Tangle - A looming government shutdown (again).

Episode Date: September 21, 2023

A potential government shutdown. This week, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) has struggled to wrangle his caucus as they attempt to pass a new spending bill. Government funding runs out in 10 days and a government shutdown now seems inevitable.You can read today's podcast here, today’s Under the Radar story here, and today’s “Have a nice day” story here. You can also check out our latest YouTube video here and listen to my chat with New York Post columnist Rikki Schlott on the Lost Debate podcast here.Today’s clickables: Couple of announcements (0:39), Quick hits (2:06), Today’s story (4:14), Right’s take (9:22), Left’s take (14:25), Isaac’s take (19:04), Daily Chatter (19:33) Listener question (23:33), Under the Radar (23:50), Numbers (24:49), Have a nice day (25:41)You can subscribe to Tangle by clicking here or drop something in our tip jar by clicking here.Our podcast is written by Isaac Saul and edited by Jon Lall. Music for the podcast was produced by Diet 75. Our newsletter is edited by Bailey Saul, Sean Brady, Ari Weitzman, and produced in conjunction with Tangle’s social media manager Magdalena Bokowa, who also created our logo.--- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/tanglenews/message Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Based on Charles Yu's award-winning book, Interior Chinatown follows the story of Willis Wu, a background character trapped in a police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. yourself from the flu. It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at flucellvax.ca.

From executive producer Isaac Saul, this is Tangle. Good morning, good afternoon, and good evening, and welcome to the Tangle podcast, the place we get views from across the political spectrum, some independent thinking, and a little bit of my take. the place we get views from across the political spectrum, some independent thinking, and a little bit of my take. I'm your host, Isaac Saul, and on today's episode, we're going to be talking about the looming government shutdown. That is right. We are back here talking about government shutdowns. Before we jump in, a couple heads up. First of all, I recently went on the Lost Debate podcast. I got a chance to sit down with Ricky Schlott, the New York Post columnist. Super smart lady, fun conversation. She was awesome to chop it up with.

We talked about Vivek Ramaswamy, Mitt Romney retiring, climate change protesting. I thought it was a pretty fun, interesting conversation. Highly recommend you go check it out. If you have not yet, the Lost Debate is a pretty fun podcast. They have me on as a co-host pretty regularly, and it's been really fun for me. So I wanted to give them a shout out and a thank you. And yeah, you should go check it out. Also, yesterday, I mentioned this, but I want to remind you today, we published a video on our YouTube channel of me discussing Ashton Kutcher's character letters for Danny Masterson. It's a

fairly controversial piece that I published last week in a subscribers only Friday edition. We decided to turn it into a YouTube video because of the response it got. And predictably on YouTube, it is already generating a lot of conversation and interest. So I wanted to shout that out and make sure that you go check that out. It's on YouTube. We are on YouTube, Tangle News. You can find us. Please go give the video a watch. And if you like it, subscribe to the channel, like the video, leave a comment. All that stuff helps us out with the YouTube algorithm. All right, with that out of the way, we're going to kick things off with some quick hits. First up, the Federal Reserve opted to leave interest rates unchanged and indicated that they anticipated one more hike before the year ended. Number two, President Biden met with

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the first time since he returned to office nine months ago. Number three, Attorney General Merrick Garland testified before the House Judiciary Committee in a contentious hearing that touched on the investigations into Hunter Biden, Donald Trump, and January 6th. Number four, the Senate voted to confirm General Charles Q. Brown Jr. as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, marking the first military promotion since Senator Tommy Tuberville, the Republican from Alabama, began blocking the promotions in protest of the military's abortion travel policy. And number five, Rupert Murdoch announced he was stepping down as chairman of the Fox Corporation board and the News Corporation We're back with growing concerns over the economy, and this time it's not from inflation or rising interest rates, but from politics. Yeah, government funding is due to run out on September 30th.

