A Glimpse of Sanity? -- Open Thread

by wj

I couldn't find a place to put this, so . . . new open thread!

I ran across this:

President Trump and Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) have agreed to pursue a deal that would permanently remove the requirement that Congress repeatedly raise the debt ceiling.

Getting rid of the debt ceiling seems like an idea whose time is way overdue. Nobody can argue that it has achieved its avowed purpose: forcing Congress to constrain spending. All it really does is provide an occasion for a whole lot of really stupid posturing. So good riddance -- if they manage to actually pull it off.

I confess that I was skeptical at first about just pushing the debt limit issue out 3 months. But if what that does is provide time to ditch it entirely? Hallelujah!

I'm not getting my hopes up on this. Except that I am getting my hopes up.

Comments

[wj]

Yes, I know that putting any faith in a statement from Trump is folly. But still, just the fact that he said it at all has to be getting knickers in a twist across the far right.

[bob mcmanus]

So much for the resistance. I can remember way back whenever when it was "Nothing never, not gonna bail the bastards out."

But the bond markets rule Democrats.

[russell]

Sounds good to me.

[bob mcmanus]

And the centrists support the Senator from Wall Street, which would be ecstatic to get rid of the debt ceiling.

I vote for the third option. Default and jubilee. I will never ever support a bipartisan deal with these racists and fascists. Let it blow.

Another reason to hate Obama, and to be very wary of Clinton.

[cleek_with_a_fake_beard]

l has to be getting knickers in a twist across the far right.

across some of the (far?) left, too. i've seen people complaining that this eliminates a pressure point Dems could have used as leverage in future negotiations.

which, i guess, is true. but it's just about as cynical as can be.

[bob mcmanus]

Whatever. Enjoy your comity and Republican friends.

A lot of ruin in a nation, we can handle more.

We can't survive a perception that we have legitimate negotiating partners on the lyncher rapist side of the aisle.

[cleek_with_a_fake_beard]

maybe democracy isn't for you, bob.

[wj]

We can't survive a perception that we have legitimate negotiating partners on the lyncher rapist side of the aisle.

Kind of an absolutist position, don't you think? If you can somehow get things you want, in exchange for stuff that you don't much care about (or even, it appears, in exchange for nothing more than kind words), what's not to like?

Sure, the other party is a scumbag. But as a nation, we do deals with scumbags all the time. And as an individual, that happens from time to time as well. Certainly I'd prefer to deal only with good people; unfortunately, that's not always one of the possible options.

[bob mcmanus]

...unfortunately, that's not always one of the possible options.

Sure, when the big money is involved. Obama signed the austerity budgets. Deals are always to be made when the rich benefit.

Why oh why Bob do you foreground class? Because the liberal capitalists will make deals with the Right, legitimating and perpetuating both.

Also see: war and Empire.

Through here.

[bobbyp]

Through here.

See? Even when you lose, you can't win.

Cribbed from The Onion via LGM:

BATON ROUGE, LA—As punishing wind and rain from the former Hurricane Harvey made landfall, government officials urged Louisiana residents Wednesday to evacuate dangerous lower income brackets. “Given the extent of the potential destruction, we urge anyone in the path of the storm to make their way to higher median incomes immediately,” said Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards, adding that residents should resist any urge to wait out the dangerous weather below the poverty line and proceed directly to a higher tax bracket. “We know from experience that in hazardous conditions like these, the safest place for Louisianans to be is at least four or five times wealthier than they are now. This is no time to take risks—please, leave right now and make your way to the upper-middle class if at all possible.” Edwards went on to say that while no one could be forcibly evacuated, anyone who chose to remain in a lower income bracket should not expect to receive help anytime soon.

'bout sums it up.

[hairshirthedonist]

Through here.

Then where not? Where do your views resonate such that they will have the force of action, to effect the change you seek?

[wonkie]

Since this is an open thread:https://www.amazon.com/Once-Was-Lost-But-Found/dp/194604413X/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1504818256&sr=8-2&keywords=laura+koerber

[russell]

We can't survive a perception that we have legitimate negotiating partners on the lyncher rapist side of the aisle.

I just figure folks like that have always been part of the mix here, they're not going away, and I might as well suck it up and get the best deal I can.

Too many of them for me to shoot, plus I don't like jail. Don't really like shooting people, for that matter.

Through here.

C'mon man, don't be that way! I know I'm glad to have you here.

[sapient]

Congratulations, wonkie! Looking forward to reading it!

[wonkie]

My dog rescue book has just become available on Amazon. Its the story of the rescue of the Olympic Animal Sanctuary dogs--the largest dog rescue to be carried out without support of local authorities Its is a story of assaults, protests, lawsuits,and small town corruption and abuse of power. I took me two years to write. The text includes the police files released under state law, eye witness accounts, lots of photos, and additional essays by professional dog behaviorists.

All proceeds will be donated to the rescues that took in the surviving dogs.

Thank you, Laura

[CJColucci]

A thing can be true even if Donald Trump says it.

[bobbyp]

The debt ceiling cudgel is simply a toy that is too dangerous for congresscritters to play with. take it away from them.

bring back pork.

[wonkie]

Well thank you all for letting me promote here. When the dogs were finally rescued, they went to paces all the US. many were in bad shape physically and emotionally and the rescues that accepted them had big expenses. I would like to give back to them. I was involved in the rescue itself--went to protests, filed a consumer fraud complaint and did my best to get one of the officers fired from his state job. The dogs were finally rescued on Christmas Eve, a little more than a year after a formal complaint about conditions was made to the local police. Sorry to say, it was the Chair of the local Democratic party who used political influence to squash the prosecution. Proud to say it was Washington states AG, Ferguson who is always suing Trump, who prosecuted the dog's owner for consumer fraud.

