The Harriet Miers of Debt Deals: A Poop Sandwich, But Tasty.

Back in 2005, after winning re-election, President George W. Bush finally had the opportunity to reshape the United States Supreme Court. Throwing everyone for a loop, he nominated his own lawyer, Harriet Miers. It was a ridiculous display of loyalty for a woman who’d been an Al Gore donor. She was unprepared for the job and had no bona fides as a pro-life advocate.

Fast forward almost twenty years, and the same loud voices who reassured everyone that Harriet Miers would be a conservative’s conservative on the United States Supreme Court are now assuring us that Kevin McCarthy’s debt deal with Joe Biden is a really good deal.

To quote a blogger from the Miers deal, this too is a “[poop] sandwich, but tasty.”

The Republican debt ceiling deal will:

• Increase spending.

• Keep the green new deal.

• Keep the student loan bailout.

• Keep almost all the IRS funding.

• Not be enforceable, but they’ll say it is enforcible without providing legal mechanisms to make it so.

• Increase the debt ceiling by $4 trillion over two years to avoid a pre-2024 election fight.

• Not put any meaningful caps on discretionary spending until 2025.

Republicans claim it is a massive success because Democrats are complaining. Democrats are complaining because the spending increase will be just one percent, but still an increase. Likewise, Republicans were able to get work requirements for welfare benefits.

So we get work requirements for welfare benefits and only a one percent increase in discretionary spending, but it will increase military and veteran spending.

Republican leaders can say these are meaningful cuts, but they are only cuts in future spending growth, not actually real cuts in any spending. The debt will still grow. The green new deal will continue. The IRS will continue to persecute middle-class gig economy workers.

But hey! The GOP pundit class says it is a win because Kevin McCarthy says so. It is the Harriet Miers of debt deals — a poop sandwich of an offer, but they assure us it tastes great.