So the federal government didn’t shut down, and the appropriations deal that was cut disappointed many Tea Party types (particularly those focused on defunding family planning) and probably even more progressives, with the latter being particularly upset by White House boasting over the level of spending cuts involved.
But just about everyone understands the bigger fight over the long-term budget is a much bigger deal, with the possibility of a rejection of a public debt limit increase being the hand grenade Tea Party allies are threatening to unpin.
This is the point at which tactical retreats by Democrats will stop making much sense. And for that reason, there is already heavy grumbling among Democrats about reports the White House is going to soon release plans for a deficit reduction strategy that includes “entitlement reform.”
The key thing to watch for is whether the administration consistently links changes in entitlement programs (sure to fall far short of the kind of toxic “reforms” being proposed by Paul Ryan) to tax increases for the wealthy. So long as they do that, and Republicans continue to oppose revenue increases as a theological matter, then talk of “betrayal” or “surrender” is simply wrong. Sure, many progressives prefer a different strategy based on out-front, unambiguous opposition to any change in entitlements. But that’s not the same as asserting that anything less is no strategy at all.
This year’s big media narrative has been the confirmation saga of Neera Tanden, Biden’s nominee for director of the Office of Management and Budget. At New York I wrote about how over-heated the talk surrounding Tanden has become.
Okay, folks, this is getting ridiculous. When a vote in the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee on the nomination of Neera Tanden was postponed earlier this week, you would have thought it presented an existential threat to the Biden presidency. “Scrutiny over Tanden’s selection has continued to build as the story over her uneven reception on Capitol Hill stretched through the week,” said one Washington Post story. Politico Playbook suggested that if Tanden didn’t recover, the brouhaha “has the potential to be what Biden might call a BFD.” There’sbeen all sorts of unintentionally funny speculation about whether the White House is playing some sort of “three-dimensional chess” in its handling of the confirmation, disguising a nefarious plan B or C.
Perhaps it reflects the law of supply and demand, which requires the inflation of any bit of trouble for Biden into a crisis. After all, his Cabinet nominees have been approved by the Senate with a minimum of 56 votes; the second-lowest level of support was 64 votes. One nominee who was the subject of all sorts of initial shrieking, Tom Vilsack, was confirmed with 92 Senate votes. Meanwhile, Congress is on track to approve the largest package of legislation moved by any president since at least the Reagan budget of 1981, with a lot of the work on it being conducted quietly in both chambers. Maybe if the bill hits some sort of roadblock, or if Republican fury at HHS nominee Xavier Becerra (whose confirmation has predictably become the big fundraising and mobilization vehicle for the GOP’s very loud anti-abortion constituency) reaches a certain decibel level, Tanden can get out of the spotlight for a bit.
But what’s really unfair — and beyond that, surreal — is the extent to which this confirmation is being treated as more important than all the others combined, or indeed, as a make-or-break moment for a presidency that has barely begun. It’s not. If Tanden cannot get confirmed, the Biden administration won’t miss a beat, and I am reasonably sure she will still have a distinguished future in public affairs (though perhaps one without much of a social-media presence). And if she is confirmed, we’ll all forget about the brouhaha and begin focusing on how she does the job, which she is, by all accounts, qualified to perform.
