This was an interesting and different take on the shutdown and I have to say I agree with it. If this was indeed performance, the performance is getting panned by the critics as well as the audience. The audience is throwing trash on the stage and demanding a refund. If nothing else, more people are now aware of the party leadership's total bankruptcy. Anger has shifted away from the traiterous eight and is now directed at the party, itself.
Trump won in 2016 and again in 2024 because the Dems, in the form of Obama/Clinton/Biden/Harris, failed to act in any way sufficient to the Dem Party having been complicit in 40 years of the middle/working class being financially undermined and politically marginalized by Neoliberal Trickle-down economics.
Inflation and affordability have now been adopted as the main issues for the disenchanted American middle by mainstream pollsters, economists, and pundits as the culprit. This is such weak tea. It turns EPI-phenomena into explanations for popular disenchantment that is so much more fundamental and, at least to me, obvious. ‘Inflation,’ ‘prices,’ and ‘the cost of living ‘ are just proxies in the popular mind for how precarious, exhausting , demeaning, and impossible for many tens of millions of Americans is the struggle to ‘make it in America.” Please read that sentence again — and again.
We, the professional and managerial elite have arrogated to ourselves the keys to relative security and prosperity in a socio-political order that values what we do most. And we continue to fail to appreciate how complicit we are in the decades-long evisceration of the middle/working class.
How to “Make it in America” as a middle/working class person/family is the most important ‘popular’ issue over the last 40 years. It spans well more than a generation. And as Tuesday showed, America’s middle/working class (and youth, more generally) are still waiting for one of the parties to actually champion and act in serious, epic, and epoch-defining ways to ensure that the average person can actually ‘Make it in America.’
I’m entirely confounded by the continuing failure of the punditocracy — let alone the Democratic Party — to understand this and to insist that the party recast and recommit itself to this simple, obvious, and overwhelmingly important cause of being the party of Making it America.
"Since Democrats have shown no appetite to meaningfully challenge Trump on economic policy..." What would a meaningful challenge look like? And in what forum?
The truth is that this comes down to a question of political power, and the Democrats don't have enough power to challenge Trump right now, and they won't have that power unless they get either the House or the Senate back in 2026. Or, better, both. (Because Donald Trump is a con man and a grifter, and some of his crowd are even sketchier, and some even sketchier than them.)
Based on the wobbly example of the GOPs Ted Cruz in 2013, the Dems figure on getting a similar result--Cruz eventually gave in after 16 days, but the Republicans somehow managed to leverage it to their benefit in the 2014 midterms (the GOP already holding the House, they flipped the Senate.) Or maybe that was just a coincidence, and government sideshows are forgettable--if expensive--sideshows, with foregone conclusions. I mean, come on, Christmas is coming.
I get the frustration of the Democrats, but I think the shutdown was questionable. It was an easy thing for Donald Trump to stonewall, which he would have continued to do even if the filibuster rule had held. Trump knew that he could hold out longer than the Congress.
The best thing the Democrats can do at this point is to just document the ill consequences of the spending cuts to important services as they mount, and make that their narrative into November. If they can make their attempt to roll back those spending cuts by shutting down the government into part of the story, maybe it will benefit them. I don't know. The Dems have some other problems.
I think Trump's tax cut is a disaster, his spending cuts are incoherent, and a lot of the current sleight of hand about tariffs--protracted negotiations and renegotiations, shifting rates, etc.--is about delaying their impact on prices, to ensure that American consumers won't feel it in their wallets until 2027. I don't know if that tactic will be successful. But Republicans do actually understand the only political goal that matters is the midterms. In contrast to the Democrats currently rending their garments and tweeting hot takes about primarying Angus King.
Evelyn, your work truly is like a light shining through so much muck. I knew the shutdown was a show, but the details and underlying motives weren't clear. Thanks.
Your analysis made the most sense to me of any I’ve read so far. One thing that isn’t clear to me is what is available to Democrats in Congress right now other than performative gestures, as they are completely out of power. I’d welcome a follow-up piece from you on what effective Congresional opposition should look like under present circumstances. (I somehow don’t think Khanna blaming Schumer is anything other than purely performative, too.)
