Trying to Clear the Foggy Air in DC: The Country’s Woes Are Building
But some are still upbeat even after losing faith in gov’t and institutions
Washington’s mood is as overcast as its skies this fall, clouded by gridlock, rancor, and a deepening loss of faith in the nation’s governing institutions. From the broken appropriations process that has kept the federal government in a costly shutdown, to escalating partisan brinkmanship over the filibuster and judicial appointments, dysfunction has become the capital’s defining feature. President Trump’s impulsive rhetoric, congressional paralysis, and missteps in the administration’s shutdown management have only amplified the sense of drift. Yet amid the disillusionment, a quieter optimism persists among ordinary Americans who, weary of Washington’s failures, keep living, working, and believing that the country’s enduring spirit — not its government — will ultimately steady the nation’s course.
(1) Filibuster. Some observers and GOP senators like Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) believe the Democrats will very likely end the filibuster when they eventually get control of the Senate and White House. Sen. Cruz says that means (1) two more states (DC and Puerto Rico) and thus four more Dems in the Senate; (2) four more Supreme Court Justices to neuter the conservatives on the bench; (3) making illegal immigrants legal, thereby making Texas a Democratic state; (4) federal takeover of elections. So, what is to stop that when the Dems get back in, especially with the party now controlled by far, far left Democrats? That is why some Republican senators are saying the GOP at the minimum needs to modify the filibuster to (1) get the government shutdown stopped and (2) possibly include fiscal year appropriations because the current system is broken.
Says a veteran Washington contact: “All of this creates a vacuum… and in this vacuum the Executive Branch steps in. If the 60-vote threshold for the filibuster is taken away you are going to see very large policy swings from one party in control to the next… meaning the fringes of parties will be in control… that so-called middle of the electorate political pundits always talk about will be left in the dust.”
| The Senate filibuster is a procedural rule that allows any senator to delay or block a vote on legislation by extending debate indefinitely — unless 60 senators vote to end debate, a step known as invoking cloture. What it includes:•Legislation: Most bills can be filibustered, meaning they require 60 votes to move forward to final passage.•Minority leverage: It gives the minority party significant power to block or negotiate changes to legislation. What it excludes:•Budget reconciliation bills: These cannot be filibustered and can pass with a simple majority under special rules (used for tax and spending measures).•Nominations: The filibuster has been eliminated for executive branch and judicial nominations — including Supreme Court justices — so these now require only a simple majority vote.• Certain procedural or time-limited matters: Such as trade agreements under “fast-track” rules or resolutions under the War Powers Act. In essence, the filibuster still applies to most ordinary legislation, but not to nominations or budget-related bills. |
Another Washington policy contact messages: “Filibuster is vital to the character of the Senate as it was intended to function, with unlimited debate and minority rights. It’s commendable that the Rs are seeking to maintain this, and lamentable the Ds are so eager to dismantle it. Perhaps some Ds would reconsider this stance when in the majority. I don’t disagree regarding their limitless ambitions to seize and hold power once they retake the levers of government. We’ll see if the no kings protestors are as concerned about left-wing authoritarianism as they are about a popularly elected president and Congress they happen to dislike.”
| Trump Renews Push to End Senate Filibuster Amid Prolonged ShutdownRepublicans weigh risks of breaking 60-vote rule as debate exposes deep divisions over power and precedent On Fox News’ Journal Editorial Report, President Trump’s renewed call for Senate Republicans to eliminate the legislative filibuster reignited an old and volatile debate — this time under the shadow of a grinding government shutdown. “It’s time for Republicans to do what they have to do, and that’s terminate the filibuster,” Trump said Wednesday, arguing that without the change, “we won’t pass any legislation.” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) quickly countered that GOP support is not there to scrap the 60-vote threshold, but according to the Journal panel, the President is prepared to make “life a living hell” for Republicans who resist. Short-Term Gain, Long-Term Risk Columnist Kim Strassel (WSJ opinion columnist) warned that ending the filibuster could backfire politically and institutionally. “Democrats would absolutely love for Republicans to be the ones to break the filibuster,” she said. “While the GOP might do it only for appropriations, Democrats would use it to enact their entire agenda.” She called it “short-term gain but long-term risk,” arguing that scrapping the rule would remove one of the few remaining checks in a polarized Congress. Cynicism and Shutdown Politics Host Paul Gigot asked whether Democrats are prolonging the shutdown for political leverage. Panelist Alicia Finley (WSJ opinion columnist) agreed, saying Democrats once decried shutdowns as reckless but are now “extending it merely to stir up their base for the 2026 midterms.” She cited past condemnations from Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Ct.) and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) during earlier funding standoffs, contrasting them with the current strategy. “The cynicism is outrageous,” Finley said, noting the mounting toll on air travel and federal programs like food stamps. The “Hoover Dam” Problem Fellow