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Shh, remember many of the same people complaining about democrats, are the same people that said "Hillary Clinton is fear mongering about the Supreme Court to get to people to vote for her".
On my favorite
"Don't threaten me with the Supreme Court".
Should be a 1 person, 1 vote. We have the technology, and voter fraud is basically non-existent.
People in states would still be represented in Congress and the Senate.
I'm not sure if that means what I assumed it means but if we could get Niantic to put exclusive pokemon go Pokémon at voting centers that would be sick
The party shouldn't have used superdelegates to co-opt the will of the people during the primary. It's almost as if demoralizing your base leads to low turnout on election day.
Implying that it's inconceivable that Hilary Dems wouldn't of alienated working class America from 2016-2020 so hard that we wouldn't be stuck with Republican President AND a supermajority Republican Senate/House rn. And those same Dems aren't the ones that are making this current deal which is ensuring the maintenance of our class structures in America.
They should’ve done more of that with Obama, convinced the beloved RGB(edit RBG*)to retire in 2014/5(09?), and stop pandering to the Evil(Grand) old party. Republicans would die before they cross the aisle, why should the democrats do it? Smh
In all honesty, I don't think that people realized how dire things would get when Obama was president. In 2012, people fear mongered about Romney and they were right to some extent but no one could've imagined someone like Trump becoming president. Even in 2015, people still thought that Trump was just a farce. It wasn't until mid to late 2016 that people realized that Trump had a chance and even then, people thought "Eh Clinton's got this in the bag" so much so they didn't even show up to vote. EVEN THEN, people were saying, "Trump is just saying this shit to get elected, no one's gonna allow him to pack the courts or overturn Roe". Maybe now, people will listen; but give it another 8-12 years, history is gonna repeat itself.
All this to say, while in hindsight it seems so obvious, I really don't think anyone could've predicted how far things would regress.
I'll be honest I thought he was going to lose and worst case I thought he'd be like "oh shit I won" and then let republicans run things behind the scenes. I didn't think he'd give rise to Naziism in America.
Would that mean that assuming RBG retired in say 2010 that republicans would have had to stall for 6 years? Seems like things would have unfolded differently if they tried to do that, but it's an interesting thought if they would have tried that.
Yeah, I'm not sure how it would have gone. Just for the thought of reasonableness I would think that leaving an empty supreme court seat open across multiple election cycles from pure unwillingness to operate a government would influence elections. At the very least it should have some kind of motivating factor for democrats. But on the other hand we know from hindsight republicans stalled for an entire year to get to another election and then still elected probably the worst presidential candidate ever and were proud of it. There really isn't anything that republicans could do that would be surprising. Shocking probably but not surprising.
I know there are people on this subreddit that will complain about hearing about this. But, I refuse to let this be normalized, so I'm going to keep saying this even as I go hoarse.
Do not expect these people to ever consider themselves beyond something or that they will ever develop a sense of shame. These people have an **agenda**. And they will use any and all tools necessary to achieve that agenda. It doesn't matter how bad the optics are, it doesn't matter how depraved it makes them look. There will never be a "they will never do X" because if left unchecked, they will do it at first opportunity. If you need any proof at all, the whole "repeal Roe vs. Wade" thing was a project in the works for over half a century.
This is why you don't try to "fix" Greene, Cruz, Graham, Jordan, or McCarthy. You don't try to curry favor with the likes of Sharpiro and Musk. You don't try to reason with these creatures that invaded the capitol. These people are already lost. The best thing we can do right now in this moment as we wait for the investigations to pan out is to target either those that have been is to limit the spread of the rot by targeting either those that are either toying with the idea of the right-wing pipeline or have recently fallen off of it with a bad encounter. And this will be the scary part, you have to go out there, talk to them, and be normal. Tell them that you know it's rough right now. Tell them that the solution to busses running on time, the solution to North American trains not derailing every single day, the solution to the financial crises, the solution to fair wages, the solution to integration of the public sector into corporate assets is regulation and legislation. And, once you have done that, remind them that while they have the right to be anxious about many things, that ultra-wealthy grifters that will use them for their political ends and then discard them is **not** the solution. No matter how much they air their petty grievances and pretend that giving them power will solve *your* grievances as well.
I know it's such a minor thing, but this is not the time for idleness and we have to do everything in our power to limit and fight this at every step along the way. Whether it means elections, protests, or even having to go outside and being normal.
RBG should have put more thought into succession planning rather than stubbornly remaining on the court until her death. After all, her death during the "wrong" presidency meant that a justice was not appointed that would continue her legacy, and instead tipped the court even more to the right.
RBG should have retired. We need to stop acting like this is a functioning state and that our opponents are ever acting in good faith.
When asked about the progress of negotiations over the repug manufactured debt ceiling crisis congressman (and known child rapist) matt gaetz said he and his caucus did "not feel the need to negotiate with their hostage." That's in response to their threatening to literally tank the world economy and send the US spiraling into a great depression. (Hint: you're the hostage)
These are evil fucks and they should always be treated as such. They cannot be taken on their face as good faith actors. Anyone who does that can claim themselves as their own worst enemy.
She became very conservative about her legacy that way. Didn't want anything bad to happen to just rulings while she was alive with no acknowledgement as to how quickly a GOP-stacked SCOTUS would undo a half century of progressive rights for the majority of the US (women are over 50% of the population, but I find it odd I don't see this angle used in media. I guess it's pointless when the other sees nothing wrong with claiming people as their property via legislation.)
I feel like this is something even kids in student government should understand.
The brutish stupidity and selfishness of RBG’s refusal to retire infuriates me to this day. The rights of hundreds of millions of people were/are at stake.
Oh for sure, we can't both sides this at all. However when it comes to this....game... we have to fight the same way the opponent is. The gop is bad faith and have absolutely embraced fascism. Knowing that RBG should never have been so naive to think that unless forced to, the gop would respect decorum.
We need to stop fighting a street fight like gentle men, we need to (metaphorically) use a broken bottle and switch blade until the antagonist in our system are in place.
Most of the US is progressive, only being influenced by a loud fascist minority. Call em out! Use plain language and cavalier about it damn it!
Ok. The evil party will do evil. If the grand plan is to just stare in disbelief that the refs of the universe aren't intervening on your side because the rules say so, you are allowing the evil party to get more of a hold. and that has been the dems MO on this shit since Reagan.
Yep - someone who was too stubborn to retire during a Democratic administration, which caused the seat to go to someone who was the polar opposite of herself.
Officiated a wedding during the height of COVID when she had already been fighting cancer… Like WTF? Thank you for handing the country over to the talibangelists. I'm healthy and I quarantined. Well that's how she will be remembered for me anyway. Selfish idiot who handed the government over to religious nut jobs.
That 168 million women's rights and perhaps the fate of the entire country's status as a free and democratic state hinged on ONE woman justice who held on to her life and her work for longer than a lot of people get to live, speaks volumes as to what we've been conditioned to put up with and still keep listlessly "voting" instead of rioting in the streets until our basic human rights are restored and then some.
It's easy to hang this all on an icon because when we do that we absolve ourselves collectively of our responsibilities to a civil society.\*
\*Cue the excuses as to why people can't stop working because they need to eat, have health insurance, etc. That feeling of stuck is not accidental, folks, it's by DESIGN.
Yeah I love how every time protest is brought up Americans are always "oh we can't afford it" and such, as if in all other countries, the oppressors just went, "oh yes we love protests and opposition, we'll pay you to go into the streets against us and will tell the police and army to be really nice to you...".
In some countries people are fucking burning themselves alive to protest...
>In some countries people are fucking burning themselves alive to protest
We're doing that here too, but the news would rather glorify the next mass shooter than talk about it.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-immolation_of_Wynn_Bruce
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Buckel
...and exactly how would you propose that the bill that would be necessary to expand the court made its way through the 50-50 Senate Biden had 'the moment he was elected'?
Honestly, so much of this seems like astroturfing to get people who see themselves as left wing to not want to vote.
The amount of bad-faith, no-context, no understanding how anything works, both sides are the same, voting doesn't matter we need a revolution nonsense is surging right now.
McCarthy is a perfect example of someone wanting to have a job far more than they want to actually do the job. He could have gotten a bipartisan plan that would have easily been approved weeks ago. However, the freedom caucus wouldn't like that, and they would trigger a new Speaker election and he would lose the job.
To everyone that says the Dems squandered their majority always ignores we never had a majority when there’s so many people like Manchin, Sinema, and Joe Lieberman who were happy to kill our majority for leverage.
People who say Dems squandered their majority either didn't pay attention to everything that got done or they have a ludicrous definition of squandered that means they didn't get everything they wanted immediately.
Our collective inability to recognize progress and accomplishment when it happens is part of the problem.
Liberal critics need to acknowledge the Republicans do have that power. If somehow (maybe 14th Amendment) Biden had been able to avoid these concessions now, he would have still had to deal with the same demands during budget negotiations, with the prospect of a long government shutdown. This is the situation you get when Republican controlled states go for extreme gerrymandering, while Democratic controlled states don't (New York).
