As I’ve said many times before, we’re in for a real ugly spell politically. Republicans have no apparent incentive to compromise and establishment media will say “both sides do it” over and over again no matter what Republicans do. The latter may not matter since establishment media is becoming less and less relevant.
It’s going to be awful and it’s going to destroy a lot of people’s lives, people who can’t get jobs at least partly because of contractionary economic policies, for example. There’s no way to sugarcoat it.
But it’s going to end. Bob Woodward may not be dead in five years, but I suspect that after Hillary or whoever puts a whupping on Marco Rubio, things will start to change, not right away, but within a few years.
Until then, we’re stuck with this:
At a presser today, President Obama was peppered with questions from reporters who demanded to know if there is anything he can do to dislodge Republicans from their no-compromise stance. One suggested locking Republicans in a room until a deal is reached. Obama responded that he is “not a dictator.”
[….]The GOP position is explicitly that there is nothing Democrats can offer that will get them to agree to new revenues. Nothing. Therefore, any offer from Dems — no matter how much in serious spending cuts it contains — is automatically a nonstarter for Republicans if it closes any tax loopholes to generate new revenue. There is no scenario under which Republicans can be induced to compromise — if we take Republicans themselves at their word. The only option for avoiding the sequester is for Democrats to propose only cuts to replace it — cuts that Republicans themselves won’t even propose. No “leadership” can avert the sequester. Only giving Republicans 100% of what they want can.
A Robespierre-style reign of terror would be more efficient and more moral than allowing this to continue, but it doesn’t seem to be on the table right now.
Just Some Fuckhead
How many Friedman Units would you estimate, Doug?
MikeJ
Better to light a single candle than to curse the darkness.
Doug Galt
@Just Some Fuckhead:
Ten.
Calouste
In a parliamentary system, even if Parliament is divided, the Republican tactics wouldn’t really work because a new election could be called at any time, specially of course at a time when the public is most fed up. The fixed election dates of the American system means that the Republicans can get away with doing f’ all for at least 18 months out of any two year period without serious consequences.
Cassidy
I’m in. Where do I sign up?
Redshirt
Rumble Tumblers!
Hill Dweller
After laying out all the things he has already done, the President asked a reporter for her suggestions on what else could be done to change Republican behavior. She, nor anyone in the room, had an answer. They just laughed after a few seconds of silence.
John Dillinger
Someone’s trolling for another of those Sullivan awards I see. Count me in, as long as we use an electric car to haul the guillotine around where it’s most needed.
General Stuck
I figure things are happening just like they are supposed to in this particular democracy. And we are in for some very tough periods, until the voting public begins to ask the right questions, and are open to the right answers.
In the meantime, the wingnuts are playing out their hands as a gathering from the past. And Once again, Lincoln was correct. A house divided against itself cannot stand, and must become all of the one thing, or all of the other. He was talking about the evils of chattel slavery. We don’t have that now, but it is another kind of servitude at issue, via class, that race is related to.
The end result is not in doubt, as in a predicted vacuum of viable democracy. This melting pot country is going to be the cultural and racial gumbo it was meant from the beginning to be. The white majority has had their run, and see where it left us as a country. No one can predict what the right wing gathering will do, when the witching hour comes for good. It could all turn out with roses, or it could all turn to shit. Not necessarily a livable script in a nuclear world.
Stooleo
It will be interesting to see what happens when the congressional staffers get furloughed.
Petorado
@Hill Dweller:
The video link to that.
dance around in your bones
Ok, just never read the news.
“Sinkhole sucks man from his bedroom into the earth”.
“Cyanide killed million dollar lottery winner, authorities confirm”.
“Two British men arrested in ‘cannibal cop’ case”
When my best friend from Canada was here visiting, I read a few headlines for her from MSNBC – she said WHAT the hell are you reading?! And I said the NEWS!.
She advised me not to read The News anymore.
Hunter Gathers
The economy is going to get worse, on purpose mind you, because of the hurt fee-fee’s of old white guys. That’s loverly.
Villago Delenda Est
The Reign of Terror, after dealing with the fascist scum on the Supreme Court, should target the Village next, before they go after a single teatard Congresscritter. Well, we might make an exception for the vile Paul family. But the Village needs to be utterly destroyed.
On edit: That definitely includes that asshat Sullivan.
