Update: I’m surprised by the reaction to this idea. We need to realize this is a war being fought asymmetrically: one side is willing to use tactics the other side is not. You cannot win that way. And to the extent necessary, some may be confusing crashing the debt ceiling (never do) with shutting down the government (do in emergency cases like the tax bill, DACA and CHIP).
And I ask those who oppose my proposal, do you also oppose it for DACA and CHIP, because Dems are actually considering that.
Some Democrats have threatened to force a government shutdown to pass DACA protection and CHIP renewal. They absolutely should.
But if it passes, repeal of the Tax Bill must be added to those demands.
This is a lethal bill. True Democrats must do everything to stop or mitigate its harm, including forcing a shutdown.
We are talking about an existential threat to the safety net and the middle class. We are talking about losing the Battle of Thermopylae in the 80 year fight by Republicans to kill social security and Medicare.
From Alf Landon in 1936, Ronald Reagan in 1980 and George W. Bush in 2005, Republicans’ most ardent goal has been to destroy the bedrock of the creation of the middle class and widespread prosperity in this county. After Ike defeated Dewey, it looked like the Republicans finally accepted the permanence of these programs. Ike said:
“Should any political party attempt to abolish social security, unemployment insurance and eliminate labor laws and farm programs, you would not hear of that party again in our political history. There is a tiny splinter group, of course, that believes that you can do these things. Among them are a few Texas oil millionaires, and an occasional politician or businessman from other areas. Their number is negligible and they are stupid.”
But then the Buckleys et al realized they could use race to divide support for government programs. They started with welfare to create the fiction that only African-Americans got help from the government, and worked their way up to general hatred of the government.
Then, race-based politics triumphed in the 2016 election, and they have taken the opportunity to turn the clock back to Alf Landon and transform the United States into a plutocracy, unconcerned about its citizens dying and falling into poverty.
The Democrats are on the overwhelmingly popular side of these issues. The public will be behind them. People don’t even know how lethal the tax bill is — many are not aware it cuts Medicare and Social Security. The 25% support for the bill would sink into single digits if these facts are widely spread.
For 8 years, Republicans obstructed Democrats’ attempts to do good things under Obama. In 2013, they shut down the government to try to kill Obamacare, which now has become extremely popular, as the defeat of ACA repeal has shown.
At the time, conventional wisdom was the shutdown would hurt the Republicans in the 2014 midterms. That totally happened, right Senators Udall of CO and Sen. Nunn of GA? (And it wasn’t because of the initial ACA web failure.)
“Chuck and Nancy” gave Democrats the opportunity to shut down the government this month. They need to threaten it and then do it, if necessary. Tens of thousands of lives and the nature and future of our country depend on it.