The breathlessly awaited Saturday meeting of House GOP caucus is over, and we now know what these feral children want in exchange for not blowing up the American economy:
The federal government on Saturday barreled toward its first shutdown in 17 years after House Republicans, choosing a hard line, demanded a one-year delay of President Obama’s health care law and the repeal of a tax to pay for the law before approving any funds to keep the government running.
In all the talk about defunding or delaying Obamacare, there’s one thing that hasn’t been discussed much, certainly not by the Village. That would be what delaying Obamacare would actually mean in the real world.
There, we’re looking at dead Americans, needlessly and avoidably cut down before their time.
Here’s the train of thought behind that claim:
The primary goal of the health care reform is to cover as many Americans who lack insurance as possible. As of this year, that is in the neighborhood of 48 million people — roughly 15% of the total US population. Under the terms of the ACA, that number will be cut by 14 million next year, with more to come as the law persists. That’s still well short of the goal for a civilized society, in my view, but 14 million people with access to health care is a real and important social and ethical good (not to mention an economic plus, in many analyses).
Those 14 million people — 14 million individual human beings with hopes and aspirations and real desires to avoid pain, misery and worse — are the primary victims of the morally bankrupt cabal that calls itself the House Republican caucus. If they were to get their way and either fund the government or commit to allow the Treasury to continue to meet obligations already undertaken only on condition that those 14 million must once again go without health care coverage then the suffering that follows is on their heads.
In that context, it’s important to note that this means that the House GOP caucus will thus almost certainly be guilty of causing some significant number of unecessary, premature deaths. The study of the connection between mortality and health insurance status is somewhat complicated, and a couple of very well publicized studies recently [PDF] have suggested that there isn’t any correlation and/or that Medicaid coverage in particular makes things worse. Those studies and even more, the trumpeting by such deep thinkers as our old friend, Megan McArdle, have in their turn been strongly criticized, to put it mildly, and they are outliers against a background of some decades of work that show real and deadly links between whether or not you are covered and whether or not you die.
To put this all in a nutshell, take a look at the good recent-ish summary of the state of play of the uninsurance-death argument comes from Dr. David Gorski writing in the Science Based Medicine blog. The key point:
analysis of survey data from patients who were uninsured but then became old enough to be enrolled in Medicare suggests that “acquisition of Medicare coverage was associated with improved trends in self-reported health for previously uninsured adults, particularly those with cardiovascular disease or diabetes.” In summary, there is a large and robust body of evidence suggesting that people do, in fact, die because of lack of health insurance.
…
J. Michael McWilliams, MD, PhD, Assistant Professor of Health Care Policy and Medicine at Harvard Medical School and an associate physician in the Division of General Medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital … speculates:
How many lives would universal coverage save each year? A rigorous body of research tells us the answer is many, probably thousands if not tens of thousands. Short of the perfect study, however, we will never know the exact number.
In other words, it’s hard given our current state of knowledge to point to John Doe over there, and say that lack of coverage killed him. The Republican House doesn’t have to worry about answering a bill of indictment charging them in Mr. Doe’s murder. But next year, were the House Republican branch of the Bolshevik party to succeed in delaying (or killing) health care reform, the some significant number of uninsured Does and Roes will die. My truly primitive back of envelope calculation yields an estimate of the number to be sacrificed to meet Republican Congressional priorities in the single digit thousands. Let’s just say the death toll would be on the scale of a couple of 9-11s.
The men who flew planes into the towers were terrorists.
What, then, should we call the House Republican Caucus, and their Ted Cruz-led Senate colleagues?
As our Roman friends would have said: “res ipsa loquitur.”
One more thing: Factio Grandaeva Delenda Est.
Image: Josse Liefernixe, St. Sebastian interceding for the plague-stricken, 1497-1499.
Villago Delenda Est
Wipe them out. All of them.
Davis X. Machina
Freedom™ isn’t free™. Show me a revolution without martyrs.
(Freedom™, and free™, are registered trademarks of the Republican National Committee. Used with permission. All rights reserved.)
Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader
Any chance Republicans will go for a large plate of oreo’s with the frosting removed?
Chickamin Slam
The Republican Party claims to be “pro-life” but is anything but. We here know this but the mainstream media won’t call them out on it. If they were really pro-life they’d be all over everyone having access to health care. They are thus, pro-death, and that should be branded onto their foreheads for all to see.
PsiFighter37
@Davis X. Machina:
Davis X. Machina
@PsiFighter37: Some of the GOP reps and senators are going through the motions, but not the voters who put them there. These people really think that they’re playing for stakes that high. That they’re standing at Armageddon, and they’re doing battle for the Lord, to quote Teddy Roosevelt.
Villago Delenda Est
@Davis X. Machina:
White supremacist America is going down the toilet. They think they have nothing to lose at this point, so they’re willing to destroy everything.
piratedan
@Davis X. Machina: and who put them there? the likes of Limbaugh, Robertson, Coulter, Malkin and histrionic asshats like Bachmann, West, Gellar etc there’s a deep bench of derp playing for the other team that absolutely believes that unless they’re handed the reins immediately, it’ll be Armageddon for us all, never mind the caveat that if the country is to be saved, it’s ONLY being saved for them.
SatanicPanic
has anyone pointed out the silliness of loudly claiming Obamacare is the most EVIL THING EVER and then being satisfied with only a year delay?
gnomedad
Help, please?
srv
These legislators are simply representing the will of their taxpayers.
If you want to wipe them out, you’re going to have to focus on something more than just a political party.
Maybe if liberals didn’t spend all their time on the internet, we wouldn’t have such divisive cultural issues.
PsiFighter37
@SatanicPanic: Why would the GOP want to stop a law if it is going to be so bad? Wouldn’t that help them politically?
Of course, these are the kinds of questions and logical step progressions that are too complicated for Fucking Chuckie and his lazy buddies in the MSM to be bothered with.
Villago Delenda Est
@gnomedad:
I had a post up that explained that, but when I revised it, it got tossed into the spam pile, for some inexplicable reason. Probably too many “delenda est“s in it, and WP though this must have something to do with male members, or gaming with real money, or female mammary augmentation.
Villago Delenda Est
@srv:
I don’t bother to listen to stupid people. You are skirting very near that territory.
Aimai
Lets be clear–they prefer abortion to infanticide with respect to the aca because after it is born millions of people will have a proprietary interest in keeping it alive. They have nothing else to to but tear down the ancestral house for fear that their fellow citizens will take up residence in it and try to tske care of it.
Patrick
@SatanicPanic:
Of course. The media has done a great job in pointing this hypocrisy out, especially Chuck Todd on MSNBC.
Yes, I am kidding…
And yes, Benghazi!
WereBear
Boy, these Libertarian pundits sure loves them some contrarian thinking.
Having health care has no effect on your health.
Nobody really wants money.
Down is UP when you look at it right.
gogol's wife
@gnomedad:
I’ll try. Some Roman orator (Cicero?) used to end every speech with the phrase, “Carthage must be destroyed [Carthago delenda est].” I googled the phrase above and found that it is a new coinage meaning, “The Republican Party must be destroyed.” (I think the post I found was also by Tom, but I didn’t stick around to find out.) Our own Villago delenda est is a similar reference — “The Village must be destroyed.”
El Cid
You can’t make an omelet without bankrupting a bunch of families whose kids get cancer.
srv
One day, much like Civil War re-enactments, people will dress up as Paul, Boehner and Cruz to celebrate their historical place in health care.
dmsilev
I’ll just leave this here:
Fuckers.
Anoniminous
2009 study from Harvard estimated 45,000 Americans die each year from lack of medical care due to lack of medical insurance.
Or about 5 people an hour.
Or one person every 20 minutes.
Guess the Tree of Liberty is watered with other people’s blood.
gogol's wife
@dmsilev:
Nauseating.
PsiFighter37
@dmsilev: That’s just infuriating. I don’t say that just as a New Yorker (and a 10th grader who very well remembers that high school day in 2001 when I lived in the NYC suburbs) – that’s just insensitive and really distills what the GOP is about – everything is abstract and a game to them.
