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You are here: MacNN Forums > Community > MacNN Lounge > Political/War Lounge > Shut it down! III: The Search for Bipartisan Agreement

View Poll Results: Will the government shut down?
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Yes, a budget agreement will not be made 1 votes (16.67%)
No, it will be averted as before 3 votes (50.00%)
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Shut it down! III: The Search for Bipartisan Agreement (Page 2)
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OreoCookie
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Sep 8, 2017, 11:46 AM
 
Originally Posted by The Final Dakar View Post
I don't think it's how democracies are supposed to work …
What I wrote wasn't meant to be deep: I was just saying that within a democracy, expect competition, and don't complain if you have it. Bernie Sanders wanted to change the course of the Democratic Party and he had the support of a good share of its members. All of this is fair game.
Originally Posted by The Final Dakar View Post
… but it seems the most logical option when yours has been rigged into a two party system.
The two-party system is a consequence of the winner-takes-all voting system. If you want to go away from a two-party system, you need to change how seats are assigned to members of Congress.
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The Final Dakar  (op)
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Sep 8, 2017, 11:48 AM
 
I agree Oreo, but also note that the parties hold the gate key to the presidential debates too. No free press for rival parties.

(I know I've repeatedly said FPTP skews the system, but that doesn't excuse collusion between the two parties to dominate the market. They reinforce their duopoly.)
     
The Final Dakar  (op)
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Sep 8, 2017, 07:57 PM
 
Well it's official. Looking forward to December when the democrats hold everything hostage and Trump impotently reams them out on twitter.

Still baffled about this. Did he do this just to piss of Ryan and McConnell?
     
OreoCookie
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Sep 8, 2017, 09:37 PM
 
Originally Posted by The Final Dakar View Post
I agree Oreo, but also note that the parties hold the gate key to the presidential debates too. No free press for rival parties.
I agree with you on the details and a whole, but the development towards a two-party system is normal in a winner-takes-all voting system. If you want more than two parties, you need to change the voting system.
Originally Posted by The Final Dakar View Post
(I know I've repeatedly said FPTP skews the system, but that doesn't excuse collusion between the two parties to dominate the market. They reinforce their duopoly.)
Yes, the players exploit the system and they have zero interest in allowing for more competition, I agree, but it's the people that have the power. If the people decide they want to change something, then they can do it. I don't remember hearing about any serious debate taking place to improve the US Constitution and fix some of the glaring flaws. Just to name one more: political parties were consciously excluded by the Founding Fathers, but evidently should have been included.
Originally Posted by The Final Dakar View Post
Well it's official. Looking forward to December when the democrats hold everything hostage and Trump impotently reams them out on twitter.

Still baffled about this. Did he do this just to piss of Ryan and McConnell?
I doubt Trump has any long-term strategy here, but he feels that even with his miserable approval numbers, he is still more popular than Congress — and he uses that as leverage for short-term gain. I think Trump's short-term goal is to get relief funds for Texas, and this was a way to get it. He knows it'd look really bad if Congress doesn't allocate funds for victims of hurricane Harvey, because of some legislative technicality such as the debt ceiling (which he is completely ignorant about).

And his actions further expose the Republicans's inability to use their majority in Congress. At this point I'd praise them if they managed to pass a regular budget instead of continuing resolutions. The Republicans may be angry, but Trump sees himself as a deal maker — and that means if he can't make a deal with the GOP, he will make one with the Democrats. I have zero sympathy for them, they chose Trump, they apologized for Trump's escapades, which range from the benign to the rather serious, and now they have to sleep in the bed that they made.
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The Final Dakar  (op)
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Nov 28, 2017, 02:00 PM
 
Back on the clock
     
The Final Dakar  (op)
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Jan 15, 2018, 01:21 PM
 
Back on the clock, again

No DACA no deal, IMO
     
The Final Dakar  (op)
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Jan 20, 2018, 05:28 PM
 
We finally here fam

First govt shutdown with one party holding all three branches.
Supposedly earliest shutdown in a presidency.

