Well said.

Progressives are at an inherent disadvantage in this ‘new’ game. Those on the right who are ideologically opposed to effective government (because they are opposed to all government) can work to undermine government and when successful say, “See, government is not the answer”. Those of us more inclined to work as a community to check the corporatists and the oligarchs must constantly explain why we have faith in government solutions when so many work so hard to consistently compromise that which we need to be functional.

Given Obama’s betrayal, I don’t see anything short of massive protests changing the dynamic. We simply do not have a vote that matters given the two parties that dominate today. And the corporate media is incapable of informing working Americans of how the Randian cult is robbing them blind.

Sucks to be a progressive these days.

XIV all the way, baby.

Obama’s non-mention of it in last night’s speech is all the proof I need that it’s the tool in his kit he intends to use. He has to; he’s otherwise derelict in his duties. And I certainly expect Boehner (or Speaker Cantor, much more likely now) to impeach him for it. Impeachment is good for Democratic presidents’ poll numbers. Obama knows this.

These silly dances are what intrigue and pay the bills at our current “media” properties in America, and distract Congress from doing real damage elsewhere. So plan on a fall impeachment, with a Senate trial — oh, how many chevrons will John Roberts design into his robe??? — as the presidential primaries roll out next year.

Sure beats workin’, for the governing and chattering classes.

The most effective way to move your legislative agenda forward is now not by winning overwhelmingly in multiple elections to gain control majority control of all the branches. As we saw in 2009-2010 with the Democratic agenda, it will just slowly die in a dysfunction Senate.

the senate is dysfunctional alright, but that’s not why the democratic agenda died. it’s died because the D party made the choice to let it die — in part through their use of the optional cloture process. all the rest is kabuki, scape goating, and false excuses (see filibuster rules which don’t actually prevent the senate majority from passing legislation by simple majority).

The President & Dems are always called to Compromise, while the Republican Party always fail to Compromise, believe that they Do Not have to Comproise! And so, It is their way or no way! The GOP Party should learn the Art of Compromise, and while their at it, true compassion for the people they propose to represent.

Given Obama’s betrayal, I don’t see anything short of massive protests changing the dynamic.

The progressives aren’t going to lead those protests. What was Obama’s approval rating among them again?

Treason by the so called patriots.

By the end of this week Obama should declare congressional efforts to produce an agreement a failure and therefore demand a clean bill that increases the debt ceiling. The republicans will of course refuse and default will occur. The resulting turmoil in domestic and international markets (massive Dow drop, precipitous increase in interest rates) will reveal as ridiculous the republican claims that default would be no big deal. By August 8th or 9th (at the latest) Obama can step in, invoke the 14th amendment and direct the Treasury to schedule T-note auctions that effectively increase debt by a trillion dollars. Obama will be the hero, strong and resolute in the face of the crisis that republicans assured us would not occur.

is this for real? (h/t cbl)

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) warned the country, “It is clear we must enter an era of austerity; to reduce the deficit through shared sacrifice.”

http://thinkprogress.org/special/2011/07/25/278696/pelosi-it-is-clear-we-must-enter-an-era-of-austerity/

It should be obvious that representative democracy no longer works, if it ever did. The question should be what’s going to replace it, but even progressives look for honest leaders to get us out of the mess. For a variety of reasons there are no such things but most everyone keeps looking because we are not inclined to do it ourselves

Even though we may wind up with an economic disaster, I think the only route is not to give in to blackmail and let the country default.

I would have been happy yesterday if Obama had given the Republicans 48 hours to accept Reid’s compromise or he’d veto ANY legislation that wasn’t a clean bill to raise the debt limit. One of the things the Republicans want is a balanced budget. That takes a 2/3 vote of Congress. If the vast majority of Americans want what the Republicans are selling, he should be able to get a 2/3 vote and overcome a Presidential veto on cap and cut and pass a Constiutional amendment.

This needs to be an either or proposition or Obama will just be negotiating with himself. If the country goes into default, the Republicans will get the blame. We may head into a depression, but you won’t see a Republican majority or President for a generation.

first past the post elections don’t actually produce Representatives that reflect the population. That is why many democracies you use proportional repersentation.

McConnell started spinning it in advance by characterizing Obama as the first President to “veto the country into default.”

If the country goes into default, the Republicans will get the blame. We may head into a depression, but you won’t see a Republican majority or President for a generation.

I agree that Obama should demand a clean bill, let the default occur, and let the republicans take the blame. We don’t have to go into a depression, however. Obama can unilaterally increase the debt ceiling by invoking the 14th amendment. That would be a political home-run for Obama, projecting strength and decisiveness. Anyone who fears a political backlash or a court repudiation of this executive power hasn’t been paying attention for the last attention. And even if the Supreme Court were to rule against Obama, the trillion dollars would have already been raised and the polital benefits to Obama would have already accrued. And Boehner and McConnell, backed by their paymasters on Wall St., will finally have the strength to tell their Teabagging faction to go to hell, which will trigger a civil war in the republican party.

I just don’t see how this default scenario can go wrong.

By choosing to govern through threat of disaster the House Republicans have turned against the entire intent of our founding document. No longer does change need the broad agreement of the separate branches.

Why is the People’s House only relevant when it’s not representing the people?

The strange architecture of our Constitution has always made fundamental change of deeply divisive issues extremely difficult to resolve.

This was not by mistake. It was by design.

If you closely study the Consdtitutional convention you can see the southern delegations working to create a document that did not explicitly enshrine slavery, the pretentious Virginians would not sully their enlightened reputations with that, but rather, made it all but impossible to legislatively abolish it. As such, it is and always has been an obstructionists dream.

We are going into the perfect storm. If the debt ceiling is not raised, and if the clock isn’t stopped while they go back to raise it, it will have severe if not (in my opinion) catastrophic effects on the asset markets. If the so-called comprise is past, it will have severe and probably catastrophic consequences for aggregate demand and employment. The shrinking economy will drive the deficit back up, and we will be where Europe is going.