Mary G
@John Dillinger: “… as long as we use an electric car to haul the guillotine around where it’s most needed.” Made me laugh out loud. Fortunately I was not drinking anything.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
Alternate title:
Oh No Love, You’re Not Alone
Amir Khalid
@Calouste:
If America had a Parliamentary system, John Boehner would be Prime Minister — a frightening thought, no matter .how briefly he was in office
Arrik
Anoniminous
Going to be interesting if this thing drags on longer enough for the Fundie/Con TeaBagging morons to experience exactly what happens when they actually “shrink the size of government enough to drown it in a bathtub.”
Like when all those hicks in Nebraska, etc., don’t get their farm subsidy checks.
ranchandsyrup
sometimes I hope that the prophecy of the popes will succeed where the Mayan Apocalypse failed.
Schlemizel
@Cassidy:
ME TOO!
Plus I have a way it can help pay down the debt. The guillotine will be high up on a stand and the chute down will be like a pachinco board. At the bottom will be numbered tubs and you can bet on which tub the head will fall into. There can be daily doubles & pick 6’s etc. Half the amount bet will go as prizes & the other half to pay down the debt!
Cassidy
Doug, you should have saved this thread for tonight when we’re all consuming alcohol.
Poopyman
@Amir Khalid: Well, not really, because the folks who are now in the Senate would be in the HoC, and Boehner would just be a backbencher, if that.
Might still have Obama as PM.
dedc79
The Republicans are basically like a bunch of college kids who know they’re not gonna graduate and want to see how long they can keep partying away even if it bankrupts their parents.
Suffern ACE
@ranchandsyrup: We’ve got a comet coming in the fall that is going to be bright and visible even during the daytime. That has to be an omen of something.
Unfortunately, it’s probably not going to be a useful omen for us. Not unless that two headed calf is born from a lightening bolt in Iowa in July. Otherwise, the comet is a false alarm for us and will only foretell a record harvest in Argentina.
Alex S.
Bowie’s new album is streaming on itunes….
piratedan
maybe we need to use their same tactics against them, say we flip the house and keep the senate in 2014 ( I can dream can’t I?)… then we implement a new tax code, where you pay more tax if you’re a Republican, since the R’s have no compunction about trying to keep you from voting if you’re a Dem, it seems only fair that we fix our revenue problems so elegantly.
Nemo_N
Now that the “SPENDING CUTS ARE GOING TO DESTROY US ALL” phase seems to be over, everyone be ready for the MSM to go back to “THE DEFICIT WILL KILL US ALL, MUST CUT SPENDING” mode tomorrow morning.
arguingwithsignposts
Can we throw “sparred” under the bus?
IowaOldLady
Mr IowaOldLady is trying to fly home from a work trip today. He keeps sending me emails saying another flight has been delayed. I’m thinking I won’t see him until tomorrow.
MikeJ
@ranchandsyrup:
Ladbrokes has Tony Blair at 500/1 for the next pope.
beltane
If there is a Robespierre-style campaign of terror I will be sure to take up knitting.
jl
Assuming that Obama and Co. play eleventy dimensional chess (which I don’t really believe, but let’s run it up the flagpole for funsies), the timing of this is pretty good. Certainly better than having an economic/fiscal showdown late last year.
The recovery may have picked up enough steam to wobble along with just slowed GDP and job growth rather than a recession. And the fiscal cliff is really a gradually steepening slope. The majority support the substantive policies of the Democrats (though, for some GOPers, only if the Dem label is removed).
Some powerful GOP sugar daddies will be hurt by the sequester, and will start to put pressure on the GOP to do something. More non-insane GOPers in non-insane districts are ready to vote for sane policies.
There are several months to see how this plays out before we have to worry about irreversible damage to the recovery.
So I am not totally despondent. Which I guess is kinda OK, given what might have happened.
The pain to regular folk is inexcusable. A lot of people, including me, may well lose their jobs if this keeps up too long.
Poopyman
@Cassidy: It’s already tonight somewhere.
Just found out three of my coworkers got the axe today. I’m somewhere in the queue, too, but don’t know how far down the list. This is at a large defense contractor, btw, and all because our customers don’t know w/w/wtf (when/whether/where) the money’s going to show up. No new contracts being awarded and existing ones squeezed.
schrodinger's cat
Cheer up DougJ, things could be worse, we could be Britain, with the upper class privileged twit leading us to a triple dip recession.
becca
Emergency powers took over Detroit.
I’m afraid this will be looked upon as a bellwether by future historians, writing of the demise of democratically elected officials and the rise of the regional corporate manager.
