This Is Not About Martin Luther


She's not even Lutheran, though she is a Protestant. But Katie Couric's obituary should read, "like Martin Luther...."

Martin Luther, a man of many character flaws- not the least of which was blatant anti-Semitism- nevertheless sparked one of the greatest social movements in world history, the Reformation.

And so it is with Katie Couric, a woman of many professional flaws, one of them on display on last Sunday's episode of 60 Minutes. Couric and Gates discussed "weapons of mass destruction" in this segment of the interview described by CBS News:

"What scares you the most? What worries you?" Couric asked.

"I think what I and most of us would say, it would be a terrorist with a weapon of mass destruction," Gates said.

"In this country?" Couric asked.

"Yes," he replied.

"Or anywhere in the world?" Couric asked.

"Well, anywhere, but especially in this country," Gates said.

Asked how likely that is, Gates said, "For years, we've received intelligence that they're trying to acquire a weapon of mass destruction. So far, they've been singularly unsuccessful, as far as we know. But it is the one thing that could be a huge challenge."

The flavor of this puff piece can best be appreciated by watching the video itself, available on the CBS website, though apparently not on youtube.

But the most significant part of the interview, which no one will recognize, is Gates' repetition of the term "weapons of mass destruction"- with no explanation or definition, and no request for clarification from Couric.

We've passed this way before. (Video of song by Seals and Crofts, which has nothing to do with this post, below. As to this issue, they were wrong. And on abortion, which is even more unrelated.) Dick Cheney referred to "weapons of mass destruction." George W. Bush emphasized "weapons of mass destruction."Secretary of State Powell, even in his detailed, albeit horribly misleading, address (transcript here) to the U.N. Security Council on February 5, 2003, employed the term "weapons of mass destruction" at least six times. The media repeatedly referred to "weapons of mass destruction" repeatedly and without clarification, helping lay the groundwork for public support of the war President Bush launched.

Repeat a phrase often enough and it becomes part of the lexicon, whether or not the individuals using the phrase, or their audience, know what it means or has any meaning at all. Presumably,if most members of the media had understood the phrase, they would have offered an explanation or at least asked the policymakers what they were referring to. Even now, many Americans regrettably believe chemical and biological weapons are of mass destruction.

This is not inconsequential because there was much evidence that Saddam Hussein possessed chemical and/or biological weapons but little reason to believe he had, or intended to develop or acquire, nuclear weapons. Moreover, Administration sources conflated biological/chemical weapons with nuclear weapons in part to exaggerate the destructive capacity of the former. In a post entitled "Saddam Does Not Have 'Weapons of Mass Destruction'," Timothy Noah on 8/27/02 explained

(Noah) That chemical and biological weapons don't deserve to be called "weapons of mass destruction" is a point long familiar to arms control experts. Here, for example, is Gert G. Harigel of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace:

The term "weapons of mass destruction" (WMD), used to encompass nuclear (NW), biological (BW), and chemical weapons (CW), is misleading, politically dangerous, and cannot be justified on grounds of military efficiency. …Whereas protection with various degrees of efficiency is possible against chemical and biological weapons, however inconvenient it might be for military forces on the battlefield and for civilians at home, it is not feasible at all against nuclear weapons.

(Noah) Wolfgang K.H. Panofsky spells out the comparative lethality of nuclear versus chemical and biological weapons in the April 1998 issue of Arms Control Today, in an article headlined "Dismantling the Concept of 'Weapons of Mass Destruction' ":

The weapons detonated over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, which killed about a quarter of a million people, had an explosive power about one-tenth that carried by a modern nuclear weapon. … If a 1-megaton thermonuclear warhead exploded at optimum altitude over a large city, little would be left standing or alive within five miles. A firestorm could be ignited, further extending the range of destruction. In a large-scale exchange, lethal fallout would cover an entire region.

(Noah) Biological and chemical weapons, though certainly very nasty, are not nearly so deadly:

If virulent BW materials were to be widely distributed over an exposed population, then the ratio of potential lethality to the total weight of the material could be comparable to that of nuclear weapons. However, for this horrifying scenario to occur, the materials cannot be dispersed by a single-point explosion, but instead must be spread by an appropriate mechanism such as spray tanks or by "fractionating" a missile's payload and dispersing separate mini-munitions over a wide area. Moreover, survival of BW material depends critically on local meteorological and other conditions which define the delivery environment. The survival of agents is generally of short duration and effects are delayed for days. … There is little question that the lethality of chemical weapons—as measured by per unit weight of delivered munitions—is lower by many orders of magnitude than it is for nuclear weapons or the undemonstrated and inherently uncertain potential of biological weapons.

