Why the Republican 'no' vote on the stimulus bill is brilliant

By brilliant, of course, I mean tactically cunning.

At the end of the day they have only one weapon: a filibuster that they can threaten to use only if they can be sure that the Democrats cannot muster one solitary vote from the GOP caucus. But the filibuster is not a trump card; everything depends on the circumstances. Even the presidential veto, which is more aptly thought of as a trump, is not absolute. Think, for example, of Clinton's confrontation with the congressional republicans over welfare reform, which he vetoed twice before being pressured by the perceived threat of upcoming elections to cave in and sign the bill that 'ended welfare as we know it'. The filibuster, which is less powerful than a veto by and large, is even more susceptible to external pressure.

If the Obama, who has been clamoring about the 'dire situation' and the 'need for action', would act in concert with Democrats to paint the Republicans as obstructing much needed reform, I fail to see how the GOP would come out on top here. This seems to me to be a losing battle for the Republicans and one that, once lost, would have further consequences for their ability to act as a serious obstructionist threat.

But this doesn't appear to be Obama's manner of proceeding. As we have seen, after the Republicans have already exacted compromises and concessions from a powerful Democratic congress and president, they are under no obligation to vote in favor of the bill. The text of the bill will be the same and since it will pass either way, the Republicans are in a position to vote 'no' and prime the pumps for even more concessions in the future. If they were to play into the 'bipartisan trap' and play nice, they would abdicate their ability to be effective obstructions of the Democrat's legislative agenda. They are doing precisely what any politically savvy opposition should do; they are ensuring to the best of their ability that the result (legislation) is as watered-down and tilted rightward as is possible under present circumstances. The Republicans use this rhetoric about 'bipartisanship' to get some influence, then after they have left their stains all over the legislation they back off and claim that: "there was nothing bipartisan about that bill at all" and self-righteously vote against it. They take the bait, get concessions and then back off such that the result appears to look exactly as it would have looked had the Democrats simply confronted the Republicans head-on.

The Republicans are doing remarkably well at this. It doesn't hurt that they have many conservative allies within the Democratic Party who are on the fence at best about whether tax breaks or spending should be paramount. The bill that is likely to pass the Senate is something like 45% tax cuts and the rest is spending. Over 200 billion in spending was cut out of the bill, although the Republicans had no problems last year with letting figures larger than that fly out of the hands of the federal government into the greedy arms of the financial industry.

We can almost already hear the magnificently moronic Mitch McConnell rejoinder, when it becomes clear that this stimulus bill doesn't 'fix' the current crisis, that 'gummint spending' simply doesn't work.