sure), and the country is filling up with minorities and liberal-minded people.
Do you think that this whole government shutdown has hurt their repuation in a major way?
It will be interesting to look back in 30-40 years and see how politics at that time evolved from today. Maybe the parties will be the same and maybe they won't, but I'm beginning to think that something is eventually going to change.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
The GOP will likely lose the Moral Majority side of things, the younger generation from GenY/Millennials have a decent enough breeding ground for libertarian 'truth lies in the middle' sycophants since their parent's generation stole their future (they might not SEE their Social Security, so 'why should the older folks keep it?') but they also tend to be perfectly fine with gay loving muslim atheists being able to vote and marry so if the GOP goes Libertarian or Moral Right it loses the other.
Without that coalition they lose all national relevance but may keep regional governments under lock.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Our government has seen major parties die and swap places multiple times. It could go either way. Personally I think some people in the GOP will become the equivalent of blue dog Democrats again, and the Republican party will restructure.
I'm actually not sure what Big Business would do if the GOP collapsed, but I don't think it's going to. I know there are lots of people who *want* it to, and will seize on anything that supports that conclusion.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
I remember after 2008, tons of progresses were braying (no pun intended) about the death of the GOP, who promptly took back both chambers of Congress in 2010.
There are at least 40% of voters who do not feel at home in the Democratic Party. They will go to the GOP barring anything like the government shutting down. It's a pretty low bar.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Do you think, based on the last several years of activity, that the Republican Party is on its way out?
It's not a matter of thinking its on its way out so much as that the data really seriously shows that its on its way out. The data is — and I'm serious, here — extremely nonambiguous about how the GOP is dead party walking, to the extent that demographers and social and statistical analysts have trouble coming up with plausible scenarios in which the Republican Party does not degrade into a regional power or otherwise essentially collapse entirely by the time I'm a senior citizen.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: I remember after 2008, tons of progresses were braying (no pun intended) about the death of the GOP, who promptly took back both chambers of Congress in 2010.
There are at least 40% of voters who do not feel at home in the Democratic Party. They will go to the GOP barring anything like the government shutting down. It's a pretty low bar.
Yeah, and most of them were on to something until the GOP gerrymandered the hell out of the country in 2010 and 2012. They're only hanging on to power through incredibly dubious means. But as Sam says, the demographics really aren't on their side, and immigrants and young people are only making the country more liberal. In response, they are getting more conservative.
That's a recipe for planned obsolescence.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: I remember after 2008, tons of progresses were braying (no pun intended) about the death of the GOP, who promptly took back both chambers of Congress in 2010.
This is a mean comparison but this is like saying "People were all freaking out about global warming, but this winter was really cold." — it's talking short-term variability versus an established and cumulative trend which is strongly supported.
I brayed about the death of the GOP and also noted that they were likely to have several upswings in the interim, one of which they turned into a massive redistricting push, even. I have previously talked at length about how the gains in legislature were not contrary to the observation that american conservatism is majorly demographically boned. It's not a hallucination of people just hoping for it and crafting data to fit a narrative.
Whether we continue with the same party names, or the Republican Party takes its name down with it to join the Whigs doesn't matter: in 20 years the american political landscape will be, relative to today's representation of the ideological divide, the "very liberal" party versus the "center-left liberal" party.
The GOP is already engaged in committed attempts to manage the issue of their oncoming demographic collapse, mainly through obvious attempts to disproportionally represent themselves, and to attempt to disenfranchise young and minority voters and keep them from voting as often as possible. They flirted with selling the 'terror babies' nonsense in the hopes it could let them take a pass at citizenship by birth. As is now usually the case, the terror baby scare was as much a simple cover as is "voter fraud."
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Samprimary:
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade: I remember after 2008, tons of progresses were braying (no pun intended) about the death of the GOP, who promptly took back both chambers of Congress in 2010.
This is a mean comparison but this is like saying "People were all freaking out about global warming, but this winter was really cold." — it's talking short-term variability versus an established and cumulative trend which is strongly supported.