[Snarki, child of Loki]

"We can't survive a perception that we have legitimate negotiating partners on the lyncher rapist side of the aisle."

Much of the negotiation is saying "nice doggy" while looking around for a stick. People negotiated with dictators and terrorists, refusing to do so is reminiscent of Dubya's diplomatic approach.

If the congressional GOP were of a similar mettle as our own wj, a more collegial negotiation would occur. Alas, it is not to be.

[liberal japonicus]

I couldn't find a place to put this

Sanity is in such short supply these days, it's like a strange new genus previously unknown to scientists...

Taking Bob's point, I'm wondering how different what he says is to a 'heighten the contradictions' stance?

Wonkie, give me a week and I'll put that up as a front page post.

[bob mcmanus]

Maybe not permanently. but I get tired.

What was the point of "resistance"? Of refusing all deals?

To let the psychos fail. McConnell and Ryan can't find the votes for extension in the gibbering caucus.

So after a default (and remember,SA and Japan ain't gonna empty the vaults on day one), or close enough to terrify Krugman, whatever damage accrues (and the money markets will know who to blame) will belong to Republicans.

Going into 2018.

Now Republicans can run the midterms on "Democrats voted themselves unlimited, infinite borrowing capacity. Do you want to also give them budget authority?"

Shit yes, McConnell is grinning ear to ear. Obamacare goes down in 2019, after big gains in both houses.

But Schumer will get tons of bank campaign money, as will Gillibrand, Booker, and Patrick.

October 2008 redux.

Give me Democrats that can take losses, to paraphrase Lincoln about Grant.

And that's just one argument.

[Countme-a-Demon]

Murderer Mulvaney:

“Clearing the decks and getting these things out of the way for now, was, I think, the right call, and allows us to focus on what’s important,” Mulvaney said. “Not only to the administration but to the folks the President represents.”

Get that last sentence. Anyone here in that group?

Thanks Mulvaney, you low fuck, you vermin murderer, for giving the game away in plain language.

Not since the South chose NOT be represented by Abraham Lincoln, the President of the United States, has the bond between all of the citizens of the United States and their President been so violated.

I am not represented. Not my gummint. As a Founding Father, I declare Death to the tyrants.

Mulvaney is nothing but the King's emissary.

[liberal japonicus]

Thanks Bob. Not sure if I agree, the base of the Democratic party is, I think, one that is turned off by total resistance (unlike the base of the Republican party, which seems to find almost sexual satisfaction with the idea, hence Rolling Coal trucks and climate change stupidity), so there has to be some appearance of moderation.

It's also funny that some people are saying that McConnell and Ryan are playing n-dimensional chess (ex Drum)

A counterweight to this concentration on class is Coates recent piece, that puts the whole thing on racism

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2017/10/the-first-white-president-ta-nehisi-coates/537909/

[wonkie]

I'm with BOB. Let the Repubicans burn the place down. That's the only thing that will let sanity back into our politics. Anything else is enabling.

Japanese Japonicus, that would be extremely nice of you. If anyone is interested in doing some googling, the money will go to Safe Haven in Nevada, Lionel's Legacy in California, Gentle Giants in New Jersey, and Chicagoland Eskimo Rescue and AARF in Seattle among other places. I hope to make enough money to give at least a half dozen rescues.

[Snarki, child of Loki]

"I'm with BOB. Let the Repubicans burn the place down. That's the only thing that will let sanity back into our politics."

Don't start the fire now, or it will burn out too soon to have enough effect on the 2018 midterms.

Did you think that Dubya would poison the GOP brand for a generation? ADHD America can't seem to keep a coherent thought for more than one TV season (hence 2010).

Timing, people. Timing.

[byomtov]

I'm with BOB. Let the Repubicans burn the place down.

I'm not. Fires are easy to start, hard to control, and hard to put out. And they do a lot of damage in expected and unexpected ways.

The debt ceiling is ridiculous and dangerous. Get rid of it. I've favored that for a long time, and the fact that Donald Trump agrees with me isn't going to change my mind.

[JanieM]

id you think that Dubya would poison the GOP brand for a generation?

Never mind Dubya, people were saying this about Trump right up to the time the returns started to come in last November.

Fires are easy to start, hard to control, and hard to put out. And they do a lot of damage in expected and unexpected ways.

Seconded.

[sapient]

Fires are easy to start, hard to control, and hard to put out. And they do a lot of damage in expected and unexpected ways.

This. Also, Trump is enough of a fire. I don't want any more smoldering than is already going on. I'd actually like to have a country left if we can get rid of him.

[wj]

To let the psychos fail. McConnell and Ryan can't find the votes for extension in the gibbering caucus.

So after a default (and remember,SA and Japan ain't gonna empty the vaults on day one), or close enough to terrify Krugman, whatever damage accrues (and the money markets will know who to blame) will belong to Republicans.

"whatever damage accrues" is a damn flippant way to dismiss an economic disaster which impacts vastly more people than just politicians. If you've got your own farm, you might be OK. Anyone who doesn't? Toast.

What we're looking at is a mess that would make the Great Depression look like a cakewalk. The onset would be more gradual, but the smash would be worse . . . and we would be standing there watching it coming and unable to do a thing about it.

