October 15, 2013

A Budget Deal Finally Starts to Take Shape

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I’ve deliberately avoided posting about all the dueling proposals and counterproposals in the Great Budget Showdown of 2013 because (a) it’s too damn depressing, and (b) you all know where to find Politico if you want to. However, it now appears that we’re getting close to a deal that might actually make it through the Senate:

The latest proposal would reopen the government at current spending levels until Jan. 15 and extend the federal borrowing limit until early February, according to aides familiar with the talks. Lawmakers also would begin longer-term negotiations on the budget, with the task of reaching an agreement by Dec. 13.

….The proposed agreement’s framework included no major alterations to the 2010 health-care law that Mr. Obama championed and congressional Republicans have tried to curtail.

However, lawmakers appeared to be weighing some minor changes, including new procedures to verify the incomes of some people receiving government subsidies for health-insurance costs. Lawmakers also appeared to be considering delaying for a year a fee of $63 per insured person levied on those who offer policies, including employers, unions and insurance carriers.

The way this fig leaf seems to work is that Republicans get the income verification provision and Democrats get a delay of the “belly button tax.” Since this is a genuine deal, not a demand for Democratic concessions in return for nothing, we can all pretend that it’s a completely independent barnacle that just happens to be attached to the rest of the deal. This means that President Obama can sign it while sticking to his promise not to negotiate anything in return for a debt ceiling increase. Everyone wins!

There are, of course, several reasons to remain cautious:

  • Ted Cruz might decide to filibuster the deal. The odds are probably against it, but you never know.
  • The House might refuse to vote on it.
  • Even if it passes, all it does it set everyone up for (appropriately) a Groundhog Day rerun of the whole mess next year. But then again, maybe not. The evidence this time around has been pretty resounding that the public isn’t on the GOP’s side in this fight, and that might convince a lot of Republican fence-sitters to nip things in the bud if the tea partiers try to start another hopeless war in February. Right now, public irritation with the budget fight probably hasn’t had any real effect on next year’s midterm elections, but if Republicans do it again and again, it might.

So….that’s where we are. Stay tuned.

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WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

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