I am all in on the cave. The only possible value of the second Trump election is the education of America. We are learning real lessons and we are learning them in our bones. As a young married soldier I forgot to leave money for food after paying my bills. Hunger is an amazing teacher. Seeing women being attacked by ICE agents and cheered on by right wing commentators is something I will never forget and we can never accept. A 1 year old child sitting in a car, whose father was being detained by ICE was pepper sprayed and is now in the hospital. The Democrats hung on long enough to let the people see what the Republicans are.
That they would starve people when the money was available and even demand that states starve people rather then spend money they were prepared to spend. We have learned that the very wealthy are dangerous to the rest of us and we had better get off our sofas and do something about it. Vote Vote Vote
The problem is caving in is going to have strong demobilizing on democratic base. If we don't have democrats willing to fight for us then why bother voting. I'm personally so disgusted that if Durbin was running again in Illinois I'd consider voting republican against him.
"The Democrats hung on long enough to let the people see what the Republicans are."
That's just simply doesn't work anymore. If people couldn't figure it out before they won't now either. We thought that Trump's first term is going to show people how bad MAGA movement is in hopes they won't get reelected.
“I'm personally so disgusted that if Durbin was running again in Illinois I'd consider voting republican against him.”
That’s the result the oligarchs have been pursuing for decades. Get people to vote against their interests and elect entertainers or give up voting entirely.
It's not that I'd be voting against my interest; it's realization that some Dems we put into office will not fight for our interests. So maybe my long term interest here is to put some people on notice that my vote is not granted for the democrats.
And oligarchs have nothing to do with it here: it's all on the dems that caved in.
As small business owners, my family has been responsible for buying our own health insurance since 1994. First of all, we could seldom afford to purchase individual health insurance coverage. First we joined a Chamber of Commerce to get group insurance rates. Our insurance company was bought 3 times and we had to switch doctors each time. It made a mess of my children’s pre-schooling health records. Then we used an LLC until the state rules changed. Then we used an insurance agent but struggled to make the payments and our insurance was cut off whenever we paid the premium late. One or two years after the 2008 crash we went without except for our children who needed insurance in order to play sports in school. Then the ACA. Graduated payments based on income until you reach the full amount of premium. If your income goes up so does your premium, if it goes down in a bad year, so does your premium. Not perfect, not everything everyone wants, but stability, reasonable rate increases for the most part. Republicans in office hate it . They feel the American people aren’t deserving of stability apparently. I just want to say, a one time $2,000 kickback so you can buy health insurance is not going to cover $12,000 a year. And people shouldn’t be forced into a position where they have to take a chance on cancer, diabetes, a car accident, joint replacement, a broken arm, a broken leg, birth complications . We are supposed to be a society. And “get a job” doesn’t cover it. It is rare that a company will offer healthcare these days. Most young people I know are working 2-3 jobs. The workplace is not your father’s 9-5.
Thank you. I wish all of those people who blame increasing health insurance premiums on the ACA alone would read this. I worked in health care and studied it more than most. Hardly anyone in Congress understands how health care financing works. Most still operate under the mistaken notion that "free market" capitalism is the answer, when it is not. Health care is fungible. There is no substitute. It has become more expensive because it is FOR PROFIT. Given that the US is the only modern (I'm not so sure we are sometimes) nation in the world that does not have universal health care. The only one. It spends the highest per capita and has very lackluster outcomes. We are something like 37th in the world in maternal/infant mortality. Bernie Sanders, you know, the Democratic Socialist, has been pushing M4A for years and has been constantly mocked for it. If we don't take this opportunity to crush the heart of the medical/industrial complex now, this country will surely degenerate into third world status. Health care should be considered a human right.
I wish I could upvote this more than once. I’m self employed as well, and my husband and I don’t know how we’re going to afford the increase in our already expensive (and already crappy) health insurance.
The goal is to have company towns again with fewer-to-no small biz self-employed (Matt Stoller's latest post mentions something about 4500 banks being whittled down to 1000) so that the serfs are kept in their place like in the Ludlow Massacre...hence why DoD contractor-tech billionaires talk about sea-steading or headquartering in places like El Salvador.