[liberal japonicus]

I tend to agree with Janie, sapient and wj, but this

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/dc/manchin-splits-with-other-red-state-democrats-praises-trumps-daca-move

Makes me think that Bob has a point...

[sapient]

Makes me think that Bob has a point...

Still not sure what that point is. Impoverishing the whole world isn't going to suddenly enlighten West Virginia.

Manchin doesn't care about DACA recipients because West Virginia has very few DACA recipients. Of course, West Virginians follow the pattern of hating immigrants when most of them have never seen one.

[bob mcmanus]

What we're looking at is a mess that would make the Great Depression look like a cakewalk.

So a 48 hour suspension of interest and rollover and nobody buys American Treasuries ever again. And dogs eat corpses in the street.

I heard this stuff in 2008. A whole lot of economists and citizens work for the banks, and yeah, they say servicing debt is sacred sacred and if a payment is missed the sky will fall. It is very hard to get a decent analysis of the consequences, near and medium-term.

They can just repossess our carriers.

We ain't Greece or Puerto Rico or even Argentina.

Countries used to default all the time. Default isn't Jubilee, sorry to say.

Sovereign Defaults

[bob mcmanus]

And one of the first things FDR did on taking office was a form of default. Allowing inflation is a form of default. Devaluations are defaults.

"The Gold Reserve Act of 1934 made gold clauses unenforceable, and changed the value of gold from $20.67 to $35 per ounce, thereby devaluing the U.S. dollar, as the dollar was gold-based."

In a gold standard economy, what did that do to gold-based securities?

But yes, people will get hurt. That is what I meant by taking losses. Better to be a hostage to banks and Republicans?

[wj]

Better to find a less apocalyptic means to get shut of the folks you don't like.

Do you have any idea of how much we benefit from our position as the safest place to put assets? Sure, people would buy American Treasuries again. But they would no longer do so at the dirt cheap rates that we get today. And they wouldn't do so until we rebuilt our reputation.

You may be fine with us being a third world country for a few decades. Amazingly enough, a whole lot of people aren't.

P.S. How do you personally expect to ride out the mess? Got funds in foreign currency, and a place to live there, until the dust settles? Because if you are staying in the US, and have all your assets here, you are in for a really nasty shock.

[bob mcmanus]

Brain is tired, back tomorrow. Time for some Excel Saga and Full Metal Panic. Just finished 148 episodes of Hunter x Hunter.

Also in the last 30 days: Visconti, Rohmer, Cocteau, Techine, Duviver, De Sica, Chabrol (2), Godard, Bergman, Lucrezia Martel, and Fukasuka.

Alternate nights.

[russell]

Countries used to default all the time

fwiw, that is not an attractive list of precedents.

just saying.

Brain is tired, back tomorrow

I hear ya.

[Doctor Science]

bob mcmanus seems to truly believe that defaulting would hurt Republicans and Moneybags guys more than the ensuing recession (or depression) would hurt millions of regular people. I hope that when he's gotten some rest, etc., he'll realize that this is *nuts*.

Among other things, this implies that the only group in Congress that truly cares about the bottom half (or three-quarters) of the income distribution is the Republican Freedom Caucus. No, I don't think so.

We were talking about this over dinner tonight, and I said I thought most Congresspeople opposed to raising the debt ceiling, like the majority of the general public who oppose it, think it's about limiting the government's ability to take on *future* debt, they don't understand it's about whether we pay the credit card bills we've already run up.

Mr Dr Science disagreed: he thinks all the GOP Congresspeople *know* not raising the debt ceiling would be to stiff our creditors, to refuse to pay our bills, and they're willing to do it anyway.

What do you guys who've actually heard these guys talk on the TeeVee Box think? Does the Freedom Caucus (et al.) really want to hurt creditors? Do they for some reason want to cause a recession? Or are they basically confused?

[wj]

I think they are quite clear that defaulting on the debt would be to stiff our creditors. And they just don't give a damn. Maybe they figure that it would be just not paying a bunch of foreign, mostly foreign government, creditors (and who cares about them?). Maybe they figure that anyone who buys bonds from the Federal government deserves whatever happens.

But no, I don't think ignorance is the reason.

[wonkie]

The Republicans in Congress do not know what the debt ceiling is, do not know what would happen if they refused to lift it and and would not believe anything they were told about it.

[JanieM]

I don't know about legislators; I don't have one of those TeeVee Boxes myself, nor do I tend to tune in to legislators online.

But I suspect, partly from things a few people have said in my presence, and partly from a general sense of how little most people understand about big money in general, that many, many voters think this is about letting the "national debt" get ever larger. (Those nasty Democrats and lefties want to spend ever more money on *those* people.)

And I would further guess that that misunderstanding is precisely what "the Freedom Caucus (et al.)" is banking on. No pun intended.

[bobbyp]

two thirds of the US debt is held by, well, us.

Thus the "Freedom" (sic) Caucus is mostly a bunch of lunatics looking for a rake to stomp on.

....and what wonkie said at 11:27 above.

[bobbyp]

You may be fine with us being a third world country for a few decades.

A "strong" currency contributes to our trade imbalance. Our trade imbalance ships jobs overseas. The cost to our prosperity from this falls on lower income working people.

I do not feel a "strong dollar" is the unalloyed good you make it out to be, wj.