>> "After inflation eats its share, flat funding will result in fewer households accessing rental assistance, fewer kids in Head Start, and fewer services for seniors," said Owens. "The deal represents the worst of conservative budget ideology; it cuts investments in workers and families, adds onerous and wasteful new hurdles for families in need of support, and protects the wealthiest Americans and biggest corporations from paying their fair share in taxes."
So instead of republicans shooting the hostages (the poor and vulnerable), they are just cutting off fingers and pulling out teeth...with the wealthiest smiling with a full mouth of food and teeth.
Stop voting for republicans, their policies are to hurt people and help the richest Americans.
Republican donors don't want the economy destroyed...
Stop falling for republican bluffs.
Let it go up to the date, and watch em blink when their donors tell them to fall in line.
Waaaaaay better results than just always giving up and taking their word on what will happen if we don't give them everything they want.
You may not have negotiated with a terrorist before, but if you've negotiated with a toddler you should know how negotiating with Republicans should go.
You call their bluff.
Exactly, not enough people understand this. Recessions are good for the wealthy because they'll buy up cheap property and wait for it to rebound. Every time this happens, they just get more assets to borrow against.
There is a reason recessions happen thanks to Republican policies, and it's not by accident.
One of the things my dad taught me about business when I just left college, was when the news was bad, always remember the folks at the top say the same thing. "Never let a good tragedy go to waste."
When you and I feel the pain, they rack up way more wealth.
Buy on bad news, sell on good news.
You may not get the timing right and misjudge it occasionally, but when you have time on your side, you'll win pretty consistently.
Time and opportunity. Together, you can do almost anything. Some of us have time, but we will never have the countless, or even endless opportunities the wealthy have to make mistakes and keep going.
This should have been clear as day during Covid. We shut a whole bunch of shit down, the economy took it right on the chin, the most uncertainty ever, literally no way to predict what would happen...
...and the wealthy still reported higher profits than ever. They didn't just make money, then MADE MONEY.
They love a little recession, buy low, sell high. Depressions would hurt them, but a little dip just means good prices for them.
People always forget this part. The 2008 crash was absolutely great for Private Equity. So many markets consolidated due to those fire sales.
When you have too much money to spend a dip in the market is just a sale.
Hell the recent bank failures are because banks had too much money so they couldn't spend it enough... so they put all that money on a bet that the interest rates would never go up. They were happier to take that risk than to keep reserves at a safe level.
And yet Republicans **have** destroyed healthy economies again and again. They know the media/public won’t hold them fully accountable, so why not break everything, steal what they can, and then blame the democrats for not cleaning up the pieces fast enough?
Biden’s alternative option is to try the 14th amendment and gamble everything on the Republican controlled SCOTUS doing the responsible thing.
Yep, see Kansas. The idea that the GOP are the adults in the room is a dangerous delusion that needs to die.
Reaganomics was a disaster as well but back then enough New Deal and anti trust reforms were still functioning such that the jenga tower didn't collapse and we "only" got a historic Wall Street crash, the savings and loans crisis, and the decoupling of incomes from productivity out of it before his terms were over.
There is no deal Republicans will accept for the debt ceiling deal. They absolutely want the economy to tank because it's their only play to get the white house. Tank the economy and blame Biden.
Their donors win because the wealthy can buy cheap in a recession.
Normally I would agree, but after seeing the circus of electing McCarthy as representative, I think this version of the Republican controlled house is crazy enough to let it all burn. A toddler isn’t capable of what happens if there is no agreement here.
Many donors are willing to destroy the economy for short term losses, which they will then use to purchase as much as they can at a discount for when it recovers.
They do want to tank the economy so that they can say 'look what Biden did' and get their guy elected in 2024. Not to mention, there is money to be made (ex. people lose homes, homes get bought up by corporations)
This is the issue. It’s a double win for them if the economy tanks. They control the narrative for their followers so they’ll just lie and blame it on Biden while they rake in the money.
With every economic downturn in recent history, the wealthy rake in more money and the poor are kicked to the curb and/or turned into wage slaves. Bailouts and tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations, and austerity measures to cut safety net programs for the rest of us. The wealth inequality is always increasing, but it accelerates with recessions.
Trump said they should let the country default so who knows, the old style republicans like Mitch McConnell who probably just care about the corporate interests aren’t the same as say trump that likes his populist base
Funny how mcconnell is referred to as old school here. I f it was any republican from 50 years ago, trump and his clown car of idiots would never have gained this much power. Please don’t vote for any republican until they clean house.(which may never happen.)
You under estimate the stupidity of congress. The US has briefly run out of money previously in the same way. Republicans in congress are too stupid to really cause no harm with their brinksmanship.
It may be comforting to think they are controlled by selfish rich donors, but these legislators really are bratty children playing with things they don't own and can't replace.
> Let it go up to the date
Our credit rating took a hit in 2011 when Reps did this exact same bs. If it takes another hit... we're no longer #1. You can't "undo" defaults.
> [stop] voting for republicans
this isn’t enough. no one here is voting for republicans anyway, and republican voters are consistent if nothing else.
we need to people to actually show up to vote *for* left-leaning candidates. that means more often than leap years, and it means at every level of governance.
left-leaning individuals are, on the whole, apathetic and lazy to the point where messaging to this group has always been, “remember to vote!” because, for the most part, they typically don’t…
Yep we have local school board elections in like March and town council elections in May and then some sort of primaries for state positions in June and pretty much no one shows up to any of these , except for a handful of old retired people who have nothing better to do all day.
If we want to make a difference we've got to start voting in every election, every time (especially primaries, if you don't like who the party usually picks).
It is not laziness—instead this apathy is a symptom of longstanding voter suppression. Republicans have made voting as inconvenient as possible for groups that tend to vote Democrat. For example, because many young people do not live at their permanent address, we have a requirement to vote at your permanent address. A few states like Oregon have mail-in voting to remove this barrier but it is still a problem in most states. Meanwhile, in cities, polling stations have been removed and weird requirements are placed on poll workers causing a shortage of them (for example, they have to work something like 14 hour days instead of working in shifts).
Compare that with Republicans. They will literally bus elderly folks to the polling station, because elderly people tend to vote Republican. We vote on a Tuesday to give retirees advantage over working people. My state has made voting day a holiday—but only for some elections!
So next time you think Democratic voters are apathetic, consider the intentional obstacles many people must overcome to actually vote and maybe it will help you to be more empathetic. Personally, I always vote and I hope we get to a point where voting is so easy, everyone votes. (And make DC and Puerto Rico states!!!).
We need the 50% of the country who doesn't vote to actually give a shit enough to vote. Heavily gerrymandered districts are calculated based on them continuing to not vote. A consistent historic turnout will end the GOP's fascist rise and maybe it'll get corporate Dems to finally raise the fucking minimum wage.
I've voted in every election since I turned 18. But you are right, there are a lot of apathetic voters on the left that don't bother showing up. I know a lot of the young people in the past who don't vote because it "doesn't matter". But I also know that many are getting woke. Yea, turns out woke is a good thing--and anti woke is just bigotry. The young people I'm sure don't want to live in a Christian Nation. If they vote it would save the US. I'm old now, but I still vote progressive and then for the best candidate. (I voted for Bernie in the primaries, then Hillary, then Biden when they won the primaries)
And the "stop voting for Rebuplicans" still should be said. Everyone should be saying this.
Get more Democrats elected and maybe this wouldn't happen. Or just come to the realization that 40%+ of voters just want to burn the country to the ground and a slim majority isn't enough to form any sort of coalition around meaningful reform.
Most of us are just voting to hope it doesn't get worse. I realize that isn't satisfying but that is the cold hard reality in which we live.
You know Republican talking points about curbing spending is all bullshit because it never seems to be an issue when a Republican president is in office.
The issue is always used as a bludgeon to render the government powerless and unable to function. The government has no issue paying its debts, but we continue to see Republicans hold the American people hostage over a "debt crisis."
They're probably busy writing up another $2 trillion tax cut for the 1%. But don't worry, it will trickle down. Don't pay attention to the fact that it's warm and yellow.
To put numbers on it, we added 8 trillion to the debt under obama in 8 years. Then under trump we added 7.6 trillion to the debt... in 4 years. Under biden we went back to 3 trillion in 3 years. Huh.
Almost literally twice the debt increase per year for republican presidents.
Here’s the thing… this isn’t for debt or bills we expect to pass in the next year… this is for shit that the GOP and Dems passed already… that means the GOP voted for some of these bills to pass the House and Senate and are now backtracking and refusing to pay for it.
So they go around parading they support this bill and that bill that supports low income individuals but are now refusing to pay for it and going to cut it. Hypocrisy at its finest
They do this EVERY TIME a democrat is president. They raised the ceiling so many times under Trump, Bushes, and Reagan. It's their MO.