I disagree. The Democrats had the shut down go on long enough that the message is clear - the President and his craven minions in the GOP really do not like the people. The GOP will have to run on that. If the shutdown continued we would likely see many more folks hurt and holidays ruined. The family stranded in an airport on Thanksgiving or Christmas might start blaming Democrats.
And remember Mike Johnson would be happy to ditch SNAP, Obamacare and even Medicaid is he could. So he would have no reason to give in.
But then, MJ is the villain, not the spineless gang of eight when the promised ACA vote never comes to pass. If they had held out for extension we would have at least has that to add to the pressure building on the regime.
Well I don't see how a longer fight would help. but you could be right. Truth to tell if we took all the punditry and averaged it out, we would probably end up where we are now.
Johnson is a villain. A smarmy little shit who cloaks his crimes in Christianity and a haircut his mother had him get.
I made a similar point below. The Trumpists don't mind chaos - that's what they have been trying to engineer. The democrats can now say "We told you so" when the Republicans refuse to permit a vote on extending ACA supplements, and use this as a cudgel.with which to beat them next year. Or, perhaps, projecting the electoral effects of last week into the mid terms, the Republicans will graciously permit them to be extended.
The WSJ just announced the other day that Italian pasta will soon be disappearing from American store shelves due to a planned 107% tariff on Italian pasta. Not sure if you saw that too. MAGA can’t even stand the middle class getting nice things like you know food.
Meanwhile, the Senate bill tells Congressmen whose phone records were seized in the Jack Smith investigation that they can sue the government for $500,000. Another money grab by the Trumpers. Under Trump, the rich are getting richer and the rest of us are told it is character building to fend for ourselves and send our unemployed children out to work in the fields.
Would the Democrats who voted for this bill explain how this particular provision was included? Do any of these legislators read the bills before they vote?!
Despite the Senate Dems votes, the government is still a long way from re-opening. Remember always that Donald Trump is incredibly, profoundly stupid, and he may very well blow this up before it even gets to the House. Remember that Mike Johnson is desperate to find any excuse at all to keep the House from reconvening because that means Givalja has to be sworn in and the Epstein Files vote comes to the floor. And we haven't heard from the Crazy Caucus who could also jump in and derail everything.
So it's a long road between where we are and a re-opened government. And Air Traffic Control is still going to be wonky come Thanksgiving even if the House moves at light-speed!
MAGA hate their fellow countrymen so much they’d rather cosy up to Putin and starve fellow citizens. In the UK we have exactly the same outlook with Farage (a Trump MAGA wannabe) who also thinks Russia is a great country and wants to deport millions of EU citizens who have legal settled status. After winning the local elections near where I live, the first thing they’ve tried to do is close down 5 old age homes. These people are all the same and relish their performative cruelty.
If the ACA is not funded, will the additional 3.8% Net Investment Income Tax (NIIT) (which was used to offset the costs of the ACA) be scrapped?
Does this mean that those who make a $1,000,000 in capital gains will have an extra $38,000 in their pockets - presumably to spend on a marble bathroom?
A big thank you from me, Paul. First, for your analysis: in these crazy times, clear analysis is appreciated and helpful. Trump’s apocalyptic vision for America will hit the bumpers (but when?), and knowing why it might do so is helpful. Second, thanks for this exceptional musical coda. Sad to admit, I hadn’t heard it before, but now I am enriched.
Clare Torry was the original vocalist in 1973. She received £30 for two hours of work. In 2005 she successfully sued and won an out of court settlement for royalties from the song
Shutting down the government over health insurance is/was both noble and politically smart, but it badly understates the broader issue of Trump’s total lawlessness and incompetence. Why should senate democrats underwrite Trump’s authoritarianism? Or help him consolidate power? Our democratic governor (ned lamont) said that Connecticut would pay 100% of SNAP, in defiance of Trump’s threats to starve poor families, and he’s not exactly a firebrand either.
And yet they keep getting put in power. People need to come to the conclusion that their ''cruelty'' isn't a deal killer especially if it's directed at people they dislike too. Just sayin'
The rethugs and Dems have roughly equal numbers of dedicated voter. The Independents are fickle. The Apolitical are the problem. Somehow we have to reach them. Dems need to be researching this group as we speak. How much more crisis will it take?