[Nigel]

This gives a fairly persuasive picture of the Trump mind - dangerous children play nice once in a while, but it tends not to last:
http://www.politico.com/story/2017/09/07/trump-jovial-after-debt-deal-242466?lo=ap_b1

[bobbyp]

Couldn't resist: Coates strikes again.

Powerful stuff. Read the whole thing.

[Countme-a-Demon]

I find it remarkable that we are still pondering whether this "thing" that has crawled up the republican party's fundament over the past 40 years is simply ignorant or rather deliberately, malignantly sociopathic.

No doubt the latter feeds upon the former, as Janie guesses, but even the ignorant seem to revel sadistically in their "so what" ignorance.

I've been struck over the years, both in personal interactions with ardent right-wingers, once represented here but no longer, and of course by observing the behavior and rhetoric of these new brand of republicans via the media and internet, by which I mean their very words, not the words liberals might put in their mouths, by the sadistic glee they take in the harm and hurt their "policy" prescriptions will inflict.

Listen to any interview with a "freedom" caucus member. Hatred oozes from their pores, accompanied by shitfaced grins about their "ideals" and their "principles".

Whether it's torture, or the dreamers, or Obamacare recipients, or simply a fucking free school lunch for a kid.

Never underestimate what we are dealing with:

https://www.balloon-juice.com/2017/09/08/so-i-elected-an-axe-murderer/

rump beshat from his mouth the other day this fatuous, meaningless crap, the sort of thing he and his sons on the way out the door of the brothel tell prostitutes who were tied to beds a few minutes earlier: "We love the Dreamers. We love everyone."

Paul Ryan speaks in much the same affectionate way about his victims. What he is doing "for" them. Show me one instance, one expression of love, romantic or otherwise, in "Atlas Shrugged".

What do they know of love? They are revulsed by the human objects they claim to "love".

What they mean by love is pain and dominance.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7vXc2HsMZg

[Countme-a-Demon]

Coates nails rump.

[wj]

A "strong" currency contributes to our trade imbalance. Our trade imbalance ships jobs overseas. The cost to our prosperity from this falls on lower income working people.

A strong currency allows us to import stuff cheaply. Which helps lower income people, who buy lots of that cheap stuff.

The "cost of our prosperity" only falls on lower income people because our income distribution is so screwed up these days. There are a number of reasons for that, not least tax policy. But the strong dollar isn't a significant contributor.

[liberal japonicus]

sapient, don't want to get in a fight here, but reading that Manchin was the _only_ red state democrat to praise the DACA, I'm thinking, maybe the Democrats ought to go for the jugular more often, i.e Bob has a point. I don't give a shit if there are no DACA recipients in WV, if Manchin feels he has to do that to get elected, screw him. Primary his ass.

Obviously, this is a bit of a sensitive subject with me, given where I am and where I am from, but if we are going to tolerate tossing DACA recipients to the shark, I wonder what else would be tolerated.

[russell]

I've been struck over the years, both in personal interactions with ardent right-wingers, once represented here but no longer, and of course by observing the behavior and rhetoric of these new brand of republicans via the media and internet, by which I mean their very words, not the words liberals might put in their mouths, by the sadistic glee they take in the harm and hurt their "policy" prescriptions will inflict.

same here.

[Hartmut]

I remember plans to legislate that foreign debt holders get priority in case of a default (known as the 'Pay China First Act' by the critics). That would have been two squirrels with one stone since it would mean staying on good terms with the cherished creditors while offering a chance to kill the New Deal and related programs at last since the proposed legislation put SocSec payments right at the bottom.
I guess it was pure survival instinct to can that when the details leaked to mainstream media too early.

[Hartmut]

I just checked. They DID NOT can it in 2013 but passed it in the House as 'Full Faith and Credit Act'along partisan lines 227-221.

[Dave W.]

lj: According to the fivethirtyeight Trump Tracker, Manchin has voted with Trump 55.1% of the time so far this year, which is the highest for any Democrat. It's still far short of the 79.6% of the most anti-Trump Republican, Susan Collins, and way short of the 93.6% you would expect a generic Senator from West Virginia to have. In other words, Manchin is worth an extra vote for the Dems in the Senate around 40% of the time vs. the generic Republican you are likely to get if you successfully primary Manchin. Even that understates his value, since that 40% will include many of the most important votes. With a R in Manchin's seat, the ACA would have already been repealed. Let's also not forget the superimportant upcoming vote in January 2018 for who gets to be the majority caucus.

So sure, I would prefer a WV Senator who would stand up for DACA, and I'll be pissed at him if a DACA bill fails by one vote in the Senate. But unless you have a DACA-supporting primary opponent to propose who has a better chance of winning the general election in WV, I think the Dems should stick with Manchin, warts and all.

[bob mcmanus]

Strong recommendation for this book. It is partly about how institutional racism and imperialism became entrenched in the Anglo West, but also provides economic histories of Melbourne and Capetown to help disillusion any ideas about American exceptionalism. It is also a fun and easy read, with a lot to learn.

Replenishing The Earth

Honestly, it appears a whole generation have been brainwashed.

The steady-state economy we have pretty much lived in since Reagan was engineered by Republican tools like Greenspan and Bernanke. Low inflation and moderate unemployment and low interest rates is a conservative economy, protecting assets rather than creating jobs.

A progressive capitalist economy is a boom-and-bust economy. The Golden age of worker empowerment 1945-1975 (and the preceding century of labor power organization) or so had a ton of recessions and periods of 5%+ to double-digit inflation. It was great. And not unique to the post-war.

And not zero-sum, but with an underlying global growth trend.