Not sure what the path out of this is. Even if we get a CR, somethings gotta give on DACA.
     
The Final Dakar  (op)
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Jan 20, 2018, 05:42 PM
 
“Well, if you say who gets fired it always has to be the top,” Trump said. “I mean, problems start from the top and they have to get solved from the top and the president’s the leader. And he’s got to get everybody in a room and he’s got to lead.”
He said that further down in history, “when they talk about the government shutdown, they’re going to be talking about the president of the United States, who the president was at that time.”

“They’re not going to be talking about who was the head of the House, the head the Senate, who’s running things in Washington,” Trump said.

“So I really think the pressure is on the president,” he added.
There's almost always a quote...
     
Thorzdad
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Jan 21, 2018, 03:13 PM
 
Originally Posted by The Final Dakar View Post
There's almost always a quote...
Which would be completely denied he ever said, despite it being on-record, because fake-news, and his staff and his base would fall in-step. Regardless, he'd never take responsibility, anyway. He's never assumed responsibility for anything even remotely negative throughout his career. That's what minions and business partners are for.
( Last edited by Thorzdad; Jan 22, 2018 at 08:52 AM. )
     
Waragainstsleep
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Jan 22, 2018, 01:03 AM
 
He's Eric Cartman. But not as smart.
I have plenty of more important things to do, if only I could bring myself to do them....
     
The Final Dakar  (op)
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Feb 7, 2018, 08:43 PM
 
Where we stand right now: Senate Dems & Pubs came to an agreement on the budget. House is in flux. Freedom Caucus doesn't seem too gung-ho and House Dems won't vote for a bill without assurances from Ryan on a DACA vote. Such assurances from Ryan would probably piss of the GOP further.

Its an interesting reversal since House GOP can pass bills without dems. Not sure where the blame goes if the GOP rebels on the bill and Dems don't pick up the slack.
     
Thorzdad
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Feb 8, 2018, 09:49 PM
 
Rand Paul is currently filibustering against any deal that doesn’t include the reinstatement of budget caps. Says he’s prepared to go into the morning if need be.

Meanwhile, in the House, Ryan is still trying to find votes. Speaking of Ryan, when criticized about rising deficits in the spending bill (particulatly, the boost in military spending) he said “The military is not the reason we've got fiscal problems. It is entitlements.” He really can’t wait to gut Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, etc. It’s like it’s his whole reason for being.
     
reader50
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Feb 8, 2018, 10:06 PM
 
Perhaps we have fiscal problems because they just passed big tax cuts. Especially on the top end.
     
The Final Dakar  (op)
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Feb 8, 2018, 10:43 PM
 
Originally Posted by Thorzdad View Post
He really can’t wait to gut Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, etc. It’s like it’s his whole reason for being.
There was a story last year when they we going to repeal the ACA and sneak it cuts to medicare that it was something he always dreamed of doing since talking about it at college.

Like, Jesus.


Originally Posted by reader50 View Post
Perhaps we have fiscal problems because they just passed big tax cuts. Especially on the top end.
There's a comparison floating around that I haven't been able to verify but something to the effect that this budget adds more spending than the Obama stimulus the GOP fought? It sounds too crazy for me to believe. Perhaps its accurate with some spin.
     
OreoCookie
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Feb 9, 2018, 12:13 AM
 
Originally Posted by The Final Dakar View Post
There's a comparison floating around that I haven't been able to verify but something to the effect that this budget adds more spending than the Obama stimulus the GOP fought? It sounds too crazy for me to believe. Perhaps its accurate with some spin.
The difference is that Obama did this to prevent a collapse of whole sectors of the US industry, whereas now the economy is doing great. This would be the time to pay back debt rather than inject another stimulus. (You can disagree with the specifics of Obama's stimulus bill, I certainly do, but the overall point still stands.)
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Laminar
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Feb 9, 2018, 10:19 AM
 