Let’s add one more piece into the hopper. As last night’s post on FBI targeting of anti-war and generally progressive groups showed, the government will do what it takes to preserve the social and economic status quo. The strains of high unemployment, a torn-up safety net, and vanishing hope that the system can be corrected through electoral politics will result in uncontainable pressure. Where it will break out is hard to say. But if there are riots, there will be repression, and it will go far beyond those who riot. Given that Congress and the Executive consider the Constitution to be a non-binding contract between rulers and ruled, I would not be surprised to see an ‘enabling act’ vesting temporary authority not subject to judicial review in the President. And of course, in 2013 we will have a Republican President, probably Rick Perry.

Plan B: renew your passports.

Proportional representation is an improvement, but it’s not a solution. Then there’s the senate which gives non-populous states the same voting power as populous states. Is that deal struck way back when worth continuing? The only question worth discussing is can we do anything other than talk. Right now the answer seems to be “No”.

These clowns are so extreme I don’t think BONER is going to get a majority of Republicans to pass his plan. I understand he’s already posted it. That means a vote tomorrow. If vote doesn’t occur, it means they don’t have the votes in there caucus. Hard to belive he will get Democratic votes to pass this crappy legislation.

our representatives, senators and also the administration CREATE disasters and crisis in order to pass legislation the people DON’T WANT.

Where do you plan to go?

Shock Doctrine.

I am somewhat disappointed with white America, and in particular white Democrats.

Take, for example, the Republicans laid down their “race card” when Obama became President, and it’s been applied non-stop ever since. American history proves that for 70 plus years, there was nary a peep from either the Democrats or Republicans, when it came to the ‘clean bill’ on increasing the debt ceiling. During the Bush Era, the debt ceiling was raised 7 times and no one tossed the white’s ownership of the race card onto themselves. Of course, doing so, would seem dangerously silly.

And yet and although a few Progressives agree with me, the overwhelming majority of Progressives disagree with me while strenously and mistakenly believing that America has entered a post-racial era in politics.

Therefore, I generally invite Progressives to come out to my Sonoran Desert and done in order for each Progressive to recognize the ‘actualization’ of both SB 1070 and HB 2281, given that my children and grandchildren are prohibited from speaking a “foreign language” because the Republicans fear that I am attempting to overthrow the Constitution. As I see it, this political belief by the Republicans falls within the parameters for “criminal stupidity” and thusly, I chuckle behind my hand, and yet, the Rule of Law, has been morphed for the sole purpose and which is to subject me and Brown People like me, into a new “status quo” for a Second Class Citizenship.

In closing, what’s occurred in the Sonoran Desert since 2009 has been expanded nationally, in the guise in which the “majority” of white America is now viewed as either bigoted or racist, or both. Consequently, the debt ceiling is just another facet of politics for the Republicans. Sadly, Obama and Biden, Pelosi and Hoyer, and Reid and Durbin, know all this, just as I do.

Jaango
J

I don’t quite see it this way.

What we have now now are symptoms and results of a highly partisan era, and it’s not the first in US history. I’m 64 now and think it may even be closer to the norm, and both ends of the spectrum are free to take advantage as circumstances permit at any given time.

The filibuster rule is nothing new, and its use even extends as to the elephant in the living room, just by being there, even when its not formally exercised. Yet when it causes something bad to result, judging from the bellyaching you’d think the filibuster was some new, evil feature which had just been cooked up and needs to be thrown out right away. Well, good luck trying to do so.

The handling of ACA passage a year ago opened new innovative doors which had been mostly notional or limited beforehand. The precedents set by reconciliation were driven by degrees of urgency, but precedents they will remain along with a newfound willingness to define “urgency” by whoever is in control. One would expect this well will be tapped again, and we won’t always like the result.

If “anti-constitutional” tactics are in play, then go ahead and invoke SCOTUS, but they will demur for sure, the petulant plaintiff will lose credibility.

So the angst will still have to be redirected where it belongs. Elections have consequences as we have twice been reminded since 2008. As if we needed yet more reminders!

That’s where the sole remedies reside, however messy the situation becomes.

mosler says not passing it will mean $150 billion / month descrease in spending and so long as it is not passed, the automatic stabilizers (which function to increase deficit spending and therefor provide a floor for the fall) will be disabled.

hard to believe anyone with a shred of sense or care for their country would even think about playing this game.

bingo!

Call her out on the wording “shared sacrifice.”

She used it. Call her on it.

i don’t think anything about america is post-racial. but i also think class and privilege play a role.

I just posted this reply to selise in an earlier post regarding my comment on missing Christy’s whipping us to move:

You know, if we were calling/faxing/emailing about these budget/SS/MedC issues on top of the office visits last week, and just flooded the Wh and critters, it would be transformational.

I really liked the talking points paper for the critter visits last week. Would love a 4 point framework for calling,faxing,emailing. (Especially, the calling & faxing.)

Christy’s efforts were empowering and fought against Shock Doctrine methods.

And that’s what is important here, fighting Shock Doctrine Methods with our voices directly.

WH and Critters are afraid of that one voice… We must not be afraid or apathetic. We are 80% against doing anything to SS/MedC/MedCr… Let’s show what 80% looks like in faxes and phone calls.

Try flooding the fax and switch board with 100 calls per hour today.

You can also call or write to the President:

The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW
Washington, DC 20500
Please include your e-mail address
Phone Numbers

Comments: 202-456-1111
Switchboard: 202-456-1414
FAX: 202-456-2461
TTY/TDD

Comments: 202-456-6213
Visitors Office: 202-456-2121

Tell Boehner too:

H-232 The Capitol Washington, DC 20515
P (202) 225-0600
F (202) 225-5117

Tell them No to balance. No to compromise. No to austerity that will kill the country. Tell them, you think the housing crisis is bad now, just wait.

and “austerity”!!!

