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Obama's Batman Gambit
By capitulating on the debt ceiling talks earlier this year, Obama set the stage for automatic budget cuts to take effect if the supercommittee couldn't compromise to find 1 trillion dollars in budget cuts. Knowing that the supercommittee wouldn't be able to make that compromise, he created a situation in which he will get 4 trillion in cuts, mostly from areas he wants; and the Republicans can't do anything, because to override those automatic cuts, they need to get past his veto power (which won't happen).
He set it up so that if a Do-Nothing Congress does nothing, he wins.
Damned, and I though this guy didn't have any balls.
He set it up so that if a Do-Nothing Congress does nothing, he wins.
Damned, and I though this guy didn't have any balls.
Comments
Could you please elaborate? I'm not sure I fully understand.
Republicans were counting on Obama just capitulating again and letting them claw back the auto cuts, since they didn't want them. But now he's threatening to veto anything they try.
Hmm. Cutting spending from the places that don't need it is a good start, but it's not much of an accomplishment unless the next step is increasing funding for the programs that do.
Granted, a kick in the balls to the people who would do something like this is its own reward.
Anybody want to weigh in on this?
You mean "Super-Committee", right?
Super Congress would be...I'm not sure.
If it's true, then /tg/ was right, Obama is a Lord of Change in disguise.
Though I don't know if the bill that created this supercommittee specifies particular changes or just cuts the budget of stuff and then leaves others to figure out exactly how to make do with smaller budgets.
And it allows one to choose where the cuts are applied?
How did that get through in the first place?
Remember the debt ceiling drama back in the summer?
The only deal they could come up with was the idea of kicking the can down the road, and installing a Sword of Damocles where the can would end up.
Except said Sword of Damocles was passed by with nary anything happening.
Part of me was trying to figure out why Republicans wouldn't give in just to foil the scheme. To me that would make sense, because it would derail the whole "Republicans are only interested in doing nothing" campaign.
Then I saw a clip explaining it:
Pretty much all the strategists were saying "by failing, Obama wins". Except Karl Rove. In his scenario, Obama loses in the end because he looks too weak to be capable of fixing the economy. If that's what Republicans in the supercommittee were thinking, damn.
It doesn't matter though, because Obama can fall back on "Well damned these Republicans are just a bunch of partisan do nothings so it's not my fault!" Also, a total lack of any really appealing (or intelligent) Republican challenger.
^ That's not a comment.
/smartassness
News for you guys who wanted a link
An improbably-named Republican lobbyist called Grover Norquist was interviewed in the Guardian today and he seemed pretty happy about the collapse of the discussions, because they meant no tax rises. He claimed the Republicans wouldn't "fall into the trap" of agreeing to tax rises to avoid defence cuts, and to be fair his organisation has written promises from all Republicans in Congress not to vote for tax increases - for what that's worth.
Still, he has A Name To Run Away From Really Fast.