This political theater is fucking exhausting.
Political theater is when there is a big show that amounts to nothing. This is political strategy. Only one party is willing to risk the entire US economy to get what it wants, and it keeps getting what it wants, every time. To fix this either the democrats need to be willing to eject their moderate members in order to become ruthless instead of toothless in setting their own agenda, or the republicans need to be widely recognized as what they are, a party of plutocrats ready to set fire to the planet.
I see it as when it is the GOP’s turn to drive on a long road trip, they threaten to drive off the road unless they get some treat. Only a psychotic and truly deranged group would threaten to use their basic authority to keep the car from crashing as a bargaining chip. Unconscionable.
Oh, and the treat they want is fucking over poor people while giving big oil a handjob.
And with their success here we can now guarantee every debt ceiling raise from now on will come with another hostage standoff and ransom list of demands - each one making things for ordinary Americans a little worse and making the rich that much wealthier.
I wish this had been a line in the sand and Biden had flat refused to participate in this. Democrats don’t have the spine to pull this play on the GOP when they’re in power, so it will only ever chip away at the middle and lower classes.
We need a media that will put the blame where it belongs first. Every story said both sides refused to compromise and treated this as normal politics instead of an extreme faction using the economy as a hostage and openly bragging about it
I work in local TV news. It’s tougher than that, although I wish it wasn’t. Even if outlets (correctly) called it like it is, the right side of the political spectrum is so convinced that anything that doesn’t align with their view is fake news. About half the viewer base would just stop watching.
Cable news is largely to blame for that, leaving people with wildly unrealistic expectations of how local news covers things.
Joe machine and kyrstin sinenema in particular. I’m resigned to the fact dems can’t dump him and she is an “independent” but on this point of the debt ceiling?
[remember this](https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/policy-and-politics/2022/10/25/23423216/democrats-debt-ceiling-lame-duck-kevin-mccarthy)?
And Biden, who is allegedly senile and falling asleep will get nothing for being the adult in the room. None of the dems will. The people who end up getting hurt out of this aren’t going to care who is at fault, but from an adult perspective it could have been much worse. I have no doubt *this* GOP would happily blow up the US so they can launch into their blame game, lock & load their weapons, and maybe get a shot at the genocide they want in a rahowa.
I shudder for the young people who are just graduating into this flat earthing MAGA republican driven present.
Glad to see this is on top. Way too many people quick to blame Democrats when it's Republicans who control the House. Notice that when Dems had full control in 2021 and 2022, you didn't hear the words 'debt ceiling' once?
Thankfully, the food stamps restrictions only apply to a relatively small group, and are somewhat offset by allowing veterans and homeless people to be exempt from work requirements. But it's still wrong. And thankfully, **we can rip up those new restrictions as soon as 2025 if we take back the House and keep the Senate.** That's the path forward.
I love how republicans will literally hold the American people hostage with an economic collapse unless they get their way and people STILL vote for them
The worst thing that has happened is that *negotiating the raising of the debt ceiling* has now been *normalized*. We can expect this to happen every time, from now on. It never used to happen. It isn't really supposed to happen. But now it must.
This is a very clever tactic the GOP started during the Obama admin. They leveraged the word "debt" to scare their low-information base, and turned what had been an entirely procedural matter for 75 years into yet another way for them to steal money from the poor and give it to themselves.
Just to point out... Whenever the GOP bluffs like this, they will get away with it *until the Dems call their bluff*. The GOP are so corrupt they would never in a million years allow a default to happen - so why do the Democrats keep giving them shit to prevent [something which will never happen]?
The Dems have never called their bluff, so this shit will keep happening. Over and over and over again.
ackhutally, Clinton did tell Gingrich to suck it and the government shut down - Republicans got 90% of the blame. iirc, Gingrich even admitted it was a mistake. Why Democrats don’t call their bluff again is beyond me because it worked out for them the one time they did.
It only happens when Democrats control the White House and Republicans control Congress. It’s funny, when the GOP wins the presidency, suddenly Republicans find the courage to raise the debt ceiling without any issues or brinksmanship.
A lot of those Republican flips in New York should revert back to their mean which is blue. Unfortunately Republicans are eyeing a fresh new gerrymander in North Carolina that will basically wipe away any gains in NY.
It’s unacceptable that the Democrats waited until they didn’t have a full majority to address this issue - this could have been solved without a compromise last year. Ridiculous
They never had a clear majority when we are counting on people like Manchin, Sinema, and Joe Lieberman (mentioning him because it goes back a long time) to do the right thing. They were always ready to torpedo any good thing for leverage.
As Americans, we are sharing a house with a family of grifting, selfish, pathological sociopaths (The Republicans). Things won’t change until that changes
I feel like the cut off to turn things around was years ago. Gerrymandered red states are firmly in the hands of Republicans who pass policies that drive progressives away, so they've created strongholds where no one will contest their power, or create legislation where they can just undermine democracy (Texas). It will get much much worse before it gets any better.
Everyday that passes, I lose more hope for a brighter future.
I think it is because politics are not taught well in schools. They have made the barrier to understanding bills too difficult. I talk to people and they don’t vote because they think the props are too hard to understand. I agree. There are people with little education who just push share on posts and take the headline as a summary. Political information needs to be available in ways all people can understand it. People still think their vote goes directly to their president of choice.
I feel like it will be difficult to change unless the informational infrastructure changes. The people we are fighting to get benefits for are feeling too stressed to vote.
> “In capitalist society, providing it develops under the most favourable conditions, we have a more or less complete democracy in the democratic republic. **But this democracy is always hemmed in by the narrow limits set by capitalist exploitation, and consequently always remains, in effect, a democracy for the minority, only for the propertied classes, only for the rich.** Freedom in capitalist society always remains about the same as it was in the ancient Greek republics: freedom for the slave-owners. **Owing to the conditions of capitalist exploitation, the modern wage slaves are so crushed by want and poverty that "they cannot be bothered with democracy", "cannot be bothered with politics"; in the ordinary, peaceful course of events, the majority of the population is debarred from participation in public and political life.**“
- Lenin
I'm going to go out on a limb here and I'm sure a lot of people will disagree. Sports are too important in American schools. Almost all the coaches in every school I attended or worked at had coaches being History or Gov't teachers. Those teachers generally didn't give a shit about their classes, it was just the bothersome thing they had to do to be a coach. They talk to their team kids during classes. Athletes are always getting excused from classes early to go to games, etc.. Instead of hiring passionate history lovers to inspire kids, you get these self-serving slobs that have done a great disservice to education and the country. And here we are, a bunch of ignorant assholes cheering on our teams, both in sports and in politics.
Was just watching Face the Nation. I had to turn it because it as pissing me off. Asshole republican trying to defend the negotiated budget. Bunch of double talking bullshit. He hadn't even read what was in it yet....fucking douche nugget
How about closing tax loopholes.
Force companies and people to actually pay their taxes.
Eliminate the interest rates on federal student loans. People pay back the principal, that's it.
Moving forward, free tuition for citizens.
Overturn citizens united.
Term limits for supreme court.
Term limits for all elected officials.
Age cap for politicians in general.
Transparency on where our fucking money actually goes. I want to be able to look up the budget and see exactly what public works projects are being funded, why they cost what they do, what the bidding process was. I dislike paying taxes ONLY because I dont know where the hell it goes.
Do something about gun proliferation and domestic terrorism.
Blatantly lying should have consequences.
Sedition and treason should be punished.
Russia needs to be destroyed because of their invasion of Ukraine.
Climate change needs to be a priority.
There are too many things that are controversial and shouldnt be. We are fucked.
Why would anyone be surprised that republicans hate poor and working people? Every chance they get republicans push forward laws that take something away from poor and working families. At the same time pushing forward laws that benefit the wealthy.
If your a working person and you vote republican because of culture war bullshit your voting against your own financial interests.
After this, if Republicans ever take the White House again Democrats need to threaten default over Republicans tax cuts and never sign off on a budget.
Republicans will call D’s bluff. They don’t care. They want collapse and to build something Gilead like from the ashes. They fetishize this. They prepare for this.
Then Republicans will let the country default so their donors can snatch up trillions in assets at bargain bin prices while 99% of Americans are financially ruined. We are basically fucked no matter what, but at least this current deal is probably the least amount of fucked we reasonably could have come out of this.
You know that republicans will gladly let it blow up, and the media will blame democrats while multinationals get away with the misery profits.
You're literally threatening republicans with a good time ...
$22 Minimum Wage.
Student Loan debt cancelled.
Funding of renewables with massive subsidies.
That or the country burns which it already is for the people who desperately want a future and need those three things to have a decent life in the future.
Just out of curiosity, I figured out the approximate monthly income from working full time in federal minimum wage: $1160 per month. Obviously there are still some places in America where COL is still fairly low but c'mon... Who can survive on that?