You nailed it.

The debt ceiling law is phony because it is an instruction contradictory to what Congress instructed in tax laws and appropriations bills. Those two pieces of legislation set the size of the deficit, and chronic deficit spending by the Congress creates debt. Emphasis on chronic. The President did set the table for this argument last night. Which sets up the use of the 14th amendment without explicitly invoking it.

This is a Constitutional crisis of Congress’s creation. Democrats and Republicans.

If the failure to raise the debt ceiling has serious effects on the markets, well tough. They brought it on themselves. Did I say before that the US has the stupidest elite class in the world. They live in the illusion that making the poor poorer makes them richer. It’s really about relative prosperity with them–about their social status more than their bank account, about their feeling powerful rather than wealthy. They will completely impoverish themselves and be satisfied as long as the bulk of their fellow citizens are dramatically more impoverished than they are.

The question I have is whether a short-term Constitutional crisis now will prevent a much large Constitutional crisis later. And bursting an asset bubble now will avoid a more catastrophic collapse later. Right now the only safe investment is in creating jobs, good-paying jobs. Think about that. Did I say that we have the stupidest investor class in the world?

Then there’s the senate which gives non-populous states the same voting power as populous states.

Senators don’t represent the people of their states anymore. Is it possible that the Senate would work better if we were to go back to the way Senators used to be selected, i.e. by state legislatures?

Yeah, she needs to be asked how you “grow” jobs with austerity when everyone starts losing their homes, jobs…Who is left to invest and grow the economy?

Iceland, if they’ll let me in.

Yes, ekunin … we are not inclined to do it ourselves.

Perhaps, were we to “change” the notion of what actually contitutes real and genuuine human leadership, it might not seem so presumptuous and aristocratically self-serving?

If those capable of true leadership, which we see exemplified by the behavior of Jane Hamsher and selise, for example, are afraid to embrace their capacity for displaying good, sound, and humane judgement, then we shall continue to be on the receiving end of sciopathic intent.

DW

Easy lip flapping for her. She’s very wealthy and very out-of-touch with reality.

The US has the stupidest elite class in the world.

Just wanted to quote you. Well said.

We need to tell that to her in calls and faxes. She is out of touch. O is out of touch. Boenhd is out of touch.

Nancy:

Washington, DC Office
Representative Nancy Pelosi
235 Cannon HOB
Washington, D.C. 20515
Phone: (202) 225-4965

San Francisco Office
Representative Nancy Pelosi
90 7th Street, Suite 2-800
San Francisco, CA 94103
Phone: (415) 556-4862

Nancy does not have a fax? Hmmm…Christy must have burned it out a few years ago!

Great Idea! Here’s another resource I put up a while back in honor of Katymine.

I call it Katymine Deluxe. It’s for the House, and it’s in alpha order by last name of your rep.

And here’s Katymine Deluxe for the Senate.

From 1947 until the late 1980s, we practiced brinksmanship in regards to global nuclear war. The risk was, if we had one, that what part of mankind survived would not be living in a world anyone would want. If the leaders were sane, we would always avoid it and the status quo would continue. The status quo, depending on where you were and who you were, was usually acceptable.

Now we have intra-American economic brinksmanship, which, if one fatal error occurs, will send our country into darkness, along with the rest of the world, for at least a decade, and what is left at the end of that decade may not be worth having. The right is bucking to take over, and the so-called left in government, well, who knows what their real intent is these days. But what is obvious is that most of those who demand “austerity” and the like have their “financial bomb shelters” fully stocked and won’t be affected in any real perceivable manner. Example, if the Koch brothers lost 90% of their value, they’d still have a billion or more dollars in an economy where a couple of thousand is now considered a fortune.

Where is there any promise to grow AMERICAN jobs from anyone? Nowhere. There is no financial incentive. We could allow any and all pollution, the total abuse of workers as chattel, the destruction of any wage structure, and not take a dime from the corporations in taxes, and the likelihood is that they would still export jobs instead of making them here. If the politicians, including the President, are oblivious to this, then it is willfull, and not unintentional.

Great work!!!

Here’s the updated info on Nancy, including fax#.

DC Address: The Honorable Nancy Pelosi
United States House of Representatives
235 Cannon House Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515-0508
DC Phone: 202-225-4965
DC Fax: 202-225-4188
Contact Form: https://pelosi.house.gov/contact/email-me.shtml
WWW Homepage: http://pelosi.house.gov/
Twitter: @NancyPelosi

Seriously, their offices hate their fax machine getting womped with constitu letters being faxed. After you fax your letter, snail mail it.

FLOOD THEM TODAY!

In this situation, is calling Pelosi’s office the best use of time?

You should post that link on every post put up today, encouraging everyone to call, fax & mail.

Thanks for your efforts!!!

And Obama has chosen to use Shock Doctrine-style catastrophe legislating, as much as the Republicans. He whipped for the TARP (in secret, of course) and saw how effective a good economic crisis can be.

When Obama had something the R’s wanted badly, extension of the Bush Tax Cuts, Obama gave them more than they ever wanted — in exchange for a single extension of unemployment insurance. To prove he was a Reagan ghoul, he even made the very lowest taxpayers end up paying more! But hedgefund managers, they got a sweet deal, as did the Uberwealthy.

At the time I figured Obama wanted to use the debt ceiling or the budget to force the Democrats to make cuts to SocSec and Medicare, plus additinal cuts to Medicaid. My bet was on the budget, but Obama went for the first one that came up.

He himself set up this “crisis” by NOT demanding the debt limit be raised back in December.

Of course, he could have let the Bush Tax Cuts expire, and much of the debt would be on its way to being paid off…but Noooooo, he WANTED a crisis.

How else could he make Dems undermine their party’s, the nation’s, crown jewels of safety net programs?

Now, Obama owns the Extended Obama Tax Cuts, along with the fucked up Obama economy.

