What About Sen Schumer?

I'm continuing to look at current public figures through the lens of what I learned working for incompetent tech managers. One of the key characteristics I began to see with all such incompetents was an inability or unwillingness to recognize the calendar. A deadline can be set many months away, and even a detailed project plan can be made and approved, but somehow people at that level of incompetence can't quantify days, weeks, or months and match those quantities to levels of effort.

Let's look at the current tasks that face Sen Schumer as Senate Majority Leader. By general consensus, his most important one is raising the debt limit, which Treasury Secretary Yellen has been insisting must be done by roughly October 18, now less than two weeks away. But there's actually less time than that, because the Senate goes on recess next week.

Schumer's problem is that he has a 50-50 Senate, with Minority Leader McConnell able to keep all 50 Republican votes in line on this issue. McConnell has been insisting that Schumer use the reconciliation process to raise the debt limit, which Schumer would be able to do with his 50 votes plus Vice President Harris able to break the tie. The problem for Schumer, which he's been aware of for some time, is that it would take several weeks to do this. And Schumer has said he's unwilling to do this.

Schumer claimed Wednesday the Senate “cannot and will not go through a drawn-out and unpredictable process sought by the minority leader.”

And Schumer doesn't have Sen Manchin's support for this strategy.

The West Virginia Democrat, who holds a pivotal vote in the 50-50 Senate, indicated to CNN that he disagrees with the strategy top Democrats are pursuing in the standoff with Republicans over raising the national debt limit. Manchin said that Democrats "shouldn't rule out anything," including a budget process that Democratic leaders have made clear they will not employ.

But Schumer has few other options. For now, McConnell has been blocking any move by Republicans to bypass filibuster or pass the measure by unanimous consent. Acccording to the New York Times of all places,

Hardball tactics by Republicans on the debt ceiling are not new. Showdowns in 1995 and 1996 shut down the government but also helped foster a balanced-budget agreement. A new Republican House majority in 2011 pushed the government so close to default that Standard & Poor’s downgraded once-unassailable U.S. debt, but it also produced the Budget Control Act, which crimped spending for years.

. . . This year was different: Republicans filibustered one measure to raise the debt limit and keep the government funded. On Wednesday, they are expected to block another measure, passed by the House, that does only one thing: lift the debt ceiling.

“There’s no bargaining,” said Senator Angus King of Maine, a moderate independent. “They’re just stamping their feet and saying no.”

. . . With every passing day, the crisis becomes more unavoidable. Each day Democrats decline to give in to Mr. McConnell’s demands to use the reconciliation process makes it that much more difficult for the maneuver to be completed in time to avoid a default. And each day the Democrats demand that Republicans blink, they reply that Democrats are to blame for not using the process when they had time.

, , , Democrats might have no choice but to pursue is changing the filibuster rules so the borrowing limit increase, and any in the future, can pass with 50 votes.

But with Manchin not supportimng Schumer, it doesdn't look like he has 50 votes to do this.

It looks like he's been badly outmaneuvered.