Profile In Dis-Courage

Trump's big ugly, blister-faced, goateed creature of a budget bill is going through a marathon of amendments to be voted on in the Senate as Democrats try to slow the bill down enough to prevent Trump from signing the bill into law on July 4 (when this blogger will be in Montreal for an extended weekend to get out of the country during a holiday this blogger no longer believes in, hence expect a new Music Video Of the Week a day early).  The bill, which cuts spending on renewable energy and health-care access and will likely cause people to die in order to give Jeff Bezos and is new wife (yuck!) a tax cut as a wedding gift.  One Senate Republican announced his opposition to it due to Medicaid cuts that will disproportionally hurt his state - Thom Tillis of North Carolina.

Tillis had been against the Affordable Care Act because he was not convinced that people could keep their coverage and their doctors if they so chose.  He was right, and he considered that a broken promise from President Obama.  That got Tillis elected to the Senate in 2014.  Now he is lashing out at Trump because the protections to Medicaid Trump promised just aren't there, which Tillis considers yet another broken promise on health care from the executive branch - only this time it's Trump, not Obama, he's angry at.     

And Trump is angry at Tillis.  After more or less threatening him with supporting a primary challenger in the 2026 U.S. Senate campaign in North Carolina, Tillis, fearing naught for his career but likely fearing for his life, prudently decided not to seek re-election after two terms.  He'll be 65 at the end of 2025, which dovetails nicely with his impending retirement.  Progressives are loath to give Tillis any credit for standing up to Trump, since he gave up his political career rather than continue fighting, even as he voted 95 percent of the time with Trump beforehand.  But it's never too late to do the right thing.

That is, until this godawful bill passes.  Tillis's only definite company in his own party in opposition to the bill is Rand Paul of Kentucky, who loathes the exorbitant spending on the tax cuts and finds the bill distasteful and fiscally irresponsible.  Like Tillis on health care, Paul is completely consistent here.  But currently there's no sign that the two extra Republicans that the Democrats need to derail the bill in the Senate are ready to step up.  Meanwhile, Republican Senator Susan Collins of Maine continues to express her "concern." 

Right now, alas, I'm afraid that passage of this budget bill is inevitable.  But then again, people said that about a Hillary Clinton Presidency, and look how that turned out.