Here's a thought. Maybe the 'caving' is coming from people quick to declare the fight for the tax credit over [View all]

...as if republicans somehow squirmed out from under their own refusal to grant the subsidies RIGHT NOW; something they can do RIGHT NOW under their own votes.

Reality is that the fight for the ACA benefits is delayed until shortly after the holidays - basically the negotiated part of the deal, and backpay which will be a relief to the individuals and families whose lives and livelihoods were subject to the republican politics of refusing to use their own majority to fund government while blaming the minority party for not.

You can fight from now until then to keep the focus on the health care benefits. Republicans own it now, and it's the main topic of concern because Democratic leaders made it so.

I saw someone complaining that the handful of Dems who negotiated took all the 'umph' out of the election win, as if all of that support for Democrats was just some abstraction that maybe the internet pundits generated out in the public with their podcasts - instead of the result of the efforts of the Democratic leaders they're flailing out against without a wit of care or wisdom about who actually stirred up the concern and opposition to the ACA tax credits over the past month. Must be themselves.

A clue: It wasn't the podcasters or the media news hosts who narrate our lives like their privileged hides are actually living the things they're gaslighting us about; like their initial whinging that Dems should be talking about everything under the sun instead of the ACA credits that they're now representing as the sun and the moon.

Imagine you're one of the Democratic legislators coming off of that election and you're stamping your feet like the fight was over because their republican opponents didn't move far enough yet.

Is that really it? Or is this present expectations game just a political construct deftly played out against the present landscape, and our fight for the things republicans are taking away isn't at all immutable and the battle still as it ever was, even against the backdrop of the shutdown?

A couple of months of their own voters anxiety boiling over is what's really always been the thing most likely to move republicans, not what Democrats do or say to them. Keep trolling them and make them as nervous about the premium increases as you are.

If you look, you can see that Democratic leaders are still out there doing just that. Join them.