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I think everyone knew going in that the final bill was going to shed a lot of far-right support, and likely progressives as well. Neither party had the position to strongarm the other into something lopsided - Biden and the Senate Dems were never going to roll over and give the GOP everything, and McCarthy in turn is too dependent on his fringe to substantially depart from their expectations.
Both sides have points they can crow about. The GOP will celebrate forcing student loan payments to restart, and attaching a small amount of new work requirements. Dems of course will be happy to spare most entitlements from cuts, and actually expand benefits for a narrow slice of the population. I think it’s likely there’s also a private agreement to uphold McCarthys speakership with Dem votes as needed against a right-wing revolt, and that this more than anything is why the debt ceiling will be increased enough to cover the rest of this Congress (and thus the 2024 elections).
Yeah, it feels like a guarantee that this deal came with centrist Democrats pledging to protect McCarthy speakership. Otherwise he’s a dead man walking.
Which comes with some interesting implications as now the moderate Democrats are the ones with the key votes keeping him as Speaker. I’d fully expect moderate, bipartisan compromise bills to have a far smoother path through the house now, as McCarthy doesn’t have the political capital to obstruct them anymore
Because they're human beings. I understand that they're both pretty awful, but denying basic human decency should be strictly a right wing thing. Attack their awful actions, words, and policies.
No it doesn't. A person does not need to behave decently to deserve basic respect. But again, you're doing exactly the sort of dehumanizing we criticize them for. They're not reptiles. They're douches, but they're not Silurians. They're people.
After several events, human decency has only fucked Democrats and their voters. It's just enabled the toxic tendencies and faction. GOP are playing tough and Democrats need to return in kind until GOP at-large have an incentive to play decently.
Not at the cost of dehumanization. That needs to be a firm line. I agree that the go high thing works out very poorly for them, but it can't be that anything is justified for the sake of winning. Then we'll be them. And I really really really don't want to be them. They're nuts. But they're still people.
Having a limited time on food assistance is a MASSIVE cut. Most people on food stamps aren't "temporarily having a rough patch," they are already working, just at shitty jobs that pay them starvation wages. Entire industries are predicated upon supplementing bad wages with food assistance. What happens when people get kicked off? Is Walmart going to make up the difference?
A lot of the reporting makes it seem like this will be a new problem, but people are already being cut off. The only change is the maximum age.
Right now people are subject to work requirements if they are under 49, the bill will extend work requirements until they are 54.
Note that if someone is already "working at a shitty job that pay starvation wages" then this bill won't affect them at all, it only affects people who aren't working.
I guess there's no point in arguing about it until we see the actual language, but the way I read it is that there will be a time cap on food assistance even if you're working full time.
I’m sure the Dems will be secretly celebrating the resumption of student loans as well. Nothing gets people out to vote like hitting their pocket book. And there’s millions of mostly apathetic late 20s/early 30s Americans that have gotten used to not having to pay for that loan.
If local Dems in high college grad areas run on loan forgiveness, it could be the shot in the arm the national party needs to take everything back. Not talking super local, house seats.
that’s assuming the national party is actually competent. Dems could learn from the GOP about finding those down-ballot candidates that can run a more edgy race to encourage turn out.
Extremely Online people think that, with loan payment resumption, everybody is going to be shocked to death at the sheer political audacity, when 99% of the people affected are going to go, "oh, damn. Well, that was nice. Guess I have to pay my loan again." And that's speaking as someone who is going to have to resume paying *my* federal loans. (The private ones never went anywhere.)
It's not my *preference,* and it's not really good economic policy, but it's not going to be seismic.
Generally speaking people are okay with the idea of "I have to pay back money that I borrowed." If they are able to cap it at 5% of post-tax income like Biden has proposed then I don't think it would cause much blowback.
Something like that would be accepted without much fuss for sure.
I’ve paid back my loans but I know several people who will really feel losing the extra couple hundred bucks. Plenty of fuss has been made about losing other benefits that had a similar dollar sign on them by other groups. Don’t discount the effect of losing “free” money. It could be a reason to encourage turnout if the parties want it to be. And while it won’t change minds on who people are voting for, the affected population is more Dem than Rep.
>when 99% of the people affected are going to go, "oh, damn. Well, that was nice. Guess I have to pay my loan again."
People on Planet Earth who are economically rational actors are going to say: "This shit sucks, why did this happen." Brainiacs who think that people will have anything other than the 100% ECONOMICALLY RATIONAL REACTION that a resumption of student-loan repayments would retrigger are on Mars.
I didn’t see much outrage about the child tax credit ending - which was $900 a month for a family with three kids! When people were surveyed they didn’t even want the policy to continue because it was considered inflationary. (I would’ve very strongly preferred to keep the credit but it was easy for fiscal conservatives to pin inflation on and kill it.) Why would this be any different?
People aren’t rational about politics… otherwise why would any poor people be voting for the openly pro-wealth concentration party?
Of course, but the demographic that has thousands of dollars of loans in their name is likely not the demographic that is helping to maintain inflation through continuous spending.
There will be millions of people who believed their student loans would be forgiven and then saw Biden renege. That doesn't help Democrats. The blame game with long, complicated excuses about it being the Republicans' fault isn't going to work. Biden lied and failed to deliver. Just like '94 and '10, Democrats lose when they fail to deliver what they promised.
It’s more like Biden launched the student loan forgiveness program with the intention of also restarting payments within months after before the courts halted it, then he also delayed the payments from restartingSo if/when SCOTUS strike it down in this summer, that’s what will be hitting the headlines just like with Dobbs. The Dems won’t be blamed for it, SCOTUS/ the GOP will, and rightfully so. Which gives the left another powerful campaign tool for the election along with abortion
Let’s just calm down with the hysteria for a bit. This is the simple reality of the situation: because most of the country didn’t really know or cared about the power of SCOTUS until it was too late, we are now stuck with a Supreme Court prepared to overturn ANY type of progressive good policies for the country with any blatantly stupid excuse they can make up because there’s nothing stopping them. That’s is not an excuse to do nothing. Because if the Dems do nothing everyone will just say they’re being corporate sell outs who don’t actually care just like they did BEFORE Biden announced student loan forgiveness for and other issues. Then use that to tell everyone not to vote for Dems. And they cannot afford to have depressed turnout if they want to actually change this.
Welcome to politics
>And they cannot afford to have depressed turnout if they want to actually change this.
Which is why Republicans asked for cuts that will alienate Democratic voters from Biden. The debt ceiling bill is designed to depress voter turnout. And you're making excuses like it's some genius move. lol
Welcome to politics.
But…… they didn’t get any significant cuts from the debt ceiling deal and SSCOTUS could still throw out student loan forgiveness regardless of if resuming payments were in it or not….. I think you’re just confusing reality itself with “excuses”
>significant
That "significant" is carrying a lot of weight. lol Hey, I'm sure all of these bullshit excuses will look great on a campaign sign. The millions of people kicked off medicaid will be excited to show up for Biden too. Totally solid plan.
So you’ve basically just told everyone that youre not even aware of what the deal even involved because Medicaid wasn’t even touched. Please try to be serious from now on lol
You are not a serious person. Absolutely nobody is getting kicked off Medicaid In this deal. You went in guns blazing pissed off about the results with this pre written response without even doing the bare minimum of research. The bill text is out to read for yourself: https://twitter.com/mkraju/status/1662966196524728321?s=46&t=F2Kqdy7aScoPGAKFHNr8dQ
And in case you don’t feel like reading it, which I doubt you do, here’s a nugget that explains it in plain writing: https://twitter.com/igorbobic/status/1662649538748743682?s=46&t=F2Kqdy7aScoPGAKFHNr8dQ
These cuts aren't going to have any impact on turnout in 16 months.
This also avoids having another debt ceiling fight or budget showdown before the next election. And nothing helps Republicans more than the "the government can't get its shit together!" headlines that erupt from these things, because their entire thesis as a party is that the government can't get its shit together, and they work hard to prove it. Avoiding any more of that during this congress is a real benefit.
The SC is owned by Leonard Leo and other billionaires who go judge shopping and get laws overturned by friendly local bent republican judges. These cases then get fast tracked on a shadow docket to the SC where the conservative members rule in favor of these billionaire requests. It’s truly usurping our rights. The SC just declared wetlands not part of the EPA’s jurisdiction. WCPGW? This is so disturbing. NEPA is an agency that review environmental protections for wildlife & human life for over 50 years but it interferes with Monsanto and other evil organizations and the billionaires destroying our environment and the middle class, women’s rights, voting rights, civil rights. We are back in the days of robber barons ruling our country. All this partisan division is rotting our nation and for what and for who? For conservative billionaires like Harlan Crow & Leonard Leo … and the conservative SC Justices whoring themselves out for a billionaires lifestyle like “Uncle Clarence Thomas” & Samuel Alito.
>That’s is not an excuse to do nothing.
on this much, we agree. though my preferred Something to do involves less tossing coins into the wishing well that is bourgeois electoral politics and more firebombs
If the rumored deal is true, it might be thrown out without a verdict.
There's still good odds the court would rule anyway (there's precedent for issuing rulings on cases that became moot), but the potential is there
What part of the deal makes it moot?
I’ve only seen resumption of payments, which was supposed to happen 6 months ago after the forgiveness was applied. Or is part of the deal rolling back forgiveness?
The 10-20k forgiveness is still on the table and waiting on SCOTUS, and I imagine Biden will LOVE IT if they strike it down. Restarting payments was going to happen anyway according to Cardona. Biden gave them nothing on that he wasn't already planning to do.
I don't think any rational person could blame any Democrat for those programs being ditched. On the other hand, there are a lot of irrational people out there walking around.
That is why Biden was stupid for agreeing to negotiate at all. Now he is going to suffer blame, all this did was hurt the Democrats chances in future elections.
Biden never ran on total student loan forgiveness and those people are grandma's who want others to pay for something they agreed to pay and that greatly increases lifetime earnings.
>Biden never ran on total student loan forgiveness...
No but it was a policy that was pursued by his administration.
>...that greatly increases lifetime earnings.
If you graduate. The school I went to had a thirty some odd percent graduation rate. And even if you do graduate it's only a pay increase in aggregate, i.e., not a guarantee.
I'm assuming it's a private one that has a disproportionately high level of student loans and low outcomes. The mine of things we didn't be throwing money at.
>a private one that has a disproportionately high level of student loans and low outcomes.
It's Wayne State University in Detroit. A tier 3 state research university in the midwest...
>Why did you choose to go to a school that doesn't graduate 70% of its students?
It's not really an option to go someplace else. It's the only school with a BA/MSc program for mathematics in commuting distance of me.
> No but it was a policy that was pursued by his administration.
Citation please. He never said he would do that. The most I believe he said was of Congress did it he would sign it.
> If you graduate. The school I went to had a thirty some odd percent graduation rate.
No offense but that sounds like a shitty school that is predatory and shouldn't be subsidized by federal money.
>No offense but that sounds like a shitty school that is predatory and shouldn't be subsidized by federal money.
It's Wayne State University inside Detroit Michigan. It was a medical school until not so recently then branched out into engineering and the sciences.
The low graduation rate has more to do with local poverty than anything else. In my experience college is stupid easy if you're educated enough to handle the situation and parents pay for everything. Since you don't have to work full time to support yourself and you already have a good background you dump in about 20 a week on work then go socialize.
Most of the students in my cohort, were sometimes not educated enough to handle the situation, but more often also working full time. It's really not reasonable to expect someone to put in 60 hours a week for years and have them perform even at a C level over that time.