Schumer didn't want to do a shutdown previously and was condemned for being a wimp (for lack of a better word). So he agrees to shut it down for ACA subsidies and is betrayed by some "moderates" in his own party. So the whole thing was kabuki theater?
My wife was on obamacare, she is now on Medicare. I had her look at her obamacare options as if she was still eligible. WOW!. A couple years ago she had a $6000 deductible, now it would be $20,000 deductible. An absolute, fucking joke and it is not in the least a funny joke.
I'm pretty sure you're right about all this though Bernie's reaction does give me pause b/c I don't see him as a virtue signaler, I think he sincerely believed the shutdown strategy made sense.
Yes I did see this and it confounded me too. Did you watch his speech? I haven’t yet. I wonder if he makes a broader point about the corporate state or Medicare For All…
Wait a minute. Your article is a proxy analysis of a proxy war served to the powers of the performative nihilists on both sides of the aisle. You could gain some insight by speaking with the rank and file who know they’re being fucked by the fascists on one side and the wholly owned subsidiary Vichy fucks on the other side. Some of us wanted the fight to go on and were willing to sacrifice because we know we’re fucked by the lot of you. Fucking Ezra Klein has an abundance of superiority bullshit. Those on the receiving end of pain, deprivation and depreciation unleashes some uncontrollable variables which some of us desire because it typically leads to realignment in unpredictable ways. Some of us prefer that to oligarchic autocracy delivered with a faux opposition helping to usher it in. Your views are outdated as evidenced by your citation to Ezra pinhead Klein as a spokesman for the opposition. You’re way behind the curve.
This proxy war take is really interesting and probably right. I think the problem for both parties is they’re losing control of the audience. The curtain is being drawn back and we don’t like what we see.
The extreme Zoomers on both sides want to wreck it all and rebuild....each with their own extreme views. The older order, left and right, wants to keep things the way they are and see no need for any "reform" because they built the system to their advantage and they are set. For most of us in the middle, it's like watching a teen dystopian movie, but in real life.
In order to “fight “ one must have a target to attack. The one legitimate target are the corporations and billionaires who extract everything from people and resources without any meaningful reciprocity. James Tallarico is doing a great job pointing out where the fight should be. But Democrats can’t fight there because they’ve sold out.
And they sold out quite a while ago, most notably Obama with the 2008 crash. Within a year banks were back on their feet, he hamstrung Elizabeth Warren, and today there are still Americans who have not recovered from that crash.
Other organizations like Indivisible and 505051 recognize, rightly, that they need to remake the Democratic Party. As much of a challenge as that is, it looks like it’s easier to do that then start a whole new party if the Green party or the Libertarians are any measure.
At this point, it’s almost impossible to tell what part of politics if any, is genuine or real. I assume it’s all performative.
And I don’t know how that will ever change because the basic problem is the American people. We are buying & large ungovernable. We don’t want to pay the dues that citizens must pay to have a non-performative responsive government.
Our history is littered with times when the people have woken up become responsible and a decade or two later have fallen back asleep.
I hope independent movements can course correct the Democrats and their sellout philosophy to corporations and billionaires. I hope they can become the party we, the people, need them to be.
And if it takes us a decade to fix the problem, we will enjoy a decade of bounty and in 30 years Americans will be right back here again.
This is the basic problem we all share: we keep making the same mistake again and again, and we keep getting the same results, again and again.
And each time the cycle unfolds Americans are shocked as hell.
When American citizens stop being performative in their citizenship, perhaps they will be able to maintain a government that isn’t performative and truly meets their needs.
This was an interesting and different take on the shutdown and I have to say I agree with it. If this was indeed performance, the performance is getting panned by the critics as well as the audience. The audience is throwing trash on the stage and demanding a refund. If nothing else, more people are now aware of the party leadership's total bankruptcy. Anger has shifted away from the traiterous eight and is now directed at the party, itself.
This is so clear and righteous I welled up.
Congress is in a play and the President and his admin are in a movie.
We are the extras and stunt performers. We are paid little and ignored. No credits roll for us. Ever.
