Democrats Should Get Tough and Quit Negotiating Spending Bills
22nd July 2025
Washington Monthly, yet another fatuous Voice of the Crust.
Yeah? With what? What lever of power do the Democrats have in their hands, that they can ignore ‘negotiate’ and jump to ‘get tough’?
In late summer of a typical year, both parties in Congress are drafting bipartisan appropriations legislation that won’t get filibustered in the Senate and will keep the federal government open when the next fiscal year starts on October 1.
Yeah, both arms of the Uniparty get together to divvy up the swag.
This year is not typical.
Thank you, Donald Trump.
Congressional Republicans, at President Donald Trump’s behest, have unapologetically broken faith in the appropriations process by undermining a bipartisan agreement struck just four months ago.
As Democrats have done every time they could get away with it so long as I’ve been alive.
That deal kept the government open through the current fiscal year. Since Democrats can no longer trust Republicans to keep their word, they should abandon negotiations over Fiscal Year 2026 spending and let the Republican majority figure out how to keep the government open.
Democrats are fine ones to bitch about others not ‘keeping their word’. And, unlike Democrats, Republicans aren’t focused on keeping the government open; a lot of them would much rather shut it down.
Proglodytes have this annoying habit of talking as if they have power even when they don’t. I suspect that’s because, in their own minds, they still do; them not having power is no part of the fantasy world that they habitually inhabit.