Originally Posted by The Final Dakar View Post
There's a comparison floating around that I haven't been able to verify but something to the effect that this budget adds more spending than the Obama stimulus the GOP fought? It sounds too crazy for me to believe. Perhaps its accurate with some spin.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/06/u...inflation.html

The $1.5 trillion tax cut that President Trump signed into law late last year, combined with a looming agreement to increase federal spending by hundreds of billions of dollars, would deliver a larger short-term fiscal boost than President Barack Obama and Democrats packed into their $835 billion stimulus package in the Great Recession.
Treasury officials said last week that the United States will need to borrow $441 billion in privately held debt this quarter, the largest sum since 2010, when the economy was emerging from the worst downturn since the Great Depression.
The Republican tax law’s $1.5 trillion deficit-financed price tag over the next decade is front-loaded. It will reduce federal revenue by $416 billion over this year and next, before accounting for additional economic growth, the Joint Committee on Taxation estimates. Many corporations are showing evidence of that in their quarterly earnings releases, as companies like JPMorgan Chase & Company and Verizon project billions of dollars in tax savings in 2018.

Administration officials say the law will spark enough growth to pay for itself, a claim that no rigorous outside analysis supports.
     
The Final Dakar  (op)
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Feb 11, 2018, 10:12 PM
 
Thanks. I'm not sure that's an apples-to-apples comparison for me. Probably because I don't consider corporate tax cuts an effective stimulus. Since the GOP claims its a stimulus, though, I suppose my opinion is moot. On the other hand, the GOP likely calls it a stimulus because there's no good messaging to be had. As it is, the notion of a stimulus at peak employment makes no sense, which kind of tells you why the tax cuts were really had.
     
OreoCookie
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Feb 12, 2018, 12:12 AM
 
@The Final Dakar
I think we can separate two important points here: one is the specific policy decision, i. e. whether corporate tax cuts really lead to growth so that tax revenue remains unaffected. But on a more fundamental level, for a lot of discussions the GOP has stopped using factual evidence and expert opinion to bolster their arguments. That's the bigger problem here.
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The Final Dakar  (op)
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Feb 12, 2018, 02:03 AM
 
Originally Posted by OreoCookie View Post
But on a more fundamental level, for a lot of discussions the GOP has stopped using factual evidence and expert opinion to bolster their arguments. That's the bigger problem here.
I actually don't think it applies here because GOP belief in tax cuts is a philosophical problem. They would readily admit that even if tax cuts didn't spur growth its still the right thing to do. This usually stems from either seeing most government spending as waste or the more virulent 'taxes are theft' strain.
     
OreoCookie
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Feb 12, 2018, 02:21 AM
 
Originally Posted by The Final Dakar View Post
I actually don't think it applies here because GOP belief in tax cuts is a philosophical problem.
Marxism (as developed initially) is also a political philosophy. In theory it could work and could be compatible with democracy. In practice it is not. I even read some conservative commentators proclaiming that the GOP was put on this earth to cut taxes and “shrink the government”. I mean, if that is your view of yourself, your philosophy really deserves to die.
Originally Posted by The Final Dakar View Post
They would readily admit that even if tax cuts didn't spur growth its still the right thing to do. This usually stems from either seeing most government spending as waste or the more virulent 'taxes are theft' strain.
Even if you grant them that tax cuts might be useful in certain circumstances, the GOP usually looks back towards the Reagan era where the economy was depressed and all. Now the US economy is (judged from things like unemployment etc.) doing very well. So even if you believed that deficit-funded tax cuts in the Reagan era were the right thing to do, it doesn't mean it is now. (Just to be clear: I am not a “believer” in Reagan's tax cuts, it accelerated the thinning out of the US middle class.)

And honestly, I don't think most politicians really believe that “taxes are theft” or “most government spending is a waste”. It is that this is what sells. Ditto for tax cuts, which is as popular as eating ice cream after each dinner — and wanting to believe that this diet won't make you fat. (It feels good now, doesn't it?!)
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