If people don't/didn't understand what trump 2.0 was going to unleash or didn't care couldn't be bothered then perhaps we don't deserve to be a democracy (democratic Republic) anymore
Why? Americans keep putting them in power. Dems get 2yrs to undo GOP BS Iraq 2 the busted economy of 2008, Trump's putrid response to COVID in 2020 pissing off NATO ALLIES etc etc then a Dem comes in gets 2yrs while clout chasing hacks like Willis and don Winslow SHYTE all over them. Dems should man up & say you wanna touch the stove go ahead. Have at it. Only a cathartic shock can change the current trajectory.even then I'm not so sure, a lot of Americans want a king or something like that remember when Trump said if you show up n vote this yr(2024) you'll never have to vote again.
What do you expect from a leader with no empathy? The worrying thing is there seem to be enough people out there that support him and don’t seem to care about he human immiseration of their fellow Americans. But don’t worry … Dr Oz “has a plan!” He just can’t tell you what it is right now ….
I was talking with my husband yesterday, about how we both were so anxious to get old, to age into Medicare. I've told this story several times, about what I went through before the ACA, but here, again. I was a runner, a bicyclist, a gardener, who walked everywhere, including to work. On my way home one afternoon, two cars collided, one sent up on the sidewalk directly at me. It cut off one foot but I lived, going through eight surgeries over two years. I quit my job, switched to COBRA. Once the eighteen months of COBRA was close to running out, I notified the insurance company I was switching to an individual policy. Nope, they told me they didn't offer individual policies in my state. (I didn't have the money to fight them.) An insurance agent offered to help me, warning me it was unlikely any would take me. I'd had serious cancer over ten years earlier, however, after ten years cancer is not supposed to count as a preexisting condition. I was turned down for a policy that was $325/month, a $10,000 deductible, a $1,000,000 lifetime cap, which excluded amputation, cancer, and reproductive system. Turned down. I was willing to pay for insurance but none would cover me. So, Rump man, how was "returning" money supposed to help?
What perplexes me is the fact that there are many Trump voters/supporters in red states that rely on SNAP and the ACA for health insurance. (Medicaid is also on the chopping block in the future.) Can't they read the writing on the wall? Are they still completely unaware of what's happening?
I still think it was a disastrous mistake for the Democrats to cave.
True, Republicans would have never caved to the Democrats' demands, but: They were already this >< close to abandoning the Filibuster, or does anyone seriously assume the GOP would have stood up to Trump's demands to scuttle it?
So then, Republicans would have had their bill, but it would have been ONLY their votes, and the Democrats would have had no part in that.
And this abandonment of the Filibuster would have exploded in the Republicans' faces after losing the midterms in a landslide, obviously, because absence of Filibuster naturally cuts both ways.
Now the Democrats have sacrificed all of this strategic advantage, and FOR WHAT? Seriously, I would love to know how much thirty pieces of silver is in USD these days.
That's interesting. That would have been an excellent outcome. However, I heard an analysis that Republicans want the filibuster WAY more than Democrats because it's only the Democrats who want to actually pass legislation. Basically the filibuster guarantees that Democrats will need 60 senators to pass anything, ever, instead of 50 until the end of time. I believe Thune when he said hell no we aren't nuking the buster.
I'm aware of what Thune said. I'm just not sure that his bluster about the buster wouldn't have collapsed when faced with Trump's threats and temper tantrums.
I am all in on the cave. The only possible value of the second Trump election is the education of America. We are learning real lessons and we are learning them in our bones. As a young married soldier I forgot to leave money for food after paying my bills. Hunger is an amazing teacher. Seeing women being attacked by ICE agents and cheered on by right wing commentators is something I will never forget and we can never accept. A 1 year old child sitting in a car, whose father was being detained by ICE was pepper sprayed and is now in the hospital. The Democrats hung on long enough to let the people see what the Republicans are.
That they would starve people when the money was available and even demand that states starve people rather then spend money they were prepared to spend. We have learned that the very wealthy are dangerous to the rest of us and we had better get off our sofas and do something about it. Vote Vote Vote
Thanks John. If it were in my power, I’d put your comment to the top of the list.
"I am all in on the cave.
...
Vote Vote Vote"
The problem is caving in is going to have strong demobilizing on democratic base. If we don't have democrats willing to fight for us then why bother voting. I'm personally so disgusted that if Durbin was running again in Illinois I'd consider voting republican against him.