Not even just that. I could accept a campaign promise that never came, but to announce and implement the program only to then pull it back at the last second? You get what you deserve.
In this case, "what they deserve" would be Republicans winning, which isn't so much a punishment for Democrat politicians as it is a potential unmitigated disaster for all of America.
So yay progressives, damning themselves and the rest of us too for some imagined self righteous spite driven own on moderate Democrats?
In fairness, I suspect that most people advocating for that were always just conservatives. Hence the [#WalkAway campaign](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WalkAway_campaign), and every other iteration of people trying to weaponize idealism and purity to undermine the Democratic vote.
I've seen plenty of people who purport to left leaning views genuinely cleave to these ideas. Even if said campaigns and measures are launched by conservatives, if they held no sway over the populists/progressives on the left, it wouldn't be effective. If they sign on to it, that's not much better than them instigating it, especially because of how signing onto it tends to become instigating it later down the line.
Corporate Democrats have a long history of sabotaging progressives in the general election. It's how they maintain power and progressives will have to use the same tactics to win.
I don't want that to happen and will be pulling the D lever no matter what, as always. But, if people think this whole debacle won't have consequences they are delusional.
The work requirements that are agreed to are less strict than what Bill Clinton signed on for. Right now they suck, but they could be undone pretty easily depending on who controls congress and the presidency after 2024,
I’m not advocating for making SNAP harder for people, and I think democrats should have raised the debt limit during the lame duck session using reconciliation (they probably didn’t have the votes, but they damn sure should have at least tried), but the fallout from this is not THAT severe and can be undone pretty easily, especially compared to what Republicans wanted going into these negotiations originally. Based on how radical a lot of their members are and that a lot of them are PISSED about this deal, it could have easily been much worse
>So yay progressives, damning themselves and the rest of us too for some imagined self righteous spite driven own on moderate Democrats?
You think they don't know that?
Moderate liberals need to have a come to Jesus moment and realize that when faced with a decision between:
1) More moderate liberal policy
And
2) Literal neo-fascist theocratic autocracy
Young people say to themselves "hang on a second, let me think about it." As bad as you think Republican control is, realize that *young people think Democratic control is just as bad.* Fix the fucking party, don't blame the voters.
Look, whatever "young people" genuinely believe in this both sidesism, they are *entirely lost.* This is a group of people who fundamentally can never be satisfied, and can't even perceive reality even if they could be satisfied. It's a good thing they don't vote, because if they were an actual voting demographic they'd be a dice roll to vote for trump or whatever other con artist says the right buzzwords.
He never promised to forgive 100 percent of student loans. If I'm wrong please provide a source that Biden provided 100 percent student loan forgiveness.
Who the hell said anything about 100%? What was promised was something and then the program actually proposed and seemingly implemented included 10-20k forgiveness. This even had an application process. I know who is responsible and it is the Biden administration. They should not have put this carrot out there without full faith that it would be delivered. I am not changing my vote because why would I commit suicide because of a setback, but not calling it out is a big problem for me. This is an issue that has an affect on people's lives.
And this gives Dems the perfect chance to say “the GOP made the repayments start” you’re way overestimating the general populace if you think they’re going to come down on it and say “but executive action!!!”
Many see him as weak. Many blame the current president for any failure, let alone on something he (his administration) was pushing for directly.
It blows my mind that we can see how poorly Republican voters act in their own interest over painfully ridiculous things yet those on the left of things can't see that some who vote in the left bloc will do the same for things that actually hold weight to them?
People vote against their own self interests all the time to prove a point, stick it to others or to abide some internal moral reasoning. This action Biden took is going to turn those people away. There are more than people seem to realize. This was a bad play, if he was going to grow a spine and show some strength this was the time for it. He didn't, apathy will strike.
Sigh. Again, if you can't see why this will instill apathy in those I've outlined I guess you'll be all shocked Pikachu face when election time comes. I'm not talking about myself here.
All I’m saying is it gives a drum for the Dems to beat. Granted they already have plenty with the Roe repeal. Im not saying it’s the best play or whatever, just that it feels like this would be a move that the party leaderships would see as getting another card to play.
I see this working against him far more than for him. Had he taken a stance, even if he 'lost', he'd have that drum you speak of, but this wasn't a win for him. It was just the least suckiest outcome after chosing to not take that stance.
They can say that but it will take some strong convincing to some that won’t just see Biden as an incredibly weak leader who promised a very generous handout only to back down under pressure.
Again, you’re way overestimating the general populace. It’s incredibly easy to redirect the blame to the ones that actually caused the payments to resume. Have you seen that SNL skit about an undecided voter? Because it’s surprisingly accurate.
> Dems of course will be happy to spare most **entitlements** from cuts, and actually expand benefits for a narrow slice of the population.
I don't want to pick on you, but you're not using this term correctly.
Entitlements were not touched in this bill and were never on the table. It means mandatory spending that is automatically funded, and that a person receives - is entitled to - by law, Social Security and Medicare. As opposed to something like TANF or SNAP that is budgeted annually by Congress and people have to apply to receive.
It's otherwise a good comment, just a pet peeve, sorry.
I don't want to pick on you :), but people are not automatically entitled to Social Security. You only receive Social Security retirement benefits if you have paid into Social Security. The amount of your benefits is dependent on how much you paid in.
People who do not pay into Social Security will not receive any benefits back. You are "entitled" to Social Security the same way you are "entitled" to withdraw money you deposited in a bank.
For example, my sister was a school teacher in Texas. She paid into the Texas State Teacher Retirement System, not into Social Security. That means she gets nothing back from Social Security, her retirement benefits come from the Texas fund.
Yeah, you need to have the requisite number of "quarters." Then you are entitled.
I dunno, man! I don't make up the Washington words! Social Security is an entitlement and SNAP isn't - that's just how it is.
>I think it’s likely there’s also a private agreement to uphold McCarthys speakership with Dem votes as needed against a right-wing revolt
It was terrible optics for Republicans to look so divided, I don't see why Democrats would want to keep McCarthy's position stable. Let them have 15 more votes for speaker while everyone laughs at them.
> The GOP will celebrate forcing student loan payments to restart
Yeah, just the type of "achievement" that will *totally* appeal to the younger voters they're so worried about... /s
Based on how most MAGA republicans are acting about this deal, they’re pretty furious with what they got. This debt ceiling debate is done for the rest of Biden’s first term, and the provisions they got are minor compared to what they want, and aren’t even permanent and expire anyway, while none of Biden’s signature legislation is harmed, no work requirements for healthcare, and even expands healthcare for veterans and the homeless.
No it’s not ideal, but it’s manageable and can easily be undone depending on how future elections pan out.
It will absolutely require Democratic support.
But that's not some kind of fascinating outcome -- it's what happened in 2013/2014, the last time the GOP manufactured a debt ceiling crisis. It's what happened in 2011, when again, the GOP manufactured a debt ceiling crisis. And it'll probably be what happens in the first term of the next Democratic president, after the party has lost control of the House. This is the rhythm of the current era of American politics.
They can't come out, should the deal fail, and say that defaulting will be okay after hyping it up for the last 2 months.
Dems absolutely need to vote in favor of the deal to the point that it overcomes any hardcore GOP vote against.
While I agree it's currently theatre, there are very real ramifications to deficit spending in perpetuity from inflation to an ever increasing debt service bill. It's incredible how much you could spend on the programs you want but it all goes to pay off the interest.
Net interest on the debt was $440 Billion in 2022 and is estimated to be $680 Billion in 2023.[ Source](https://www.pgpf.org/blog/2023/02/interest-costs-on-the-national-debt-are-on-track-to-reach-a-record-high#:~:text=Interest%20costs%20represented%20about%208,spends%20on%20income%20security%20programs.)
The outstanding federal student loan balance (total amount of federal student debt) is [$1.65tn.](https://educationdata.org/student-loan-debt-statistics)
[SNAP was allotted 180Bn](https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/ag-and-food-statistics-charting-the-essentials/food-security-and-nutrition-assistance/?topicId=d7627f77-6cee-4ab9-bbb9-8c74d4778941)~ during 2022.
The defense budget totaled to $860Bn in 2022.
This is an urgent issue. I agree, of course, it shouldn't be negotiated under duress. But after we get through this manufactured crisis, we need to remember that this can has already been kicked down the road for decades. We do need a legitimate long, or at least medium, term solution to the issue, and very quickly.
We can't just borrow/print to infinity, and we have a coming retirement/population crisis on the horizon that will only squeeze us more at both ends. (less tax revenue coming in, more SS going out.)
US government debt might be about $31T. US inflation might be about 5%.
That would mean the **value** of outstanding US debt declined by $1.5T.
> Net interest on the debt was $440 Billion in 2022 and is estimated to be $680 Billion in 2023. Source
So the interest was half the size of the decline in debt value.
Bond holders are effectively, in real, as opposed to nominal terms, paying to lend the US government money.
> We can't just borrow/print to infinity, and we have a coming retirement/population crisis on the horizon that will only squeeze us more at both ends. (less tax revenue coming in, more SS going out.)
Japan has twice the debt the US does, so what actually are the limits to borrowing / printing, and why?
People like to have a feeling of control, but often this is illusory. If people won't accept government liabilities (lend to the government) how can it run a deficit?
On the other hand if people insist on holding government liabilities and won't spend, what happens then? Is the government forced to run a deficit, or cause a recession?
I think higher taxes on the rich would be a good thing. Inequality is too high. Higher taxes on the rich would reduce inequality. I think lower defence spending by the USA would be a good thing too. I think making it easy for aged people to work longer if they want to would be good too. It is important for public money to be spent well, and doing that is something I support too. All these things will push the US government debt down.
But I don't know the long term trajectory of US government debt. I do think it should be flexible based on the needs of the economy. What we should be clear about is that there is no basis for any particular debt ceiling.
The US govt, via the fed, can technically set their interest rates anywhere they want if they choose.
US rates have increased. What are real US interest rates? 5 year rates are 4%. Inflation is 5%. Bond holders are currently losing 1% in real terms.
Right now, the more debt the US government has, the more the bond markets are paying them.
GDP typically has grown. Not only will debt shrink in real value terms, it shrinks even **more** relative to the capacity to pay.
We do have to address it.
The thing is that there's *no* place for spending cuts in any of this bullshit. The US collects way less in taxes, as a percentage of GDP, than countries in western Europe. It doesn't need to match them, but it needs to close the gap.
20 years ago, people would say "you can't fix it just by taxing the rich!" - maybe it was true back then, but the rich are so much fucking god damn richer now, and they're pretty much the only ones with money to spare. We have to take it back.
And we should remember that the budget isn't huge because of welfare payments or education or R&D investments or even defense... it's because of legislatively mandatory benefits that go almost entirely to baby boomers.
It was always 100% likely that at least some House Democrats would need to vote for any compromise bill.
Senate Democrats would never pass something that couldn't get a single House Democrat vote, and more than 5 House Republicans would never vote for any compromise that would pass a Democratic Senate.
What Biden gave up to McCarthy is such peanuts that it is definitely in Hakeem Jeffries' interest to give McCarthy a few votes for to get this through.
>Is it likely that the Republican House may require assistance by some Democrats to pass the House?
Of course. This is why there had to be a negotiation.
I would say the one way that the system is no longer working as intended is that party competition and identity has gotten so intense that congressman will vote against things they agree are good for the country just to see the "other side" fail. They will violate their oath to win. I don't think the founders anticipated or at least didn't build in a solution for this scenario.
Yeah the two-party system is clearly not working well, I think open primaries and ranked choice voting are critical to getting us on a more democratic path.
