The moderates
There are two-- Collins and Murkowski. They opposed the GOP on healthcare, but both have been far more squishy on the tax bill, particularly Murkowski. Hell, Murkowski is now saying she supports repealing the individual mandate, even though she voted against "skinny repeal." Both Collins and Murkowski were basically written off as no votes throughout the negotiations on healthcare. That's not happening now. Why? Because it isn't the case now. Offer them tax cuts and... they're still Republicans. Collins could vote no. Murkowski is really, truly on the fence. That's different from healthcare, and that puts the GOP in a stronger position by far.
The "deficit hawks"
Maybe you have heard of these people. I am really sick of this term. There is no such thing as a Republican "deficit hawk" anymore. Long ago, Republicans used to care about the deficit. They used to care about the following mathematical expression: Revenue - Expenditures. If Revenue - Expenditures < 0, then you're in deficit territory, and there are two ways to address it: cut spending or raise taxes. A "deficit hawk" wants to reverse the direction of that "<" thingie. Remember Bob Dole? Once upon a time, he was a "deficit hawk." He was willing to raise taxes if it meant switching a "<" into a ">". A dude named Jack Kemp, who really hated taxes, said that Dole "never met a tax he didn't hike." But, Poppy Bush lost the 1992 election after breaking his "no new taxes" pledge, everyone in the GOP freaked the fuck out and decided that if you raise any tax, your dick will fall off, and when Dole ran for President in 1996, he made Jack Kemp his running mate. Dole didn't want his dick to fall off, so he adopted a "flat tax" proposal as his platform, lost, and then started hawking Viagra on tv while leering at Brittany Spears, because that wasn't creepy back then. Oh, wait... That was creepy, you disgusting old fucker...
Anyway, the point is that even Bob Dole stopped giving a rat's ass about deficits. There are no Republican deficit hawks. They don't exist. Ain't no such thing. Yeah, Corker and a few others are making noises, but like I keep saying, I won't believe it until I see a no vote.
I haven't seen a Republican actually care about deficits since before the Clinton administration. They make noises about it, mainly when the President has a "D" after his name. A couple of them are making noises about it now.
The burden of evidence is on them to convince me that they aren't completely full of shit. I am currently ignoring Bob Corker. Hell, I'll even call him, "Liddle Bob," sucking up the pain of typing the "d," because I have so little respect for his newfound posturing.
If he opposes this plan because it raises the deficit, I'll re-evaluate. Right now, if Trump wants to make fun of him on this, Corker deserves it. Bullshit posturing, until demonstrated otherwise.
The Drama Club
During the healthcare debate, I dubbed Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, Mike Lee and Ron Johnson "The Drama Club," because they kept pulling the, "this isn't conservative enough for me!" act, and saying, "I can't vote for this! I'm too pure and full of pain and angst!" Drama queens. Of course, none of them actually would have killed a bill that would have passed. The point was that if a bill was dead anyway, they hated it all along. They wanted to get as many concessions as possible, and the ideal is to be the one Republican who votes against a bill that passes. That way, you win on policy while posturing as the one, truest, purest conservative. Right now, Ron Johnson is the most dramatic of the drama queens, having said he won't vote for the bill. Bullshit. McConnell will give him something and he'll cave if his vote will be the determining vote. That conditional statement is the key. Johnson won't vote yes if it won't matter because he has to preen and posture. Drama club bylaws. At some point soon, the other members of the club will start making some demands, but Johnson has taken up all of the oxygen, so, ya' know, good on him.
The point about the Drama Club is that they are all, um... hyper-constipated. The problem is that there are four of them. The GOP can only lose two votes. They have a bit of a coordination problem. If all four preen and posture, then any one who "defects," in game theory terms, loses by supporting a doomed bill and looking like a cuckservative. So, all four posturing against the bill is an "equilibrium," in game theory terms.
Equilibrium conditions for the Drama Club, and the coordination problem among them, depend on the rest of the caucus. If, for example, both Collins and Murkowski are no votes, then the whole club needs to get on board and stop their melodramatics. The thing is, that's actually easier than if, say, Collins votes no, and one clubber gets to defect and vote no with Collins, because then Paul, Cruz and Lee get pissed off that Johnson called dibs on the no vote. Internecine warfare in the Drama Club! Oh, this could get fun, and that could sink the bill!
John McCain
Yup. Who knows what he'll do? He voted no on the Bush tax cuts, he voted no on "skinny repeal," and he has been quiet so far. What will he do? No clue here.
McCain may be the hardest to get because McConnell has nothing to offer him, and he has no principles whatsoever. He's just a fickle thing who likes to mess with people, in order to preen for the press once in a while. He got some great press when he did so on "skinny repeal," and it had been years since that happened. What will he do? Who knows?
Collins? A hard get. Murkowski, though, can be bought off. McConnell is throwing everything at her. She is on board with an individual mandate repeal, and on board with the concept of the tax cuts. Everything else is in the details, so... why would she vote no? Eh... The deficit hawks? No such thing. They're all full of shit. The Drama Club? That's a coordination problem to solve, but a solvable one. At the end of the day, if McCain and Collins are voting no, and everyone else is voting yes, then by holding together after getting concessions, the Drama Club get their tax cuts. They all vote yes.
So, there are pressure points here. This could fail. I still see passage, eventually, as likely. Of course, this will be hard work for McConnell because nothing is easy in the Senate, but I don't see any insurmountable obstacles here.