Does he want to destroy the Dem Party? Seems like that. Too bad he’s going to take the nation down with it. Too bad he has advisers who think he can win with votes from the mushy middle….

We’re so screwed, we’re Plouffed!

Closely read the transcript of Obama’s Monday statement on the debt talks stalemate. The full transcript is right here. And the full transcript of Boehner’s response is right here.

Using political forensics, notice any clues, perhaps telltale code words that reveal to whom he was really addressing his Monday message? Clearly, it wasn’t congressional Republicans — or Democrats, for that matter.

The nation’s top talker uttered 4,526 words in those remarks. He said “balanced approach” seven times, three times in a single paragraph.

That’s the giveaway. Obviously, David Plouffe and the incumbent’s strategists have been polling phrases for use in this ongoing debt duel, which is more about 2012 now than 2011. “Balanced approach” is no sweet talk for old Bernie or tea sippers on the other side.

Obama is running for the center already, aiming for the independents who played such a crucial role in his victorious coalition in 2008. They were the first to start abandoning the good ship Obama back in 2009 when all the ex-state senator could do was talk about healthcare, when jobs and the economy were the peoples’ priority.

Actually, I think being way to the right is Obama’s comfort zone, so it’s not difficult to persuade him that ignoring the left is good electoral strategy.

We shall see.

I cannot vote for him. If he’s this Republican when needing Dem votes for reelection, I figure he will go unrestrainably rightward with no upcomeing election to win.

Post racist?

Perhaps the milk and cookies “Progressives” may believe that, Jaango, but those of us who feel labels are meaningless, for the most part, on the real, human level and still possess eyes to see, ears to hear, and hearts that feel … are aligned, firmly, in the past, now, and henceforth … with you.

The evidence of rasicsm AND classism is to be seen virtually everywhere, outside of everyone’s front door …

DW

Don’t you mean election fraud has consequences? The will of the people is not protected, in fact, it has been institutionally displace from the electoral process thru grotesque corporate campaign expenditures, voter suppression, the 2-party dominance and vote tabulation fraud.

In this situation, is faxing Pelosi’s office the best use of time?

Doesn’t it make far more sense to burn out the fax machines of Boehner and Reid as the Speaker and Senate Majority leader, and your own Rep and Senators from your district and state?

It’s been widely reported; I saw it in Dayen’s news round up from The Guardian.

Nancy either found a horse head in her bed or she’s been right royally Plouffed.

She must figure she has to support the Democratic-cloaked Republican president — or be attacked for disloyalty?

Or…?

We’ve posted higher up the WH and Boen contact info @ 28.

Kelly has all the links for critters @ 38. Nancy just needs to be called out on her use of shared sacrifice and austerity. So yes, it is worth the few minutes to tell her she is wrong.

Christy use to share how upsetting it was for the critters and WH to get flooded with calls and faxes. Faxes are great. Super great. When a fax runs out of paper, it is not so quiet. Scanning a letter and attaching it onto an email is okay but calls and faxes tie up the staffers the most and make a loud point.

In order to run an effective Corporatist/Neoconservative/Fascist state, several things are required. First is the usurpation of any democratic processes. Corporate financing of campaigns, TV propaganda and the 2000 election saw to this. Second is the creation of an irredeemable, perpetual enemy of the state. The US has this internationally in Terrorists and domestically in Latin American immigrants. Third comes the negation of the rule of law, which was accomplished under George W. by throwing out habeas corpus and expanded under Obama. Next, is the substitution of the law as a collective, binding, objective social instrument in exchange for the word of the Lawgiver. The attainment of this is revealed in statements like, “I am the decider” and “I am the President of the United States; my words carry weight.” After getting rid of the old laws, new emergency ones are required (e.g. The Patriot Act) as well as the undoing of previously accepted legal terms so that accepted definitions loose their meaning (e.g. POWs become Enemy Combatants). Lastly, the Corporatist state must maintain its hold on power by pretending to exist in a state of permanent exception where everything is a crisis, and therefore every solution must be resolved through Leadership and the population can be kept perpetually in fear.

Mission accomplished.

Bingo!

Do not be afraid. Fax and call. Be empowered.

Oh, I would love to hear from Christy right about now!

CC your calls and faxes to the media as well. Tie up their phone lines and faxes too.

Altering the form of governance will be useless if this form of crass/class capitalism is not drastically altered too.

Since we are morally bankrupt already, accepting the need for a daily ration of bodies for the Magnificent Mindless ‘Merican Murder Machine, I won’t mind if we collapse rather than continue the never ending war on the planet and it’s people. We have proved unworthy of our constitution and it’s promises.

We are the burning man before the match.

To see the wealthy grovel for whatever , Priceless.

The Passive Aggressive Apocalypse

It’s not just the Rs and Teahadists. Say all you will against the willingness of a certain minority to exploit fake veto points in our system to take hostages, and no sensible person will disagree with you. But the fact remains that these are all fake veto points. Every single one of them is entirely phony. The sensible majority can either overturn them with a simple majority, or they have no force, they carry no real threat against the hostage.

The filibuster and hold exist as Senate rules. As such, a simple majority of the Senate, such as the Ds now enjoy, can get rid of them at any time.

The annual budget reconciliation process is merely a collation step designed to rationalize the spending already obligated by law. The adminstration proposes how much money the various executive departments will need to carry out the laws passed by Congress, and then Congress takes that proposal, and after exercising as much Congressional oversight over the operations of the executive departments as it chooses, it changes that proposal accordingly and votes that modified budget into law. Should Congress fail to complete this process of exercising its oversight, the obligation to do all the functions that the law requires, and therefore to spend the money to accomplish these functions, remains unchanged. Govt operations should continue unchanged in the event Congress chooses not to exercise this oversight of the budget reconciliation process. It did continue uninterrupted whenever Congress was merely a bit late finishing its work. But late in the Carter administration, the emergence of at least a tinge of threat behind Congress being late, the fact that the appropriations bills started being held up specifically for hostage purposes, so some group of legislators or another could extort some little concession or another, the administration retaliated with the novel concept that the govt would have to shut down in the absence of completed appropriations, or at least a Continuing Resolution to the same effect. An exception was rationalized for “emergency” govt services, which pretty much reveals that the whole idea is merely rationalization designed to tip the ball back into the other side’s court. If the money for the year hasn’t been appropriated, and your theory is that that means that spending lacks authority in law, then all spending lacks authority in law, period. If you make exceptions for emergencies, you don’t really believe money has to be appropriated to become a legal obligation, you’re just play-acting to tit for tat hostage-taking the folks holding the budget bills hostage.