And when members return from their summer recess, they'll have just 12 legislative days to pass a spending bill to avert potentially harmful government shutdown. Senator McConnell and his chamber returned to Capitol Hill Tuesday to a ticking clock, counting down to a potential government shutdown. Funding for the U.S. government expires at the end of September. If Congress does not pass a new package through both chambers, by then we could see the first shutdown in nearly five years. Speaker Kevin McCarthy says House members are making progress towards reaching a deal to avert a government shutdown. But his statement comes as infighting,

and the Republican Party stalls the advancement of bills in Congress. The House speaker says lawmakers are continuing to work through a bill to fund the government, although the shutdown deadline is just over a week away, McCarthy said he is, quote, never going to give up on reaching a solution. This week, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, the Republican from California, has struggled to wrangle his caucus as they attempt to pass a new spending bill. Government funding runs out in 10 days and a government shutdown now seems inevitable. To back up, each year, the United States government passes 12 appropriations bills that fund the government operations before a new fiscal year begins. For the last few decades,

Congress has been especially bad at this, and often passes temporary spending measures after the fiscal year begins until they can agree on one giant omnibus bill to fund the fiscal year already in progress. The new fiscal year begins October 1st, which is the deadline for passing the appropriations bills. Typically, when all 12 appropriation bills aren't passed in time, Congress and the President keep the government working by passing short-term extensions of current funding, called Continuing Resolutions, or CR. Congress has passed zero of the 12 appropriation bills so far this year, and the House has only passed one. Now they're having trouble agreeing to a CR to keep the

running. House Republicans have a very thin 221-212 majority in the House and cannot lose more than four votes without needing some Democrats to advance legislation. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy was elected in a contentious battle that required him giving major concessions to the five to 10 conservatives in the right flank of his party, including the ability for any individual member to call for a snap vote to potentially remove him. Now, those lawmakers are flexing their muscle once again to get what they want in the upcoming spending bills. Their demands vary, but roughly speaking, some members want McCarthy to cut more spending than he agreed to in the debt ceiling deal struck with Democrats

in the spring, while others want a long-term plan to address the debt. Additional demands include a guarantee to pursue impeachment against Biden, promises to stop funding Ukraine, and commitments to increasing spending on the border. However, many of these proposals would be dead on arrival in the Senate, so McCarthy and other more moderate Republicans are struggling to chart a path forward that will result in a workable deal. On Sunday, the hard right House Freedom Caucus and moderate Republican Main Street Caucus came to an agreement on a CR that would extend government funding for 30 days, cut most federal agencies' discretionary spending by 8%, and preserve military and veteran funds. The agreement also includes some of the border security proposals House Republicans passed in May but failed to pass in the Senate. But some House Republicans, including members of the Freedom Caucus, rejected this proposal, despite the fact that some Freedom Caucus leaders had supported the legislation.

On Wednesday, McCarthy appeared to cave to the right flank, moving to pass a CR at the $1.47 trillion level in discretionary spending, which is the same as Republicans' Limit Save Grow Act from this spring. The CR also added restrictions on U.S. immigration and border policy and left out any money for Ukraine or disaster relief funding. It's unclear whether the CR will even pass the House, but if it does get to the Senate, they're expected to gut it and send it back to the House with Ukraine funding and disaster relief restored. McCarthy will then have to decide between working with Democrats to pass something or sticking to the party line and allowing the government to shut down. If the CR doesn't pass the House, McCarthy will be left facing the same dilemma. In either case, most in D.C. are bracing for a shutdown. While this is

going on, the Problem Solvers Caucus, a bipartisan group of moderates, is working on an alternative to the GOP plan that would fund the government through January 11th, pass all 12 appropriation bills for next fiscal year, include the $24 billion of funding for Ukraine requested by the White House, allocate $16 billion for disaster relief, and tack on new immigration rules similar to Title 42 that would allow Biden to address the crisis on the border by expelling or rejecting migrants more quickly. So what happens if the government shuts down? Well, during shutdowns, many federal employees are asked not to come back to work, though they get paid retroactively when the shutdown ends. Essential services like air traffic control, law enforcement, and the military continue operating, and Social Security and

