“When You Are On Fire”: Exactly How Much Republican Pyromania Are We Expected To Accept?
It must be difficult to be a Democratic Member of Congress right now. You are perpetually on call to put out a fire your Republican colleagues are determined to set, but they can’t make up their minds whether to burn down the house or the whole neighborhood.
Originally John Boehner wanted to give his charges the chance for an extended temper tantrum about Obamacare timed to conclude when the moment arrived to keep the federal government functioning, perhaps with a bit less money. Nope, that wasn’t sufficient. So the GOP headed directly towards a government shutdown, until Boehner and company looked about two inches beyond their own noses and saw that the public was (tragically) more tolerant towards a debt limit default threat than a shutdown. So the House GOP leaders moved in that direction. But they soon discovered getting the entire House GOP to vote for a debt limit increase would require a measure that incarnated every conservative policy fantasy in sight, and they are still struggling to get the votes. So now they may throw some sand in the gears of the continuing appropriations resolution and perhaps generate a mini-shutdown as a tonic to the troops, and hope that between the appropriations and debt limit measures they can slake the destructive furies of the Republican Party and its often-caustic right-wing chorus, and maybe even mark up a victory or two if Democrats conclude concessions are better than economy-wreaking chaos.
But at the moment, chaos reigns.
Even the jaded fans of pointless drama at Politico seem to think it’s out of control, per a Sherman/Bresnahan report:
Boehner and his team have now cycled through three fiscal strategies in about as many weeks, as rank-and-file Republicans jump from one approach to another in a so-far losing effort to emerge victorious from a budget showdown with President Barack Obama and the Democrats.
Now it’s on to “Plan C,” or whatever Republicans call this third iteration of government funding-debt ceiling strategy….
At this point, it’s difficult to conclusively determine where all the House GOP’s maneuvering and false starts will end.
I’m beginning to wonder if the whole idea is to convince Democrats that they need to consult abnormal psychology textbooks every time they deal with a fresh GOP demand.
Back when I worked for (pre-apostasy) Zell Miller, a very sensitive internal political memo laying out Zell’s secret re-election year agenda got accidentally taken off a fax machine at an out-of-state governors’ conference and handed to a reporter for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution. It was all so weird and unlikely that the big story wasn’t what was in the document, but that Zell’s minions had gone to such lengths to leak it. “This is great,” I recall a colleague saying with real enthusiasm. “They think we’re completely crazy.”
Being completely out of control does create some leverage, particularly if the firebug is willing to set fire to himself (“When you are on fire,” Richard Pryor famously observed after nearly incinerating himself in a freebase cocaine accident, “people get out of your way.”). So people start thinking about making concessions they wouldn’t otherwise consider, or contemplating scenarios they wouldn’t otherwise entertain. As Ezra Klein said with disgust this morning:
It’s a mark of the insane and reckless turn in our politics that shutting down the government so one of our to major political parties can get the brinksmanship out of its system is emerging as the sober, responsible thing to do. But here we are, greatest nation the world has ever known.
Today’s Republicans really do make America exceptional. But I don’t know exactly how much pyromania we are expected to accept.
By: Ed Kilgore, Contributing Writer, Washington Monthly Political Animal, September 27, 2013
“Boom Times For The NRA”: The United Nations Is Coming After Your Guns, Send Us Money!
There’s a lot happening at the moment—government shutdown, war in Syria, Iranian president sort of maybe not denying the Holocaust—so there was very little attention given to the fact that yesterday, the United States government signed the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty (ATT), commonly known as the small-arms treaty. It’s meant to prevent the arming of human-rights abusers—potential perpetrators of genocide, and the like—by obligating states not to sell conventional weapons, from small arms up to tanks and helicopters, to foreign governments or entities that are going to use them to commit war crimes and massacre civilians. When it was voted on by the UN, the only countries that voted against it were Syria, Iran, and North Korea.
