The people selling details of the TRIGGER bill are spreading (witting or unwitting) disinformation.

[Leopolds Ghost]

They are (witting or unwitting) part of an organized disinformation campaign --

The same campaign that policymakers wage upon the rank-and-file every time they pass a bill that is designed to fail and be replaced with another, lard it up with their constituents' liberal provisions, and advertise it to the low-information rank and file as Democratic achievements.

They did the same thing with HCR and the so-called "public option".

(This is the real reason liberals like Sanders and Kucinich voted against this bill and not others -- they were released to vote as they choose, because their votes were not needed for passage.)

Get this straight -- the TRIGGER provisions are NEVER INTENDED to pass. They are based on the ones used in Gramm-Rudman.

Obama himself described the trigger mechanism as an unacceptable alternative to the Commission bill.

Then he sent out his PR flacks to praise the details of the trigger mechanism here on DU and other blogs.

That is called blatant falsehood, deception and contempt for the Democratic rank and file.

In the White House press release announcing the deal, Obama described the Trigger as a tool to force Congress to vote for the Commission report no matter what it contains, in order to take the decision out of Congress's hands. His press release specifically stated it would be viewed as unacceptable and he would use it as a boogeyman to campaign against anyone who votes against the Commission bill.

That includes liberals who vote against the bill in November.

In other words, it is Obama's version of the debt cieling -- a tool to force Congress to vote on more cuts by creating in Obama's words "an unpalatable alternative".

The Trigger is a cudgel to force the passage of whatever the Commission comes up with. (Hardly needed, since, when Congress is forced to pass something without amendments -- they always do. You don't have real democracy when dealing with a crowd of 500 paid shills who are low-information voters to boot, and can't organize amongst themselves -- Congress -- like a studio audience, they are a directionless mob. They will vote for whichever soda the ad executive tells them to.)

Also note that the Commission will be 3/4 Republican since Reid will be choosing 1/4 of the members from his Blue Dogs.

[jaxx]

1. Links?

There must be several to cover all that

[Leopolds Ghost]

3. WH Press Release, Monday.

Look it up yer own damself. See how the Internet has made people unable to communicate?

Or read the CNN article: http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x1625408

[jaxx]

5. You could have just posted them instead of having it look like

you might have written it. That's the usual way it's done. Take something from an article, give credit.

[Leopolds Ghost]

6. I already posted the CNN excerpt and it dropped like a stone. Then the disinfo campaign started

I naturally assumed that when the news of the deal first hit, that people would focus on the actual provisions of the deal as described by the people that negotiated it

But that was before I remembered both parties would go into their usual spin campaign and twist the meaning of the bill to make it palatable to their own rank and file. :shrug:

What kind of representative democracy is that?

[jaxx]

8. Well you know you will get spin from the right.

And some from the left bloggers. The interested people will go read the outlines of the bill that was released. It's the only way to survive the media blitz.

[Leopolds Ghost]

7. Clarification: I don't believe most DUers are wittingly buying into this. It is all misdirection

It is terrifyingly easy to sell most informed Americans on the idea that your representative voted for something even though it was a parliamentary trick designed to have the opposite effect.

Perhaps we need to reform Congress next.

[jaxx]

9. Reforming Congress needs to be done first.

The bills begin and end there, and they are corrupt as a bargaining unit now. JMO

[Leopolds Ghost]

10. The question is, how does one reform Congress?

I mean, Congress owns a piece of real estate in the Capital, and the Architect of the Capitol is exempt from most laws as a result. When they voted to build a bunker under the East Lawn, demolish Frederick Law Olmstead's gardens and close off their doors to anyone but members, staffers and "registered lobbyists" (with tour-only timed tickets for members of the public, enter via a security hall underground) they would not have been allowed to do so under Federal Law, but they are exempt from many laws.

[riderinthestorm]

2. Recced to zero. Unfortunately too many people don't want to acknowledge your insightful OP.

Kick back to the top for an important reminder....

[Leopolds Ghost]

4. It's all facts, yet they don't want to believe

The trigger is designed "an unpalatable alternative" -- CNN quoted White House on this

According to sources, cuts in the trigger mechanism would be across-the-board, including Medicare and defense spending, to present an unpalatable alternative for both parties in the event Congress fails to pass the special committee's proposal.

"You want to make it hard for them just to walk away and wash their hands," Gene Sperling, the director of Obama's National Economic Council, told CNN. "You want them to say, if nothing happens, there will be a very tough degree of pain that will take place."

[Newest Reality]

11. One wonders why

the unrec crowd are so quite about why.