Medicare benefits will still be dispersed. Many common and some critical services, however, slow down or stop altogether. You might experience delays in things like applying for passports or small business loans. Food safety inspection and tax audits will be fewer. Economic reports from the Labor Department on inflation or unemployment may be delayed. National parks and museums funded by the government will shut down. There have been 14 shutdowns since 1981. Some were brief, lasting only a day or two, while the longest in U.S. history was 35 days. That happened from 2018 into early 2019 when Donald Trump held out for $5.7 billion for a border wall. The shutdown ended without the funding ever being approved. Today, we're going to take a look at some commentary from the right and the left about the shutdown and then my take. First up, I want to note some agreement here. Many commentators

on the left and the right are skeptical of government shutdowns being an effective way to elicit change and criticize Congress for not having a strategy to address spending or get what they want out of a shutdown. Many on both sides also believe a government shutdown would do more political damage to Republicans than Democrats. First up, we'll start with what the right is saying. The right is saying. The right is conflicted on the prospect of a shutdown with many concerned that it will be a big political loser for Republicans. Some argue drastic measures are necessary to force lawmakers to reckon with

out-of-control government spending. Others say those pushing for a shutdown have no coherent plan after that. The Wall Street Journal editorial board criticized the GOP for wasting its majority on foolish shutdown threats. The details of the internecine feuding are too boring to relate to busy readers, but the essence of the problem is that too many Republicans have forgotten the reality of the current Beltway balance of power. Their only hold on power is a four-vote majority in the House, one of the narrowest in history. They don't hold the Senate or the White House, the board said. House Republicans can't even pass the defense or homeland security spending bills, which should be the easiest and contain many GOP priorities on military spending and border security. Recalcitrant members, snipers inside the

perimeter, are demanding that somehow the House cut even more spending than the debt ceiling bill stipulated. They're willing to shut down the government to make their point, which is the equivalent of holding your breath until you pass out. The party that seeks a shutdown is always blamed by voters, and Republicans will get few, if any, policy victories by forcing a shutdown now. This is all so obvious, so civics 101, that it's amazing to watch men and women who ran for Congress refuse to get it. Too many Republicans apparently come to Washington these days mainly to blow things up and count their TikTok followers, the board said. Republicans lack the votes to significantly change the direction of policy. To do that, they need bigger majorities and control of the Senate. On their current path,

however, and if they shut down the government in a stupid, futile gesture, all they'll do is make it easier to turn the gavel over to Speaker Jeffries. In The Hill, Brian Darling said a good old government shutdown is exactly what we need right now. Although the House Freedom Caucus will not get all at once, its members are fighting a just battle that will put downward pressure on the level of spending in any final appropriations deal. As a preliminary matter, this is a good fight to have. Good politically and good for the nation. Our federal government is projected to run up between $1.5 trillion and $2 trillion in debt this year alone. The Congressional Budget Office projects that outlays this year will be $6.4 trillion with only $4.8 trillion in revenues, Darling wrote. In these budget fights, Republicans

usually settle for a continuing resolution, kicking the proverbial can down the road. But that is not an option this year because a continuing resolution would continue spending at the elevated post-COVID pandemic levels, well above $6 trillion for fiscal 2024. Democrats and the media are sure to accuse Republicans of destroying the government and the economy with a shutdown, but in truth, this would be a shutdown in name only. The Anti-Deficiency Act allows core government functions to continue while the non-essential elements of the federal government are shuttered. Failure to pass appropriations bills will do nothing to stop our military from defending America, Darling said. The Freedom Caucus is right to hold the line on

spending, and anything it can do to defund the far-left agenda of the Biden administration is an option that will both move the ball forward on good policy and push the budget closer to balance. In red state, Joe Cunningham said McCarthy has led the House to chaos by trying to be all things to all people. Based on Charles Yu's award-winning book, Interior Chinatown follows the story of Willis Wu, a background character trapped in a police procedural who dreams about a world beyond Chinatown. When he inadvertently becomes a witness to a crime, Willis begins to unravel a criminal web, his family's buried history,

and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is nearly double the historic average of 52,000 cases. What can you do this flu season? Talk to your pharmacist or doctor about getting a flu shot. Consider FluCellVax Quad and help protect yourself from the flu. It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages six months and older, and it may be available for free in your province. Side effects and allergic

