Senator Dick Durbin said some really dumb and unhelpful things on Sunday.
Sadly, he has been saying some really dumb and unhelpful things for years.
Thankfully, with Sen. Bernie Sanders sitting on board, and Sen. Dick Durbin sitting on the sidelines, and in this exciting time where Sen. Elizabeth Warren has joined the Senate and Rep. Alan Grayson has re-joined the House, it's going to be even harder than it was before to end up with Simpson and Bowles greatest dream as our new nightmare. The wretched Grand Bargain. (Not that this means we should let down our guard. Or stay silent about how we feel about Social Security and Medicare when we call our Senators and Representatives offices in the coming weeks and months ahead.) We have options we didn't have in the past to say "Hell no!" and I have seen no evidence that rank and file Democrats are willing to trade anything related to the social safety net because of some 'they stood firm' fantasy mojo that only a Chuck Todd could believe in. So. Dick Durbin pissed me off, but I didn't lose any sleep over it.
What, exactly, does make me lose sleep at night these days, after the shutdown?
The derpishly daft logic that is the wet sand foundation beneath the Grand Bargain Theory.
Or, why I think a Senator Dick Durbin said some really dumb and unhelpful things on Sunday.
He thinks, in the end, the Grand Bargain will be such a good thing it will justify saying things like this on a conservative propaganda channel that helped shutdown the government that the Democrats just fought tooth and nail to re-open.
"Social Security is gonna run out of money in 20 years," Durbin said. "The Baby Boom generation is gonna blow away our future. We don't wanna see that happen."
He knows this isn't true. He knows it. But he went on television and said it anyway.
Why? He sees passing a Grand Bargain as a noble act. A restorative act. His belief?
The idea that, once such a deal is agreed to and done, everything changes in US governance.
What the proponents of a Grand Bargain believe would be accomplished would be, by the Republicans final grudging agreement to the terms of that Grand Bargain that they would not care for, a historically important armistice. Not forever, but certainly for a long enough time to make it worth the Democratic pain. That, by agreeing, the Movement Conservative Right's endless war on 'Big Government' would be over for maybe many years. Maybe a decade. Maybe more. This staggeringly naive thinking is thoroughly baked into the entire idea. It's not the money, it's the idea that something that is impossible to do now would be possible to do once the deal was sealed and the ink was finally bone dry on the paper.
Once the Democrats have given the Movement Conservative Right what would amount to permanent Social Security and Medicare cuts in exchange for what would surely be temporary new tax revenue streams and closed loopholes, then kumbayah will break out in DC, because once that agreement has been made, it will be a tacit admission that government works, good governance is important, and Democrats can then govern effectively and in ways that were impossible to consider before because the age of obstructionism and Rightwing extremism will be over and a new age of cooperation will have dawned.
And this brings me to Senator Dick Durbin, and the dumb and unhelpful things he said.
He is a Grand Bargain Theory Fan. You cut the deal, and magic things will surely come.
Where was Senator Dick Durbin between 1993 and 2013? In Washington DC.
In fact, he's been in DC a lot longer, predating the 'Contract on America' crowd that came in 1994. He was first elected to the US House in 1982. He has been a US Senator since I believe 1997. He has no excuse to believe in the idea of a magic deal.
That should, bluntly, enrage you. This is the sort of 'noble lie' shit that Bill Kristol engaged in during the run-up to the Iraq War. It's okay, if it is for the greater good.
He has seen it all. Heard it all. And yet he believes there is a magic deal to be made.
And if he has to look you in the eye and lie to you about it? He will do it. He just did.
It's not just about new taxes, or additional revenues, or closed loopholes, or tax reform. These are the top-tier Grade A 'get' conditions that a man like Senator Durbin thinks gives him credible cover to put his name on something that would be a complete disaster for the party but he thinks would trigger a new golden age. His passion for Chained CPI is about more than backing the policy. It's about the grand motivation behind the grand bargain:
Once the Democrats have given the Movement Conservative Right what would amount to permanent Social Security and Medicare cuts in exchange for what would surely be temporary new tax revenue streams and closed loopholes, then kumbayah will break out in DC, because once that agreement has been made, it will be a tacit admission that government works, good governance is important, and Democrats can then govern effectively and in ways that were impossible to consider before because the age of obstructionism and Rightwing extremism will be over and a new age of cooperation will have dawned.
Dick Durbin is not talking about how instituting a Chained CPI in exchange for tax increases, new revenue streams, or both simply as a good deal for the American people in the context of that deal. Although he may sincerely believe that as well. But as a moment in time that changes the political culture of Washington DC and heralds in a new age in getting things done. It might be one thing to believe that if you have been working since 1982 as a columnist for the Washington Post, but as a US Senator in the Democratic Party?
If you have been in DC since 1982, in office, and you believe in unicorn breeding programs?