Chris
@Villago Delenda Est:
Interesting how the white supremacist backlash seems to have been getting more furious, irrational, and willing to burn everything down the farther we move from the civil rights revolution, rather than less.
dmsilev
@PsiFighter37: It is, isn’t it. I’d contribute to a fund to bring a family member of someone who died on that flight to DC so they could stick a knee in that Congressman.
piratedan
@dmsilev: because delaying a health care mandate, designed to bring escalating health care costs out of control, while at the same time allowing the country to default on its debts is just like attempting to seize control of a plane from terrorists….
good to know that they think that they’re heroes…
FlipYrWhig
@dmsilev: Culberson is one of the Republican party’s many Boss-Hogg-lookin’ motherfuckers. He was on Chris Matthews yesterday grinning and lying and repeating a string of talking points at least as long as his small intestine.
Scott S.
Wouldn’t take much more than a couple hatchets buried in skulls to get ’em to realize they’ve got scarier stuff to deal with than a few impotent teabaggers.
piratedan
I keep waiting for the GOP to have their Lee J Cobb moment from 12 Angry Men but it seems clearer to me that these fuckers are simply irredeemable.
Davis X. Machina
@piratedan:
The alternative — that they’ve arrived here on this planet more or less at random, for no detectable purpose, for a few score years, and those mostly given over to getting and gaining, known to and cared about by fewer people than fill a mid-sized airliner — is too horrible to contemplate.
Thus the need to belong to some grand crusade.
Most of our politics will eventually be replaced by better psychotherapy.
Jennifer
@PsiFighter37: Yes, because voting to keep other people from getting health care is JUST AS HEROIC as fighting a bunch of armed terrorists, knowing you’re going to die in the process.
I think it’s way past time for me to start up that guillotine manufacturing company I’ve been thinking about.
SiubhanDuinne
@srv:
Kids used to play “Cowboys and Indians” and “Cops and Robbers.” In the future, perhaps they’ll play “Democrats and Rethugs.”
(“NO! You were Nancy Smash last time! it’s my turn!!” “Okay, but let’s make your little brother be Ted Cruz and make him talk until tomorrow and not even go tinkle!”)
PhoenixRising
@FlipYrWhig: @dmsilev:
I will personally contribute $10 to that fund. Alice Hoaglund, whose son Mark Bingham was a pivotal member of the first gay rugby league I ever played in, should definitely get her expenses for a trip to knee that little weasel in the groin.
Or we can invite her to join on the Subaru-conveyed throat-punching tour.
Violet
Alan Grayson had it right in 2009:
NotMax
One could make the same claim for every Congress since, say, Harry Truman proposed universal health care.
Chris
@Davis X. Machina:
This.
I’ve long thought that teabaggers’ willingness to believe the most ridiculous conspiracy theories and determination to treat every political battle like a hill worth dying on comes in no small part from the fact that… it makes them feel like they matter. In their own heads, they’re the champions bravely fighting one last heroic grand stand against the forces of Satan that’ve engulfed the rest of the world and are now trying to wipe out the last godly people in it – them! Because that’s so much more interesting – and easier on the ego – than their real lives, any way you look at them.
mai naem
When I was young and dumb, I worked at this business where we had this manufacturer’s rep who used to come in. He was probably in his forties. He had a severely disabled child and he himself had some preexisting stuff. He was good at his job but you could tell he didn’t lurv his job. Anyhow, what I remember about his was when COBRA passed, he quit his job. Why? Because it finally gave him the option to switch jobs and go with the job he really wanted, and make a better living to boot. He had the money to pay for his insurance for a few months before his next job’s insurance kicked in. We still used to get him coming in, except he was working for another company and OMG he was so much happier. I swear the GOP doesn’t like anybody being happy like that, unless they are rich mofos. I think a small part of this anti-soshulist healthcare is that big companies hang onto very good employees who can’t get decent health insurance on their own. Employees who could be making very good money working on their own.
WereBear
Sometimes, it helps to know that Republican politicians are so often revealed to be leading a secret life of great debauchery, rabid denial, stark dysfunction, and seemingly unending misery.
Or, we can just look at the way they treat others. They truly don’t care if children die so they can keep their cushy jobs.
That is messed up.
Ben Franklin
@Davis X. Machina:
Actually, let’s all wait for the green eggs and ham cuisine arrives for the taste test. Hopefully, a wise perspective has examined NHS and will navigate the shoals to avoid shipwreck.
Violet
@mai naem: Health insurance freedom is going to change how America works. Lots more entrepreneurship because that pre-existing condition or your kid’s health problems won’t keep you chained to a corporate job with health insurance. I think it’s going to be an engine for the economy.
SiubhanDuinne
I know this is off topic, and I know I’m the last person in the world to be making a football comment, but HOLY FUCK, is anyone watching this UGA-LSU game?
SatanicPanic
@Patrick: You had me going for a second there.
Sly
@srv:
Would you like us more if we took a page from you and made common cause with white nationalists?
Chris
@mai naem:
Oh for sure. It’s all about control, not money. That was the glory of the Gilded Age; you didn’t have a safety net, even though one was desperately needed, so whoever had enough resources to provide the necessities of life was all-powerful.
Like your employer: “Want money? Enough of it to feed your family? Then you’ll work as hard as I want, as many hours as I want, and I don’t want to hear you complaining about working conditions, or any of this nonsense about unionization! Do everything I tell you, then maybe you’ll have enough to eat.”
Or the local machine politician: “What, you need job relief and no one’s hiring? Sure, we can totally help with that. But you and all your friends better vote Tammany in the next election! If this district goes to someone else, it’ll be the last help you ever get from us!”
Or the church: “Charity? Oh, well that’s what we’re here for, isn’t it. But I’d better damn well see you in the pews every Sunday, and if I ever catch you disobeying the moral code of this church, it’s over for you and your family!”
Or the mob: “Some day, and that day may never come, I will call upon you to do a service for me. But until that day, consider this charity a gift on my daughter’s wedding day.”
All those parasites lost big when the New Deal took all the things that they used to be able to dole out on a whim (and withhold if you didn’t do exactly what they wanted) and made them available to everyone as a right, not as charity. Health care, as it happens, is one of the last tools of control that the feds never quite managed to wrest from them during the 20th century, so it makes sense that they’d be fighting so furiously to keep control of it.
e.a.f.
If “obamacare” is so bad, then why do they want to delay it for onlyone year. You’d think they would want it scraped right now. It either is dangerous or not.
Of course those countries with government funded medical systems are doing quite well thank you. Women receive prenatal care, babies get care, children get to see doctors and receive care. Fathers get care. Grandparents live longer and are there for their families. People who work and have good medical care are more productive at work.
There is something very sick about a group of politicians who don’t want children to have adequate health care, unless their parents can afford it. If government sponsored medical care is so bad, why do countries that have it, have lower mortality rates for babies, than the U.S.A. Yes, that is correct the U.S.A. has a higher mortallity rate for babies than a lot of other countries. So much for the richest country on earth. it is actually full of paupers, either financial or moral.
Sly
@e.a.f.:
In Republican fantasyland where gun-toting unicorns frolic with dinosaur-riding Supply Side Jesus, delaying it for one year gives them a better chance to repeal it in January of 2015 when they’re TOTALLY gonna get veto-proof majorities in the House and Senate.
geg6
@SiubhanDuinne:
Ed Kilgore is freaking out. He said he was going, so I’ll bet he gets trashed tonight. He loves UGA.
Tom Levenson
@gogol’s wife: Yeah, that was me. I got help from the Latin-savvy commentariat to come up w. Factio Grandaeva for Grand Old Party, and the rest is a crib from Cato (not Cicero).
RaflW
My goodness, Tom, you scoundrel. It is outrageous to make a claim like yours. Republicans are not at fault.
Lazy, sick Americans who refuse to bootstrap themselves some wonderful private insurance are 100% culpable, and GOP pols are morally angelic.