TPTB tire of democracy. Between all the gerrymandering, voter suppression, race- baiting, gender-baiting, a stacked bench on the Supreme Court, and the GOP openly mocking a large majority of Americans…now Detroit.
Fuck Godwin’s Law. They may not be Nazis, but they are a kissing cousin.
Cassidy
@Schlemizel: Your ideas are intriguing to me and I wish to subscribe to your newsletter.
ranchandsyrup
@Suffern ACE: So it may be a bad time to join a cult. Darnit, I already perused their literature.
@MikeJ: I thought you were foolin but nope. Ladbrokes be trolling. Successfully.
Cassidy
@Poopyman: I hear ya. Some of our contractors have been told to start looking. I’m just hoping they don’t RIF before May.
beltane
Spring is coming. Perhaps the millions of people who will be hurt by the GOP’s War on America can have a huge “We Hate Republicans” march on the Mall.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Arrik:
Because the French Revolution wasn’t a purely top-down affair. Robespierre didn’t get the keys to Dr. Guillotine’s marvelously scientific, clean, reliable and humane (that’s what they said back then) new invention until after the sans culottes had demonstrated their willingness to smash in doors, drag people out into the street, and tear them apart limb by limb the old fashioned way.
How much mob violence do we have today? Got any friends who have the know-how and desire to make IEDs and car bombs and use them on Wall St., and are willing to die doing so? How about strapping on 100lbs of C4 and suicide bombing a MSNBC green room in order to take out some of the Villager scum? Any takers?
That’s why not.
Today it isn’t bad enough to motivate people to do desperate things like that, aka tattered as it is, the welfare state is doing the job it was designed for, which is to save capitalism from itself.
Poopyman
@becca: Cute that that shithead Snyder did it on the Friday the Sequester is sucking up all the news cycles.
dance around in your bones
@beltane:
I’m already an excellent knitter, so I’ll be on the front lines, waiting for the heads to roll.
(Ok, that sounded more gross than I would actually wish for. Since I have compassion and empathy and all).
Alex S.
@becca:
Panic in Detroit?
(stolen from Twitter)
MomSense
I can’t take it anymore. I need an Oakeshott in the Widener Library for succor–make it a double.
Poopyman
@beltane: Well, if I get “sent Galt” I’m going to be using all of my time in the spring working on my Victory garden, although “Victory” may not be th eword I’m looking for. “Subsistence”?
@Cassidy: It’s a long way to May, my friend.
Robin G.
@Petorado: That was uncomfortably funny in a “Oh God oh God we’re all gonna die” kind of way. /whedon
MomSense
@dance around in your bones:
I was discussing politics with my Dad while knitting and he said “Easy there Madame Defarge”. Now they all call me Madame Defarge every time I rant about politics.
I usually tell them to watch it because I am an angry woman with dangerously sharp sticks.
Southern Beale
Yes and no. I think the 2014 midterms could really settle this, if Dems win just a few key races.
Look, right now the Republicans in Congress are more afraid of being primaried from the right than they are of losing a general election to a Democrat. Until THAT changes — until Democrats really muscle up and prove they must be reckoned with — we’re going to keep getting this wackadoodle crazy crap.
If Dems can pull out a few key wins in ’14 — get a few prominent scalps, electorally-speaking — Republicans will have the fear of God put in them. Right now, Republicans need to be more afraid of losing to a Democrat than getting primaried by a right-wing nutball.
Southern Beale
And let me add, I fucking hate this “elections happen every four years” crap. NO THEY DON’T. National elections happen EVERY TWO YEARS. Jesus, Doug. You know better.
Repeat it, often, loud and clear. If Democrats had turned out in 2010 we wouldn’t be having near this many problems.
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@Poopyman:
And that would all be worthwhile if Barney Frank could be Queen.
dance around in your bones
@MomSense:
I remember when it was possible to take your knitting AND needles on the aeroplane! Without anyone thinking you were going poke somebody’s eye out and take over the plane.
Jeebus, you were just fucking knitting.
Hoodie
@Poopyman: Yeah, having worked in defense in the distant past, I remember folks started hitting the bricks pretty quick when there were no charge numbers. There could be whole towns that depend on DoD contracts seize up in the next month or so, so you could see a rapidly escalating unemployment. Walmart will really be hurting then.
I wonder about the role of the asymmetry of information here. Could the Republicans be like a lawyer asking a witness a question they don’t know the answer to and getting a nasty surprise when the witness responds? The average republican congresscritter can’t really know what the effects of the cuts will be without a lot of fact gathering, which they don’t seem to have done. Of course, they almost never do, given their general hostility to evidence. Obama’s people should be in the best position to know that since they administer the agencies involved. Would they have made a big deal about it if they didn’t think it would be bad? Panetta was laying the ground work for months.