I brayed about the death of the GOP and also noted that they were likely to have several upswings in the interim, one of which they turned into a massive redistricting push, even. I have previously talked at length about how the gains in legislature were not contrary to the observation that american conservatism is majorly demographically boned. It's not a hallucination of people just hoping for it and crafting data to fit a narrative.
Whether we continue with the same party names, or the Republican Party takes its name down with it to join the Whigs doesn't matter: in 20 years the american political landscape will be, relative to today's representation of the ideological divide, the "very liberal" party versus the "center-left liberal" party.
The GOP is already engaged in committed attempts to manage the issue of their oncoming demographic collapse, mainly through obvious attempts to disproportionally represent themselves, and to attempt to disenfranchise young and minority voters and keep them from voting as often as possible. They flirted with selling the 'terror babies' nonsense in the hopes it could let them take a pass at citizenship by birth. As is now usually the case, the terror baby scare was as much a simple cover as is "voter fraud."
Time will tell if you are right. But Republicans never had the majority in the House or Senate for 50 years between 1952 and 1992. They also didn't have the presidency for 20 years after Hoover. Didn't kill them then, I'm not so sure they are going to die now.
If no viable new party starts making noise, the strength of all the mechanisms that keep us a two party system will work towards creating bi-polarism again, and the GOP will be the only game in town other than the Democrats.
The American people have a bit of an aversion to keeping Congress and the Presidency in one party for a long time.
edit: I don't think we will ever have another Era of Good Feeling again.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
Based on practically everything we know about how people vote there are no real scenarios which keep a conservative party as a major political party. The GOP in its present incarnation is doomed. Today's party platform is completely nonviable in a couple of decades at most.
Here's all you have to know.
1. The only demographic that floats conservatives to the point of having a viable first party in this country is the 65 and older age demographics. Anything younger is liberal. 40 and younger is greatly liberal. 25 and younger is even more greatly liberal. People who politically came of age during the clinton presidency are pretty liberal. People who politically came of age during the bush administration or after are really liberal and greatly dislike conservatives and conservatism on the whole.
2. Old people are the best voters. They vote the most reliably and the most regularly. Young people are generally terribly unreliable voters and they don't vote in great numbers. But they become old voters eventually, and perform near identically to the people who were old voters when they were young voters.
3. So all of the young voters now will eventually vote as regularly and reliably as today's old voters do.
4. And most all of today's old voters will have dwindled to a near absent voting bloc in general. Mostly on account of having been done off by old age, as is our unfortunate tendency.
5. The absolute most reliable indicator of how a person will vote for their entire lifetime is their party and ideological identity from when they first start voting. If you vote conservative at 20, you are most likely going to vote conservative for the rest of your life. If you vote liberal at 20, you are most likely going to vote liberal for the rest of your life. This is a VERY RELIABLE pattern.
6. The myth that people turn into conservative voters when they grow old is an absolute crap made-up nonfact that is completely untrue. We trend slightly, mildly, just a tiny bit more liberal as we age. It's not much, but it's not this scenario where people turn into conservative voters as they age.
7. And, again, young voters are overwhelmingly liberal. If only people 40 and under voted in the last presidential election, Obama wins in a huge landslide. If only people 30 and under voted in the last presidential election, it's a complete wash and Romney barely manages to take, like, Utah and a couple other states. It's seriously not even close. It was already pretty bad in the election before that (35 and under voters left McCain in the single EC digits) and before that, it's just that it keeps getting worse for conservatives as time goes on.
8. Part of this is that the GOP's push to keep their core demographic (of old people) out in the booths, inspired to go and be voting people from their party into office, involved using agendas which resonated with old people but generally alienated young people. It resulted in more and more strident pushes for things that appeal to old voters but made everyone else really dislike conservatism. Everyone here can name a few of these wedge issues, at least.