Noah's piece is infinitely (o.k., much more; "infinitively" is like referring to chemical and biological weapons as those of "mass destruction") more informative than Couric's adoring interview. Still, if Katie Couric continues to be a substandard journalist, she will have performed in her professional career a service, though dwarfed by that of Martin Luther, which will have overshadowed any of her deficiencies.

For it was Katie Couric who ever will be remembered as the media personality who asked Sarah Palin what Supreme Court decisions, other than Roe v. Wade, she disagreed with and what newspapers and magazines she "regularly read(s)." Palin's response to those questions helped transform her image as a bold, candid maverick into an immature and unsteady running mate for a 73-year old man. Unfortunate statements and erratic behavior have followed, but Couric's interview helped sink the McCain-Palin ticket, thus shielding the nation from the risk posed of Palin being first in succession to the Presidency. The political career of the former Alaskan governor continues on a downward spiral. And however a McCain presidency might have turned out, that is a major contribution to civilization

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Doing Nothing


Oh no, not more John Boehner! But while on Face The Nation (transcript here) he issued threats about Medicare and Medicaid and lied about Social Security, the Cryer of the House remarked, seemingly unremarkably, remarked

Remember, the greatest threat to our country and to our economy is doing nothing.

That would not be the greatest threat to our economy- or at least not to the deficit, which was Boehner's topic and his party's obsession.

In April, Annie Lowery explained what she characterized as the Slate "Do-Nothing Plan for Deficit Reduction":

So how does doing nothing actually return the budget to health? The answer is that doing nothing allows all kinds of fiscal changes that politicians generally abhor to take effect automatically. First, doing nothing means the Bush tax cuts would expire, as scheduled, at the end of next year. That would cause a moderately progressive tax hike, and one that hits most families, including the middle class. The top marginal rate would rise from 35 percent to 39.6 percent, and some tax benefits for investment income would disappear. Additionally, a patch to keep the alternative minimum tax from hitting 20 million or so families would end. Second, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, Obama's health care law, would proceed without getting repealed or defunded. The CBO believes that the plan would bend health care's cost curve downward, wrestling the rate of health care inflation back toward the general rate of inflation. Third, doing nothing would mean that Medicare starts paying doctors low, low rates. Congress would not pass anymore of the regular "doc fixes" that keep reimbursements high. Nothing else happens. Almost magically, everything evens out.

Lowery laments the plan "won't get us facetime on Meet the Press, or a mash note from pundits. It requires some very unpopular measures—such as serious middle-class tax hikes and sticking with Obamacare." She might have added that it is what President Obama and the mainstream media are clamoring for: shared sacrifice, as both the upper class and the middle class have to give something up. It's not the perfect plan but it's better than we're likely to get, with the middle class expected to give one for the team yet again. But it does reveal how "doing nothing" is not irresponsible, disastrous, or unserious, just a reasonable alternative that will has been, and will continue to be, ignored.

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That Trust Fund


The myth of the myth of the Social Security trust fund lives on. So you have The Hill on March 15 of this year claiming "The trust fund itself has a theoretical $2.6 trillion surplus, but that money has been spent by the federal government like general revenues." And you have Speaker of the House John Boehner on May 15 pretending

Today there are ten thousand new people signing up for Social Security and Medicare every single day, ten thousand more every single day. And as a result, the money in the so-called trust fund doesn’t exist. And it has to come out of current revenues. And that’s why everything needs to be on the table. We’ve put for-- forward our plan.

Spreading the disinformation about the trust fund is central to the efforts of the GOP, neo-liberals, and traditional media to gin up support for cutting the program. Boehner asserts, dishonestly, "the so-called trust fund doesn't exist" and therefore reducing benefits "needs to be on the table."

When The Hill misinformed its influential readers two months ago, Dean Baker responded

It is not clear what information the paper thinks is added by the word "theoretical." It is possible to add the word to almost any sentence (e.g. "Washington has a theoretical basketball team"). When something actually exists in the world, calling it "theoretical" is presumably intended to impugn it in some way.

