The CR That Wasn't

Interesting few days in congress and actually a good class on government corruption. The ugly sausage-making of the system is completely exposed by these shenanigans. Trying to back the people into a corner, the resident GOP/POS Speaker Mike Johnson attempted to dump a 1,547 page “continuing resolution” (CR) which should contain a few lines of text stating simply that current funding will be extended for a specific period of time. Instead it included a pay raise for Congress, funding of a key part of the government censorship of the people and a defense for the January 6 committee from investigation.

The leadership of the House: Johnson, Scalise, et al praised it as a tough but fair bill. It wasn’t, it was pork. It wasn’t even particularly good for the GOP. Elon Musk, Vivek Ramaswamy and other conservative bloggers and influencers rose up against it. This is the key point, this was the people rebelling against a horrible omnibus bill disguised as a CR, not the dictates of Musk, Ramaswamy or Trump.

Immediately, the Democrats railed on about Musk being a quasi-president. What they do understand, I think, but refuse to acknowledge, is that Musk represents the people. He is part of the people, especially now where he has no more power than the average Joe, but with a lot more influence. This bill would have made the DOGE’s job a lot more difficult and he may have simply responded to his own interests, as invested in effecting government efficiency as he is and promising to fix it, but in this case, his interests align with the people’s interests.

I want to make clear here that there are no heroes, the are no selfless servants of the people. Everyone has a stake in what’s going on, none more so than the people, but we do not elect representatives and senators to negotiate our rights and our interests away to please their donors or supporters (even though that’s what they do). To whatever degree the people can leverage the interests of Musk and Ramaswamy to our benefit, it’s our duty to support that effort with phone calls to representatives. That’s what happened, the switchboards melted down with demands to kill the inappropriately named CR.

This forced Johnson to come back with a mightily scaled-down version of the CR, a 116 page CR that Musk, Ramaswamy and Trump supported, because it added hurricane relief and relief to farmers. This was still not good enough, because 38 House Republicans refused to vote for it and all of the Democrats, who would not get their negotiated goodies, opposed it. The demand is for a clean CR, nothing but an extension.

The important part of this is that the people, those who voted to give the House, the Senate and the White House to Republicans, voted for change, for repudiation of CRs that really aren’t, that spend money on everything the people detest and fuel inflation to satisfy their donors. Not even the support of Musk, Ramaswamy and Trump could change that truth. The people are not interested in supporting someone who does not support America-First objectives, one of which is to cut spending.

A lot of people want to see relief for victims of hurricanes Helene and Milton, but that can be done outside of a CR. So can relief for farmers abandoned by Joe Biden. The people want the elected 119th Congress to make spending decisions, not the lame-duck 118th. The 119th might well not even feature a Mike Johnson Speakership due to the incredibly tone-deaf presentation of the 1,547 page omnibus CR. It was one more betrayal by the Speaker that might make his next campaign for Speaker DOA and the 119th Congress will be forced to choose a new one.

I don’t care about Musk, Ramaswamy or Trump, what I care about is freedom, both literal and financial, and when their assistance helps that cause, I support them. Where it does not, I do not.

What this demonstrates more to the Republicans than to the Democrats is that the people now have a voice, even if it is run through Musk primarily, because he has the money to primary recalcitrant politicians and has pledged to spend it there to achieve what must be achieved, which is a vast reduction in government spending, regulations and bloated bureaucracies. I’ve spoken many times of the bureaucratic dictatorship and the only way to address that, to even start pulling away at the loose threads of it, is through funding.

Never be afraid to pursue your voice in government. There are a few times the people who support Trump have pushed back against his decisions, or his guidance, where they saw it at odds with their objectives. This is how it should be. The people run this show and the more we’re able to leverage those like Musk and Trump, we should do so, but never can we let them use our power, the power of the vote and lobbying representatives, to oppress us as they are as likely to do as anyone else in positions of power. Better than anyone else, Trump understands this, has strayed and been taken to task over it.

In a proper republic, the House and Senate responds to the people. The people cannot be cheerleaders for them, but see them in their proper roles as servants. Jamie Raskin, the Democrat bomb-thrower in the House, was visibly upset that the “carefully negotiated” 1,547 page CR was shot down. He blamed Musk, but Musk is our voice. That is what Raskin was angry about, that the people rejected the CR and actually had their voices heard. As an effective politician he targeted Musk, but every time he said it, I knew he was talking about the people. It exposes what both Democrats and Republicans in the House think of the people, that they should simply accept whatever horrible bills they negotiate between each other, leaving the people out of it. Those days are gone. It will take some time for these people to understand that.

The world has shifted under their feet. Until today, they thought the only one they had to vilify was Trump, but now they know that he is a vessel for the demands of the people. Musk is smart enough to understand that the people will have to help him pursue his goals and cannot alienate them. He’s smart enough to know that the people have Trump’s back and his, but they are not sheep to be led, not anymore, but are the wolves at the door of the politician’s chamber.

This is not to say that we will not be betrayed, we will. What we must understand is that we need to be ever vigilant and enlist the help of those who will help, if just for one crucial point in time, or another. When they stray, we need to rebel. There is a chance here to make our voices heard again, if we don’t overplay our hand. Power is shifting and for now, that’s in our favor, but vigilance is the price of freedom.

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