Marc McKenzie
@Hill Dweller: “She, nor anyone in the room, had an answer. They just laughed after a few seconds of silence.”
Funny thing about that–I think it can be applied to most of us who are always shouting for the Pres to do something–but have no real clue what that “something” is.
The GOP deserves to own this, because they are the ones who are behaving like spoiled children, still throwing a tantrum months after the Black Guy With The Funny Name kicked the @$$ of their candidate and won re-election.
eemom
Well, at least we don’t also need to consider the potential implications of increasing numbers of desperate people having unfettered access to deadly weapons. Oh wait…
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@Alex S.:
Nah. Detroit Breakdown (Motor City Shakedown).
Marc McKenzie
@Southern Beale: “If Democrats had turned out in 2010 we wouldn’t be having near this many problems.”
Agreed. Why people cannot see this cold, blunt point is beyond me. But, I guess it was more important for them to pout and take the ball and go home because they couldn’t get single-payer in two seconds and he didn’t close Gitmo fast enough (which he tried to do, but was cb’d by Congress). Did people really think that giving the Pres a majority GOP Congress would force him to go left? Well, even if it did….CONGRESS IS WHERE LEGISLATION IS BORN. The Pres can only sign bills into law.
And with the GOP in charge of the House and Senate Rs acting like tossers….what did they think was going to happen?
Don’t blame Obama for this if, in 2010, you sat it out to “send a message”. Look in the mirror–that’s where the fault lies. We’ve got till 2014 to fix this, and 2016, and 2020. This has to be a long-term commitment.
gvg
‘m pretty pissed at the R’s but I actually took a course on the French revolution. No it would not be more moral than this deadlock. It was really horrible, it lasted a lot longer than most people realize, and it became the model other peoples revolution followed instead of the American earlier model which is why S America for instance and even the communist revolutions were so much less sucessful than our own. Also things were much worse then before it kicked off.
The wingnuts have co opted Founders worship but we really were lucky there. Our founding fathers were power mad crazies and it saved us a lot of grief down the line. Washington set an example by not running for President more than twice and a bunch of other things went right.
There are a lot of simularities with the Reformation era to the fools posturing now. The ignorant “conservatives” don’t even know that we have seperation of church and state to PROTECT religious beliefs not impose atheism. The founders were from a society mostly settled by refugees caused by losing at various stages the christian religious war between Catholics/Protestants/other protestants. 30 years war doesn’t ring any bells in them.
Oh well, I know it was meant as fun hyperbole but the French revolution made me sick when I was studying it and the Reformation was pretty bad too though I have to say I don’t think I understood that one nearly as well. It was too different a mind set for me to get. I’m not religious. Rich poor conflicts I get. Killing over different prayers I don’t.
ranchandsyrup
@Alex S.: New translation of Detroit is “in dire straits”.
jayjaybear
@dance around in your bones:
Yes…but you could be knitting an Afghan!
Oregon Beer Snob
This old Bowie song seems appropriate.
gene108
@Southern Beale:
What races?
I think unless a Republican House member says something nice about President Obama, and thus invite a primary challenge, I don’t think they have a lot to worry about.
Republicans have a natural advantage in Congress, as many small (population-wise) states are solidly Republican and the Constitution went out of its way to favor small states, with regards to representation in Congress.
.
Anoniminous
@gvg:
French Revolution did give us such calm, humane, inspiring, writings like …
— Jean-Paul Marat
(What a guy.)
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@Marc McKenzie:
Look, I loathe and despise the firebaggers as much as any Obot, but I think this idea has been pretty conclusively debunked. The GOP’s success in the 2010 midterms happened despite Democratic voters turning out at about the same rate Dems have turned out for midterm elections for decades now. What was different about 2010 is that GOP voters, and especially older voters, turned out in higher numbers than normal for a midterm election. Why? We don’t know for sure but probably on account of the GOP’s successful scaremongering re: Medicare during the preceding summer. Which is why Congress only tries to fiddle with healthcare about once per generation.
Temporarily Max McGee (soon enough to be Andy K again)
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
One party’s voters heeded the calls of the Goons of August. The other’s didn’t- which was stupid.
celticdragonchick
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
Lets see what happens when the police continue to violently suppress peaceful demonstrations like Occupy. We may get our armed angry mobs eventually when it becomes apparent that peaceful means are not going to work and will not be tolerated by the 1%.
patroclus
Uh, no, the Robespierre/Danton era was not more moral than today. I realize we’re all Baader-Meinhof now, but I’m not going to go all French Revolution-excess quite yet.
