Republicans' Failure to Resolve Fiscal Cliff Could Produce Another Economic Catastrophe

Just four years after Republican ineptitude, malfeasance and blind dedication to its failed supply-side ideology led to the worst economic collapse since the Great Depression — and just 18 months after tea party obstruction led to the United States’ first-ever credit downgrade — the GOP is ready to do it again.

From the Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC last night:

RACHEL MADDOW: Look at the chart Jared Bernstein [former economic adviser to Vice Pres. Biden and now a Senior Fellow at the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities] put together today.

You know they just revised the number for economic growth for the country for the last quarter. They just revised it today. And it was a good revision. It was a revision upwards. So the third quarter, this last quarter this year, we were growing at a rate of 3.1 percent. It’s up almost two points from the quarter before.

If they don’t get their act together, this is what the Congressional Budget Office says is going to happen to the economic growth rate this quarter. Two percent. And look what happens next quarter, the first three months of next year. That’s bad. Maybe … we can endure that and we’ll come back stronger than ever. But that’s bad. That is an economic catastrophe that will hurt a lot of Americans for a long time.

And maybe you want to bear that brunt. but maybe that happening accidentally because of so much chaos on one side that they can’t tell which way’s up, which way’s down and who’s on their own side is not the way to get that. This is like being wheeled in for heart surgery and looking up and seeing that it is actually Edward Scissorhands leaning over you in a mask and scrubs ready for [the surgery] on which your life depends.

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Republicans’ Failure to Resolve Fiscal Cliff Could Produce Another Economic Catastrophe

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Poetic Justice

Verbatim

“As is so often the case, Donald Trump’s opponents are playing into his hands. This is exactly the kind of fight that Donald Trump loves, with his opponents carrying Mexican flags past burning cars.”

— Republican pollster Whit Ayres, quoted by the Wall Street Journal.

“Don’t kid yourself they know they are absolutely getting cooked politically with their terrible bill and rising prices, and they want to create a violent spectacle to feed their content machine. It’s time for the mainstream media to describe this authoritarian madness accurately.”

— Sen. Brian Schatz (D-HI), reacting on X to President Trump sending National Guard troops to Los Angeles.

“The people have spoken. A new political party is needed in America to represent the 80% in the middle! And exactly 80% of people agree. This is fate.”

— Elon Musk floated a new political party on Friday after falling out with President Trump over the big, beautiful bill, The Hill reports. He followed up with a potential name for the group, “The America Party.”

“Donald Trump and Elon Musk’s alliance took off like one of SpaceX’s rockets. It was supercharged and soared high. And then it blew up.”

— Associated Press

“The BBB will increase by orders of magnitude the scope, scale and speed of removing illegal and criminal aliens from the United States. For that reason alone, it’s the most essential piece of legislation currently under consideration in the entire Western World, in generations.”

— Trump aide Stephen Miller, on X, defending the Republican budget bill after Elon Musk called it a “disgusting abomination.”

Numerati

53% to 27%

As the Senate debates the GOP tax and spending bill titled One Big Beautiful Bill Act and President Donald Trump pushes for a July 4 deadline to sign it, a new Quinnipiac poll finds voters overwhelmingly oppose the legislation, 53% to 27%, with 20% not offering an opinion.

47% to 34%

A new YouGov poll finds that President Trump’s deployment of Marines to Los Angeles is deeply unpopular, with a 47 percent disapproval mark, compared with 34 percent who approve. Dispatching the National Guard isn’t much better: 45 percent disapprove and 38 percent approve.

$134 million

After persistent questioning about the cost of sending National Guard members and Marines to Los Angeles in response to protests over immigration raids, Hegseth turned to his acting comptroller, Bryn Woollacott MacDonnell, who said it would cost $134 million, the Associated Press reports.

8

Eight states, including Florida and Tennessee, have introduced or passed legislation to ban planes from emitting “chemtrails” to poison Americans or control the weather, The Guardian reports. Of course, there’s no credible evidence that this is even happening.

70%

A new KFF Health poll finds that more than 70% of Americans are worried about the impact of Medicaid cuts in the bill leading to more people uninsured and hurting hospitals.