9. So Millenials are now something like 60% democratic, 20% republican. It's seriously that grim.
10. Put it all together. They vote the same or a little bit more liberal as they age. Today's conservative old voters disappear. Today's liberal young voters become tomorrow's reliable voters, and are much more liberal than today's old people are conservative. And they're also increasingly nonwhite and/or immigrant demographics that SERIOUSLY despise conservatives ...
are we getting it yet, cause
Posted by Risuena (Member # 2924) on :
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Yeah, and most of them were on to something until the GOP gerrymandered the hell out of the country in 2010 and 2012. [/QB]
To be fair, where possible, the Democrats gerrymandered the hell out of things too. Maryland is an example and I'm sure there are a couple of other examples, too (and as a native and very liberal Marylander, even if I no longer live in the state, I'm pretty damn appalled by their gerrymandering).
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Sam: None of that necessitates the GOP being destroyed, merely tacking left after having shifted right against the current for too long. Why should a shift left be impossible? The Democratic party can't cover every position people have. There's going to always be a second party. It's going to be the GOP unless something else manages to articulate itself.
People won't be comfortable with the Democratic party controlling everything if that indeed happens. People will start voting for the other party purely out of a sense of keeping things balanced. The Democratic party (at least in name) managed to survive the Civil War. Why should the Republican party be different?
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
quote:Sam: None of that necessitates the GOP being destroyed, merely tacking left after having shifted right against the current for too long. Why should a shift left be impossible?
to quote myself, again: "Whether we continue with the same party names, or the Republican Party takes its name down with it to join the Whigs doesn't matter: in 20 years the american political landscape will be, relative to today's representation of the ideological divide, the "very liberal" party versus the "center-left liberal" party."
quote:There's going to always be a second party. It's going to be the GOP unless something else manages to articulate itself.
Such as the (very real) possibility that the GOP doesn't stay around through collapse reform, and degenerates to being a regional or extinct party. In which case you have the (also very real) opportunity for divide created from when centrist liberals and far-left types are made able to run against each other without a spoiler effect 'split vote' loss to republicans.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
Well, alright then.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by Risuena:
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Yeah, and most of them were on to something until the GOP gerrymandered the hell out of the country in 2010 and 2012.
To be fair, where possible, the Democrats gerrymandered the hell out of things too. Maryland is an example and I'm sure there are a couple of other examples, too (and as a native and very liberal Marylander, even if I no longer live in the state, I'm pretty damn appalled by their gerrymandering). [/QB]
This is quite simply not true. It's false equivalence to compare what the Republicans are doing now to what Democrats are doing now or have done in the past. We can compare states with Democratic governments and Republican governments now, and we can compare them to trends over the last 30 years.
What the Republicans are doing right now is unprecedented in the modern era, and is utterly beyond compare to what Democrats have done or are currently doing.
Liberals in California, where Democrats probably could have squeezed out another dozen Democratic House seats if they'd wanted to, instead created a non-partisan commission to fairly divvy the state up.
Let's not pretend this is an issue where both sides are equally wrong.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
yeah, instead of "where possible" it's actually that democrats often did not take the route of gerrymandering, even though they did in a few places (that one MD district is a thing of wonder)
whereas the republicans gerrymandered so utterly as to have their current house majority in sum.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote: The American people have a bit of an aversion...
Also Obama winning when the economy is doing poorly also was something significant.
quote:Originally posted by Risuena:
quote:Originally posted by Lyrhawn: Yeah, and most of them were on to something until the GOP gerrymandered the hell out of the country in 2010 and 2012.
To be fair, where possible, the Democrats gerrymandered the hell out of things too. Maryland is an example and I'm sure there are a couple of other examples, too (and as a native and very liberal Marylander, even if I no longer live in the state, I'm pretty damn appalled by their gerrymandering). [/QB]
Democrats are also not really able to do this to anywhere the same degree as Republicans because Republican voters don't live voluntarily in ghettos.
