Examining the Impact of Legislation on Social Security and Medicare

Minutes after recording this episode, Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) provided the decisive vote for GOP legislation to kick 15-20 million people off their health insurance and give rich people a trillion dollar tax cut, along with many other horrors.

Now it’s back to the House, where hope, which springs eternal, goes to die!

In this episode, Matt and Brian discuss:

* What more could have been done to stop this?

* By whom?

* Given GOP margins and Donald Trump’s warlord-like control over the GOP, would it have made any difference?

Then, behind the paywall, could Zorhan Mamdani kill this bill … by endorsing it?

And, more seriously, what does his victory in the New York mayoral primary mean for Democrats post-2024? Is there anything Democrats in more conservative places can learn from a primary in a very blue city? Can the Democratic Party be a genuinely big tent, where centrists abide progressives (even self-avowed socialists) and progressives give red-state Democrats room to run on cultural issues?

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Further reading:

* Matt on the sewer socialists Mamdani can (and hopefully will?) learn from.

* Brian on whether Republicans’ continued obsession with “starving the beast” will return us to the era of New Deal politics.

* Matt, again, on the moderate-left synthesis: The view that an obsessive focus on cost-of-living issues is a winning move across factions.

* Brian, again, on the hard truths progressive and moderate leaders should tell their fellow travelers, for the sake of unifying against right-wing extremism.