panelist Kyle Peterson (WSJ editorial board member) dismissed the notion that the filibuster could be eliminated only for one issue — such as reopening the government — without broader consequences. “That’s like saying you’ll drill a teeny, tiny hole in the Hoover Dam,” he said. Once breached, he argued, political pressure would erode the rule entirely. Peterson warned that Democrats could use a future simple-majority Senate to enact sweeping changes — from granting statehood to Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico, to packing the Supreme Court or federalizing election laws. “Policy would swing wildly back and forth,” he said, “and if you think politics are heated now, wait until 51% can remake the country from top to bottom.” Strassel: Ending the Filibuster Would “Accelerate the Race to the Bottom” Strassel emphasized that President Trump’s warning — that Democrats will inevitably end the filibuster when they return to power — has been around for years, but she cautioned that acting on it now would hasten institutional decay. “That was the same argument the President used in his first term,” she said. “And yet, the rule survived for a while because senators like Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) were willing to resist enormous pressure from their own party to get rid of it.” She pointed out that those moderates are now gone, which increases the political risk, but also said there’s no certainty about what future Democratic majorities might do. “You could see the party swing in many different directions,” she said, noting internal divisions that could shape the next Congress. “There’s a little bit of a civil war going on there now, so we can’t tell what the future will bring.” Still, she warned Republicans that preemptively ending the rule would be “an open declaration to race further to the bottom faster.” Strassel argued that doing so would deepen the cycle of partisan escalation, eroding the Senate’s role as a stabilizing institution. “It might feel satisfying in the moment,” she said, “but it would guarantee even greater volatility in the years ahead.” Why Many Senators Still Want It Finley added that lawmakers in both parties appreciate how the filibuster forces bipartisan negotiation on major bills. “That’s where you get legislation that has to pass with 60 votes, where compromises happen,” she said. “Otherwise the majority just runs roughshod over the minority — and that’s not what the Founders intended.” Bottom Line: As the shutdown’s costs mount and partisan tension deepens, Trump’s challenge to the filibuster rule underscores the larger struggle over how power should be exercised — and restrained — in a divided Washington. |
(2) President Trump and the meat packers. Did you see his Truth Social tweet on the meat packers? Link. Judge and jury before the so-called DOJ and USDA investigation even begins. Trump threw out words such as Illicit Collusion, Price Fixing, and Price Manipulation. Even for Trump this is too much. Many do not quarrel with any investigation but do not tell the investigators what you have concluded before it even starts. And USDA Secretary Rollins is cheering Trump and DOJ’s Pam Bondi on. Trump’s emotional Truth Social comments are very close to comments previously made by Sen. Cindy Hyde Smith (R-Miss.)
Something to remember: What President Trump has to say about meat packers doesn’t translate into what DOJ finds.
(3) A totally dysfunctional Congress. While some try to defend Congress, they really are the biggest part of the current problems. The current gov’t shutdown is the direct result of the inability of congressional leaders from both political parties and appropriators from both political parties to do their jobs of finishing and voting on the 12 annual appropriations bills. That is their primary responsibility, and they have totally and completely failed. For years. For decades. Perhaps the Senate should work more than three days a week.
A veteran Washington source says: “Trying to use short-term funding to keep the gov’t open to gain concessions just seems over the top… but equally ridiculous is the fact that the party who controls Washington can’t get a single appropriations bill done on time.”
Another Washington contact says: “The country is deeply divided and that divide is reflected in Congress. Not everyone is rowing in the same direction. As for the current shutdown, it is solely the fault of Congressional Democrats who decided to shutdown government to feed their base, at so much cost to others, costs they felt confident would be blamed on Trump and Rs.”
Some news: Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) told reporters on Saturday that senators will remain in session until a deal is unlocked to reopen the government as the shutdown reached Day 39 with members still far from an agreement. When asked if lawmakers will stay in town until a deal is reached, Thune responded in the affirmative. The upper chamber was scheduled to be out of Washington for recess around Veterans Day, but will instead be in session. Thune spoke as the Senate convened for a rare Saturday session after the path toward a deal took multiple turns on Friday.
Meanwhile, in a Truth Social post (link) Saturday morning, Trump said that Congress should restructure the Covid-era credits, which expire in December, to be paid “to the people” instead of “money sucking Insurance Companies.”
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) is meeting in the Capitol with senators from both parties today to try to craft a proposal to end the 39-day shutdown. Democratic negotiators continue to insist that there’s momentum toward a deal.
Finally, Thune said that appropriators are close to wrapping up a three-bill minibus spending package (including Agriculture) and he is hoping to hold a vote this weekend. As of now, it seems like that vote will be Sunday. And given the deepening impasse on ObamaCare, it’s unclear if that package will pass.