And now we have the crazies holding hostages over the debt ceiling. This is simply the next step. In this situation, we have spending obligations all the way throught the process. They are enshrined in the budget bills passed just a few months ago as undoubted, completely finalized, law of the land. Yet, when the crazy Teahadist (or Teahadist-terrorized, take your pick) majority in the House threatens to refuse to raise the debt ceiling, suddenly the law of the land is sacred and must be obeyed only when it comes to the debt ceiling law. The supposedly sensible people in this farce refuse to do the obvious, rest on the claim that whatever ceremonial function the debt ceiling law might have as a sop to the deficit scolds, the actual operational debt ceiling of the US is set to whatever must be borrowed to meet all the legal obligations of the US, period. But the supposedly sensible forces refuse to take that step, refuse to explain calmly and clearly to the elecorate that the Teahadists don’t merely propose bad policy, they aren’t merely immoral enough to try to take hostages to get their bad policy through, they are actually so incompetent as to be threatening the hostage with the water pistol of the ceiling law, a threat that has no weight because it exists entirely in their deluded minds.

So, yes, the Teahadists are stupid, evil and deluded. Great, we all agree there. But what the hell is our side doing engaging them in some diving contest to reach bottom on the most passive aggressive behavior possible? We supposedly sensible people have played along because the immediate and short-term easiest way to handle the passive aggrssive is to fight fire with fire, and out passive-aggressive them.

Well, children, we’ve reached the end of that rope. It is perfectly understandable that Obama doesn’t want to let the Rs tag him with some real Kenyan Usurpation when he has to tell the nation that the debt ceiling actually has no legal force, given the preponderant force of the legal spending obligations, and that the administration will therefore continue borrowing beyond the ceiling to meet all the legal obligations of the US. That was greater than 4th Grade language I had to use to explain that, and that’s always a bad sign when you have to get something over to the general public. But we have considerations a bit more pressing than worrying about winning the day in terms of PR, pundits and polls. If we let the US go over the cliff of an actual, and completely unneccessary and self-imposed, national bankruptcy, it’s essentially game over.

You think this country is screwed up now, just wait until the morning after we do that to ourselves. Far from unscrewing anything, that passive aggressive apocalypse will just screw thing up further in all the familiar battlegrounds, and then into whole new dimensions of screwed up we haven’t seen yet, and really don’t want to see ever.

When she said that it’s clear we must enter a period of austerity, she was just describing what the results will be of what the President, Speaker and Senate Majority Leader are pushing for and will most likely successfully push on the American people.

When she added the comment calling for shared sacrifice, she was just criticizing it, seeing how there’s no shared sacrifice in what the President, Speaker and Senate Majority Leader are pushing for.

Or take Nancy Pelosi at her word: “WE”, the rich and unjustly privileged, must share.

amen and thanks!

Bollocks. If you want a crisis, look for Presidents demanding, abetting, and as a last resort implementing elite committees that create closed door “up or down” grand bargains. Or maybe just look at war powers. You are a few decades late and a couple trillion dollars short.

Hate the game, not the player! The tea party republicans are taking the country in exactly the wrong direction. But, pissing and moaning because they actually have a strategy and are willing to fight is just useless whining. In the abstract the House should set the agenda and frame debates. The real problem is we have one party of extreme reaction that understands how to fight. We have another party of wall street that serves wall streets needs but is still followed by workers, women, and people of color. We need a center left party to do what the teabaggers are doing. *No raising the debt ceiling until Medicare for all* not this pointless whining about how the teabaggers actually manage to find pretexts and openings to advance their agenda.

Sending faxes is a great idea. In this situation, sending them to Pelosi seems like taking target at the wrong person. Unless you want her to lead an overthrow of the government, I’m not sure what more you want her to do.

She’s right: what’s being pushed right now on the American people will lead us into a period of austerity.

Doesn’t it make more sense to target the people who are doing the pushing?

Selise@27

With respect to “spending cuts” being delivered via both Reid and Pelosi, “Who in America is going to ‘yardstick’ these cuts against the “perpetuation and expansion” of LBJ’s Great Society”?

Hopefully, some smart alecky Progressive will. If so, America’s “racial and ethnics” will start expressing themselves “loudly” since Obama and Boehner, have sidelined this segment of our society, since each is reaching out to the “independents” for their respective re-election efforts.

Jaango

I would think Direct Democracy would be where we go next. As twitter has shown the last couple of days from the outpouring of #FuckYouWashington tweets, there are a hell of a lot of people who are very aware of everything happening, and fully capable of contributing to governance.

The internet can make direct democracy work.

thanks.

Nuanced irony?

Pelosi?

“You don’t know the half of it”, she said, once upon a time.

Why, Nancy, don’t we, the people, know?

Perhaps we’ve been lied to?

Again and again.

Remember what Bush said?

“We don’t do nuance …”

DW

Direct, Participatory Democracy.

Can the human species survive without it?

Thank you, Adam503.

DW

Indeed. The other thing I see is a very strong sociopathic streak in the far right that insists that the extent to which the government functions, it should only function for their needs and fuck everybody else. The housing crisis is an example. So is corporate welfare. Or gun owners who are only concerned about their freedom and not the wishes of others who may like to enjoy the freedom from gun violence. What can be done to redress this selfish atomization in US culture, I don’t know, especially since citizens have become Consumers.

we all know — or ought to — who is being hurt the most. and we all, i hope, will be expressing ourselves loudly.

thanks jaango. really appreciate your comments. they make me think.

