Manchin Aids and Abets House GOP’s Economic Terrorism




Economic Policy | Joe Manchin | Republicans
by Joan McCarter | January 24, 2023 - 8:29am



While Congress is busy getting organized this week, the real story is that the government has bumped up against the debt ceiling, and the clock is ticking for the measures the Treasury can take to keep paying the bills. The House GOP is talking about creating a plan for after the default, to tell Treasury what to prioritize paying once the money runs out. All the other responsible law- and policy-makers are refusing to cede any ground on this to the economic terrorists in the House.

Count Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) among the irresponsible and unserious lawmakers. He endorsed the GOP hostage-taking even before they gained the House majority. He thinks the White House should be negotiating with terrorists and uses the most banal and misguided justification, just like a Republican would. “Every American has to live within a budget. If they don’t, they’re in trouble financially,” he told CNN. That old trope. Then he went on Fox to announce that he is meeting with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to determine a path forward.

So two people who don’t grasp that they aren’t in control—McCarthy can’t direct the Treasury Department’s work and Manchin can’t negotiate for the Senate and White House—are going to solve this? Manchin is just playing a game here.

He’s already made debt ceiling ultimatums (not passing a hike with just Democratic votes) and then accepting fig leaf solutions (a one-time lifting of the filibuster to pass it), so he’s just attention getting here, along with betraying his colleague. But everyone’s used to that. What he can achieve, however, is drawing this out and making it more painful for everyone involved.

It’s all so much play-acting, as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) writes in an op-ed in the Boston Globe. A true fiscal conservative would be aghast at doing the damage a default—or even the threat of it—would bring to the economy. This is just another way to slash assistance for regular people to make more room for tax cuts for the wealthy.

“Republicans don’t really care about the national debt,” Warren points out. “In fact, the first bill that House Republicans advanced would increase budget deficits in order to protect wealthy tax cheats.” That’s the bill to strip the IRS of new funding Congress passed last year so that it has the capacity to go after all the money owed to the treasury. Repealing $70 billion in funding for the IRS would cost the deficit $114 billion over a decade.

When we were here in 2011, Warren reminds readers, Republicans got their way and forced “a massive austerity program,” that “cost the US economy more than 7 million jobs, delayed our recovery from the Great Recession by years, and helped set the stage for Donald Trump’s election in 2016.”

“If Republicans hadn’t spent nearly $2 trillion on the Trump tax cuts and abetted wealthy tax cheats by starving the IRS for a decade, the United States wouldn’t need to raise the debt ceiling this year,” Warren writes. If any of these deficit fetishists were serious about policy solutions, were sincere in wanting to do something about debt and deficits, that’s not hard. At least not hard in terms of the math. The politics part of it is the problem, because the solution of reversing Trump’s tax cuts to the wealthy, closing corporate tax loopholes and overseas tax having, and imposing a billionaire’s tax would take care of it pretty painlessly for everybody but the rich.

The GOP and Manchin don’t want to solve anything. In fact, the House GOP is planning a vote on a ridiculous gimmick bill they call the “Fair Tax,” a 30% national sales tax on everything Americans purchase—“everything from milk to auto repairs,” Warren points out.

Manchin Aids and Abets House GOP’s Economic Terrorism




Economic Policy | Joe Manchin | Republicans
by Joan McCarter | January 24, 2023 - 8:29am



While Congress is busy getting organized this week, the real story is that the government has bumped up against the debt ceiling, and the clock is ticking for the measures the Treasury can take to keep paying the bills. The House GOP is talking about creating a plan for after the default, to tell Treasury what to prioritize paying once the money runs out. All the other responsible law- and policy-makers are refusing to cede any ground on this to the economic terrorists in the House.

Count Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) among the irresponsible and unserious lawmakers. He endorsed the GOP hostage-taking even before they gained the House majority. He thinks the White House should be negotiating with terrorists and uses the most banal and misguided justification, just like a Republican would. “Every American has to live within a budget. If they don’t, they’re in trouble financially,” he told CNN. That old trope. Then he went on Fox to announce that he is meeting with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to determine a path forward.

