Cliffed

Thanks to the holidays, I had a certain amount of distance from the cliffhanging in Washington.  It felt good, in a sad sort of way.  I hope not to be drawn into the coming tragic nonsense, which is likely to be considerable.

As to evaluation of the deal, the analysis that makes the most sense to me was Lawrence O'Donnell.  He makes a couple of key points: no Democratic President in memory has gotten congressional Republicans to raise taxes on anybody.  The last time some GOPers voted to raise taxes was with Bush I in the White House, and fewer of them voted for that than voted for the deal this time.

But the biggest point is that when taking inflation into consideration, the $400,000 tax bracket in this deal is precisely the same as the $250,000 bracket in the Clinton era.  In other words, if the Clinton tax structure had never been altered by Bush II, it would be exactly the same as the deal that Obama-Biden made.  Plus they got the unemployment benefits renewed, and a number of other crucial items.  They didn't cave.  Other Democrats--especially from high cost of living places like NY and southern CA--thought the $250,000 level was too low.  They're happier with 400K.

Another random thought.   Jonathan Chiat thinks Speaker Banal's proclaiming that he won't negotiate with Obama is crazy.  Taking Banal literally, it's not crazy.  Banal has tried it twice and run away from the deal twice.  He either can't back up a deal with votes or he realizes he's out of his depth and getting rolled, or both.  He'd be crazy to keep doing it.  Chiat's point is that if the House wants to actually do anything, they have to know if Obama will sign it.  But they don't need Banal going to the White House to find that out.  All this worked for years through various means (aides talking, back-channel phone calls, signals through the media, etc.) so that both sides had a pretty clear idea where the other side stood on specific legislation and provisions, without "negotiations."

In fact, Banal going to the White House to negotiate with the President like he was a head of state was always more of a symbolic win for the GOP, placing their leader on equal ground with the POTUS.  But Banal has failed so spectacularly in public, he's better off being as invisible as possible.

The new Congress was sworn in today--the most diverse in history, and for the first time, white men aren't the majority.  Still, Michele Bachmanniac is back, and she introduced the first bill, to repeal Obamacare.  Positive change is happening, but the old craziness is still powerful, and it's a crap shoot at this point whether positive change is happening fast enough to avert multiple catastrophes.