Counting down until the Democrats fold

Excuse me if I've become overly cynical.

I've simply lowered the bar on my expectations.

Which means basically I don't expect anything good to get accomplished by the Senate Democratic majority, for the rest of this year, or even the next two years.

Today the Senate Republican leadership, led by always ornery Kentucky senator Mitch McConnell, has vowed to stand together and use their 42-vote block to filibuster every single bit of legislation during the December "lame duck session" (boy, if there was ever a more appropriate phrase!) unless Democrats introduce a bill that extends the ridiculously huge Bush tax cuts for several more years.

From the AP via Yahoo! News:

Senate Republicans threatened Wednesday to block virtually all legislation until expiring tax cuts are extended and a bill is passed to fund the federal government, vastly complicating Democratic attempts to leave their own stamp on the final days of the post-election Congress.

[..]

The Democratic to-do list also includes extending the expiring tax cuts — although they and Republicans differ on particulars, as well as a measure to keep the government in operation. But the rest of their agenda marks an attempt to court voters Democrats need in 2012 to recapture the majority, including Hispanics, gay-rights activists and organized labor.

Call it lame-duck politics.

Here's what's gonna happen: The GOP will block so-called social legislation (like the DADT repeal) until they make enough deals with pseudo-Democrats like Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson to support the tax cut extension, and it'll come up for a vote right before they break for Xmas.

And it'll pass. Of course.

As far as I'm concerned, I'm quitting the middle class. It's just not that cost-effective an economic strata anymore.

Starting tomorrow, I've decided I'm going to be super-wealthy. Yes, I know it won't be easy. But there are so many obvious advantages to being super-wealthy that I'd have to be a fool not to become a member of their ranks.

So it's gonna be huge amounts of personal wealth at ridiculously low tax rates for me from now on!

See you on Easy Street, suckers!