So two people who don’t grasp that they aren’t in control—McCarthy can’t direct the Treasury Department’s work and Manchin can’t negotiate for the Senate and White House—are going to solve this? Manchin is just playing a game here.

He’s already made debt ceiling ultimatums (not passing a hike with just Democratic votes) and then accepting fig leaf solutions (a one-time lifting of the filibuster to pass it), so he’s just attention getting here, along with betraying his colleague. But everyone’s used to that. What he can achieve, however, is drawing this out and making it more painful for everyone involved.

It’s all so much play-acting, as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) writes in an op-ed in the Boston Globe. A true fiscal conservative would be aghast at doing the damage a default—or even the threat of it—would bring to the economy. This is just another way to slash assistance for regular people to make more room for tax cuts for the wealthy.

“Republicans don’t really care about the national debt,” Warren points out. “In fact, the first bill that House Republicans advanced would increase budget deficits in order to protect wealthy tax cheats.” That’s the bill to strip the IRS of new funding Congress passed last year so that it has the capacity to go after all the money owed to the treasury. Repealing $70 billion in funding for the IRS would cost the deficit $114 billion over a decade.

When we were here in 2011, Warren reminds readers, Republicans got their way and forced “a massive austerity program,” that “cost the US economy more than 7 million jobs, delayed our recovery from the Great Recession by years, and helped set the stage for Donald Trump’s election in 2016.”

“If Republicans hadn’t spent nearly $2 trillion on the Trump tax cuts and abetted wealthy tax cheats by starving the IRS for a decade, the United States wouldn’t need to raise the debt ceiling this year,” Warren writes. If any of these deficit fetishists were serious about policy solutions, were sincere in wanting to do something about debt and deficits, that’s not hard. At least not hard in terms of the math. The politics part of it is the problem, because the solution of reversing Trump’s tax cuts to the wealthy, closing corporate tax loopholes and overseas tax having, and imposing a billionaire’s tax would take care of it pretty painlessly for everybody but the rich.

The GOP and Manchin don’t want to solve anything. In fact, the House GOP is planning a vote on a ridiculous gimmick bill they call the “Fair Tax,” a 30% national sales tax on everything Americans purchase—“everything from milk to auto repairs,” Warren points out.

Manchin Aids and Abets House GOP’s Economic Terrorism




Economic Policy | Joe Manchin | Republicans
by Joan McCarter | January 24, 2023 - 8:29am



While Congress is busy getting organized this week, the real story is that the government has bumped up against the debt ceiling, and the clock is ticking for the measures the Treasury can take to keep paying the bills. The House GOP is talking about creating a plan for after the default, to tell Treasury what to prioritize paying once the money runs out. All the other responsible law- and policy-makers are refusing to cede any ground on this to the economic terrorists in the House.

Count Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) among the irresponsible and unserious lawmakers. He endorsed the GOP hostage-taking even before they gained the House majority. He thinks the White House should be negotiating with terrorists and uses the most banal and misguided justification, just like a Republican would. “Every American has to live within a budget. If they don’t, they’re in trouble financially,” he told CNN. That old trope. Then he went on Fox to announce that he is meeting with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to determine a path forward.

So two people who don’t grasp that they aren’t in control—McCarthy can’t direct the Treasury Department’s work and Manchin can’t negotiate for the Senate and White House—are going to solve this? Manchin is just playing a game here.

He’s already made debt ceiling ultimatums (not passing a hike with just Democratic votes) and then accepting fig leaf solutions (a one-time lifting of the filibuster to pass it), so he’s just attention getting here, along with betraying his colleague. But everyone’s used to that. What he can achieve, however, is drawing this out and making it more painful for everyone involved.

It’s all so much play-acting, as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) writes in an op-ed in the Boston Globe. A true fiscal conservative would be aghast at doing the damage a default—or even the threat of it—would bring to the economy. This is just another way to slash assistance for regular people to make more room for tax cuts for the wealthy.