(4) The White House, especially OMB Director Russ Vought, did the country a big disservice in the way they are operating the shutdown. For agriculture, their initial gameplan was found faulty, which is why they had to suddenly bring in a partial FSA reopening because more than a few farmers were in financial problems because of promised payments delayed by the White House decision on shutdown details, decisions that went against the usual way farm program payments were made during a gov’t shutdown. Meanwhile, USDA’s NASS/World Board was given the funding to put out delayed November Crop Production and WASDE reports for reasons tied to various farm program payments. This and a lot of other reasons show that the initial White House/OMB gov’t shutdown strategy was woefully shortsighted.
Bottom Line: The Trump administration could have tried to administer programs/government to result in the least impacts or at least chosen some to treat in this way. Instead, it chose a hammer approach. It was meant to cause Democrats to relent, but it did not work.
(5) SNAP/food stamps: Yes, the program needs reform, but during the shutdown the White House appears to have wanted to inflict as much pain as possible to the Democrats to sign on to a “clean” CR, but that strategy again did not work, and the courts have told them to pay up. The optics of this are horrible, despite the recent Supreme Court ruling on this topic. The administrative order by Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson allows the Trump administration to temporarily withhold benefits.
Bottom Line: if there was a way to keep funding SNAP, the administration should have done it.
(6) Progressive earthquake in New York: Mamdani’s win deepens Democratic divide.
New York City Mayor-elect Zoran Mamdani declared that the city is entering “an age where New Yorkers expect from their leaders a bold vision” — one that includes rent freezes for more than two million tenants, free and faster buses, and universal childcare. His victory over former Governor Andrew Cuomo was not just a local upset; it was a symbolic win for the ascendant progressive wing of the Democratic Party. “We will prove that there is no problem too large for government to solve and no concern too small for it to care about,” Mamdani proclaimed in his election-night speech.
A split laid bare. Appearing on Fox News’ Wall Street Journal Editorial Report, host Paul Gigot and a guest dissected what Mamdani’s victory means for Democrats nationwide. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), speaking from Vermont after the election, said the race revealed a “division within the Democratic Party,” one he expects to see “all over this country.” Sanders argued that progressives like Mamdani represent the future of a movement “protecting the needs of the working class and taking on big money interests.”
Doug Schoen: “A very wide chasm.” Democratic pollster and strategist Doug Schoen, who advised both Bill Clinton and former Mayor Michael Bloomberg — and most recently Cuomo — described the ideological divide as “a very wide chasm.” He predicted Mamdani’s win will “empower the far left” and trigger a wave of primary challenges against sitting Democrats in Congress and the Senate.
“Bernie clearly sees an opportunity based on Mamdani’s clear victory,” Schoen said. “As we sit here in New York, we have AOC empowered also by this result. She will either run for the U.S. Senate against Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), and she’s 20 points ahead of in current polls, or run for president.”
When asked who might stop the left’s momentum, Schoen was blunt: “I don’t see the voices that will stop it. I see the voices that will seek to accommodate and appease.” He cited New York Governor Kathy Hochul as one such example and noted that only Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) is “a very lonely and isolated voice” opposing the progressive tide with the kind of intensity once common under Bill Clinton.
Centrist resistance, or retreat? Gigot noted that moderate Democrats like Mikie Sherrill in New Jersey and Abigail Spanberger in Virginia won by emphasizing affordability and steering clear of polarizing cultural issues. Schoen agreed they are “much more the future of the Democratic Party than Zoran Mamdani,” but he warned they are not prepared to confront the left directly. “They did it more by avoidance than confrontation,” he said.
Republican troubles mount. Turning to the GOP, Schoen said Republicans “took a drubbing” in Tuesday’s elections. He attributed their losses to multiple factors — “the government shutdown in the short term, the affordability crisis, and the harsh enforcement policies on illegal immigration.” Those factors, he argued, have “helped fray, probably not permanently but certainly for the time being, the Trump coalition.”
He added that voters no longer buy Trump’s economic blame-shifting: “People are getting pretty darn impatient with Donald Trump, and that message doesn’t ring true now.” Schoen’s advice to Republicans: “Address affordability, ease up on immigration enforcement, expand SNAP benefits, and compromise on health care. Hard-right, ultra-MAGA policies will not win the day.”
A warning shot for 2026. Schoen concluded that the results should serve as “a warning shot across the bow” for Republicans and a wake-up call for moderates in both parties. “Until Tuesday, I wasn’t so sure,” he said. “Now I think it’s a great warning sign.”
Citing New Jersey, where Sherrill outperformed unpopular Governor Phil Murphy by 10 points, Schoen said voters there made clear that national issues — not just local concerns — drove turnout. “Republicans have to take this very seriously,” he warned.