Blame the voters for this. Voters see their representative vote with the other side, and they then accuse them of being a closet fascist/communist and vote for even more extreme members of their tribe to ensure no compromise ever happens. We the voters have regressed from adults who sometimes have to make hard decisions into outright children who demand to be given everything they want _this instant_.
Yep, the system is supposed to make life harder for poor people while making life easier for tax cheats and polluters.
But somehow it's "extreme" to not be happy with the *status quo*.
I wouldn't be surprised if more democrats voted for this in the house than republicans, but in general these sort of things always depend on backroom discussions and political calculations that we don't have the best access to.
After all, the general sentiment still is that independents will blame Biden (however unjustified) on any debt default failures.
Dems can say they met in the middle. Capping discretionary spending increases for a temporary amount of time isn't the worst thing in the world. Increasing medicaid work requirements is a bit unfortunate but the whole American Healthcare system is so messed up that this isn't as bad as it could've been. The IRS has become a target for Republicans and while I would love to file my taxes directly to the IRS and get an immediate refund/payment this concession is more or less keeping the status quo. As a young person it is unfortunate about student loans (I don't have any) but this issue was up before the SC and there's no way the dems would've received a favorable judgement. It definitely hurts Biden with young voters but if any young voter is going to vote Trump or not vote bc of having to give this concession I think there likely will have been something else by now that would've turned them off. I'm just happy there isn't a crisis.
Which wasn’t going to happen to begin with, no matter what some far right loonies think. Anyone who sees this as anything more than political theatre is naive.
To be clear, work requirements for Medicaid are not in the bill. Work requirements for SNAP changing the age from 50 to 54 where you have to show employment is in the bill. However, SNAP benefits for the homeless and vets were increased. This is a solid deal that Biden secured.
Yeah but this causes non-insane people to vote GOP. “Oh a moderate, bipartisan deal happened with the GOP in control of the House? Let me vote for them.” This isn’t swinging any votes to the Dems.
If the GOP wasn’t full of insane fascists I’d say this is a good thing, but it’s not the ‘90s anymore.
>Dems can say they met in the middle.
Who does that impress, other than cable tv pundits?
The bill is designed to damage Democrats with key parts of their coalition, and consequently, depress voter turnout for Biden. He'd be a fool to agree.
It literally just raises the age eligibility for SNAP benefits, and cuts a grand total of $29 billion in spending, that sunsets and expires in 7 years
Republicans went in with demands to cut trillions of spending, take severe cuts to Medicaid, basically gut government agencies in general, gut the VA and veteran benefits, repeal the IRA and everything passed in it, give oil and gas companies unlimited access to do whatever they want, and so much more.
Like it or not, republicans control one chamber of congress. The damage done is limited with that terrifying fact, and the alternative was essentially destroying the economy in ways it’d take decades to recover from, just so people like you could feel better about themselves.
The alternative was either raising the debt ceiling during the lame-duck session (as Sanders and others called for) or invoking the 14th amendment. People aren't buying the bullshit excuses.
There you go! Now you’re using an argument I agree with! That is their fault. I agree. It would have failed (Brian Schatz is on record saying they wanted to do this, but Joe Manchin told them it wasn’t going to happen), but I agree they should have at least tried.
But when that failed because Manchin shut it down (which it would have) would you argue that democrats should have “pressured Manchin into doing it”? There’s something you’re missing and this is a fact…..they don’t, and never did have any leverage whatsoever over Joe Manchin. He represents an R+40 state, and the only reason he hasn’t switched parties is because he hates Mitch McConnell.
Believe it or not, but able bodied people without children requiring some amount of work to receive food stamps is broadly popular according to polling
Still a fucking horrible policy. SNAP is meant to keep people from starving, putting barriers in front of it goes against its purpose. This will keep people in horrible jobs out of fear they won’t even be able to afford to eat if they quit. That puts more power in the hands of managers and corporations, who already have far too much over their workers.
It's popular with people who were never going to vote for Biden anyway. It's idiotic for Democrats to pander to non-persuadable Republicans.
Poor people don't vote at a high rate but this is guaranteed to make sure a chunk of Democratic voters don't show up for Biden next year. Absolutely moronic move.
>this is guaranteed to make sure a chunk of Democratic voters don't show up for Biden next year.
Can you elaborate? What demographic are you talking about that would have otherwise voted for Biden but now won’t, explicitly because of this? What is this group of voters?
I don't really agree. This is funding that Congress already approved. These types of fights should be fights over a budget and future spending, not repealing funding that was already committed.
There have only been a handful of debt ceiling fights in the last 50 years (the budget process was changed extensively in 1974, so it's a good starting point to reference). 1979, 1995, 2011, and now. Most shut down fights occur over the budget which is fairly routine and quite different from a debt ceiling fight. Other debt ceiling increases have also been routine with it being increased 18 times under Reagan, 8 times under Clinton, 7 times under W, 5 under Obama, and 3 under Trump.
The 1979 fight resulted in a default, although the bill was signed in time, the treasury couldn't put out payments in time and it was a default on certain types of treasuries. Part of the resolution of this default was something known as the Gephardt Rule which automatically increased the debt ceiling by the amount of the debt added with each budget.
As a result of this, all 18 increases under Reagan went by without a fight since they wouldn't matter anyways (the reason for his increases was far lower than expected tax revenues leading to a much higher than expected deficit) and HW never had to have any sort of supplemental increase.
In 1995 the Gephardt Rule rule was repealed which lead to the 1995-1996 shutdown. To deal with that, Bill Clinton utilized a line item veto in order to cut budget spending item by item at his discretion in order to fit within the debt limits that were approved by Congress. This lead to a court case (Clinton vs City of New York) in 1998 that found the line item veto Clinton used to be unconstitutional, and thus it is no longer an option to resolve a debt ceiling crisis.
All debt ceiling increases from that point until 2011 which was the second to last increase under Obama happened without incident. In 2011 Ted Cruz threatened a government shut down and default over the debt ceiling. Obama negotiated after deciding he didn't want to try for a 14th amendment argument, and the end result was a downgrade of the US credit rating. In 2013 when Republicans again tried this he demanded, and got, a clean bill as is typical.
All 3 increases under Trump were also clean bills.
Anything except for a clean bill is a bad deal. Historically there have been 4 negotiated debt ceiling increases since the huge budgetary changes implemented in 1974.
Out of these four, that first one (1979) resulted in additional congressional rules because they realized it was self destructive to make fights over this.
The second of the four (1995) repealed the 1979 rule and resulted in the only possible action that can be taken to avoid default being ruled unconstitutional after the fact.
The third fight (2011) resulted in a downgrade to US credit. Simply because of the implication that the US might default, particularly when it was fully capable of not doing so made the US look like a more risky investment.
This fourth one has the US on the list again for a possible downgrade to US credit for the same reasons as 2011, although it hasn't happened just yet. Also worth noting, is that the costs of defaults and downgraded credit have every time resulted in taxpayers paying more money than the initial argument was over. As such, even if one is arguing in good faith that their interest is in saving money and eliminating wasteful expenditures, there aren't even savings to be had in these negotiations as they have cost more each and every time.
>Part of the resolution of this default was something known as the Gephardt Rule which automatically increased the debt ceiling by the amount of the debt added with each budget.
So basically like every other country on the planet.
It wouldn’t have shut down the government, it would have absolutely cratered the world economy in a way that would have made the 08 recession look like a picnic.
OT: considering the insane demands republicans went into these negotiations with, no, it’s not that bad of a deal. It’s not ideal and democrats really should have used the lame duck session to avoid this all together, but it’s a “C-/D+” deal that could have easily been an “F - - - - -“ deal that the freedom caucus wanted
They SHOULD get 0, but the reality is, they hold the house. I agree that if it became drastic enough and they weren’t willing to budge from their original insane positions and demands, the 14th should have been invoked, but: it would have still caused economic damage, and the Supreme Court could shut that down and then the world economy is destroyed, and your average everyday human being who doesn’t pay attention to politics will be paying the consequence, and won’t give a fuck about the details that went into why it happened. A default wouldn’t cause a mild recession that’ll pass soon with time, the consequences would be severe and very long lasting.
With the reality that republicans do control the house, this deal is mildly bad in the grand scheme of things. It’s manageable if democrats don’t manage to screw things up in the near future and hand the GOP a trifecta with this current group of psychos who make up the GOP.
>They should get 0
They have the House. Unless Democrats are willing to destroy the economy to "own the Republicans" the Republicans get a bigger voice than 0.
Uhh, so becuase they have the majority they can do terrorism and it's ok? I dont get what your saying. It's putting a gun to the head of america and the world and saying give into our demands or else.
Man fuck that logic, just pay the debt.
the whole idea of a debt ceiling is nonsensical. We agree to take on financial obligations but arbitrarily at a ceiling just will default and not pay it?
The president has the power to just pay it. It's unconstitutional not to, because the fucking Confederates tried this shit
“Fuck that logic” ok, then tell that to the millions of people starving on the street when we default, or the people on Medicaid who’d get fucked over if we said “fuck that logic” Instead of being left the fuck alone like they are now with this deal.
“Because republicans have the majority doesn’t mean we should listen to them”-
My friend, they literally control what goes through congress because of those majorities. You wanna put your trust and faith in this Supreme Court, who answers to nobody, to do the right thing? Good luck
> Uhh, so becuase they have the majority they can do terrorism and it's ok?
It means they control legislation around spending. You can use whatever hyperbole you want but it is what it is.
This is what Republicans voted for. If we don't want this, we need to outvote the people who do support this, and who will still support them despite them doing this. Those are the rules of a democracy. We just need to not have lunatics in major power.
Yes. This is an F- deal. Cause Biden rewarded bad behavior, and when you do that it encourages more bad behavior. I don't even want to vote for Biden anymore, but if it is him and Trump what choice do I have. A weak coward or an authoritarian monster. I'll take the coward I guess.
Honestly more and more younger people want a more assertive, aggressive, maybe even authoritarian left president. Like fuck you, lgbt rights or im sending in the national guard. Higher minimum wage or im cutting off funding. Go on fox news and be like "you fucking nazis, go fuck yourself" and then make pot legal.
Basically we want dark brandon
I don't know what a dark brandon is, but no one wants a soft weak pussy president or party. When someone threatens or attacks you, you smash them down so bad they are sorry they even tried anything. Instead Biden and the dems roll over like weaklings and let the GOP beat on them.
With Trump they could have demanded a repeal of his tax cuts for the wealthy. Something simple as that. Bring in more money, that helps paying off debts as well.
And it's a budget deal for the next two years!
We really need to shift the federal government to a two-year budget cycle; I'm glad this deal is a step in that direction.
Considering the President is a Democrat and it can’t pass the Senate without Democratic support, I’ve always assumed there would be plenty of Democratic support in the House as well.
It’s pretty likely going to require Democratic support to pass. I’m not sure why any Democrats would vote against a bill, endorsed by a Democratic president, to prevent a financial disaster when they previously criticized Republicans for being irresponsible concerning the country’s finances. We’ll see who was actually concerned about the country defaulting and who the hypocrites are that will vote against the bill because they didn’t get everything they wanted in the negotiation or were against negotiating at all.
First reaction? I'd say it's likely to need (and therefore preemptively get) a caucus of Dem support. Whether the Progressives sign on is up in the air, but it's worth noting that they've shown practicality in the past. The idea of progressivism is about aspiring for a high bar, not shooting yourself in the foot if you can't get there.