"The Democrats hung on long enough to let the people see what the Republicans are."
That's just simply doesn't work anymore. If people couldn't figure it out before they won't now either. We thought that Trump's first term is going to show people how bad MAGA movement is in hopes they won't get reelected.
“I'm personally so disgusted that if Durbin was running again in Illinois I'd consider voting republican against him.”
That’s the result the oligarchs have been pursuing for decades. Get people to vote against their interests and elect entertainers or give up voting entirely.
It's not that I'd be voting against my interest; it's realization that some Dems we put into office will not fight for our interests. So maybe my long term interest here is to put some people on notice that my vote is not granted for the democrats.
And oligarchs have nothing to do with it here: it's all on the dems that caved in.
As small business owners, my family has been responsible for buying our own health insurance since 1994. First of all, we could seldom afford to purchase individual health insurance coverage. First we joined a Chamber of Commerce to get group insurance rates. Our insurance company was bought 3 times and we had to switch doctors each time. It made a mess of my children’s pre-schooling health records. Then we used an LLC until the state rules changed. Then we used an insurance agent but struggled to make the payments and our insurance was cut off whenever we paid the premium late. One or two years after the 2008 crash we went without except for our children who needed insurance in order to play sports in school. Then the ACA. Graduated payments based on income until you reach the full amount of premium. If your income goes up so does your premium, if it goes down in a bad year, so does your premium. Not perfect, not everything everyone wants, but stability, reasonable rate increases for the most part. Republicans in office hate it . They feel the American people aren’t deserving of stability apparently. I just want to say, a one time $2,000 kickback so you can buy health insurance is not going to cover $12,000 a year. And people shouldn’t be forced into a position where they have to take a chance on cancer, diabetes, a car accident, joint replacement, a broken arm, a broken leg, birth complications . We are supposed to be a society. And “get a job” doesn’t cover it. It is rare that a company will offer healthcare these days. Most young people I know are working 2-3 jobs. The workplace is not your father’s 9-5.
Thank you. I wish all of those people who blame increasing health insurance premiums on the ACA alone would read this. I worked in health care and studied it more than most. Hardly anyone in Congress understands how health care financing works. Most still operate under the mistaken notion that "free market" capitalism is the answer, when it is not. Health care is fungible. There is no substitute. It has become more expensive because it is FOR PROFIT. Given that the US is the only modern (I'm not so sure we are sometimes) nation in the world that does not have universal health care. The only one. It spends the highest per capita and has very lackluster outcomes. We are something like 37th in the world in maternal/infant mortality. Bernie Sanders, you know, the Democratic Socialist, has been pushing M4A for years and has been constantly mocked for it. If we don't take this opportunity to crush the heart of the medical/industrial complex now, this country will surely degenerate into third world status. Health care should be considered a human right.
It is in most western countries except the USA.
I wish I could upvote this more than once. I’m self employed as well, and my husband and I don’t know how we’re going to afford the increase in our already expensive (and already crappy) health insurance.
The goal is to have company towns again with fewer-to-no small biz self-employed (Matt Stoller's latest post mentions something about 4500 banks being whittled down to 1000) so that the serfs are kept in their place like in the Ludlow Massacre...hence why DoD contractor-tech billionaires talk about sea-steading or headquartering in places like El Salvador.
Some recent examples: 1. 47 dumped 2 billion gallons of freshwater that CA farmers and firefighters were counting on. 2. 47 ordered the incineration of 500 tons of expired emergency rations instead of air dropping them into Gaza or distributing them to SNAP recipients. 3. For the same $200M being spent on Trump-Taj-Mahal-2.0, the entire Navajo reservation could have running water. 4. 47 destroyed 10M worth of birth control intended for USAID instead of donating. 5. Today 47 floated the idea of 50 year mortgages. What’s next? 50 year student loans? How about taxing the rich instead? https://www.npr.org/2025/02/07/nx-s1-5287016/farmers-are-worried-after-trump-released-billions-of-gallons-of-water-in-california. https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2025/07/usaid-emergency-food-incinerate-trump/683532/. https://www.navajowaterproject.org/. https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/11/health/usaid-contraceptives-destroyed-trump.html. https://www.cnn.com/2025/11/11/business/fifty-year-mortgage
I disagree. The Democrats had the shut down go on long enough that the message is clear - the President and his craven minions in the GOP really do not like the people. The GOP will have to run on that. If the shutdown continued we would likely see many more folks hurt and holidays ruined. The family stranded in an airport on Thanksgiving or Christmas might start blaming Democrats.