reactions can occur, and 100% protection is not guaranteed. Learn more at FluCellVax.ca. A shutdown isn't a guaranteed loser by any means, but a caucus in chaos is a guaranteed way to look like a joke to voters, and the buck stops with the man in charge, Kevin McCarthy. McCarthy is a lifelong big government Republican who wasn't just part of the establishment, but actually helped create it. He makes deals with everyone he can in order to maintain power and influence, but like the dog who caught the car, he does not seem to have a plan now that he has the power and influence he sought. The Republicans are being derailed, not by conservative reformers, but by people who hate McCarthy personally, Cunningham said. Under normal circumstances, I'd be excited for a government

shutdown. But there has to be a plan. There needs to be a condition for victory, or at least an honorable retreat. But the holdouts don't have a plan. Solid conservatives like Byron Donalds and Chip Roy had a plan, but those holdouts sided with Democrats and scuttled it. And because of that, it seems like McCarthy doesn't seem to have a plan either, Cunningham wrote. McCarthy tried to be all things to all people. He tried to come across as a conservative despite his big spending past. He sought the power of the office, but once he got there, he began flailing. The result is a caucus that cannot properly stand against Democrats and their excessive government spending. All right, that is it for what the right is saying, which brings us to what the left is saying.

The left puts the blame squarely on House Republicans for the impending shutdown, arguing that the party has become beholden to its most radical members. Some note that no past government shutdown has ever worked and say there's no reason to believe it will now. Others criticize McCarthy for adopting a doomed strategy of appeasing his far-right members. In his quick update newsletter, Representative Jeff Jackson, the Democrat from North Carolina, discussed why some Republicans want to shut down the government. What the right flank wants most right now is a shutdown. Why? Because a shutdown comes with a ton of media attention, and for many of them, media attention is the whole ballgame. The Speaker has tried multiple times to talk them out of it. Behind closed doors,

he's been very candid that he believes a shutdown could backfire and hurt their party in the next election, to no avail. Apparently, they really want to touch the stove, so we're all expecting it. But last week, it also became clear to the Speaker that indulging his right flank in a shutdown wouldn't be enough. They wanted something more. Impeachment. McCarthy is trying to trade his right flank a shutdown and an impeachment in exchange for being allowed to pass a budget. It's unclear whether they're going to accept his offer. My bet is they ask for even more, Jackson said. Why wouldn't McCarthy make a deal with Democrats to remove the leverage of his far right members? Because if he made that deal, it would be an extraordinarily unpopular thing for him to do

within his party, and not just with his right flank. His support among Republicans could plummet well beyond the capacity of the minority party to realistically make up the difference. In Bloomberg, Joshua Green said House Republicans are determined to force a shutdown, even though history shows they don't work. As in the past, the logic of shutting down the federal government is clear, if not compelling. The Republican instigators believe that the public will rally behind them and force Democrats and moderate Republicans to slash spending, Green wrote. What's also clear is the record of shutdowns and bringing about the outcome their proponents desire. It's 0 for 10,

and if Republicans don't settle on a funding bill by September 30th, we'll likely soon be 0 for 11. Both parties have forced government shutdowns in the past decade, all of which failed to achieve their policy goals and saw public opinion turn against them. To this, conservative Republicans say, hold my beer. What's even more frustrating to Republicans hoping to avoid a government shutdown and its blowback is that this unwelcome fight is arriving at a particularly inopportune moment for the GOP. Democrats have just endured a long and difficult summer that's seen Biden's approval ratings slide to dangerously low territory as voters unhappy about inflation

and the state of the economy have turned against him, Green said. A shutdown that advertises Republican chaos and dysfunction would throw Biden and Democrats a lifeline by reminding voters of what they disliked about the Trump era and the MAGA fire breathers who prospered during his tenure. It would yank the spotlight away from the beleaguered president and probably give Biden a welcome boost. In The American Prospect, David Dyan wrote about the absurdity of Washington brain. McCarthy believes that his position is dependent on the Freedom Caucus not throwing him out of office like they did the last two Republican leaders. So the first thing he did when the