Villago Delenda Est
@dmsilev:
The “let’s roll” sounded better in the original Arabic.
srv
@Sly: Well, y’all are already quoting Darth Sidious. Who’s Godwin in the Star Wars saga?
scav
@RaflW: If you’re not born with self-levitating bootstraps at 3,000 feet, it’s just proof that Free-Market Jebus needs your blood for Liberty Gardening.
SiubhanDuinne
@geg6: Well, then, he is a happy man. But i’ll bet his blood pressure spiked and dipped like a roller coaster during that fourth quarter.
(I absolutely cannot believe that at age 71 I just might be starting to get slightly interested in football. Jeez. First baseball, then hockey, now handegg. I was raised to scorn all sports. My grandmother would disapprove.)
TAPX486
For 200+ years the way the system worked was you win the election, control both ends of Pennsylvania Ave and you get to pass your agenda. If the tea party doesn’t like Obamacare, then win the Senate in 2014, and the White House in 2016 At 12:01PM on Jan 20, 2017 then can repeal every law passed since Jan. 1, 1800 since they obviously are more comfortable living in the 18th century
Villago Delenda Est
@TAPX486:
Actually, most of them would be more comfortable living in the 12th century. Michelle Bachmann, after all, said that The Renaissance was “a mistake”.
TAPX486
@Villago Delenda Est: LOL.
WereBear
And yet they manage to drive cars, take antibiotics, opt for anesthesia, use cellular telephones…
RepubAnon
@Chickamin Slam: Uninsured people tend to be poor (or soon become so if they require medical care). Thus, they are probably Democrats – which may help explain why the Republicans want to see them die (and thus be removed from the voting rolls).
Davis X. Machina
@TAPX486:
That was the American government. Which you can’t have if Democrats control one or more of the branches. Because who ever heard of an American government not composed of Americans? Or composed of not-Americans?
The Tea Party, remember, didn’t ride into action shouting “Throw the bums out!”. That’s as old as time. They were more like “Take our country back!” And that means there’s got to be someone, or something that’s not our country, to take it back from.
That’s what’s new.
There are no rules when you’re fighting a war of national liberation. Certainly there are no binding norms of merely parliamentary government.
Mr Stagger Lee
@SiubhanDuinne: Is Raven there? The Republicans are beyond wickedness, they are into chaotic anarchy, is there a word that describe a state beyond psychopath?
PsiFighter37
@efgoldman: So was the hotel a mistake in and of itself, or did something that happened there was a mistake? Inquiring minds want to take this conversation into innuendo heaven.
SiubhanDuinne
@Villago Delenda Est: I never could figure that out. Her point seemed to be that the Renaissance led inexorably to the Age of Enlightenment, which is a Bad Thing because it gave us, oh, I dunno, the FUCKING CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES among other things. Right?
Chris
@SiubhanDuinne:
But the Constitution is a Christian document, and Christianity is older than the Renaissance. QED.
scav
OT query. Not being sports oriented, could this be an interesting example of them continuing to eat their own or business as usual? Analyst Craig James accuses Fox Sports of discrimination
Davis X. Machina
@scav: I don’t know about Fox. They might have been thinking he was something of a moderate. He’d been rejected by the Republican primary voters of Texas. So he might just not be bigoted, mean and crazy enough.
SiubhanDuinne
@Mr Stagger Lee:
I would have though sociopath, but on looking the two words up on Mr. Googlemachine, I do think psychopath is slightly beyond sociopath. But IANATT.
Dunno if he went to the game. I seem to recall that he mentioned in a morning thread that he passed by the tailgate entrance and people/vehicles were already lined up around dawn, well before the gates opened.
raven
HOW BOUT THEM DAGS BITCHES!
Cassidy
Know where your supply caches are. Try not to get eaten.
SiubhanDuinne
@Mr Stagger Lee:
@raven:
@SiubhanDuinne:
Oops there he is!!
Davis X. Machina
@SiubhanDuinne:
Beyond, I don’t know. There is a word for a state south and to the west of psychopath, though — Oklahoma.
PsiFighter37
@efgoldman: I feel like most sports players are this way (except for basketball, where pretty much every big-name NBA player was maxing out for Obama and hosting fundraisers for him). It’s kind of strange in the 4 major sports in particular – these assholes are all union members, and if they weren’t they wouldn’t get paid shit to play children’s games for a living. That probably gets lost on them, though.
Villago Delenda Est
@SiubhanDuinne:
You’re under the obviously mistaken impression that a bunch of guys in suits and powdered wigs got together in Philadelphia and wrote the Constitution, when in fact it was carried down from Mt. Sinai on stone tablets by Jesus himself.
That Madison guy, he just made up the entire story of how these effete snobs in Philly wrote, wrangled, and compromised to come up with it, when it was very clearly dictated by the Almighty himself.
raven
@SiubhanDuinne: I am totally exhausted, it was wonderful!!
tybee
did UGA change their name?
SiubhanDuinne
@Chris:
We, the Christian people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Christian union, establish Christian justice, ensure domestic Christian tranquillity, provide for the common Christian defense, promote the general Christian welfare, and secure the blessings of Christian liberty on our Christian selves and our Christian posterity, do christianly ordain and establish this Christian constitution of the United Christian States of Christian America.
raven
@efgoldman: Not tonight, there is no way you ruin this. Ten years ago the last conversation I had with my dad before he died was after we lost to LSU. If he had lived for this the prevent defense we ran at 4th and 22 would have killed him.
JPL
So the repubs have also taken out the section covering contraception cuz we can be barefoot and pregnant..
what is next..
Villago Delenda Est
@SiubhanDuinne:
First bureau established under said Constitution: the Department of Redundancy Department.
Baud
@raven:
Congrats. Quite a win.
TAPX486
Good news. The GOP is going to add the Vitner amendment to the next version of the CR. Does that mean we all get to see Dave’s little black book of naughty ladies???
This would embarrass even the government of the Ducky of Fenwick (with apologies to Peter sellers).
Villago Delenda Est
@JPL:
Taxpayer subsidized boner pills for all GOP congresscritters.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
they can’t help themselves, thank the FSM
JPL
@SiubhanDuinne: At least during the Renaissance they had interesting artwork to accompany their theory.
Villago Delenda Est
@efgoldman:
Those are the people who actually live the stereotype of the lazy, entitled government worker. They don’t represent the majority of them, but they are the ones who actually live the stereotype.
JPL
@Villago Delenda Est: we already do that.. just sayin.. so it’s not next.
Mnemosyne (iPhone)
Babysitting tweens is not terribly exciting for any of us. My niece (13) is programming her own video game based on her favorite book series (apparently “Warrior Cats” is the hot new thing), my nephew (10) is playing Angry Birds, and I’m on my iPhone.
? Martin
Determination for what is ‘critical’ and what isn’t is entirely up to Obama. I’m not sure Congress is aware of that.
He could send border patrol home. He could send Customs home – effectively shutting down all of the nation’s ports. The administration determines what is and isn’t critical – not Congress.
raven
@tybee: God, I’m so keyed up I didn’t even see that!
Villago Delenda Est
@Jim, Foolish Literalist:
“If any of my employees use contraception, it’s a violation of my religious freedom.”
These people need extended sessions with clue by fours.
PsiFighter37
@efgoldman: If most congresspeople were poor, I’d support removing their salaries and healthcare as soon as the government shut down. Unfortunately, most of them are filthy rich and probably don’t care. I don’t think there are enough truly poor/middle class politicians in Congress to have much of an impact.
@TAPX486: God, they are really stupid. I guess painting a target on their backs wasn’t enough; they needed to add a GPS so that they can easily be marked for a drone strike.
These fools are so easy to predict; they figure that they might as well load up on the crazy while they can. That’s the easiest fucking way for this whole charade to backfire on them.
dmsilev
Oy vey.
(CNN). Wonder how the ‘Wimmin are icky’ Act of 2013 will do in the Senate.
Baud
@dmsilev:
And it still won’t pass.
SiubhanDuinne
@Villago Delenda Est:
Division of Repetitive Tautology. Not to be confused with Bureau of Tautological Repetitiveness. That’s down the hall.