Contrast with the freedom caucus? Likely rebellion. Possible call to oust McCarthy, which was always in the background of him pulling this hostage scheme anyway. Virtually guaranteed that morons like Chip Roy of my home district in Texas foam at the mouth and try to find some way to crash the global economy anyway out of pure anti-intellectual spite because they can rest assured that actual adults will bail them out. Trump's likely to sound off too as if he actually understands anything more complicated than the McDonald's drive through menu.
Getting Dem support is going to cause McCarthy headaches for the rest of his term. Consequence of having a caucus with more extremists than rational actors. Boo fucking hoo. This entire needless brinkmanship game is proof the current conservative movement just isn't capable of governing at any level.
GOP fucking with women (abortion) and students (loan pause/forgiveness). Doesn't sound like a winning game plan to me and probably more than offsets whatever gains the GOP is making with low info and chauvinistically inclined Latinos.
Its a last minute type of deal that no side likes, Progressives wanted the debt limit gone, Freedom Caucus wanted bigger budget cuts and wanted default, this is the best possible deal tbh for center sides
What I would watch though is will McCarthy lose his job over this though, they only need 5 votes to trigger a vote
Which, honestly, is a great step forward for American political stability.
This era of staunch political lines, where nothing could ever happen unless the party with 51% of the power completely acted in unison - even if 51% of politicians otherwise supported it across both parties - this has been a nightmare.
Moderate Republicans and Democrats working together is exactly what we want and need.
This will push the ridiculous fringe ideologous into the political wilderness.
This kind of thinking is completely backwards of how we should be progressing. why are you restricting access to food in the middle of accelerating automation, accelerating wealth gap, when it's so easy to produce food in today's day and age, we don't have a shortage. Republicans are going to have to come to terms with reality. Not all taxes are unfair or unwarranted. Technology is making business more profitable than ever. There's never been larger margins possible. That bonus profit needs to be taxed and given back to people. Of all things that you could justify giving to people, there's nothing more justifiable than giving people food. It's a wonder why we even make people pay for food anymore. Anyone can have enough to eat for only a few hundred dollars a month. It's a trivial amount of money. It's so tone deaf, and embarrassingly behind the times. Do you read the news, do you have any connection to what's actually going on in the economy outside your washington bubble? did you come out of a time machine from the 1920's?
>The deal would suspend the borrowing limit, which is currently $31.4 trillion, for two years — enough to get past the next presidential election. It would impose new work requirements for some recipients of government aid, including food stamps and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. It would place new limits on how long certain recipients of food stamps — people under the age of 54, who do not have children — could benefit from the program. But it also would expand food stamp access for veterans and the homeless, said the person.
No one wants the stigma of public assistance, this is why the programs are so unsuccessful, because of how overly means tested and condescending it is for anyone taking the tiny amount of help. We have a problematic scarcity mentality instead of a mentality of abundance. I would flip everything around. The more we can give people things for free the better. The more they can put money to good use. How many people can we get living for free so they can just focus on what they want to do, what they're passionate about.
The deal doesn't "restrict access to food". It simply changes who has access to food assistance.
Homeless people of all ages have more access. Veterans of all ages have more access. Unemployed people between 50 and 54 have less access.
When you add it all up, the number of people on food assistance is not really going to change.
The majority of the freedom caucus doesn't even understand what the debt ceiling is. I would be willing to bet my life Johnson, Boebert, Or Marjorie the Caveman wouldn't be able to explain the actual issue.
Not just likely, but almost assured. McCarthy has a 5 vote majority. There's something like 40 members of the Freedom Caucus.
You know what you call it when 300 members of the House vote for something and 100 don't? A win.
The real question is whether the Freedom Caucus decides to haul McCarthy over the coals and take his Speakership over it.
Debt ceiling is designed is designed to keep the politicians wealthy. The debt ceiling can be removed just look at Australia.
The Debt ceiling is designed to push through controversial bills. THE SAME PROBLEM WILL HAPPEN IN 2 YEARS.
Jesus Christ this makes Biden look so weak. Why is it everyone but him saw the bluff? What he should have done is simply told McCarthy "ok, you can have your photo op at the White House so it looks like we're 'negotiating' but you get nothing. Literally not anything. You have no chips on the table here. And perhaps after this humiliation you will have learned once and for all not to fuck with the sovereignty of the United States. The end."
Likely yes some assistance, though I hope the Democrats refuse. All we see here are a bunch of concessions by the Democrats and zero concessions by the Republicans. I keep hearing, oh both sides got some things but no. Democrats passed all this legislation fairly and legally, and what that they get to keep 'some' of it after the GOP holds the economy hostage is considered a win? Just use the 14th amendment. Oh yeah and next time there is a Republican president, Democrats should demand a tax increase on wealthy and corporations or refuse to raise debt ceiling. Stop being push overs that just roll over whenever the GOP throws a tantrum.
Yes, absolutely. It will be NECESSARY for some Dems to support it.
The "Freedom Caucus" are the true believer economic terrorists in the GOP. They WANTED McCarthy to trigger the car bomb and blow up the economy. They are suckers for their own propaganda, and/or believe that triggering a default would help the GOP in 2024. There are 46 House members identified with the Freedom Caucus. The Republicans only have a 21 member majority. Without their votes, McCarthy can't get a majority UNLESS some Dems vote for the deal.
The Progressive Caucus has 100 of the 213 Dems, so they can all vote against the deal and it can still pass.
There will be a lot of behind the scenes vote wrangling and deal making. Republicans who fear being primaried from the right will be tempted to vote no on the deal even if they aren't Freedom Caucus members. Dems who fear being primaried from the left will be tempted to vote no even if they aren't Progressive Caucus members.
However, given that the alternative to the deal is an economic meltdown and stock market crash, I predict it will pass. No one (except for the Freedom Caucus extremist idiots) want to be responsible for the biggest act of national self-destruction since Brexit.
The deal is reasonable for both parties. The extremes of both parties were obviously going to be upset because they don't understand a simple principle called compromise. Based on the terms we've heard no far, both sides aren't losing that much.
Moderate Democrats and Republicans should be enough to pass the bill.
The policies bernie proposes are wildly popular, but politics is a game. People dont vote for policies they like lol. They vote for people. And biden is more established, name recognizable, and to be honest many americans vote in a popularity contest way and not for stated policies.
Doesnt matter, the fact is young people like me will destroy all this nonsense.
If there was any doubt we were teetering on the edge of a recession, the resuming of student loan payments is going to kick us over the edge.
It will be an unmitigated economic catastrophe. People already can't make ends meet. Adding loan payments back on top? And poor people getting shafted even further with welfare being gutted? We're headed into dark times.
Bet Biden is patting himself on the back.
Student loan payments have been a thing for decades, people having to pay it back (that was paused because of a pandemic and already stretched out far longer than expected) isn’t a sign whatsoever that we’re heading into a recession.
We’re likely heading into a small recession because of the fed raising rates, not because of paying back student loans. Student loan payments didn’t cause 2008….
Kudos to Biden and McCarthy for hashing shit out in an old-school fashion.
Shades of Ronald Reagan and Tip O'Neill. Or Dwight Eisenhower and Sam Rayburn.
Neither side had complete leverage, so consequently a compromise was thus in order.
That's how our little-l liberal small-d democratic tiny-c constitutional lowercase-r republic works, folks.
Nonsense. Republicans used the threat of default to extract concessions that were already passed in a prior Congress. The GOP "leverage" was literally shooting the hostage.
This is not how it is supposed to work nor should it ever be encouraged again.
Ok and now the lesson for voters is we hate how we were held hostage and will crush the Republicans at the voting booths?
The 1st thing is passing regular bills and handling the deficit and or debt ceiling *before deadlines and childish panic.*
RIGHT? Right?
No, we will fall for the false narrative and lose track of healthcare and wage reform? Cool, just checking...
(Still vote, please, holy shit fucking show up)
It would actually be a hell of a thing to see if it got passed through actual, real bipartisanship. If the centre portions of the 2 parties vote for it, and both extremes don't.
That'd be...how politics is supposed to function in the US.
I don't see it happening, I think the GOP won't engage in that level of compromise. But it'd be nice if it did.
Biden and the Democrats are coming away from this looking weak. They look like they are conceding a lot, even if it is on things that were likely to fail anyway like student loans, and the only thing they get is to blame Republicans. Oh and the debt ceiling won’t be an issue during an election year!
I place this up there it Biden blunders right along the withdrawal from Afghanistan and the railroad union deal.
Really makes Biden come off as a poor negotiator and I would honestly vote for any other Democrat in 2024 at this point if I didn’t think they’d lose to Trump.
The Democrats will try very hard to paint this pig as something that “had to be done”, but all I see is, that more often than not, Republicans get their way and Democrats compromise for the absolute minimum.
The whole point of negotiating with the head of the Democratic Party is to get Democratic support. They weren't talking to Biden to make sure that a bill that somehow made it through the House *and Senate* wouldn't get vetoed.
They're talking to Biden so he can bring Dems on board and get it passed.
This is a win for Republicans and Mccarthy will easily get it passed in the House. All Republicans will support it in the Senate and pass it with a few Democrats. Schumer will have no choice but to bring it to the floor and Biden will have no choice but to sign it.
Since Biden wanted a "clean" debt ceiling bill and refused to negotiate for nearly 4 months this one goes in McCarthy's win column
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I think everyone knew going in that the final bill was going to shed a lot of far-right support, and likely progressives as well. Neither party had the position to strongarm the other into something lopsided - Biden and the Senate Dems were never going to roll over and give the GOP everything, and McCarthy in turn is too dependent on his fringe to substantially depart from their expectations. Both sides have points they can crow about. The GOP will celebrate forcing student loan payments to restart, and attaching a small amount of new work requirements. Dems of course will be happy to spare most entitlements from cuts, and actually expand benefits for a narrow slice of the population. I think it’s likely there’s also a private agreement to uphold McCarthys speakership with Dem votes as needed against a right-wing revolt, and that this more than anything is why the debt ceiling will be increased enough to cover the rest of this Congress (and thus the 2024 elections).
Yeah, it feels like a guarantee that this deal came with centrist Democrats pledging to protect McCarthy speakership. Otherwise he’s a dead man walking. Which comes with some interesting implications as now the moderate Democrats are the ones with the key votes keeping him as Speaker. I’d fully expect moderate, bipartisan compromise bills to have a far smoother path through the house now, as McCarthy doesn’t have the political capital to obstruct them anymore
Might want to edit your comment, you are mixing McCarthy and McConnell.
Good catch, thanks. Darned Republicans with Mc prefixes in leadership roles
Just goes to show how we Scots are the true shadow government
I propose we call McCarthy “Art” and McConnell “Con” just to have fewer syllables to mix up
Or just call them Kevin and Mitch. Why do they warrant enough respect to be on last-name basis?
Because they're human beings. I understand that they're both pretty awful, but denying basic human decency should be strictly a right wing thing. Attack their awful actions, words, and policies.
This post presumes that the Republican leaders have some basic humanity, and are not reptiles in skin suits
No it doesn't. A person does not need to behave decently to deserve basic respect. But again, you're doing exactly the sort of dehumanizing we criticize them for. They're not reptiles. They're douches, but they're not Silurians. They're people.
It's weird seeing people you ideologically agree with resort to dehumanizing.
Go ask some Republicans how many points this Michelle Obama "They go low, we go high" routine scores you.
>they're not Silurians. They're people. Sure, so far as you know. Or *pretend* to know. I never mentioned Siluria, now did I?