House returned from summer break, only three weeks from the deadline, was to unilaterally initiate an impeachment investigation into Joe Biden. This was done entirely to coze up to the obstinate hard right, Dianne said. Only in Washington would you respond to a set of demands with an unrelated demand and expect that to work. It's like a manager responding to workers wanting to see the air conditioning fix at the office by bringing in a pinball machine. But some parasitic worm endemic to Capitol Hill gets into the brains of leadership, seizes control of the relevant neurons, and commands the Speaker to try these absurd gambits. Think about how abstract we've now gotten. Republicans are arguing with each other over how much funding to cut in a one-month

stopgap continuing resolution, not the budget itself, when even cutting by one dollar means all House Democrats, all Democrats who control the Senate and the President will be opposed, Dianne said. Meanwhile, everyone and their brother knows the continuing resolution bill that will get the necessary votes, just a plain old clean continuing resolution. McCarthy doesn't want to do it because of the potential for a revolt from the hard right faction. He knows and has explicitly said that Republicans will lose a government shutdown showdown. But for all his bravado, he's just an incredibly weak leader. And so he's playing out these Washington brain strategies that work nowhere on earth other than Capitol Hill. All right, that is it for what the left and the right are saying, which brings us to my take.

So there are a few themes to this McCarthy House Freedom Caucus tension that I've written about before and I want to reemphasize again today. First, it's good for there to be tension in Congress. I am pro-tension. Let them fight. Our country is messy and complicated, and a lot of people have a lot of different ideas, and I get very, very suspicious when trillion-dollar spending bills are getting approved without much friction. The infighting on the right can easily be reframed as disagreement, and the outcome very well may be a kind of consensus spending agreement that represents everyone from the far right to the center. And that's a good thing. Second, similar to the first point, let's not view House members exercising their power as some grave threat to democracy. As I said in June, leadership in Congress has been too powerful for

too long. The debt ceiling standoff was a bad and counterproductive way for these members to exercise their power. But forcing negotiations on legislation and appropriation bills is a good way to exercise their power. You don't have to support the House Freedom Caucus's goals to understand that it is good for members not to just take whatever leadership shoves down their throats. Congress is supposed to be composed of representatives representing. Third, voting on 12 appropriation bills is also how Congress is supposed to work, and they seem to have just forgotten that. According to Pew, Congress has passed all its required appropriations measures on time only four times. Fiscal year 1977, the first full fiscal year under the current system,

1989, 1995, and 1997. And even those last three, Congress was late in passing the budget blueprint that, in theory at least, precedes the actual spending bills. Now, they are starting to just settle on giant omnibus bills that have much less accountability, debate, and care. I applaud House Republicans for trying to force the issue. It'd be nice if they could, you know, actually do it. All that being said, I think this rambunctious and sometimes nutty group of 5-10 members needs to tread very, very carefully. One obvious outcome of all this might be that Speaker McCarthy just turns to moderate Republicans and Democrats to pass these appropriation bills with very little opposition. Politically, that move might be a death wish with

the base, and it could cause a snap vote to remove him. But at some point, the government is going to shut down, and the demands from a small fraction of Congress that are very clearly not going to be met are going to seem less and less important. So we will have a little other choice. Many in Congress are already saying this. Any solution will involve Democrats. McCarthy isn't going to jump straight to pulling that lever now, but after enough stalemates and posturing and shutdown time, he will have to. And then what? Conservatives lose their power and get much, much less of what they want in the actual appropriations bills. In that regard, it's totally unclear to me what their plan is, maybe because they don't really have one. Personally,

without yet knowing the outcome, I'd be thrilled to see this result in some more bipartisanship in the House. How this plays out politically depends largely on how you view the mood of Americans. I am deeply concerned about our spending and debt, so I'd be happy to see this result in some reforms and appropriations that bring down the deficit. But I'm also, as of now, still supportive of backing Ukraine in the war, so I don't want to see funding get haphazardly pulled. supportive of backing Ukraine in the war, so I don't want to see funding get haphazardly pulled. Some Americans are like me. Others are done with backing Ukraine and also worried about spending, while some fully support funding Ukraine and are not particularly concerned about the debt.

