The Dems are a bottom up coalition of sometimes competing interests barely held together by the belief that govt can & should make life a little less nasty, brutish, & short. The GOP is a top down ideological party captured by Trump dedicated to destroying the federal govt as we've known it for 90 years. There's no way the Dems were going to save ACA, Medicaid, SNAP, or anything else, shutdown or no shutdown. What they've managed to do is demonstrate just how malevolent Trump & his whores, hacks, & grifters really are. Could they have done as much without a shutdown? Probably. Could they do more by extending it? I don't see how. Time to move on.
BTW, disgust with the Dems for not being more effective is silly. No one knows how to stop Trump, not the courts & certainly not the GOP establishment ante. The best anyone can hope for is that he'll self-destruct. permanently damage the GOP, & give the Dems a chance to fix whatever they can.
Also: note that as part of this "deal" that the 7 Ds and Angus King signed on to, the Agriculture appropriation will be funded for the full fiscal year, so when the new CR (to be approved in the days ahead) expires in January, then if there's another shutdown over ACA subsidies and Medicare cuts, there will not be the risk of people losing SNAP benefits (funded by the Ag portion of the budget). At that time, at least some of these 8 folks who crossed over won't have much incentive to compromise to keep the gov't open, and it will again help the Ds highlight the GOP's "cruelty' (on ACA and Medicare)... much closer to the Nov 2026 midterms. One can but hope!
I find the arguments made by those who voted to end the gov shutdown naive at best, completely disingenuous at worst. Do they really think we’re getting those ACA subsidies back anytime soon or ever?! Those eight senators pretty much guaranteed that I will lose my ACA health insurance in January. It’s more than tripled in cost and I simply cannot afford it.
It looked like Trump was willing to continue the shutdown into January. There’s no indication that a longer shutdown would result in any different outcome.
I’m sorry your health insurance premiums were jacked sky high to the point where you probably can’t afford it. It’s a disaster.
Guess we’ll never know. What I do know is that the hateful eight just tanked the only leverage they had to bring back the ACA subsidies. If those senators or anyone else think the GOP will negotiate in good faith, I’ve got a bridge over some swamp land in Florida to sell ya.
Fast forward to January and the vote to extend ACA subsidies. What are the optics of all of the Republicans voting to cancel the subsidies in a roll call vote? Seems like a radioactive way to get primaried and then pushed out by voters and ordinary folks who are disrespected. Meanwhile, the government functions restart and the dems are given credit for ending the shutdown that was started by the Republicans. See, it partially works if the democrats can message effectively.
Professor Daniel W. Drezner: The Democratic Party is being crushed in the House and Senate by a Tyranny of the Majority.
OMB Director Russell Vought used the deadlock to expire SNAP and WICK. Remember, Mr. Vought was the author of Project 2025.
In a similar spirit, Speaker Michael Johnson -- for whom the priest Aaron was not enough ambition, God TOLD Johnson that HE IS THE NEW MOSES (!!) -- the "Christian" House and Senate were willing to hold hostage the needy, the poor, the sick, the weak.
To the Democratic Party, this is like whether to pay or fold on ransom of a kidnapped loved one. Even payment of the ransom might not result in the wellbeing of the victim.
My theory is the Democrats picked 8 scapegoats as a way out of the impasse.
Here are the eight:
Senator Angus King of Maine;
Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia;
Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois;
Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania;
Senator Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire;
Senator Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire;
Senator Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada; and,
Senator Jacky Rosen of Nevada.
Of the eight, Senators Durbin and Shaheen are retiring.
The lack of immediate political danger to the Senator is the least common denominator uniting the group of eight.
They could vote for a Hobsons-Choice "compromise," while the rest of the Party could stand on principle.
If anyone can point to a way towards victory for liberal principles in this composition of the House and Senate, I will listen carefully and respectfully.
We have a House and Senate of moderate Democrats against Republicans, irrespective of the principles and intentions of individual GOP members, who are held captive to the rantings of an Idiot and, frankly, Aryan-Racism and cruelty.
What the GOP inflict on the populace is like the extortion of a kidnapper of children upon the loving parents.