Chris
@efgoldman:
In my experience, Government-Sponsored-Glibertarians tend to believe that they are the truly vital and necessary workers keeping the government running, and that all their colleagues are the inefficient dead weight that needs to be cut. They won’t appreciate having their paycheck cut, but they’ll blame Obama and liberals for allowing the government to get so bloated with useless, inefficient bureaucrats that the conservatives were forced, forced I tell you, to take drastic measures. Besides, a better way of trimming the fat could probably have been reached if only Obama hadn’t been so darned unreasonable, but you just know he drove the conservatives to it.
PsiFighter37
@dmsilev: Apparently the Republicans decided that losing outright wasn’t good enough; they have to make it easier for themselves to get humiliated in the court of public opinion first.
Good. Please proceed, asshats.
dmsilev
@Baud: That’s sort of what I’m thinking too. The only reason to toss a clause like that in at the last minute is because the leadership is afraid of losing even this vote and thinks they need a sweetener. I wonder; if the House votes against, will Boehner commit seppuku live on CSPAN?
Keith G
O-H
Ash Can
@scav: LOL — I love his “I’m being oppressed because I can’t be shitty to people” whining. I’ll bet his attorney is salivating — an (I’m assuming) affluent moron who doesn’t have a prayer of getting anywhere with his complaints, but is going to try anyway to get a decision in his favor. Just sit back and watch the client fees roll in.
JPL
If I may brag, I listened to the house hearings for three minutes. My challenge is for someone to do the same. Now I’m taking a shower because I feel so dirty………..
dmsilev
@PsiFighter37: Right now, Obama is probably thinking something along the lines of what Voltaire once said: “I have never made but one prayer to God, a very short one: ‘O Lord make my enemies ridiculous.’ And God granted it.”
Davis X. Machina
@dmsilev: He needs guts for seppuku — and there’s little evidence to support their existence.
SiubhanDuinne
@? Martin:
Well, I would make a good Congressperson, then, because I Did Not Know That.
What an awesome superpower for POTUS to have! I hope he tosses on the cape, pulls up the tights, and does what needs to be done for Truth, Justice, and the American Way!
Long Tooth
“Here’s the train of thought behind that claim”.
No need to elaborate.
Once the terms and benefits of Obama Care are properly comprehended across the board, Americans will have lived to see a great light.
Which will happen.
To be sure, it will happen later rather than sooner. The delay will be attributable to the ‘rule or ruin’ mentality of today’s GOP.
But it will happen.
? Martin
Man, they really can’t give up on this idea that Obama the Dictator is also utterly weak and spineless, that only the GOP is man enough to destroy the country.
I mean, before they even have a chance to test Obama, they need to get this stuff through the Senate, and I don’t see that being an easy road. So long as Harry is willing to send back clean CRs, Obama can do or say pretty much anything he damn well pleases, attacking the GOP on primetime addresses. And other nations don’t need to preserve the bipartisan courtesy either. They can go full-guns at the GOP at every turn, because our shutdown, and definitely our debt limit carries huge global consequences.
These people really have lost their mind. This is not difficult to game out.
PsiFighter37
@JPL: Why would you ruin the end of what was (at least here in NYC) a gorgeous fall Saturday with garbage like that?
Probably was a bunch of white men railing at the Kenyan socialist living in ‘their’ house and salivating over more restriction on women’s health, amirite?
PF37 +1 Otter Creek Oktoberfest (this is amazing fall seasonal lager – if you’re in the NE, you can probably grab it somewhere…it’s from Vermont)
dmsilev
@JPL: I got about one minute in. African American Congresswoman talking about the moral imperative of keeping the government open, followed immediately by some oily white guy with a Southern accent explaining in full condescension mode that she didn’t understand what this bill was about.
Enough.
Santa Fe
Well, this is odd. I’m sitting here in Santa Fe wondering if I’ll be able to secure health insurance for myself (and my family) for the first time in 10 years on the New Mexico Health Insurance Exchange, which has a website ready to go with enrollment on Oct. 1. Planning on being one of the first ones in the door to apply, and hoping various dental and other ills stay manageable until Jan. 1 so we can juggle paying for health care and paying for college for our boys. And my biggest worry is Republicans derailing the legislation. I’m a middle class freelancer, and the GOP has lost me permanently. WTF?
SiubhanDuinne
@dmsilev:
Oplezeoplezeoplezeoplezeopleze
schrodinger's cat
BTW do we know how the default will affect the OTC derivatives market for currency and interest rates? With notional values of $60Trillion and $500 Trillion. For comparison, the notional value of the credit derivatives market which imploded in 2008 was $50 Trillion.
Baud
@dmsilev:
Seems more like C-Span 2 material.
JPL
@dmsilev: Actually I have to admit that GA has the looniest ones. Tom Graves preaching about personal responsibility is like Judas saying, I only did it cuz I loved you…
b
http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2013/09/28/gop-to-add-conscience-clause-to-spending-bill/
Washington (CNN) – House Republicans have added a measure aimed at limiting contraceptive coverage to the spending bill coming up for a vote Saturday night, a spokesman for Rep. Tim Huelskamp, R-Kansas, told CNN.
A senior House leadership aide confirmed that development.
And the war on women continues! What does this have to do with the budget and a CR?
PsiFighter37
@schrodinger’s cat: As someone who is quite familiar with this given my job – I don’t think it will have a huge impact right off. These markets are very liquid, and you’re not in a position that got banks in trouble last time around (i.e. they were selling off securitized products, or credit protection, and got caught naked when things went south).
There will be problems if credit freezes up again – namely, if banks stop lending. I don’t think that will happen…the main consequence will just be a shitload of volatility in the market and a huge hit to any asset valued in US dollars.
Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader
The kids have been asking me for years why I have so many guns. I told them zombies, always knowing that one day I’d have to explain the brain eating virus that afflicted approximately 27% of the population including beloved nana and papa. Liberalvines!
Baud
@Santa Fe:
My suggestion is to wait a few weeks to actually sign up. There will probably be bugs and glitches to work through in the early days. They won’t run out of insurance, so you’ll be OK.
gelfling545
@dmsilev: Some relative of a person who was on that plane should seek this man out & punch him in the mouth. Jesus, how appallingly ignorant & disrespectful of the victims.
PsiFighter37
@dmsilev: Probably similar to when Orange Julius came on TV last week and was like “That’s not how things work here.”
Honestly, to most white people in the sticks, they think talking down to people like this is okay. But anyone who has encountered real civilization cannot ignore the fact that the manner in which Obama gets spoken about / to by these bumblefuck white Teabaggers is incredibly disrespectful and (frankly) racist.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@gogol’s wife: Pretty much. It took me a minute to equate “old faction” with “Grand Old Party”. There might be a reference to chariot racing factions in there that I’m missing, being much more of a Nipponophile than Latinist.
schrodinger's cat
@PsiFighter37: But since we are in such uncharted territory do we really know what will happen?
Ash Can
@b:
Awesome. As if these clowns weren’t embarrassing themselves enough.
PsiFighter37
@schrodinger’s cat: From 2011, we have some idea of what will happen – which is that stocks will sell off, and paradoxically the dollar and Treasury market will rally.
But if we actually go through the ceiling, it’s anyone’s guess. It won’t end well, though. Kind of like when the first vote on TARP failed…and the stock market nearly hit the circuit breaker (which means trading stops if the broad stock index is down 10%).
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
Grats raven, that was a big win for Uga. Clearly all the defensive talent in the SEC has been drafted out, but both quarterbacks are great and if you guys get Gurley back I don’t see you having any issues winning the conference. Could win it without him. Can’t believe Cole didn’t put up a thread, the ‘eers pulled a shocker after last week’s debacle. I’m hoping for a miracle in a typhoon at the Clink tonight for my Cougs. Wonder if Yuts will raft his way over for that one.
MomSense
The Republicans are committing economic treason. Their behavior is cruel and irresponsible.
If we had a media worth a damn, the Republicans would receive nothing but scorn.
Not to make too big a deal about this but I have a pre-existing condition and ObamaCare is going to change my life.
MomSense +1 Arrogant Bastard – seemed appropriate to the times.
SiubhanDuinne
@JPL:
As Tom Levenson demonstrates pretty much every time he posts a thread. Pretentious Art Due, represent!!