I had to share this – from Huffington’s article on HuffPost – http://www.huffingtonpost.com/arianna-huffington/the-debt-ceiling-impasse_b_909314.html

“So why aren’t we focusing on jobs and growth? Summers’ admirably candid answer to Charlie Rose: because “those without jobs aren’t in a position to contribute to political campaigns, and to a disproportionate extent are the people who don’t vote.” “

Your absolutely right about having no leverage and the need for massive protests. There is a march scheduled in DC in October and maybe by then as more people lose their jobs, lose their homes, see their retirement savings dwindle away, as students are unable to return to school etc. perhaps the ranks hitting the streets will balloon. Without demonstrations, however, we are nothing more than observers with the only course of action being “strongly worded letters” and petitions. Where is today’s Eugene McCarthy, MLK, Eugene Debs, Teddy Roosevelt or Harry Bridges?

The problem from my perspective is that it seems we still talk about R’s vs D’s. There is only one party with 2 heads. Don’t we have to get our message unified? Most people here understand this however don’t all of us need to recognize this? I am just a layman but after some intense reading and reading the informed posters here everything that is going on makes complete sense to me. I believe the last straw will be the Super Congress that is in both plans if I am not mistaken. I think Jane has nailed it. The devil is in the details. Fascism takes time to fully unfold. This will be the final nail in the coffin of the USA. I hope someone stands up and fights this in our government. My 2 cents.

Add to all this the “SuperCongres” present in both the current bills and goodbye America, we hardly knew ye

BWBartoo@44

Thanks for the response.

When it comes to Jobs Creation, I have yet to see any Progressive advocating for taking the approximate $50 billion returned to the Treasury on an annual basis, and turn this wealth into having the Federal Reserve to craft a schematic that eventually leads to OJT contracts for the unemployed, via a visit to the state’s Unemployment Office. And this suggestion, is in keeping with LBJ’s Great Society for empowering the individual.

As such and from years’ past, my former finance professor, while working in the White House, created the National Alliance of Businessmen and Manpower/Employment Training. He was an old-fashioned Progressive with the Great Depression in his political portfolio and equivalent to a Krugman working in the White House. More importantly, LBJ “reached out” and “captured everyone” with Ideas, and that’s the difference between LBJ and Obama. When it comes to Obama, Obama rejects Ideas.

Jaango

I guess Obama didn’t feel comfortable burning down Congress and then blaming the dfh’s. No need for “violence” when fascism can be implemented with merely the stroke of a pen.

His very narrow mind is already made up.

Well, after the two speeches last night, I was able to send a note to my House congress critter with no difficulty. However, getting through on the Senate website was impossible. Read in the news this morning that the servers were crashed and I have to say there was every evidence that that was true.

So be careful when you say the American people are completely uninvolved in this or that they don’t care. Enough of them were watching last night to effect a shutdown of the system. That’s good enough for me.

I took care of writing to my Senators first thing this morning. Everything else was up and running.

I have also exhorted my Facebook friends to do the same. I’m tired of the excuses from all aspects of the population, this board included, that writing doesn’t do anything. You’ll never know until you actually do it. And keep doing it until you get the answers.

Jaango,
I get it. I’m anglo and a relative newcomer to the Sonoran desert, 1991, and I’ve watched it get worse over the years. Anyone who believes that there isn’t discrimination based on appearance, or accent, is kidding themselves. You won’t see sheriff Joe’s boys harassing a bunch of anglos on the corner waiting for the guy with the pickup to hire them. You never hear any on the right praising the citizenship of our many citizens of southwestern decent who often have ancestors who were in the area far before any anglo showed up. And politically, anyone who looks at a map of Arizona’s 8 congressional districts can see what the definition of jerrymandering really is.

Unfortunately, we have little representation. And the way that the state is districted, even when the population scales shift and the disenfranchised vote enblock, the power structure may still be in place.

Indeed. Leaders are the easy way out. Such collective abdication leaves room for dishonest exploitation.

“The perfectly engineered storm.”

Brought to us by Obama and the House Republicans.

Some kabuki going on between Obama and Boehner, to ensure the public is properly scared shitless and the will accept getting the Austerity Treatment? Not scream too loudly or vote too much against those who undermined SocSec and MM???

Suggestion: Let’s get the directories for both Senate and House, important contact numbers for DC Congressional leadership, DNC, RNC telephone numbers, email addresses, and snail mail addresses in a post which is sticked or put in the side column.

BTW, I will not use Obama’s forced email page. Back in Bush II, there was a nice simple president@wh.gov email address for the president; Obama did away with that. That email no longer works; I tested it earlier in the debt ceiling mess. It took four days for G-mail to get back to me to say my email had failed.

T/U.

Thanks for this necessary perspective.

Was it a true shutdown of the system or a, “Turn those damned things off!” /s

It would be interesting to know the breakdown of calls. For all we know the majority could be Tea-O-Pees screaming, “Burn it all down”.

It may have been Paul Wellstone – but he died and we were attacked for mourning him.

Was it Franklin who said it is a Republic if you can keep it?

nocompromises4me@76

The first cold one is on me, or if you prefer mescal, LaRue from the Bay Area will bring it, and I will offer up the mesquite for the cook out.

Jaango

Agreed.

RoyalOak @ 68, thank you for this HuffPo link — I think I began watching Summers on Rose and couldn’t take Charlie’s interview style. (I remember, long ago, when I thought Rose was not a coporatist shill….)

From the HuffPo article:

Interestingly, one of the most eloquent voices on the subject has been Larry Summers. “The biggest problem the country has right now is not the budget deficit,” he said in an conversation with Walter Isaacson in Aspen. “The biggest problem the country has right now is the jobs deficit.”

