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The Tea Party is back in business! (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter timschochet
- Start date
spreagle
Footballguy
Why do government workers affected by the shutdown have orders to do absolutely nothing related to their job? No email, no calls, no project work, nothing. Its being treated like a strike. Are government workers all union? What's wrong with government workers continuing to work on their projects for free? All sorts of people in the private sector put in extra time for free to finish their responsibilities.
The ends justify the means is morally bankrupt? You used that very same argument a hundred times in the NSA thread.
You have a record of him voting yes on these? You have no idea what he would have done if he had the necessary votes. As president he rammed a bunch of stuff down people's throats including ACA when he had the votes to back him and told dissenters to get to the back of the bus.
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pantagrapher
Footballguy
GOP made some half-assed efforts yesterday to blame the shutdown on dems, but it seems like they're at least owning it today.
pantagrapher
Footballguy
igbomb
Footballguy
You must have me confused with someone else. I have yet to post in the NSA thread. Not once.
Premier
Footballguy
As they should. This is what their constituents demanded, a no holds barred attack on the ACA and in some cases the government itself. I'm not sure this is going to lose the GOP ground like many are predicting though. Maybe the ones Tim likes to call moderates, but it's going to gain ground for the Tea Party types. This is a huge success on their part and is going to gain that movement even more traction. What we're seeing is a reshaping of the GOP, but they couldn't continue to be liberal lite and survive anyways.
omahawildcat25
Footballguy
Tea Party did nothing but try to actually uphold the constitution. The dems are the ones that didn't want to compromise.
cstu
Footballguy
BigSteelThrill
Footballguy
Don Quixote
Footballguy
What part of the constitution are they trying to hold up? And why would the Dems compromise in something that passed the House, the Senate, the White House, the Supreme Court, and even an election that was about the ACA! And the Dems won on all 4? It is time to move on, and start to make adjustments to make the ACA better, not go against the will of Americans!
Redwes25
Footballguy
Putting in extra time and still getting paid is one thing. Putting in extra time when you are not getting paid at all is another.
timschochet
Footballguy
It was well said, until he referred to the establishment GOP as "liberal life" which is complete and utter crap. I don't know what's going to happen, but what I HOPE will happen is that this will do the exact opposite of what Dr. J just wrote- finally discredit the Tea Party so badly that they will sink into political oblivion, making it safe for people like me to support the GOP again. We'll see.
B-Deep
Footballguy
The real problem to me is the precedent. When one side does something like this the other ups the ante later. Anyone thinking the dems would not do this to a GOP president in the future is mistaken. IT's just an escalation of the lengths the parties will go to to prove they are different from and better than the other party. If one house of congress disagrees with a law in the future this could be the template to fight it.
At some point governing has to take precedence over campaigning and establishing positions to solidify your base, if not this country cannot survive. No country lasts forever, if we do not find a way to make compromise a strength instead of a weakness we are on a path to failure.
At some point governing has to take precedence over campaigning and establishing positions to solidify your base, if not this country cannot survive. No country lasts forever, if we do not find a way to make compromise a strength instead of a weakness we are on a path to failure.
timschochet
Footballguy
However, I never once argued in the NSA thread that the ends justifies the means. I don't believe that.
Mjolnirs
Footballguy
The Commish
Footballguy
This is the perfect illustration of this being about egos and not policy. This policy is pretty freakin' close to what the GOP was pushing for back in the day. Now? It's the worst thing EVER!!! The only thing that's changed is the side proposing it. Truly sad.
timschochet
Footballguy
Excellent post.
Abraham
Footballguy
Agreed. Somewhere along the way the definition of political compromise became "either we get what we want or no one gets anything at all." Of course that's not what a compromise is but don't tell the folks in DC.
Spanky267
Footballguy
If your brother banks with Navy Federal then he will continue to receive his pay. Navy Federal has commited to continue making direct deposits during the shutdown.
matuski
Footballguy
Tea Party types might be willing to compromise, but not on the terms Washington has operated under for the last 50+ years. The game needs to be changed. Personally I align more with this movement than either of the two current parties and I'm happy to own this. Do I root for some guy making 30k to lose a paycheck? No, not exactly. But we aren't and shouldn't be willing to compromise on the terms that Washington has operated under for the last 50+ years. Lose the budget, now. Not some 10 year plan that only cuts a small fraction, meaningful changes. There's no easy way for that to happen, but the deeper we dig the harder it gets. And ACA doesn't help either. Until the budget is in control, we shouldn't implement gigantic new programs that no one even seems to understand. Get our current situation in check first.