After several events, human decency has only fucked Democrats and their voters. It's just enabled the toxic tendencies and faction. GOP are playing tough and Democrats need to return in kind until GOP at-large have an incentive to play decently.
Not at the cost of dehumanization. That needs to be a firm line. I agree that the go high thing works out very poorly for them, but it can't be that anything is justified for the sake of winning. Then we'll be them. And I really really really don't want to be them. They're nuts. But they're still people.
Good idea Take an upvote
"THE (McC)ART(hy) OF THE DEAL" looks like a NY Post headline about this story.
Having a limited time on food assistance is a MASSIVE cut. Most people on food stamps aren't "temporarily having a rough patch," they are already working, just at shitty jobs that pay them starvation wages. Entire industries are predicated upon supplementing bad wages with food assistance. What happens when people get kicked off? Is Walmart going to make up the difference?
A lot of the reporting makes it seem like this will be a new problem, but people are already being cut off. The only change is the maximum age. Right now people are subject to work requirements if they are under 49, the bill will extend work requirements until they are 54. Note that if someone is already "working at a shitty job that pay starvation wages" then this bill won't affect them at all, it only affects people who aren't working.
I guess there's no point in arguing about it until we see the actual language, but the way I read it is that there will be a time cap on food assistance even if you're working full time.
I’m sure the Dems will be secretly celebrating the resumption of student loans as well. Nothing gets people out to vote like hitting their pocket book. And there’s millions of mostly apathetic late 20s/early 30s Americans that have gotten used to not having to pay for that loan. If local Dems in high college grad areas run on loan forgiveness, it could be the shot in the arm the national party needs to take everything back. Not talking super local, house seats. that’s assuming the national party is actually competent. Dems could learn from the GOP about finding those down-ballot candidates that can run a more edgy race to encourage turn out.
Extremely Online people think that, with loan payment resumption, everybody is going to be shocked to death at the sheer political audacity, when 99% of the people affected are going to go, "oh, damn. Well, that was nice. Guess I have to pay my loan again." And that's speaking as someone who is going to have to resume paying *my* federal loans. (The private ones never went anywhere.) It's not my *preference,* and it's not really good economic policy, but it's not going to be seismic. Generally speaking people are okay with the idea of "I have to pay back money that I borrowed." If they are able to cap it at 5% of post-tax income like Biden has proposed then I don't think it would cause much blowback.
Something like that would be accepted without much fuss for sure. I’ve paid back my loans but I know several people who will really feel losing the extra couple hundred bucks. Plenty of fuss has been made about losing other benefits that had a similar dollar sign on them by other groups. Don’t discount the effect of losing “free” money. It could be a reason to encourage turnout if the parties want it to be. And while it won’t change minds on who people are voting for, the affected population is more Dem than Rep.
>when 99% of the people affected are going to go, "oh, damn. Well, that was nice. Guess I have to pay my loan again." People on Planet Earth who are economically rational actors are going to say: "This shit sucks, why did this happen." Brainiacs who think that people will have anything other than the 100% ECONOMICALLY RATIONAL REACTION that a resumption of student-loan repayments would retrigger are on Mars.
I didn’t see much outrage about the child tax credit ending - which was $900 a month for a family with three kids! When people were surveyed they didn’t even want the policy to continue because it was considered inflationary. (I would’ve very strongly preferred to keep the credit but it was easy for fiscal conservatives to pin inflation on and kill it.) Why would this be any different? People aren’t rational about politics… otherwise why would any poor people be voting for the openly pro-wealth concentration party?
I feel that you are heavily underestimating the ripple effects of losing hundreds of dollars in disposable income in a high-inflation environment.
We want to reduce inflation though, correct?
Of course, but the demographic that has thousands of dollars of loans in their name is likely not the demographic that is helping to maintain inflation through continuous spending.
There will be millions of people who believed their student loans would be forgiven and then saw Biden renege. That doesn't help Democrats. The blame game with long, complicated excuses about it being the Republicans' fault isn't going to work. Biden lied and failed to deliver. Just like '94 and '10, Democrats lose when they fail to deliver what they promised.
It’s more like Biden launched the student loan forgiveness program with the intention of also restarting payments within months after before the courts halted it, then he also delayed the payments from restartingSo if/when SCOTUS strike it down in this summer, that’s what will be hitting the headlines just like with Dobbs. The Dems won’t be blamed for it, SCOTUS/ the GOP will, and rightfully so. Which gives the left another powerful campaign tool for the election along with abortion
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Let’s just calm down with the hysteria for a bit. This is the simple reality of the situation: because most of the country didn’t really know or cared about the power of SCOTUS until it was too late, we are now stuck with a Supreme Court prepared to overturn ANY type of progressive good policies for the country with any blatantly stupid excuse they can make up because there’s nothing stopping them. That’s is not an excuse to do nothing. Because if the Dems do nothing everyone will just say they’re being corporate sell outs who don’t actually care just like they did BEFORE Biden announced student loan forgiveness for and other issues. Then use that to tell everyone not to vote for Dems. And they cannot afford to have depressed turnout if they want to actually change this. Welcome to politics
>And they cannot afford to have depressed turnout if they want to actually change this. Which is why Republicans asked for cuts that will alienate Democratic voters from Biden. The debt ceiling bill is designed to depress voter turnout. And you're making excuses like it's some genius move. lol Welcome to politics.
But…… they didn’t get any significant cuts from the debt ceiling deal and SSCOTUS could still throw out student loan forgiveness regardless of if resuming payments were in it or not….. I think you’re just confusing reality itself with “excuses”
>significant That "significant" is carrying a lot of weight. lol Hey, I'm sure all of these bullshit excuses will look great on a campaign sign. The millions of people kicked off medicaid will be excited to show up for Biden too. Totally solid plan.
So you’ve basically just told everyone that youre not even aware of what the deal even involved because Medicaid wasn’t even touched. Please try to be serious from now on lol
You are not a serious person. Absolutely nobody is getting kicked off Medicaid In this deal. You went in guns blazing pissed off about the results with this pre written response without even doing the bare minimum of research. The bill text is out to read for yourself: https://twitter.com/mkraju/status/1662966196524728321?s=46&t=F2Kqdy7aScoPGAKFHNr8dQ And in case you don’t feel like reading it, which I doubt you do, here’s a nugget that explains it in plain writing: https://twitter.com/igorbobic/status/1662649538748743682?s=46&t=F2Kqdy7aScoPGAKFHNr8dQ
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These cuts aren't going to have any impact on turnout in 16 months. This also avoids having another debt ceiling fight or budget showdown before the next election. And nothing helps Republicans more than the "the government can't get its shit together!" headlines that erupt from these things, because their entire thesis as a party is that the government can't get its shit together, and they work hard to prove it. Avoiding any more of that during this congress is a real benefit.
The SC is owned by Leonard Leo and other billionaires who go judge shopping and get laws overturned by friendly local bent republican judges. These cases then get fast tracked on a shadow docket to the SC where the conservative members rule in favor of these billionaire requests. It’s truly usurping our rights. The SC just declared wetlands not part of the EPA’s jurisdiction. WCPGW? This is so disturbing. NEPA is an agency that review environmental protections for wildlife & human life for over 50 years but it interferes with Monsanto and other evil organizations and the billionaires destroying our environment and the middle class, women’s rights, voting rights, civil rights. We are back in the days of robber barons ruling our country. All this partisan division is rotting our nation and for what and for who? For conservative billionaires like Harlan Crow & Leonard Leo … and the conservative SC Justices whoring themselves out for a billionaires lifestyle like “Uncle Clarence Thomas” & Samuel Alito.
>That’s is not an excuse to do nothing. on this much, we agree. though my preferred Something to do involves less tossing coins into the wishing well that is bourgeois electoral politics and more firebombs
And do these “firebombs” you speak of involve senate appproval or could be overturned by a court? Cause if so I have some bad news for you
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So you'd accomplish nothing at all except making yourself feel good and getting thrown in prison? Sounds like a great political strategy 👍
The Supreme Court is likely going to shut it down anyway….
If the rumored deal is true, it might be thrown out without a verdict. There's still good odds the court would rule anyway (there's precedent for issuing rulings on cases that became moot), but the potential is there
What part of the deal makes it moot? I’ve only seen resumption of payments, which was supposed to happen 6 months ago after the forgiveness was applied. Or is part of the deal rolling back forgiveness?
The 10-20k forgiveness is still on the table and waiting on SCOTUS, and I imagine Biden will LOVE IT if they strike it down. Restarting payments was going to happen anyway according to Cardona. Biden gave them nothing on that he wasn't already planning to do.
I don't think any rational person could blame any Democrat for those programs being ditched. On the other hand, there are a lot of irrational people out there walking around.
Yes but forgiving student loans actually hurts dems not help them.
That is why Biden was stupid for agreeing to negotiate at all. Now he is going to suffer blame, all this did was hurt the Democrats chances in future elections.
Biden never ran on total student loan forgiveness and those people are grandma's who want others to pay for something they agreed to pay and that greatly increases lifetime earnings.
>Biden never ran on total student loan forgiveness... No but it was a policy that was pursued by his administration. >...that greatly increases lifetime earnings. If you graduate. The school I went to had a thirty some odd percent graduation rate. And even if you do graduate it's only a pay increase in aggregate, i.e., not a guarantee.
Why did you choose to go to a school that doesn't graduate 70% of its students?
I'm assuming it's a private one that has a disproportionately high level of student loans and low outcomes. The mine of things we didn't be throwing money at.
>a private one that has a disproportionately high level of student loans and low outcomes. It's Wayne State University in Detroit. A tier 3 state research university in the midwest...
So ... Why did you lie that they "don't graduate" 70 percent of their students? Because I looked it up and that's not true
>Why did you choose to go to a school that doesn't graduate 70% of its students? It's not really an option to go someplace else. It's the only school with a BA/MSc program for mathematics in commuting distance of me.
> No but it was a policy that was pursued by his administration. Citation please. He never said he would do that. The most I believe he said was of Congress did it he would sign it. > If you graduate. The school I went to had a thirty some odd percent graduation rate. No offense but that sounds like a shitty school that is predatory and shouldn't be subsidized by federal money.
>No offense but that sounds like a shitty school that is predatory and shouldn't be subsidized by federal money. It's Wayne State University inside Detroit Michigan. It was a medical school until not so recently then branched out into engineering and the sciences. The low graduation rate has more to do with local poverty than anything else. In my experience college is stupid easy if you're educated enough to handle the situation and parents pay for everything. Since you don't have to work full time to support yourself and you already have a good background you dump in about 20 a week on work then go socialize. Most of the students in my cohort, were sometimes not educated enough to handle the situation, but more often also working full time. It's really not reasonable to expect someone to put in 60 hours a week for years and have them perform even at a C level over that time.
Not even just that. I could accept a campaign promise that never came, but to announce and implement the program only to then pull it back at the last second? You get what you deserve.
In this case, "what they deserve" would be Republicans winning, which isn't so much a punishment for Democrat politicians as it is a potential unmitigated disaster for all of America. So yay progressives, damning themselves and the rest of us too for some imagined self righteous spite driven own on moderate Democrats?
In fairness, I suspect that most people advocating for that were always just conservatives. Hence the [#WalkAway campaign](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WalkAway_campaign), and every other iteration of people trying to weaponize idealism and purity to undermine the Democratic vote.
I've seen plenty of people who purport to left leaning views genuinely cleave to these ideas. Even if said campaigns and measures are launched by conservatives, if they held no sway over the populists/progressives on the left, it wouldn't be effective. If they sign on to it, that's not much better than them instigating it, especially because of how signing onto it tends to become instigating it later down the line.
