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President Biden Is Planning On MAGA Mike Johnson Fumbling Into A Government Shutdown. [1]

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Date: 2023-11-11

Supposedly, MAGA Mike Johnson will release a “plan” after a 3 P.M. conference call today to prevent a government shutdown by next Friday. President Biden is planning for MAGA Mike to screw up royally and bring about a government shutdown. And the White House is preparing a good political strategy to deal with the upcoming fuck up, in my humble opinion. Part of it deals with hitting the Republicans over the head with their favorite boogeyman Iran.

Washington this morning is waiting for House Speaker Mike Johnson to release his plan to keep the government funded past Friday, with Johnson and other leaders planning to brief House Republicans in a 3 p.m. call. Given the timetable (less than a week), Johnson’s experience dealing with shutdown politics (near zero), and the level of disarray in the GOP conference (high), the chances of a shutdown are growing.

Given that there are NO DETAILS being leaked about this “plan’ to avert a government shutdown, I am reasonably sure it will involve a lot of wishful thinking on MAGA Mike’s part. It has been my experience that any political plans are always leaked to the media first to try and test the waters. My guess is that the plan will involve this “ladder” idea that MAGA Mike has been gravitating toward. For those who are not aware, the Freedom lunatics want to have the opportunity to only fund parts of the government they like, if any. The so called “establishment” Republicans think this is a terrible idea.

Anyway…

A last-minute short-term clean CR is always possible, but over at the White House they are not holding their breath. Aides are betting on Johnson not being able to figure this out and are preparing along two tracks. — First is the potential shutdown: Nobody is rooting for a shutdown, but it isn’t lost on Democrats that the recent political history of these funding standoffs is that they usually redound to the benefit of one party — and it isn’t the GOP.

The article cites all the other past government shutdowns, and they have never worked out well for Republicans. They avoid getting their asses handed to them in the elections because government shutdowns happen well before any elections, but Republicans always fail to convince Americans that they can live without the government. Unfortunately for the rest of us, Republicans are hell bent on trying to prove that government is terrible and should be destroyed. And as always, Democrats have to remind the ever forgetful public that the government does include important employees that get hurt.

In 2018-2019, Donald Trump precipitated a shutdown with a Republican Congress over funding for a border wall. It ended after 35 days when Democrats, who had won the House in the midterms, took over. The public blamed Trump for the shutdown and his approval rating took a nosedive. It goes without saying that given Biden’s approval rating right now, he is on the hunt for moments when he can be compared to the alternative rather than the almighty, and a shutdown could certainly do the trick. The White House is prepping surrogates already, according to talking points distributed to allies and that were obtained by Playbook: “The clock is ticking. We are just X days from an Extreme Republican Shutdown that would: Force servicemembers and law enforcement officers to work without pay. Risk significant delays for travelers. Undermine public health. Cut off funding for small businesses.”

Emphasis is mine.

Next, President Biden will link a Republican hobby horse to Ukraine aid: Iran’s support for Russia’s war with the Ukraine.

— And then there’s the supplemental: If a shutdown doesn’t materialize, or if it does and gets resolved quickly, the fight over Biden’s $106 billion national security funding request would return to the center of White House-Congress negotiations. And Johnson can expect to face a new foreign policy buzzsaw when it comes to aid to Ukraine. Democrats are planning a pile-on focusing on Iran, one the White House has signaled in recent weeks. There was a reference, for instance, buried in the Biden veto threat of Johnson’s Israel supplemental: “There is strong bipartisan agreement that it is in our direct national security interest to help Ukraine defend its freedom and its sovereignty, and protect its people against the appalling crimes being committed by Russian forces against thousands of innocent civilians — and against Russia’s attacks against the Ukrainian people with Iranian weapons.”

Right now, Republicans just want to send aid to Israel, and they have been screaming that we need to bomb Iran. President Biden will point out the obvious: Iran is supplying the Russian’s with weapons to kill Ukrainians. Republicans cannot scream about Iran’s support of Hamas and Hezbollah without skipping over the fact that Iran is allied with Russia against Ukraine. President Biden is going to remind the American voters of this.

In other words, Biden is going on offense against MAGA Mike and his extremists.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2023/11/11/2205166/-President-Biden-Is-Planning-On-MAGA-Mike-Johnson-Fumbling-Into-A-Government-Shutdown?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=trending&pm_medium=web

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