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matuski
Footballguy
pantagrapher
Footballguy
Sand
Footballguy
Oh please. Government workers will get paid in full, just perhaps in arrears. This is a free paid vacation that doesn't count against vacation time.
Great graph! Very informative.
When you look at the graph you'll note that every single uptrend here has been with a Democratic House. Every single one. So you ask what is to gain here? How about a budget that is in the realm of sanity? The ACA is a massive tax increase (lowering GDP) and a huge expenditure over and above those tax increases (further increasing the debt). This is a long term debt bomb and I can certainly see why there is resistance to it by the only party that actually cares about spending restraint.
The other side of the house will simply spend us into the ground, and has shown that they will do so when they can. And have done so.
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Absolutely - Defense spending, Medicare, and SS. And a whole lot of departments the federal government has no business involving itself in.
timschochet
Footballguy
But that's not what they're doing. If the Tea Party threatened to shut down the government unless there was a complete overhaul of spending, I wouldn't agree with that at all, but I might respect them more.
But in fact, they've shut it down over ONE issue: Obamacare. They demand that President Obama surrender his legacy achievement. That's irrational; it's never going to happen. And it doesn't address any of the issues you're raising.
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igbomb
Footballguy
Philosophically, I agree with some of the Tea Party precepts, primarily being that we need to address the financial situation of our government. The biggest issue to me is that they take a completely antagonistic approach with no room for good faith negotiation. And that is just not a situation conducive to real reform.
Like it or not, we have some divergent philosophies in this country, and in the Congress. And the Tea Party doesn't have near the numbers to negate this. All they accomplish is to simply halt any momentum towards any change.
I don't care what the forum is, if you have some schmuck stand up at the beginning of every meeting and shout "my way or the highway", nothing will get done. And these guys aren't dumb. If I know that you need to create an air of cooperation to be successful, so do the Tea Partiers. Which tells me that they are completely self-serving and are looking to do nothing more than get themselves elected and then re-elected.
Deplorable.
Real change and real reform happens in this country when aisles are crossed and people talk like adults. And I think without the Tea Party mucking up the works, we are in a place in this country where that would happen. But their poisonous approach grinds the whole thing to a halt.
Politician Spock
Footballguy
You made it clear that the means are the only way to fight terrorism. If fighting terrorism is a must, then the means are justified.
timschochet
Footballguy
That's not exactly what I wrote. It's a subtle distinction, but the distinction IS there.
You made it clear that the means are the only way to fight terrorism. If fighting terrorism is a must, then the means are justified.
In any case, let's not discuss it further in this thread.
Uwe Blab
Footballguy
http://www.slate.com/blogs/weigel/2013/09/30/no_democrats_never_really_held_the_debt_limit_hostage.html
No, Democrats Never Really Held the Debt Limit Hostage
By David Weigel
Charles C. Johnson is a careful reporter for the Daily Caller, an expert at digging through public records to find graft or hypocrisy. Example: It was Johnson who proved that former Institute for Study of War analyst Elizabeth O'Bagy both had a problem with disclosure and a problem with overstating her academic credentials.
Today, Johnson attempts to prove a point that Republicans have been making before they release their full debt limit demands. "The Democratic Party," he writes, "has consistently battled debt ceiling increases when Republican presidents were in power." Fair-minded journalists have been wondering about this, wondering how many Pinocchios or Pants on Fire to assign Barack Obama when he says the GOP's current demands are without precedent. Johnson's near-total failure suggests that Obama might be right.
First of all: Consistently? Like, every time it's come up for a vote. Actually, no—not even Johnson really proves that. He finds three examples in the 1980s when the Democratic House did not quickly give Ronald Reagan a debt limit increase. Exhibit A:
In 1981, the Democrats opposed efforts to increase the debt limit and accused Republicans of “conscience-less” politics targeting the poor, according to The Milwaukee Journal.
