Sunday Morning Comin' Down: Thee Shutdownes Of Olde

Over in The Better Universe...

...Tom Mullen demonstrates the proper way to negotiate with hostage-takers.

Back here, in this Universe, Paul Krugman explains why:

"...if Democrats give in to the blackmailers now, they'll just face more demands in the future."  

So, if you're here on this 30th day of the Trump/McConnell Fakestag Fire and are are new to our planet or just fell off the political turnip truck and got "woke" yesterday you might be wondering where in the wide world of sports the Republican Party ever got the idea that this tactic of shutting the government down in a fit of pique for an objectively idiot reason was a winner?

How did they come to believe that it doesn't matter how patently ridiculous their demands are, or how many bare-faced lies they tell to sell it, or how much gratuitous damage they inflict on the country?

And what convinced them they would never have to pay a political price for any of it?  That the media would automatically frame a purely Republican-inflicted crisis on Both Sides?  That if they just dug hard enough, bellowed loud enough, and refused to give an inch, eventually Democrats would cave?

And the answer is ... 2010.

Yep.

In fact, that's when the aforementioned quote from Paul Krugman is actually from.

...if Democrats give in to the blackmailers now, they’ll just face more demands in the future. As long as Republicans believe that Mr. Obama will do anything to avoid short-term pain, they’ll have every incentive to keep taking hostages. If the president will endanger America’s fiscal future to avoid a tax increase, what will he give to avoid a government shutdown? 

So Mr. Obama should draw a line in the sand, right here, right now. If Republicans hold out, and taxes go up, he should tell the nation the truth, and denounce the blackmail attempt for what it is.

And although we've played line-of-succession musical chairs since then (and Republican Party has finally given up any pretense that it gives a shit about this county) the Republic-manufactured shutdown crisis now is remarkably similar to the Republic-manufactured shutdown crisis then.

Republicans are once again holding the nation hostage to a ludicrous and destructive demand on the not-unreasonable assumption that the brain-dead, Both Siderist corporate media will, A) automatically blame Both Sides for the calculated sadism of the Republican Party and, B) immediately bring enormous pressure to bear on the Democrats to capitulate because the media knows perfectly well that Republicans are sociopaths who do not give one good god damn about the suffering they inflict on others.

And back then it all went off exactly according to plan.  From The Guardian:

Barack Obama gives way to Republicans over Bush tax cuts 

Allies say president 'blackmailed' into extending tax cut for wealthier Americans which may cost $4tn in lost revenue...

In fact, here is none other than future-Never Trumper Jennifer Rubin crowing at the thought of Barack Obama being forced to bend the knee to her Republican Party.

Left freak-out: Obama to fold on tax cuts?

...I've mentioned that I love politics, in part for the plethora of irony in its twists and turns. There is no greater irony than watching Obama secure the extension of the Bush tax cuts. Yes, it's quite a bitter pill for the left.

And here is Ms. Rubin during the same week, thrilling to the thought that Obamacare was mortally wounded and had crawled under the porch to die, and that Murrica had finally seen the last of that horrible Nancy Pelosi and her demon legion of Libtards:

Republicans amazed by Democrats' gamesmanship  

...This is the last gasp of the Pelosi majority, which convinced itself that ObamaCare would be a political winner and that the stimulus plan would "create" jobs. In other words, outgoing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is perfectly in tune with the left wing of her party. The rest of the country? Not so much.

Perhaps she thought we had forgotten.

We have not forgotten.

Putting a gun to the nation's head an demanding capitulation was the Republican tactic-of-choice back in 2010, just as it was in 2013, when the same Republican leaders (now hoisted even further by their own petard thanks to their bloodthirsty Tea Party zealot caucus) upped the ante, this time demanding that President Obama kill his own signature heath care program and gut every other social safety net program or they would damn well blow up the still-fragile global economy.  

Shutdown Day 9: House GOP to meet with Obama at White House 

Facing a looming federal default, the House GOP leadership will meet with President Barack Obama at the White House on Thursday in a bid to resolve the budget deadlock that has shut down much of government for more than nine days...

