Facebook Activity
Teen Ink on Twitter
Teen Ink
teenink
Dec. 27, 2012 at 1:19 pm
Well, it’s looking more and more like there isn’t going to be a deal before we drive off the cliff, so who should we blame? Thelma or Louise? Of course, I don’t really mean to point fingers at Hollywood’s Geena Davis and Sarah Sarandon for all of the country’s troubles, but someone’s keeping their foot on the gas pedal. In the movie it was Thelma. So the question is who’s Thelma in our cliff scene? Obama and the Senate Democrats, or Speaker Boehner and the House Republicans?
Dec. 27, 2012 at 3:40 pm
Both. Obama regards his releection as a mandate and therefore flat out refuses to give anything to the Republicans. He has his foot on the gas pedal and won't let up.
Boehner doesn't want to raise taxes on principle (and also because he knows doing so will be political suicide) but at this point the Democrats (and everyone who voted for them) are going to blame him if we don't reach a deal- and congratulate the president if we do. I think he's starting to figure out that every option ends badly for him, so he's going to cave at the last minute and give the Democrats everything. He's going down anyway and I think he'd rather be hated for giving in than for refusing to apply the brakes and letting us go over.
Dec. 27, 2012 at 4:34 pm
I agree with you that both are partly to blame, if not the Democrats more than the Republicans since they have half of Congress and the presidency. However, I don’t believe Boehner has any ability to cave at the last minute. Remember the “Plan B” bill that the Speaker supported but the House Republicans rejected? Boehner had agreed to some tax hikes on the rich there, and yet he couldn’t find enough votes for it. If the Republicans wouldn’t agree to raise taxes then, what makes you think they’d agree before New Year’s?
Dec. 29, 2012 at 11:56 pm
The sudden realization that the Dems won't budge and the GOP will get the blame if they don't do anything.
Either that or we go off the cliff (for a day or two, at least) and then Congress as a whole has a crash course in learning to get along. (Yeah, I know that's a little-farfetched. Call me an optimist.)
Dec. 30, 2012 at 2:10 pm
Truthfully, I doubt that anything will make the Republicans budge. Any PR damage that’s happened is already done. But if you want to be optimistic, no problem. I’d like to be optimistic too, but logic says otherwise.
Jan. 2 at 9:58 am
Well they did get a deal done after all. Any thoughts on the political or economic consequences?
Jan. 2 at 7:13 pm
I don't really feel like it was a deal at all. They just kicked the problem down the road a little bit. Give it a few months and we'll be back to the same dilemma again.
Jan. 2 at 8:21 pm
It wasn't a battle, it was just a way for both sides to look tough, and then be all bipartisan when the time came. It was all posturing, a deal was comming either way.
Jan. 16 at 6:55 pm
I don’t know if I can agree with that human6, but I definitely am with Imagine on this one. Just wait a little while, and they’ll be arguing over the debt ceiling. Sometimes it feels like this stuff never ends.