Of course the trust fund does exist in the world, it is held in the form of U.S. government bonds. These bonds are referred to as "IOUs" in the Hill piece. It is highly unusual to refer to bonds of private corporations or government bonds as IOUs.

The Social Security website explains

Far from being "worthless IOUs," the investments held by the trust funds are backed by the full faith and credit of the U. S. Government. The government has always repaid Social Security, with interest. The special-issue securities are, therefore, just as safe as U.S. Savings Bonds or other financial instruments of the Federal government.

Bonus lie from Speaker Boehner: "the money in the so-called trust fund doesn’t exist. And it has to come out of current revenues." Well, no, the money includes interest on the U.S. government securities bought with the trust funds. The SSA website explains "the principal amount of special issues redeemed, plus the corresponding interest, is just enough to cover an expenditure."

Social Security is not included in the current budget negotiations because it doesn't contribute to the deficit and it appears too hot to handle before the 2012 elections. But if the GOP prevails in 2012, it will be a prime target. And even if it does not.

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Ever So Accomodating


CBS' Face the Nation (transcript here) played a clip of President Obama, as ever, being serious, mature, even-handed, and bipartisan, explaining

John Boehner and I agree that we got to reduce our deficit. Second of all, we both agree that we’ve got to raise the debt ceiling....

And-- and what I’ve said is let’s not have a-- the kind of linkage where we’re
even talking about not raising the debt ceiling. That’s going to get done. But let’s get serious about deficit reduction. And I’ve put a-- a plan on the table that takes four trillion dollars out of our-- out of our deficit and debt. The question is, are we going to have some compromise? Is it going to be balanced? Are we going to make sure that no single group, not seniors, not poor folks, not any single group is carrying the entire burden? Let’s make sure that the burden is shared for making some tough choices.

Ever-ready to show his hand, Obama explained "I've put a plan on the table that takes four trillion dollars out of our deficit and debt.... let's make sure that the burden is shared for making some tough choices." Responding to Obama's statement, John Boehner delivered his answer:

Well, it makes me think that he’s really not serious about tackling the big problems that face our country.

This is the fellow Barack Obama chooses to negotiate with- a guy who stakes out a position on the far right of the far right party while the President's position is the middle ground (actually, center-right) and, presumably, where he hopes to end up.

Boehner's answer to it all? Cut the elderly, cut the disabled, cut the poor:

Medicare, Medicaid, all-- everything should be on the table except raising taxes because raising taxes will hurt our economy and hurt our ability to create jobs in our country.

The deficit was caused primarily by the recession begun in the previous, Republican Administration and by the tax cuts that President was addicted to. John Boehner voted for those tax cuts- and for the Medicare prescription drug act, effectively diverting tax dollars to pharmaceutical companies; supported the two wars which helped drain the Treasury; and negotiated the tax cut of last autumn which will add some $800 billion to the debt. And he blames..... Barack Obama?

Five days earlier, Boehner, asked on the Today show whether "raising taxes is a nonstarter,” replied “It’s off the table. Everything else is on the table.”

President Obama won't take any of it personally, though- he takes no criticism, except from the left, personally. True to form, according to The Washington Post

President Obama urged members of his party Wednesday to avoid declaring absolute positions in the debate on increasing the federal debt ceiling, a day after House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) said that tax increases were “off the table” as part of any agreement.

In an hour-long session with Senate Democrats at the White House, Obama told his former colleagues not to “draw a line in the sand” in negotiations, said Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (Nev.). Showing an unwillingness to compromise, Obama said, would not only limit the ability to reach a deal with Republicans but could also have a negative impact on financial markets.

Obama’s view diverges not only from that of Boehner and many congressional Republicans — who say an increase in the nation’s debt limit must be accompanied by large spending cuts — but also from that of some Democratic activists.

What makes the President's attitude even more puzzling- or, in an odd way, less- is that

The White House meeting came as several dozen business groups, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Financial Services Forum, which represents the nation’s largest banks, released a letter that urged lawmakers to take “timely” steps to increase the debt limit but did not call for immediate spending reductions as well.

