Let's get real about "the deal."
Chris Bowers put up a diary with a poll today asking if we should accept the odious deal before us or not.
I have two observations. The first one is easy: the answer to Chris's poll is "no."
Even if you would take the deal, the answer is "no."
Why is the answer "no"?
Because we are in a negotiation and we want the deal to improve. That's basic. We should be kicking and screaming right now, as the Republicans usually do. That the Republicans aren't kicking and screaming just tells you how much we have to kick and scream about.
OK, so much for the diary title. My second observation may be more important.
Here's what we do if the odious deal (hat tip to Colonel Korn in the holy book Catch-22) passes:
Ready?
Every day,
every week,
every month,
every year,
for as long as we control the Senate,
and for as long as House rules allow us to muck about,
we must amend bills to include making the middle-class tax cuts permanent.
In the House, that can be through the use of those fancy "motion to recommit" procedures David Waldman writes about.
In the Senate, if the House so much as tries to name a Post Office, we should hollow out the bill and send it back to the House with this text substituted:
"This bill makes the current middle class tax rates permanent."
The Republicans think that they can keep us from decoupling the tax cuts once we pass temporary extensions?
They are wrong -- if we have the will to make them wrong.
Postscript: Once this happens, repeat the entire exercise, but with repealing the temporary extensions for the bloated rich.
The Republicans think they've won?
Not if the public is on our side and we're willing to play hardball.
I don't like this "compromise." My "no" is real, not just a bargaining tactic.
But if we lose this one, we can and will and MUST make the Republicans' lives hell.
Every day.
Every week.
Every month.
Every bill.
We can do it -- if we have the will.
And President Obama had damned well better not stand in our way if we do.
Update: