2001

I didn’t realize Brett was British.

2002

I don’t blame the Democrats at all for making the GOP own their bullshit on this vote by voting first. Voting against it is a bit cute, though.

2003

I think she would have been much more stubborn on certain issues, yes, and she certainly wouldn’t have just caved to Republican demands. She’s quite accustomed to dealing with their lunatic fringe.

Frankly, I pine for the days of Clintonian triangulation. Obama is negotiating with their fringe from his own center-right position.

2004

You know what I REALLY hate about the Republicans? It has made me agree far too much with one of my favorite sparring partners on here (Jason. ;) )

2005

I wonder how much worse this can get.

You think the GOP will reign in the far right movement (or tea party) for 2012, or will they get further emboldened by what they have achieved so far and gain more power in the next election and sign the death warrant of the US?

From afar it seems that the DEMS and Obama are willing to cede on almost anything, whereas the REPS are more likely to stick to their guns, the country be damned. The worst thing is that it seems the Republicans are rewarded for this kind of behaviour (i.e. willing to default on their accrued debt, just to appease the extremists in their organisation)-- Perhaps the 2012 elections will show the USA in a new light, as the Obama years so far have been pretty rocky and shown again and again that the Democrats are willing to cede anything if they meet opposition.

Will be really interesting to see who will take over the reigns in 2012 or if Obama will retain his beleaguered presidency for another 4 years.

2006

When you watch professional poker players, they will consistently beat good amateurs, no matter what the cards (overall, there is some variability.) The main reason is that they are not afraid to lose. I managed to play a couple of times some years ago where some of the pros were playing. I would have a good hand, and they would go all in. Then I would think, I KNOW he is bluffing, there’s no way he could have a 7 and a K, and that is the only thing that would make the full house that is the ONLY hand that can beat me, but if I am wrong, I’m out. And I’d fold because I just didn’t want to risk it. Which they knew. The difference was that they didn’t worry about losing a huge amount, and I did. Which meant they would beat me every time.

The Democrats need to be able and willing to go all in. The Republicans know they won’t, and they win every time. Obama needs to be willing to say, OK, nation, I am calling in the Tea Party and telling them we are unwilling to choose cutting student loans, Medicare, Medicaid, SS, and other services instead of hedge fund manager taxes, millionaire and billionaire taxes, special exclusions for the most profitable companies in the world, etc. I’m going to put out there publicly, in detail, the choices with check boxes, and we will publish that for America. And if the Tea Party and their cohorts choose to check Medicaire over, say, hedge fund manager taxes, we’ll make sure America knows that is the choice. And then Obama and the Democrats need to say, No - we will not allow that. We simply will not allow it. We will not give in on this, and we think America is with us. And if you want to take America into default because you want to defend those special interests, so be it. We’ll work with you, we’ll give on some things, but you have to also, and we are going to make the entire process and the details extremely public and transparent as we go. But we will only meet you halfway. Period.

Now, the Tea Party would likely be willing to drive the bus off the cliff, singing God Bless America on the way down. But I really don’t believe the other hundred plus Republicans would. I have to believe that they would be scared to death of America looking at the tote board, seeing that they were siding with the rich over the middle class (and it is important that everything is completely open and clear and transparent so they have a hard time spinning it,) and kicking their ass out for choosing to side with the hedge fund manager making a million a day over their Medicaire or funds for their parents’ social services or any of the other things that will impact them.

That is pretty poorly articulated, but the point is, if the other side is willing to go all in, and you aren’t, you will lose all your chips every time. The irony of playing not to lose vs. playing to win is you almost always guarantee you’ll lose that way.

2007

The problem is the message is so simple for the Republicans. No new taxes and cut wasteful spending. The message is harder for the Democrats. Fair tax increases and careful cuts of spending.

The Democrats need a new message. They need to equate modest tax increases on the wealthy with…something. I’m not sure what.

2008

Poker analogies work when the stakes are just a few hundred dollars in your pocket. They break down when the price of losing is economic catastrophe.

2009

I really think this misses the point. Democratic messaging sucks, but it’s not the problem.

The problem is a simple dynamic wherein one player is indifferent to maximally bad outcomes. It looks something like this:

  • Republicans are only interested in a small set of goals (minimize taxes on the wealthy, dismantle the welfare state, and, uhh, that’s it).
  • Republicans are able to credibly threaten to destroy or seriously damage the country’s economy. They are indifferent to the potential suffering this will cause to the masses in pursuit of their goals.
  • Democrats find total economic collapse unacceptable. They are not indifferent to the consequences of default.

This basic dynamic explains the entire debt ceiling conflict; you don’t have to get into the President’s weakness or negotiation strategies or Hillary Clinton’s balls or poker analogies to explain it. With control of one house of Congress, Republicans have enough power to present Democrats with a lose/lose situation. Democrats rationally chose the least bad option.