In this situation of extortion with the tyranny of the slim majority, no football-referees are around to prohibit the GOP team from brutal personal fouls upon our team to knock us out of the game. We need to bring back the referees by electing a Democratic House in face of extreme GOP gerrymandering to rig the 2026 elections.
One referee against extreme brutality of this Administration and the Republicans is the Courts.
Well, look at the Chief-Justice John Roberts Court.
In the name of "Originalism" -- going back to the meaning of the Constitution to our Founding Fathers, right?! -- CJ Roberts has reached instead back to Justice Roger Taney to bring the Supreme Court to the lowest level since the Civil War, and to blow a truck-wide HOLE in the Constitution under the tyrannical theory of "Unitary Presidency" -- Dick Nixon, 1972: "If the President does it, ladies and gentlemen, that means it is not illegal" -- so the 32-ton Orange Donald-J-TRUCK can plow through the Constitution with that truck's 18-wheels and powerful engine of tyranny.
My interim judgment on Leader Hakeem Jeffries is of a cool head, able House leadership, and strategic vision.
My rebuttable presumption is that Leader Jeffries will lead the Democrats in the House to a slim majority in 2026, despite the GOP gerrymandering.
My rebuttable presumption is that the Senate will even out or slightly tilt in favor of the Democrats in 2026.
War is fog. The GOP kicks out the referees and foul our teams players, as when Speaker Michael Johnson -- Call me Moses -- won't swear in Congresswoman-Elect Adelita Grijalva circa 50 days after victory! The GOP is ingenious in strategy of gerrymandering.
Speaker-Emerita Nancy Pelosi was a political genius, who earned repeated election to the top House leadership positions by being THE RAINMAKER of the Democratic Party.
I am fairly good at analysis -- excellent when presented with enough insight into the real interests of competing parties -- but have no insight into the strategy of reclaiming the House and the Senate, and certainly not of the Presidency.
But the Governor victories this week coupled with the strategic insights of Leader Hakeem Jeffries gives me rays of hope for 2026.
I so appreciate your nuanced explanation of so many moving balls and perspectives. It's a lot to sort out, and I look to your post each evening to help me consider and review my reactions.
This is a very balanced and insightful explanation of what we all just saw happen. Democrats were winning, but the cost of winning peeled off some senators who couldn’t stomach the suffering.
This all on Schumer. He's a horrible leader and an even worse communicator. He should resign as minority leader and let a real leader take over. Perhaps someone who can articulate a position without having to read it off a piece of paper. Jefferies needs to go to, he also lacks leadership and communication skills.
It's a repeating pattern with the Democrats and either Trump Administration. They take on battles (e.g. not one, but two impeachment efforts, a shutdown or two, three twisted elections) they know they probably won't win. But don't they have to?
What is the alternative when the foe--the Republican Party and the Supreme Sphincter--they're fighting has a single-minded drive to establish one-party rule based on how much of the 21st century safety net they can avoid paying for? "Purely political" (sounds oxymoronic, doesn't it?) says keep applying the pain so the nation can tell who the bad guys are. But don't most Americans already know that?
What hurts and scares me most is that once again, I can't think what they might have done differently and had it make any sort of difference.
More than three years of Trump-Vance theater to sit through, so, yes, Adriana, it will certainly seem "never-ending". Thanks for your summation of my frequent despair.
I think the political landscape will definitely shift...just not predictably ("past performance is no guarantee of future outcome"). A thoughtful person who thinks we can reset to, say, Biden or Obama, is too optimistic in my opinion.
But, Obama's eight years accomplished much in expanding our options concerning ideas for the future because of his example and his conscious policy of opening up opportunities for sharing the levers of power with a much wider variety of candidates.
Biden won us time by setting the Trump 1.0 fractures in our ability to work with others and watching them heal remarkably quickly. Yet, Trump and, yes, Mitch McConnell-didn't relent in their attempts to scuttle all of the 12 years of non-Republican White House leadership.
[MCConnell retires my new John C Calhoun Award for most pernicious actor in Congressional history. I have inducted him as a Second-Class Sphincter in my recently formed Order of the Anal Orifice (OAO). Please note OAO 2nd C is the highest rank in the OAO other than Supreme Sphincter because there's nothing first-class about any of the members. Nominations for unworthy OAO dishonorees always welcome.]