Certainty (anchored expectations), under conditions of rentier (think about it) empowerment, kills hope.

[sapient]

Obviously, this is a bit of a sensitive subject with me, given where I am and where I am from, but if we are going to tolerate tossing DACA recipients to the shark, I wonder what else would be tolerated.

I try to give what I can, both with money and volunteer time, and other than trying to get Democrats elected in Virginia, immigrants and refugees get most of that effort. I know some DACA kids, and I am not a fan of the racism and cruelty that ending DACA embraces.

But unless you have a DACA-supporting primary opponent to propose who has a better chance of winning the general election in WV, I think the Dems should stick with Manchin, warts and all.

Yes. Sad, but that's what's necessary. Until we get to a better place, instead of just discussing WV voters as the economically anxious "white working class," we need to call it racism, and try to figure out whether there are ways to address that real problem. Crashing the world economy doesn't seem like the solution to me.

[Pro Bono]

The US government raises money by selling bonds. Bond investors discount the price they'll pay for bonds by the perceived probability of default. So the higher the probability of default, the higher the interest rate the US has to offer to compensate for it.

Every time US politicians threaten to default, the perceived probability of default goes up. Playing this game costs the US government money in future interest payments.

Apparently Republican politicians are more willing than Democrats to harm their country in order to make a political point. Taking this dangerous toy away from them is therefore in the interests of the Democratic party as well as the American people. Even if you have to talk to Trump to do it.

[Marty]

It's odd but the Dems were the ones threatening to shut down the government this time, you couldn't tell that from the comments here. The Republicans wanted an 18 month extension and the Dems wanted leverage in December. How does that square with any comment above on those mean Republicans willing to destroy the country?

[bob mcmanus]

Before 2008, your favorite economists were throwing around nightmares about the collapse of the dollar and spiking interest rates/inflation. They totally missed the housing bubble, or didn't care.

After the crash, the Fed couldn't keep foreign direct investment down, or interest rates and inflation up to trend. They tried (in a way) to print their way to making the dollar weaker, but still haven't managed.

The US is the sovereign currency hegemon, and the mainstream economists number two job is protecting capital and bond values. The number one job is preventing social unrest.

Don't listen to the scaremongers.

[sapient]

It's odd but the Dems were the ones threatening to shut down the government this time, you couldn't tell that from the comments here.

Cite?

It's my impression that the Freedom Caucus is still threatening to breach the debt ceiling and some Democrats are refusing to be held hostage. And, Democrats (led by Schumer and Pelosi) are trying to negotiate an end to the debt ceiling. So please be specific.

Thanks.

[bob mcmanus]

Crashing the world economy doesn't seem like the solution to me.

I love the idea, in fact consider it an absolute necessity.

1) Liberal Capitalism kills millions most years, makes billions suffer, and enacts symbolic violence and terror on everybody. Your hands are dripping with blood. It is not a matter of not killing millions, but about which millions. The wrong millions are dying and suffering, by your conscious choice.

2) I am a freaking Marxist. M-L, Mao, Trotsky, whatever.

Class struggle is a very good thing, the more intense and widespread and violent the better.

Intensified class struggle, adding to the internal contradictions of capitalism, will intensify and make more common capitalist crises, including recessions and depressions.

This will eventually, hopefully soon, lead to a workers social revolution, in which millions of capitalists and their tools will die. I look forward to it.

If labour and the left do not take responsibility for and generate social unrest and economic disruption,the fascists will, and they will win.

There is no peace. Up with antifa.

[sapient]

2) I am a freaking Marxist. M-L, Mao, Trotsky, whatever.

Yeah, I get that. I'm not.

[Marty]

The Reps presented an 18 month extension, then 6, the Dems said no because it takes an issue off the table they think, obviously true based on this blog, is goid for them. The whole"willing to shut down the government" or "default on the debt" argument is bs, it takes two sides to create a stalemate. If either of those things happen both parties decided it was worth getting their way.

[bob mcmanus]

One of the great technologies of the industrial age, shared simultaneously by capitalism and liberal democracy, is the legal concept of limited liability. Mercury in the river is not the shareholders fault.

Under limited liability, the Democrats can blame Republicans and Republicans can blame Democrats for the black brown and yellow people dying, and the rich getting richer. Of course, alternating in power so as to confuse.

I don't want to hear it.

[sapient]

it takes two sides to create a stalemate.

It takes two to have a hostage crisis, the hostage taker and the hostage. Dems don't want to play that game anymore.

[hairshirthedonist]

I'm not sure it matters what the timeframe is, at least if it's not completely silly, like a one-day deal. I wonder if the Democrats even expected to get the 3-month deal, anyway. Trump's agreeing to it seems to be kind of a surprise to almost everyone, maybe even Trump.

What Marty appears to be ignoring is the Democratic proposal to eliminate the debt ceiling forever.

But the deal they cut provided hurricane relief and kept the government running for another 3 months. And it did that without funding the stupid border wall.

The main reason, aside from whatever the hell got into Trump, that they could get this done is because the Republicans need the Democrats, because there are too many crazies in their own party who want to burn the place down (who are oddly allied with bob mcmanus on that, though I'm sure the freedumb cawkus has very different reasons than does Marxist bob).

[cleek_with_a_fake_beard]

the more intense and widespread and violent the better.

you get to volunteer other people for violence?

what you have there is a broken ideology.

[Doctor Science]

Marty:

It's my understanding that the 18-month extension of the debt ceiling, tho suggested by GOP leadership, was not one they could get their own members to pass.

