Maybe it’s because he doesn’t have to worry about being reelected anymore, or maybe it’s because he has the Republicans by the short and curlies for the first time since he lost his 60 vote supermajority in the Senate, but the president has a new uncompromising tone. It was on full display during his press conference. The most interesting response came when he was asked if he could envision a situation in which we would go over the fiscal cliff. He basically shrugged and said that he was sure we could all envision that situation. It would come if the Republicans didn’t extend the Bush tax cuts for 98% of Americans and 97% of small businesses.
The translation is that John Boehner must convince his caucus to break their pledge to Grover Norquist or over the cliff we go. I’m pretty sure Boehner would hand his Speaker’s gavel to Nancy Pelosi right now if he could.
It’s structural. This is the first time Obama gets to be the hostage-taker.
Now if the line can hold.
Going over the cliff makes the debt ceiling happen much later into next year removing even more Rethug leverage.
Isn’t it awesome to see the other side squirm for a change.
hmmmm….I didn’t realize about the ceiling thing. That DOES put an interesting spin on it.
McConnell and Co. won’t have the debt to hold over his head in exchange for not selling the country down the river.
Good.
Good point about the debt ceiling. I hadn’t put 2 and 2 together.
You know who probably did? Barack Obama.
Yeah, no, you’re all wrong.
According to today’s Treasury release, the statutory debt limit is $16,394,000,000, and the current total public debt subject to that limit is…$16,209,147,000.
So only $184,853,000 to go before congressional reauthorization. Action will have to be taken early in 2013 no matter what spending cuts take hold.
https://www.fms.treas.gov/fmsweb/viewDTSFiles?dir=w&fname=12111300.txt
So when does the ceiling hit? Mid to late Feb is the current thinking. But the increase in $$ and decrease in spending coming up from the CLIFF will stave that off by a couple of months at least.
This effectively takes the debt ceiling out of the equation for “fixing” sequestration.
At least, I think it does. But then, I’ve not been right about any damn thing yet this year.
It’s probably a little of all those things. And that shrug you refer to certainly stood out to me. He is making it damn clear to everyone that if we get to the end of the year without a deal, the onus for this will be on the GOP. I think even the media hounds at the news conference came away with that feeling, too. And, according to polls, it appears that the majority of people agree with him. As quickly as I would grow sick of the pearl clutching and hyperventilating that would occur, I think the best chance for a good deal is to let the GOP nuts take us over the fiscal “curb”. I can’t shake the fear that any early deal might just give away too much.
I don’t know about everyone else, but I’m ready for this President to play a little hardball here. We’ve waited a long damn time for this kind of advantage and I think the planets are aligning for a significant long term shot-in-the-arm for a more progressive future.
Yet, going to get the stock quotes, I find this:
Obama: tax hikes on middle class could lead to another recession
It certainly looks like he is preparing for another compromise that extends the full Bush tax cuts to avoid recession, just like he extended them before to avoid cutting off extended unemployment benefits.
He extended them last time in order to get a laundry list of legislative priorities through the Senate, like DADT repeal and the NEW START nuclear weapons treaty. There is no such motive this time, which the nuts controlling the House.
I still cannot **ing believe he had to extend the Bush tax cuts to get the nuclear arms treaty through. The Republicans are willing to risk nuclear attack on American (and other) cities just to get a 4% reduction in the top rate for the 1%.
Psychopaths.
What I still cannot believe is the giant yawn with which segments of the left greeted the arms reduction treaty.
Nuclear arms reduction was a core left-wing position for decades. When Shrub pulled out of the deals with the Russians, every freaked right the hell out – as well they should have.
But then, when Obama restarts the STARTs, and gets a Nobel Prize for doing so, and cancels the missile defense bases in Poland and the Czech Republic to help things along, and accomplishes a deal, and then gets it through the Senate, the people who should have been turning cartwheels were furious because he actually had the temerity to horse trade to make it happen.
Ohnoes, slightly higher deficits for two years!
And what is different this time?
The Republicans have no carrots to offer him. Last time, there were all kinds of things that had already passed the House, and a big treaty that only need Senate approval. The Senate Republicans sold all of those things (in the form of ending their filibuster) in exchange for the tax cut extension.
This time, they have nothing to offer.
Restoration of the fiscal cliff cuts including the extension of unemployment benefits again.
Kindly go back and reread the first comment in which I explained this.
This one, here: http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2012/11/14/15158/986#5
Restoration of the fiscal cliff cuts and the extension of unemployment benefits. That’s a laundry list.
The Democrats want many of the fiscal cliff cuts. It’s the Republicans who want the defense spending cuts put back. The Democrats don’t even seem too concerned about the Medicare provider cuts.
But this all misses the point: in 2010, the Republicans were able to offer a list of things, like NEW START and DADT repeal, that were completely outside of the budget/tax issues being negotiated. It wasn’t just the items in that deal that the Democrats got – they got the opportunity to pass a host of unrelated items. It is that list of items that the Republicans can’t offer anymore.