Trump won in 2016 and again in 2024 because the Dems, in the form of Obama/Clinton/Biden/Harris, failed to act in any way sufficient to the Dem Party having been complicit in 40 years of the middle/working class being financially undermined and politically marginalized by Neoliberal Trickle-down economics.
Inflation and affordability have now been adopted as the main issues for the disenchanted American middle by mainstream pollsters, economists, and pundits as the culprit. This is such weak tea. It turns EPI-phenomena into explanations for popular disenchantment that is so much more fundamental and, at least to me, obvious. ‘Inflation,’ ‘prices,’ and ‘the cost of living ‘ are just proxies in the popular mind for how precarious, exhausting , demeaning, and impossible for many tens of millions of Americans is the struggle to ‘make it in America.” Please read that sentence again — and again.
We, the professional and managerial elite have arrogated to ourselves the keys to relative security and prosperity in a socio-political order that values what we do most. And we continue to fail to appreciate how complicit we are in the decades-long evisceration of the middle/working class.
How to “Make it in America” as a middle/working class person/family is the most important ‘popular’ issue over the last 40 years. It spans well more than a generation. And as Tuesday showed, America’s middle/working class (and youth, more generally) are still waiting for one of the parties to actually champion and act in serious, epic, and epoch-defining ways to ensure that the average person can actually ‘Make it in America.’
I’m entirely confounded by the continuing failure of the punditocracy — let alone the Democratic Party — to understand this and to insist that the party recast and recommit itself to this simple, obvious, and overwhelmingly important cause of being the party of Making it America.
"Since Democrats have shown no appetite to meaningfully challenge Trump on economic policy..." What would a meaningful challenge look like? And in what forum?
I was thinking about a real left agenda here!
from your mouth to god's ears as my grandma used to say
The truth is that this comes down to a question of political power, and the Democrats don't have enough power to challenge Trump right now, and they won't have that power unless they get either the House or the Senate back in 2026. Or, better, both. (Because Donald Trump is a con man and a grifter, and some of his crowd are even sketchier, and some even sketchier than them.)
Based on the wobbly example of the GOPs Ted Cruz in 2013, the Dems figure on getting a similar result--Cruz eventually gave in after 16 days, but the Republicans somehow managed to leverage it to their benefit in the 2014 midterms (the GOP already holding the House, they flipped the Senate.) Or maybe that was just a coincidence, and government sideshows are forgettable--if expensive--sideshows, with foregone conclusions. I mean, come on, Christmas is coming.
I get the frustration of the Democrats, but I think the shutdown was questionable. It was an easy thing for Donald Trump to stonewall, which he would have continued to do even if the filibuster rule had held. Trump knew that he could hold out longer than the Congress.
The best thing the Democrats can do at this point is to just document the ill consequences of the spending cuts to important services as they mount, and make that their narrative into November. If they can make their attempt to roll back those spending cuts by shutting down the government into part of the story, maybe it will benefit them. I don't know. The Dems have some other problems.
I think Trump's tax cut is a disaster, his spending cuts are incoherent, and a lot of the current sleight of hand about tariffs--protracted negotiations and renegotiations, shifting rates, etc.--is about delaying their impact on prices, to ensure that American consumers won't feel it in their wallets until 2027. I don't know if that tactic will be successful. But Republicans do actually understand the only political goal that matters is the midterms. In contrast to the Democrats currently rending their garments and tweeting hot takes about primarying Angus King.
Evelyn, your work truly is like a light shining through so much muck. I knew the shutdown was a show, but the details and underlying motives weren't clear. Thanks.
Thank you so much :)
Your analysis made the most sense to me of any I’ve read so far. One thing that isn’t clear to me is what is available to Democrats in Congress right now other than performative gestures, as they are completely out of power. I’d welcome a follow-up piece from you on what effective Congresional opposition should look like under present circumstances. (I somehow don’t think Khanna blaming Schumer is anything other than purely performative, too.)
Maybe I am wrong, please feel free to correct me.
Schumer didn't want to do a shutdown previously and was condemned for being a wimp (for lack of a better word). So he agrees to shut it down for ACA subsidies and is betrayed by some "moderates" in his own party. So the whole thing was kabuki theater?