Posted by Orincoro (Member # 8854) on :
It's patently absurd. The proof is in the pudding: if Democrats did it just as much, then the popular vote would be closer to the actual delegation numbers (meaning Democratic representation would be higher). It could easily be higher, as Sam points out above: we could take away up to 12 seats just in California, except the citizens of California wouldn't stand for such nonsense, and we voted in a Citizen Commission.
I think we need a constitutional amendment actually: the districting of the several States shall be undertaken by a commission of citizens appointed from the Jury rolls, its results subject to judicial oversite. Done and Done.
Posted by SenojRetep (Member # 8614) on :
quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky: I'm not sure how to address this. It seems like you've already accepted that there are significant financial damages (both short and long term) associated with the loss of consumer confidence and international faith in the U.S. economy. If that is so, whether or not these are included in analyses like the S&P one* is pretty much beside the point.
* - They are. Of course they are. It would be insane to intentionally leave out known economic effects.
The question I raised is whether the long-term gain caused by Obama choosing to extend the shutdown rather than accept the moderate Republican compromise was worth the short-term pain Sam pointed to. The question of what the long-term gain (if any) was is, to me, quite uncertain, and unlikely to have justified the cost.
quote:I don't believe the Tea Party will start acting any more responsibly or intelligently. I don't think the core of the party has the capacity to and the people riding herd on them have committed to their approach. But I don't think that failing so spectacularly will cool their ardor for this particular tactic.
Think of like a dim, spoiled child. Things aren't going his way, so he throws a tantrum. If this tantrum works, he's going to do it again. If you don't give in, they're likely going to try some other tactic.
I don't find the analogy particularly apt; there were many more than two players in this game, and generalizing lessons learned from parenting to large-scale organizational conflicts seems dubious to me. I mean, I know we all use frames necessarily to understand situations, but I think in this case it elides too much to be useful.
quote:It's too early to see what the long term situation is going to be, but public opinion polling has shown the Tea Party at the highest unfavorable (and the large majority of that is strongly unfavorable) they've ever been. Also, several of the big money people who have been supporting the Tea Party have already publicly cut ties with them. Some of them are calling/laying the framework for campaigns to compete against Tea Party candidates in the coming elections.
If we're lucky, this will be the beginning of the end for the Tea Party. They'll stick around, but hopefully they'll fall to fairly insignificant. Even better would be if a more responsible, reasonable Republican party raises from this, one that relies more on principles instead of personal hatred, lies, and ignorance.
We can hope. That said, I don't believe anything the President did was meant to weaken the Tea Party.
At first, based on his own rhetoric, I believed Obama's logic in this situation was similar to what you wrote above, about not giving in to childish demands because it will only reinforce the bad behavior. As I said, though, it seems like flawed logic to me, and it didn't sit well. Having thought about this for a week I've come to a different conclusion: President Obama (or his strategists) knew this was a partisan battle they were positioned to win. They still want to pass a Democratic legislative agenda and this will be helped if they can capture more seats in the House. The only seats at risk are those of moderates. By engaging in, and winning, a partisan fight like this one, the President discourages moderates and emboldens hard-liners, resulting in more Tea Party primary challenges, which results in more flawed GOP candidates, either because moderates are forced to the right, or because they lose to the challengers. As a result, more Democrats get elected than otherwise would have, and the President's legislative agenda is strengthened.
The Tea Party is very useful to the President; it's almost too trite to say, but without them he'd have nothing to push against, no one to make him look like the reasonable adult. You saw this briefly in 2009 when he worked hard to elevate Rush Limbaugh in to an ideological foil for himself, and I think what we just saw was him doing it again, although now he has some people with actual power to prop up as his antagonists.
Posted by SenojRetep (Member # 8614) on :
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: It's patently absurd. The proof is in the pudding: if Democrats did it just as much, then the popular vote would be closer to the actual delegation numbers (meaning Democratic representation would be higher). It could easily be higher, as Sam points out above: we could take away up to 12 seats just in California, except the citizens of California wouldn't stand for such nonsense, and we voted in a Citizen Commission.