SatanicPanic
@schrodinger’s cat: Is it possible the returns on TBills will go up? Since they’re “riskier” they might need to pay out more. Sucks for the US Gov (fiscal conservatism at work!) but maybe good for investors? I’m just spitballing, IANAIATS (I am not informed about this stuff)
Keith G
I-O
SiubhanDuinne
@SiubhanDuinne:
@JPL:
As Tom Levenson demonstrates pretty much every time he posts a thread. Pretentious Art Dude, represent!!
schrodinger's cat
@SatanicPanic: Certainly possible, since the interest rates are very low right now by historical standards.
raven
@Comrade Nimrod Humperdink: Good luck! Oh yea, it was THIRD and 23!
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
@raven: Thanks man, we’ll need it against those blasted Trees.
IowaOldLady
Do these fools actually think they’re doing something that might have an effect on reality? What waste of time.
SiubhanDuinne
@b:
Is the technology in place to do a kind of SNL liveblog of this? Because I would totes start watching again.
Davis X. Machina
@Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism: Factio was the term — always opprobrious — used in Republican Rome for what we would call a party. (You and your friends are just the boni, the good guys.) The Federalist Papers use ‘faction’ in the same sense. See, eg. “Party Politics in the Age of Caesar” by Lily Ross Taylor for the details.
SiubhanDuinne
@SiubhanDuinne:
Damn, it’s “Pretentious Art Douche,” isn’t it? Note to self: Do not rely on memory. You are bound to get it wrong.)
PsiFighter37
@efgoldman: It never hit the circuit breaker during the crisis. There were days it got real close, but it never happened.
@SatanicPanic: If people decide that Treasuries are not as safe as they used to be, people will sell them. The price of the bonds will go down, but that means whoever buys them at the lower levels will receive a higher yield.
It’s not good either way, because ultimately the main thing is that the US dollar will be worth less than it was in the past. So you might be earning more on your returns in dollars, but take your dollars to the international markets and it could very well be worth a lot less than it used to be.
scav
Wonder how far back they’ll repeal citizenship for the wrong kind of immigrants?
PsiFighter37
@SiubhanDuinne: I would start watching SNL again if they had any decent writing. Outside of the election stuff, they have been incredibly bad. I used to watch every Saturday night in high school, back when Will Ferrell, Jimmy Fallon, Tina Fey, and Molly Shannon were the main stars (I think Amy Poehler was on then as well). It’s a shadow of that now (and obviously of what it used to be in its heyday).
Mr Stagger Lee
@raven: @raven: Looked like Mark Richt was ready to cry after that game, I guess a cry of relief. @MomSense: I think the same psychopathy that has affected the GOP is prevalent in the corporate media, the guys who decide what stories go on air or print, don’t give a dilly ding dong what happens to this country. To them if this burns the nation down, they are for it.
SatanicPanic
@PsiFighter37: Well, at least the inlaws will get to come visit for cheap. I’m trying to look on the bright side
+ not enough
Keith G
@MomSense:
Well…actually…as reprehensible as it is, their behavior is rational and predictable.
Remember, after 4 Nov 2008, a whole bunch of folks were writing off the GOP as a marginal party that had just been kicked to the sidelines. They decided not to follow the script. Their wretched behavior has had some notable success. For example, the “sequester budget” is essentially the baseline budget for future budget negotiations. And they seem to be betting that they can wring a few more concessions with the current game of chicken.
raven
@Mr Stagger Lee: He did cry. This was very emotional for him and the team. I assume you know that he had to kick Mettenberger off the team and Mett’s mom works for the football office? Murray has also gotten a bad wrap for this “can’t win the big one” bullshit so it was real vindication for everyone. I’m not crazy about Richt’s Christian deal but I can tell you he lives is. He’s adopted a couple of kids, one with a sever disability. I’ve run into him a couple of times and never mentioned football and he’s always been as nice as he could be. I didn’t cry but I was pretty emotional myself.
eta Richt also was the first one to hug Mett after the game.
Baud
@PsiFighter37:
It’s so strange. Usually, financial safety is grounded in economics. Here, it’s nothing more than political grandstanding that will eventually end. How do you price the risk if you’re the market?
schrodinger's cat
From TPM
GOP, Sociopaths are Us.
raven
@efgoldman: Belushi is a home boy. He went to Wheaton High and two of my friends in high school were part of his inner circle.
JPL
@PsiFighter37: I’m old enough to remember when SNL did a skit about Jean Harris who accidentally murdered her friend who wrote the Scarsdale Diet. She accidentally killed several guards, in the skit . That had to be in the early eighties.
SiubhanDuinne
@PsiFighter37: I can’t remember the last time I watched SNL. Probably during the 2008 Presidential campaign. Pretty sure I haven’t seen it since then.
schrodinger's cat
@Baud: We are in uncharted waters, many countries have dollars as their foreign exchange reserve. If the dollar is not the safest currency expect people to dump dollars, Euro has its problems but at least investors won’t be dealing with insane people.
SiubhanDuinne
@PsiFighter37: I am a lot older than you, and remember watching it first during the fall of 1975 (which may have been their first season on the air, I’m not sure). They had some great seasons, but over the past 25-30 years I’ve watched only intermittently. I figure if a sketch is good enough or funny enough, someone on Balloon Juice will provide a YouTube link.
/lazy-ass bitch
raven
@SiubhanDuinne: I have the first season on DVD. You would freak out to hear Carlin talk about cutting a stewardesses throat in it.
eta We would stop parties on Saturday night to watch.
PsiFighter37
@Baud: You don’t. The market is ill-informed about all this shit because they assume it’s going to be resolved. Implied volatility, particularly on the S&P 500 index, is significantly below where I think it should be. One reason why I hate all this ‘the market has perfect knowledge’ crap. No, it doesn’t – it’s just weighted-average probability of what it thinks will be the outcome. It will never price tail risk properly, and GOP lunacy is a tail risk – and probably more of a systematic risk that should be priced in nowadays.
@SiubhanDuinne: I only bothered seeing certain skits; to be honest, I haven’t taken in a full SNL in probably close to a decade.
On another note, I’m getting into political arguments on Facebook (which I try to stay out of). One person had this bright idea to say ‘both sides do it’ and equate Bachmann and Cruz with Pelosi and Jesse Jackson, Jr. Goddamn, for someone who is pretty smart (I met her last year) – if you don’t pay attention to politics in this country, you can come off as pretty fucking ignorant and stupid to those who do. That’s why I try to stay out of these discussions – there is no way (and maybe a bit arrogant of me, but whatever) that someone is going to get into a pissing match with me on Facebook about politics and argue a point off of me.
Seriously, how the hell is Pelosi the same as either of those Republicans? I don’t remember her ever saying Dubya was the second coming of Nazi Germany (which is what Cruz did the other night on the Senate floor during his fauxlibuster).
TAPX486
@SatanicPanic: Breaching the debt limit will probably have a much greater effect than just a rise in interest rates. I think it was over on KOS this morning but if Treasury can’t buy or sell T-bills it would freeze up the commercial paper market and destroy the money market mutual funds, the FED would not be able to perform the various functions that keep the banking system liquid and a couple of other impacts that would make the 2008 credit freeze look like a sunny summer day. In 2008 the FED and other agencies had the borrowing capacity to step in and limit some of the damage as lender of last resort. They won’t have that ability if the debt limit is hit.
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman: Yup. See my #161.
Yatsuno
@scav: Hopefully to 1850. Then I can be deported up north.
schrodinger's cat
@TAPX486: I agree see comment #118. BTW Obama shouldn’t budge a nanometer in this fight.
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman: I remember them all. I remember the first time someone noted that Generalissimo Francisco Franco was still dead. I remember when Chevy Chase as Gerald Ford tumbled arse over teakettle down the Air Force One steps. I remember thinking, Well, it’s no Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In, but it has possibilities.