Think you missed a little bit of the address for the link reference. Doesn’t work.
l think this is the blurb referenced.
it seems to me that making the jump to
is a bit of a stretch.
l read it as, yeah, it could happen if the boner and his asshat brigade on the other side of the aisle keep to their petulant ways. and as boo pointed out earlier, mcconnell’s put boner in the hot seat.
Yes, I would agree a “bit of a jump”.
Today’s circumstances do not really correlate to those at the time that the President made his compromise. Yes, the House is still as dysfunctional and shrieking as before. But they are in a completely different place as far as the cards they are holding. They have virtually nothing in their hand, and they know it.
I see that the stock market had a sell-off after the news conference. You can bet the RW pundits will be pointing at that until they get a cramp in their finger.
Has Obama ever bought a car? You don’t go in and tell the salesman how you really really want that car, dire things will happen if you don’t get it and your trade-in in a piece of crap. You pretend not to care and play up how good your trade-in is and maybe you’ll buy the new one because it has a few better features but you are certainly not going to pay a lot or you are going to walk.
I’ve never negotiated a legislative deal, but I’ve bought a LOT of cars.
That analogy doesn’t really hold here.
Obama talking about the fiscal cliff and how terrible it would be if a deal wasn’t struck isn’t like saying HE really needs the car. The harm of not making a deal doesn’t accrue just, or even primarily, to him, but to the Republicans.
Because of how the election went, and because of how things worked out in July 2011, the public is going to blame the Republicans much more than Obama if a deal isn’t struck. When he talks up the downside of doing nothing, he isn’t baring his soul about his worries; he’s threatening the Republicans, putting pressure on them to fold.
Yes, that is it. Thank you. Copy and Paste seems to have had a problem.
Maybe McConnell thinks Boehner is as bad as Rachel Maddow thinks he is.
Great minds think alike.
I heard part of the press conference on the radio. The bit where he defended the honor of Susan Rice, publicly telling John McCain and Lindsey Graham that if they want to (go on Fox and) pick on someone over the Benghazi stuff, he IS the President and he’d be willing to have that discussion with them.
Apparently Little Miss Lindsey got really miffed over the public bitch-slap and fired off some note to Obama (meaning a press release) about it.
I just got home and I’ve gotta find more info on this. Sounds like some real drama!
Here’s a link to the McCain smackdown. Epic!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dkjNky1QSco&feature=youtu.be
I missed the presser, but I heard POTUS was in a “…CALL ME MR TIBBS” mood. and he completely. PWND Chuck Todd & that other reporter for shouting out a question I like it. I hope this will be the blueprint for the 2nd term. The GOP & MSM & FauxNews people ain’t gonna be able to handle it.
The characterization I heard that seems appropriate is that this was the post-election “No More Mister Nice Guy” press conference.
Here’s a link to the whole press conference from C-Span. Gonna watch it now…
That the McMorris/Price contest for the chair of the House Republican Conference was a proxy fight over Ryan’s influence in the coming session. Read somewhere that Ryan “controlled” more votes than Boehner in the debt/sequester negotiations and Ericson now calling for a spill however unrealistically.
My understanding is there could be a challenge in the opening of the new session, though that would be quite exceptional for Republicans. Any thoughts on this? Seems more unlikely now with Price’s apparent defeat.
Yep, interesting. That the read on it is that Boehner’s proxy, Cathy McMorris, won over Ryan’s choice of Price and that will translate into a more balanced (read less openly hostile) Rep wing seems more like a ‘let’s get a token woman in’ thing Rush would think of rather than a loss for Ryan.
Interesting. Is Ryan angling for the Speakership?
He backed Price while the establishment promoted McMorris. Hard to say but it would be a stretch; maybe not after this defeat.
A loser all around.
I thought Ryan was going to run for president in 2012.
It seems hard to overestimate his arrogance and ambition. We’ll see if anyone in the Republican party can reign him in during the coming legislative session. He’s got to walk a fine line between now and whenever his next opportunity for promotion arises.
Well, good for Boehner on getting his way and this baby step back towards mainstream relevance for his caucus. However, according to the AJC this morning, Price’s loss might mean that he takes a run at Saxby’s Senate seat in 2014.
Say what you will, but Saxby is to Price what Cleland was to Zell. And, given that it’s highly unlikely that the Dems will be able to field a strong opposition candidate in the general, methinks I maybe will vote in the GOP primary in July 2014, if this somehow turns out to become fact.
Late to the party, but I don’t see any reason to vote Saxby over Price. In a legislative body, what counts is the median position on each issue. Saxby is already so far to the right that replacing him with Price probably won’t change a single roll call. But, by being kookier, Price has a higher chance of losing, which would shift every roll call 1 vote in our direction.
If this were an executive position, the tradeoff would be very different (eg Bush vs. Gore for a Green). But it’s not.
A Democrat in Georgia has a steep uphill path, but not as steep as Donelly’s or McCaskill’s were. Price might give us that chance. And even if not in 2014, by 2020 demographic shifts might well give a Democrat the advantage, and then having a nuttier Repub will be greatly to our advantage.