In November 2025, Trump 2.0 looks to have irreparably damaged our ability to act inclusively (and diversely and equitably). But a counter movement may be gaining strength. It won't be "progressive" or "populist". It will have to sustain its development of a new consensus against a very determined cadre of Arrogant and Mean forces. Fortunately, my new acronym ASIM characterizing such forces as Arrogant, Stupid, Ignorant, and Mean allows for ineptitude in implementation.
[SIAM scans better, but needlessly drags in Thailand's historic past in our political contretemps.]
My answer may sound a bit Pollyanna-ish (I visited her home library in Littleton, NH several times), Adriana, but it's sincerely meant.
Let's not think parties, let's think about the huge mass of Americans being dismissed as valuable. It can be the biggest civil society ever assembled and may persuade enough others to shift their gaze from the latest X-rated offense to finding points of agreement.
The big trick in promoting such a coalition is trying to avoid questions of who controls what. When pundits say "Democracy is messy", they're both correct in anticipating such an outcome and perhaps mistaken in how readily that might happen. If No Kings actually acts as a precursor to such a movement, then a broad-based reaction is as likely as any of the other possible futures at this moment.
What’s incredible to me is, whatever you think of the strategy in general, that it took 6 Democrats six weeks to get to the point where from their own reasoning they should have been in one week.
What do you think of Matt Yglesias' thought that what links the 8 senators is not "moderation" but something else entirely? Here's what Matt wrote today.
"Jeanne Shaheen’s group that led these talks has been widely characterized as “moderates.” But I find a style of moderation in which you vote to ban internal-combustion-engine cars and won’t support a voter ID law but then shy away from procedural hardball to be absurd. If you look at the Majority Democrats roster of Michael Bennet, Ruben Gallego, and Elissa Slotkin in the Senate (plus current Senate candidates James Talarico and Angie Craig), they are all against the deal and instead offer some gestures of heterodoxy on questions of public policy."
I agree completely with your analysis, DD. The politics favored Ds holding firm on the shutdown, but that doesn't solve the ethical problem of continuing the shutdown at the expense of people who would suffer harm from it: e.g., the families going hungry without their SNAP benefits, the federal workers idled and unpaid, at their expense and the expense of the communities in which they serve and spend their paychecks,, etc. We know it's bad to negotiate with terrorists/hostage-takers, but we do it all the time, to minimize further injury and trauma to hostages.
I've thought for some time we were going to wind up here at Capitulation Junction sooner or later. It's cold comfort, but we can hope that the way this is playing out will strengthen and galvanize the Resistance Block of the D party and speed the turnover of the party (and the government) to newer, more energetic progressive leaders and office-holders. Fingers crossed, anyway...
No mention of Dems not having a viable off-ramp — no plan if the R’s wouldn’t buckle. The blame-game polls favor them still, but could easily start ratcheting the other way; easy to see how this could have turned bad by Thanksgiving. Better to take the win now, and if R’s refuse to fix the health care cost issue next month, the issue will haunt them for 1 year if not 3.
If any of these pathetic senators believe that Rs will negotiate in good faith, then they really are total fools. Chump doesn't negotiate, and he will force all Rs to do the same. Ds were punched in the face and told to say thank you-and they did. This is why the party has such low approval by their own members.
The Dems are a bottom up coalition of sometimes competing interests barely held together by the belief that govt can & should make life a little less nasty, brutish, & short. The GOP is a top down ideological party captured by Trump dedicated to destroying the federal govt as we've known it for 90 years. There's no way the Dems were going to save ACA, Medicaid, SNAP, or anything else, shutdown or no shutdown. What they've managed to do is demonstrate just how malevolent Trump & his whores, hacks, & grifters really are. Could they have done as much without a shutdown? Probably. Could they do more by extending it? I don't see how. Time to move on.