One thing this whole business has made really clear to me: Trump is willing to work with Pelosi & Schumer because they, unlike McConnell & especially Ryan, can actually deliver the votes of their caucus on tricky issues.

Yes, going for a 3-month extension instead of 18-month (which would be after the 2018 elections) is a political calculation. Surprise surprise. The 3-month deadline gives Pelosi & Schumer actual leverage to use on Trump & the GOP, to maybe get a deal where the debt ceiling is automatically raised as needed, the way it was pre-Gingrich (1995).

But Trump would never have come to back the Dems if the GOP in Congress was prepared to function like a governing party. They can't: they're acting like a coalition in a parliamentary system, where the "Party Republicans" have to ally with the Freedom Caucus and the Tuesday Group. The Freedom Caucus, in particular, is acting like one of the small hard-right groups Likud has to work with to get its majority, and which end up driving policy on certain topics.

[Doctor Science]

So I'm saying the same thing hairshirtthehedonist does, only in a more boring way.

[liberal japonicus]

it takes two sides to create a stalemate.

Marty must have got that from a North Korean news announcer. Marty, you wearing a red or pink joseon-ot?

[byomtov]

it takes two sides to create a stalemate.

Well, sort of. But if one side says, "It's plain common sense that we need to do this," and the other says, "We won't agree to do it unless you yield to this list of (stupid) demands," then it's hardly a case of equal fault, especially since it's clear that it is in fact plain common sense.

Ryan laughably accused the Democrats of "playing politics" with the ceiling. Can someone please go Janesville, WI and explain to those voters that this guy is one of the most destructive politicians in the country, and they should pick someone, anyone, else to represent them in Congress?

[wj]

I don't give a shit if there are no DACA recipients in WV, if Manchin feels he has to do that to get elected, screw him. Primary his ass.

Well, lj, it's your party not mine. But imposing that kind of litmus test, in a state (or district, come to that) which isn't essentially a "safe seat", is a good way to lose that seat. See the experience of the California Republican Party -- descent into irrelevance is all too possible.

In short, what Dave W said.

[Countme-a-Demon]

Marty Bothsides, his nickname among his Mafia associates (there are none, because that was a joke) wants a gal to call his own.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W1ldfGFrfqo

We've been through 25 years (let's be charitable) of blackmailing government shutdowns and debt ceiling showdowns instigated and carried out by the republican party, and constant cavalier threats of blackmailing government shutdowns and debt defaults in the intervening periods by the republican party between the actual items, and now suddenly Marty finds it, at best, a tiresome shenanigan.

While I favor getting rid of the debt ceiling because it has been perverted into a malign tool, just like the filibuster, the supreme court nominating process, the no-taxes pledges (for a stalemate on the issue, every Democratic candidate would have had to sign a pledge to accept nothing less than a 100% tax rate on every dollar), and every other traditional tool of governance by the radical wing of the republican party, now its center, I find a Democratic Party/rump alliance vomit-inducing ... on any issue.

(As I write this, I see the term "pre-Gingrich" invoked by Doc Science regarding the debt ceiling, and if that is an achievable goal, I'm all ears, depending on what the quid pro quo is. I'm not going to be triangulated clintonesquely.

Especially since now, if this entire thing is not an improvisational kabuki trap on rump's part (like clapping his hands during a financial huddle with his casino lenders and transactional .... the only "trans" permitted apparently .... dancing girls and platters of transactional caviar blinis suddenly appearing as a diversionary ass kissing tactic), impeachment is surely off the table, making the stealing of elections, by foreign powers or not, an acceptable occurrence in the future of the exceptional United States.

Unlike McManus, I have no Marxist program for the post republican party world, though I am amenable to his views regarding the basic similarities between the establishments in both parties serving the same powerful interests) when it will be dead and made illegal, like the Cosa Nostra, and I have no specific radical preferences for a country run by the Democratic Party, beyond making sure everyone can see a doctor and have shelter and sustenance without kissing expensive ass for it (if that's radical, then I'm Malcolm X).

I merely want vengeance, and if they want violence in return, come and get it, on the entire lunatic vandalizing conservative movement for their deliberate malign chortling brinksmanship bullshit, domestic and international, these past 40 years.

I want it fucking dead. No breathing Gingrich, pre- or post-.

What comes after (I have no plans to nationalize the shoe industry) is of little matter to me because my job, at this small cubicle near the furnace in the basement of the interblogs) will be done and I'll gather up my things and be out of your hair.

I'll throw the carbine back to Pompey and if you need further assistance, send a rider out to my ranch.

[wj]

I am a freaking Marxist. M-L, Mao, Trotsky, whatever.

Class struggle is a very good thing, the more intense and widespread and violent the better.

Just out of curiosity, has there ever been an occasion, anywhere in the world, where this was tried and provided anything but a disaster for the working man? Every time I am aware of, it either just provided a new and different elite (along with lots of bloodshed -- mostly working men's blood; for all the number of the old elite who died as well) as in the USSR, etc. Or just bloodshed without the new elite (Cambodia).

Got anything, bigger than a village, where it has worked?

[wj]

It's odd but the Dems were the ones threatening to shut down the government this time, you couldn't tell that from the comments here.

Of course, it's also the Dems who are working with Trump to get rid of the debt ceiling altogether....

[wj]

there are too many crazies in their own party who want to burn the place down (who are oddly allied with bob mcmanus on that, though I'm sure the freedumb cawkus has very different reasons than does Marxist bob).

