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Notes -
Senate ends shutdown.
With no provision to extend COVID-era ACA subsidies, merely a vote, it has the appearance and character of a Democrat loss. The usual suspects on Reddit are crying foul of cowardice.
But could it have ended any other way? The Democrats are obliged to government unions, who weren't being paid: and to the urban poor, who weren't getting SNAP. Two massive interests within their base were being sacrificed for the benefit of... four million recipients? The math never added up.
You could say that the Republicans were heartless, but they have come out of it looking like fighters and winners, while the Democrats have capitulated to 'fascists'. The midterms will still probably be a Dem victory, but this act by Schumer and the moderates will not be something the #resistance will be likely to forget anytime soon.
I'm mostly experience whiplash from the DNC messaging. I wonder at the hypothetical bugman who just uncritically believes all of it. Because in the span of hours, we went from "This is a Republican shutdown" to "Who are the traitorous Democrats who caved and allowed the government to open again?"
Ah well. No helping it.
There is no contradiction between those two. Republicans could have, at any time, used their Senate majority to end the shutdown by over-ruling the parliamentarian and invoking cloture with less than 60 votes. What actually happened is that eight Democrats voted for cloture so that Republicans didn't have to do that.
That's fascinating. So your contention is that Democrats are mad that Republicans didn't end the filibuster?
Huh? Democrats (assuming this means voters) are mad that eight Senators voted to end the government shutdown with what seem like no material concessions.
For selfish reasons, I hope the democrats unseat them in bloody primaries which nominate #resistance dems instead of some of their highest value over replacement senators.
None of them are up for reelection in 2026, and no one will remember this in 2028.
Its precisely the timing calculus that let them defect. You can mathematically model this out as the penalty curve flattening out by the time its their turn on the ballot box, and the converse applies to the other democrats that held the line: their constituents wanted to win SOMETHING out of this fight but the politicians realized they had few victories achievable.
it just goes back to the fundamental composition incoherence the democrats find in themselves: overpoliticized liberals who dont need government services want the party to hold the line against evil trumplanders, while democrat politicians know their offices are getting drowned by calls for help from constituents. Ironically there is a simultaneous moral incoherence at the same time, where progressives insist on doubling down on cultural positions to keep coalitional discipline and liberals want to take the L and move on to winnable fights. There is little overlap between all these tactical and motivational principles, and within this incoherent mess an absolute spineless weakling like Schumer can continue plodding along.
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