The extremist Right crazies are at it again, playing their brinksmanship games with the debt ceiling - this even after a credit downgrade (by Standard and Poor) earlier this summer thanks to their springtime cliff hanger. Now Kevin McCarthy's wretches are in 'redux' mode - led by the likes of Rep. Chip Roy (R-Tex.) — a top member of the House Freedom Caucus. This deranged cretin pledged on local radio to “use every tool I have at my disposal” to stop a short-term spending deal that doesn’t include the extremists' priorities. The latter became necessary after the GOP Trumper wackjobs demanded a sharp break with the original deal that party leaders, including House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.), already worked out to raise the nation’s debt limit.
That agreement was designed to prevent another stalemate over spending this fall. It was, indeed, to have lasted until January, 2025 before any more debt ceiling games were played. But the GOP Reich extremists never liked that deal because it prevented their ongoing interference in Joe Biden's presidency and postponed the reckoning they wanted until after the election. So they reneged on it and here they are, again, threatening Kevin N0-balls unless he finds them the votes needed - to shut the government down by September 30th - or give them the cuts they were denied in May. NO, you can't make this shit up. Just look at some of the comments from the WaPo:
Sure,
why not? Let's have a government shutdown. Let's impeach Biden.
Republicans take great glee in harming the American people. No abortions, no libraries, mass shootings every other week, faux "investigations", blocking military promotions, etc.
This is all the result of the GOP and it's freedom caucus gamesmanship.Not enough for them that our credit has already been downgraded, like they want to burn it all down if they can't rule...
So as Trump's felony counts mount his faithful cult realizes that this diversion is the only way they can take the heat off their Traitor hero. And also, they grasp the only way to save their overlord is if they can put more blame on Biden for whatever financial calamity happens. See e.g.
Immediately in the GOP debt freaks' sights: the Women, Infants and Children nutrition program (WIC), which provides monthly aid to roughly 6.6 million poor families. With food prices still high and program participation on the rise, its existing $5.69 billion budget is not sufficient to provide benefits at their current level through next fiscal year. But do these House GOP miscreants care? No, they believe the ones suffering are mostly D voters anyway, so let them go pound sand.
Without an additional $1.4 billion, the program — funded by the federal government, and managed by the states — may be forced in the coming year to “implement waiting lists, causing women and children to lose vital nutrition assistance and increasing child poverty and hunger.” Again, the Reep Reptiles do not care. They only want to use as much leverage as possible to try to catapult Trump back into the White House.
The Biden White House call for new funding stands in stark contrast with the plan put forward by House Republican Extremists, who instead seek to roll back that expansion. How much 'roll back'? What these roaches are allowing could reduce the amount some WIC recipients receive for fruits and vegetables to about $11 per month. In other words, about the cost of 3 packs of M&Ms and a coke.
In total the extremist GOP proposal underfunds the nutrition aid program by about $800 million, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. It essentially ensures millions of kids go on starvation diets, and mothers who care for them as well. As I said, they can pound sand for all the GOP rats care. But this was all warned about in previous posts when I noted this is the price paid for putting these pigs in control of the House. They are not about any serious governance, only posturing for and enabling the Traitor and 91-count felon, Donald Trump. And let me further note many on the GOP’s far-right flank have openly courted the idea of a shutdown, once again hoping to use the threat of a fiscal calamity as leverage to achieve steep spending cuts.
In other words, extortion pure and simple. Terrorist -style extortion to use Janice's parlance, because such a shutdown would almost certainly delay VA benefits and Social Security payments, as well as other critical funding - including for the victims of the Lahaina firestorm, as well as emergency relief for Florida in the wake of hurricane Idalia and $20.6 billion to help Ukraine. One can visualize crippled vets or malnourished seniors on their last can of cat food, and swollen kids' bellies in Appalachia - all while the House Repukes chortle about impeaching Joe Biden.
Earlier this month, in the wake of the 'Freedom Caucus' rebellion, McCarthy and Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) realized they needed to do damage control to avert another debt crisis and potential credit downgrade. So each signaled
early support for a continuing resolution (CR) that might offer lawmakers more time
to craft a full-year spending deal. Schumer later described the discussions as
a “good sign,” while McCarthy pitched the idea as a way for his party to
continue its “investigations and everything else,” a reference to the Trump cult's ongoing yen to probe Biden and his family. McCarthy, however, soon learned his restless extremist faction would be no part of a CR unless they got the massive spending cuts they've been slavering over.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell who had yet another "brain freeze" episode on Wednesday, predicted lawmakers would adopt a “short-term” deal into December while “we struggle to figure out exactly what the government’s spending level is going to be.” But that now looks like a distant fantasy.
Meanwhile, the Biden administration has also asked Congress to allow federal agencies to spend more rapidly to prepare for pandemics, oversee Medicare, process student loan applications and payments, and review claims for Social Security benefits. But that now has as much chance happening as extraterrestrials kidnapping Trump and hauling his fat ass off to Kepler 186f.
In the meantime, we can only hope that the 10-12 House GOP members not part of the wacko caucus - and who won in pro-Biden districts - come to their senses and oppose any pro-shutdown extortion. After all, their own jobs may be on the line if the voters perceive they don't have their - or the national interest- at heart.
See Also:
We are in September now, which means the government-shutdown stopwatch is ticking. This congressional calendar is even more fraught than usual because there’s just so much that Congress needs to do—and yet, House Republican extremists remain intent on creating chaos. Making matters worse, the House remains on vacation this week, and has scheduled only 12 legislative days before the fiscal year ends and government funding expires on Oct. 1.
And:
by Heather Digby Parton | August 31, 2023 - 7:35am | permalink
Donald Trump's legal problems just got very real.
We now have trial dates being set, jockeying among various co-defendants and even Trump's former chief of staff, Mark Meadows, taking the stand to essentially say he was only following orders. It now appears certain that one way or the other, Trump will be facing a jury before the 2024 election. And for all his blustering about how every indictment makes him more popular, he wants his Republican supporters to do something about it.
My colleague Amanda Marcotte has a full rundown of the Republican hysteria around the threat to their Dear Leader. The party is in such disarray that it's difficult to anticipate how successful they might be at their various gambits to interfere in the 2024 elections around the country. But the outlines of what the MAGA caucus in the House of Representatives plans to do in Washington are clear. They want to impeach Joe Biden, as we all predicted the moment they took the majority in 2022, and flood the zone with investigations. And they want to hold the government hostage by shutting down the government. If all goes well, they might even wreck the economy in the process.
And:
And:
by Thom Hartmann | August 31, 2023 - 7:17am | permalink
Republican politicians and the rightwing billionaires who fund them want a nation of uneducated, compliant serfs in their workforce, not a nation of well-educated union-conscious people who are willing to strike to get better pay and benefits.
No comments:
Post a Comment