BTW, disgust with the Dems for not being more effective is silly. No one knows how to stop Trump, not the courts & certainly not the GOP establishment ante. The best anyone can hope for is that he'll self-destruct. permanently damage the GOP, & give the Dems a chance to fix whatever they can.
for real
It’s possible … just barely possible … that when this deal ends in January after
— the House and Senate vote against extending the subsidies
— the big jump in insurance costs have kicked in
— Trump has done more crazy and unpopular stuff
— there’s no longer the prospect of ruining holiday travel, which would have been bad for Dems as well as Republicans
— and with Dems having positioned themselves as the responsible, moderate,flexible party
that … the Eight will sign on for a new shutdown with their party in a stronger position?
I don’t think this reopening is happening for such strategic reasons. And cave once, cave always is far more likely. But … a guy can hope, can’t he?
Also: note that as part of this "deal" that the 7 Ds and Angus King signed on to, the Agriculture appropriation will be funded for the full fiscal year, so when the new CR (to be approved in the days ahead) expires in January, then if there's another shutdown over ACA subsidies and Medicare cuts, there will not be the risk of people losing SNAP benefits (funded by the Ag portion of the budget). At that time, at least some of these 8 folks who crossed over won't have much incentive to compromise to keep the gov't open, and it will again help the Ds highlight the GOP's "cruelty' (on ACA and Medicare)... much closer to the Nov 2026 midterms. One can but hope!
I find the arguments made by those who voted to end the gov shutdown naive at best, completely disingenuous at worst. Do they really think we’re getting those ACA subsidies back anytime soon or ever?! Those eight senators pretty much guaranteed that I will lose my ACA health insurance in January. It’s more than tripled in cost and I simply cannot afford it.
It looked like Trump was willing to continue the shutdown into January. There’s no indication that a longer shutdown would result in any different outcome.
I’m sorry your health insurance premiums were jacked sky high to the point where you probably can’t afford it. It’s a disaster.
Guess we’ll never know. What I do know is that the hateful eight just tanked the only leverage they had to bring back the ACA subsidies. If those senators or anyone else think the GOP will negotiate in good faith, I’ve got a bridge over some swamp land in Florida to sell ya.
Blame it on MAGA... I do..😂
I’m blaming MAGA and the cowards who caved when they had maximum leverage.
Fast forward to January and the vote to extend ACA subsidies. What are the optics of all of the Republicans voting to cancel the subsidies in a roll call vote? Seems like a radioactive way to get primaried and then pushed out by voters and ordinary folks who are disrespected. Meanwhile, the government functions restart and the dems are given credit for ending the shutdown that was started by the Republicans. See, it partially works if the democrats can message effectively.
I'm wanting to feel positive and optimistic despite the contrary opinions. So thanks for that perspective.
Professor Daniel W. Drezner: The Democratic Party is being crushed in the House and Senate by a Tyranny of the Majority.
OMB Director Russell Vought used the deadlock to expire SNAP and WICK. Remember, Mr. Vought was the author of Project 2025.
In a similar spirit, Speaker Michael Johnson -- for whom the priest Aaron was not enough ambition, God TOLD Johnson that HE IS THE NEW MOSES (!!) -- the "Christian" House and Senate were willing to hold hostage the needy, the poor, the sick, the weak.
To the Democratic Party, this is like whether to pay or fold on ransom of a kidnapped loved one. Even payment of the ransom might not result in the wellbeing of the victim.
My theory is the Democrats picked 8 scapegoats as a way out of the impasse.
Here are the eight:
Senator Angus King of Maine;
Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia;
Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois;
Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania;
Senator Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire;
Senator Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire;
Senator Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada; and,
Senator Jacky Rosen of Nevada.
Of the eight, Senators Durbin and Shaheen are retiring.
None -- count them -- NONE are running in 2026.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/10/us/politics/senators-democrat-shutdown-vote.html
I believe the Democrats were the parents of a kidnapped daughter and paid the ransom in the least painful way.
Not one faces election this term.
Not one.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/10/us/politics/senators-democrat-shutdown-vote.html
The lack of immediate political danger to the Senator is the least common denominator uniting the group of eight.
They could vote for a Hobsons-Choice "compromise," while the rest of the Party could stand on principle.
If anyone can point to a way towards victory for liberal principles in this composition of the House and Senate, I will listen carefully and respectfully.
