The budget deal (deftly summarized here by Ezra Klein) announced on Tuesday by Rep. Paul Ryan and Sen. Patty Murray represents just how much of the playing field, in terms of fiscal policy, now belongs to drown-the-government-in-the-bathtub conservatives.
Oh, I understand that given the political realities of a divided Congress, given the economic need to restore at least some governing stability, that the deal is better than nothing. But so much of this un-grand bargain is tailored to sell to non- or semi-Tea Party Republicans in the House and Senate (the hard-core teapartiers will nevva evva buy into it, of course).
Take, for instance, the fact that the long-term unemployed are essentially told to go to hell, or to the soup line, whichever seems more appealing. In just a few weeks, the benefits provided by the federal government to 1.3 million former workers will expire. These unfortunate folks are mostly the victims of the Great Bush Recession, an economic calamity so Great that now, more than four years after the thing supposedly ended, people are still suffering.
But helping to alleviate the suffering of these and other folks in need is not one of what House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan called the “core principles” of conservatives. That’s right, during the announcement of the deal on Tuesday, Ryan went out of his way to assure right-wingers that those principles have been preserved:
I expect we’re going to have a healthy vote in the House Republican Caucus. We are keeping our principles. The key here is nobody had to sacrifice their core principles. Our principles are don’t raise taxes, reduce the deficit.
Now, think about that for a minute. Paul Ryan could have said that “jobs” was a core principle of conservatives. He could have said “health care” was a core principle. He could have said “national defense.” Hell, he could have told the truth and said that “keeping Grover Norquist’s nuts warm” was a core principle. But he didn’t. The first thing that popped into his pickled pumpkin was, “Our principles are don’t raise taxes, reduce the deficit.” That’s it. Now that Barack Obama is president, that’s all that matters to these guys. Long-term unemployed? F’em!
Meanwhile, our side, because the economy is still limping along in so many ways, because we believe in governing, felt we had to make a pact that included abandoning those who, for a variety of reasons, can’t find a decent job. But is this the best deal possible? Could Democrats have insisted on continuing long-term unemployment benefits and called the implied Republican bluff to once again shut down the government?
Of course they could have. But it’s just not in the nature of those who value government to risk wrecking it again and injuring even more people. Our side could have told Paul Ryan that unless he included an extension of unemployment benefits, there would be no deal. And, given the dynamics involved, Ryan would have, eventually, had to take it. Why? Because there is no way in hell that Republicans, basking in the media-aided glow of the failure of the ObamaCare roll out, want to shift journalists’ attention away from all the “I got screwed” ObamaCare news stories to “Republicans did it again” stories about the harmful effects of yet another closure of government.
Thus there is one important reason why Republicans would have given up more than they did in this deal and why they would not have shut down the government again: They believe with all their hearts that keeping the focus on ObamaCare is their path to power. They believe, as Jim DeMint famously said before the Affordable Care Act was even passed, that “this health care issue is D-Day for freedom in America,” and,
If we’re able to stop Obama on this it will be his Waterloo. It will break him.
And, you see, breaking Obama, breaking his black and Democratic back, is what this is mostly about, what it has always been mostly about. They despise this man. They hate what they deliberately misapprehend as his radical politics. They’ve never wanted him to succeed, domestically or diplomatically. If Obama wants a health reform law inspired by Republicans, they want to break him and call him a socialist. If Obama wants a jobs bill, they demand a deficit-reduction bill. If Obama suggests war, they want peace.If Obama wants peace, they suggest war. It’s been that way from the beginning of his presidency.
Alas, this deal will pass. It will become reality. And Democrats say that they will try to pursue extending long-term jobless benefits via separate legislation. Good for them. But it is hard to see how that will happen, now that the pressure is off, now that Republicans don’t have to worry about the backlash of a government shut down, now that they can go, full pelt, into an all-out assault on ObamaCare in their quest to break the law’s champion.
Meanwhile, the Super Bowl of politics continues to be played on the right side of the field. Meanwhile, the peopleless principles of the Republican Party—no new revenues and slashing government—continue to dominate the game.
Meanwhile, many of the victims of the Great Bush Recession are on their own.
