What did Democrats expect, an engraved invitation?

Posted Tuesday evening, December 5, 2017.

“The Bosses of the Senate” by Joseph Keppler, Puck, January 1889. Via the art and history collection of the United States Senate.

“I don’t think there’s a conspiracy to go attack Democratic districts. But that’s how the legislative process works -- if you’re not going to participate in a game you’re going to lose,” he said. “You need the revenue, and those constituencies are not really being represented because their representatives refused to participate.” ---GOP lobbyist quoted in Sahil Kapur’s story at Bloomberg, ‘Death to Democrats’: How the GOP Tax Bill Whacks Liberal Tenets, December 5, 2017.

Here’s how the Democrats were invited to participate in the process:

Republicans: Look, here’s the deal. More than anything, our donors want massive tax cuts. To give them to them, we’re going to rush through a bill that hasn’t been written yet, with no hearings, no scoring, and no real debate. We got a problem, though. Cutting taxes to that degree will add bigly to the deficit, which means it’s a non-starter under the Byrd rule. You guys will filibuster it, and much as we’d like to get rid of the filibuster entirely we’re afraid we might lose the Senate in 2018 and then we won’t be able to filibuster Medicare for All and the tax hikes you’re going to have to pass to clean up the mess we’re going to make here. So to get around that and be able to say with straight faces we’re not blowing a ginormous hole in the budget, we’re going to eliminate all kinds of deductions that benefit the middle and working class, sunset others so that those non-rich people’s taxes will rise later rather than sooner, sabotage Obamacare, take a huge whack at Medicaid, and generally stick it to all your core constituencies. While we’re at it, we’re throwing in lots of goodies for our families, friends, and donors. And in the end, we’ll reject everything you propose to mitigate the damage and pass the plan we want with you or without you. Are you in?

Democrats: Hell, no!

Republicans: Ok, be that way. But you can't say you weren’t asked.