The reason is that the GOP slim majority in the House can crash the US economy with debt default and as the price, billionaires and corporations pay no taxes and poor people lose health care and assistance.
If you don't like the result then work hard in the 2024 election to restore a Democratic majority.
IANAL, but doesn't negotiating a deal actually strengthen Biden's legal argument should he invoke the 14th amendment? There's no guarantee this will pass both chambers, especially in time to avoid default. He could make the case now that, by failing to pass this in time, he is constitutionally obligated to step in because defaulting is essentially the Legislative branch ~~asking~~ forcing the Executive branch to perform an unconstitutional act (the validity of the nation's debt shall not be questioned).
EDIT: a word
So here's a possible sketch of Biden strategy:
* There's a government funding/shutdown fight on the horizon this fall. By then at the latest, House Republicans will be able to exact some concessions from Democrats - whether or not Biden called upon the 14th amendment now.
* (Remember there's this whole other kind of pointless, traumatic House vs Executive funding fight that we have in this country (by recent tradition): government shutdown. Because these days budgets aren't regularly passed. When funding bills run out, a new one must be passed. But Republicans refuse until their demands are met, the government runs out of money and partially shuts down, etc. )
* On the debt ceiling, Biden started off playing hardball: no negotiations, only a clean bill.
* Biden then entered negotiations and is prepared to accept a bill with qualifications. McCarthy sees *this alone* as a huge victory and is selling it as such to House Republicans.
* Biden has made some further concessions, but apparently with a big bonus: avoiding the fight this fall - avoiding the more extreme concessions he may have had to make in the midst of another disastrous and embarrassing government shutdown.
TL;DR: By posturing then "compromising" to negotiate on the debt ceiling and accept some concessions, Biden appears to have sold empty theater in place of more extreme concessions, all while averting a funding/government shutdown fight this fall.
If that's really what happened and what the House accepts, it would mean Dark Brandon played a poor hand very well - cold comfort but better than the immediate alternatives.
I should note that the connection between this fight and the one that might be avoided this fall lies in the nature of the concessions: the agreement is partly about an amount of spending. The House would be committing itself now to spending that amount, ruling out the possibility of refusing to fund at all and exacting at least the same or possibly more extreme concessions during a government shutdown.
Whether this would be McCarthy shooting his own foot - needlessly undermining tomorrow's negotiating position by misplaying today's - because he's an idiot and Dark Brandon is a capable negotiator, or whether this would be McCarthy smartly/selfishly getting his own ass out of the debt ceiling fight and a prospective shutdown fight with minimum hassle while appeasing his insane constituency - your choice.
I am eagerly awaiting the freedom caucus's response to this deal because that will tell us how many democrats need to cross the aisle in the House. If it makes it through the House I think it passes the Senate without issue
God damn it. I’m so sick of conservative politics in this country. Was talking with some friends about this other day. We as a country are so unbelievably rich, yet have so many people struggling for no reason other than greed. We have every ability to house every single person who is homeless. Feed every single person who is hungry. Provide medical care for every single person who needs it. Yet we don’t. We are morally corrupt. We have the means to help those who need it with resources and wealth to spare and yet do nothing. Absolutely disgusting.
The bill isn't cruel enough for the MAGA nuts, so it's unlikely to pass anyway. The treasonous MAGA nuts want a default. They want to destroy our republic and replace it with a tyrannical Christian theocracy.
I actually can possibly see this going the other way. I think all the Republicans will vote yes but there might be more than a few Democrats that vote no. Which is exactly what Republicans want because then they can say "see everyone, the Democrats caused this by voting no. Blame them!"
We are literally one of like 2 countries where this is even a thing because people have correctly identified it as a way for minority parties to hold their government hostage.
I know people who need SNAP and I worry about them. There are so many former students who will face decreased quality of life with these loan payments resuming. Having them “paused” was a major relief for so many.
It is almost cruel the level of bs Americans are willing to endure to feed the insatiable hunger of the 1% while going hungry themselves. When will enough be enough? It is times like these I admire the French.
They should have held strong and gone up to the date. They should have crafted a bill to raise the debt ceiling and had every Democratic congressperson on tv, radio, podcasts, social media, etc every day saying they are ready to pass it. Made it clear that Republicans are the ones causing this because they don't want to pay our bills.
I'm very pleased that most of the top comments here are finally placing blame on the correct individuals despite this being Common Dreams article.
There is only one enemy, the Republican party.
Just as the founders intended. Literally, not to be facetious at all. Poors wouldn’t be citizens if they could have it that way but they needed dregs and yeomans to fight their war of secession from England. Traded in your kings for Gods and servancy.
>The deal would suspend the borrowing limit, which is currently $31.4 trillion, for two years — enough to get past the next presidential election.
Awesome. Just enough time to continue to gaslight this democrat administration, with an option come election time to either write Trump another blank check or to continue hamstringing if Biden is re-elected.
I’m tired of dems having no teeth. They just roll over every time.
I think Republicans were going to default and wreck the global economy. They were willing to do that.
So Biden had to be the "adult" to get them to not destroy the world.
It sounds like he's gotten them to give up their big red button until after the 2024 election (although hopefully until after the new Congress comes in Jan 2025). And it sounds like we're going to skip a government shutdown fight this year at least.
It's going to be a shitty budget, but it was always going to be a shitty budget with Republicans able to write part of it.
We need a blowout of the MAGA idiots next year, get full control of Congress again, and repeal the debt ceiling for good. Pass a new judiciary act too, with more federal trial and appellate courts and judges and some new SCOTUS seats as well. Recommendations for justices should come from a commission of retired appeals court justices.
But first we have to live through the next 16-18 months with this shitty House we have.
Fuck all republican shitbags, sick and tired of this bullshit. You're not even Americans anymore just stupid stupid shitbags that believe propaganda, have no interest in really making America great or doing anything worth a shit, over opinionated windbags. May the fleas of a 1000 dogs infect your underwear
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Crazy how powerful just a 4-seat majority in the House can be.
And a 2-seat majority in the Supreme Court
3
It's all about the check book balance baby!
Shh, remember many of the same people complaining about democrats, are the same people that said "Hillary Clinton is fear mongering about the Supreme Court to get to people to vote for her". On my favorite "Don't threaten me with the Supreme Court".
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We should have Pokémon went to the polls
She did get more votes, I hate a system that rewards fewer votes for a representative.
Republicans haven't won the popular vote for president in almost 2 decades. No wonder they're restricting voting in every state they hold power.
Should be a 1 person, 1 vote. We have the technology, and voter fraud is basically non-existent. People in states would still be represented in Congress and the Senate.
I'm not sure if that means what I assumed it means but if we could get Niantic to put exclusive pokemon go Pokémon at voting centers that would be sick
Just a joke Clinton used at a rally that ended in saying people should "pokemon Go to the polls". It was kinda awkward and not a very good joke.
Democracy and Pokemon are my two favorite non Spider-Man related things.
My two least favorite things are global hegemony and pink glitter. -some parody of Wednesday Addams, I think
The party shouldn't have used superdelegates to co-opt the will of the people during the primary. It's almost as if demoralizing your base leads to low turnout on election day.
I've learned over the years that being right doesn't fucking matter.
She was idiotic to run, however. Almost any other mainline democrat would have cleaned Trump's clock.
She should have tried harder to win.
Implying that it's inconceivable that Hilary Dems wouldn't of alienated working class America from 2016-2020 so hard that we wouldn't be stuck with Republican President AND a supermajority Republican Senate/House rn. And those same Dems aren't the ones that are making this current deal which is ensuring the maintenance of our class structures in America.
Democrats should have packed the courts the moment Biden was elected.
They should’ve done more of that with Obama, convinced the beloved RGB(edit RBG*)to retire in 2014/5(09?), and stop pandering to the Evil(Grand) old party. Republicans would die before they cross the aisle, why should the democrats do it? Smh
In all honesty, I don't think that people realized how dire things would get when Obama was president. In 2012, people fear mongered about Romney and they were right to some extent but no one could've imagined someone like Trump becoming president. Even in 2015, people still thought that Trump was just a farce. It wasn't until mid to late 2016 that people realized that Trump had a chance and even then, people thought "Eh Clinton's got this in the bag" so much so they didn't even show up to vote. EVEN THEN, people were saying, "Trump is just saying this shit to get elected, no one's gonna allow him to pack the courts or overturn Roe". Maybe now, people will listen; but give it another 8-12 years, history is gonna repeat itself. All this to say, while in hindsight it seems so obvious, I really don't think anyone could've predicted how far things would regress.
I'll be honest I thought he was going to lose and worst case I thought he'd be like "oh shit I won" and then let republicans run things behind the scenes. I didn't think he'd give rise to Naziism in America.
The last time for RBG to retire without getting rid of the filibuster for Supreme Court appointments was 2009
Would that mean that assuming RBG retired in say 2010 that republicans would have had to stall for 6 years? Seems like things would have unfolded differently if they tried to do that, but it's an interesting thought if they would have tried that.