Amir Khalid
@IowaOldLady:
You ask this of a political party whose members were, on the eve of the last Presidential election, absolutely sure that Mitt Romney was about to trounce Barack Obama. It seems to me that they (well, some of them, anyway) now believe themselves about to claim a historic victory over Obama’s hated presidency and its main achievement. And if they crash the US Federal government and the world economy — well, you have to make the big play to score the big win, right?
One doesn’t often see such a coming together of anger, blind delusion and apocalyptic nihilism. Certainly not in a major political party with a century and a half of history behind it. The Republican party is going kablooey someday fairly soon. I don’t see how it can avoid that.
PsiFighter37
@TAPX486: I would need to read up on this, but I don’t feel like this is totally correct. The Fed doesn’t issue debt (the Treasury Department does that); all it does is print money. Theoretically it should be able to just keep printing money to buy Treasuries.
I think the question is, if the U.S. has defaulted, you’re basically shuffling money between two assets that no longer have full faith and credit of the U.S. Not sure exactly what that would lead to.
Keith G
O-H-
scav
@Yatsuno: Depending on the one-drop ruling, I’ve a window of opportunity from 1901 to somewhere in the 1600s (if they are so PC as to admit descent through the female).
SiubhanDuinne
@raven: Once upon a time, SNL was worth stopping parties for.
raven
@efgoldman: They did a job on the Illini last week.
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@Davis X. Machina: Yah, I was just firing off random neurons at the possibility of a secondary meaning. With all the tribalism in the air lately, the Blues and Greens keep coming to mind. Factio Grandaeva being a nickname for one of the factions would have just been added deliciousness.
And now I have a strong urge to reread the Nika riot scene from Flint and Drake’s Belisarius books.
Baud
@efgoldman:
Amir makes me think Malaysia is full of highly intelligent supermen.
I’m a little afraid of that country now, truth be told.
Amir Khalid
@efgoldman:
Yes, but only on assignment as a journalist and never for more than six days at a time.
Jay C
@dmsilev:
Naaah, none of that sloppy gory foreign nonsense for our Distinguished Speaker: he’ll probably just lay in a few dozen jugs of bourbon under the Speaker’s Rostrum and drink himself to death, like a REAL American leader…..
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@efgoldman:
Violets on television!
ETA: And it still was no Laugh-In.
TAPX486
@PsiFighter37: Could be. Looked for the article but can’t find it. There were half dozen bullet points of bad outcomes.
gogol's wife
@SiubhanDuinne:
There was a self-aggrandizing article by Lorne Michaels in Vanity Fair that completely dismissed the significance of Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In. I was indignant.
Did anyone post a link to Renee Fleming singing the Top Ten list on Letterman? She is so charming:
http://artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/09/26/renee-fleming-sings-an-operatic-top-ten-for-david-letterman/
raven
@efgoldman: Combined with his dignity it’s a hell of a combo!
scav
@efgoldman: Well, perhaps only in that 6 days or fewer is not enough of a window to catch whatever it is that plagues both our nation and journalists.
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman:
Elastic waistbands, my friend. Elastic. Drawstrings in a pinch.
Keith G
I-O!
SiubhanDuinne
@gogol’s wife:
I follow her (or like her, or whatever the hell) on Facebook, and the Top Ten was posted there. Delightful.
BillinGlendaleCA
@Yatsuno: Are you commenting from a boat? Damn, I don’t think I ever saw rain that hard in Seattle.
SiubhanDuinne
@efgoldman:
“I grow old … I grow old …
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.”
Davis X. Machina
@efgoldman: Exactly. Belts are for people who have waists. I have a Tropic of Capricorn, not an equator.
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
@Yatsuno: I take it you aren’t braving the weather tonight at the Clink?
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
@efgoldman: uhhhhhhhhhhhhrect Siiiuuuuuuuuuuuuh!
schrodinger's cat
Somber Saturday thread needs Literary Caturday Kittehs
Sister Rail Gun of Warm Humanitarianism
@efgoldman:
Hmm. I have a clear memory of her outrage at the insult to the inoffensive little flowers. Wonder where that came from?
Never mind.
Keith G
@efgoldman: O-H..I-O
Even a few lads from England know the score.
IowaOldLady
@schrodinger’s cat: Also retired military dog checking out his first kitten:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/27/military-dog-meets-kitten_n_4004889.html
schrodinger's cat
@Amir Khalid: As a journalist what is your opinion of the beltway media?
Yatsuno
@Comrade Nimrod Humperdink: I’ve been through worse in college. My abstention from the Clink is due to me needing to watch my finances due to delayed paychecks. I might need to see if the folks need to help me though I squirreled a small amount away and I should have enough for bills for most of the month. I wish I could have afforded to go though, got lots of old friends there now.
Amir Khalid
You’re all so kind.
The House Republican caucus has pretty much bet all its chips on this hand. It seems to believe it will beat Obama only by never backing down. Most people expect its strategy to do a lot of damage if the shutdown happens and the US debt ceiling is reached. I just saw Obama pull a rabbit out of the hat on Syria. But this time, it’s not his hat, and I wonder if there’s a rabbit to be pulled out at all.
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
@Yatsuno: Sorry to hear that man. Ah well, least I can stream it and commiserate here. As an aside, it’ll be lovely when ESPN gives me a way to stream their shit legally without a damned cable subscription.
SiubhanDuinne
@Keith G:
@Keith G:
Why, oh, why, oh, why-oh?
Amir Khalid
@schrodinger’s cat:
The mainstream guys are just as bad, just as much in bed with the powers that be, as political journalists in the Malaysian mainstream media. Although, I will credit American journos for not being quite as shameless about it.
schrodinger's cat
@Amir Khalid: I don’t know much about the Malaysian media, but the Beltway Punditry has no shortage of chutzpah.
Yatsuno
@Comrade Nimrod Humperdink: It’ll be a pasting, but then again everyone thought the same of the U$C game. Plus we’ve been a bug in Stanford’s ear before. I guess we’ll know more at the end of the night.
Keith G
@SiubhanDuinne: Money and adventure.
Tripod
@SatanicPanic:
1. Denial
2. Anger
->3. Bargaining
4. Depression
5. Acceptance
SiubhanDuinne
@Keith G: Well, yeah, but I’m afraid even Leonard Bernstein couldn’t make that scan.
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
@Yatsuno: Aand here we go… I’ve been worried about what would happen when a decent quarterback finally got after this secondary.
Frankensteinbeck
@Amir Khalid:
Really, I still think it’s all about Boehner. He can’t pass anything remotely sane with just Republicans. The only way this gets resolved is for Boehner to allow Nancy to pass something – which she can, if he lets it come to a vote. In practical terms, the Republicans don’t have a majority in the House, but they have the Speakership, who has an absolute veto. If Boehner caves, the CR and debt ceiling pass.
EDIT – @Tripod:
My Celestia, I think you’re right. ‘One more year!’ It’s textbook.
Keith G
@SiubhanDuinne: Oh, I thought you were inquiring why one would leave Ohio.
As to the performance linked, it seems like a good enough kid friendly big time concert experience. Good for them.
Keith G
Another TD
O-H
Yatsuno
@Comrade Nimrod Humperdink: 3-3 with six minutes to go in the 1st. I honestly expected much worse.
John O
That’s a helluva post, Mr. Levenson.
For me it’s becoming increasingly about…despair. We have become ungovernable.
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
@Yatsuno: Give it time
Yatsuno
@Comrade Nimrod Humperdink: Now it’s 10-3, but Stanford is only really making progress by luck. No pun intended.
EDIT: At least the Papists lost.
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
@Yatsuno: I’m hoping the Papists go oh-fer against the Pac, though I foresee a lot of ugliness when they battle SC. First team to 10 wins that game.
Amir Khalid
@Frankensteinbeck:
So it all depends on Boehner. But I don’t see how he wins this. He’s not about to talk sense into his caucus; they won’t listen because they believe they’re winning. If he keeps doing what his caucus wants, he’s seen as following the crazies rather than leading them. If he does the right thing, if he goes cap in hand to Pelosi and cuts a deal with the House Democrats, he effectively makes her the speaker de facto and he might as well resign as Speaker.