This is hard to comprehend, even for Mr. Hope And Change. Boehner says "sure, we're for raising the debt ceiling but there must be deep spending cuts, including to two of the three Democratic signature issues- Medicare and Medicaid- and no tax increases." His party's corporate base is telling the GOP "just raise the ceiling." And the President is telling his party "clam up and accept some of the GOP's demands." Maybe Obama is comforted by the Speaker's assurance that

It’s going to have to come to that. I’ve talked to the President all year privately about the fact that we were not going to increase the debt limit without serious changes. I mean, this conversation’s been going on for quite a while. I’ve offered the President, I said Mister President, come on, you and I, let’s lock arms and we’ll jump out of the boat together.

If they "jump out of the boat together," Boehner will have satisfied both the faux populist (sometimes referred to as the "Tea Party") and the corporate bases of his party while Obama will have satisfied his need to be the great deal-maker. However, when Grover Norquist and Karl Rove get on this, it'll be Democrats crushing Medicare and sending old people out to pasture. Of course, while the President is credited by the traditional media for being open-minded and centrist enough to "compromise," it would be congressional Democrats who get pounded for destroying the social safety net. But then, that's the way they have it mapped out at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

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Fair And Balanced On Climate Change


The second worst tornado in American history. In April, a record tornado outbreak for a four-day period, including more in one 24-hour period than ever before. A spate of wildfires in Texas sparked by the worst drought in nearly a century in the state. Since March, record flooding or lake levels in 25 locations in ten states. On track for the greatest number of billion dollar weather disasters in American history. Severe thunderstorms, hailstorms, floods, tornado elsewhere in the world.

You'd almost think that this is an (arguably) unprecedented run of extreme weather spurred by a change in the climate. If so, you wouldn't be a member of the school board in one district in California:

Before Los Alamitos High School science teachers can tackle topics such as global warming, they will have to demonstrate to the school board that the course is politically balanced.

A new environmental science course prompted the Los Alamitos Unified School District on Tuesday to rewrite its policy for teaching controversial subject matter. Concerned that "liberal" faculty members could skew lessons on global warming, the board of education unanimously voted to make teachers give an annual presentation on how they're teaching the class.

“I believe my role in the board is to represent the conservative voice of the community and I’m not a big fan of global warming,” said board member Jeffrey Barke, who led the effort. “The teachers wanted [the class], and we want a review of how they are teaching it.”

The high school will begin offering an advanced-placement environmental science course next fall. Based on demand elsewhere in California, district officials expect it to be popular—more than 15,000 public school students enrolled in the class in 2008-09.

Although there is a consensus among scientists, including the American Association for the Advancement of Science, that global climate change exists, the board of education said the topic is controversial enough to require a change in the district's policy.

The new class will be the first for which district teachers must prove political balance to the school board.

“Most teachers are left to center, and if we leave it to teachers to impose their liberal views, then it would make for an unbalanced lesson,” Barke said. “Some people believe that global warming is a crock of crap, and others are zealots.”

The course also covers topics such as population dynamics, evolution and biodiversity, pollution, ozone depletion and human health and toxicity.

“We define a topic to be controversial if it has more than one widely held view,” said Assistant Superintendent Sherry Kropp, who will take the district's helm when Superintendent Gregory Franklin steps down at the end of the school year. “There are many issues regarding the environment that have become politicized these days and we want kids to be exposed to all sides.”

Why limit this 'fair and balanced' approach to the environment? The possibilities are endless. Why not "expose the kids to all sides" of the cancer controversy?

In 1997, in depositions taken as part of the class-action lawsuit numerous states filed against major tobacco companies, Alexander Spears, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Lorillard Tobacco Company, said "I don't it(smoking) has been proven to cause lung cancer. Dr. Frank Colby, scientist and researcher with RJ Reynolds, denied smoking causes lung cancer and contended "allegations of the connection between smoking and health are a matter of controversy."

And these guys were under oath, unlike the people who still maintain that Barack Obama wasn't born in the U.S.A.

True, in neither case has it been scientists making the claims. But the Los Alamitos school superintendent referred to "more than one widely held view" rather than "more than one widely held view among scientists" or among "people without an ax to grind." It matters little, then, that (graph, below, from Skeptical Science)




And those two(2) pale guys (gals) are undecided!

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Limbaugh Scores 50%


I come not to bury Limbaugh, but to praise him.