My read on the polling and the mood of the country is that the group of people who both want to pull funding for Ukraine and are passionately worried about our debt is small, representing probably less than a quarter of the population. And a government shutdown because of Republican infighting would be bad for Republicans politically. As commentators above pointed out, it's also historically unlikely to get them what they want. For those reasons, I think McCarthy and House Republicans are in a precarious spot. What does look clear to me, though, is that a shutdown is coming. If the House can actually pass this CR, which still looks like a coin flip, it is a guarantee that the Senate is going to gut it and send it back with all these things House Republicans say they won't support. With October 1st just 10 days away, I don't see any world in which we avert a shutdown, and that's when McCarthy is going to have to start making the really tough decisions.

All right, that is it for my take. We are skipping today's reader question because our main story took up a lot of space. So if you want to write in with your own reader question, you can reach me, Isaac, I-S-A-A-C, at readtangle.com. Next up is our under the radar section. The child care industry is also on the cusp of a crisis. In nine days, the United States will fall off a child care cliff, Axios' Emily Peck reports. That's the day pandemic era funding many child care centers now rely on will run out. The funding amounted to a $24 billion temporary solution for an industry that has long struggled

to make ends meet. As many as 70,000 centers serving over 3 million children could close when that funding runs out, according to one estimate from the Century Foundation. The cliff is approaching as workforce participation among women and mothers hits new all-time highs and employment gaps between men and women hit new all-time lows. Childcare providers are expected to either close, forcing many parents home, or raise prices to levels that are unaffordable for many families. Axios has the story and there's a link in today's episode description. link in today's episode description. All right, next up is our numbers section. The annual deficit the Congressional Budget Office expects to be added to the debt every year for the next decade is $2 trillion. The percentage of Americans who think the government should have a bigger role

providing more services is 49%, according to a Pew survey. The percentage of Americans who think the government should have a smaller role providing fewer services is 48%. The percentage of Americans who say we should increase the size of the U.S. military is 43%. The percentage of Americans who say we should reduce the size of the U.S. military is 17%. The percentage of Americans who say the size of the U.S. military should stay the same is 38%. The percentage of Americans who say the size of the U.S. military should stay the same is 38%. The percentage of Americans who said Congress should not authorize additional funding for Ukraine was 55%, according to a CNN August poll. All right, and last but not least, our Have a Nice Day section.

An 18-year-old in Berlin, Germany found himself pinned beneath the tire of a bus's rear axle last Monday after attempting to catch the departing bus at a local stop. However, thanks to the quick response of the bus driver and the combined efforts of about 40 people, the young man escaped the life-threatening situation with only minor injuries. Noticing what happened, passengers and bystanders acted quickly and worked together to elevate the right side of the bus high enough to free the young man from beneath it, according to authorities. Frank Kersey, one of the volunteers who participated in the rescue, recalled the scene, saying, I saw men trying to lift the bus and it was clear to me that I also

had to help lift the bus and attempt to extricate the young man from underneath. Sunny Skies has the story and there's a link to it in today's episode description. All right, that is it for today's podcast. As always, tomorrow is a Friday edition in the newsletter, so if you want to receive that, you can become a member, retangle.com slash membership. And don't forget, we have a video up on our YouTube channel on the Ashton Kutcher stuff. And I want you to go check out the Lost

Debate podcast if you want to hear me get interviewed by New York Post columnist Ricky Schlott. And we'll be back here on Monday. Have a great weekend. Peace. Peace. was produced by Diet 75. For more on Tangle, please go to readtangle.com and check out our website. Based on Charles Yu's award-winning book, Interior Chinatown follows the story of Willis Wu, Thanks for watching. buried history, and what it feels like to be in the spotlight. Interior Chinatown is streaming November 19th, only on Disney+. The flu remains a serious disease. Last season, over 102,000 influenza cases have been reported across Canada, which is nearly double the historic average of 52,000 cases. What can you do this flu season? Talk to your pharmacist or doctor about getting a flu shot.

Consider FluCellVax Quad and help protect yourself from the flu. It's the first cell-based flu vaccine authorized in Canada for ages 6 months and older, Thank you.