“Republicans don’t really care about the national debt,” Warren points out. “In fact, the first bill that House Republicans advanced would increase budget deficits in order to protect wealthy tax cheats.” That’s the bill to strip the IRS of new funding Congress passed last year so that it has the capacity to go after all the money owed to the treasury. Repealing $70 billion in funding for the IRS would cost the deficit $114 billion over a decade.

When we were here in 2011, Warren reminds readers, Republicans got their way and forced “a massive austerity program,” that “cost the US economy more than 7 million jobs, delayed our recovery from the Great Recession by years, and helped set the stage for Donald Trump’s election in 2016.”

“If Republicans hadn’t spent nearly $2 trillion on the Trump tax cuts and abetted wealthy tax cheats by starving the IRS for a decade, the United States wouldn’t need to raise the debt ceiling this year,” Warren writes. If any of these deficit fetishists were serious about policy solutions, were sincere in wanting to do something about debt and deficits, that’s not hard. At least not hard in terms of the math. The politics part of it is the problem, because the solution of reversing Trump’s tax cuts to the wealthy, closing corporate tax loopholes and overseas tax having, and imposing a billionaire’s tax would take care of it pretty painlessly for everybody but the rich.

The GOP and Manchin don’t want to solve anything. In fact, the House GOP is planning a vote on a ridiculous gimmick bill they call the “Fair Tax,” a 30% national sales tax on everything Americans purchase—“everything from milk to auto repairs,” Warren points out.

Manchin Aids and Abets House GOP’s Economic Terrorism




Economic Policy | Joe Manchin | Republicans
by Joan McCarter | January 24, 2023 - 8:29am



While Congress is busy getting organized this week, the real story is that the government has bumped up against the debt ceiling, and the clock is ticking for the measures the Treasury can take to keep paying the bills. The House GOP is talking about creating a plan for after the default, to tell Treasury what to prioritize paying once the money runs out. All the other responsible law- and policy-makers are refusing to cede any ground on this to the economic terrorists in the House.

Count Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) among the irresponsible and unserious lawmakers. He endorsed the GOP hostage-taking even before they gained the House majority. He thinks the White House should be negotiating with terrorists and uses the most banal and misguided justification, just like a Republican would. “Every American has to live within a budget. If they don’t, they’re in trouble financially,” he told CNN. That old trope. Then he went on Fox to announce that he is meeting with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to determine a path forward.

So two people who don’t grasp that they aren’t in control—McCarthy can’t direct the Treasury Department’s work and Manchin can’t negotiate for the Senate and White House—are going to solve this? Manchin is just playing a game here.

He’s already made debt ceiling ultimatums (not passing a hike with just Democratic votes) and then accepting fig leaf solutions (a one-time lifting of the filibuster to pass it), so he’s just attention getting here, along with betraying his colleague. But everyone’s used to that. What he can achieve, however, is drawing this out and making it more painful for everyone involved.

It’s all so much play-acting, as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) writes in an op-ed in the Boston Globe. A true fiscal conservative would be aghast at doing the damage a default—or even the threat of it—would bring to the economy. This is just another way to slash assistance for regular people to make more room for tax cuts for the wealthy.

“Republicans don’t really care about the national debt,” Warren points out. “In fact, the first bill that House Republicans advanced would increase budget deficits in order to protect wealthy tax cheats.” That’s the bill to strip the IRS of new funding Congress passed last year so that it has the capacity to go after all the money owed to the treasury. Repealing $70 billion in funding for the IRS would cost the deficit $114 billion over a decade.

When we were here in 2011, Warren reminds readers, Republicans got their way and forced “a massive austerity program,” that “cost the US economy more than 7 million jobs, delayed our recovery from the Great Recession by years, and helped set the stage for Donald Trump’s election in 2016.”

