It's broken. Let's break it some more...

A deal was made. No one likes it. Therefore it must be good... From what I've heard, it's dreadful.

I have a few problems with it. Acknowledging that cuts have to be made, something I'm not at all convinced of, I think the cuts are aimed at those who can least afford them. And it does nothing to raise taxes; even the various tax loopholes are preserved.

It was fun watching the Tea Party and the Republicans going at each other so viciously; in the end, the Tea Party proved that you don't have to have a plan to change Washington - all you need is belligerence, idiocy, obstinacy and the power to veto and undermine your own party. "The American People" was said so often I think it became worn it. In all the interviews I heard, including Don Lemon's, I don't think I heard any Tea Party person argue coherently; I heard platitudes and sweeping statements of intent. But not much else.

The tactics of the Tea Party weren't quite as fun or interesting; if John Boehner moved in their direction, they moved the posts. They did it so often it became apparent that they weren't actually being serious; they were trying to shut the government down. (They may succeed yet!) Instead of pausing to ask if this was a good idea, they kept on and on and on. In the end they overreached, diminishing themselves as individuals and as a group. The more frightening thought was that they were concerned about their local primaries! If they didn't cow tow to the party line (so much for individualism, eh?) the local party bosses would put up someone who was more hardline reactionary and conservative. It was like a replay of the Christian Evangelicals gaining all that power a few years ago; the difference was that they didn't wield the political power the Tea Party has.

Overall the spectacle wasn't of sausage making; it was of a bunch of ill-tempered children ruining everything for everybody because the ride was broken. And they were the ones who broke it.

Carolyn Ann