The Daily Escape:
Trillium Lake, with Mt. Hood in background, OR – February 2024 photo by Mitch Schreiber Photography
In negotiations, there are four possible outcomes, two for “Yes” and two for “No”. The answers can come quickly or slowly. The fast “Yes” generally means that we offered more than we had to, while the fast “No” means there wasn’t enough in the deal for the other side to truly consider it. The worst outcome is the slow “No”. It burns tons of calories, and delays work on other important things. It is the most frustrating result for a negotiation, always raising the question of whether the other side was really negotiating in good faith.
Welcome to America’s politics in 2024 where if it wasn’t for bad faith, there would be no faith at all. Wrongo is speaking about the so-called border bill. Republicans had insisted that any allocation of funding for Ukraine be tied to an agreement about the border, saying that no money should go abroad until the US has addressed border security concerns here at home. They were also saying that the Democrats would need to agree to deal points that in the past, would have been very hard for the Dems to swallow.
But this past Sunday, Senate negotiators released the details of their hard-fought bipartisan border agreement which is harsher than we would have seen under any Democratic administration or Congressional majority in the last 40 years. The Dems agreed to the terms because it was the price House Republicans demanded in order to fund Ukraine. So naturally, House Republicans immediately declared it dead on arrival. This wasn’t a shock because they’ve been saying that for weeks despite not knowing precisely what was in the language of the bill.
The bad faith started with House Speaker Johnson (R-Bible) lying to the media by suggesting that he wasn’t consulted on the negotiations, a contention refuted by the principal GOP negotiator, Sen. James Lankford, (R-OK) who said that Johnson had declined his invitation to participate.
That led to an avalanche of slow “No’s” by Republicans in the Senate. The GOP’s default to “No” is for the moment, an election year strategy. They see border chaos as an important weapon against Biden in November. But the GOP often says “No” simply because it can’t figure out what else that divided caucus wants to do. They sometimes prefer foaming rage to solutions, or to victories.
As Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI) tweeted:
“I’ve never seen anything like it….They literally demanded specific policy, got it, and then killed it.”
You can’t engage in bad faith negotiations and expect that the other side will forget about it when the next issue comes along.
It’s unclear if this is a moment of Republican/Trumpian desperation or madness. But they came out against a serious, bipartisan bill targeted at what they said was required in order to tackle our border challenges. The Border Patrol Union, which endorsed Trump in 2020, has endorsed the Senate bill. The WSJ editorial page has endorsed the bill. Neither of these are Biden supporters.
The GOP is now committed to a policy that will keep our borders, which they say are in existential crisis, in chaos. They believe that chaos serves their 2024 political goals of winning the White House, while sweeping the Senate and the House. Wrongo is re-upping his quotes from Ezra Klein about American’s desire to vote for stability:
“Biden and his allies are framing this election as order against chaos. The party that gets things done against the party that will make America come undone.”
And this:
“…Democrats are right that voters are craving stability. But…Trump is leading in many polls because voters believe that he is the one who might offer it. What Trump is pitching….is a push for order — ‘I am going to be the one who secures the border. I’m going to be the one that cracks down on crime. I’m going to be the one that tries to stabilize your prices.’”
So where do we go from here? It would be nice to think that if they really want stability, the American people will see through all this and realize how the Republican Party has grown so adept at holding hostages. Their MAGA wing represents a minority within a minority, yet our institutional rules permit them to veto decisions clearly favored by a majority of Americans.
But, with all the noise, it’s difficult to understand if voters can hear this even if they’re paying attention. Walking away from the border bill has enormous implications for the presidential election. With Biden’s economy going gangbusters (even Fox News admits that); with the inflation Republicans had expected to run on falling; with unemployment at historic lows and the stock market at historic highs; with the end of Roe trailing Trump like a dark cloud; he (and the GOP) have limited narratives left for waging his 2024 campaign, except fearmongering about border security.
Today’s chaos will become tomorrow’s over the imminent need to fund the government. Speaker Johnson has until March 1 and March 8 to get deals with the Senate and the President if we are to avoid another government shutdown. Right now, it’s difficult to see how any good faith negotiations will occur after what has happened this week with the border bill.
The government funding chaos isn’t on the voters’ radar just yet. So Democrats ought to go on offense about the border bill, describing what’s in it, where the GOP is lying about it, and how even when you meet Republicans more than halfway, they move the goal posts. The Dems need to make every Republican House and Senate member defend killing the border bill vote every day between here and the election, by making the immigration bill a central message of Biden’s reelection campaign.
As the Cato Institute reported last November:
“The Biden Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has removed a higher percentage of arrested border crossers in its first two years than the Trump DHS did over its last two years. Moreover, migrants were more likely to be released after a border arrest under President Trump than under President Biden. In absolute terms, the Biden DHS is removing 3.5 times as many people per month as the Trump DHS did.”
But those are facts, not feelings. Time to dust off this snippet of Stephen Sondheim’s song, “Send in the Clowns“:
Don’t you love farce?
My fault, I fear
I thought that you’d want what I want
Sorry, my dear
But where are the clowns?
Quick, send in the clowns
Don’t bother, they’re here
Speaker Johnson is the embodiment of the Alex Keaton character with a lot less charm and style. What is astonishing is how the GOP is wedded to lying – as we see with Ted Cruz who is going all out to dismiss a bill that should represent the 21 speed carbon frame bicycle under the Xmas tree.
There is nothing good to say about this “process” as we watch it unfold. Conduct from both sides of the aisle is disgusting. The Executive Branch is utterly incompetent. And they wonder why the majority of American’s are discouraged and fed up with both political parties?
The notion that “both sides” are engaging in terrible conduct is wrong headed. And the idea that the executive under the current administration is incompetent is also curious, as if the person commenting has not idea what the executive really does or can do.