In part, anyway- the part where he outlined, albeit a day late, presumably by design- the slick strategy Mitt Romney should have taken in his speech on the Affordable Care Act. As governor of Massachusetts, Romney signed into law a bill providing health care reform eerily similar to the signature piece of legislation of the Obama presidency. That doesn't enhance his popularity among GOP primary voters. In what the 's Charles Babington termed a "talk and slide show" Thursday to college Republicans, Romney had stated

A lot of pundits around the nation are saying that I should just stand up and say this whole thing was a mistake, that it was just a bone-headed idea and I should just admit it. There's only one problem with that: It wouldn't be honest. I, in fact, did what I believe was right for the people of my state.

That seems like a reasonably honest statement and (no but about it) Republican opinion-makers were not pleased. Rush Limbaugh, himself an ardent opponent of almost anything designed to help the middle class or the poor, remarked on Friday

Why doesn't he say, "Look, I was a governor of a liberal state. The people of that state were clamoring for health care reform. I believe in the states being laboratories, trying different things and after all these various experiments, we come up with the best way to do it for the country." That's what he's saying that he would do as president.

Open it up, here. States, do what you want to do here and we'll come up with the best system we can.

That's actually brilliant analysis- no, really it is. And it would have allowed Romney, if asked afterward if he's conceding that he made a mistake in supporting the legislation, to deny that he had. (And politicians are loathe to admit to a "mistake.") He acted, he could have said, in view of popular demand. Now that it is clear it's not the best option for expanding coverage and lowering costs, he might have argued, Massachusetts is free to rescind the program and try something else. He could have had it both ways- opposing what the incumbent president, whom he hopes to face in November of 2012, has enacted while defending his course of action in the "laboratory of democracy," as the traditional media previously called the states.

But that doesn't give Rush license to make things up. (He already has that license.) On the same program, he slammed the Administration's denial of emergency aid for the state of Texas, claiming

This is punishment. The state of Texas also happens to be where Bush lives. The state of Texas did not vote for Obama. There are plenty of other states that did, and they're gonna get the money first. It's no more complicated than that. Obama is president of Obama! I'm surprised anyone would have this question.

Obama was walloped in Texas- just as he was in Mississippi, where

Gov. Haley Barbour announced residents and business owners in four additional counties can access federal emergency assistance programs after President Obama approved and expanded Mississippi’s federal disaster declaration for severe storms, tornadoes and flooding that affected the state....

U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan announced HUD would speed federal disaster assistance to Mississippi and provide support to homeowners and low-income renters forced from their homes following severe storms, tornadoes, straight-line winds and flooding.

Last Friday, President Obama issued a disaster declaration for Clarke, Greene, Hinds, Jasper, Kemper, Lafayette and Monroe county in Mississippi. The President’s declaration allows HUD to offer foreclosure relief and other assistance to certain families living in these counties.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack announced that USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) has made immediately available $6 million in Emergency Watershed Protection (EWP) Program aid for disaster recovery projects in 10 states affected by storms and floods. These states are Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Missouri, Mississippi, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia.

A majority of the voters in 7 of those 10 states cast their lot in 2008 with the McCain-Palin ticket, with only 3 voting for Obama. Obama lost Mississippi by a whopping 13.7% and will not carry it in 2012 unless he wins by a landslide's landslide, in which case Mississippi won't matter. There hardly was any political incentive for the Obama administration to aid Mississippi or Alabama, Arkansas, Georgia, Kentucky, or Tennessee, none of which he'll carry next year; or Illinois, which he will win unless he comes out for the carpet-bombing of Joliet.

Rush could have modified his argument slightly and made it believable by noting that Texas Governor Perry in February, heralding the GOP electoral victory in November, gloated

Ladies and gentlemen who championed that big government idea of bailouts, those so-called stimulus programs, supported government giveaways — they got a pink slip. It was awesome.

Two months later, Governor Perry had a more charitable view of the "giveaways" big government specializes in. President Obama could have seen to it that Texas get its requested aid in time of need and then subtly suggested that the Texas Republican had an abrupt change of mind when convenient. Instead,

Craig Fugate, administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, wrote in a letter to the governor Friday that the storm's "severity and magnitude" did not exceed the capabilities of state and local government.

"Accordingly, we have determined that supplemental federal assistance is not necessary," Fugate wrote.