The more I think about it, the more I figure this turns into a rearguard action by Democrats over the next ten or twenty years that ends in calamity. The GOP will use every budget vote, every debt ceiling vote, &c., to hold the country hostage. Democrats might even try doing the same when the situation is reversed. The repeated hostage situations are going to inevitably end with the hostage getting shot. God only knows what happens then, I don’t.

2010

If the country wasn’t running such an enormous deficit, then you wouldn’t have to raise the debt ceiling so much.

I mean, didn’t this raise the debt ceiling by a trillion dollars? If the government immediately blows through a freaking trillion more dollars of debt, then you got some serious problems. We’re talking ridiculously large numbers at this point. It’s between three and five times the number of stars in our galaxy.

Saying that we need to go another trillion dollars into debt isn’t something that we should take lightly. Spending trillions of dollars isn’t something that should be of trivial consequence.

2011

Yup. All-in in poker just wipes out your buy in. If it wiped out your life savings instead…

Even then, losing doesn’t hurt you so much as the country. I think the gun/hostage analogies work better.

2012

I think it’s virtually impossible the Republicans maintain their house margin next cycle; barring economic collapse, there’s no way in hell they hold all those swing districts. The only question is how many seats they lose.

I’d say the most likely scenario is (assuming Romney gets the nomination) Obama loses, the Democrats lose the Senate (their situation is awful), and the GOP loses a ton of seats in the House, possibly losing it.

As an aside, the biggest Congressional majorities ever is just amazing. 333-89.

2013

Fine. But if you want to cut back on spending*, then you cut back on spending. You don’t cut back on paying your bills.

*(I don’t believe that the Republicans give two shits about cutting back on spending, since they had every opportunity in the world during the six years that they controlled the entire government, and instead of shrinking the deficit, they grew it. A lot.)

2014

If i remember correctly, didn’t Republicans tank the economy and then almost immediately shift the blame to Obama, saying they would bring change (back to the policies that tanked the economy in the first place) that would fix the economy? I seem to remember them convincing a lot of the country of this false reality and winning a lot of seats.

What makes you think Americans now have long memories? By the presidential elections, the American people will have almost certainly completely forgot about this and the conversation will be entirely on “Obama done took our jobs!”

2015

This.

I think the Republicans are in for a trifecta of control if they nominate a relatively moderate Presidential candidate. Which sucks.

2016

You’re overgeneralizing and oversimplifying. The US has a very large debt. The US also has a very large economy. The US debt is about a little less than 100% the total yearly GDP. By comparison:

It’s a problem, yes. It’s not a critical earth-shattering we-must-destroy-the-world-to-save-it problem. We’re on the wrong side of the ideal (note that to be admitted to the EU your debt can’t exceed 60% of GDP) but it’s sustainable in the near term and nowhere near, say, Japan, which has been wrestling with a debt crisis, public debt twice their yearly GDP and a paralyzed government for a decade and still manages to muddle onward.

The debt problem in the US is dramatically overstated by ideologues who want to leverage it to demolish the government. Asserting otherwise denies, well, numbers and the rest of the world.

2017

Get it right Murbella, it’s “Obama took our jerbs!”

2018

But the strategy in war-like situations like this is that you have to figure out what the enemy - the GOP - fears most/is not willing to lose. Then you have to figure out how to attack and threaten that.

That’s the point of the poker analogy. The GOP knows what will cause the Democrats to fold. The Democrats have not figured out what will cause the GOP to fold, and until they do, they will lose and lose and lose. To be more precise, the Tea Party has figured out what will cause the Democrats AND the rest of the Republicans to fold.

2019

“Burn your bridges/ boats/ ships” has been a brutally effective strategy since the year dot.

2020

In brief, the Democrats need a LibDem Orange Book; they need their best thinkers to come out, speaking to the party, about “Democratic” ideology, about what it “means” to be a Democrat, what and how Democrats can and should think, and what they should do, about the most common and important issues facing the nation, and then insist everybody get on board once they hash out the details. The biggest problem with the Democrats is that, honestly, they don’t really know what they believe. They don’t really believe in raising taxes, although they would definitely like to do so on the handful they can get way with; certainly they would more than happily raise taxes on a few and lower taxes for the “middle class”. They might believe in environmental concerns but they certainly don’t care enough to rock the boat more than is required to quiet the primary voters. They don’t believe in the debt, but they get on board the Tea Party Debt Express as soon as they find themselves outmaneuvered, and rather lamely profess about bipartisanship and meeting in the middle while acquiescing to everything the Republicans want. The might profess to believe in reducing the military, restoring civil liberties, or ending wars, but they sure don’t seem to care to rock the boat here either once in power. The problem is that the Democrats are deathly afraid of being liberal, as the very word has become an almost slanderous insult amid almost all but the most very progressive areas in the country. The Democrats need to take back liberalism.

And if they don’t, they need to move aside and let another party take their place.