The Debt Ceiling Blues

I've been taking a break from blogging, but not from following what's going on in politics, and, honestly?  This whole debt ceiling saga is not the kind of thing that makes my blogging-muses salivate. For one thing: the debt ceiling is a big deal.  Leaving aside the constitutional "full faith and credit" business, there's the whole economy to think of.  A double-dip recession would be just one of the not-fun things that would likely transpire.  And the principle on which the debt ceiling not be raised allegedly hinges is just stupid: the debt ceiling has to do with spending that's already been done, and a default would a) raise the interest rates and b) cost the economy both in the short and long run.  There just doesn't seem to be anything fiscally conservative about it. Carking on about spending cuts without any concession on revenue increases is even more out of touch. Reagan raised taxes.  Bush the first raised taxes. Clinton raised taxes--

And yet, right now, tax revenues are at, what, a sixty-year low? Again, maybe I have an understanding of the term "fiscally conservative" that doesn't equal "nucking futz", but really? Have that many Teahadists swallowed the Norquist Kool-Aid? 

 Anyway, this debt ceiling drama just seems like dragging out an inevitability for political points. I should be at least able to enjoy it for the spectacle and pageantry it is, but sadly, uh-uh.  I am not enjoying the plot, it's derivative and repetitious, the pacing is bad, the characters are simply not believable--

And of course, this is not a play but real fucking life and I kind of wish everyone would act a little more like they "got" that.



My impressions of the dramatis personae thus far:

1) John Boehner.  Not the most "ept". Says one thing one day, says something else another.  Possibly out of his depth.  Or, presiding over a really useless House majority, uselessly.

2) Eric Cantor.  Designated driver? I'm fond of Dana Milbank's characterization of Cantor's role. To which I'd only add, it is believed that there's more than just ambition in Cantor's possible motivation in fumbling any deal before a default.

3) Barack Obama.  The Gambler? I'm not in the "Closet Conservative" or the "Eleventy-Dimensional Chess!" camps of Obama analysis.  Obama is a left-leaning centrist who looks for consensus and tries to get the best deal he actually can when dealing with a complex diversity of opposing views.   Sometimes I get why he's doing a thing, sometimes I don't-- but I don't necessarily assume that what he does as policy or puts forth as a proposal is "the Real Obama".

Take putting Social Security and Medicare on the table. He makes lefties nervous with that stuff. Did he think Pelosi and Reid would find anything that makes cuts as deep as he was proposing, and an attack on the social safety net, even remotely acceptable? Probably not--in fact, that shit might have had to go in there just to be unacceptable enough to guarantee that no Democrats would be okay with it, because, let's be real--Democrats in general can be disappointingly eager to take bad compromises. But they are too smart to drink poison.

On the other had--that should have been toooooo delicious for Boehner, Cantor, et als to pass up--but they had to! More on that....

4) Mitch McConnell.  I don't like him at all. It's been pretty clear since he claimed that the GOP's job was to see to it that Obama does not get re-elected that he's only about the politics, but lately, it's just goddamn transparent. He's saying, basically, that nothing good can be allowed to happen if there's even the remotest chance Obama could take credit for it (and presumably, bad things can happen if Obama gets credit for them). Those priorities do not seem to be taking the interests of the country very much to heart if you ask me.

But take the McConnell deal that would have basically put the power to raise the debt ceiling in Obama's hands--provided Obama proposed spending cuts with each "ask". McConnell couldn't get the tastiest deal through a majority Dem Senate, and Boehner is stuck with his Tea Party nursery school. Who knows what the House would do--holler for more, worse, and sooner?  Or decide a default would taste great and be less filling! The best thing they can do is--intentionally nothing. They want any possible failures to go to Obama's credit, after all, whilst being able to grandstand on aaaalllll the the stuff he's supposedly not helping them get done re: reducing the debt or "creating jobs".  (Which has been roughly 0% of the actual proposals coming from the GOP-ers, from what I can tell. )

But in the meanwhile, Obama has shown a huge public willingness to negotiate by putting those things on the table even if it pisses off his base, whereas the GOP looks paralyzed between pissing off the tent poles of their base, apparently millionaires and Cos-play Conservatives.

5)  Bachmann, Gohmert and King.  This is not a folk music trio. Honest to Jeebus, I'd feel better if I knew any of these people could pick a mean banjo.  One of these people is running for president.  That's all I have to say about that.

Anyway--overall impression:  it sucks so hard I came out of a two-week hiatus to do a long-form blog-post about how much I think it sucks.

But yeah, short of the long is, I see the ceiling getting raised and the GOP getting not nearly what they thought they might after making a BFD over not raising it. Why?  Because--obvs.  Unless they are actually, you know. Nucking futz.