[photo: J. Scott Applewhite]
The Erstwhile Conservative: A Blog of Repentance 
Sedate Me
/ December 11, 2013I was wondering if Grover Norquist is small enough to drown in a bathtub. I’d sure like to try.
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R. Duane Graham
/ December 11, 2013How about a swimming pool so that those on the right afraid to cross him can also be a part of this wonderfully entertaining metaphor? I said “metaphor,” people.
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Sedate Me
/ December 12, 2013Too late, Duane. The drone strike is on the way, you dangerous threat to America, you!
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R. Duane Graham
/ December 12, 2013Dammit!
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brucetheeconomist
/ December 12, 2013Did you pick that photo that makes Ryan look that much taller? Is he standing on something?
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R. Duane Graham
/ December 12, 2013Ryan is much, much taller, even though that angle distorts it a bit. I picked that photo because of what it symbolizes, as far as I’m concerned: the right, although it only controls one-third of the governing instruments of our system (thus the background shot), nevertheless loom much taller than we do.
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Jim Wheeler
/ December 13, 2013A well-researched post here, Duane. I confess that I often don’t follow the links in posts but I was motivated to follow the NYT article that you highlighted above as . . . for a variety of reasons. Structural unemployment is the new reality. What a nightmare. And I learned something that surprised me, that if a person has no permanent address, is homeless in other words, they can not qualify for Medicaid! This appears to mirror the general insurance industry’s natural mind-set: the preferred customer is the one who needs the product the least. And that is a major reason why the ACA is swimming against the current. Meanwhile, the GOP continues to morph into Marie Antoinette.
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ansonburlingame
/ December 14, 2013I defered commenting on this post as it seemed to me to be just another shot at the GOP. But then I read the Roberts column in today’s (Sat) Globe, blasting the “loony left”. Their collective point that combating the Ted Cruz wing of the GOP with the “Warren left” segment of the Democratic Party was a bad approach. I recommend all you lefties herein read it and consider it.
Just one point in specific rebutal to the above rant. If in fact structrual unemployment is a ‘fact” and new reality in America as it continues to try to “fit into” a global economy, is the solution simply more government benefits “forever”? Of course you lefites will say No. Instead you will call for more government stimulus to “fix” the structural unemployment, right?
Either way, your solution to a perhaps new world reality is for the federal government to spend more money. With strict majority power you spent $1 Trillion that failed, miserably, to work as a long term solution. Your response was to spend “more”, at least another $1 Trillion, which got nowhere once your majority lock on government was lost. Face it lefties, Paul Krugman’s way will never pass muster in America until the Democratic Party gains and keeps full majority control of both houses of Congress and the White House, which of course is your solution to all government issues, right.
If all of you are so worried about the 2 Million or so long term unemployed that will fall off the benefits wagon in a month or so there is a long term solution. Raise taxes high enough to allow the government to hire them all in full time, full benefit jobs, government jobs. Let the government form a construction company to “fix infrastructure” (of all sorts) and then turn them loose (like the WPA of long ago). Hell you could even pay them in “government vouchers” or “script” I suppose.
But stay tuned all you lefties. Duane and his “union negotiations” tactics will always suggest a way to shove it down the other side’s throat, good ideas or bad in the short, medium or long term. Muster your masses all you like, just as unions have been doing for about 100 years now in America. But check the numbers of such masses today. What is it, some 8% or so of working Americans are now unionized and still going down it seems.
And don’t forget the role the federal government plays in sustaining even those low numbers. Without the federal government some 1-2% of those current numbers could well be unemployed today, the former auto workers, left high and dry without another government bail out, right. Take it even farther into the future. Keep up the lefty approach to governing and see more and more Detroits and STATES falling into the Detroit arena, later on.
If you believe the Tea Party will result in a bunch of brown booted red necks running things, the consider future “mayors of Detroit” in charge of the federal government!!! Go ahead, all you lefties, raise SS benefits as seemingly suggested by “Warren” and not touch the revenues needed to do so. Then we’ll see how things turn out. Or be brave and raise SS deductions enough to pay for it, sustainably, and see how the 2 million unemployed (long term) changes UPWARD, as more and more money goes to the fed instead of the people that used to hire those people in PRODUCTIVE jobs.
Anson
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