Instead Of Whining, Dems Could Write Their Own Big Beautiful Bill

Opposition is understandable, but being the ‘Party of No’ only works when you wield power. Democrats don’t.

I may have a more comprehensive take on the “Big Beautiful Bill” once I better understand it, but there’s a political dimension to this that holds true irrespective of the specifics: if Democrats have an alternative, nobody seems to know what it is.

A little walk down memory lane:

Mitch McConnell’s GOP

One of the most unappealing features of circa-2009 Republicanism was how patently out of ideas the GOP was. W. Bush had screwed them over so badly on national security, they couldn’t really talk about it anymore. There was little appetite for traditional Republican fare like tax and spending cuts, and they were facing this monstrously popular newcomer who could out-communicate their entire starting bench in his sleep.

Lucky for them, Mitch McConnell had a plan.

Republicans didn’t need new ideas. They didn’t need new proposals (proposals that would all die in the water anyway). And they didn’t need to communicate. They just needed to dig their heels in. To say no.

No to everything. No to anything. No to the thing they wanted yesterday, and no to the thing they might want tomorrow.

Democrats found McConnell’s ‘Party Of No’ approach vexing because it struck them as so intensely unfair. Here they’d been, trying to make peace, trying to compromise, trying to appease, and how were they repaid? In obstinance. Endless cold shoulders and endless turned backs.

It worked though.

It can be hard to remember this now, in light of the global resurgence of right wing popularity, but Republicans looked pretty well cooked at the time of Obama’s ascension. They were near death as a party, and the problem was mostly of their own making. The Republican base would allow no compromise or out-of-the-box thinking, voters had emphatically rejected their usual shtick, and the hopey-changey guy was running rhetorical circles around them.

By forming a shield wall to block every single initiative, nominee, or policy tweak Obama offered, they managed to stop him in his tracks. They didn’t really get any more popular, but they didn’t have to. They succeeded in pulling the fresh new champion right down into the muck with them, and #44 never got his shine back.

The Obama-era Dems were slow to read the play, and their ultimate response helped not one single bit. They would try to ride above it. Uphold governing norms, be ‘reasonable,’ be mature, be the grown-ups, and wait for voters to reward their sanity. Obama may have been reelected, but the party-wide payoff never really came.

Double Edged Swords

A side note here, newly relevant: some of us ravens croaked ourselves hoarse at the Democrats of that period, admonishing them to use tools like budget reconciliation to pass the bigger pieces of their agenda. McConnell’s abuse of the filibuster had rendered the upper chamber a no-man’s-land, where change went to die. Nothing would get through via regular order, so the party had to adapt.

They didn’t adapt though. They let themselves be stalled. Which is another thing: the Republican strategy only worked because Democrats allowed it to.

“If we dismantle the filibuster, or maneuver around it, we won’t have it to protect us should the GOP regain power,” was the argument.

To which we crowed, “Read the room, dipshits, you won’t have it anyway. Republicans will never allow themselves to be constrained the way they’ve constrained us.”

We screamers were right, of course, not that it matters now.

The ‘Big Beautiful Bill,’ if it passes the Senate, will do so only through use of budget reconciliation, and will dodge the 60-vote threshold required of anything that can be filibustered.

So for the Obama years, we got nothing in exchange for our prudence, except legislation that was materially worse than what might have been had we damned the torpedoes. And we earned a reputation for fecklessness, cowardice, and weakness.

So now, 15 years too late, Democrats have finally learned the importance of playing hardball. They just can’t play it. Not even to save their [political] lives.

The BBB

What struck me most about my first browse of the Big Beautiful Bill is how actually not awful a lot of its provisions are. As I said up front, I need to take a wonkier dive into it. When I do, I’m sure I’ll find plenty to hate. But some of its bigger-ticket items - no taxes on social security, tips, or overtime - are likely to put some coin back in working and middle class pockets. I’m cautiously okay with that, even if it’ll be murder on the deficit.

Look, I don’t especially like this double standard, but voters only care about the deficit when Republicans tell them to. Democrats can cry all they want about the expected $2-3 trillion price tag on these tax cuts, but nobody - and I do mean nobody - will give a shit.

Democrats have justifiable objections to the bill’s other provisions, especially those that make accessing Medicaid and SNAP benefits harder. But the GOP’s packaging there is clever. They aren’t being sold as cuts, even if a lot of poor Americans will lose benefits. They’re being sold as reforms.

