There’s really not much drama going on in Congress lately, but a manufactured crisis could shut down the federal government right in the middle of the general election season, as I explained at New York:
Kicking cans down the road is an essential skill in Congress, particularly when partisan control of the government is divided, as it is now. Routine decisions like keeping the federal government operating must await posturing over essential laws each party wants to enact but does not have the power to impose. And that’s why there seems to be a perpetual threat of a government shutdown — which is what happens if either house of Congress or the president refuses to sign off on spending authority — and why Washington typically lurches along from stopgap spending deal to stopgap spending deal.
The most recent stopgap spending deal expires on September 30, the last day of Fiscal Year 2024. There’s been some back-and-forth about the length of the next stopgap based on changing calculations of which party is likely to be in the ascendancy after the November election. But this normal bit of maneuvering suddenly turned fraught as Donald Trump bigfooted his way into the discussion on Truth Social not long before he debated Kamala Harris:
“If Republicans in the House, and Senate, don’t get absolute assurances on Election Security, THEY SHOULD, IN NO WAY, SHAPE, OR FORM, GO FORWARD WITH A CONTINUING RESOLUTION ON THE BUDGET. THE DEMOCRATS ARE TRYING TO “STUFF” VOTER REGISTRATIONS WITH ILLEGAL ALIENS. DON’T LET IT HAPPEN — CLOSE IT DOWN!!!”
The backstory is that in April, when Speaker Mike Johnson was feeling some heat from the House Freedom Caucus over allegedly “caving” to Democrats in the last stopgap spending fight, the Louisianan scurried down to Mar-a-Lago to huddle with the Boss. Johnson announced he would do Trump’s bidding by introducing a bill to outlaw noncitizen voting, the phantom menace that is one of Trump’s favorite stolen-election fables. Those of us who understood that noncitizen voting (of which there is no actual evidence beyond a handful of votes among hundreds of millions) is already illegal shrugged it off as a MAGA red-meat treat.
But Johnson forged ahead with a House vote to approve the so-called SAVE Act. After the Senate ignored it, he included it in the first draft of his new stopgap bill. Everyone, and I do mean everyone, figured it would be dropped when negotiations got serious. But then Trump made his latest intervention and then, worse yet, Johnson couldn’t get the votes to pass his stopgap and get the ping-pong game with Democrats going (many right-wing House members won’t vote for any stopgap spending bill, and others are demanding big domestic spending cuts that don’t pass the smell test). So Johnson is back to square one, as the New York Times reports:
“Speaker Mike Johnson on Wednesday abruptly canceled a vote on his initial plan to avert a government shutdown, as opposition to the six-month stopgap funding measure piled up in both parties.
“It was a bruising setback for Mr. Johnson coming only a few weeks before a Sept. 30 deadline Congress faces to fund the government or face a shutdown.”
So now what? In the intense heat of an election year in which both the House and the White House are poised between the two parties, the leader of the GOP ticket has ordered Johnson to hold his breath until he turns blue — or more to the point, until the government is shut down — unless something happens that is as likely as Johnson suddenly coming out for abortion rights. Indeed, far from ramming the deeply offensive and impractical SAVE Act down the throats of Chuck Schumer and Joe Biden, he can’t even get the stopgap spending measure that includes it out of his own chamber. In the past, Democrats have loaned him a few votes to help him out of a jam, but they won’t do it unless he drops the SAVE Act. And if he drops the SAVE Act, Trump’s friends in the House will happily drop him the first chance they get (maybe right away, or maybe after the election). On the other hand, if he obeys Trump and refuses to move any spending bill, there’s a good chance a few Republicans will defect and back a Democratic measure to avoid an unusually pointless and politically damaging government shutdown. That, too, would expose Johnson as feckless and disposable.
Ever since Johnson succeeded Kevin McCarthy, Washington observers have alternated between treating him as some sort of backwoods parliamentary genius who fools people with his apparent befuddlement and as a Mr. Magoo who stumbles forward blindly and survives by luck and the fact that House Republicans have no better prospects for wielding the gavel. We’ll soon see which Mike Johnson emerges from the current morass. Another major incident of GOP fecklessness and disarray could help Democrats flip the House, but it’s a shame people may not be able to do their jobs in the interim.
“Liar, Krugman of NYT, blasts McCain With the Truth”
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/9/12/01115/6334/278/595686
Republicans Hijacked 911, by Keith Olberman, Courage to Speak Truth!
http://www.jedreport.com/2008/09/special-commen…
How many more Journalists & Reporters will show courage and begin to do their duty and Inform the public as to truth and falsity? We should never again be lied into a False & Phony war by a President you want to have a beer with! Republicans strong on National Security? I don’t think so, after all 911 happened on their watch, but they have been allowed to distort the facts and public perception that it is the Democrats who are weak on national security! They have failed to properly enact the 911 Commissions recommendations which would make us a lot safer! Politicans who willfully and intentionally lie to the public are engaged in a betrayal of the public trust and such distortion should be deemed unethical and in some cases, criminal! We need a Media to be the third-wheel of democracy again and not a parrot of those who are corrupt, unless they are corrupt too!
Republicans are just as dismal on economics. It is an outrage or should be that the government can give millions of dollars to CEO’s from the failed Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac and yet, cannot give a second stimulus check to American citizens in these hard economic times? Republicans say No to a second stimulus while the Democrats say Yes to a second stimulus! Is the Republican Congress working for CEO’s or are they working for you, the people? We need a Government and a Congress to work for the People, not lie to the people, not bail out their own special interest groups and leave the people hanging. We need a government to put the burden of taxes on the rich where they belong and stop putting the tax burdens on the middle class and poor, those who can least afford it. We need a government who will put money into education and make that a national priority again, both lower and higher education and give more Pell Grants and less loans so that young people can once again achieve a higher education, get a good job and lift everybody up out of poverty. We need action and not more spin, talk and lies. We need a Congress who will vote Yes to bridges, roads, schools, health care. Who will invest in America and not in Iraq and in themselves and their special interest groups. America is dying. We need Change!
And we need to play just as dirty in order to win, or we will fall back into out usual form..that of losers.
The moment McCain clearly pulled into the lead in the Republican primaries last winter there were three predictions that could be made with absolute certainty.
1. That McCain’s unique biography would have tremendous appeal for those voters who didn’t know his history and choose their candidate based on personality rather than positions on major issues.
2. That, if a “high road” campaign did not seem to be doing the job by summer, Bush-Rove operatives would be called in to run a nasty, “swift-boat” style media campaign for the fall.
3. That religious and cultural conservatives would be extremely unhappy and unenthusiastic with McCain as the candidate but – recognizing the huge threat posed by Democratic victory – – would somehow rationalize a way to actively support him after the conventions.
Seen in this light, the only real surprises in this campaign have been (1) that Obama actually proved himself to be extraordinarily compelling and attractive as a candidate and orator – much more than anyone anticipated last February – and (2) that John McCain found a Vice-Presidential choice who is every bit as “rock star” mediagenic and attractive to her natural conservative audience as Obama is to his.
Now sure, it would have been lovely if McCain had continued to run a lackluster campaign, chose a conventional and very boring vice-president, refused to go nasty and negative and continued to reject the religious and cultural conservatives as “agents of intolerance” – but was there really any reason to think this would actually happen?
Not a chance. After a very slow start, the Republicans are just reverting back to form – avoiding the issues, blatantly lying about their opponents, appealing to “Us vs. Them” rhetoric and stereotypes.
Let’s face it, aren’t these the tactics and isn’t this the battle we knew we’d be in from the very beginning.
Yeah it’s ugly, but it isn’t a surprise.