Aaaaaand Schumer folds like a lawn chair. Just a man who is utterly incapable of meeting the moment. NY and CA Democratic Parties are the worst in the country.
Aaaaaand Schumer folds like a lawn chair. Just a man who is utterly incapable of meeting the moment. NY and CA Democratic Parties are the worst in the country.
The biggest mistake Schumer made was not prepping the ground correctly. In a shutdown fight, the side who isn't willing to accept a clean CR loses. That should be the Republicans! This CR isn't clean. Problem is it's being *treated* as clean, both because if you squint at it from the right angle, it's close to clean (this isn't their dream bill), and more importantly because we completely fumbled our media strategy. After we made that mistake - letting them call this clean - we were screwed either way.
I think on shutdown fights while in the minority we should say, look, we're always willing to accept an honest, clean CR. If the Republicans want anything other than current policy, they have to negotiate with us for it and give us something in return. Making this point clear a month ago could have led to a better outcome here. That's the original error. It doesn't take a savant to figure this out, and it's what makes me seriously question whether Schumer is up to the job. I'd like to see new leadership.
But the whole point of shutdown negotiations is that you can't afford to get the blame for the shutdown. Every party that's been blamed for a shutdown in the last fifteen years has eventually caved. Making extortionate demands like that just doesn't work.
That's an absolutely impossible demand for the Republicans to meet. I support using leverage to gain possible concessions, and necessary ones like I outlined, not to absolutely refuse to participate, no matter what, and come across as total obstructionist extremists, which is what your approach would have done. Unfortunately, it's moot.
Yeah, Schumer was betting on House Republicans not getting their shit together like they did the first Trump was in office and failed to repeal the ACA. I admit, I was hoping Chip Roy and the Free Dumb Caucus would be a pain in the ass along with some more weirdos like Thomas Massie breaking. But this isn't 2017 where the GOP had a bigger majority. Johnson knew he couldn't spare to lose any votes. Don't get me wrong, the GOP kept the the Democrats on the Appropriations Committee completely out of the process and rammed this through but Schumer should've seen that coming. What's insane is even John Fetterman agreed with AOC that this was all performative.
Now I don't know how this Schumer cave plays out electorally for Democrats next year or even this year (I don't think it will for the Governor races or legislative races). But if the grassroots/base anger can materialize into recruiting real, electable (heavy emphasis on that word) primary candidates that can knock out incumbents, that's going to be the real test. It's very tiresome to explain what CRs and cloture and the whole process means to regular voters.
Democrats need to stop putting New Yorkers in top leadership positions. With a couple of exceptions, particularly AOC, the congressional membership is rancid.
Unfortunately, you are right. I'm so livid tonight! I get emails from Schumer every fucking day about how dangerous Trump is, he's such a threat, and will I fucking send him money to help him fight Trump, and now, he behaves like the fucking Center Party in 1933 Germany. Fuck him! This is the worst thing he's done since his vote to give G.W. Bush a blank check to invade Iraq.
No it wasn't. Republicans are increasingly unpopular right now and that change is happening rapidly. It's happening because of how they're running government.
Standing aside and giving our stamp of approval to their actions is just about the stupidest thing Schumer/Jeffries could have done for our party.
There is a legitimate counterargument: "never interrupt your enemy while he is making a mistake." You're absolutely correct that the way Republicans are running government right now is wrecking their popularity. A shutdown fight might interrupt that, which is why you see some Democrats backing down here.
Now I'm not saying they're right. I think there's a real argument for saying "no, wait, we'll only take an actual clean CR". But I can see both sides here.
Playing along with a CR gives us culpability. "Democrats voted for it too." Also it's not like a clean CR would have stopped republicans from doing the deeply unpopular things, so I don't buy that argument at all. They'd continue making their mistakes. If anything, we interrupted their mistake by running over and shoving our nametags all over it.
One of the biggest problems we have with a decent chunk our should-be voters is that a lot of them think we're not much different from republicans, that we're "republican-lite." Crap like this reinforces that and makes getting them to turnout that much harder.
Also just generally this is fucking awful for our ability to wield power in DC. If we hold the presidency, republicans threaten to shut down the government if we don't do what they want. Eventually we cave and pass a CR with concessions to them. If republicans hold the presidency, they threaten to shut down the government if we don't do what they want. Eventually we cave and pass a CR with concessions to them.
This kind of behavior calls into question the entire point of having people win offices in congress. This is mind numbingly stupid of Schumer. On every level.