And today, the National Rifle Association is celebrating. That might strike you as odd, but the ATT is political gold for them. It’s the international equivalent of a failed gun control effort in Congress, which is far, far better than no gun control effort at all. It gives them the opportunity to scream, “They’re coming for your guns!”, raise money, keep their congressional allies asking “How high?” when they say jump, acquire new members, and reinvigorate their existing members. And it all happens without even the tiniest threat to anyone’s actual gun rights. Who could ask for anything more?
The last year has been just fantastic for the NRA. You might have thought that the Newtown massacre and all the other mass shootings we had would have been a threat to the organization and its insane views. Au contraire. Yes, there may be more Americans who’ve now been exposed to what those views are, and who now think less highly of the NRA. But on just about every other measure you could come up with, nothing’s better for them than having a bunch of kids get mowed down, or having the United States sign a treaty that touches on the international arms trade.
Why? Because what the NRA needs to keep its internal momentum going is a threat. Not a real threat, mind you, but a threat that sounds just plausible enough to gun owners (when presented with the NRA’s particular zealous interpretation) to sound like it might someday impinge on their ability to buy all the killing machines they want, yet in reality poses no threat at all.
Throughout Barack Obama’s first term, the NRA was constantly crying, “Obama and Pelosi are coming for your guns!” But after a while, it wasn’t all that persuasive. For a gun-grabber, Obama was remarkably passive. In his whole first term, he signed only two laws dealing with guns, both of which expanded gun rights (you’re now allowed to take your guns to national parks and on Amtrak trains, so congrats on that). But then Newtown happened, and Obama finally proposed some gun control legislation. It didn’t matter that the legislation was almost absurdly modest; what mattered was that the NRA could say, “See! See! We told you he was coming for your guns! Send us more money!” The NRA got its boost in membership and fundraising, and the congressional effort came to nothing. They won on both ends.
And the same thing will happen with the Arms Trade Treaty. Ever since it was proposed, the NRA has been saying that if we signed on, blue-helmeted UN troops would be coming to your door to confiscate your guns. That this is false and ridiculous never mattered. All that mattered was that there is, in fact, a UN treaty, and it says something about small arms. And that’s enough. None of their members are going to bother to read it (here it is, if you’re so inclined). When they hear what it does and doesn’t do, they’ll assume that’s just liberal lies. And so the treaty gives the NRA another chance to say “They’re coming for your guns! Send us money!”
For the sake of accuracy, we should note that just about every single thing the NRA says about the ATT is false. The NRA claims the treaty “covers firearms owned by law-abiding citizens,” meaning the UN might try to take your guns. That’s false. In reality, the treaty covers only cross-border trade; it explicitly states that it has nothing to do with the domestic policies of any country. What it says is that nations agree not to sell arms to other nations when they know they’re going to be used in war crimes. So for instance, if we sold a bunch of rocket launchers to the Syrian government right now, knowing that the launchers would be used to target civilians, we’d be in violation of the treaty. The NRA claims the treaty mandates a “registry of law-abiding firearms owners.” That’s false. In reality, the treaty requires record-keeping of transnational arms sales, something the United States already does.
Which brings us to perhaps the most important thing to understand about this treaty: the United States already has export controls that do exactly the same thing for our own arms sales. It doesn’t impose any new obligations on us. By joining the treaty, we’re trying to get other countries to hold to the same standards we do. But because of the opposition of Republicans, the treaty will never pass the Senate.
Speaking of which, those Republican politicians use the nonexistent threat of gun confiscation for the same purposes as the NRA does. A few months back, Rand Paul sent out a fundraising letter saying this: “Will you join me by taking a public stand against the UN “Small Arms Treaty” and sign the Official Firearms Sovereignty Survey right away? Ultimately, UN bureaucrats will stop at nothing to register, ban and CONFISCATE firearms owned by private citizens like YOU.” And how can you prevent such a terrible thing? By sending Rand Paul money, of course. For the gun-rights gang, these are the best of times.