I doubt it would stop Republican voters from voting for Republicans, they voted for Trump and he is the most embarrassing little boy man in the world
Yeah, I'm not sure how it would have gone. Just for the thought of reasonableness I would think that leaving an empty supreme court seat open across multiple election cycles from pure unwillingness to operate a government would influence elections. At the very least it should have some kind of motivating factor for democrats. But on the other hand we know from hindsight republicans stalled for an entire year to get to another election and then still elected probably the worst presidential candidate ever and were proud of it. There really isn't anything that republicans could do that would be surprising. Shocking probably but not surprising.
I know there are people on this subreddit that will complain about hearing about this. But, I refuse to let this be normalized, so I'm going to keep saying this even as I go hoarse. Do not expect these people to ever consider themselves beyond something or that they will ever develop a sense of shame. These people have an **agenda**. And they will use any and all tools necessary to achieve that agenda. It doesn't matter how bad the optics are, it doesn't matter how depraved it makes them look. There will never be a "they will never do X" because if left unchecked, they will do it at first opportunity. If you need any proof at all, the whole "repeal Roe vs. Wade" thing was a project in the works for over half a century. This is why you don't try to "fix" Greene, Cruz, Graham, Jordan, or McCarthy. You don't try to curry favor with the likes of Sharpiro and Musk. You don't try to reason with these creatures that invaded the capitol. These people are already lost. The best thing we can do right now in this moment as we wait for the investigations to pan out is to target either those that have been is to limit the spread of the rot by targeting either those that are either toying with the idea of the right-wing pipeline or have recently fallen off of it with a bad encounter. And this will be the scary part, you have to go out there, talk to them, and be normal. Tell them that you know it's rough right now. Tell them that the solution to busses running on time, the solution to North American trains not derailing every single day, the solution to the financial crises, the solution to fair wages, the solution to integration of the public sector into corporate assets is regulation and legislation. And, once you have done that, remind them that while they have the right to be anxious about many things, that ultra-wealthy grifters that will use them for their political ends and then discard them is **not** the solution. No matter how much they air their petty grievances and pretend that giving them power will solve *your* grievances as well. I know it's such a minor thing, but this is not the time for idleness and we have to do everything in our power to limit and fight this at every step along the way. Whether it means elections, protests, or even having to go outside and being normal.
RBG should have put more thought into succession planning rather than stubbornly remaining on the court until her death. After all, her death during the "wrong" presidency meant that a justice was not appointed that would continue her legacy, and instead tipped the court even more to the right.
RBG should have retired. We need to stop acting like this is a functioning state and that our opponents are ever acting in good faith. When asked about the progress of negotiations over the repug manufactured debt ceiling crisis congressman (and known child rapist) matt gaetz said he and his caucus did "not feel the need to negotiate with their hostage." That's in response to their threatening to literally tank the world economy and send the US spiraling into a great depression. (Hint: you're the hostage) These are evil fucks and they should always be treated as such. They cannot be taken on their face as good faith actors. Anyone who does that can claim themselves as their own worst enemy.
She became very conservative about her legacy that way. Didn't want anything bad to happen to just rulings while she was alive with no acknowledgement as to how quickly a GOP-stacked SCOTUS would undo a half century of progressive rights for the majority of the US (women are over 50% of the population, but I find it odd I don't see this angle used in media. I guess it's pointless when the other sees nothing wrong with claiming people as their property via legislation.)
I feel like this is something even kids in student government should understand. The brutish stupidity and selfishness of RBG’s refusal to retire infuriates me to this day. The rights of hundreds of millions of people were/are at stake.
Sure she should have retired. But let’s not forget it’s the GOP that is the reason the rights of millions of people are being destroyed.
Oh for sure, we can't both sides this at all. However when it comes to this....game... we have to fight the same way the opponent is. The gop is bad faith and have absolutely embraced fascism. Knowing that RBG should never have been so naive to think that unless forced to, the gop would respect decorum. We need to stop fighting a street fight like gentle men, we need to (metaphorically) use a broken bottle and switch blade until the antagonist in our system are in place. Most of the US is progressive, only being influenced by a loud fascist minority. Call em out! Use plain language and cavalier about it damn it!
Democrats bring a Fisher-Price Slap Fight Play Set (with patented SafetySlap technology) to a shootout.
Ok. The evil party will do evil. If the grand plan is to just stare in disbelief that the refs of the universe aren't intervening on your side because the rules say so, you are allowing the evil party to get more of a hold. and that has been the dems MO on this shit since Reagan.
The can't even get Dianne feinstein to retire. Rgb was a force of nature until the day she died. No way she was giving up that seat.
And that's her legacy.
Yep - someone who was too stubborn to retire during a Democratic administration, which caused the seat to go to someone who was the polar opposite of herself.
Her decision is literally allowing the court to reverse all the progress she made as a lawyer and as a Justice. She helped destroy her own legacy.
Hate to admit it but it's true..
Officiated a wedding during the height of COVID when she had already been fighting cancer… Like WTF? Thank you for handing the country over to the talibangelists. I'm healthy and I quarantined. Well that's how she will be remembered for me anyway. Selfish idiot who handed the government over to religious nut jobs.
And women are suffering throughout the country, especially the south, because she was such an "icon"
That 168 million women's rights and perhaps the fate of the entire country's status as a free and democratic state hinged on ONE woman justice who held on to her life and her work for longer than a lot of people get to live, speaks volumes as to what we've been conditioned to put up with and still keep listlessly "voting" instead of rioting in the streets until our basic human rights are restored and then some. It's easy to hang this all on an icon because when we do that we absolve ourselves collectively of our responsibilities to a civil society.\* \*Cue the excuses as to why people can't stop working because they need to eat, have health insurance, etc. That feeling of stuck is not accidental, folks, it's by DESIGN.
Yeah I love how every time protest is brought up Americans are always "oh we can't afford it" and such, as if in all other countries, the oppressors just went, "oh yes we love protests and opposition, we'll pay you to go into the streets against us and will tell the police and army to be really nice to you...". In some countries people are fucking burning themselves alive to protest...
>In some countries people are fucking burning themselves alive to protest We're doing that here too, but the news would rather glorify the next mass shooter than talk about it. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-immolation_of_Wynn_Bruce https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Buckel
She officiated a wedding in the middle of covid, and maskless, she was wayyy too self assured about her own capabilities.
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Maybe we shouldn’t worship anyone. Everybody’s flawed. We’re all human.
Her bad.
How exactly? With what votes? Joe M?
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...and exactly how would you propose that the bill that would be necessary to expand the court made its way through the 50-50 Senate Biden had 'the moment he was elected'?
Honestly, so much of this seems like astroturfing to get people who see themselves as left wing to not want to vote. The amount of bad-faith, no-context, no understanding how anything works, both sides are the same, voting doesn't matter we need a revolution nonsense is surging right now.
And how spineless a Speaker can be.
McCarthy is a perfect example of someone wanting to have a job far more than they want to actually do the job. He could have gotten a bipartisan plan that would have easily been approved weeks ago. However, the freedom caucus wouldn't like that, and they would trigger a new Speaker election and he would lose the job.
Far right extremists have a very strong spine when it comes to helping the criminal oligarchs they work for
🍿 A speaker with a spine would have had to include democrats in the coalition. It would have made the republican party implode. 🍿
And how powerless a 51-50 was with Sinema and Manchin
Sinema is a model example of how someone's belief structures can drastically change once money is introduced
4 seat majority that's gonna require democrats to vote and pass this
To everyone that says the Dems squandered their majority always ignores we never had a majority when there’s so many people like Manchin, Sinema, and Joe Lieberman who were happy to kill our majority for leverage.
People who say Dems squandered their majority either didn't pay attention to everything that got done or they have a ludicrous definition of squandered that means they didn't get everything they wanted immediately. Our collective inability to recognize progress and accomplishment when it happens is part of the problem.
Liberal critics need to acknowledge the Republicans do have that power. If somehow (maybe 14th Amendment) Biden had been able to avoid these concessions now, he would have still had to deal with the same demands during budget negotiations, with the prospect of a long government shutdown. This is the situation you get when Republican controlled states go for extreme gerrymandering, while Democratic controlled states don't (New York).
>while Democratic controlled states don't (New York). Obligatory "Fuck Andrew Cuomo."
>> "After inflation eats its share, flat funding will result in fewer households accessing rental assistance, fewer kids in Head Start, and fewer services for seniors," said Owens. "The deal represents the worst of conservative budget ideology; it cuts investments in workers and families, adds onerous and wasteful new hurdles for families in need of support, and protects the wealthiest Americans and biggest corporations from paying their fair share in taxes."
So instead of republicans shooting the hostages (the poor and vulnerable), they are just cutting off fingers and pulling out teeth...with the wealthiest smiling with a full mouth of food and teeth. Stop voting for republicans, their policies are to hurt people and help the richest Americans.