I think we need a constitutional amendment actually: the districting of the several States shall be undertaken by a commission of citizens appointed from the Jury rolls, its results subject to judicial oversite. Done and Done.
It's absolutely true there was much more Republican gerrymandering than Democratic in the last cycle. There are several reasons, only one of which is the technocratic strain in the Democratic party that prevented a gerrymander in California*. Republicans controlled many more state legislatures than Democrats, especially ones that had been held by Democrats during the previous redistricting cycle (like NC). As Risuena mentioned, by several measures MD is the most gerrymandered state in the country. Here's a top-ten list from Azavea, a non-partisan analysis firm: MD, NC, LA, WV, VA, HI, NH, IL, PA, RI. By my count, four democratic- and six republican-held state legislatures. At a superficial level, it seems like 'both parties do it' isn't that inaccurate. As a MA resident, I can add that our redistricting absolutely shored-up Democratic majorities in three districts where Scott Brown performed well.
In addition to the legislative advantage Republicans held, there's also the fact that having geographically contiguous districts inherently disadvantages Democrats, because Democrats tend to live in more ideologically homogenous areas. The Voting Rights Act exacerbates this problem by mandating a certain number of majority-minority districts. That's why non-partisan plans tend still to have a slight GOP-bias in seats held relative to popular vote. To get to proportional representation, we'd need to randomize the mapping of citizens to representatives, eliminating the geographic basis for legislative districts entirely.
None of this is to say gerrymandering isn't a problem, nor that it didn't primarily benefit Republicans in the most recent election. It's just that the effect can be easily overstated for various reasons. Personally, I like the idea of non-partisan redistricting commisions. I would certainly support one in my home state.
For further reading from some actual political scientists, see here and here. To read a different perspective (by a neuroscientist who dabbles in election prediction), see here.
*Arizona, which was controlled by Republicans, passed a similar bill, so non-partisan redistricting efforts didn't just cost Democrats gerrymandered seats.
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Elison R. Salazar:
quote: The American people have a bit of an aversion...
Really? My statement has absolutely nothing to do with "condition X having an affect on somebody being elected president."
But thanks for playing.
A heuristic truism of one sort is really no different from another sort of heuristic truism. They both operate on the assumption "This is how it's been." The notion that American's don't like one party in dominance for too long your basing on the notion that in previous elections when one side "wins" it may lose the next election cycle.
This really isn't different from saying "Well its always been the case you needed [x] to win."
The main incongruence in the analogy is that the historical evidence doesn't really support your notion.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote:Originally posted by SenojRetep:
quote:Originally posted by MrSquicky: I'm not sure how to address this. It seems like you've already accepted that there are significant financial damages (both short and long term) associated with the loss of consumer confidence and international faith in the U.S. economy. If that is so, whether or not these are included in analyses like the S&P one* is pretty much beside the point.
* - They are. Of course they are. It would be insane to intentionally leave out known economic effects.
The question I raised is whether the long-term gain caused by Obama choosing to extend the shutdown rather than accept the moderate Republican compromise was worth the short-term pain Sam pointed to. The question of what the long-term gain (if any) was is, to me, quite uncertain, and unlikely to have justified the cost.
quote:I don't believe the Tea Party will start acting any more responsibly or intelligently. I don't think the core of the party has the capacity to and the people riding herd on them have committed to their approach. But I don't think that failing so spectacularly will cool their ardor for this particular tactic.
Think of like a dim, spoiled child. Things aren't going his way, so he throws a tantrum. If this tantrum works, he's going to do it again. If you don't give in, they're likely going to try some other tactic.