Actually, I think their reasons are virtually identical. Both groups think (based on zero actual evidence) that if they burn the place down, they will somehow end up untouched and in charge. A rare burst of optimism from two groups which otherwise are sure that the world is going to hell in a handbasket.

[hairshirthedonist]

What comes after (I have no plans to nationalize the shoe industry)...

Wait. Isn't that part of friends on the left re-tooling the entire economy? I apparently did not get the half-measures memo!

[Countme-a-Demon]

One shoe at a time.

[CaseyL]

Got anything, bigger than a village, where it has worked?

Thank you, wj!

This is exactly the question I've been asking the BernieBros and Steiniacs on FB. "When has this ever worked? When?? Where??"

The only responses I get are repetitions of the "Dems Just as Bad, Burn It All Down!" bleats.

From which I conclude that the extreme left is just as nihilistic as the extreme right. They don't actually care about whether something "works" - they just want to destroy stuff.

[hairshirthedonist]

Actually, I think their reasons are virtually identical. Both groups think (based on zero actual evidence) that if they burn the place down, they will somehow end up untouched and in charge.

Pronoun trouble - different "they"s. It's like saying Eagles fans and Cowboys fans want the same outcome - their team to win!

That, and I don't think mcmanus wants to be (or wants his people to be) "in charge" in the sort of sense the freedumb cawkus would have in mind. Marxism doesn't work that way.

[bobbyp]

It's odd but the Dems were the ones threatening to shut down the government this time, you couldn't tell that from the comments here.

Bull. The GOP has a majority in the House the Senate. They hold the presidency. They can pass a resolution to raise the debt limit any damnned time they please.

But they can't. They need Dem votes to do so.

But it's all the Dems fault.

Sure. You bet'cha.

[wj]

hsh, I was thinking of "in charge" in the sense of "things are run the way *I* think they should be." Whether that involves command and control or not.

[wj]

"When has this ever worked? When?? Where??"

Casey, I suppose we should note that this isn't an argument for no change at all. Trying new things is definitely a good idea. It's just an argument for gradual, incremental change rather than a massive revolutionary change to everything....

[bobbyp]

But Trump would never have come to back the Dems if the GOP in Congress was prepared to function like a governing party.

Yep. Exactly. Why if the shoe was on the other foot, the Dems would pass the debt limit increase without a second thought. Why even lickspittle Joe Manchin would go along.

Unlike what we observe with the GOP, there is no left wing "heighten the contradictions" faction of Democratic Congresscritters willing to burn it all down to impose their ideological whimsies.

[Countme-a-Demon]

Rush Limbaugh's studio fills up with hoax-like seawater.

He follows the rats overboard, grabbing his conspiratorial bottled water on the way, and heads for higher ground, meaning the luxury penthouse atop his ego.

http://juanitajean.com/rush/

Ah, to see Gingrich and Limbaugh floating face down at full tide among the sea wrack.

[bobbyp]

"When has this ever worked? When?? Where??"

This is not a fair question. A lot of folks died needlessly to attain our western standard of living. Do you want a list?

Stalin, murderous asshole psychopath that he was, raised the Russian standard of living significantly. You can certainly (and I would agree reasonably) argue that the price was too high, but tell that to some schlub working in a factory in Leningrad in 1965 who had a lot more in the way of wealth and social services than his czarist peasant forbearers.

When bob says there is blood on our hands, he is essentially correct.

We just tend to turn a blind eye to it.

[sapient]

Stalin, murderous asshole psychopath that he was, raised the Russian standard of living significantly.

Easier to raise the average income when you murder millions of inconvenient peasants.

[cleek_with_a_fake_beard]

A lot of folks died needlessly to attain our western standard of living.
...
When bob says there is blood on our hands, he is essentially correct.

and yet bob is right up there calling for more blood to be spilled for his ideology.

[bob mcmanus]

But Trump would never have come to back the Dems if the GOP in Congress was prepared to function like a governing party.

The stupid and irresponsible party controls how much gov't at every level?

To my fans above about the most recent series, I had to levee an apparent stormsurge in unwanted credibility.

I can't predict if or how Democratic rank and file will regret this most recent DC group hug: if, because God knows October 2008 is getting misremembered, rewritten, and misanalyzed; and how, because I can' be sure how* Republicans will abuse this opportunity, because frankly, Republicans are smarter than I am, as measured by their dominance.

Democrats are stupider or more corrupt than I can ever imagine, and there is a motivating enlightenment in being constantly disappointed beyond expectations.

*Brad DeLong has consistently bemoaned that Democrats raise taxes and moderate spending to decrease deficits followed by Republicans cutting taxes and increasing spending. This pattern was upheld by Obama.

FDR after PH increased taxes to 90 to cover the war expenses. Bush II cut taxes on the invasion of Iraq.

I expect this to be repeated in the current, and next few administrations.

[Snarki, child of Loki]

Re: the debt limit, etc.

All too many people, including those who really should know better base their opinions about debt, government budgets, and the economy on the idea that "money" is "a finite pile of shiny metal".

It's not. Hasn't been for most of a century.

In 1840, a country that couldn't come up with the "pile of shiny metal" to pay their debts was in a really tough bind. In 2017, it's just bits on a computer.

Yes, I would like to see the US debt limit abolished. But I wouldn't mind it being used as a cudgel on some GOPers first. A cudgel that they can make disappear anytime they want, but it requires pulling heads out of fundaments, and that's unpossible.