And he brilliantly summed up the reality that is eluding the negotiating parties in Washington: “an extra percent a year on the growth rate for the next five years will do more for the budget than any amount of the entitlement-cutting that’s under discussion.” As Summers explained on Charlie Rose, every new dollar of GDP takes 25 to 30 cents out of the deficit in year one. And yet that simple economic truth does not appear to be included in the “everything” that Obama claims is “on the table.”

“It is crazy if you think about it,” Summers told Isaacson, “that we have schools across this country where we tell our kids that education is the most important thing in the world, but we ask them to study in classrooms where the paint is chipping off the walls.”

“I’d rather see us focus on the jobs deficit,” said Summers. “I’d rather see us focus on the public investment deficit. I’d rather see us focus on the human capital deficit. Those are deficits that we need to focus on also.”

Why do people have to leave office before they can unambiguously and unequivocally speak the truth?

As Peter Orszag, now also no longer in office, wrote for Bloomberg View, a sluggish-growth scenario would add $2.5 trillion to the debt by 2021, more than the $2 trillion in cuts being discussed in the debt-ceiling package.

And a way to ensure the sluggish scenario is to do exactly what they’re doing in Washington right now. “I only ask… as Congress looks at the timing and composition of its changes to the budget,” said Ben Bernanke to the Senate Banking Committee, “that it does take into account that in the very near term the recovery is still rather fragile, and that sharp and excessive cuts in the very short term would be potentially damaging to that recovery.”

So why aren’t we focusing on jobs and growth? Summers’ admirably candid answer to Charlie Rose: because “those without jobs aren’t in a position to contribute to political campaigns, and to a disproportionate extent are the people who don’t vote.”

But, Obama believes –or says for politcal strategy– that there are no jobs because business owners are too nervous about the debt ceiling affecting interest rates adversely to do any job creation.

No mention from Barry that with no demand for goods and services, only charities provide such things. And decent governments…. But not our Barry: He’s swallowed and now regurgitates the Republican talking points over and over and over. He seems unable to understand or accept simple economic concepts. Just Reagan BS.

Thank you, jaango, for your perspectives and steadfast notions of principle and justice.

And, should opportunity ever find me able to spend time in your very spiritual part of paradise, I should most definitely enjoy meeting you and sharing such repast as we may find available to us.

Namaste.

DW

Maybe Direct Democracy applied to taxes. One’s IRS form is an itemized list. Each tax payer gets to check off the item(s) and amount of their taxes that go to it. What might happen then to corporate welfare and perpetual war?

Thank you, jaango @72, for your perspectives and steadfast notions of principle and justice.

And, should opportunity ever find me able to spend time in your very spiritual part of paradise, I should most definitely enjoy meeting you and sharing such repast as we may find available to us.

Namaste.

DW

Why didn’t Obama bring up the wars in his prime-time talk to the nation? The wars have cost 16 trillion +, not 4.4 trillion. This jobs program for the military has to end. Share the sacrifice Pentagon and defense industries and defense stock dividend collectors. Obama, get your head out of the sand re your wars. Think of all the beautiful and empowering infrastructure we could have had in this country if Bush and Cheney did not start the big lie, and if Obama did not continue it. I think it’s time Cheney’s construction companies build some big time pro-bono infrastructure for America since he seems to have made out so well due to his own big lie (bomb Iraq to get the 9/11 perps).

That is one of the first true empowerments which should arise from Participatory Democracy, otto, the right to determine how taxes shoould be spent … with an understanding of “why” certain things, say health care, should have far more importance than “endless wars of convenience”, for example.

Were that choice available right now, its result would effectively finish the MICC and the ascendency of war profiteers.

DW

Thank you, gtomkins. This ought to be a diary, as there are many points I would like to see discussed. Others have raised the point about conflicting laws and which one would be followed, and given the suggestion that other countries don’t even have a ceiling, combined with disaster legislation, it’s an important topic. Isn’t there something about domestic tranquillity in the preamble to the Constitution? Where is that in this scenario? I have to say I’m not feeling it.

Yes indeed.

Have been wondering if the puppet masters want America to default so they can have their way and get America on the ‘Amero’ monetary system with Mexico. A sweet way to really bring down wages even more and say it was necessary to save the nation in crises. Manufactured crises all the time. The ‘wars’ were a manufactured crises. Bailouts manufactured. Debt ceiling deadline manufactured. Bush ‘ranch’ manufactured. ‘Change’ promise manufactured. Change=from the fire to the frying pan. When a candidate runs on such high ideals, it only means something if he or she decides to be in the game for one term while pissing others off in order to follow through with the high ideal promises.

Read Walker is closing down DMVs in Wis so voters have difficulty getting DL for photo IDs to vote? This wowuld be government harming citizens, not helping them. Evil.

“And yet that simple economic truth does not appear to be included in the “everything” that Obama claims is “on the table.””

A reasonable conclusion, then, is that what is currently going on has nothing to do with the deficit. If it did, jobs and cutting the cost of perpetual war would be front and center. Either that or the political “leadership” in the US is dangerously incompetent. I lean toward the former.

They have made it that simple.

Well, we do have a functional debt ceiling — it just isn’t the number cited in the debt ceiling law. Treasury is both authorized and obligated to borrow just as much as its projections show will be necessary to make up the difference between revenue intake and spending outflow. It’s not allowed to borrow more than this floating debt limit, but it’s also not allowed to borrow less.

It’s also settled law that the administration has no authority to broker spending, to spend so as to pay off only some legal obligations, while impounding other obligated spending. Spending can only be approved or witheld by public law, not under executive authority. Nixon tried impoundment, in a small, “demonstration project” sort of way, as a deficit scold stunt. He certainly didn’t try to impound 45% of govt expenditures. Impoundment was ruled unconstitutional by SCOTUS.