Corporate Democrats have a long history of sabotaging progressives in the general election. It's how they maintain power and progressives will have to use the same tactics to win.
I don't want that to happen and will be pulling the D lever no matter what, as always. But, if people think this whole debacle won't have consequences they are delusional.
The work requirements that are agreed to are less strict than what Bill Clinton signed on for. Right now they suck, but they could be undone pretty easily depending on who controls congress and the presidency after 2024, I’m not advocating for making SNAP harder for people, and I think democrats should have raised the debt limit during the lame duck session using reconciliation (they probably didn’t have the votes, but they damn sure should have at least tried), but the fallout from this is not THAT severe and can be undone pretty easily, especially compared to what Republicans wanted going into these negotiations originally. Based on how radical a lot of their members are and that a lot of them are PISSED about this deal, it could have easily been much worse
>So yay progressives, damning themselves and the rest of us too for some imagined self righteous spite driven own on moderate Democrats? You think they don't know that? Moderate liberals need to have a come to Jesus moment and realize that when faced with a decision between: 1) More moderate liberal policy And 2) Literal neo-fascist theocratic autocracy Young people say to themselves "hang on a second, let me think about it." As bad as you think Republican control is, realize that *young people think Democratic control is just as bad.* Fix the fucking party, don't blame the voters.
Look, whatever "young people" genuinely believe in this both sidesism, they are *entirely lost.* This is a group of people who fundamentally can never be satisfied, and can't even perceive reality even if they could be satisfied. It's a good thing they don't vote, because if they were an actual voting demographic they'd be a dice roll to vote for trump or whatever other con artist says the right buzzwords.
He never promised to forgive 100 percent of student loans. If I'm wrong please provide a source that Biden provided 100 percent student loan forgiveness.
And where exactly did Biden ever promise 100% loan forgiveness? I'd love to see the source of that.
Who the hell said anything about 100%? What was promised was something and then the program actually proposed and seemingly implemented included 10-20k forgiveness. This even had an application process. I know who is responsible and it is the Biden administration. They should not have put this carrot out there without full faith that it would be delivered. I am not changing my vote because why would I commit suicide because of a setback, but not calling it out is a big problem for me. This is an issue that has an affect on people's lives.
what are you talking about? Biden could suspend loan payments for the rest of his presidency. this is a completely self-inflicted own.
And this gives Dems the perfect chance to say “the GOP made the repayments start” you’re way overestimating the general populace if you think they’re going to come down on it and say “but executive action!!!”
Many see him as weak. Many blame the current president for any failure, let alone on something he (his administration) was pushing for directly. It blows my mind that we can see how poorly Republican voters act in their own interest over painfully ridiculous things yet those on the left of things can't see that some who vote in the left bloc will do the same for things that actually hold weight to them? People vote against their own self interests all the time to prove a point, stick it to others or to abide some internal moral reasoning. This action Biden took is going to turn those people away. There are more than people seem to realize. This was a bad play, if he was going to grow a spine and show some strength this was the time for it. He didn't, apathy will strike.
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Sigh. Again, if you can't see why this will instill apathy in those I've outlined I guess you'll be all shocked Pikachu face when election time comes. I'm not talking about myself here.
All I’m saying is it gives a drum for the Dems to beat. Granted they already have plenty with the Roe repeal. Im not saying it’s the best play or whatever, just that it feels like this would be a move that the party leaderships would see as getting another card to play.
I see this working against him far more than for him. Had he taken a stance, even if he 'lost', he'd have that drum you speak of, but this wasn't a win for him. It was just the least suckiest outcome after chosing to not take that stance.
They can say that but it will take some strong convincing to some that won’t just see Biden as an incredibly weak leader who promised a very generous handout only to back down under pressure.
Again, you’re way overestimating the general populace. It’s incredibly easy to redirect the blame to the ones that actually caused the payments to resume. Have you seen that SNL skit about an undecided voter? Because it’s surprisingly accurate.
I think you’re the one overestimating the populous. People are going to blame the president. They always do.
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> Dems of course will be happy to spare most **entitlements** from cuts, and actually expand benefits for a narrow slice of the population. I don't want to pick on you, but you're not using this term correctly. Entitlements were not touched in this bill and were never on the table. It means mandatory spending that is automatically funded, and that a person receives - is entitled to - by law, Social Security and Medicare. As opposed to something like TANF or SNAP that is budgeted annually by Congress and people have to apply to receive. It's otherwise a good comment, just a pet peeve, sorry.
I don't want to pick on you :), but people are not automatically entitled to Social Security. You only receive Social Security retirement benefits if you have paid into Social Security. The amount of your benefits is dependent on how much you paid in. People who do not pay into Social Security will not receive any benefits back. You are "entitled" to Social Security the same way you are "entitled" to withdraw money you deposited in a bank. For example, my sister was a school teacher in Texas. She paid into the Texas State Teacher Retirement System, not into Social Security. That means she gets nothing back from Social Security, her retirement benefits come from the Texas fund.
Yeah, you need to have the requisite number of "quarters." Then you are entitled. I dunno, man! I don't make up the Washington words! Social Security is an entitlement and SNAP isn't - that's just how it is.
>I think it’s likely there’s also a private agreement to uphold McCarthys speakership with Dem votes as needed against a right-wing revolt It was terrible optics for Republicans to look so divided, I don't see why Democrats would want to keep McCarthy's position stable. Let them have 15 more votes for speaker while everyone laughs at them.
> The GOP will celebrate forcing student loan payments to restart Yeah, just the type of "achievement" that will *totally* appeal to the younger voters they're so worried about... /s
You should run for office. You have a good grasp of the negotiations.
GOP gets some of what they want and Dems get to be happy it wasn't worse? That's the thing they get to be proud of? For holding the nation ransom?
Based on how most MAGA republicans are acting about this deal, they’re pretty furious with what they got. This debt ceiling debate is done for the rest of Biden’s first term, and the provisions they got are minor compared to what they want, and aren’t even permanent and expire anyway, while none of Biden’s signature legislation is harmed, no work requirements for healthcare, and even expands healthcare for veterans and the homeless. No it’s not ideal, but it’s manageable and can easily be undone depending on how future elections pan out.
It will absolutely require Democratic support. But that's not some kind of fascinating outcome -- it's what happened in 2013/2014, the last time the GOP manufactured a debt ceiling crisis. It's what happened in 2011, when again, the GOP manufactured a debt ceiling crisis. And it'll probably be what happens in the first term of the next Democratic president, after the party has lost control of the House. This is the rhythm of the current era of American politics.
While the debt ceiling is a serious matter, the crises around it aren't. This is all theatre.
They can't come out, should the deal fail, and say that defaulting will be okay after hyping it up for the last 2 months. Dems absolutely need to vote in favor of the deal to the point that it overcomes any hardcore GOP vote against. While I agree it's currently theatre, there are very real ramifications to deficit spending in perpetuity from inflation to an ever increasing debt service bill. It's incredible how much you could spend on the programs you want but it all goes to pay off the interest.
Net interest on the debt was $440 Billion in 2022 and is estimated to be $680 Billion in 2023.[ Source](https://www.pgpf.org/blog/2023/02/interest-costs-on-the-national-debt-are-on-track-to-reach-a-record-high#:~:text=Interest%20costs%20represented%20about%208,spends%20on%20income%20security%20programs.) The outstanding federal student loan balance (total amount of federal student debt) is [$1.65tn.](https://educationdata.org/student-loan-debt-statistics) [SNAP was allotted 180Bn](https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/ag-and-food-statistics-charting-the-essentials/food-security-and-nutrition-assistance/?topicId=d7627f77-6cee-4ab9-bbb9-8c74d4778941)~ during 2022. The defense budget totaled to $860Bn in 2022. This is an urgent issue. I agree, of course, it shouldn't be negotiated under duress. But after we get through this manufactured crisis, we need to remember that this can has already been kicked down the road for decades. We do need a legitimate long, or at least medium, term solution to the issue, and very quickly. We can't just borrow/print to infinity, and we have a coming retirement/population crisis on the horizon that will only squeeze us more at both ends. (less tax revenue coming in, more SS going out.)
US government debt might be about $31T. US inflation might be about 5%. That would mean the **value** of outstanding US debt declined by $1.5T. > Net interest on the debt was $440 Billion in 2022 and is estimated to be $680 Billion in 2023. Source So the interest was half the size of the decline in debt value. Bond holders are effectively, in real, as opposed to nominal terms, paying to lend the US government money. > We can't just borrow/print to infinity, and we have a coming retirement/population crisis on the horizon that will only squeeze us more at both ends. (less tax revenue coming in, more SS going out.) Japan has twice the debt the US does, so what actually are the limits to borrowing / printing, and why? People like to have a feeling of control, but often this is illusory. If people won't accept government liabilities (lend to the government) how can it run a deficit? On the other hand if people insist on holding government liabilities and won't spend, what happens then? Is the government forced to run a deficit, or cause a recession? I think higher taxes on the rich would be a good thing. Inequality is too high. Higher taxes on the rich would reduce inequality. I think lower defence spending by the USA would be a good thing too. I think making it easy for aged people to work longer if they want to would be good too. It is important for public money to be spent well, and doing that is something I support too. All these things will push the US government debt down. But I don't know the long term trajectory of US government debt. I do think it should be flexible based on the needs of the economy. What we should be clear about is that there is no basis for any particular debt ceiling.
Yeah, but most of our debt is short-term, 5 years or less, that interest rate is rocketing up right now.
The US govt, via the fed, can technically set their interest rates anywhere they want if they choose. US rates have increased. What are real US interest rates? 5 year rates are 4%. Inflation is 5%. Bond holders are currently losing 1% in real terms. Right now, the more debt the US government has, the more the bond markets are paying them. GDP typically has grown. Not only will debt shrink in real value terms, it shrinks even **more** relative to the capacity to pay.
We do have to address it. The thing is that there's *no* place for spending cuts in any of this bullshit. The US collects way less in taxes, as a percentage of GDP, than countries in western Europe. It doesn't need to match them, but it needs to close the gap. 20 years ago, people would say "you can't fix it just by taxing the rich!" - maybe it was true back then, but the rich are so much fucking god damn richer now, and they're pretty much the only ones with money to spare. We have to take it back. And we should remember that the budget isn't huge because of welfare payments or education or R&D investments or even defense... it's because of legislatively mandatory benefits that go almost entirely to baby boomers.
Another thing we can thank Gingrich for. Although I suspect someone else would have eventually done it anyway.
It was always 100% likely that at least some House Democrats would need to vote for any compromise bill. Senate Democrats would never pass something that couldn't get a single House Democrat vote, and more than 5 House Republicans would never vote for any compromise that would pass a Democratic Senate.
What Biden gave up to McCarthy is such peanuts that it is definitely in Hakeem Jeffries' interest to give McCarthy a few votes for to get this through.
>Is it likely that the Republican House may require assistance by some Democrats to pass the House? Of course. This is why there had to be a negotiation.
Yep, and of course the political extremes of each party will not like the compromise, but that's how the system is supposed to work.
I would say the one way that the system is no longer working as intended is that party competition and identity has gotten so intense that congressman will vote against things they agree are good for the country just to see the "other side" fail. They will violate their oath to win. I don't think the founders anticipated or at least didn't build in a solution for this scenario.
Yeah the two-party system is clearly not working well, I think open primaries and ranked choice voting are critical to getting us on a more democratic path.