[Countme-a-Demon]

Unfortunately, to the say least, when the chickens come home to roost, they break the very eggs they were trying to hatch, along with the Faberge eggs they confiscated to trade for chickenfeed for the chicks.

Someone call the metaphor translators.

But, you know, when income disparities are what they are, and are made to in-your-face persist and widen by the top recipients and their tools, anger and hate get the best of us.

You don't like envy? Stop being so preeningly enviable.

Let them eat cake, unless it ruffles your religious sensibilities to let them eat cake?

Eat this.

We could have been peaceably eating at the common table long ago, but somehow food and healthcare and shelter got confused with rewards and incentives.

Perverts.

[hairshirthedonist]

"things are run the way *I* think they should be."

Then you agree that bob and the freedumb cawkus want almost exactly opposite things to arise from the ashes, unless you think the freedumb cawkus want labor to unite and rise up to wrest economic control from the capitalists.

[Countme-a-Demon]

Speaking of perverts and Gingrich:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/gingrich-or-santorum-as-speaker-house-conservatives-plot-mischief-for-the-fall/2017/09/07/8df6ab60-9316-11e7-aace-04b862b2b3f3_story.html?utm_term=.cb1f2cc94ed3

via Hullabaloo.

rump is further radicalizing the radical dumbshit caucus. He wants nigger healthcare (thank you, Coates) gone and this latest is merely a ploy to get there, along with the rest of the radical agenda.

rump is not demented in the medical sense. He's stupid like my grandmother was deaf but could recite conversations she overheard from three rooms away.

He's demented like Ted Bundy squeezing through a prison ceiling vent and immediately removing the passenger seat in the next car to resume his perversion.

Nancy Pelosi is merely a momentarily convenient Lauren Bacall to rump's Johnny Rocco, because he's pissed off at John McCain's Humphrey Bogart for snatching the death of nigger healthcare and now nigger deportation from his clutches.

The House Freedom Caucus is Stalin.

Feet first is how they will leave the scene.

It's the only way.

[Countme-a-Demon]

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/scott-pruitt-climate-change-insensitive-floridians

Said the wolf to the little pigs as he blew their house down.

[Marty]

"Of course, it's also the Dems who are working with Trump to get rid of the debt ceiling altogether...."

Which is the stupidest thing I have ever heard, second to 100% Medicaid coverage from the feds but managed by the state. Let's remove all accountability from government thinking. The Dems are perfectly willing to get rid of any limits on what they spend.

[Pro Bono]

The debt ceiling isn't a limit on spending, that's what the budget is for. It's an opportunity for politicians to stamp their feet.

[sapient]

The Dems are perfectly willing to get rid of any limits on what they spend.

This makes me laugh.

[sapient]

Still laughing.

[Countme-a-Demon]

"Which is the stupidest thing I have ever heard"

So much stupid unheard then.

[wj]

"When has this ever worked? When?? Where??"

This is not a fair question. A lot of folks died needlessly to attain our western standard of living. Do you want a list?

Yes, actually, I would like a list. No question a lot of people died. But the "needlessly" part -- looking just at economics, not other kinds of violence (e.g. political) and without benefit of 20/20 hindsight? That would be of interest.

Let me introduce a small reality check. Not because I expect to convince you**, but because I have a tendency to tilt at windmills.

Lots of people die during industrialization. But compared to the alternative? Do you know why developing economies (including our own, when it was developing) have sweatshops? Mostly it's because lots of people are willing, even eager, to work in them. The alternative, subsistence agriculture, is worse.

Worse in standard of living, worse in effort required, worse in health and longevity. That's why Thai peasants voluntarily move to cities and work in sweatshops: the alternative is worse. (If you haven't spent time in places where subsistence agriculture happens, chances are minimal that you realize just how bad it is. It's grim.)

Do owners ("capitalists" if you prefer) benefit from sweatshops? Sure. Do they prefer running sweatshops? Absolutely not. The profit margins are lower in sweatshops than in more advanced factories. That's why Chinese sweatshops are on the way out: there's more money to be made elsewhere, once your workforce actually has some skills and can do the higher skill jobs.

How does that square with our current situation? Owners, like everybody else, are both risk averse and not exceptionally bright. (Sorry top 5%, but it's true.) So when you are talking about new technology, that is something that hasn't been proven out elsewhere, they mostly can't see how it would work out and so would rather stick with the tried and true. So they take other approaches to getting richer (e.g. tax law features).

But the minority who have the vision, and are willing to take a risk, can get super-rich. (Gates, Musk, need I go on?) Not only are they the ones who make progress happen, they generally pay better than the old guard. Not so much because they can (although that does come into it), but because workers are risk-averse also, and you have to pay them more to work in your novelty shop.

Given time, the old way can't compete and changes. But if you want to make it happen faster, the way you do that is to put your effort into politics. Elect people who will change the tax laws to something fairer. Which means educating voters. It's not as exciting as having a revolution. But it kills a lot fewer people. And has the added benefit of being far more likely to actually work.

** In my experience, convinced Marxists are about as amenable to reality as any other religious fundamentalist or any Tea Partyer.

[Countme-a-Demon]

Stalin's name gets mentioned again in the service of absurd comparisons. Leave it to Dreher.

http://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/fruits-same-sex-marriage-australia-uk/

Stalin would have disappeared Lacticia too.

[Countme-a-Demon]

I merely misspell her name: Lactitia.

That is one precocious 8-year-old.