“This is the most the Republican Party has accomplished in over a decade,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) said in a “Dear Colleague” letter over the weekend announcing his latest surrender to Joe Biden. “Represents the most favorable budget agreement ever reached.”
Hmm…where did you hear that bromide from Republican leadership?
Seven months ago, Johnson's predecessor, Kevin McCarthy, said that Johnson's deal to raise the debt ceiling was “the biggest cut Congress has ever delivered.” Until now Even if it brings in $2.6 trillion in profits. increase I ended up in debt in just over half a year. With that in mind, Prime Minister Johnson's hyperbole of “the best in 10 years'' may be progress.
Unfortunately, that's not the case. It's the same Orwellian spending cuts that McCarthy concocted. Worse, it would lock in the McCarthy-Biden debt ceiling deal that led to the fastest national debt expansion in American history.
After refusing to fight through the first budget deadline in November and selling out the December conference on the National Defense Authorization Act, Johnson is moving ahead of twin funding deadlines of January 19 and February 2. , with one goal in mind. It's about avoiding a government shutdown. no matter what.
Forget that our borders, culture, economy, and freedoms are closed. Mr. Johnson's calculations are that we must continue to fund every branch of government no matter what.
Now, if you telegraphed a message to the Democrats that you would not allow a single budget deadline to expire, or even an authorization to expire for Defense or FISA or whatever, of course the Republicans would have no idea what to do. It has no influence. Democrats have pretty much everything they want. every. single.time.
Prime Minister Johnson reached an agreement with the White House over the weekend to pass a budget for the remainder of fiscal year 2024 in line with the 2023 debt ceiling agreement. The agreement allocates discretionary spending of $1.658 trillion, with $886.3 billion for defense and $772.7 billion for non-defense programs. The agreement locks in an additional $69 billion in nondefense spending that Mr. McCarthy accepted in a “side agreement” with the White House in May. do not have Suspending the debt ceiling was written into law.
Prime Minister Johnson used the oldest trick in the book to sell his deal press conference, claiming he was cutting spending to avoid scheduled automatic cuts and offset the deal's top line. ing. But the problem is that this spending cut is actually a “cancellation” of $6.1 billion in unused pandemic relief money and $20.2 billion in IRS funds. Either way, it's money we didn't need and we could have kept those savings for free.
Following the “Art of the Deal” principle, Democrats appropriated an exorbitant amount of money for 80,000 IRS employees in their 2022 Green New Deal bill, but hiring so many IRS employees would be impossible. I knew that no matter how much I dreamed of it, it would be impossible. This gave the IRS enough room to negotiate new spending “concessions” while expanding it to alarming levels. The same goes for the original amount of pandemic cash.
Interest on the debt is now approaching $1.1 Trillion A year on, and with the Treasury set to conduct more bond auctions than ever before, Johnson's deal is the equivalent of spitting into the ocean in a debt crisis. That's probably why our good friend Mitch McConnell was quick to praise this deal.
On paper, Johnson's agreement only concerns spending levels, not necessarily funding, for the various abhorrent policies that Republicans are fighting over. Theoretically, we can still fight over border invasions, the Green New Deal, federal persecution, transgenderism in the federal government, and funding for coronavirus vaccines — a quandary on the right. Here are some points.
Johnson has argued that a spending deal would allow Republicans to “fight for important policy riders in the House's fiscal year 2024 bill.”
But it is clear that Prime Minister Johnson fears a government shutdown more than he fears the government cutting off our lives, freedoms, culture and sovereignty. He made it clear that he would not allow the deadline to pass, even if it did not result in a complete shutdown. Mr Johnson has no intention of cutting anything.
Appropriations bills for agriculture, energy, water, military construction, veterans, transportation, housing and urban development are scheduled to expire on January 19th. The remaining federal spending is scheduled to expire in two weeks.
This is a do-or-die moment for House Republicans. If you fear a government shutdown in the midst of an invasion, inflation, and government indoctrination crisis under the control of a semi-comatose and unpopular president, then a government under a Republican chief executive. There is no way we can survive the closure of institutions. This is exactly why Republicans gave Democrats everything they wanted in 2017 and 2018, when they held a trifecta but fell 60 votes short in the Senate.
We can change Republican Congressional leadership, but some things never change. They fabricate the same deals with the same talking points every time. Don't worry, they will definitely fight “next time”. Until we are destroyed.