For so long as the Republicans control the House, we’re going to be in this situation. They are not interested in governing in the normal sense and are deliberately pursuing destructive policies because they can. We’re just going to have to live with it for so long as it lasts.
MomSense
@dance around in your bones:
Shoot I took a project with circulars and they didn’t say anything.
eemom
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
I don’t disagree, but frankly I have no interest in arguing about WHY people don’t turn out to vote, because as I was saying earlier, in my mind there is no excuse EVER for not voting, and it just drives me freaking CRAZY that people don’t understand that.
I stood there last Nov. 6 in a line that snaked around the entire school builing where we vote, thinking about how yes, ALL of this shit could have been averted if that line had been there in November 2010 — and 2009 in the case of the Virginia state elections — and just wanted to scream, “What the fuck is WRONG with you people??”
gene108
@gvg:
I think a big difference between the U.S. revolution, the French revolution and the revolutions in South America, is the British allowed a great deal of autonomy to the U.S. at the state and local level.
The U.S. didn’t have re-imagine how to run state and local governments without the British. The question was really about how to run a national government and preserve unity.
The French were riding the tiger of popular resentment and had to come up with new ways of administering their government on the fly, at every level. This is why the created new calendars, measuring systems, etc. They had to do something to stay on top of the populist wave. Also, the French were faced with a very real threat of war from the French royal family’s allies elsewhere in Europe.
The Spanish directly administered the governments in South America. When they were driven out, the whole process of government had to be re-engineered from the city to the state to the national government.
What Have the Romans Ever Done for Us?
I love the last line of the snippet – “cuts the Republicans themselves won’t even propose.” They want the cuts, they should come to the table with them, and pay the political price.
The bottom line is Boehner’s caucus literally won’t vote for anything. Because Obama might sign it, and if he did, then they could be accused of compromising with Obama, and that is a route straight to being primaried out of office.
dance around in your bones
@Marc McKenzie:
I thought this “Democrats stayed home in 2010” was debunked years ago .
538 as well
Hell. I just don’t give a shit anymore. Obama can’t run again, have no idea who is gonna run next and seriously considering becoming apolitical otra vez.
Maybe I’ll just concentrate on my spiritual life nowadays. Not sure I have that many days left, anyways.
Whoa! I sound kinda gloomy, no?!
Shanna Carson
We need a spending freeze across the board. We should only maintain essential spending. After all, if it’s not essential, why are we spending money on it? Our children are getting further in debt before they are even born…
Keith G
Sorry Doug, it’s gonna be longer than you think. The other side has already rigged our system of representation just enough (with more to follow) to give them over-sized influence at least through 2021. And if we are not proactively vigilant, by 2015 they will have rigged the electoral college just like they rigged US representative districts on Texas and Ohio.
I get distressed when I notice liberals acting like this new brand of conservative crazy has an expiration date stamped on it. They are not going anywhere until we fully and aggressively confront and stop them. They are immune to snark so if our major tact is to crack wise while we wait for better demographics, we are just giving them more time to doctor the rules.
celticdragonchick
@gvg:
gvg Says:
The pre-Radical phase of the Revolution was not so much the problem (and I think the “Great Fear” was probably justified when the mansions and dovecotes were burned down). The Radical Revolution is what we all think of, of course, and I agree that we do not need genocidal warfare a’la the Infernal Columns in the Vendee’ and daily mass murder. I do think we could use another Bastille moment though, where we actually tear down the edifices of Wall Street.
shortstop
@Keith G: This. THIS.
dance around in your bones
@MomSense:
I knit with circular needles all the time (so easy! did many projects from the top down or the bottom up) but as far as the TSA is concerned you might as well be carrying switchblades.
Heck, I had my husband’s mustache scissors( maybe 2 inches long?) seized on a flight in 2004? I said, “Hey, You’re welcome for the free gift” That was in Mexico, fer Krist’s sake.
It’s just gotten beyond crazy.
Jennifer
Ironic how these are the same guys who have been using “your FAMILY has to live on a budget!” as a go-to. I’d pay to hear someone ask one of them, “what family out there trying to pay off debt would remove “generate more income” from the list of potential solutions as a way to at least partially address the problem?”