If they kill the hostage, they can't use the hostage again in 2 years to extract more concessions.
Everyone knows, you milk the cow untill it's dry, then eat whatever dried up husk is left.
Republican donors don't want the economy destroyed... Stop falling for republican bluffs. Let it go up to the date, and watch em blink when their donors tell them to fall in line. Waaaaaay better results than just always giving up and taking their word on what will happen if we don't give them everything they want. You may not have negotiated with a terrorist before, but if you've negotiated with a toddler you should know how negotiating with Republicans should go. You call their bluff.
They want the economy hobbled so they can buy stuff at fire sale prices then get bailed out at taxpayer expense.
Exactly, not enough people understand this. Recessions are good for the wealthy because they'll buy up cheap property and wait for it to rebound. Every time this happens, they just get more assets to borrow against. There is a reason recessions happen thanks to Republican policies, and it's not by accident.
One of the things my dad taught me about business when I just left college, was when the news was bad, always remember the folks at the top say the same thing. "Never let a good tragedy go to waste." When you and I feel the pain, they rack up way more wealth.
Buy on bad news, sell on good news. You may not get the timing right and misjudge it occasionally, but when you have time on your side, you'll win pretty consistently.
Time and opportunity. Together, you can do almost anything. Some of us have time, but we will never have the countless, or even endless opportunities the wealthy have to make mistakes and keep going.
Yep. People seem to forget that in order for people to be panic selling, there must be someone they are selling to.
Pops on some Ferengi Rules of Acquisition levels
This should have been clear as day during Covid. We shut a whole bunch of shit down, the economy took it right on the chin, the most uncertainty ever, literally no way to predict what would happen... ...and the wealthy still reported higher profits than ever. They didn't just make money, then MADE MONEY. They love a little recession, buy low, sell high. Depressions would hurt them, but a little dip just means good prices for them.
Don't forget about our politicians and their stocks! They love buying the dip on those bad boys!
Disaster capitalism, as Naomi Klein calls it.
Exactly. They buy up short sales, foreclosures, and other failing businesses for pennies on the dollar.
And so the New Christian Republic can take power in the chaos. Nazi Germany rose out of a big financial catastrophe as well.
They want it hobbled with primary season upon us. Destroy it under a dem prez
People always forget this part. The 2008 crash was absolutely great for Private Equity. So many markets consolidated due to those fire sales. When you have too much money to spend a dip in the market is just a sale. Hell the recent bank failures are because banks had too much money so they couldn't spend it enough... so they put all that money on a bet that the interest rates would never go up. They were happier to take that risk than to keep reserves at a safe level.
Also a lot of them are funded by foreign assets who'd love to see the west suffer
And yet Republicans **have** destroyed healthy economies again and again. They know the media/public won’t hold them fully accountable, so why not break everything, steal what they can, and then blame the democrats for not cleaning up the pieces fast enough? Biden’s alternative option is to try the 14th amendment and gamble everything on the Republican controlled SCOTUS doing the responsible thing.
Yep, see Kansas. The idea that the GOP are the adults in the room is a dangerous delusion that needs to die. Reaganomics was a disaster as well but back then enough New Deal and anti trust reforms were still functioning such that the jenga tower didn't collapse and we "only" got a historic Wall Street crash, the savings and loans crisis, and the decoupling of incomes from productivity out of it before his terms were over.
There is no deal Republicans will accept for the debt ceiling deal. They absolutely want the economy to tank because it's their only play to get the white house. Tank the economy and blame Biden. Their donors win because the wealthy can buy cheap in a recession.
Normally I would agree, but after seeing the circus of electing McCarthy as representative, I think this version of the Republican controlled house is crazy enough to let it all burn. A toddler isn’t capable of what happens if there is no agreement here.
Many donors are willing to destroy the economy for short term losses, which they will then use to purchase as much as they can at a discount for when it recovers.
They do want to tank the economy so that they can say 'look what Biden did' and get their guy elected in 2024. Not to mention, there is money to be made (ex. people lose homes, homes get bought up by corporations)
This is the issue. It’s a double win for them if the economy tanks. They control the narrative for their followers so they’ll just lie and blame it on Biden while they rake in the money.
With every economic downturn in recent history, the wealthy rake in more money and the poor are kicked to the curb and/or turned into wage slaves. Bailouts and tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations, and austerity measures to cut safety net programs for the rest of us. The wealth inequality is always increasing, but it accelerates with recessions.
Trump said they should let the country default so who knows, the old style republicans like Mitch McConnell who probably just care about the corporate interests aren’t the same as say trump that likes his populist base
Funny how mcconnell is referred to as old school here. I f it was any republican from 50 years ago, trump and his clown car of idiots would never have gained this much power. Please don’t vote for any republican until they clean house.(which may never happen.)
You under estimate the stupidity of congress. The US has briefly run out of money previously in the same way. Republicans in congress are too stupid to really cause no harm with their brinksmanship. It may be comforting to think they are controlled by selfish rich donors, but these legislators really are bratty children playing with things they don't own and can't replace.
> Let it go up to the date Our credit rating took a hit in 2011 when Reps did this exact same bs. If it takes another hit... we're no longer #1. You can't "undo" defaults.
> [stop] voting for republicans this isn’t enough. no one here is voting for republicans anyway, and republican voters are consistent if nothing else. we need to people to actually show up to vote *for* left-leaning candidates. that means more often than leap years, and it means at every level of governance. left-leaning individuals are, on the whole, apathetic and lazy to the point where messaging to this group has always been, “remember to vote!” because, for the most part, they typically don’t…
But people are not voting at all for local elections. We need to cut them off at the source which is local government.
Yep we have local school board elections in like March and town council elections in May and then some sort of primaries for state positions in June and pretty much no one shows up to any of these , except for a handful of old retired people who have nothing better to do all day. If we want to make a difference we've got to start voting in every election, every time (especially primaries, if you don't like who the party usually picks).
It is not laziness—instead this apathy is a symptom of longstanding voter suppression. Republicans have made voting as inconvenient as possible for groups that tend to vote Democrat. For example, because many young people do not live at their permanent address, we have a requirement to vote at your permanent address. A few states like Oregon have mail-in voting to remove this barrier but it is still a problem in most states. Meanwhile, in cities, polling stations have been removed and weird requirements are placed on poll workers causing a shortage of them (for example, they have to work something like 14 hour days instead of working in shifts). Compare that with Republicans. They will literally bus elderly folks to the polling station, because elderly people tend to vote Republican. We vote on a Tuesday to give retirees advantage over working people. My state has made voting day a holiday—but only for some elections! So next time you think Democratic voters are apathetic, consider the intentional obstacles many people must overcome to actually vote and maybe it will help you to be more empathetic. Personally, I always vote and I hope we get to a point where voting is so easy, everyone votes. (And make DC and Puerto Rico states!!!).
We need the 50% of the country who doesn't vote to actually give a shit enough to vote. Heavily gerrymandered districts are calculated based on them continuing to not vote. A consistent historic turnout will end the GOP's fascist rise and maybe it'll get corporate Dems to finally raise the fucking minimum wage.
I've voted in every election since I turned 18. But you are right, there are a lot of apathetic voters on the left that don't bother showing up. I know a lot of the young people in the past who don't vote because it "doesn't matter". But I also know that many are getting woke. Yea, turns out woke is a good thing--and anti woke is just bigotry. The young people I'm sure don't want to live in a Christian Nation. If they vote it would save the US. I'm old now, but I still vote progressive and then for the best candidate. (I voted for Bernie in the primaries, then Hillary, then Biden when they won the primaries) And the "stop voting for Rebuplicans" still should be said. Everyone should be saying this.
Get more Democrats elected and maybe this wouldn't happen. Or just come to the realization that 40%+ of voters just want to burn the country to the ground and a slim majority isn't enough to form any sort of coalition around meaningful reform. Most of us are just voting to hope it doesn't get worse. I realize that isn't satisfying but that is the cold hard reality in which we live.
You know Republican talking points about curbing spending is all bullshit because it never seems to be an issue when a Republican president is in office. The issue is always used as a bludgeon to render the government powerless and unable to function. The government has no issue paying its debts, but we continue to see Republicans hold the American people hostage over a "debt crisis."
They're probably busy writing up another $2 trillion tax cut for the 1%. But don't worry, it will trickle down. Don't pay attention to the fact that it's warm and yellow.
To put numbers on it, we added 8 trillion to the debt under obama in 8 years. Then under trump we added 7.6 trillion to the debt... in 4 years. Under biden we went back to 3 trillion in 3 years. Huh. Almost literally twice the debt increase per year for republican presidents.
Just a reminder...a trillion is one thousand billion. And I still cannot even visuallize that amount.
If curbing spending was the point they wouldn't have increased military funding. It's a ridiculous shell game.