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
@Yatsuno: And getting lit up deep isn’t luck. Our dbs have improved, but they’re mostly slow, and no pass rush exacerbates that. Plus linebackers can’t be asked to stay with wideouts for 4 seconds plus, not even our beloved Cyrus Coen.
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
See what I mean?
Suffern ACE
Hmmm. Wouldn’t keeping the law on the books but repealing the tax to pay for it greatly increase the deficit?
Frankensteinbeck
@Amir Khalid:
Nobody even knows what ‘winning’ means to him. The only people who know if he can be pressured or over what or if he has any kind of plan are physically there taking part in the negotiations. We know he’s caved before several times, but from this far away, we can’t predict whether he will again, or if he’ll side with the clowns.
cckids
@efgoldman:
Me too, though I was in junior high, in the wilds of small-town Nebraska. There was little “entertainment” press, at least that we saw; I remember going to school Mondays, talking about this new show we’d discovered, making plans to either get together or spend the next Saturday night on the phone, co-watching.
So different from everyone being sold everything in advance & hyped to death on the internet. We got to be “insiders”:)
Yatsuno
@Comrade Nimrod Humperdink: Well, I see flashes of good defence and offence, so going 3-2 at this point isn’t much to be ashamed of. I actually have decent hope Apple Cup might be a battle, I haven’t been all that impressed with the Huskies this year. Honestly I’ll take bowl eligibility, the band kids deserve the trip of their lives plus my old director is finally retiring. We’re about halfway there now.
cckids
@SiubhanDuinne: I earned cool points by digging up the “Lord and Lady Douchebag” skit, & showed it to my son back in the early days when “douchebag” was making a comeback as an insult. He was 11 or so & couldn’t believe it.
Alison
We need some kind of special BJ bat signal when it’s been too long without a new thread. Maybe it could look like a big hand flipping the bird…
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
@Yatsuno: Oh the schedule gets lighter after this week, we’ve got a shot against everybody not dressed in Highlighter the rest of the way. Stanford is just too much, and there’s no shame in that. We’re performing better against them than ASU did.
CaseyL
Boehner’s not going to let anything pass if it means giving up the Hastert Rule, because that would be the end of his Speakership. The Speakership is very important to him. Not the actual doing-the-job part, mind you. Just the title and attention part.
I have to think Obama has an end game. He’s got to realize the nuts are fully in control, that they actually want a shut-down and default. Not only do they get to bring down the government and country they hate, but then they can start an impeachment circus against Obama for “letting” it happen.
Bob's Had Enough
Perhaps it’s to stop the use of this sort of tactic forever. Or at least for the rest of his term. Past that, it’s up to whomever is in office as to whether they want to be jerked around by a small minority.
1. Don’t give in. Do not negotiate.
2. Just take the pain now. One dose now will be less than the cumulative hurt of many future rounds.
John O
@CaseyL:
This.
I think a default and impeachment proceedings are quite likely at this point. And if all you do is switch the two party’s around in your own head, you can still hear the GOP howling like wolves at the moon, and I mean literally, were the Dems to pull this shit after a lost election.
I think it’s going to be a very big month for this nation’s future. OTOH, I went on my first Breaking Bad jag ever, and it was a long one, so I may just be suffering a particularly dim view of humanity right now.
Suffern ACE
@John O: actually, us rabble and riff raff are doing just fine. Our elite need to beaten with night sticks and tear gassed. We could probably stop the riot with the confinement of 5,000 people to their rooms.
PurpleGirl
@TAPX486: The Mouse That Roared was written by Leonard Webberly. Of course, Peter Sellers was a genius in his triple roles.
John O
It will be extraordinarily difficult to do this for the President, but I agree with you on both points. Obama lost me on civil liberties and negotiating incompetence years ago, when he had a chance, but I still trust his judgement and decision making processes quite a bit.
He actually needs to do this (let it burn) for the sake of several Presidents to come. It’s quite a moment for him.
Bob's Had Enough
@John O: He didn’t lose me on negotiating.
He offered deals and waited for the other side to respond in kind. When they didn’t he generally withdrew his offer. At times he gave the other side something they wanted in an attempt to show good faith and get the process started.
After several years he seems to have decided that those (grownup) techniques aren’t going to work with the Baggers. He’s got to disarm them by simply refusing to ever play their game again.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
I’m not a fan of Arianna Huffington or her Post, but check out this front page while it’s still up there. Just for a light hearted moment, cause it sounds like they want to burn the village. Not, unfortunately, The Village.
John M. Burt
@Davis X. Machina: “Most of our politics will eventually be replaced by better psychotherapy.”
Ah, another Doris Lessing fan, I see.
John O
@Bob’s Had Enough:
I always thought he started from too reasonable a place. He’s never been playing the game like the GOP does. Negotiating 101: Ask for WAY more than you know you’re going to get.
Bob's Had Enough
Negotiating Graduate Seminar –
1. State your needs and desires. Do not exaggerate.
2. Listen to the other side’s needs and desires.
3. Engage in constructive discussion to see how each side can get as much of what they want as possible.
Belafon
@Bob’s Had Enough: I think if he ever saw adults in the House he would negotiate. But, I do think he’s decided, as he said, that the debt ceiling and funding the government are not something you do use as hostages to get things through you wouldn’t otherwise.
If he can’t break them of this, every president will suffer.
John O
@Bob’s Had Enough:
Sure, but those tactics have been proven, IMHO, to be pretty conclusive failures, because he’s not negotiating with graduate-level people, and never has been. He’s dealing with ’60’s era used car salesmen.
Bob's Had Enough
My point was that he gave the right more than ample opportunities to work toward solutions acceptable to both sides.
They have continued to not join in. And they are now attempting to use extreme funding measures to force their agenda.
PBO, I think, has told them “No.”. It seems to me that he (and Senate Democrats) are simply refuse to give in and accept anything other than a clean bill. If that means a partial government shutdown until Republicans realize that he is serious then that’s the price to be paid.
John O
@Bob’s Had Enough:
Oh, jeez, I’m still thinking default. The shutdown is here for sure. The Main Event comes in a few weeks.
I agree that O has been MORE than reasonable.
Felonius Monk
@Bob’s Had Enough: When you are dealing with douchebagels like our current goper House, the rules of rational negotiation do not apply. These people are no longer rational, they are not just being obstinate, they are operating out of fear. Not fear of the ACA or fear of govt. spending, but fear of their overlords and controllers who will replace them in a heartbeat if they don’t toe the line. This coupled with the fact that Boehner is as inept a Speaker as the House has ever had is creating this chaos.
This battle will be totally lost if Obama attempts any kind of compromise with them. This must end here and now — it will be painful.
Yatsuno
@efgoldman: I did five bowl trips. All of them were amazing fun, even the Rose Bowl, which is fucking exhausting. I’d love to have my director get one more free trip before he runs off to Montana.
Bob's Had Enough
@John O: What’s worked for me when dealing with car salesmen is to write down my only and final “out the door” offer and my telephone number and tell them to call me if their manager accepts my price.
Otherwise, don’t call.
No one has called back more than once trying to jerk me around and I’ve always ended up with a vehicle at what I figure is an acceptable price.
I could be reading PBO wrong, but it seems to me he’s given the Baggers his final offer.
Bob's Had Enough
@John O: If PBO does not give in on the shutdown one would expect him to have more credibility if he says he will not negotiate over the default.
This would seem to be the time to engage.
Chris
@Felonius Monk:
Just in case we needed another argument for why allowing corporate cash to control politicians was a bad fucking idea… well, we got it.
John O
I agree! Thus, shutdown, and since I see no difference between now and then in either sides’ demands, default. Or an “impeachable” way around the default, and yet another economy-killing Constitutional crisis.
I think it’s fair to say I’m a bit pessimistic at this point. I just don’t see either side caving in time to save the hostage.
GregB
I think the GOP needs to add in one more addendum to their bill and demand that President Obama admit that he sent Seal Team 6 to kill everyone in the Benghazi consulate.
Bob's Had Enough
If PBO stands his ground on this one then he largely disarms the Baggers. Not a total defeat, but he takes one weapon away from them.
If he doesn’t then they will use it over and over and over. They’ll extend things for a week or two and demand new concessions for each further extension.