The debt ceiling law is a fifth wheel. We have a perfectly functional legal scheme to implement the Constitutional scheme governing the flow of money into and out of the Treasury. The debt ceiling law is not part of that legal scheme, it’s a ceremonial sop to the deficit scolds. Every few years when the national debt approaches the current ceiling, the scolds get to engage in ritual flagellation of themselves and the political process as a whole for the Sin of deficit spending, and amid much beating of breasts, dressed in sackcloth and ashes, Congress completes the ritual and votes a new, higher ceiling. Great theater, if your tastes run in that Stations of the Cross vein, but not a part of the actual legal scheme that governs money flowing into and out of the Treasury.

Congress fulfills its Constitutional right and duty to control by law the debt of the United States every time it votes a law creating the legal obligation to spend money. It votes to authorize and require Treasury to borrow any shortfall between available revenues and these obligations. This question doesn’t even rise to the level of a legal or Constitutional issue, it’s a simple matter of interpreting the will of Congress in voting spending and its will in voting for the ceiling law in a way that lets both stand, that doesn’t let them conflict. And the only way the debt ceiling law stands in that process is if it’s interpreted as a purely internal reminder for Congress to consider the size of the national debt, and after the appropriate obeisances to the deficit scolds and the Balanced Budget Gods, then vote a new higher limit designed to sound the sacred warning bell some time in the future.

The ceiling law clearly was not intended to be a veto point. It wasn’t intended to be a sort of self-destruct button on Starship USA, a law that triggers national bankruptcy if a bare majority of one chamber pushes the red button. The real question here is why so many supposedly sensible people are letting the Rs use it as a veto point, are pretending that the ship will blow up if the Rs push that button.

Not a chance in hell this plays out like that.

One of the R or D plans goes thru, soon.

Super Committee is established.

IT cuts social services with no apparent political thread to either party or president in office . .

Only, the people will know they are all losing everything they have regardless of WHO or WHAT party is in ‘sposed charge.

What really has me worried is what lies behind implementing this Super Committee . . not THEIR intent but how the hell this country is gonna enforce and implement the intent and control the massive uprisings as people are cut off from what keeps them alive.

Agreed with most of your thoughts, aside from Perry.

Yes, the Super Committee with pass an ;enabling act’, and they will begin to come for us all . . .

Till then, it’s by by Obama around the end of the year (Dim Party will ask him to step aside), hello HRC for the Dim nom, GOP counters with Jeb Bush and he wins regardless of the vote or electorals.

Then, the enabling comes to us in ’13 or ’14.

Faster than I ever dreamt it would.

He doesn’t have to, the Dim plan is the same as his.

No taxes, cut SS MC, MA and establish the Super Committee.

And along will come Jeb Bush to be erected . . . . see my comment above.

Well done, once again . . .

Salud.

I agree with most of the comments you post here but would mind explaining to me how this country will elect another Bush. Unless the answer is Diebold then I agree. I am just asking in all seriousness I don’t see jeb getting elected. Maybe I am naive.

Her millionaire husband must’ve told her. I’m sure there’ll be _lots_ of austerity around the Pelosi household.

“[Paul] Pelosi owns and operates Financial Leasing Services, Inc., a San Francisco, California-based real estate and venture capital investment and consulting firm.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Pelosi

You are right provided we can get on the same page. Tom Friedman’s column in Sunday’s Times was about an effort to create a virtual political party. As is usual individualism will sink the ship. Everyone wants it their way and as a result nothing gets done because we cannot agree on anything. Take FDL as an example. Change should start here or we create a blog that is not top down. You cannot get anyone to talk about that. One problem is trust, or the lack of it. Having confidence in someone you know online requires a huge leap of faith. This conversation, rather than be pursued, will vanish into the ether until the next one when everyone makes the same observations. The fault, dear Brutus, is not in the stars.

Thank you very much, gtomkins. All of this is very difficult for the average citizen to understand, particularly when those participating in the manipulations clearly have not told us what is actually going on. I’ve given up on socalled progressive radio because a sensible stance in criticizing both sides of this public debate gets immediately replaced by subservience to one or the other. Ed Schultz is a case in point – he had taken an understandable position on Thursday, left to go fishing Friday, came back Monday completely won over to the general mantra that everything our CinC is doing is more wonderful than ever. He gives no plausible reason for this conversion; it simply is what it is. That’s crazy, so he is not to be listened to any more than the others.

That is why this site is such a blessing. Clearly there are different points of view here, but one must defend one’s position, or another will come and explain it better. The arguments either have clarity or they don’t. And you have explained the charade to my satisfaction, if not to my complete understanding. The latter may be impossible; I’m a dim old lady in general. But what I can grasp I hold onto, and the main point is that it was unnecessary, completely unnecessary to combine a routine matter involving raising the debt ceiling with difficult policy changes and a scary heightening of brinksmanship drama – on both ‘sides.’

I also thank this site very much for putting up with what may be stupid questions and ignorant side remarks on my part. Nobody has been snarky or mean, and I love that about you all. Please just accept that I represent the general public, ill informed and bemused by much that’s going on in this crazy world. Thank you all.

Sorry. I did paragraph that, but in editing the paragraphs disappeared.

That is why this site is such a blessing. Clearly there are different points of view here, but one must defend one’s position, or another will come and explain it better

I couldn’t agree more. I am a layperson myself but have learned so much from the well informed and intelligent people here. There is so much happening in Washington it is impossible to keep up with it all.

This thread is past its prime so I am probably talking to myself, but the issue will reappear shortly and attract the same comments. We cannot have participatory democracy here at FDL. Jane doesn’t want it. Since it’s her sandbox, she makes the rules. FDL presents in microcosm national issues. Bad things happen here. People get banned or censored, hardly a liberal approach, but it is perceived as effective. I wonder what the community thinks.

You say, if this is what I want, why not go off and do it. Won’t work. Here I am in the midst of liberalism’s hot bed and get no takers. I will do no better online at large.