It would have been much simpler, as well as more honest and probably more accurate, to have reported that the federal government concluded that Texas could solve this problem on its own and that a bunch of states which rejected Senator Obama in 2008 and will reject President Obama in 2012 did in fact receive aid. But that would have required the presentation of facts and in the conservative fact-free zone, that is simply not allowed.

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Debt Ceiling Machinations


Over the past 29 hours (note: all times listed there are PST), Digby has posted thrice on the debt limit, under the headings "Brinkmanship for Dummies," "Negotiatin'," and "McConnell pounds his chest and stomps his feet."

The bad news she notes is reflected in yesterday's exchange on Andrea Mitchell Reports between the Speaker of the House and the chairman of the Democratic National Committee:

John Boehner: Democrats want a free pass to continue to spend more. We're in a hole and Democrats won't give up the shovel. Doing nothing is not an option, the American people won't tolerate it and neither will we.

DebbieWasserman-Shultz: He has some nerve not sitting around the table with Democrats, hammering out some compromise and striking a balance. What President Obama called for a few weeks ago was that we needed to strike a balance. We need to make sure that we engaged in shared sacrifice. So Democrats aren't just calling for revenue increases and tax increases. What we are calling for is that the wealthiest among us and the middle class and even people who can't bear any more pain all share the sacrifice to fix our deficit and make sure that we can continue to create jobs and turn this economy around.

McConnell has learned that when negotiating with the Democratic Party of Barack Obama, there is no better tactic than staking out a position on the far left while Democrats gradually move from the center-left, to the center, and finally to the right in an effort to "compromise" with the defiant extremists of the GOP. Eventually, when a deal is struck, the President can claim victory for himself by reaching across the aisle and compromising, getting the deal- any deal, but a deal- done. The "shared sacrifice" cited by Wasserman-Schultz is euphemism for cutting Medicaid and Medicare, throwing the poor, the disabled, and the elderly to the side while the wealthy maintain their tax breaks and tax cuts. Digby explains

I'm sure there are plenty of people who think this is a terrific way to show that the Democrats are "serious" about deficit reduction and God knows there's nothing more important than that. But I will just remind them that actual human beings' lives are at stake in this and that the last time a president proved that Democrats were responsible fiscal stewards they impeached him for his trouble and gave the money to their rich friends the first chance they got.

Senate Minority Leader McConnell is holding out for a "grand bargain" which, in the words of Bloomberg News, would include "sharp cuts in entitlement spending," otherwise known as Medicaid and Medicare. (What, no Social Security? I guess it really doesn't have anything to do with the deficit, after all.) Democrats might demand a tax hike and/or cut in defense spending as part of this arrangement but, Digby notes, this is

not a bargain, that's a suckers play. The entitlements will stay cut while the tax hikes and defense cuts will be reversed the first time the Republicans gain the power to do it. That's always their first order of business.

But the good news comes from a Wall Street Journal blog:

Sixty-two business groups, including the American Gas Association, the Telecommunications Industry Association, and the National Association of Manufacturers, urged congressional leaders on Wednesday to raise the federal debt ceiling amid fears that political brinkmanship could lead to another financial crisis.

“Raising the statutory debt limit is critical to ensuring global investors’ confidence in the creditworthiness of the United States,” the groups wrote to Speaker of the House John Boehner (R., Ohio), House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.), Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.). “With economic growth slowly picking up we cannot afford to jeopardize that growth with the massive spike in borrowing costs that would result if we defaulted on our obligations. It is critically important that the United States stands fully behind its legal obligations.”

The letter comes less than one week before the U.S. government is expected to hit the $14.294 trillion debt ceiling.

The American Gas Association, the Telecommunications Industry Association, and the National Association of Manufacturers. This is a big chunk of the GOP's corporate base which, ultimately, is its base. The powers- several of them, anyway- are eager to see the debt ceiling lifted, and anxious that it won't be. Given a choice between aggravating those powerful allies and seeming to anger the tea party enthusiasts, the Repub politicos will choose Option B. (The Tea Party leaders are corporate-connected and the rank-and-file can be bought off by abortion or some other issue.)

Top GOP leaders are primed to go with the Big Money Guys, who are their kind of fellows. Democratic leaders know it, and if they acquiesce in a cut to either Medicaid or Medicare, it's because they want the cuts, for tactical political reasons or otherwise. They will not have acquiesced, but collaborated. And we all know who the top co-conspirator will have been.

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