Worse, if you are knowingly willing to say things about Social Security that aren't true to chase the adoption of the unicorn breeding program you believe is for the greater good?
You really should be a serious candidate for being replaced by a much better option.
At this point in time, even if we have to fight to be sure that nothing that could have been a part of a Grand Bargain agreement doesn't end up being a part of any budget solution to come in the negotiations to come post-shutdown, the likelihood of a Grand Bargain being struck are not nearly as viable as they have been in the past. Thankfully, we may have been saved from that outcome by the GOP refusing to take 'yes' for an answer. But what lingers, what remains, is that people in our party could be in Washington DC believing in things that you'd have a hard time accepting from a small child who believed that a giant magic bunny was leaving chocolate eggs for them to find, or that a magical creature gives them money under their pillows at night for lost baby teeth.
Criticizing Dick Durbin is not liberal pique. He's lying about Social Security, and doing it on a rightwing propaganda channel that eats that kind of shit up because it would love to see the social safety net get slashed for it's rich white and powerful masters.
This is about being, frankly, as stunned by a seasoned pols lack of an ability to see what is staring him right in the face as disgusted by the stupid and unhelpful things he has been saying. In terms of what America actually wants passed as policy, in terms of survival instincts in regards to his party and its brand, and the ability to recognize the actual party of the opposition that exists rather than the one that a Sen. Dick Durbin might wish existed. It's a little scary to be honest.
What is more likely to happen if the Democrats cut Social Security benefits?
A golden era of good governance?
Or.
"The Democrat Party gutted Social Security, took what was rightfully yours, and gave it to somebody else. They stole your hard earned cheddar. The GOP won't let it happen again. Ever."
What? The Village is going to help the Democrats clear up what happened?
Or are they going to help the GOP?
PolitiFact rates "Democrat Party Stole Your Cheddar" ad... Mostly True!
Even if you have more options to fight a Grand Bargain. Or it's less likely to happen.
You have to take stock of something as, well, really damned derpy as the thinking behind why a Grand Bargain is such a bang-up great idea for Democrats to get behind. It's still there to fuck things up in the future if you don't acknowledge it is something that is there.
There is no magical point where the GOP stops trying to destroy what you have built to help the poor, the old, and the sick. I don't know how bad, or obvious, the Movement Conservative Right will have to get before every Democrat inside the Democratic Party is on the same page with seeing the GOP as the party it is, rather than the party that we might wish it would be. If the New Unhinged Right holds true to form, the ACA will be like Abortion and not like Medicare. Maybe like Head Start. Never fully funded or implemented due to some form of Rightwing undermining. It will always be under attack in any way the Right can. Why would you think you would be rewarded with Rockefeller Republicanism for giving them SS cuts?
If you raise the SS age to 70 and then 75 in 20 years they will say "why not 80 now and 90 in 10?" next time, not take attacking SS off the table. This is our reality today. No tax increase, loophole closure, or new revenue stream, temporary all, is worth that kind of deal or justifies that kind of thinking.
It is frightening to think of somebody who is eyeball deep in DC who can't see this.
Or who does see it, clearly, and doesn't care enough to let it inform his decisions and allow him to change his course, because he coldly rationalizes his belief in the pain that he would willingly bring to lots of people, many of whom put their time and money and efforts into his sitting in that Senate seat, never dreaming he would do such a thing, because "it was/is for" what he chooses to see as "the greater good".
Just imagine the 2014 election cycle if the so-called "Grand Bargain" had passed. The GOP would be running ads trumpeting how the "Democrat Party" had "gutted" Social Security and Medicare. They telegraphed this when one of the key House Republicans denounced the floating of Chained CPI before being shouted down by the House GOP Leadership because they were supposed to wait until it was the law of the land before attacking the Democrats. Not tip their hand.
The Democratic Party has a brand. It has to be maintained and built. It's not magic. It's not immortal. You can destroy the Democratic Party brand. You have to have credibility to do things that rely on you having credibility. The GOP was largely unsuccessful in portraying the Democrats as the party of the Shutdown because they have zero credibility on being the party of good governance. But as we saw during the 2010 election, the Democrats have taken their brand being so air-tight rock solid on Social Security and Medicare that they don't have to worry about it.
The GOP ran in 2010 as the party of defending Medicare.
That is insane, but it's also a sign that you are no longer thought of as 100% rock solid as you think you are on the Social Safety net. When the GOP can bamboozle the public on the Social Safety Net, you have let your brand go, and you need to get a clue about that and do the things you need to do to get that brand back to where it should be again.
Not noticing that you can lose any edge your traditional political brand has given you in the past, not understanding your brand is magic and you have to maintain and build it, not seeing the truly vile and untrustworthy nature of the political foes you face even after their most extreme attempt to govern via political terrorism?
That is the sort of thing that makes me lose sleep at night.