By: Paul Waldman, Contributing Editor, The American Prospect, September 26, 2013
“The New Ransom Note”: Republicans Ready To Trade One Hostage For Another
There are just five days remaining for Congress to pass legislation to prevent a government shutdown, and overnight, the odds of some modicum of success appear to have improved. In the Senate, where a spending measure was on track to pass Sunday night, a bipartisan agreement was reached that will “accelerate” the process — the chamber should now wrap up its work on Saturday.
In theory, this could give House Republicans time to reject the Senate bill, push another far-right alternative, and practically guarantee a shutdown, but all evidence suggests that’s unlikely. As National Journal reported, “Conservative Republicans in the House appear ready to back off their demands that the short-term funding resolution Congress must pass to avoid a government shutdown also defund or delay Obamacare.”
So, for those hoping congressional Republicans don’t shut down the government, this is good news, right? On the surface, yes. Based on overnight developments, a shutdown appears less likely than it did a few days ago.
The problem is, as the Washington Post and others are reporting, GOP lawmakers appear eager to trade one hostage for another — and the next hostage crisis will be far more serious.
With federal agencies set to close their doors in five days, House Republicans began exploring a potential detour on the path to a shutdown: shifting the fight over President Obama’s health-care law to a separate bill that would raise the nation’s debt limit.
If it works, the strategy could clear the way for the House to approve a simple measure to keep the government open into the new fiscal year, which will begin Tuesday, without hotly contested provisions to defund the Affordable Care Act.
But it would set the stage for an even more nerve-racking deadline on Oct. 17, with conservatives using the threat of the nation’s first default on its debt to force the president to accept a one-year delay of the health-care law’s mandates, taxes and benefits.
This is nothing short of madness, but it’s nevertheless quickly become the preferred Republican plan — the GOP is prepared to let one hostage go (they won’t shut down the government), while putting a gun to a new hostage (Republicans will trash the economy on purpose unless their demands are met). All of this will play out over the next 22 days.
The next task, aside from preventing a shutdown, is filling out the details of the ransom note.
According to the plan that GOP leaders will present to members today, Republicans will present a debt-ceiling plan “loaded with dozens” of right-wing goodies, including:
* A delay in the implementation of the Affordable Care Act;
* Approval of the Keystone XL oil pipeline;
* The elimination of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau;
* A tax-reform blueprint Republicans consider acceptable;
* A block on combating the climate crisis;
* The elimination of Net Neutrality;
* An extension on destructive sequestration spending cuts;
* Scrapping elements of the Dodd-Frank financial regulatory reform law;
* Medicare cuts;
* Tort reform;
* Maybe a ban on late-term abortions.
In exchange, Democrats would get … literally nothing. And if their demands are not met, Republicans will crash the economy, push the nation into default, and trash the full faith and credit of the United States for the first time in American history.
Republicans could try to achieve these goals through the normal legislative process, but they probably realize those bills would fail to become law. So, as they abandon American governing and adopt policymaking-by-extortion, these unhinged lawmakers figure they’ll just load up a must-pass bill with goodies, and threaten deliberate harm to Americans unless they get their way.
This is evidence of a political party that’s gone stark raving mad. If you hear a politician or a pundit suggest this is somehow normal, or consistent with the American tradition, please know how very wrong they are.
By: Steve Benen, The Maddow Blog, September 26, 2013
“Imaginary Armies Of Voices”: The “American People” Who Only Exist In Ted Cruz’s Head
Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz spoke seemingly endlessly about Obamacare yesterday and today, repeatedly demanding that Washington listen to “the American people.” But to which people exactly is Cruz listening? And is he willing to follow his own advice?
I ask because the latest New York Times/CBS News poll shows that an astonishing majority disapproves of the kind of shutdown-showdown tactics the tea party legislator is pushing in his effort to stop the Affordable Care Act. According to the Times:
Eight in 10 Americans find it unacceptable for either President Obama or members of Congress to threaten to shut down the government during budget negotiations in order to achieve their goals, according to the latest New York Times/CBS News poll. Fewer than 1 in 5 think the stalemate between Mr. Obama and the Republicans in Congress is acceptable.
