THe need for Boehner to add the BBA requirement to his bill to get it to pass last week is what brought about the bill we have today.
Boehner’s original bill had some slim chance of passing the senate, because it was rather similar to the final deal, except it had better triggers.
But with BBA, it guaranteed that the senate would simply reject it, because the Senate knew the BBA provision gave them political cover to reject it.
Then the Senate couldn’t pass anything either, so they ended up with this bargain.
At least the Senate couldn’t pass their bill, if they had it would be even worse. But this is not as good as Boehner’s original bill (the one before the BBA).
Well, the problem was boehners bill last week was better than this one, but wrists still had to be twisted to pass it because it still stunk, and it’s passage open the door for the final bill. Our side needed to kill the boahner bill and either go back to CCB or come up with a more favorable alternative that would have been the basis for final negotiation. the Boehner bill was crafted with the reid and McCain el staffers specifically as a Trojan horse to force conservatives to accept that general structure while everyone knew another less favorable bill would be thrown back at the House on the final day. Now our side is doing shady back room deals just like the left. Not good.