I don't find the analogy particularly apt; there were many more than two players in this game, and generalizing lessons learned from parenting to large-scale organizational conflicts seems dubious to me. I mean, I know we all use frames necessarily to understand situations, but I think in this case it elides too much to be useful.
quote:It's too early to see what the long term situation is going to be, but public opinion polling has shown the Tea Party at the highest unfavorable (and the large majority of that is strongly unfavorable) they've ever been. Also, several of the big money people who have been supporting the Tea Party have already publicly cut ties with them. Some of them are calling/laying the framework for campaigns to compete against Tea Party candidates in the coming elections.
If we're lucky, this will be the beginning of the end for the Tea Party. They'll stick around, but hopefully they'll fall to fairly insignificant. Even better would be if a more responsible, reasonable Republican party raises from this, one that relies more on principles instead of personal hatred, lies, and ignorance.
We can hope. That said, I don't believe anything the President did was meant to weaken the Tea Party.
At first, based on his own rhetoric, I believed Obama's logic in this situation was similar to what you wrote above, about not giving in to childish demands because it will only reinforce the bad behavior. As I said, though, it seems like flawed logic to me, and it didn't sit well. Having thought about this for a week I've come to a different conclusion: President Obama (or his strategists) knew this was a partisan battle they were positioned to win. They still want to pass a Democratic legislative agenda and this will be helped if they can capture more seats in the House. The only seats at risk are those of moderates. By engaging in, and winning, a partisan fight like this one, the President discourages moderates and emboldens hard-liners, resulting in more Tea Party primary challenges, which results in more flawed GOP candidates, either because moderates are forced to the right, or because they lose to the challengers. As a result, more Democrats get elected than otherwise would have, and the President's legislative agenda is strengthened.
The Tea Party is very useful to the President; it's almost too trite to say, but without them he'd have nothing to push against, no one to make him look like the reasonable adult. You saw this briefly in 2009 when he worked hard to elevate Rush Limbaugh in to an ideological foil for himself, and I think what we just saw was him doing it again, although now he has some people with actual power to prop up as his antagonists.
Occam's Razor would like a word...
Posted by Xavier (Member # 405) on :
I expect it is true that a lot of today's Republican positions are going to fade away as untenable. Their stance on gay marriage, abortion, health care, and a few other issues, are fights they have already lost. So there's reason for a liberal to feel optimistic, and perhaps even a bit smug.
But today's issues are not tomorrow's issues. I wouldn't be shocked if in 20 years, the big political issue is something completely outside the current political discussion. Perhaps something really far out there, like legal human cloning. Or perhaps its allowing people to genetically engineer traits into their offspring. Or for legal polygamous/polyandrous marriages. Or more realistically, for something like government funded free university education. Or for removing the tax avoidance from churches. Whatever.
The details aren't important, just that there are lots of political fights that haven't even started yet that are going to spring up. The nature of liberalism is that what is considered the "liberal" position is constantly changing. Progressing, if you will. And whatever the next liberal stance is that gets advanced, you can be damn sure that half the country (or more) is going to line up to oppose it. Those will be the next generation's "conservatives", of course. Whether they call themselves "Republicans" or not, I can't say. Though I expect they will.
[ October 22, 2013, 03:39 PM: Message edited by: Xavier ]
Posted by BlackBlade (Member # 8376) on :
quote:Originally posted by Elison R. Salazar:
quote:Originally posted by BlackBlade:
quote:Originally posted by Elison R. Salazar:
quote: The American people have a bit of an aversion...
Really? My statement has absolutely nothing to do with "condition X having an affect on somebody being elected president."
But thanks for playing.
A heuristic truism of one sort is really no different from another sort of heuristic truism. They both operate on the assumption "This is how it's been." The notion that American's don't like one party in dominance for too long your basing on the notion that in previous elections when one side "wins" it may lose the next election cycle.
This really isn't different from saying "Well its always been the case you needed [x] to win."
The main incongruence in the analogy is that the historical evidence doesn't really support your notion.
Actually, it does. There has never been a protracted period of time in American history where one party managed to hold on to both branches of government.