These results jibe with a host of other polls showing that Americans want cooperation in Washington and don’t want a government shutdown. But that’s precisely what Cruz and House Republicans are threatening to do with their “defund” stand: shut down the government unless President Obama and Senate Democrats grant them a win by extortion that the American people – the real ones, not Cruz’s imagined armies – denied them at the ballot box less than a year ago.
And it also bears repeating that for all of Cruz’s sanctimonious blather about how Congress should be more attuned to “the American people,” he flatly opposes their will on other critical issues. As I wrote last week:
For example 86 percent of Americans support background checks for people buying guns; on immigration reform, 64 percent of Americans support the comprehensive bill that the Senate passed and 78 percent support a qualified path to citizenship for illegal immigrants. … For those keeping track at home, those figures are more impressive than the 50-something opposed to Obamacare – perhaps no one has told Cruz, Lee et al. about these judgments from “the American people?”
So which “American people” is he talking about exactly? And will he listen to the ones that exist outside of his imagination?
By: Robert Schlesinger, U. S. News and World Report, September 25, 2013
“A Fanatical Group Of Nihilists”: The Upcoming Shutdowns And Defaults Are Symptoms Of A Deeper Republican Malady
Congressional Republicans have gone directly from conservatism to fanaticism without any intervening period of sanity.
First, John Boehner, bowing to Republican extremists, ushers a bill through the House that continues to fund the government after September 30 but doesn’t fund the Affordable Care Act. Anyone with half a brain knows Senate Democrats and the President won’t accept this — which means, if House Republicans stick to their guns, a government shut-down.
A shutdown would be crippling. Soldiers would get IOUs instead of paychecks. Hundreds of thousands of federal employees would be furloughed without pay. National parks would close. Millions of Americans would feel the effects.
And who will get blamed?
House Republicans think the public hates the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) so much they’ll support their tactics. But the fact is, regardless of Americans’ attitudes toward that Act — which, not incidentally, passed both houses of Congress and was signed into law by the President, who was re-elected with over 50 percent of the vote, and constitutionality was upheld by the Supreme Court — Americans hate even more one party using the United States government as a pawn in their power games.
According to a recent CNN poll, 51 percent of Americans say they’d blame the Republicans for a shutdown; 33 percent would blame the President. They blamed Republicans for the last shutdown at the end of 1995 and start of 1996 — contributing to Republican losses of seven out of 11 gubernatorial races in 1996, 53 state legislative seats, 3 House seats, and the presidency.
So what are Senate Republicans doing about this impending train wreck for the country and the GOP?
Senator Ted Cruz is now trying to round up 40 Senate Republicans to vote against — not for, but against — the House bill when it comes to the Senate floor next week. Why? Because Cruz and company don’t want the Senate to enact any funding bill at all. That’s because once any bill is enacted, Senate Democrats can then amend it with only 51 votes — striking out the measure that de-funds Obamacare, and even possibly increasing funds in the continuing resolution to keep the government running.
So if Ted Cruz gets his way and the Senate doesn’t vote out any funding bill at all, what happens? The government runs out of money September 30. That spells shutdown.
The only difference between the Cruz and Boehner scenarios is that under Boehner we get a government shutdown and the public blames the GOP. Under Cruz, we get a shutdown and the public blames the GOP even more, because Republicans wouldn’t even allow a spending bill to come to the Senate floor.
In truth, the fanatics now calling the shots in the Republican Party don’t really care what the public thinks because they’re too busy worrying about even more extremist right-wing challengers in their next primary — courtesy of gerrymandering by Republican state legislators, and big-spending right-wing gonzo groups like the Club for Growth.
The Republican Party is no longer capable of governing the nation. It’s now a fanatical group run out of right-wing states by a cadre of nihilists, Know-nothings, and a handful of billionaires.
But America needs two parties both capable of governing the nation. We cannot do with just one. The upcoming shutdowns and possible defaults are just symptoms of this deeper malady.
By: Robert Reich, The Robert Reich Blog, September 21, 2013
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