Take the Medicaid work requirements. Ostensibly, nobody on Medicaid need be kicked off. The new rule is that to stay on, you have to either study, volunteer, or work part time…unless you physically can’t, in which case you don’t have to.

A valid criticism of this proposal is that reporting requirements will be more onerous, creating more paperwork and bureaucratic mess. Another is that most able-bodied Medicaid recipients already work part time, if not full time.

But the first point is easily sold as a money-saver; “we’re reducing fraud.” And the second is just as easily deployed as an argument for the work requirements; “there aren’t many people who can work but don’t, so this will cause minimal pain while encouraging good, productive behavior.”

Can Democrats still fight this? Sure. I’ll even help…if they ever get around to telling me what they want instead..

What Is A Democrat?

The trouble is, I don’t know what policies Democrats actually favor in any of these areas. Their only animating principle at the moment seems to be that they don’t want the Trump and the GOP to get their way.

They don’t want work requirements for Medicaid? Fine. I can understand that. I wouldn’t push for them either. But does that mean they want better coverage? Looser requirements? Expansions?

The states actually expanding Medicaid access and coverage right are doing so only because of the Affordable Care Act. That law was passed 15 years ago! Kind of hard to argue that this is a hot priority for the Blue Team.

What, if not this Republican plan, do Democrats actually want to see enacted? Does anyone know? Do they know?

Let’s look at immigration.

Republicans want mostly closed borders. Very few Democrats want open ones. So where’s the sweet spot? Past efforts (and some still kicking around) have featured beefed up security plus better pathways to citizenship and permanent residency. Do Dems still want that?

Ruben Gallego released his own plan earlier this month, but to little fanfare. High profile Dems aren’t talking about it, it’s received virtually no press coverage since the week it dropped, and any of the components that would have appealed to Republicans will be seen to by the BBB anyway.

The Big Beautiful Bill rips open the funding hydrant for border security - there’s money for everything; the wall, ICE agents, detention, removal, and more. Voter distaste for mass immigration hasn’t been this high in 20 years, which has given Republicans an opening, not just to run (and win) on the issue but to legislate aggressively.

Democrats don’t like their proposal. Fair enough. So what, if not that and if not Gallego’s, is their alternative?

“Er…not Trump. Some of what Trump wants, sure…but like, not as spicy maybe.”

If one takes to Google, one can find answers to some of the questions I’ve posed in this piece. The odd Democrat, here or there, has weighed in on the odd component of the BBB. But there’s no consistency. No uniformity on specific counterproposals, no message discipline, and crucially, there’s no evidence of any better ideas.

One advantage to powerlessness is that nobody really expects you to accomplish anything. Democrats could be promising the moon right now, so why the hell aren’t they? At worst, nobody cares, they keep losing, and it doesn’t matter anyway. At best, people get excited, vote for them, they win, and they actually get to enact the bold thing.

Unless…that’s the problem? Unless they don’t want to in the first place?

Party Of No [Balls]

Democrats don’t wear the Party Of No mantle as well as Republicans did. It’s unfair, but it’s the reality. Republicans were able to look like stalwarts. Dems just look like whiners and sore losers.

And remember, the strategy was effective for Republicans only because Democrats allowed it to be. Democrats regarded institutional integrity and maintenance of governing norms to be more important than banking policy victories. I thought that was a poor judgement call, and that allowing Republican minority rule was foolish. For whatever reason, they didn’t listen to me!

Now, the shoe is on the other foot, and it big time doesn’t fit. Republicans are not going to allow Democrats to govern from the minority. Put differently, Democrats are powerless to stop Republicans from doing a single damn thing they want to do.

The only way forward is to make better proposals and try to sell voters on them. That’s it. That’s all there is. That’s the whole ballgame. Republicans are playing it pretty well at the moment. Democrats, meanwhile, are hiding in their dugout, thinking that if they curse Trump loudly enough, they’ll ultimately win.

Trump is popular(ish) because the status quo isn’t, and Trump is kicking it in the balls. Voters who hate normalcy are never going to reward a party promising to preserve or restore it. That was how Biden governed, it was how Harris campaigned, and it’s the posture Dems have chosen to adopt to face Trump 2.0. It’s been a loser in all three cases.

The opposite of Republican should be Democrat, not gruel. The GOP is selling Nacho Cheesier. Fine then, let’s offer up some Cool Ranch!

We’re not though. What’s on our menu? Unsalted saltines. Prune juice. Spaghetti with margarine, and dry pound cake. No frosting.

It’s not always enough to be Not Trump.