It's not even that a "decent chunk our should-be voters is that a lot of them think we're not much different from republicans"; it's that this is a complete cave-in, absolute collaboration, and at a time when this was the one way Democrats could oppose dictatorship and demand an end to recissions, arbitrary firings and the immediate reinstatement of everyone fired without due process as requirements for their votes, they have betrayed the country and helped usher in true dictatorship. It's only some courts that are trying to resist now.
I have absolutely no faith in his leadership whatsoever. I just got an email from the DSCC and I'm sure my response went into the ether but I'm not sending any money to these committees anymore.
Schumer and the Senate Dems were put in an absolute no-win situation: a vote for the CR is a vote to enable Trump and Musk, whereas a vote for a government shutdown would have handed a potentially effective attack line against Democrats (and Senate Democrats in particular) to Trump and the GOP.
Schumer would have been better off caving from the outset instead of feigning a shutdown threat and then caving, which has done nothing but enrage progressives and hyperpartisan establishment Dems (a big part of the Democratic base) and make Schumer look comically weak. At least Jeffries got all but one member of his caucus to hold firm!
Republican House + Republican Senate + Republican White House = Republican Shut down. Schumer going along lends them bipartisan cred and plays right into the "both parties are the same" crap. Lord know what will be demanded and caved to in the next crunch moment.
The institutional Democratic Party is guided by an almost pathological level of conflict avoidance in almost every direction. “What can we do to make the least number of people mad?” is just a bankrupt way to operate.
Aaaaaand Schumer folds like a lawn chair. Just a man who is utterly incapable of meeting the moment. NY and CA Democratic Parties are the worst in the country.
https://bsky.app/profile/sahilkapur.bsky.social/post/3lkc5ngo6ts2q
The biggest mistake Schumer made was not prepping the ground correctly. In a shutdown fight, the side who isn't willing to accept a clean CR loses. That should be the Republicans! This CR isn't clean. Problem is it's being *treated* as clean, both because if you squint at it from the right angle, it's close to clean (this isn't their dream bill), and more importantly because we completely fumbled our media strategy. After we made that mistake - letting them call this clean - we were screwed either way.
I think on shutdown fights while in the minority we should say, look, we're always willing to accept an honest, clean CR. If the Republicans want anything other than current policy, they have to negotiate with us for it and give us something in return. Making this point clear a month ago could have led to a better outcome here. That's the original error. It doesn't take a savant to figure this out, and it's what makes me seriously question whether Schumer is up to the job. I'd like to see new leadership.
He isn't up for the job.
Even if the Republicans were willing to pass a clean CR our demands to keep the government open should have been:
Hakeem Jeffries as Speaker+Resignation of Trump/Vance.
But the whole point of shutdown negotiations is that you can't afford to get the blame for the shutdown. Every party that's been blamed for a shutdown in the last fifteen years has eventually caved. Making extortionate demands like that just doesn't work.
We shouldn't have been negotiating to begin with.
I repeat, even if Republicans were willing to pass a clean CR, the better strategy to me was to shut the government down regardless.
I don't agree. End to rescissions and firings without due process, rehirings of everyone thus fired.
Again, the minimum demand should have been Hakeem Jeffries as Speaker + Resignation of Trump/Vance to keep the Governmenr open.
That's an absolutely impossible demand for the Republicans to meet. I support using leverage to gain possible concessions, and necessary ones like I outlined, not to absolutely refuse to participate, no matter what, and come across as total obstructionist extremists, which is what your approach would have done. Unfortunately, it's moot.
Yeah, Schumer was betting on House Republicans not getting their shit together like they did the first Trump was in office and failed to repeal the ACA. I admit, I was hoping Chip Roy and the Free Dumb Caucus would be a pain in the ass along with some more weirdos like Thomas Massie breaking. But this isn't 2017 where the GOP had a bigger majority. Johnson knew he couldn't spare to lose any votes. Don't get me wrong, the GOP kept the the Democrats on the Appropriations Committee completely out of the process and rammed this through but Schumer should've seen that coming. What's insane is even John Fetterman agreed with AOC that this was all performative.
Now I don't know how this Schumer cave plays out electorally for Democrats next year or even this year (I don't think it will for the Governor races or legislative races). But if the grassroots/base anger can materialize into recruiting real, electable (heavy emphasis on that word) primary candidates that can knock out incumbents, that's going to be the real test. It's very tiresome to explain what CRs and cloture and the whole process means to regular voters.