Because of course, no one would rule out raising more revenue if they were making a sincere effort to get out of debt.
“Sincere” is the operative word there.
celticdragonchick
@gene108:
The French were facing war on three fronts…and losing… (some of that was self inflicted) by the time Robespierre and the Committee of Public Safety took over and kicked the Girondin faction out.
The Snarxist Formerly Known as Kryptik
The sequester is just another example of the infuriating tendency of the GOP to win even win they lose. What incentive does the GOP have to work with anyone when they can just go fucking scorched earth and do what they always do? Kneecap gov’t in order to prove that gov’t doesn’t work?
And even when they suffer for it, they rarely do in any tangible, effective sense, since their successes always manage to fucking ingrain their will to where their losses are always minimized, and fuck it, they already codified their shit in ways that’ll take decades to fix, after which the public will have likely forgotten the GOP is the reason for their messes and bring them in for fucking unprecedented majorities once more.
Darkrose
@Anoniminous:
from The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade , by Peter Weiss
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@gene108:
There were other big differences. The US Revolutionary War was to a significant degree a civil war re-litigating on this side of the pond issues from the English Civil War of the mid-17th Cen and subsequent Stuart Restoration and Glorious Revolution. As a result our victory re-establised rule by the lineal and ideological descendants of the Puritan/Parliamentary/Cromwellian faction, who had a past history of governance on both sides of the Atlantic, and our foundational documents had a solid grounding in British history and law, including the Grand Remonstrance and the debates of the Long Parliament. So the US Revolution was not quite as revolutionary as it appeared, it might be more accurate to call it the US Evolution.
ETA: that, and we got the French to pay for it, which eventually bankrupted them rather than us (see French Revolution, causes of)
Anoniminous
@Various.
Total voter turn-out in 2010 was around 41% versus 61% in 2008 and 58% in 2012. Active Democrats turned out in their usual numbers. The voter demographic in 2010 was older, whiter, and more conservative than in 2008 and 2012 because of a drop across the board of “loosely attached” Democratic Party voters, which has been a consistent for off-year elections for as long as I can remember.
Napoleon
The big differance between the US Revolutionary War and French Revolution is that the French version was in fact a revolution and the US version was a war of national independance (likewise, our civil war was not a civil war, it was a failed war of national independence).
Anoniminous
@Darkrose:
Be darned. I haven’t seen a reference to that play in years.
NonyNony
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ:
Also too – the US Revolution involved a lot of very rich, property-owning men who were put out about the fact that they were denied the privileges of rich men who happened to own property in England instead of in the colonies. They liked their system of government just fine, they just wanted to change who was in charge.
The French Revolution, OTOH, initially involved a lot of very rich but not property-owning men and women who had a lot of grievances about the Divine Right that Louis claimed for himself as king and wanted a fundamental change to how they were governed. They didn’t like their system of government at all and wanted to replace it.
This is probably the primary reason why the French Revolution became the standard model of revolutions rather than the US model. Because there were very few circumstances where the US model actually was a viable alternative to the French model.
Citizen Alan
“If Democrats had turned out in 2010 we wouldn’t be having near this many problems.”
Well, I voted in 2010 for all the good it did me in my ruby-red state. Honestly, I think a lot of this sentiment is borne of a desire to have someone to blame. Dem turnout in 2010 was, IIRC, perfectly consistent with past mid-term turnout. NO ONE on the left in 2010 anticipate that white seniors would go stark raving mad as a result of Obama winning and would vote in unprecedented numbers for reactionary ignorant fascists. Yes, we’ll be paying for that inability to foresee the future for years to come, but this reflexive need to bash fellow Dems over 2010 is not really productive, IMO.
Suffern ACE
@Keith G: Yep. They gave a hint of what they will do in VA, OH and PA unless we get those governors out of office and replace them with Dems. There’s only so long you can win the popular vote and lose the election and then keep asking voters to turn out for you.
Skippy-san
If the reign of terror ever does come to pass-I nominate Paul Ryan as the first to the guillotine.
Joseph Nobles
Look, I’m not saying I endorse what Robespierre did, but I understand.
/ChrisRock
Scott S.
@Shanna Carson: Fuck you, jackass.
Joseph Nobles
@Shanna Carson: If only we had a way to determine what “essential spending” means – say, a body of representatives given the authority to collect taxes and provide for the general welfare of the United States.
ranchandsyrup
@Shanna Carson: Your comment reminds me of Ginny Thomas calling up Anita Hill and asking her whether she’s ready to apologize.