Now, I’m not going to paint PBO into a corner and state that he must do this or be a failure (or however the Firebaggers would put it). He may have an entirely different plan worked out. Or he may see a new idea and grab it.
It’s just that with the limited information I have right now, I see it as time to get Assad to give up his chemical, er, to get take the budget weapon away from the Baggers.
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
@Yatsuno: My dad and I got to go to the Holiday Bowl in ’03, that was an absolute blast. One of the best games I managed to attend. The ’02 USC game and the ’97 UCLA game were probably my favorites in Pullman, and the ’02 Apple Cup was easily the most heartbreaking.
Bob's Had Enough
@Chris: The House Baggers aren’t, I suspect, under the control of corporate money as much as the Bagger-voters in their home districts.
Some Senate Republicans are somewhat moving away from the Bagger position. They’ve got an entire state electorate to consider and corporate money may be their only hope for hanging on.
The corporate world has made it pretty clear that they aren’t on board with this shutdown/default stuff. It screws with bottom lines and stock values.
scav
@GregB: Oh, and Chik-fil-a as a necessary 1/4th of foodstuffs on the pyramid, not to mention drastically upping the Minimum Daily Requirement for GMO Cornsyrup.
Comrade Nimrod Humperdink
Egad, we’re gonna run outta quarterbacks in 2 series if this keeps up.
Felonius Monk
@Chris: Exactly. The only solution to this kind of bullshit is to get the “big” money out of politics.
Hill Dweller
Reid will table the House bill Monday. Then send the clean CR back to the House.
The wingnuts have no leverage. Also, too, adding the contraception nonsense to the bill they’re voting on tonight was a really dumb strategic move. It is easily ridiculed and something most Americans will find absurd.
fuckwit
@Bob’s Had Enough: I’ve been glad there have been no major terrorist attacks on our soil since Obama has been President, but, it looks like, here’s the first major one on its way, and it will be big, incoming directly from Ted Cruz and the teabaggers.
I’m glad Pierce is saying it. I’m glad Ploffe and others in the administration are saying it. I hope it gets said more and louder and the media starts picking it up:
The teabaggers have conspired to attack the United States of America with a treasonous act of sabotage, vandalism, hostage-taking, and terrorism. This should not stand.
I expect President Obama to smack these fuckers down with extreme prejudice. He tends to try his best to avoid confrontation, but, when he’s left no other options, he fights. I’m not looking forward to this, but here it comes.
Also, this must destroy the Republican party, and it must do it NOW, not in 2016, but RIGHT NOW, before 2014. I do not think the damage to this country and its people should be allowed to continue any longer than it has to.
Felonius Monk
This is one time that if the Prez had the Line Item Veto capability, the game would be over.
Bob's Had Enough
@Hill Dweller: Best to portray them as tantruming children who are demanding everything in Santa’s Workshop.
Ash Can
And while they’re at it, why don’t the House (and Senate) GOP members include a provision that mandates us Caucasian-Americans to have heterosexual sex every night so that we produce a maximum amount of white babies, and have the FBI banging on our doors every night and observing our coitus to make sure we’re doing our duty to the
VaterlandUSA? And, once we’re pregnant, making sure that our pregnancies progress optimally — maybe chaining us up someplace, to make sure we stay safe? And if any of us are found to be infertile — e.g., us post-menopausal ladies — maybe we need to be, ahem, eliminated to make way for younger females who are able to gestate white babies? After all, they want to take back the country, right?fuckwit
@Tripod: Ooh, that’s really good. Yes, that makes a lot of sense. They’ve howled, and now they’re making demands, trying to negotiate their way out of it. I only hope “depression” hits just in time for them to barely be able to drag their ass to defeat in the 2014 elections.
joel hanes
@efgoldman:
@Villago Delenda Est:
PRINCIPAL POOP : Your housing – food – insecurity will be guaranteed by the Department of Redundancy Department — and, the Natural Guard. So don’t move. Don’t panic. Don’t take off your shoes!
JOBS is on the way.
PORGY : Gee whiz!
MUDHEAD : They’ve got us surrounded !
fuckwit
@Ash Can: I believe dictator Nicolae Ceaucescu tried this in Romania in the 1970s and 1980s. He outlawed abortion and birth control, and had his secret police interrogating people who weren’t having enough children. Ceaucescu, of course, ended up in front of a firing squad after the inevitable revolution those forced-birth children carried ou once they grew up.
Chris
@Bob’s Had Enough:
Well, that’s good, at least. But if the corporate guys are angry with this shutdown stuff, they need to turn off the money faucet this instant for anyone who votes for it, and leave them flapping in the breeze all through the 2014 election, until they or their successors have learned to be good corporate whores 100% of the time and not just when it aligns with the “we hate That One” platform. The teabaggers run on astroturf. Take it away from them and they’re just another bunch of kooks standing on street corners giving angry speeches at the world as it passes them by.
They wanted a system where money talks – well, they got it. So if they’re concerned with what their proteges are doing, time to use it.
Bob's Had Enough
@fuckwit: I don’t think this will destroy the Republican Party. It’s more likely to restore it to some degree of sanity.
The corporate wing of the Republican party realizes that they have no future if they continue Nixon’s Southern Strategy (vers. 2, 3, 4 and 5 extended to cover women, Hispanics, non-Christians and gays).
Senate Republicans have partially split off from the House Baggers. Several leading Republicans who aren’t currently holding office have split with the Baggers. Some state Republican office holders have spit off.
This could be the point at which the extreme wing of the Republican party gets kicked to the curb. Leave them to fight for their jobs without help from the wealthy and connected part of the party in 2014. Some of them might even get primaried with backing for their opponents.
Corporate interests are interested in what is best for corporations. Continuing to loose control of the government is not in the best interests of corporations.
These Baggers have done nothing to help bottom lines. They’ve reduced no regulation. They’ve passed no favorable tax bills. They have produced no value that I can see.
The Tea Party was a corporate play by a limited number of businesses and it’s failed. Businesses generally know when to close down a nonprofitable department.
MomSense
@John O:
Interestingly, until Obama’s first two years the President with the highest legislative success rate was Johnson at 93%. Obama’s legislative success rate was 96.7% and with fewer Democrats in the House and Senate.
Felonius Monk
@joel hanes:
Wonderful. R.I.P. Peter Bergman (aka Mudhead, Lt. Bradshaw, Nazi Goring).
Bob's Had Enough
@Chris: I don’t think that would work right now.
The Baggers are all caught up in the heat of battle. They’re likely counting on their constituents to support them and aren’t thinking ahead to what a well-funded, slightly more moderate opponent might do to them in the primaries.
I think corporations wanted the immigration problem fixed. I’m sure they don’t want the economy derailed. I suspect conversations are happening right now at the corporate level of how to ease the Baggers aside.
The word might quietly go out to some of the less extreme Republicans that it’s time to dump the Hastert rule. We’ll get a good hint that Bagger days are done if, after a few days of shutdown, a combination of House Dem and Repub votes passes a clean bill.
It would be in the best interest of business to go back to a cooperative Republican party. They country is not anti-business. Corporations could get much of what they want via cooperation and they’re getting nothing this way.
Debbie(aussie)
Haven’t read comments yet, but here goes; hubby & I saw the doco about the gentleman from Las Vegas with elephantiasis of the scortum and his journey through surgery. Fuck! Every American should be outraged, and the medical profession ashamed, at what this man went through. I sat there looking at hubby saying ‘how!’ , just ‘how!’. His reply, ‘best health care in the world Deb’. Too right!
Skippy-san
@Chris: I think its deeper than that. Today’s GOP wants nothing less than a one party state like they have in Singapore. They want to disenfranchise the Democratic party and arrange the elections so that only they can win. Anyone who rises up will be crushed, just like J.B. Jeyaretnam and what he went through. That’s what they want because they know that demographics are against them in the long term. So they are choosing to seize power now.
SiubhanDuinne
@Keith G: I was :-)
Davis X. Machina
@Bob’s Had Enough:
If you’re not excessively greedy, you can get that outcome from either party.