“If Republicans hadn’t spent nearly $2 trillion on the Trump tax cuts and abetted wealthy tax cheats by starving the IRS for a decade, the United States wouldn’t need to raise the debt ceiling this year,” Warren writes. If any of these deficit fetishists were serious about policy solutions, were sincere in wanting to do something about debt and deficits, that’s not hard. At least not hard in terms of the math. The politics part of it is the problem, because the solution of reversing Trump’s tax cuts to the wealthy, closing corporate tax loopholes and overseas tax having, and imposing a billionaire’s tax would take care of it pretty painlessly for everybody but the rich.

The GOP and Manchin don’t want to solve anything. In fact, the House GOP is planning a vote on a ridiculous gimmick bill they call the “Fair Tax,” a 30% national sales tax on everything Americans purchase—“everything from milk to auto repairs,” Warren points out.

Just think about this. If the Socialist Democrats had not have passes all these give away bills to the tune of 3 to 4 Trillion. We would not need to raise the debt ceiling. I am in favor off cutting spending to cover the shortfall. The stupid a$$ Socialist Democrats just think money is a never ending river. They love spending everyone else’s money. It is fun watching these silly ba$tards when things don’t go their way. We are seeing the beginnings of our failed school system. The teachers started teaching how great socialism is. These are the same teachers that like to groom your children for their sexual pleasure. I am just sick of all the pieces of trash Democrats in government. Anyone under 30 , save a few, do not understand what this country was and how great it should be. When the Democrats with the CIA killed their own president was the beginning of BS we are going through today. I’m old enough that I won’t see this country collapse and the rest of the world be coming around picking at the bones. One thing I would like to see is the politicians in DC jailed for life. I bet if we start with the Democrats the country would turn around really fast. Then the deep state members in the alphabet soup divisions need to see the inside of prisons as well.

Manchin Aids and Abets House GOP’s Economic Terrorism




Economic Policy | Joe Manchin | Republicans
by Joan McCarter | January 24, 2023 - 8:29am



While Congress is busy getting organized this week, the real story is that the government has bumped up against the debt ceiling, and the clock is ticking for the measures the Treasury can take to keep paying the bills. The House GOP is talking about creating a plan for after the default, to tell Treasury what to prioritize paying once the money runs out. All the other responsible law- and policy-makers are refusing to cede any ground on this to the economic terrorists in the House.

Count Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) among the irresponsible and unserious lawmakers. He endorsed the GOP hostage-taking even before they gained the House majority. He thinks the White House should be negotiating with terrorists and uses the most banal and misguided justification, just like a Republican would. “Every American has to live within a budget. If they don’t, they’re in trouble financially,” he told CNN. That old trope. Then he went on Fox to announce that he is meeting with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to determine a path forward.

So two people who don’t grasp that they aren’t in control—McCarthy can’t direct the Treasury Department’s work and Manchin can’t negotiate for the Senate and White House—are going to solve this? Manchin is just playing a game here.

He’s already made debt ceiling ultimatums (not passing a hike with just Democratic votes) and then accepting fig leaf solutions (a one-time lifting of the filibuster to pass it), so he’s just attention getting here, along with betraying his colleague. But everyone’s used to that. What he can achieve, however, is drawing this out and making it more painful for everyone involved.

It’s all so much play-acting, as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) writes in an op-ed in the Boston Globe. A true fiscal conservative would be aghast at doing the damage a default—or even the threat of it—would bring to the economy. This is just another way to slash assistance for regular people to make more room for tax cuts for the wealthy.

“Republicans don’t really care about the national debt,” Warren points out. “In fact, the first bill that House Republicans advanced would increase budget deficits in order to protect wealthy tax cheats.” That’s the bill to strip the IRS of new funding Congress passed last year so that it has the capacity to go after all the money owed to the treasury. Repealing $70 billion in funding for the IRS would cost the deficit $114 billion over a decade.

When we were here in 2011, Warren reminds readers, Republicans got their way and forced “a massive austerity program,” that “cost the US economy more than 7 million jobs, delayed our recovery from the Great Recession by years, and helped set the stage for Donald Trump’s election in 2016.”