Ted & Hellen
So…I’ll ask: What is Obama doing to be certain the weight of the cuts fall hardest and most viciously upon red states and districts?
Is he too going to go scorched earth and make Republican voters and officials suffer the most?
Or is he going to spread the pain evenly because “I am not a dictator?”
Which, by the way, sounds awfully whiny.
God, this country’s government sucks.
Southern Beale
@gene108:
Oh I dunno, if they unseat Mitch McConnell or if some prominent House CongressMonsters get sent packing, it’s too early to tell at this point, whichever ones the “insiders” say are crucial for the GOP before election day. You know how this goes, anything that goes against the “conventional wisdom” about this stuff.
geg6
@Shanna Carson:
Please define “essential”.
Davis X. Machina
Torches we can still do.
Tumbrels, though, are a problem.
And the last domestic manufacturer of pitchforks, Ames/True Value, closed its West Virginia plant in 2005.
MCA1
@Southern Beale: Right on. And it’s slowly, achingly, starting to happen (witness the recent VAWA action and the comments from Rep. Dent of PA re: the underlying politics). There’s a larger, Congressional purpose to the President’s intentional and continuing demagoguing about general Republican intransigence, oftentimes inflamed by the President’s trolling efforts. The idea is to turn the part of the public that can be turned against do-nothing, party of no obstructionist Republicans to such a degree that they become more vulnerable from the left than the right.
That said, I tend to agree also with the longer term view that we’re in the midst of a slow-motion psychotic break for a large portion of the public, and a significant longterm shift in cultural and national identity. This ugliness, while it might be overcome electorally through some savvy moves, is not going to go away if it’s temporarily shoved to the back of the room.
Jay in Oregon
@dance around in your bones:
There’s always this: http://theon1on.com/
Regnad Kcin
@General Stuck: Wingnuts, The Gathering?
SFAW
@geg6:
From the Rethug/troll lexicon:
essential spending = money spent on stuff for me, my friends/family, and assorted rich people, but NO blahs or browns or Lie-berals
OzoneR
@Southern Beale:
You had NY-23 in 2009, NY-27 in 2011, Indiana-Senate, Missouri-Senate, just to name a few, where Republicans threw key races to Democrats over the Tea Party. I’m not sure what else could happen, especially with how they drew the lines.
The Senate isnt in Republican hands only because of Republicans.
OzoneR
@eemom:
What I find is that these are the people who have been taught to hate liberals and discover that they hate conservatives more and are liberals, but still programmed to hate them.
evodevo
@Stooleo: They are already whining …. href=”http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2013/2/25/92351/8503″>
OzoneR
@Ted & Hellen:
He doesn’t have to do anything, they already will feel the pain more.
And they’ll blame Obama for it.
Or did you think people who have repeatedly voted Republican were suddenly going to change their mind and vote Democrat because their precious money got taken away by the government run by the black dude?
People in these districts are going to respond to the pain the way Fox News tells them to.
FlipYrWhig
@Shanna Carson:
I hate this stupid rhetorical flourish with a bloody, teeth-gnashing passion. Your children don’t have to make the national debt zero at all, and especially not while they’re still pretty wittle baybeez.
Baud
@OzoneR:
I don’t know, actually. Part of the joy of being a Republican voter is the low-risk aspect of it. If the Democrats control the government, the economy will grow, people will have jobs, and everyone will benefit. There is almost no downside risk. Now that the Republican house has become more ideological, it will be interesting to see whether their voters have the constitution to keep up the fight. We’ll see, I guess.
ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@FlipYrWhig:
Or if they had been old enough to vote in the 2000 election and pulled the lever for Gore, et. al., rather than Bush and his GOP friends, we could have kept the Clinton era tax rates that were generating a net surplus, and goodbye burdensome debt! Yet for some reason the debt is only a burden when a Dem is in charge, and worse yet, when a Dem in charge actually does pay down the debt, that is suddenly a problem in need of a solution.
Omnes Omnibus
@Davis X. Machina: I think any kind of cart or small trailer should work.
FlipYrWhig
@ThatLeftTurnInABQ: For conservatives, “debt” means “free stuff for mud people.” For moderate technocrats, it means its actual definition, but it still bothers them roughly as much.
Calouste
@NonyNony:
Indeed. The American Revolution was a fight between two factions of the ruling class, more along the lines of the War of the Roses than the French and Russian Revolutions.
