April 8th. That’s the deadline for Republicans and Democrats to reach a deal on funding for the remainder of 2011. No deal? Then the government shuts down. And if I were a betting man, that’s where my money would be right now: the negotiations have become too acrimonious, the issues at their heart too numerous and personal to the parties, to make a deal likely even in normal circumstances. But in circumstances in which newly elected Republicans are trying to prove to their base that they won’t catch Beltway fever and compromise while Democrats are trying to prove they won’t get pushed around by a party that controls a minority of the federal government? A deal seems near impossible.
One way you know that talks are going poorly is that, over the last 24 hours, reporters have suddenly been showered with leaks and inside information about what’s holding up the talks. It’s not just that Republicans want to cut deeper than Democrats and pass a series of riders accomplishing longtime conservative priorities like defunding Planned Parenthood. It’s also that Republicans are insisting that the House’s spending bill serve as a starting point for all negotiations and Democrats are insisting that if Republicans want so many cuts, they need to be open to the cuts coming from outside the non-defense discretionary bucket. So the fights over “what” and “how much” have been joined by fights over “from where” and “based off what.” It’s not a good sign, at this late stage in the negotiations, for the points of contention to be multiplying.
I'm still not convinced of a shutdown. If you had shown me this post six weeks ago as a message from the future, I would have agreed with it totally. But in the intervening weeks what I have seen is that at pretty much every major juncture in this process since the new Congress was convened, Dems have folded.
Republicans have all but gotten a complete win on the budget here and the process has been the same: Tea Party Republicans threaten to destroy the country, GOP leaders say "Well if you give us some concessions we might be able to put a leash on them", Dems offer billions more in cuts, and the Tea Party settles down for a few days, then the process repeats itself.
I fully expect another round of tens of billions more in cuts to be offered by the Democrats before the end of next week, which will buy another couple of weeks in the House for negotiations. Dems are convinced that if there is a shutdown, they will be blamed, and not the Republicans. Even the chance that they might take the heat for it is leading them to capitulate. They're buying the Cantor Theory.
"Senator Reid failed to pass a budget last year and once again is abandoning his responsibility to offer a credible plan to cut spending and fund the government for the rest of the year. The Reid/Schumer leadership team has failed to take our fiscal crisis seriously, as members of their own Democratic caucus have pointed out.
"Our federal government borrows nearly forty cents of each dollar it spends, yet Senate Democrats want to keep spending money that we don't have. It is clear that because Senator Reid refuses to make any spending cuts, he instead plans to force a massive future tax hike on families and small business people.
"In the scope of our debt crisis, if Senator Reid and Senator Schumer force the government to partially shut down over these sensible spending cuts, Americans will hold them accountable."
Every word of it other than "Senator Reid" and "Senator Schumer" (because they are Senators) is a lie, but the Dems are completely terrified by this. Now, it's possible that the Tea Party will revolt and Ezra is right. But I think the Republicans can get one more batch of cuts, basically getting to the $60-$80 billion in cuts range that they put as their starting position, without having to give up anything but a couple of continuing resolutions.
Seems like a total win to me...unless Ezra is right and the Tea Party blows up the whole deal (which is very possible.)
[UPDATE] Brian Beutler reports that Republicans are planning to can the White House's latest offer outright, leaving everything up in the air. Entirely possible now that this is prelude to a shutdown. It's also possible that this is prelude to a complete fold by the Democrats.
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