THE SHUTDOWN AND DEBT LIMIT (RECAP)

On the TV political analysis show, Morning Joe, the other morning, Joe Scarborough and another conservative bemoaned Democrat Senate leader Harry Reid holding up 14 bills the House of Representative passed opening this and that part of the government from the House instituted shut down.  I suppose it is only natural when you are in the wrong that you try to justify your actions and blame it on the "other guy."

Pardon me, but there was a bill before the House, that Speaker John Boehner refused to let be voted upon that would have prevented the shut down for 12 weeks (sic!).*  Furthermore, the bill was in effect a Republican bill drafted and passed in the Senate that carried a budget actually not only below the original Paul Ryan level but even below the Sequester limit and significantly below what the Senate Democrats wanted (see figure).  The Democrats in the Senate helped pass this bill in a futile attempt to get a clean continuation resolution  bill. It turned out that budgetary success wasn't  enough for the House Republicans so they added bigger things to it than the bill itself (like destroying the ACA or Obamacare).  Though the Republican dominated House passed various bills opening up various agencies and attacking the ACA, they were held up in the Senate that was first asking for a clean continuing resolution bill such as the one they had passed.

However, the continuing resolution bill was not the only problem  After years of complaining that the Senate never came forth with a budget, this fiscal year they finally did.  The House also had a budget, but, again, Republican House Speaker Boehner refused to let their bill go to a conference committee to find an agreement between the two bills.  The Senate requested a conference committee 18 times.**  Included here is the record in excruciating detail.***

So spin as they might, the Republicans cannot squirm out of the responsibility for the October budget and debt limit fiascos.

It is interesting that in the final compromise bill, the government has been reopened for 12 weeks (as in the original continuing resolution), there is to be a conference Senate-House committee on the budget (that had been requested by the Senate for half a year), and income verification of earnings from ACA (Obamacare) recipients of subsidies (which is in the original ACA bill).  That's the bright side, but we get to go through this again in the middle of January.  Republican Sen. Mich Mcconnell, minority leader of the Senate, says there will be no shutdown in January (http://www.drudge.com/news/173116/mcconnell-promises-no-more-shutdowns).

* http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/budget/news/2013/09/30/76026/the-senate-continuing-resolution-is-already-a-compromise/
** http://www.chrisweigant.com/2013/10/10/a-complete-timeline-of-republican-obstructionism-on-budget-negotiations-they-are-now-demanding-part-2/
***
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/chris-weigant/a-complete-timeline-of-re_b_4074372.html
http://www.chrisweigant.com/2013/10/10/a-complete-timeline-of-republican-obstructionism-on-budget-negotiations-they-are-now-demanding-part-2/

COMEBACK KID COMES BACK -- AGAIN!

Well!  So Obama came back to be reelected after all.  He has fooled me several times (an example is getting Obamacare), and here I had suggested he might be the best one-term president ever (http://stopcontinentaldrift.blogspot.com/2010/08/best-one-term-president-ever.html).  I did, however, protect myself a bit in writing " Therefore I feel that President Obama probably will be a one-term president no matter his other outstanding accomplishments; however, we have learned that it is dangerous to count out The Comeback Kid."  And so he did.  There is concern that Obama has not outlined a visionary agenda for his second term, but there is much to his first term that still need to be consummated.  A good example is that the Dodd-Frank bill is still being assimilated with maybe two-thirds of the regulations still to be decided.   Obamacare is not yet fully implemented.  And then there is the Dream Act still to be consummated  as well as the infrastructure legislation among others.  Also the "fiscal cliff" seems to need to be dealt with.

Will Republicans be more flexible in doing the nations' business?  Mitch McConnell's stated primary goal of defeating President Obama's reelection didn't work out so well.  Will Republican's somehow grow to love Hispanic Americans?  Oh sure, they do have a few Republican Hispanic governors,  Senators and Representative, but, after all, Obama did get 71% of the Hispanic vote.  Are Republican's happy that they kept Elizabeth Warren from being head of the Consumer Protection Agency only to have her take away a Senate seat from them?

So it has happened again.   As I type this, the stock exchanges are down big time although in 80% of the Democratic Presidencies, the S&P500 has been up and the DJIA almost as much.

It will interesting to follow.  But it sure appears that Obamamcare is protected.