This leaves out oodles of context. At the start of 1981, Republicans controlled the Senate and White House. Some Senate Republicans wanted to pass a debt limit increase and attach a tax cut. Some Democrats, who had voted for debt limit increases under Jimmy Carter and been attacked by Republicans, balked. They didn't actually make demands, and from the outset they had a majority of members ready to vote for a clean debt limit increase. From the Feb. 2, 1981, edition of the New York Times:
The Speaker of the House, Thomas P. O'Neill Jr. of Massachusetts, has promised President Reagan that he will try to line up Democratic votes to support the requested increase in the debt ceiling. But he informed Mr. Reagan that he expected the Republicans to support the budget ceiling increase, and disavow ''budget-ceiling politics.''
The crisis, such as it was, lasted four more days. Sen. Robert Byrd, then the Democratic majority leader, said that his party only wanted to "depoliticize" the debt limit to prevent another campaign in which Democrats were pilloried for voting for it. O'Neill, however, was good to his word, and on Feb. 5 he pushed the debt limit increase through the House on a 305–104 vote. Most members of both parties voted for a debt limit increase with no extra riders.
That was Johnson's first example. His second is a 1983 Senate vote against the debt limit increase; at the time, Republicans controlled the Senate, and it was conservatives who temporarily thwarted the vote. But his third (and final) example is more promising—he finds a June 28, 1984, article in which Democrats beat two debt limit votes to gain leverage against defense spending increases in the Senate. This Washington Post story from the same day provides some more context.
In the latest debt-ceiling fight, Democrats want to force approval of a budget resolution setting a compromise figure for defense spending next year, while Republicans are delaying in hopes that the issue will be resolved in a more favorable arena, close to the $299 billion figure they negotiated with the White House several months ago. This was a cut of $13 billion from what Reagan originally proposed but represents a substantial increase over current spending.
The Republicans' so-far successful stall has angered and frustrated the Democrats, even those like House Budget Committee Chairman James R. Jones (D-Okla.) who normally refuse to hold debt measures hostage for other objectives.
Unless defense spending cuts are assured as part of a three-year deficit-reduction package of between $140 billion and $180 billion, the recent one-half percent increase in the prime rate "will just be the beginning" of a surge in interest rates, Jones warned in urging the House to block the debt-ceiling increase as a way of forcing the Senate to compromise on defense reductions.
That's a fair analogue to our current crisis, right? So how long did the impasse last? Just one more day: Democrats were criticized for the brinkmanship and passed a clean debt limit increase.
To recap: Raising the debt limit always been unpopular, and tough to explain to voters. A few times, Democrats balked at raising it for a few days to make a point, then caved in. Many more times, they've just voted for the damn thing. John Boehner's Republicans have only ever agreed to raise the debt limit if they won major policy concessions from the president. Both parties don't do it. One party does it.
No, Democrats Never Really Held the Debt Limit Hostage
By David Weigel
Charles C. Johnson is a careful reporter for the Daily Caller, an expert at digging through public records to find graft or hypocrisy. Example: It was Johnson who proved that former Institute for Study of War analyst Elizabeth O'Bagy both had a problem with disclosure and a problem with overstating her academic credentials.
Today, Johnson attempts to prove a point that Republicans have been making before they release their full debt limit demands. "The Democratic Party," he writes, "has consistently battled debt ceiling increases when Republican presidents were in power." Fair-minded journalists have been wondering about this, wondering how many Pinocchios or Pants on Fire to assign Barack Obama when he says the GOP's current demands are without precedent. Johnson's near-total failure suggests that Obama might be right.
First of all: Consistently? Like, every time it's come up for a vote. Actually, no—not even Johnson really proves that. He finds three examples in the 1980s when the Democratic House did not quickly give Ronald Reagan a debt limit increase. Exhibit A:
In 1981, the Democrats opposed efforts to increase the debt limit and accused Republicans of “conscience-less” politics targeting the poor, according to The Milwaukee Journal.