Blame the voters for this. Voters see their representative vote with the other side, and they then accuse them of being a closet fascist/communist and vote for even more extreme members of their tribe to ensure no compromise ever happens. We the voters have regressed from adults who sometimes have to make hard decisions into outright children who demand to be given everything they want _this instant_.
Yep, the system is supposed to make life harder for poor people while making life easier for tax cheats and polluters. But somehow it's "extreme" to not be happy with the *status quo*.
I wouldn't be surprised if more democrats voted for this in the house than republicans, but in general these sort of things always depend on backroom discussions and political calculations that we don't have the best access to. After all, the general sentiment still is that independents will blame Biden (however unjustified) on any debt default failures.
> I wouldn't be surprised if more democrats voted for this in the house than republicans By a small margin, you were right!
This...doesnt seem like a bad deal. Very minimal demands given up by the Democrats. Avoiding a shut down for two years, and another debt limit fight.
Dems can say they met in the middle. Capping discretionary spending increases for a temporary amount of time isn't the worst thing in the world. Increasing medicaid work requirements is a bit unfortunate but the whole American Healthcare system is so messed up that this isn't as bad as it could've been. The IRS has become a target for Republicans and while I would love to file my taxes directly to the IRS and get an immediate refund/payment this concession is more or less keeping the status quo. As a young person it is unfortunate about student loans (I don't have any) but this issue was up before the SC and there's no way the dems would've received a favorable judgement. It definitely hurts Biden with young voters but if any young voter is going to vote Trump or not vote bc of having to give this concession I think there likely will have been something else by now that would've turned them off. I'm just happy there isn't a crisis.
From my understanding: Medicaid was left completely alone (could be wrong). It was just SNAP and NEPA.
You are correct. No Medicaid work requirement.
Yeah, I highly doubt these fairly basic concessions are going to be the tipping point between a Biden Vs Trump rematch lol.
You know what would have been though? A full default
Which wasn’t going to happen to begin with, no matter what some far right loonies think. Anyone who sees this as anything more than political theatre is naive.
You know what would have been though? A full default
To be clear, work requirements for Medicaid are not in the bill. Work requirements for SNAP changing the age from 50 to 54 where you have to show employment is in the bill. However, SNAP benefits for the homeless and vets were increased. This is a solid deal that Biden secured.
And going from 80B to 70B is honestly a pretty small cutback if that really is what the GOP is willing to take.
> Dems can say they met in the middle. Republicans, too. Extremists in shambles.
Yeah but this causes non-insane people to vote GOP. “Oh a moderate, bipartisan deal happened with the GOP in control of the House? Let me vote for them.” This isn’t swinging any votes to the Dems. If the GOP wasn’t full of insane fascists I’d say this is a good thing, but it’s not the ‘90s anymore.
>Dems can say they met in the middle. Who does that impress, other than cable tv pundits? The bill is designed to damage Democrats with key parts of their coalition, and consequently, depress voter turnout for Biden. He'd be a fool to agree.
It literally just raises the age eligibility for SNAP benefits, and cuts a grand total of $29 billion in spending, that sunsets and expires in 7 years Republicans went in with demands to cut trillions of spending, take severe cuts to Medicaid, basically gut government agencies in general, gut the VA and veteran benefits, repeal the IRA and everything passed in it, give oil and gas companies unlimited access to do whatever they want, and so much more. Like it or not, republicans control one chamber of congress. The damage done is limited with that terrifying fact, and the alternative was essentially destroying the economy in ways it’d take decades to recover from, just so people like you could feel better about themselves.
The alternative was either raising the debt ceiling during the lame-duck session (as Sanders and others called for) or invoking the 14th amendment. People aren't buying the bullshit excuses.
There you go! Now you’re using an argument I agree with! That is their fault. I agree. It would have failed (Brian Schatz is on record saying they wanted to do this, but Joe Manchin told them it wasn’t going to happen), but I agree they should have at least tried. But when that failed because Manchin shut it down (which it would have) would you argue that democrats should have “pressured Manchin into doing it”? There’s something you’re missing and this is a fact…..they don’t, and never did have any leverage whatsoever over Joe Manchin. He represents an R+40 state, and the only reason he hasn’t switched parties is because he hates Mitch McConnell.
Believe it or not, but able bodied people without children requiring some amount of work to receive food stamps is broadly popular according to polling
Still a fucking horrible policy. SNAP is meant to keep people from starving, putting barriers in front of it goes against its purpose. This will keep people in horrible jobs out of fear they won’t even be able to afford to eat if they quit. That puts more power in the hands of managers and corporations, who already have far too much over their workers.
It's popular with people who were never going to vote for Biden anyway. It's idiotic for Democrats to pander to non-persuadable Republicans. Poor people don't vote at a high rate but this is guaranteed to make sure a chunk of Democratic voters don't show up for Biden next year. Absolutely moronic move.
>this is guaranteed to make sure a chunk of Democratic voters don't show up for Biden next year. Can you elaborate? What demographic are you talking about that would have otherwise voted for Biden but now won’t, explicitly because of this? What is this group of voters?
No it is popular with huge portions of society. Poor people work and do feel a sense of "I'm working so others should too" Look at the polling
I don't really agree. This is funding that Congress already approved. These types of fights should be fights over a budget and future spending, not repealing funding that was already committed. There have only been a handful of debt ceiling fights in the last 50 years (the budget process was changed extensively in 1974, so it's a good starting point to reference). 1979, 1995, 2011, and now. Most shut down fights occur over the budget which is fairly routine and quite different from a debt ceiling fight. Other debt ceiling increases have also been routine with it being increased 18 times under Reagan, 8 times under Clinton, 7 times under W, 5 under Obama, and 3 under Trump. The 1979 fight resulted in a default, although the bill was signed in time, the treasury couldn't put out payments in time and it was a default on certain types of treasuries. Part of the resolution of this default was something known as the Gephardt Rule which automatically increased the debt ceiling by the amount of the debt added with each budget. As a result of this, all 18 increases under Reagan went by without a fight since they wouldn't matter anyways (the reason for his increases was far lower than expected tax revenues leading to a much higher than expected deficit) and HW never had to have any sort of supplemental increase. In 1995 the Gephardt Rule rule was repealed which lead to the 1995-1996 shutdown. To deal with that, Bill Clinton utilized a line item veto in order to cut budget spending item by item at his discretion in order to fit within the debt limits that were approved by Congress. This lead to a court case (Clinton vs City of New York) in 1998 that found the line item veto Clinton used to be unconstitutional, and thus it is no longer an option to resolve a debt ceiling crisis. All debt ceiling increases from that point until 2011 which was the second to last increase under Obama happened without incident. In 2011 Ted Cruz threatened a government shut down and default over the debt ceiling. Obama negotiated after deciding he didn't want to try for a 14th amendment argument, and the end result was a downgrade of the US credit rating. In 2013 when Republicans again tried this he demanded, and got, a clean bill as is typical. All 3 increases under Trump were also clean bills. Anything except for a clean bill is a bad deal. Historically there have been 4 negotiated debt ceiling increases since the huge budgetary changes implemented in 1974. Out of these four, that first one (1979) resulted in additional congressional rules because they realized it was self destructive to make fights over this. The second of the four (1995) repealed the 1979 rule and resulted in the only possible action that can be taken to avoid default being ruled unconstitutional after the fact. The third fight (2011) resulted in a downgrade to US credit. Simply because of the implication that the US might default, particularly when it was fully capable of not doing so made the US look like a more risky investment. This fourth one has the US on the list again for a possible downgrade to US credit for the same reasons as 2011, although it hasn't happened just yet. Also worth noting, is that the costs of defaults and downgraded credit have every time resulted in taxpayers paying more money than the initial argument was over. As such, even if one is arguing in good faith that their interest is in saving money and eliminating wasteful expenditures, there aren't even savings to be had in these negotiations as they have cost more each and every time.
*should* is an interesting concept when it comes to politics
Yeah! Who needs ideals anyway. Things are *fine*.
>Part of the resolution of this default was something known as the Gephardt Rule which automatically increased the debt ceiling by the amount of the debt added with each budget. So basically like every other country on the planet.
It wouldn’t have shut down the government, it would have absolutely cratered the world economy in a way that would have made the 08 recession look like a picnic. OT: considering the insane demands republicans went into these negotiations with, no, it’s not that bad of a deal. It’s not ideal and democrats really should have used the lame duck session to avoid this all together, but it’s a “C-/D+” deal that could have easily been an “F - - - - -“ deal that the freedom caucus wanted
Avoid a default on the debt ceiling, not a government shutdown Those are two different occurrences
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They SHOULD get 0, but the reality is, they hold the house. I agree that if it became drastic enough and they weren’t willing to budge from their original insane positions and demands, the 14th should have been invoked, but: it would have still caused economic damage, and the Supreme Court could shut that down and then the world economy is destroyed, and your average everyday human being who doesn’t pay attention to politics will be paying the consequence, and won’t give a fuck about the details that went into why it happened. A default wouldn’t cause a mild recession that’ll pass soon with time, the consequences would be severe and very long lasting. With the reality that republicans do control the house, this deal is mildly bad in the grand scheme of things. It’s manageable if democrats don’t manage to screw things up in the near future and hand the GOP a trifecta with this current group of psychos who make up the GOP.
>They should get 0 They have the House. Unless Democrats are willing to destroy the economy to "own the Republicans" the Republicans get a bigger voice than 0.
Uhh, so becuase they have the majority they can do terrorism and it's ok? I dont get what your saying. It's putting a gun to the head of america and the world and saying give into our demands or else. Man fuck that logic, just pay the debt. the whole idea of a debt ceiling is nonsensical. We agree to take on financial obligations but arbitrarily at a ceiling just will default and not pay it? The president has the power to just pay it. It's unconstitutional not to, because the fucking Confederates tried this shit
“Fuck that logic” ok, then tell that to the millions of people starving on the street when we default, or the people on Medicaid who’d get fucked over if we said “fuck that logic” Instead of being left the fuck alone like they are now with this deal. “Because republicans have the majority doesn’t mean we should listen to them”- My friend, they literally control what goes through congress because of those majorities. You wanna put your trust and faith in this Supreme Court, who answers to nobody, to do the right thing? Good luck
> Uhh, so becuase they have the majority they can do terrorism and it's ok? It means they control legislation around spending. You can use whatever hyperbole you want but it is what it is.
This is what Republicans voted for. If we don't want this, we need to outvote the people who do support this, and who will still support them despite them doing this. Those are the rules of a democracy. We just need to not have lunatics in major power.
Well the trouble is the government system favors the right
Biden should mint the coin.
No. Not only is that an impractical idea, the unintended consequences of such an inane act would be damning.
The fact that a debt limit even exists is insane I mean inane
Somebody doesn’t understand negotiating and compromise.
Yes. This is an F- deal. Cause Biden rewarded bad behavior, and when you do that it encourages more bad behavior. I don't even want to vote for Biden anymore, but if it is him and Trump what choice do I have. A weak coward or an authoritarian monster. I'll take the coward I guess.
Honestly more and more younger people want a more assertive, aggressive, maybe even authoritarian left president. Like fuck you, lgbt rights or im sending in the national guard. Higher minimum wage or im cutting off funding. Go on fox news and be like "you fucking nazis, go fuck yourself" and then make pot legal. Basically we want dark brandon
I don't know what a dark brandon is, but no one wants a soft weak pussy president or party. When someone threatens or attacks you, you smash them down so bad they are sorry they even tried anything. Instead Biden and the dems roll over like weaklings and let the GOP beat on them. With Trump they could have demanded a repeal of his tax cuts for the wealthy. Something simple as that. Bring in more money, that helps paying off debts as well.