Presidents needing to carry Missouri has no actual cause and effect mechanic you could describe. People not wanting one party to have too much power makes a lot of intuitive sense. Whether it holds up in a study is something neither of us have done. But don't insult my intelligence by linking an XKCD comic and just standing behind it snickering.
I'm not arguing it's impossible that through a series of factors, one party could take and hole both branches of government. But I am arguing there is a significant force that works against that. It's real.
Posted by Samprimary (Member # 8561) on :
heuristic truism incongruence occams
quote:But today's issues are not tomorrow's issues.
Yes, but humans are dumb in a lot of really weirdly specific ways, and one is that today's political allegiances .. are tomorrow's political allegiances, without much tenable regard for how things have changed.
A 25 year old today who despises the republican party and conservative ideology, whatever his or her reasons, will rarely in the future 'go over' no matter how things change. No matter if the conservatives end up taking the position they had and the democrats leave their position behind and go hard left. We're stubborn and we stick. And many of the people coming of age today hate republicans for reasons that stick even harder than usual. Like "I'm hispanic and the GOP has been utter dickbags to us forever" — these things do not get forgiven easy.
Did conservatives switch over in large numbers when the GOP shifted hard-right and the democrats essentially adopted the heritage foundation's plan as the Affordable Care Act? Not really.
Posted by Lyrhawn (Member # 7039) on :
quote:Originally posted by SenojRetep:
quote:Originally posted by Orincoro: It's patently absurd. The proof is in the pudding: if Democrats did it just as much, then the popular vote would be closer to the actual delegation numbers (meaning Democratic representation would be higher). It could easily be higher, as Sam points out above: we could take away up to 12 seats just in California, except the citizens of California wouldn't stand for such nonsense, and we voted in a Citizen Commission.
I think we need a constitutional amendment actually: the districting of the several States shall be undertaken by a commission of citizens appointed from the Jury rolls, its results subject to judicial oversite. Done and Done.
It's absolutely true there was much more Republican gerrymandering than Democratic in the last cycle. There are several reasons, only one of which is the technocratic strain in the Democratic party that prevented a gerrymander in California*. Republicans controlled many more state legislatures than Democrats, especially ones that had been held by Democrats during the previous redistricting cycle (like NC). As Risuena mentioned, by several measures MD is the most gerrymandered state in the country. Here's a top-ten list from Azavea, a non-partisan analysis firm: MD, NC, LA, WV, VA, HI, NH, IL, PA, RI. By my count, four democratic- and six republican-held state legislatures. At a superficial level, it seems like 'both parties do it' isn't that inaccurate. As a MA resident, I can add that our redistricting absolutely shored-up Democratic majorities in three districts where Scott Brown performed well.
In addition to the legislative advantage Republicans held, there's also the fact that having geographically contiguous districts inherently disadvantages Democrats, because Democrats tend to live in more ideologically homogenous areas. The Voting Rights Act exacerbates this problem by mandating a certain number of majority-minority districts. That's why non-partisan plans tend still to have a slight GOP-bias in seats held relative to popular vote. To get to proportional representation, we'd need to randomize the mapping of citizens to representatives, eliminating the geographic basis for legislative districts entirely.
None of this is to say gerrymandering isn't a problem, nor that it didn't primarily benefit Republicans in the most recent election. It's just that the effect can be easily overstated for various reasons. Personally, I like the idea of non-partisan redistricting commisions. I would certainly support one in my home state.
For further reading from some actual political scientists, see here and here. To read a different perspective (by a neuroscientist who dabbles in election prediction), see here.
*Arizona, which was controlled by Republicans, passed a similar bill, so non-partisan redistricting efforts didn't just cost Democrats gerrymandered seats.
You're ignoring the fact that there was a national, concerted effort by conservatives with a huge amount of funding specifically for the purpose of taking over state legislatures in order to gerrymander districts to make those states produce a disproportionate number of Republican House seats.
It didn't just happen to be that Republicans lucked into those positions and went about normal gerrymandering. There was a larger plan from the start to achieve that specific goal. And as soon as they finished gerrymandering, a lot of them tried to force through measures to change how electors are distributed to give Republicans an advantage there too.
