29th
GOP Prisoner’s Dilemma?
I was thinking the same thing. What happened today is, I think, the Republicans got called on a bluff. Perhaps more than the prisoner’s dilemma, it was a game of chicken. The Republicans were sure that at the last second, the Dems would swerve off the road. Instead, the Dems decided that if the Repubs wanted to crash, they’d crash too. But because of how this works, it seems likely that the Rs will pay the price. That being said, they’ll probably cave and vote on something this week.As I listen to how things went down with the bail fail this afternoon, I’m reminded of the game theory construct called the Prisoner’s Dilemma. This simulation is intended to demonstrate that in some situations the ideal outcome (cooperation) is consistently missed because individual parties perceive non-cooperation to be rational, ultimately ending in a poor outcome for everyone.
The reason I’m reminded of the prisoner’s dilemma, is that it feels like this happened to a bunch no-name GOP House members, probably junior ones. After the leadership of both parties supported the bill, it was expected that majorities of both parties would vote yes.
The problem is that individual members would love to vote against it, because the election is in 5 weeks and most of their constituents (today) don’t like the bill. The prisoner’s dilemma comes in because I think these members assumed the others would cooperate, but THEY, the defector, could run on “I voted against BAILING OUT WALL STREET!” in November. They all thought that, they all voted no, and here we are.