We have a House and Senate of moderate Democrats against Republicans, irrespective of the principles and intentions of individual GOP members, who are held captive to the rantings of an Idiot and, frankly, Aryan-Racism and cruelty.
What the GOP inflict on the populace is like the extortion of a kidnapper of children upon the loving parents.
In this situation of extortion with the tyranny of the slim majority, no football-referees are around to prohibit the GOP team from brutal personal fouls upon our team to knock us out of the game. We need to bring back the referees by electing a Democratic House in face of extreme GOP gerrymandering to rig the 2026 elections.
One referee against extreme brutality of this Administration and the Republicans is the Courts.
Well, look at the Chief-Justice John Roberts Court.
In the name of "Originalism" -- going back to the meaning of the Constitution to our Founding Fathers, right?! -- CJ Roberts has reached instead back to Justice Roger Taney to bring the Supreme Court to the lowest level since the Civil War, and to blow a truck-wide HOLE in the Constitution under the tyrannical theory of "Unitary Presidency" -- Dick Nixon, 1972: "If the President does it, ladies and gentlemen, that means it is not illegal" -- so the 32-ton Orange Donald-J-TRUCK can plow through the Constitution with that truck's 18-wheels and powerful engine of tyranny.
My interim judgment on Leader Hakeem Jeffries is of a cool head, able House leadership, and strategic vision.
My rebuttable presumption is that Leader Jeffries will lead the Democrats in the House to a slim majority in 2026, despite the GOP gerrymandering.
My rebuttable presumption is that the Senate will even out or slightly tilt in favor of the Democrats in 2026.
War is fog. The GOP kicks out the referees and foul our teams players, as when Speaker Michael Johnson -- Call me Moses -- won't swear in Congresswoman-Elect Adelita Grijalva circa 50 days after victory! The GOP is ingenious in strategy of gerrymandering.
Speaker-Emerita Nancy Pelosi was a political genius, who earned repeated election to the top House leadership positions by being THE RAINMAKER of the Democratic Party.
I am fairly good at analysis -- excellent when presented with enough insight into the real interests of competing parties -- but have no insight into the strategy of reclaiming the House and the Senate, and certainly not of the Presidency.
But the Governor victories this week coupled with the strategic insights of Leader Hakeem Jeffries gives me rays of hope for 2026.
I so appreciate your nuanced explanation of so many moving balls and perspectives. It's a lot to sort out, and I look to your post each evening to help me consider and review my reactions.
This is a very balanced and insightful explanation of what we all just saw happen. Democrats were winning, but the cost of winning peeled off some senators who couldn’t stomach the suffering.
It sounds optimistic even if it’s wrong-headed. Keep the fires burning…
This all on Schumer. He's a horrible leader and an even worse communicator. He should resign as minority leader and let a real leader take over. Perhaps someone who can articulate a position without having to read it off a piece of paper. Jefferies needs to go to, he also lacks leadership and communication skills.
And take Trump with him!
SLl-F76
It's a repeating pattern with the Democrats and either Trump Administration. They take on battles (e.g. not one, but two impeachment efforts, a shutdown or two, three twisted elections) they know they probably won't win. But don't they have to?
What is the alternative when the foe--the Republican Party and the Supreme Sphincter--they're fighting has a single-minded drive to establish one-party rule based on how much of the 21st century safety net they can avoid paying for? "Purely political" (sounds oxymoronic, doesn't it?) says keep applying the pain so the nation can tell who the bad guys are. But don't most Americans already know that?
What hurts and scares me most is that once again, I can't think what they might have done differently and had it make any sort of difference.
More than three years of Trump-Vance theater to sit through, so, yes, Adriana, it will certainly seem "never-ending". Thanks for your summation of my frequent despair.
I think the political landscape will definitely shift...just not predictably ("past performance is no guarantee of future outcome"). A thoughtful person who thinks we can reset to, say, Biden or Obama, is too optimistic in my opinion.
But, Obama's eight years accomplished much in expanding our options concerning ideas for the future because of his example and his conscious policy of opening up opportunities for sharing the levers of power with a much wider variety of candidates.