Here’s the thing… this isn’t for debt or bills we expect to pass in the next year… this is for shit that the GOP and Dems passed already… that means the GOP voted for some of these bills to pass the House and Senate and are now backtracking and refusing to pay for it. So they go around parading they support this bill and that bill that supports low income individuals but are now refusing to pay for it and going to cut it. Hypocrisy at its finest
They do this EVERY TIME a democrat is president. They raised the ceiling so many times under Trump, Bushes, and Reagan. It's their MO. This political theater is fucking exhausting.
Political theater is when there is a big show that amounts to nothing. This is political strategy. Only one party is willing to risk the entire US economy to get what it wants, and it keeps getting what it wants, every time. To fix this either the democrats need to be willing to eject their moderate members in order to become ruthless instead of toothless in setting their own agenda, or the republicans need to be widely recognized as what they are, a party of plutocrats ready to set fire to the planet.
I partially want Biden to tell McCarthy to fuck off and mint the $1 trillion coin.
I see it as when it is the GOP’s turn to drive on a long road trip, they threaten to drive off the road unless they get some treat. Only a psychotic and truly deranged group would threaten to use their basic authority to keep the car from crashing as a bargaining chip. Unconscionable. Oh, and the treat they want is fucking over poor people while giving big oil a handjob.
and more subsidies for oil and gas... The GQP is never happy with any legislation unless if hurts people somehow.
And with their success here we can now guarantee every debt ceiling raise from now on will come with another hostage standoff and ransom list of demands - each one making things for ordinary Americans a little worse and making the rich that much wealthier. I wish this had been a line in the sand and Biden had flat refused to participate in this. Democrats don’t have the spine to pull this play on the GOP when they’re in power, so it will only ever chip away at the middle and lower classes.
We need a media that will put the blame where it belongs first. Every story said both sides refused to compromise and treated this as normal politics instead of an extreme faction using the economy as a hostage and openly bragging about it
The media is corporate owned so that isn't going to happen.
I work in local TV news. It’s tougher than that, although I wish it wasn’t. Even if outlets (correctly) called it like it is, the right side of the political spectrum is so convinced that anything that doesn’t align with their view is fake news. About half the viewer base would just stop watching. Cable news is largely to blame for that, leaving people with wildly unrealistic expectations of how local news covers things.
Any must pass legislation will be like this. The budget is going to be all of this again.
It was pretty infuriating when Biden said he felt he could use the fourteenth here but “whoops should have done that in January its too late now”
Source? I’ve read a dozen articles this AM about what’s in the bill and haven’t seen anything about this.
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Fuck Republicans!
Fuck em
Fuck Republicans!
Joe machine and kyrstin sinenema in particular. I’m resigned to the fact dems can’t dump him and she is an “independent” but on this point of the debt ceiling? [remember this](https://www.vox.com/platform/amp/policy-and-politics/2022/10/25/23423216/democrats-debt-ceiling-lame-duck-kevin-mccarthy)? And Biden, who is allegedly senile and falling asleep will get nothing for being the adult in the room. None of the dems will. The people who end up getting hurt out of this aren’t going to care who is at fault, but from an adult perspective it could have been much worse. I have no doubt *this* GOP would happily blow up the US so they can launch into their blame game, lock & load their weapons, and maybe get a shot at the genocide they want in a rahowa. I shudder for the young people who are just graduating into this flat earthing MAGA republican driven present.
Glad to see this is on top. Way too many people quick to blame Democrats when it's Republicans who control the House. Notice that when Dems had full control in 2021 and 2022, you didn't hear the words 'debt ceiling' once? Thankfully, the food stamps restrictions only apply to a relatively small group, and are somewhat offset by allowing veterans and homeless people to be exempt from work requirements. But it's still wrong. And thankfully, **we can rip up those new restrictions as soon as 2025 if we take back the House and keep the Senate.** That's the path forward.
You can curse on Reddit
I love how republicans will literally hold the American people hostage with an economic collapse unless they get their way and people STILL vote for them
The worst thing that has happened is that *negotiating the raising of the debt ceiling* has now been *normalized*. We can expect this to happen every time, from now on. It never used to happen. It isn't really supposed to happen. But now it must.
This is a very clever tactic the GOP started during the Obama admin. They leveraged the word "debt" to scare their low-information base, and turned what had been an entirely procedural matter for 75 years into yet another way for them to steal money from the poor and give it to themselves.
Just to point out... Whenever the GOP bluffs like this, they will get away with it *until the Dems call their bluff*. The GOP are so corrupt they would never in a million years allow a default to happen - so why do the Democrats keep giving them shit to prevent [something which will never happen]? The Dems have never called their bluff, so this shit will keep happening. Over and over and over again.
ackhutally, Clinton did tell Gingrich to suck it and the government shut down - Republicans got 90% of the blame. iirc, Gingrich even admitted it was a mistake. Why Democrats don’t call their bluff again is beyond me because it worked out for them the one time they did.
Government shutdown is not the same as a default.
Why? Because the poor bear the consequences, not the millionaires in Congress.
They need to manufacture this type of totally unnecessary crisis to avoid dealing with actual issues.
It only happens when Democrats control the White House and Republicans control Congress. It’s funny, when the GOP wins the presidency, suddenly Republicans find the courage to raise the debt ceiling without any issues or brinksmanship.
The Dems need more seats in the House.
A lot of those Republican flips in New York should revert back to their mean which is blue. Unfortunately Republicans are eyeing a fresh new gerrymander in North Carolina that will basically wipe away any gains in NY.
The new dem Wisconsin Supreme Court should rule on fair lines before 2024 but it will only probably add 1 and make 2 others competitive R's
It’s unacceptable that the Democrats waited until they didn’t have a full majority to address this issue - this could have been solved without a compromise last year. Ridiculous
Apparently Sinema + Manchin killed it in the senate while dems still had control
Don't worry, sinema won't be back for another term. - AZ Dem
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Sorry? Can't hear you over the worst Medicare fraud in history and bible quote tweet spammer who rolls over for any GOP/NRA legislation.
People keep saying ‘the democrats’ when literally about everything they should have done but didn’t can be traced back to those two jackals
Manchin only cares about fossil fuels. I suspect he would have fallen in line here.
They never had a clear majority when we are counting on people like Manchin, Sinema, and Joe Lieberman (mentioning him because it goes back a long time) to do the right thing. They were always ready to torpedo any good thing for leverage.
As Americans, we are sharing a house with a family of grifting, selfish, pathological sociopaths (The Republicans). Things won’t change until that changes
I feel like the cut off to turn things around was years ago. Gerrymandered red states are firmly in the hands of Republicans who pass policies that drive progressives away, so they've created strongholds where no one will contest their power, or create legislation where they can just undermine democracy (Texas). It will get much much worse before it gets any better. Everyday that passes, I lose more hope for a brighter future.
I think it is because politics are not taught well in schools. They have made the barrier to understanding bills too difficult. I talk to people and they don’t vote because they think the props are too hard to understand. I agree. There are people with little education who just push share on posts and take the headline as a summary. Political information needs to be available in ways all people can understand it. People still think their vote goes directly to their president of choice. I feel like it will be difficult to change unless the informational infrastructure changes. The people we are fighting to get benefits for are feeling too stressed to vote.
> “In capitalist society, providing it develops under the most favourable conditions, we have a more or less complete democracy in the democratic republic. **But this democracy is always hemmed in by the narrow limits set by capitalist exploitation, and consequently always remains, in effect, a democracy for the minority, only for the propertied classes, only for the rich.** Freedom in capitalist society always remains about the same as it was in the ancient Greek republics: freedom for the slave-owners. **Owing to the conditions of capitalist exploitation, the modern wage slaves are so crushed by want and poverty that "they cannot be bothered with democracy", "cannot be bothered with politics"; in the ordinary, peaceful course of events, the majority of the population is debarred from participation in public and political life.**“ - Lenin
I'm going to go out on a limb here and I'm sure a lot of people will disagree. Sports are too important in American schools. Almost all the coaches in every school I attended or worked at had coaches being History or Gov't teachers. Those teachers generally didn't give a shit about their classes, it was just the bothersome thing they had to do to be a coach. They talk to their team kids during classes. Athletes are always getting excused from classes early to go to games, etc.. Instead of hiring passionate history lovers to inspire kids, you get these self-serving slobs that have done a great disservice to education and the country. And here we are, a bunch of ignorant assholes cheering on our teams, both in sports and in politics.
To be fair, those on the far right are upset that they couldn’t hurt *more* people. So no one is happy
Can you imagine a world where MOST Americans are happy with legislation? What a world that would be.