No such plan existed on the Democratic side. The only plan I can think of is the project Democrats are trying to get together in Texas, but instead of dumping money into the state to buy legislature spots so they can redistrict, the plan is largely based around grass roots organizing and voter registration so the hundreds of thousands of minorities in the state who don't vote will vote. Hardly on the same level.
No objective viewer of the current state of the House of Representatives could honestly claim that body is really and truly representative of the nation.
Posted by Elison R. Salazar (Member # 8565) on :
quote: but instead of dumping money into the state to buy legislature spots so they can redistrict, the plan is largely based around grass roots organizing and voter registration so the hundreds of thousands of minorities in the state who don't vote will vote. Hardly on the same level.
Its funny because Republicans think this actually is voter fraud.
Posted by Darth_Mauve (Member # 4709) on :
Will the Republican party disappear? No. One of two things will happen. Either we will have a fiscal-conservative take over of the Republican party, or we will have a split in the party between pro-business groups and tea-party groups.
The Republican Party is in trouble. In a democratic republic they are trying to gain power through various non-democratic means. They are trying to game the system--through gerrymandering, voter suppression, fear mongering and propagandizing. They are building a power base that is based on lies, falsehoods, shrinking minorities, and threats. They are trying to bully their way into power. Each part of that base is flawed and will fail over time.
Lies, from death panels to the Muslim infiltration of the government to President Obama's birth location are believed firmly, but by fewer and fewer people.
Falsehoods, such as the danger of gay marriage to the institution of marriage, the denial of climate change, the laziness and overpayment of teachers, the idea that all the unemployed are drug using bums, all of these falsehoods drive away more voters daily as people recognize those falsehoods personally (they know a teacher, a gay couple, go on food stamps for a bit, etc).
Shrinking Minorities are older, white, and mostly male. These are the power folks of yesteryear, and they hold most of the power today. What power they don't hold is the power of the majority. Even Christianity is losing people. As this group gets smaller it reacts more and more conservatively to maintain that power. While this motivates itself to more and more action, it drives others further and further away.
Threats are the big gun in conservative politics today. Its become the party of bullies. Tea Party groups and conservative power players were bullying other Republicans to go along with the shut down or face challengers. They bullied Speaker Boehner to play along or lose his position. The Speaker then was told to Bully the Senate and the President into doing what they wanted.
American's as a group will do almost anything you ask them too, and almost nothing you tell them to. We are strange that way. Threats and bullying motivate people out of fear, but if they fear you they will only do what you demand until they find a way to remove you.
Bullies do not make friends. They make enemies.
As this base starts to crumble as it must, what is there to hold the group together, and elect more to the same?
Abortion. This has not been settled, and is probably the biggest thing holding the Republican's together.
Defeating Democrats. This is all they seem to talk about. Defeat is not in the election sense, since that takes to long. They want to defeat Democrats, and President Obama particularly, in every way possible--short of building a broad coalition and winning elections other than their own.
Lowering Taxes. Why? Its just what everyone wants.
So it looks really bad for Republicans, but they will not go away.
Because the same Democrats in their safe majority will soon be battling themselves. Pro-women democrats will be fighting pro-business democrats who will be fighting pro-marijuana democrats. Some will fall into scandal. Others into jail. Conservative Democrats will win elections, and become Republican.
Does this mean the two party system is here to stay? Not necessarily. The carefully gerrymandered districts in each state may allow the formation of a third party, a local and ultra-conservative party called the Tea Party. We may slowly evolve to a multi-party system not because the two Parties failed, but because they became too successful. They created a gerrymandering system that allows for strong minor views to elect folks to a national level, and they destroyed limits on funding politics so that the wealthiest and the corporate interests can buy their way into a national level.
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
Accelerationism! Burn it all down!![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Dont Know]](graemlins/dontknow.gif)
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
![[Razz]](tongue.gif)