One, Big Beautiful Bill (The Mega-Bill)

[PAF]

So it's passed. I'm indifferent. In theory I agree with all of you who want a balanced budget and to pay down the debt. But it's never going to happen.

With this either some zeros are added and more money printed or it all crashes down. Either is fine with me.

Consensus among the people. Right on

Which is exactly why things are the way that they are.

Good grief.

 

[Voluntarist]

PROVISION: Waiver For Non-Contiguous States
Guess who's vote this one is targeted at getting
This is fine tuning on the revision to cuts in Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).

The irony of all this is that the GOP SNAP provisions are designed to punish the states with high payment error rates (PDF here); but the GOP is trying to exempt Alaska, which has the highest payment error rate of any state in the Union. Alaska's error rate is 24.66% compared to the US national average of 10.93%. The other "non-contiguous state, Hawaii, has an error rate of 6.68% - and that's just above the 6% threshold that has been proposed in the SNAP provision as a trigger for states to begin sharing in SNAP benefit costs (so exempting "non-contiguous" Hawaii isn't really going to benefit them that much). This is the sausage-making that Congress goes through on this $hit.

Senate GOP scrambles to save Alaska SNAP carveout

Senate Republicans are racing to salvage a food aid carveout for Alaska and Hawaii in their policy megabill after the parliamentarian privately signaled the plan wouldn’t meet strict Senate rules as written.

The Senate parliamentarian Monday afternoon signaled that the provision, designed to appease Alaska’s GOP Sens. Lisa Murkowski and Dan Sullivan, would need to be reworked. But she hasn’t issued a final ruling, according to two people with direct knowledge of the matter.

The provision would allow Hawaii and Alaska to be temporarily exempt from the GOP’s controversial plan to make states pay for some Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits for the first time, allowing those two states to avoid hundreds of millions of dollars in new food aid costs.

Republicans are revising the provision with just hours to spare. The protections for Alaska will be key to keeping Murkowski’s and Sullivan’s support for the megabill.

The two senators have been especially worried about how the SNAP cost-share plan will impact their home state, which has the highest error payment rate in the country.

 

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[Occam's Banana]

Before it passed the House, the Massie and Musk crowd cited exactly zero positives of the bill. Now, they are whining that all these good things are being stripped out or watered down.

Or what amounts to the same thing, from the other direction:

Before it passed the House, the Massie and Musk crowd cited many negatives of the bill. Now, they are mocking the fact that even the relatively few positives are being stripped out or watered down.
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[familydog]

Or what amounts to the same thing, from the other direction:

​

Before it passed the House, the Massie and Musk crowd cited many negatives of the bill. Now, they are mocking the fact that even the relatively few positives are being stripped out or watered down.​

​

You would have a point if that crowd actually cited any positives prior to the Senate butchering it.

 

[PAF]

Elon Musk is [paying his social media staff] saying all of the right things. In fact, he sounds too good to be true.

The administration’s efforts to compile data began under Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency initiative, which sought Americans’ personal data from multiple agencies including the IRS, the SSA, Selective Service, Medicare, and many others.

Trump Is Building a Bigger Deep State with the Help of "Libertarian" Peter Thiel | Mises Institute

JD Vance is Palantir’s man and every call for “Vance 2028” is likely music to the ears of the deep state and its Big Tech allies.

mises.org

 

[Occam's Banana]

What’s the point of a government if all they do is steal money from us?""

That is the point.

(It's one of the biggest reasons they replaced the Articles with the Constitution.)

 

[TheTexan]

Elon Musk is [paying his social media staff] saying all of the right things. In fact, he sounds too good to be true.

​

Very sus. Now that I think about it, Massie [or his staff] says all the right things too.

Very very sus.

 

[nikcers]

What’s the point of a government if all they do is steal money from us?""

That is the point.

(It's one of the biggest reasons they replaced the Articles with the Constitution.)

John Adams said the point of the government he created as one of our founding fathers is to make people happy and for people to consent to it since they were unhappy with Monarchy and didn't consent to it.

 

[unknown]

 

[Occam's Banana]

You would have a point if that crowd actually cited any positives prior to the Senate butchering it.

Why should one be at all obliged to cite the relatively few positives of a bill one believes to be mostly negative (especially when - just as happened here - those fewer positives can reasonably be expected to end up being neutered or eliminated)?

It makes no sense to expect others to laud or tout the few virtues (if any) of a thing they otherwise oppose due to what they deem to be its weightier vices.

 

[nikcers]

Yeah we also have had tremendous growth in our country.

We are the world's sole global super power and we are the 3rd largest country by population size.

If we had a small economy with with our population 160 million of us would be farmers and we wouldnt have a space program to go to mars.

 

[nikcers]

Why should one be at all obliged to cite the relatively few positives of a bill one believes to be mostly negative (especially when - just as happened here - those fewer positives can reasonably be expected to end up being neutered or eliminated)?

It makes no sense to expect others to laud or tout the few virtues (if any) of a thing they otherwise oppose due to its weightier vices.

Thats usually the idea behind when people say if you didnt vote you have no right to complain.

You can only say that passing a spending bill is going to destroy the country so many times before people catch on.

It's like pretending to throw the ball. My dog falls for it once or twice but eventually my dog just stares at me and doesnt run for it.

 

[unknown]

 

[Occam's Banana]

Elon Musk is [paying his social media staff] saying all of the right things. In fact, he sounds too good to be true.

Very sus. Now that I think about it, Massie [or his staff] says all the right things too.

Very very sus.

I can't stand it when people say the right things.

Especially when they're in a position to widely disseminate and bring more attention to the right things that they say.

Really, it's just so deplorable and tragic.

 

[familydog]

Why should one be at all obliged to cite the relatively few positives of a bill one believes to be mostly negative (especially when - just as happened here - those fewer positives can reasonably be expected to end up being neutered or eliminated)?

It makes no sense to expect others to laud or tout the few virtues (if any) of a thing they otherwise oppose due to its weightier vices.

I've never claimed anyone is obliged to say anything about anything. I was simply pointing out that absurd nature of whining about good things being taken out or watered down when they never praised those things to begin with.

There are/were plenty of individual items worthy of praise in the House passed version of the bill, even for Massie and Musk. Now, whether you think the trade offs are worth it when it's combined with bad things in the bill is a separate argument. But it's disingenuous to say there were few virtues in it.

 

[unknown]

 

[nikcers]

Illegals are being deported and not being let into the border.

If you don't want illegals to get things you have to prevent them from being here.

Nobody seriously wants a hospital to turn someone away and let them die if they end up somehow making it past our border security and are dying and cannot pay for life saving care.