And remember Mike Johnson would be happy to ditch SNAP, Obamacare and even Medicaid is he could. So he would have no reason to give in.
But then, MJ is the villain, not the spineless gang of eight when the promised ACA vote never comes to pass. If they had held out for extension we would have at least has that to add to the pressure building on the regime.
Well I don't see how a longer fight would help. but you could be right. Truth to tell if we took all the punditry and averaged it out, we would probably end up where we are now.
Johnson is a villain. A smarmy little shit who cloaks his crimes in Christianity and a haircut his mother had him get.
I made a similar point below. The Trumpists don't mind chaos - that's what they have been trying to engineer. The democrats can now say "We told you so" when the Republicans refuse to permit a vote on extending ACA supplements, and use this as a cudgel.with which to beat them next year. Or, perhaps, projecting the electoral effects of last week into the mid terms, the Republicans will graciously permit them to be extended.
No, the rs will never "run on that". They will continue to run on fabrications and myths and cruelty "to those people".
The WSJ just announced the other day that Italian pasta will soon be disappearing from American store shelves due to a planned 107% tariff on Italian pasta. Not sure if you saw that too. MAGA can’t even stand the middle class getting nice things like you know food.
I'll be making a visit to the small Italian-owned market(s) here to see if that comes true.
Meanwhile, the Senate bill tells Congressmen whose phone records were seized in the Jack Smith investigation that they can sue the government for $500,000. Another money grab by the Trumpers. Under Trump, the rich are getting richer and the rest of us are told it is character building to fend for ourselves and send our unemployed children out to work in the fields.
Would the Democrats who voted for this bill explain how this particular provision was included? Do any of these legislators read the bills before they vote?!
Despite the Senate Dems votes, the government is still a long way from re-opening. Remember always that Donald Trump is incredibly, profoundly stupid, and he may very well blow this up before it even gets to the House. Remember that Mike Johnson is desperate to find any excuse at all to keep the House from reconvening because that means Givalja has to be sworn in and the Epstein Files vote comes to the floor. And we haven't heard from the Crazy Caucus who could also jump in and derail everything.
So it's a long road between where we are and a re-opened government. And Air Traffic Control is still going to be wonky come Thanksgiving even if the House moves at light-speed!
Dems should have swearing in Givalja a condition for signing on to the "compromise." Make mj squirm a bit.
He also has dementia.
MAGA hate their fellow countrymen so much they’d rather cosy up to Putin and starve fellow citizens. In the UK we have exactly the same outlook with Farage (a Trump MAGA wannabe) who also thinks Russia is a great country and wants to deport millions of EU citizens who have legal settled status. After winning the local elections near where I live, the first thing they’ve tried to do is close down 5 old age homes. These people are all the same and relish their performative cruelty.
My question is
If the ACA is not funded, will the additional 3.8% Net Investment Income Tax (NIIT) (which was used to offset the costs of the ACA) be scrapped?
Does this mean that those who make a $1,000,000 in capital gains will have an extra $38,000 in their pockets - presumably to spend on a marble bathroom?
A big thank you from me, Paul. First, for your analysis: in these crazy times, clear analysis is appreciated and helpful. Trump’s apocalyptic vision for America will hit the bumpers (but when?), and knowing why it might do so is helpful. Second, thanks for this exceptional musical coda. Sad to admit, I hadn’t heard it before, but now I am enriched.
Yes, brilliant music!!
Clare Torry was the original vocalist in 1973. She received £30 for two hours of work. In 2005 she successfully sued and won an out of court settlement for royalties from the song
Shutting down the government over health insurance is/was both noble and politically smart, but it badly understates the broader issue of Trump’s total lawlessness and incompetence. Why should senate democrats underwrite Trump’s authoritarianism? Or help him consolidate power? Our democratic governor (ned lamont) said that Connecticut would pay 100% of SNAP, in defiance of Trump’s threats to starve poor families, and he’s not exactly a firebrand either.
Big Gretch in Michigan did so as well. And the Repubs will be screaming 'but you said you'd fix the damn roads!'
