It used to be that compromise on appropriations bills was easy—you’d either split the difference, or you’d slide toward the more popular amount. But now the size of the difference has grown to unprecedented proportions, and the amount has gotten all mixed up with principles—government can’t leave people in the lurch v. government has got to be downsized or the heavens will fall. Always before urban oriented members have been able to swallow subsidies to the rural rich because part of deal was help for the urban poor. That arrangement goes back to the Kennedy era. Now the House has separated the two. It can just barely pass the subsidies for the rural rich. It seems pretty clear that a Speaker who let a SNAP bill come to the floor and pass with Democratic votes in the teeth of opposition from a majority of his caucus would, or at least very well might, be deposed. Republicans who support a bill the Senate can accept risk defeat in a primary. Democrats who don’t insist on a SNAP appropriation close to that in the Senate bill face similar risks. And suppose this gap is somehow bridged. Isn’t the gap over a budget and raising the debt ceiling even larger? Only the sequester resolved the first House-Senate disagreement, and that resulted in disaster, and anyway neither side will buy that one again. “Dysfunctional” is when you get an outcome everybody finds highly repugnant—no agriculture bill at all, no budget, Uncle Sam unable to pay his bills. Is our government still functional? dish.andrewsullivan/2013/07/12/the-gop-buys-the-farm/
Posted on: Sat, 13 Jul 2013 05:44:09 +0000
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