Disaster Aid Disaster Averted, barely
By Linda Beale
Disaster Aid Disaster Averted, barely.
Once again, Republicans intent on obstructing the normal operation of the federal government unless they can extract cuts to programs they don’t like (in the name of deficit reduction) applied the combination of House recalcitrance and Senate anti-majoritarian filibuster to threaten a government shutdown and siderail needed funding for emergency assistance to ordinary Americans until they could get at least some of their objectives. A compromise that will get money to FEMA and keep the government funded for a spell has been reached.
(AP video at ataxingmatter, see link…I am still mostly missing my internet connections)
None of this is going to end well.
Mike,
That’s the understatement of the century….what’s the over/under on when Greece implodes?
buff,
No idea.
If I had time – a lot of time!!! – I’d go back and re-read my Gibbon. And maybe Guns of August. I guess what brings about the end is insane politics.
Put in perspective: the pentagon will get nearly $700B this years.
Check the cartoon.
buff,
I would rather know how many CDS treasury will need to buy from Wall St when it all goes south in the Euro Zone.
The Fed can also fill its balance sheet with them.
I first read teh Guns of August when I was like 8 or 9, that and Asimov’s ‘Lucky Star’ series got me reading and into history, science and SciFy. I started reading almost anything I could find. Read Guns again in High School and the mis-steps and bad moves during the run-up and first few months of WW I always fascinated me. (I always thought the Germans could have won it quick if they had stayed with the plan and accepted a risk to Berlin from the Russians, but I digress).
One of the obvious parts of the run up was the blindness of all involved to just how bad it would be, the risks invovlved of a war or the chances for a war, and most just didn’t think it would happen. They couldn’t/didn’t see the slippery slope and I bet more than one leader was surprised as the first shells rained down on Belgrade and the forts around Liege…
So what are we missing, or discounting as trivial or un-important today? Who or what will be todays equivalent of the archduke? Will we look back in 20 years and realize it was Lehman Brothers? What is/was the first dominoe…Greek default?
I don’t have any answers either. My crystal ball is pretty cloudy. I do know we need to get the lightweight in the Whitehouse out of there in Nov 12. He doesn’t have the chops for what could be coming.
Islam will change
Great cartoon.