And yet they keep getting put in power. People need to come to the conclusion that their ''cruelty'' isn't a deal killer especially if it's directed at people they dislike too. Just sayin'
The rethugs and Dems have roughly equal numbers of dedicated voter. The Independents are fickle. The Apolitical are the problem. Somehow we have to reach them. Dems need to be researching this group as we speak. How much more crisis will it take?
If people don't/didn't understand what trump 2.0 was going to unleash or didn't care couldn't be bothered then perhaps we don't deserve to be a democracy (democratic Republic) anymore
That may be, but I and a lot of others are not going down without a fight.
Best way to ''fight'' them was to not let them get back in power in 2024. 77mill people voted for this. Millions didn't bother to vote. It's on them.
That is the past. We need to dust ourselves off and fight the good fight.
Why? Americans keep putting them in power. Dems get 2yrs to undo GOP BS Iraq 2 the busted economy of 2008, Trump's putrid response to COVID in 2020 pissing off NATO ALLIES etc etc then a Dem comes in gets 2yrs while clout chasing hacks like Willis and don Winslow SHYTE all over them. Dems should man up & say you wanna touch the stove go ahead. Have at it. Only a cathartic shock can change the current trajectory.even then I'm not so sure, a lot of Americans want a king or something like that remember when Trump said if you show up n vote this yr(2024) you'll never have to vote again.
What do you expect from a leader with no empathy? The worrying thing is there seem to be enough people out there that support him and don’t seem to care about he human immiseration of their fellow Americans. But don’t worry … Dr Oz “has a plan!” He just can’t tell you what it is right now ….
I was talking with my husband yesterday, about how we both were so anxious to get old, to age into Medicare. I've told this story several times, about what I went through before the ACA, but here, again. I was a runner, a bicyclist, a gardener, who walked everywhere, including to work. On my way home one afternoon, two cars collided, one sent up on the sidewalk directly at me. It cut off one foot but I lived, going through eight surgeries over two years. I quit my job, switched to COBRA. Once the eighteen months of COBRA was close to running out, I notified the insurance company I was switching to an individual policy. Nope, they told me they didn't offer individual policies in my state. (I didn't have the money to fight them.) An insurance agent offered to help me, warning me it was unlikely any would take me. I'd had serious cancer over ten years earlier, however, after ten years cancer is not supposed to count as a preexisting condition. I was turned down for a policy that was $325/month, a $10,000 deductible, a $1,000,000 lifetime cap, which excluded amputation, cancer, and reproductive system. Turned down. I was willing to pay for insurance but none would cover me. So, Rump man, how was "returning" money supposed to help?
What an ordeal for you. A lesson for all of us.
What perplexes me is the fact that there are many Trump voters/supporters in red states that rely on SNAP and the ACA for health insurance. (Medicaid is also on the chopping block in the future.) Can't they read the writing on the wall? Are they still completely unaware of what's happening?
Starting to. I'm going by the boos Trump got at the football game.
These people care not one whit about political strategy or policy. They deserve stuff. It doesn't matter who's in the WH as long as they get it.
I still think it was a disastrous mistake for the Democrats to cave.
True, Republicans would have never caved to the Democrats' demands, but: They were already this >< close to abandoning the Filibuster, or does anyone seriously assume the GOP would have stood up to Trump's demands to scuttle it?
So then, Republicans would have had their bill, but it would have been ONLY their votes, and the Democrats would have had no part in that.
And this abandonment of the Filibuster would have exploded in the Republicans' faces after losing the midterms in a landslide, obviously, because absence of Filibuster naturally cuts both ways.
Now the Democrats have sacrificed all of this strategic advantage, and FOR WHAT? Seriously, I would love to know how much thirty pieces of silver is in USD these days.
That's interesting. That would have been an excellent outcome. However, I heard an analysis that Republicans want the filibuster WAY more than Democrats because it's only the Democrats who want to actually pass legislation. Basically the filibuster guarantees that Democrats will need 60 senators to pass anything, ever, instead of 50 until the end of time. I believe Thune when he said hell no we aren't nuking the buster.
I'm aware of what Thune said. I'm just not sure that his bluster about the buster wouldn't have collapsed when faced with Trump's threats and temper tantrums.