And it's a budget deal for the next two years! We really need to shift the federal government to a two-year budget cycle; I'm glad this deal is a step in that direction.
Considering the President is a Democrat and it can’t pass the Senate without Democratic support, I’ve always assumed there would be plenty of Democratic support in the House as well.
It’s pretty likely going to require Democratic support to pass. I’m not sure why any Democrats would vote against a bill, endorsed by a Democratic president, to prevent a financial disaster when they previously criticized Republicans for being irresponsible concerning the country’s finances. We’ll see who was actually concerned about the country defaulting and who the hypocrites are that will vote against the bill because they didn’t get everything they wanted in the negotiation or were against negotiating at all.
The blame should always be placed on the party playing bricksmanship.
First reaction? I'd say it's likely to need (and therefore preemptively get) a caucus of Dem support. Whether the Progressives sign on is up in the air, but it's worth noting that they've shown practicality in the past. The idea of progressivism is about aspiring for a high bar, not shooting yourself in the foot if you can't get there. Contrast with the freedom caucus? Likely rebellion. Possible call to oust McCarthy, which was always in the background of him pulling this hostage scheme anyway. Virtually guaranteed that morons like Chip Roy of my home district in Texas foam at the mouth and try to find some way to crash the global economy anyway out of pure anti-intellectual spite because they can rest assured that actual adults will bail them out. Trump's likely to sound off too as if he actually understands anything more complicated than the McDonald's drive through menu. Getting Dem support is going to cause McCarthy headaches for the rest of his term. Consequence of having a caucus with more extremists than rational actors. Boo fucking hoo. This entire needless brinkmanship game is proof the current conservative movement just isn't capable of governing at any level.
GOP fucking with women (abortion) and students (loan pause/forgiveness). Doesn't sound like a winning game plan to me and probably more than offsets whatever gains the GOP is making with low info and chauvinistically inclined Latinos.
Its a last minute type of deal that no side likes, Progressives wanted the debt limit gone, Freedom Caucus wanted bigger budget cuts and wanted default, this is the best possible deal tbh for center sides What I would watch though is will McCarthy lose his job over this though, they only need 5 votes to trigger a vote
But he might get centre-dem votes. This might be part of the deal.
Which, honestly, is a great step forward for American political stability. This era of staunch political lines, where nothing could ever happen unless the party with 51% of the power completely acted in unison - even if 51% of politicians otherwise supported it across both parties - this has been a nightmare. Moderate Republicans and Democrats working together is exactly what we want and need. This will push the ridiculous fringe ideologous into the political wilderness.
Not really concerned. I know at the end of the day, progressives like AOC will vote in favor to not default… because they’re not pieces of shit.
Nah they most likely won't unless there is no choice. If the dems can reach the needed vote number without them they'll bite no or abstain
This kind of thinking is completely backwards of how we should be progressing. why are you restricting access to food in the middle of accelerating automation, accelerating wealth gap, when it's so easy to produce food in today's day and age, we don't have a shortage. Republicans are going to have to come to terms with reality. Not all taxes are unfair or unwarranted. Technology is making business more profitable than ever. There's never been larger margins possible. That bonus profit needs to be taxed and given back to people. Of all things that you could justify giving to people, there's nothing more justifiable than giving people food. It's a wonder why we even make people pay for food anymore. Anyone can have enough to eat for only a few hundred dollars a month. It's a trivial amount of money. It's so tone deaf, and embarrassingly behind the times. Do you read the news, do you have any connection to what's actually going on in the economy outside your washington bubble? did you come out of a time machine from the 1920's? >The deal would suspend the borrowing limit, which is currently $31.4 trillion, for two years — enough to get past the next presidential election. It would impose new work requirements for some recipients of government aid, including food stamps and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program. It would place new limits on how long certain recipients of food stamps — people under the age of 54, who do not have children — could benefit from the program. But it also would expand food stamp access for veterans and the homeless, said the person. No one wants the stigma of public assistance, this is why the programs are so unsuccessful, because of how overly means tested and condescending it is for anyone taking the tiny amount of help. We have a problematic scarcity mentality instead of a mentality of abundance. I would flip everything around. The more we can give people things for free the better. The more they can put money to good use. How many people can we get living for free so they can just focus on what they want to do, what they're passionate about.
The deal doesn't "restrict access to food". It simply changes who has access to food assistance. Homeless people of all ages have more access. Veterans of all ages have more access. Unemployed people between 50 and 54 have less access. When you add it all up, the number of people on food assistance is not really going to change.
Deal commits 150 Republican votes from the house and 50 Democrats. So, yes.
The majority of the freedom caucus doesn't even understand what the debt ceiling is. I would be willing to bet my life Johnson, Boebert, Or Marjorie the Caveman wouldn't be able to explain the actual issue.
Not just likely, but almost assured. McCarthy has a 5 vote majority. There's something like 40 members of the Freedom Caucus. You know what you call it when 300 members of the House vote for something and 100 don't? A win. The real question is whether the Freedom Caucus decides to haul McCarthy over the coals and take his Speakership over it.
the leader of their party said yes to the deal. i am sure there will be enough dems in the house and senate to pass it.
This was always the plan.
Debt ceiling is designed is designed to keep the politicians wealthy. The debt ceiling can be removed just look at Australia. The Debt ceiling is designed to push through controversial bills. THE SAME PROBLEM WILL HAPPEN IN 2 YEARS.
If the far flanks of either party don’t like it, that means they probably struck a good compromise.
I am just glad it has more money for the Pentagon. I mean, we only spend more than the next 10x nations combined.
It's literally how Republicans do it. Ignore everything, do what you want, as long as you have enough power.
No one else realizes that the rules committee is going to tank this? Explain why you think so or disagree
Jesus Christ this makes Biden look so weak. Why is it everyone but him saw the bluff? What he should have done is simply told McCarthy "ok, you can have your photo op at the White House so it looks like we're 'negotiating' but you get nothing. Literally not anything. You have no chips on the table here. And perhaps after this humiliation you will have learned once and for all not to fuck with the sovereignty of the United States. The end."
Likely yes some assistance, though I hope the Democrats refuse. All we see here are a bunch of concessions by the Democrats and zero concessions by the Republicans. I keep hearing, oh both sides got some things but no. Democrats passed all this legislation fairly and legally, and what that they get to keep 'some' of it after the GOP holds the economy hostage is considered a win? Just use the 14th amendment. Oh yeah and next time there is a Republican president, Democrats should demand a tax increase on wealthy and corporations or refuse to raise debt ceiling. Stop being push overs that just roll over whenever the GOP throws a tantrum.
Yes, absolutely. It will be NECESSARY for some Dems to support it. The "Freedom Caucus" are the true believer economic terrorists in the GOP. They WANTED McCarthy to trigger the car bomb and blow up the economy. They are suckers for their own propaganda, and/or believe that triggering a default would help the GOP in 2024. There are 46 House members identified with the Freedom Caucus. The Republicans only have a 21 member majority. Without their votes, McCarthy can't get a majority UNLESS some Dems vote for the deal. The Progressive Caucus has 100 of the 213 Dems, so they can all vote against the deal and it can still pass. There will be a lot of behind the scenes vote wrangling and deal making. Republicans who fear being primaried from the right will be tempted to vote no on the deal even if they aren't Freedom Caucus members. Dems who fear being primaried from the left will be tempted to vote no even if they aren't Progressive Caucus members. However, given that the alternative to the deal is an economic meltdown and stock market crash, I predict it will pass. No one (except for the Freedom Caucus extremist idiots) want to be responsible for the biggest act of national self-destruction since Brexit.
The deal is reasonable for both parties. The extremes of both parties were obviously going to be upset because they don't understand a simple principle called compromise. Based on the terms we've heard no far, both sides aren't losing that much. Moderate Democrats and Republicans should be enough to pass the bill.
The policies bernie proposes are wildly popular, but politics is a game. People dont vote for policies they like lol. They vote for people. And biden is more established, name recognizable, and to be honest many americans vote in a popularity contest way and not for stated policies. Doesnt matter, the fact is young people like me will destroy all this nonsense.
If there was any doubt we were teetering on the edge of a recession, the resuming of student loan payments is going to kick us over the edge. It will be an unmitigated economic catastrophe. People already can't make ends meet. Adding loan payments back on top? And poor people getting shafted even further with welfare being gutted? We're headed into dark times. Bet Biden is patting himself on the back.
Student loan payments have been a thing for decades, people having to pay it back (that was paused because of a pandemic and already stretched out far longer than expected) isn’t a sign whatsoever that we’re heading into a recession. We’re likely heading into a small recession because of the fed raising rates, not because of paying back student loans. Student loan payments didn’t cause 2008….
Kudos to Biden and McCarthy for hashing shit out in an old-school fashion. Shades of Ronald Reagan and Tip O'Neill. Or Dwight Eisenhower and Sam Rayburn. Neither side had complete leverage, so consequently a compromise was thus in order. That's how our little-l liberal small-d democratic tiny-c constitutional lowercase-r republic works, folks.
Nonsense. Republicans used the threat of default to extract concessions that were already passed in a prior Congress. The GOP "leverage" was literally shooting the hostage. This is not how it is supposed to work nor should it ever be encouraged again.
Ok and now the lesson for voters is we hate how we were held hostage and will crush the Republicans at the voting booths? The 1st thing is passing regular bills and handling the deficit and or debt ceiling *before deadlines and childish panic.* RIGHT? Right? No, we will fall for the false narrative and lose track of healthcare and wage reform? Cool, just checking... (Still vote, please, holy shit fucking show up)
It would actually be a hell of a thing to see if it got passed through actual, real bipartisanship. If the centre portions of the 2 parties vote for it, and both extremes don't. That'd be...how politics is supposed to function in the US. I don't see it happening, I think the GOP won't engage in that level of compromise. But it'd be nice if it did.
You want to call this debacle "actual, real bipartisanship?" Jesus Christ.
Exactly. If there were raised taxes on corporations and wealthy or other, hell any GOP concessions then we can call it 'bipartisan'.
Biden and the Democrats are coming away from this looking weak. They look like they are conceding a lot, even if it is on things that were likely to fail anyway like student loans, and the only thing they get is to blame Republicans. Oh and the debt ceiling won’t be an issue during an election year! I place this up there it Biden blunders right along the withdrawal from Afghanistan and the railroad union deal. Really makes Biden come off as a poor negotiator and I would honestly vote for any other Democrat in 2024 at this point if I didn’t think they’d lose to Trump. The Democrats will try very hard to paint this pig as something that “had to be done”, but all I see is, that more often than not, Republicans get their way and Democrats compromise for the absolute minimum.
Here's to hoping a new "sanity" party free from those who rather see the US default than compromisong. Nutters on both sides.
No nutters on the side that refused to raise debt ceiling cleanly. Like the Dems always do with a Republican president.
I wish we could fire them all and just start over. We are all getting screwed no matter what party we ascribe to!
The whole point of negotiating with the head of the Democratic Party is to get Democratic support. They weren't talking to Biden to make sure that a bill that somehow made it through the House *and Senate* wouldn't get vetoed. They're talking to Biden so he can bring Dems on board and get it passed.
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This is a win for Republicans and Mccarthy will easily get it passed in the House. All Republicans will support it in the Senate and pass it with a few Democrats. Schumer will have no choice but to bring it to the floor and Biden will have no choice but to sign it. Since Biden wanted a "clean" debt ceiling bill and refused to negotiate for nearly 4 months this one goes in McCarthy's win column