This leaves out oodles of context. At the start of 1981, Republicans controlled the Senate and White House. Some Senate Republicans wanted to pass a debt limit increase and attach a tax cut. Some Democrats, who had voted for debt limit increases under Jimmy Carter and been attacked by Republicans, balked. They didn't actually make demands, and from the outset they had a majority of members ready to vote for a clean debt limit increase. From the Feb. 2, 1981, edition of the New York Times:
The Speaker of the House, Thomas P. O'Neill Jr. of Massachusetts, has promised President Reagan that he will try to line up Democratic votes to support the requested increase in the debt ceiling. But he informed Mr. Reagan that he expected the Republicans to support the budget ceiling increase, and disavow ''budget-ceiling politics.''
The crisis, such as it was, lasted four more days. Sen. Robert Byrd, then the Democratic majority leader, said that his party only wanted to "depoliticize" the debt limit to prevent another campaign in which Democrats were pilloried for voting for it. O'Neill, however, was good to his word, and on Feb. 5 he pushed the debt limit increase through the House on a 305–104 vote. Most members of both parties voted for a debt limit increase with no extra riders.
That was Johnson's first example. His second is a 1983 Senate vote against the debt limit increase; at the time, Republicans controlled the Senate, and it was conservatives who temporarily thwarted the vote. But his third (and final) example is more promising—he finds a June 28, 1984, article in which Democrats beat two debt limit votes to gain leverage against defense spending increases in the Senate. This Washington Post story from the same day provides some more context.
In the latest debt-ceiling fight, Democrats want to force approval of a budget resolution setting a compromise figure for defense spending next year, while Republicans are delaying in hopes that the issue will be resolved in a more favorable arena, close to the $299 billion figure they negotiated with the White House several months ago. This was a cut of $13 billion from what Reagan originally proposed but represents a substantial increase over current spending.
The Republicans' so-far successful stall has angered and frustrated the Democrats, even those like House Budget Committee Chairman James R. Jones (D-Okla.) who normally refuse to hold debt measures hostage for other objectives.
Unless defense spending cuts are assured as part of a three-year deficit-reduction package of between $140 billion and $180 billion, the recent one-half percent increase in the prime rate "will just be the beginning" of a surge in interest rates, Jones warned in urging the House to block the debt-ceiling increase as a way of forcing the Senate to compromise on defense reductions.
That's a fair analogue to our current crisis, right? So how long did the impasse last? Just one more day: Democrats were criticized for the brinkmanship and passed a clean debt limit increase.
To recap: Raising the debt limit always been unpopular, and tough to explain to voters. A few times, Democrats balked at raising it for a few days to make a point, then caved in. Many more times, they've just voted for the damn thing. John Boehner's Republicans have only ever agreed to raise the debt limit if they won major policy concessions from the president. Both parties don't do it. One party does it.
timschochet
Footballguy
igbomb
Footballguy
Look again. The undoing of the Clinton era in the 2000s was led by a Republican House.
And if you want to focus on party, here is the sum total of Presidents since WW2 that have seen an increase in debt on their watch:
Ford (very small)
Reagan
Bush 1
Bush 2
Obama
Four our of five are Republicans.
snogger
Footballguy
Sand
Footballguy
Are you civil service or a contractor? If civil service I don't understand the stress. You have one of the most secure jobs in existence.
Obamacare is an issue here. Not entirely central, but very relevant. It's ridiculous to implement gigantic federal programs when we can't sustain the current ones.
igbomb
Footballguy
Not sure how, but I had never seen this group. Thanks for the link.
glock
"Don't grumble, give a whistle!"
What came first? The chicken or the egg? We are a country divided roughly right down the middle on many issues. Look at our election results. Why are we surprised that stalemate is the name of the game? It is who we are as a country. Did politicians do it to us, or did we do it to ourselves?
The real question is how to come up with a larger middle ground in which both parties can see themselves? I see moderation- often derided in politicians as chicken ####- as the only path.
How do we get there?
The real question is how to come up with a larger middle ground in which both parties can see themselves? I see moderation- often derided in politicians as chicken ####- as the only path.
How do we get there?
![[icon]](/data/avatars/m/5/5167.jpg?1660313464){kind=avatar}
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Insoxicated
Both sides are acting like little kids. Repubs and Dems both suck balls now. It's all about the slapfight and not about bettering the nation and fixing the problems. Whole lotta stomping feet, pointing fingers, and yelling "BUT HE STARTED IT". Jackholes, the lot of em.
