I still think the process would go better if the light, heat, air-conditioning and water shut off in the Capitol and all the House and Senate office buildings any time the lack of a budget resulted in a fed.gov shutdown. It would give Congress a positive incentive.
Nevertheless, they did manage to cobble together a continuing resolution that keeps things running, while including almost none of the sparkly stuff Representatives, Senators and President-elect Trump wanted. What was left out included plenty of items that will be fodder for opionators on both sides of the aisle, from children's cancer research funding to scrapping the debt limit. The process exposed fracture lines in the GOP coalition, and they can be sure their pals across the aisle were taking notes. Nevertheless, the CR received commanding majorities in both House (366 - 34 - 1, with all 34 noes from the Republicans) and Senate (85 - 11). With 15 Republicans and 14 Democrats out in the House, Jasmine Crockett of Texas voted "present" and balanced the scales. Likewise, the four missing or not-voting Senators were split. The absent wouldn't have tipped the vote anyway.
It's a hell of a way to run a railroad, but the feather-ruffling is at least evenly distributed, and they can all scamper off to holiday celebrations, secure in the knowledge that they managed to kick the can far enough down the road that the incoming Congress won't have to take it up again until springtime, at which point it will once again be a sudden and wholly unanticipated emergency, because Congress has the memory of a goldfish when it comes to the fiddlin' details of paying the piper, and they think you do, too.
Update
1 week ago
4 comments:
I'd rather see the squabbling than a rubberstamp body in full lockstep.
Squabbling leading to compromise (or to starting over and then to compromise) is how it's supposed to work, but I am leery of Mr. Musk's influence; between "X," vast amounts to spend on political ads and personal access to Mr. Trump, he has a megaphone that "Colonel" McCormick or William Randolph Hearst could only have dreamed of. Elon Musk is smart, but he has given me considerable reason to doubt that he is wise -- and even if he was, he's got too much sway for one man to have.
True, but Trump & Musk are two guys who want to be leading the parade. They're inevitably going to have a clash, and I don't think that's going to be long in coming.
When it comes to Donald Trump, I'm about through making predictions what he'll do next or how it will go. He keeps dodging "inevitable" outcomes. Maybe he'll have a falling-out with Mr. Musk, but as long as he sees a benefit in the arrangement, it will continue, no matter how weird things get.
Post a Comment