Not to try to get off topic a bit but we’ve gotta hand it to Paul Ryan:
1) He had it easier than Mike Johnson as House Speaker.
2) He left office while he could after Trump was first POTUS.
3) Never went MAGA.
4) Is now having a more lucrative and higher paying career in the private sector than he did after being in the House since the late 90’s.
Fetterman was going to vote to avoid a shutdown according to his own tweet.
He's been such a disappointment.
Democrats need to stop putting New Yorkers in top leadership positions. With a couple of exceptions, particularly AOC, the congressional membership is rancid.
Unfortunately, you are right. I'm so livid tonight! I get emails from Schumer every fucking day about how dangerous Trump is, he's such a threat, and will I fucking send him money to help him fight Trump, and now, he behaves like the fucking Center Party in 1933 Germany. Fuck him! This is the worst thing he's done since his vote to give G.W. Bush a blank check to invade Iraq.
the executive leadership also fucking sucks. Is there a worse quartet than Cuomo, Adams, de Blasio, and Hochul?
I'm sure there is, but the worse ones would be Republicans.
It was a real dilemma.
No it wasn't. Republicans are increasingly unpopular right now and that change is happening rapidly. It's happening because of how they're running government.
Standing aside and giving our stamp of approval to their actions is just about the stupidest thing Schumer/Jeffries could have done for our party.
There is a legitimate counterargument: "never interrupt your enemy while he is making a mistake." You're absolutely correct that the way Republicans are running government right now is wrecking their popularity. A shutdown fight might interrupt that, which is why you see some Democrats backing down here.
Now I'm not saying they're right. I think there's a real argument for saying "no, wait, we'll only take an actual clean CR". But I can see both sides here.
Playing along with a CR gives us culpability. "Democrats voted for it too." Also it's not like a clean CR would have stopped republicans from doing the deeply unpopular things, so I don't buy that argument at all. They'd continue making their mistakes. If anything, we interrupted their mistake by running over and shoving our nametags all over it.
One of the biggest problems we have with a decent chunk our should-be voters is that a lot of them think we're not much different from republicans, that we're "republican-lite." Crap like this reinforces that and makes getting them to turnout that much harder.
Also just generally this is fucking awful for our ability to wield power in DC. If we hold the presidency, republicans threaten to shut down the government if we don't do what they want. Eventually we cave and pass a CR with concessions to them. If republicans hold the presidency, they threaten to shut down the government if we don't do what they want. Eventually we cave and pass a CR with concessions to them.
This kind of behavior calls into question the entire point of having people win offices in congress. This is mind numbingly stupid of Schumer. On every level.
It's not even that a "decent chunk our should-be voters is that a lot of them think we're not much different from republicans"; it's that this is a complete cave-in, absolute collaboration, and at a time when this was the one way Democrats could oppose dictatorship and demand an end to recissions, arbitrary firings and the immediate reinstatement of everyone fired without due process as requirements for their votes, they have betrayed the country and helped usher in true dictatorship. It's only some courts that are trying to resist now.
ok whens the debt limit? Schumers got one more chance.
I have absolutely no faith in his leadership whatsoever. I just got an email from the DSCC and I'm sure my response went into the ether but I'm not sending any money to these committees anymore.
Schumer and the Senate Dems were put in an absolute no-win situation: a vote for the CR is a vote to enable Trump and Musk, whereas a vote for a government shutdown would have handed a potentially effective attack line against Democrats (and Senate Democrats in particular) to Trump and the GOP.
Schumer would have been better off caving from the outset instead of feigning a shutdown threat and then caving, which has done nothing but enrage progressives and hyperpartisan establishment Dems (a big part of the Democratic base) and make Schumer look comically weak. At least Jeffries got all but one member of his caucus to hold firm!
Republican House + Republican Senate + Republican White House = Republican Shut down. Schumer going along lends them bipartisan cred and plays right into the "both parties are the same" crap. Lord know what will be demanded and caved to in the next crunch moment.
Exactly.
The institutional Democratic Party is guided by an almost pathological level of conflict avoidance in almost every direction. “What can we do to make the least number of people mad?” is just a bankrupt way to operate.
https://bsky.app/profile/chrislhayes.bsky.social/post/3lkc53x4ghs2h
I’ve been saying this for ages.
Being everything to everyone makes one nobody to everyone. I wish more people within the Democratic Party understood that.