https://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/426668-mcconnell-bloc...
In more calm times they could just pass legislation that would end the concept of government shut downs by funding at the previous rate in the event of a failure to agree to new funding levels.
Neither side wants that because it's a good political cudgel.
Of course, I wouldn't hesitate to blame Democrats - they had the house and senate in 2008-2010 and chose not to go about abolishing the electoral college, ending the possibility of shutdowns, or insuring the loophole that let a Republican congress delay voting on a supreme court nominee for a year was closed. They didn't bring any such bills or amendments to the floor in either house and never voted on any of it, so they can't even blame filibusters.
They had absolutely no way to do that. That would require a constitutional amendment.
(There's another way around it where enough states agree to award electoral votes to the winner of the popular vote, but that also requires action by the states).
The interstate compact, on the other hand, has enough signers that it is at least plausibly going to be successful. Though there will be lots of legal challenges if it ever gets used, it's not clear they're allowed to do such a thing.
They couldn't have. It requires 2/3 of both houses. Democrats never had anywhere near that many seats.
Its why the US Democratic party isn't seen as just objectively better than Republicans even in intellectual circles. They don't actually represent abject moralistic improvement or they would push such an agenda when they had power, even if it wasn't guaranteed to succeed. They should be pressing it even now, when they have only half of congress and don't hold the presidency, to paint their opponents as against policies most of the citizens agree with.
But they don't propose them because a majority are bought and paid for by the same interests that sponsor Republicans. Talk on campaign trails about fair elections or fixing flaws in democracy or the execution of the government are cheap. When they actually are in power and make no attempt on that front you see their true colors and who their true constituents are.
For all their flaws, at least Republicans constantly brought bills to repeal the ACA to a vote over and over for years under Obama. It was only once it actually had a chance of passing under Trump that they stopped doing it knowing it would self-sabotage their reelection campaigns if rednecks suddenly lost their healthcare in many states. But that doesn't justify the "blue team" never bringing the policies they campaign on to a vote even if they have no chance on passing, because that is the whole reason many people turn out to vote for them in the first place.
Its part of why Bernie is so popular. He has a track record of constantly pushing in committee single payer healthcare and similar policies like increased minimum wage. Even when he knows he has no chance of even reaching a vote with his legislation he still tries because its his job to do so and its what he owed his electorate for what he promised when they voted for him. Hes not alone in it, but hes absolutely in a minority of ethical congressmen willing to do so.
That's because they didn't care about actually passing anything because they knew they couldn't. Passing bills they knew Obama wouldn't sign didn't distract from what they were actually trying to accomplish.
When the Democrats controlled both houses, they were trying to pass the ACA, and spending time pushing show bills that have a 0% chance of passing wasn't what they wanted to focus on.
There's no evidence these kind of political stunts are effective, much less the only moral strategy as you are suggesting.
>Its why the US Democratic party isn't seen as just objectively better than Republicans even in intellectual circles
I don't know what "intellectual circles" you run in, but most "intellectuals" I know understand there is a clear difference between parties.
A majority in the House and Senate isn't even enough to propose an amendment to do that, much less to actually do it.
Don’t throw that both sides crap in here.
In any specific case, blame is more likely to fall on the side that demands anything out of the ordinary.
So technically the processes are there for this to never happen. The problem is that the process relies on people not having malevolent intentions.
But the senate majority leader, and other spineless Republicans afraid of angering Trump's base, are exactly that set of malevolent actors that aren't willing to put country over themselves.
It's a shitty situation and I feel sorry for the government workers affected, but there are clearly multiple parties responsible here. If the plight of these workers were a real concern, if it were considered a real crisis, it wouldn't be happening.
That's the most extravagant line of reasoning I've read in this thread so far. And now my brain is in a knot. I understand you're saying parliament should have proactively made their end of the deal worse because the negotiations were a sham anyway. You realize they're still not willing to do that after negotiations have broken down?
In the end you're just blaming them for not having made a different deal earlier. But that wasn't on the table then, and isn't now. So you're just blaming them for not giving in. Which (disregarding the particulars) is a reasonable position. But somehow you've packed it up all weird.