My wife was on obamacare, she is now on Medicare. I had her look at her obamacare options as if she was still eligible. WOW!. A couple years ago she had a $6000 deductible, now it would be $20,000 deductible. An absolute, fucking joke and it is not in the least a funny joke.
obamacare = go die.
Schumer was not betrayed. He helped orchestrate this outcome.
I won't stick up for him. I can't even stand to look at him.
I'm pretty sure you're right about all this though Bernie's reaction does give me pause b/c I don't see him as a virtue signaler, I think he sincerely believed the shutdown strategy made sense.
Yes I did see this and it confounded me too. Did you watch his speech? I haven’t yet. I wonder if he makes a broader point about the corporate state or Medicare For All…
Wait a minute. Your article is a proxy analysis of a proxy war served to the powers of the performative nihilists on both sides of the aisle. You could gain some insight by speaking with the rank and file who know they’re being fucked by the fascists on one side and the wholly owned subsidiary Vichy fucks on the other side. Some of us wanted the fight to go on and were willing to sacrifice because we know we’re fucked by the lot of you. Fucking Ezra Klein has an abundance of superiority bullshit. Those on the receiving end of pain, deprivation and depreciation unleashes some uncontrollable variables which some of us desire because it typically leads to realignment in unpredictable ways. Some of us prefer that to oligarchic autocracy delivered with a faux opposition helping to usher it in. Your views are outdated as evidenced by your citation to Ezra pinhead Klein as a spokesman for the opposition. You’re way behind the curve.
This proxy war take is really interesting and probably right. I think the problem for both parties is they’re losing control of the audience. The curtain is being drawn back and we don’t like what we see.
The extreme Zoomers on both sides want to wreck it all and rebuild....each with their own extreme views. The older order, left and right, wants to keep things the way they are and see no need for any "reform" because they built the system to their advantage and they are set. For most of us in the middle, it's like watching a teen dystopian movie, but in real life.
In order to “fight “ one must have a target to attack. The one legitimate target are the corporations and billionaires who extract everything from people and resources without any meaningful reciprocity. James Tallarico is doing a great job pointing out where the fight should be. But Democrats can’t fight there because they’ve sold out.
And they sold out quite a while ago, most notably Obama with the 2008 crash. Within a year banks were back on their feet, he hamstrung Elizabeth Warren, and today there are still Americans who have not recovered from that crash.
Other organizations like Indivisible and 505051 recognize, rightly, that they need to remake the Democratic Party. As much of a challenge as that is, it looks like it’s easier to do that then start a whole new party if the Green party or the Libertarians are any measure.
At this point, it’s almost impossible to tell what part of politics if any, is genuine or real. I assume it’s all performative.
And I don’t know how that will ever change because the basic problem is the American people. We are buying & large ungovernable. We don’t want to pay the dues that citizens must pay to have a non-performative responsive government.
Our history is littered with times when the people have woken up become responsible and a decade or two later have fallen back asleep.
I hope independent movements can course correct the Democrats and their sellout philosophy to corporations and billionaires. I hope they can become the party we, the people, need them to be.
And if it takes us a decade to fix the problem, we will enjoy a decade of bounty and in 30 years Americans will be right back here again.
This is the basic problem we all share: we keep making the same mistake again and again, and we keep getting the same results, again and again.
And each time the cycle unfolds Americans are shocked as hell.
When American citizens stop being performative in their citizenship, perhaps they will be able to maintain a government that isn’t performative and truly meets their needs.
The top 1% in NYCity ( and elsewhere) pay about 40% of the city taxes. Do Democrats really want to boost the Floridian real estate market again ?
When and where was the republican party open to extending ACA credits????
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/11/us/politics/obamacare-subsidies-government-shutdown-congress.html
Man, you're good! Hope you'll weigh in on Open AI's proposed government bailout of. . . Open AI.
And all the substackers, who benefit by weighing in on the purported theatrics, feigning outrage for the poor electorate.
https://cliffwilliams.substack.com/p/the-vote-that-proves-congress-allegiance?r=237mn9
This is perfect! So well written, as well. The reasoning is sound.