Sequester Thoughts
We haven’t commented too much on the effective ending of sequestration, but as always, the public seems to misunderstand what really was happening.
Too many conservatives are coming out and gnashing their teeth about this. Yes, the sequestration was powerful leverage against the Democrats—but it had very limited effectiveness going forward. We learned this year that Democrats, when pushed, will happily let the government shut down in order to embarrass Republicans. And yes, this means that government spending is going up. But the GOP was pretty much out of options.
Time for the slap of reality: nothing is going to matter until the Republicans win the Senate. With the way things are going, this could be as soon as November, 2014…although they won’t come into power until January, 2015. We can demand reductions in spending and government growth all we want—but with the Senate obeying the rule of Sen. Harry Reid, not much will every happen there. We had the sequester, but that was on fumes.
Meanwhile, support for Republicans winning the Senate is up, but not as fast as support for Democrats in either chamber is plunging. So yeah: we will need to bite the bullet for a little while longer until January, 2015.
Two takeaways: first, instead of conservatives reliving the Night of Long Knives everytime a bill is introduced, we should be mindful that Republicans did manage to reduce the tax increases for the middle class. Yes, it is dreadful that taxes for the upper brackets are going up again, but the middle class is hurting terribly now. And the bill will help a bit.
Second, Speaker John Boehner needs to decide which freaking side he’s on. During the shutdown, he sided with the Tea Party and failed to help them. Now, he’s bad-mouthing the Tea Party and siding with Establishment Republicans. If this were some master plan to unify support between the different groups of Republicans, we would be all for it. But he switches sides too easily and then ridicules the side he just left. Whatever that is, it sure isn’t leadership.
Boehner is not the villain he is often portrayed to be. He is a decent, honorable man who is intensely proud of his country and really is on the smarter side. But the Czar must conclude his leadership has been erratic, and yes—someone else probably would have been a better choice.
Божію Поспѣшествующею Милостію Мы, Дима Грозный Императоръ и Самодержецъ Всероссiйскiй, цѣсарь Московскiй. The Czar was born in the steppes of Russia in 1267, and was cheated out of total control of all Russia upon the death of Boris Mikhailovich, who replaced Alexander Yaroslav Nevsky in 1263. However, in 1283, our Czar was passed over due to a clerical error and the rule of all Russia went to his second cousin Daniil (Даниил Александрович), whom Czar still resents. As a half-hearted apology, the Czar was awarded control over Muscovy, inconveniently located 5,000 miles away just outside Chicago. He now spends his time seething about this and writing about other stuff that bothers him.