Biden won us time by setting the Trump 1.0 fractures in our ability to work with others and watching them heal remarkably quickly. Yet, Trump and, yes, Mitch McConnell-didn't relent in their attempts to scuttle all of the 12 years of non-Republican White House leadership.
[MCConnell retires my new John C Calhoun Award for most pernicious actor in Congressional history. I have inducted him as a Second-Class Sphincter in my recently formed Order of the Anal Orifice (OAO). Please note OAO 2nd C is the highest rank in the OAO other than Supreme Sphincter because there's nothing first-class about any of the members. Nominations for unworthy OAO dishonorees always welcome.]
In November 2025, Trump 2.0 looks to have irreparably damaged our ability to act inclusively (and diversely and equitably). But a counter movement may be gaining strength. It won't be "progressive" or "populist". It will have to sustain its development of a new consensus against a very determined cadre of Arrogant and Mean forces. Fortunately, my new acronym ASIM characterizing such forces as Arrogant, Stupid, Ignorant, and Mean allows for ineptitude in implementation.
[SIAM scans better, but needlessly drags in Thailand's historic past in our political contretemps.]
My answer may sound a bit Pollyanna-ish (I visited her home library in Littleton, NH several times), Adriana, but it's sincerely meant.
Let's not think parties, let's think about the huge mass of Americans being dismissed as valuable. It can be the biggest civil society ever assembled and may persuade enough others to shift their gaze from the latest X-rated offense to finding points of agreement.
The big trick in promoting such a coalition is trying to avoid questions of who controls what. When pundits say "Democracy is messy", they're both correct in anticipating such an outcome and perhaps mistaken in how readily that might happen. If No Kings actually acts as a precursor to such a movement, then a broad-based reaction is as likely as any of the other possible futures at this moment.
What’s incredible to me is, whatever you think of the strategy in general, that it took 6 Democrats six weeks to get to the point where from their own reasoning they should have been in one week.
What do you think of Matt Yglesias' thought that what links the 8 senators is not "moderation" but something else entirely? Here's what Matt wrote today.
"Jeanne Shaheen’s group that led these talks has been widely characterized as “moderates.” But I find a style of moderation in which you vote to ban internal-combustion-engine cars and won’t support a voter ID law but then shy away from procedural hardball to be absurd. If you look at the Majority Democrats roster of Michael Bennet, Ruben Gallego, and Elissa Slotkin in the Senate (plus current Senate candidates James Talarico and Angie Craig), they are all against the deal and instead offer some gestures of heterodoxy on questions of public policy."
I agree completely with your analysis, DD. The politics favored Ds holding firm on the shutdown, but that doesn't solve the ethical problem of continuing the shutdown at the expense of people who would suffer harm from it: e.g., the families going hungry without their SNAP benefits, the federal workers idled and unpaid, at their expense and the expense of the communities in which they serve and spend their paychecks,, etc. We know it's bad to negotiate with terrorists/hostage-takers, but we do it all the time, to minimize further injury and trauma to hostages.
I've thought for some time we were going to wind up here at Capitulation Junction sooner or later. It's cold comfort, but we can hope that the way this is playing out will strengthen and galvanize the Resistance Block of the D party and speed the turnover of the party (and the government) to newer, more energetic progressive leaders and office-holders. Fingers crossed, anyway...
" ... were acquiesced ... "?
Maybe, " ... were deceived into accepting ... "?
Reading this am that all 8 are either retiring or not running in the next election. Hmmmm.
Your list of quotes didn’t include Angus King’s defeatist, gut-punching capitulation to Trump.
No mention of Dems not having a viable off-ramp — no plan if the R’s wouldn’t buckle. The blame-game polls favor them still, but could easily start ratcheting the other way; easy to see how this could have turned bad by Thanksgiving. Better to take the win now, and if R’s refuse to fix the health care cost issue next month, the issue will haunt them for 1 year if not 3.
If any of these pathetic senators believe that Rs will negotiate in good faith, then they really are total fools. Chump doesn't negotiate, and he will force all Rs to do the same. Ds were punched in the face and told to say thank you-and they did. This is why the party has such low approval by their own members.