The debate performance of President Biden, and the discussion that followed gave me a sense of déjà vu, thinking of my time as a young man working on Capitol Hill as Chief of Staff for a Republican Members of the House during President Nixon’s Watergate crisis.
The Member I worked for was in a swing district in the NYC area and he had a political dilemma: come out against Nixon and run the risk of losing the Republican primary, or support the Republican President and risk losing the General Election. Then when the White House tape recordings of the President talking to aides was released it became obvious that he would have to vote to impeach the President.
What happened as leading Republicans became convinced of the President’s guilt a group of the most senior Senate Republicans went to the White House and told President Nixon he no longer had their support, they would vote to impeach, and he should resign from the Presidency.
While not the criminal factor the Republicans faced after the release of the Nixon tapes, President Biden’s debate performance raised serious questions as to his ability to run for a four-year term at age 81. With gains in medical science more and more Americans have seen friends and relative suffer cognitive decline as they age, and many saw those symptoms in President Biden Thursday night. Over the weekend Democratic leaders came out in support of the President dismissing his performance as “over preparation” or just a bad night. But the efforts to dismiss what everyone saw reminded me of the classic Marx Brothers line “do you believe me or your lying eyes.”
This is obviously unchartered territory, but it appears that the only way President Biden can be replaced as the Democratic nominee is to not accept the nomination. Nearly all the delegates are bound to vote for the President on the first ballot by state laws. Clearly, a new factor has been added to the race for President after the Thursday debate.
FY 2025 budget
The annual process to approve a budget for the 12 program areas of the US Government is underway with the US House approving three major budget areas last week.
The US Government runs on a fiscal year that begins on October 1, meaning that some budget action needs to be taken by Congress and approved by the President prior to midnight on September 30th. To avoid a government shutdown at midnight on the 30th Congress passes a Continuing Resolution (CR) that keeps government departments running at the spending levels approved for the just concluded fiscal year. Some areas such as Defense often get approved ahead of the deadline as both parties agree that new spending priorities need to be established.
Last week the House passed three important program areas: defense, homeland security and foreign affairs. However, as the Republican House has done on other major legislative programs, they filled the bills with social amendments ranging from abortion to gender equality that turn the bipartisan bills into partisan legislation Democrats can’t support.
Last week the House vote on Defense was 217 YES to 198 NO. Similarly, on Homeland Security the vote was 212 Yes to 203 No, and the State and Foreign Operations the vote was 212 YES to 203 NO. Changes will be made by the Democratic Senate, and then the two bodies will need to work out a bipartisan spending plan that can also win the support of the White House. With the August recess only a month away, and the election year calendar shortening the time for Congress to act, a Continuing Resolution seems more likely with the passing of each week with no bipartisan agreement.
