Me neither, obviously. What would have been your preference?
At first pass, I would have held out longer. I would have framed it as a debt issue from the start. Make a freeze on the debt ceiling the condition for funding Obamacare from the beginning. If the Dems are correct in arguing that the ACA will save us money in the long run both sides win. If they are wrong It's the Dems come out looking like idiots who failed high-school algebra, while the GOP gets to cast themselves as the voice of reason standing in the way of an out-of-control federal bureaucracy.
Along similar lines I would have also attacked the the various delays and exemptions much more vigourously. play up the whole "rules for thee not for me" angle and appeal to Americans sense of fairness. Why should congressional workers and SEIU members get a pass when bob from Kansas does not. Paint it as partisan graft because that's what it is.
The problem of course is that there are established interests in the GOP who don't want to see an end to partisan graft because that would require taking their own hands out of the cookie jar as well.
Thus we have the situation we see now.
We're good for it.
Are we? Why do we keep raising the debt ceiling then? Why have a debt ceiling in the first place? If you keep raising the ceiling indefinitely, sooner or later our lenders are going to conclude, correctly, that we have no intention of paying down the principal and that they own us.
no subject
At first pass, I would have held out longer. I would have framed it as a debt issue from the start. Make a freeze on the debt ceiling the condition for funding Obamacare from the beginning. If the Dems are correct in arguing that the ACA will save us money in the long run both sides win. If they are wrong It's the Dems come out looking like idiots who failed high-school algebra, while the GOP gets to cast themselves as the voice of reason standing in the way of an out-of-control federal bureaucracy.
Along similar lines I would have also attacked the the various delays and exemptions much more vigourously. play up the whole "rules for thee not for me" angle and appeal to Americans sense of fairness. Why should congressional workers and SEIU members get a pass when bob from Kansas does not. Paint it as partisan graft because that's what it is.
The problem of course is that there are established interests in the GOP who don't want to see an end to partisan graft because that would require taking their own hands out of the cookie jar as well.
Thus we have the situation we see now.
We're good for it.
Are we? Why do we keep raising the debt ceiling then? Why have a debt ceiling in the first place? If you keep raising the ceiling indefinitely, sooner or later our lenders are going to conclude, correctly, that we have no intention of paying down the principal and that they own us.
That'll be a shitty day when it comes.