“If Republicans hadn’t spent nearly $2 trillion on the Trump tax cuts and abetted wealthy tax cheats by starving the IRS for a decade, the United States wouldn’t need to raise the debt ceiling this year,” Warren writes. If any of these deficit fetishists were serious about policy solutions, were sincere in wanting to do something about debt and deficits, that’s not hard. At least not hard in terms of the math. The politics part of it is the problem, because the solution of reversing Trump’s tax cuts to the wealthy, closing corporate tax loopholes and overseas tax having, and imposing a billionaire’s tax would take care of it pretty painlessly for everybody but the rich.

The GOP and Manchin don’t want to solve anything. In fact, the House GOP is planning a vote on a ridiculous gimmick bill they call the “Fair Tax,” a 30% national sales tax on everything Americans purchase—“everything from milk to auto repairs,” Warren points out.

Manchin Aids and Abets House GOP’s Economic Terrorism




Economic Policy | Joe Manchin | Republicans
by Joan McCarter | January 24, 2023 - 8:29am
You wouldn’t recognize a terrorist if he blew your head off!


While Congress is busy getting organized this week, the real story is that the government has bumped up against the debt ceiling, and the clock is ticking for the measures the Treasury can take to keep paying the bills. The House GOP is talking about creating a plan for after the default, to tell Treasury what to prioritize paying once the money runs out. All the other responsible law- and policy-makers are refusing to cede any ground on this to the economic terrorists in the House.

Count Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) among the irresponsible and unserious lawmakers. He endorsed the GOP hostage-taking even before they gained the House majority. He thinks the White House should be negotiating with terrorists and uses the most banal and misguided justification, just like a Republican would. “Every American has to live within a budget. If they don’t, they’re in trouble financially,” he told CNN. That old trope. Then he went on Fox to announce that he is meeting with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy to determine a path forward.

So two people who don’t grasp that they aren’t in control—McCarthy can’t direct the Treasury Department’s work and Manchin can’t negotiate for the Senate and White House—are going to solve this? Manchin is just playing a game here.

He’s already made debt ceiling ultimatums (not passing a hike with just Democratic votes) and then accepting fig leaf solutions (a one-time lifting of the filibuster to pass it), so he’s just attention getting here, along with betraying his colleague. But everyone’s used to that. What he can achieve, however, is drawing this out and making it more painful for everyone involved.

It’s all so much play-acting, as Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) writes in an op-ed in the Boston Globe. A true fiscal conservative would be aghast at doing the damage a default—or even the threat of it—would bring to the economy. This is just another way to slash assistance for regular people to make more room for tax cuts for the wealthy.

“Republicans don’t really care about the national debt,” Warren points out. “In fact, the first bill that House Republicans advanced would increase budget deficits in order to protect wealthy tax cheats.” That’s the bill to strip the IRS of new funding Congress passed last year so that it has the capacity to go after all the money owed to the treasury. Repealing $70 billion in funding for the IRS would cost the deficit $114 billion over a decade.

When we were here in 2011, Warren reminds readers, Republicans got their way and forced “a massive austerity program,” that “cost the US economy more than 7 million jobs, delayed our recovery from the Great Recession by years, and helped set the stage for Donald Trump’s election in 2016.”

“If Republicans hadn’t spent nearly $2 trillion on the Trump tax cuts and abetted wealthy tax cheats by starving the IRS for a decade, the United States wouldn’t need to raise the debt ceiling this year,” Warren writes. If any of these deficit fetishists were serious about policy solutions, were sincere in wanting to do something about debt and deficits, that’s not hard. At least not hard in terms of the math. The politics part of it is the problem, because the solution of reversing Trump’s tax cuts to the wealthy, closing corporate tax loopholes and overseas tax having, and imposing a billionaire’s tax would take care of it pretty painlessly for everybody but the rich.

The GOP and Manchin don’t want to solve anything. In fact, the House GOP is planning a vote on a ridiculous gimmick bill they call the “Fair Tax,” a 30% national sales tax on everything Americans purchase—“everything from milk to auto repairs,” Warren points out.