Gigot’s closing note. Host Paul Gigot wrapped the segment by saying that though Donald Trump wasn’t on the ballot, “he figured prominently” in the night’s outcomes. Both parties, he said, will have to grapple with what voters told them — that the political center is uneasy, the progressive left is energized, and the old coalitions of 2024 may no longer hold.
(7) Our education system is failing as no one knows civics anymore, says an email I received. “Any democracy is in trouble if you do not educate the masses. Because the masses aren’t educated, we have few hard-hitting journalists. It is yellow journalism at best. But it’s probably ordering on just propaganda. Added to that, higher education is taking the brunt of politicians. They either must bow to the politicians or lose their funding. Some of those things need to be reformed, but right now we are killing the patient to cure their cold.”
Another reader writes on this topic: “I would never send my kid to public school or college. Not only is the education hit or miss on the basics, mostly miss, but they confuse the children with left-wing ideology and worse. You see a schoolhouse; I see a re-education camp. And that is not limited to schools/colleges. That’s societally pervasive.
(8) President Trump’s trade policy would have been on target had he stayed with his reciprocal trade strategy and dealt with allies differently than countries with clear protectionist or for other reasons tied to fentanyl and steel and aluminum tariffs. U.S. farmers (soybean, corn, sorghum, cotton, etc.) have been negatively impacted by the latest Trump trade war with China. The recent Trump/Xi truce still leaves U.S commodities prices uncompetitive due to the lingering 10% tariff on China due to fentanyl, giving China a way out of its purchase commitments. Now journalists, even including some in the mainstream ag media, call the coming Trump trade mitigation payments a bailout, when those payments will clearly not make the farmer whole, far from it. Ditto for a likely congressional farmer aid package, when lawmakers get back to work.
A veteran Washington observer says: “Trade imbalance must be addressed. It’s essential. The trade agenda that gave away the entire textile sector — once America’s largest manufacturing industry — has been an unmitigated disaster. Trump is right to try and fix that. I suppose I could quibble over details. But his focus is accurate. It’s regrettable that it blows back at ag. Hope he and Congress stand with ag to help it regain markets and provide help until it does.”
(9) Biofuel policy. It is clear to anyone looking at the growing might of Brazilian soybean production that trade alone will not cure U.S. soybean demand problems. More focus on domestic soybean utilization is needed… now. Yet the Trump administration delays making decisions on the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS) program and especially tax incentives and eligibility details are being punted to perhaps the spring of 2026. Unless trade and domestic use problems are not corrected, U.S. soybean producers will have to reconsider the number of acres planted to that crop. Ditto for sorghum producers. And most of those acres will still be planted, most likely to corn, and that eventually will boost corn production and increase carryover and bring on another problem for that crop.
But I will end on a more upbeat response I got from a good friend:
“As I shuffle, sprint and speed from one youth sporting event to the other my faith in America is strong frankly because of the last five years. Starting with Covid and continuing with Biden-is-fine, Americans have increasingly lost faith and trust in the nation’s institutions — none more than the federal government and the media that cover it. Thank God because as I look around the football crowds gathered this beautiful fall Saturday afternoon, Americans are going about their lives.
“Now, the dad I saw last night who missed 3/4’s of his daughter’s Senior night because of a ground stop at DCA… only exacerbates more the lost faith in our government and our institutions. The staff who haven’t been paid in over a month while the people they staff have. Shameful.
“The Trump administration is extremely sensitive to food price inflation. Up 30% in five years. I understand the concern, but the response is worn out Elizabeth Warren pablum. Beef prices are a proxy and a tired punching bag.
“But America keeps going and will keep going and if for no other reason, right now, despite government. Thankfully.”
Bottom Line: For all the frustration coursing through Washington — the policy swings, the shutdown brinkmanship, the tone-deaf leadership of both political parties, and the partisan paralysis — the heart of the country keeps beating beyond the Beltway. Americans have grown skeptical of their institutions, and justifiably so, but that disillusionment has also bred a renewed self-reliance and a quiet resilience. The anger and exhaustion are real, yet so is the sense that America’s strength lies not in the halls of Congress or the marble offices of the West Wing, but in the hands of those who carry on despite them. The fog may not lift soon in D.C., but across the country, the light of ordinary perseverance continues to cut through.
But a Washingtonian responds: “Optimism is not going to cure the country’s problems. It’s going to take a lot of hard work. But, first, the vast majority of Americans must wake up to the realization the country has a problem and what the nature of that problem is.My hunch is about 50% say the country has a problem and the best answer is to double down on what’s put the country here in the first place.And the other half feels the country has a problem and the best answer is optimism and nostalgia and some return to more normal times without ever really putting their finger on the problem. Truth is, if we recognized the problem, many would not want to fix it because they love it too much… You can usually see America’s future by looking at where Europe is today. Not good.”