The same Both Siderist Quislings in the media wept the the same crocodile tears over the Death of Bipartisanship that they had shed last time, but by now it was perfectly clear to anyone who was not paid to say otherwise that the Republican Party was just mobs of bigots and lunatics bend of crashing toppling the United States government because Freedumb!

In 2013 this tactic largely failed, which is an important point, but the more important point is this: because the Beltway media insures that Republicans never pay any permanent political price for their madness, vandalism and pathological lying, they never learn any lasting lessons.

To fully appreciate how deeply the Beltway media as committed itself to ignoring the bone-deep, racist rot that has killed the Republican Party, consider that just a year after the 2013 Republican shutdown fiasco, Mr. David Brooks of The New York Times had returned to his factory default settings and was talking eagerly about the glorious Republican renaissance that was just around the corner!

The big Republican accomplishment is that they have detoxified their brand. Four years ago they seemed scary and extreme to a lot of people. They no longer seem that way. The wins in purple states like North Carolina, Iowa and Colorado are clear indications that the party can at least gain a hearing among swing voters. And if the G.O.P. presents a reasonable candidate (and this year’s crop was very good), then Republicans can win anywhere. I think we’ve left the Sarah Palin phase and entered the Tom Cotton phase. 

And less than a year after Mr. Brooks made this bold prediction, Donald J. Trump was gliding down the Escalator of Doom and into the hearts of Mr. Brooks' Republican Party.

Because the Republican Party never really changes.  It only gets worse, distilling itself into ever purer, more noumenal iterations of the amoral fascist dungheap it has always been, and then relying on its stooges, enablers and fellow travelers in the media like Mr. Brooks lie to the public about it.

Which it why it should come as absolutely no surprise that President Stupid would deploy the most reliable weapons in the Republican Party arsenal -- nation-crippling threats, lies, Hate Radio, Fox News, the gutless Beltway media, the reprogrammable meatbag base and the craven Republicans in congress -- to try to bludgeon Democrats into meeting his insane demands.

Which brings us 'round at last to this year, 2019. and we find that something has changed.  Something kinda cool.

Sure, there are still few Fox News Democrats abroad in the land who will gladly shiv their own party to pick up a little traction among Imaginary Centrists

Gabbard: 'Both sides' at fault for shutdownhttps://t.co/ceWW2VHjxV

— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) January 20, 2019

And, yes, Ghosts of Catastrophic Republican Failures Past have returned to sing the old songs and dance the old  dances --

George W. Bush delivers pizza, calls for 'both sides' to end government shutdown

-- as has the mortal remains of Tom Brokaw:

Government Shutdown-Both Sides Need To Compromise

And the last, disgraced high priests of Triangulation will always find a megaphone on Fox News through which to shout:

Mark Penn: No winners in this government shutdown – Both sides should compromise to reopen government

But now there appears to be a little more light in the darkness.  A few more voices speaking up to amplify what the Left has been saying about the Right all along.  That it is not Both Sides.  And that to continue to pretend otherwise means that you are actively siding with the vandals and lunatics.

From Bethesda 1971 on Daily Kos:

AM Joy Will Not Tolerate "Both Sides" Coverage on the Shutdown (or Anything). More of this, please.

From NYMag:

The ‘Both Sides’ Brigade Is Encouraging Trump to Take More Hostages 

The United States is inflicting long-term damage on its own government and economy, condemning thousands of Americans to needless financial despair, jeopardizing public health, undermining airport security, and preventing cancer patients from accessing much-needed medical care — because Republicans want to spend 0.11 percent of the federal budget on a border barrier that Democrats find symbolically problematic.

Given this state of affairs, it would be reasonable for a low-information voter to condemn both parties, in equal measure, for putting ideological purity above the national good. But it would be a dereliction of duty for a television journalist to do the same.

Alas, on Thursday night, CNN’s Chris Cuomo did precisely that...

From David Atkins in The Washington Monthly:

Both Sides Are Not To Blame For the Shutdown

I realize that we are probably still shouting into the abyss, but it definitely feels better to no longer be shouting alone.

Behold, a Tip Jar!