FlipYrWhig
@Calouste: Also, while I’m not a monarchist or anything, I’ve never thought that the grounds for a revolutionary break from Britain seemed all that compelling. The rage of the French Revolution is much more righteous to me. YMMV.
Darkrose
@Anoniminous: I was a drama major in college. Even though I was a techie, we needed at least two units of acting credit to graduate. One of the MFA directing students was doing Marat/Sade as his thesis project, so I auditioned.
I was extremely disappointed my acting was so bad that I couldn’t even get cast as a crazy person when I didn’t have to do much more than be myself.
Mnemosyne
@Shanna Carson:
“Essential” is in the eye of the beholder. Is it “essential” that we keep 100,000 troops in Afghanistan? Is it “essential” that we have a missile defense system to fight off the Soviet Union? Is it “essential” that we update weapons systems that the Army doesn’t want updated?
Give us your list of “essentials” and then we can talk them over. But that’s always the problem with Republicans — you complain about spending too much money on things that aren’t “essential,” but you can never seem to name the things you want cut. Are bridges on your essential list? Roads? Schools? Hospitals? Police? Fire departments? You sure as hell aren’t acting as though they’re essentials, or at least not as essential as propping up defense contractors.
Darkrose
@FlipYrWhig: The American Revolution always brings to mind the quote from Samuel Johnson: “How is it that we hear the loudest yelps for liberty among the drivers of negroes?” (I’m looking at you, Thomas Jefferson.)
FlipYrWhig
@Darkrose: Yeah, I enjoy that quotation too… just taught a Johnson essay today in fact (but not that one).
lojasmo
@Ted & Hellen:
Cut and paste in THREE FUCKING THREADS?
Drink bleach.
amk
@Shanna Carson: Did your paymasters define what is essential? Go back and ask them.
mclaren
The Robespierre reference represents an uncharacteristic unforced error for you, Doug. Remember that Robespierre ended up the victim of his own Grand Terror, guillotined by his own people.
Democrats who tried to use violence would doubtless end up the same way.
Violence doesn’t end these kinds of ideological struggles effectively. As witness the Civil War, which defeated the South militarily but argued created the origins of the toxic political deadlock we’re experiencing today.
The Republicans need to get so comprehensively discredited that their audience drifts away and disappears. We’ll have won when Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh no longer have an audience.
mclaren
@Mnemosyne:
More to the point–
Which is more essential: spending $86,000 on four canine tactical suits for SEAL dogs, or spending that $86,000 on keeping the streetlights in our cities turned on and keeping the busses running?
If you want to talk about “nonessential government spending,” we can pretty much zero out the 1.2 trillion dollars per year of wasted pointless American military and national-security spending that gets pissed away on useless garbage like recording every phone call of every American citizen and intercepting and storing every email of every U.S. citizen… Which proves useful only for outing the head of the CIA for screwing a civilian woman in an adulterous affair, apparently.
1.2 trillion dollars per year is real money. Stop wasting that Himalayan mountain of cash on crap like titanium teeth for SEAL dogs, and you could really do something to improve this country…
mclaren
@amk:
“Shanna Carson” is most likely a private first class employed in the Psyops Unit in some D.C. military intelligence division of the Pentagon. And since the pay of active military personnel is shielded from the sequester, guess what? We’re gonna have to deal with pfc “Shanna Carson”‘s online disinformation for a long, looooooong time.
Omnes Omnibus
@mclaren: Shanna Carson is much more likely to be an intern at some right wing policy shop.
mclaren
@Omnes Omnibus:
Either way, most likely not an earnest well-meaning soccer mom as she’d like us to believe.
MeDrewNotYou
@Omnes Omnibus: Just check out the ‘blog’ her nym links to.
Omnes Omnibus
@MeDrewNotYou: Oh dear lord. mclaren and I were both wrong. She’s a self-help life coach.
jrg
@Shanna Carson: I’d find that a lot more compelling if I expected to hear it the next time a Republican decides to spend a few trillion invading Equatorial Guinea to look for magical gummy bears.
As it stands, there’s only one show in town for people who understand you have to pay for shit… But it’s pretty clear about half this country wants to bitch about “entitlements” without taking any responsibility for cutting medicare, medicaid, social security or defense. Get your head out of your ass.
Cygil
@jrg: I see the Freepers are concerned enough to send their comment trollers out again. Usually this only hapens at election time.
TenguPhule
Improved.
TenguPhule
Not gonna happen. Their base LOVES the toxic hate and would begin a brownshirt purge the instant they thought they could get away with it.
So you only plan to win once humanity goes extinct?