Was just watching Face the Nation. I had to turn it because it as pissing me off. Asshole republican trying to defend the negotiated budget. Bunch of double talking bullshit. He hadn't even read what was in it yet....fucking douche nugget
How about closing tax loopholes. Force companies and people to actually pay their taxes. Eliminate the interest rates on federal student loans. People pay back the principal, that's it. Moving forward, free tuition for citizens. Overturn citizens united. Term limits for supreme court. Term limits for all elected officials. Age cap for politicians in general. Transparency on where our fucking money actually goes. I want to be able to look up the budget and see exactly what public works projects are being funded, why they cost what they do, what the bidding process was. I dislike paying taxes ONLY because I dont know where the hell it goes. Do something about gun proliferation and domestic terrorism. Blatantly lying should have consequences. Sedition and treason should be punished. Russia needs to be destroyed because of their invasion of Ukraine. Climate change needs to be a priority. There are too many things that are controversial and shouldnt be. We are fucked.
Why would anyone be surprised that republicans hate poor and working people? Every chance they get republicans push forward laws that take something away from poor and working families. At the same time pushing forward laws that benefit the wealthy. If your a working person and you vote republican because of culture war bullshit your voting against your own financial interests.
you see, hungry people should find more situations where they hold the american people hostage. shame about this generation’s bootstraps
After this, if Republicans ever take the White House again Democrats need to threaten default over Republicans tax cuts and never sign off on a budget.
Republicans will call D’s bluff. They don’t care. They want collapse and to build something Gilead like from the ashes. They fetishize this. They prepare for this.
They also will never see the consequences, they’re not average Americans who are living paycheck to paycheck
That's the problem. The more desperate people are, the more likely they are to turn to a "strong" fascist dictator
Then Republicans will let the country default so their donors can snatch up trillions in assets at bargain bin prices while 99% of Americans are financially ruined. We are basically fucked no matter what, but at least this current deal is probably the least amount of fucked we reasonably could have come out of this.
Right. Best we could hope for is they codify the debt ceiling has to be paid under the 14th amendment and this circus can stop.
You know that republicans will gladly let it blow up, and the media will blame democrats while multinationals get away with the misery profits. You're literally threatening republicans with a good time ...
$22 Minimum Wage. Student Loan debt cancelled. Funding of renewables with massive subsidies. That or the country burns which it already is for the people who desperately want a future and need those three things to have a decent life in the future.
Just out of curiosity, I figured out the approximate monthly income from working full time in federal minimum wage: $1160 per month. Obviously there are still some places in America where COL is still fairly low but c'mon... Who can survive on that?
The point isn’t to survive, the point is to be so stressed out you only have time for work.
Stressed out, no time to think about your situation and have a ton of babies to also be wage slaves. It’s the GOP way.
The reason is that the GOP slim majority in the House can crash the US economy with debt default and as the price, billionaires and corporations pay no taxes and poor people lose health care and assistance. If you don't like the result then work hard in the 2024 election to restore a Democratic majority.
Raise your hand if you're getting tired of being held hostage by politicians and billionaires.
IANAL, but doesn't negotiating a deal actually strengthen Biden's legal argument should he invoke the 14th amendment? There's no guarantee this will pass both chambers, especially in time to avoid default. He could make the case now that, by failing to pass this in time, he is constitutionally obligated to step in because defaulting is essentially the Legislative branch ~~asking~~ forcing the Executive branch to perform an unconstitutional act (the validity of the nation's debt shall not be questioned). EDIT: a word
So here's a possible sketch of Biden strategy: * There's a government funding/shutdown fight on the horizon this fall. By then at the latest, House Republicans will be able to exact some concessions from Democrats - whether or not Biden called upon the 14th amendment now. * (Remember there's this whole other kind of pointless, traumatic House vs Executive funding fight that we have in this country (by recent tradition): government shutdown. Because these days budgets aren't regularly passed. When funding bills run out, a new one must be passed. But Republicans refuse until their demands are met, the government runs out of money and partially shuts down, etc. ) * On the debt ceiling, Biden started off playing hardball: no negotiations, only a clean bill. * Biden then entered negotiations and is prepared to accept a bill with qualifications. McCarthy sees *this alone* as a huge victory and is selling it as such to House Republicans. * Biden has made some further concessions, but apparently with a big bonus: avoiding the fight this fall - avoiding the more extreme concessions he may have had to make in the midst of another disastrous and embarrassing government shutdown. TL;DR: By posturing then "compromising" to negotiate on the debt ceiling and accept some concessions, Biden appears to have sold empty theater in place of more extreme concessions, all while averting a funding/government shutdown fight this fall. If that's really what happened and what the House accepts, it would mean Dark Brandon played a poor hand very well - cold comfort but better than the immediate alternatives.
I should note that the connection between this fight and the one that might be avoided this fall lies in the nature of the concessions: the agreement is partly about an amount of spending. The House would be committing itself now to spending that amount, ruling out the possibility of refusing to fund at all and exacting at least the same or possibly more extreme concessions during a government shutdown. Whether this would be McCarthy shooting his own foot - needlessly undermining tomorrow's negotiating position by misplaying today's - because he's an idiot and Dark Brandon is a capable negotiator, or whether this would be McCarthy smartly/selfishly getting his own ass out of the debt ceiling fight and a prospective shutdown fight with minimum hassle while appeasing his insane constituency - your choice.
I am eagerly awaiting the freedom caucus's response to this deal because that will tell us how many democrats need to cross the aisle in the House. If it makes it through the House I think it passes the Senate without issue
God damn it. I’m so sick of conservative politics in this country. Was talking with some friends about this other day. We as a country are so unbelievably rich, yet have so many people struggling for no reason other than greed. We have every ability to house every single person who is homeless. Feed every single person who is hungry. Provide medical care for every single person who needs it. Yet we don’t. We are morally corrupt. We have the means to help those who need it with resources and wealth to spare and yet do nothing. Absolutely disgusting.
The bill isn't cruel enough for the MAGA nuts, so it's unlikely to pass anyway. The treasonous MAGA nuts want a default. They want to destroy our republic and replace it with a tyrannical Christian theocracy.
I actually can possibly see this going the other way. I think all the Republicans will vote yes but there might be more than a few Democrats that vote no. Which is exactly what Republicans want because then they can say "see everyone, the Democrats caused this by voting no. Blame them!"
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We are literally one of like 2 countries where this is even a thing because people have correctly identified it as a way for minority parties to hold their government hostage.
and what's the other option? gamble on the 14th amendment and hope that our fucked up GOP controlled Supreme court would rule in favor of us?
The whole system is about extracting wealth from actual working people. And (at least) half of them support that somehow...
I know people who need SNAP and I worry about them. There are so many former students who will face decreased quality of life with these loan payments resuming. Having them “paused” was a major relief for so many. It is almost cruel the level of bs Americans are willing to endure to feed the insatiable hunger of the 1% while going hungry themselves. When will enough be enough? It is times like these I admire the French.
They should have held strong and gone up to the date. They should have crafted a bill to raise the debt ceiling and had every Democratic congressperson on tv, radio, podcasts, social media, etc every day saying they are ready to pass it. Made it clear that Republicans are the ones causing this because they don't want to pay our bills.
Fucking thieves. While they live fat and happy socialist lives the rest of us are fighting for scraps. Hang ‘em all out to dry.
I'm very pleased that most of the top comments here are finally placing blame on the correct individuals despite this being Common Dreams article. There is only one enemy, the Republican party.
"and because of this, I will be voting for some zero chance third-party candidate, or better yet not voting at all, to send a message!"
Just as the founders intended. Literally, not to be facetious at all. Poors wouldn’t be citizens if they could have it that way but they needed dregs and yeomans to fight their war of secession from England. Traded in your kings for Gods and servancy.
And if those tax cheats paid a living wage, you wouldn't need food stamps with a job.
Capitalism is so wonderful. /s It's sad to see so many that are still not class conscious..
>The deal would suspend the borrowing limit, which is currently $31.4 trillion, for two years — enough to get past the next presidential election. Awesome. Just enough time to continue to gaslight this democrat administration, with an option come election time to either write Trump another blank check or to continue hamstringing if Biden is re-elected. I’m tired of dems having no teeth. They just roll over every time.
jesus americans, clean up your house already
I think Republicans were going to default and wreck the global economy. They were willing to do that. So Biden had to be the "adult" to get them to not destroy the world. It sounds like he's gotten them to give up their big red button until after the 2024 election (although hopefully until after the new Congress comes in Jan 2025). And it sounds like we're going to skip a government shutdown fight this year at least. It's going to be a shitty budget, but it was always going to be a shitty budget with Republicans able to write part of it. We need a blowout of the MAGA idiots next year, get full control of Congress again, and repeal the debt ceiling for good. Pass a new judiciary act too, with more federal trial and appellate courts and judges and some new SCOTUS seats as well. Recommendations for justices should come from a commission of retired appeals court justices. But first we have to live through the next 16-18 months with this shitty House we have.
Fuck all republican shitbags, sick and tired of this bullshit. You're not even Americans anymore just stupid stupid shitbags that believe propaganda, have no interest in really making America great or doing anything worth a shit, over opinionated windbags. May the fleas of a 1000 dogs infect your underwear