Tuesday, August 02, 2011

On the debt-limit front, by this point it was all long since over but the retching

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Thomas Friedman, Private Eye
by Tom Tomorrow
[Don't forget to click to enlarge.]

by Ken

I admit was surprised that "the deal" was struck yesterday, which was merely August 1, a full day ahead of the August 2 "deadline." Those who don't understand much about negotiations, at least of the political kind, seem to imagine that putting a deadline on the matter facilitates negotiations and compromise, whereas in reality it almost always assures that no serious negotiating happens until the deadline is a whisper away. Otherwise neither party can go back to its "people" without being accused of having made all manner of unnecessary concessions. How could they possibly have been necessary if there was still XXX length-of-time left?

And you'll notice that over on the Loonified Right, they're hoppin' mad, despite having gotten everything they could possibly have hoped to. But of course there's no reason or sense over there. Their fallback position is always an unbroken: "We're mad as hell, and we're mad as hell."

In the wake of the mournful day there's been no lack of highly sensible writing on the subject, and I had this plan of lifting extracts from half a dozen or so pieces that I read with appreciation. But somehow it all seems beside the point, since sense never had anything to do with it. Over there in the Party of Hello No, they seem almost proud of the fact that not only do they not understand any aspect of either the debt or debt-ceiling problem, they don't know anyone who does, having already thrown anyone who showed signs of having a lick of sense over the edge of the flat earth.

In this vein, it seems to me rather beside the point to upbraid members of Congress for their vote, whichever way they voted. Yes, it might have been interesting if one or both houses had refused to go along with the deal, just as a sign of resistance. But does anyone believe there was any chance of achieving a less onerous deal? There were no votes to be had among the Hell No-ers, and without at least some of them no deal would have been possible -- not to mention the panic all those Fraidy-Scared Pols in the Middle are feeling having to face an electorate that thinks all the pols have been acting like "spoiled children," as CNN's pollsters are reporting. Well, of course the poll-makers undoubtedly designed the poll to prove that point, but still, that tells us something, doesn't it?

About the only vote I can imagine having any force of reason would have been to vote "present," since there was no "good" vote, only a choice of bad ones. As Jonathan Cohn wrote in his fine tnr.com blogpost, "This Is Not Leadership," one of the pieces I planned to cannibalize:
Out of exasperation as much as curiosity, I e-mailed a Washington insider who happens to be among President Obama's most loyal supporters. How, I asked, could Obama agree to such a lopsided deal? This person answered with a different question: What would I have done instead? It took me a few minutes to realize that I didn't have an answer.

By the time we reached this stage, I don't have an answer either. Earlier on there might have been some possibilities, as our friend David Dayen outlined in his fine TAP post, "Turning Points: Five chances to avoid the debt-ceiling fight that Obama missed," but by this month it was all over but the shouting, or should I say retching?


Actual Audio: Obama On the Debt Deal
by scottbateman

I'm not sure what makes this a "comic," or really what it thinks it's doing, but it makes for pretty nauseating listening, and just now it seems like a helpful thing to have concrete reasons for feeling nauseous, seeing as how it's how most of us are feeling anyways.

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2 Comments:

At 9:34 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Humanity is waiting for the last minute to deal with climate change, education, infrastructure. There is always a point of no return. Chemical irretreivablity is our most ominous threat.

What good will money be if it's 125 degrees in Kansas in the spring and the entire state of Texas is a desert.

 
At 1:40 PM, Blogger KenInNY said...

Excellent point, Anon.

As (I believe) a world-class procrastinator, I'm familiar with the impulse to put off dealing with stuff as long as humanly possible, but even I (usually) have sort of built in there the proviso: until you really have to deal with it. On all those issues you l list, this doesn't seem to be part of the deal, does it?

Cheers,
Ken

 

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