1) Remember the basic points about "conditional party government." The majority party will allow leadership the authority to rush something through if and only if the party is ideologically unified. There are clear divisions within the GOP, but what unites them, policy-wise? Tax cuts. They love tax cuts. And not necessarily in a platonic way. As I have pointed out on many occasions so far, the question has been which taxes to cut, but once you give them a choice of tax cuts or no tax cuts, they're pretty much going to choose tax cuts. They are ideologically unified on that.
2) As always, the legislative process is easier in the House than in the Senate, for a couple of reasons. First, there are fewer people who can, in any way, be called "moderates" in the House. Paul Ryan doesn't have anyone like Susan Collins or Lisa Murkowski to gum up the works. Second, the House doesn't have people like Bob Corker or John McCain in it. Corker and McCain have signaled their willingness to stir up trouble on tax "reform," and neither have to worry about reelection, for... different reasons. So, they are going to be more brave than any Representative in different ways than any Representative. The House does have to deal with some Rand Paul-types, and remember that Rand Paul was the one Senator who voted against the budget resolution because, ooooh! Look at how dramatic I am! Yes, the House has a drama club. They're called "The Freedom Caucus." But, the Senate has both a drama club, and moderates, and retiring/dying people who don't seem to want to play along anymore. Combine that with a slimmer margin in the Senate, and Paul Ryan just has a much easier job than Mitch McConnell. (Which is good for the GOP because Ryan isn't nearly as smart as McConnell).
3) But that's not all, folks. Senate rules don't give McConnell nearly as many disciplinary tools as the House does to Ryan. A few years back, Boehner actually had to strip a few jackasses of their committee assignments because they were too fucking stupid to vote for debt ceiling increases and similarly-necessary bills, and he needed to make examples of them. In fact, one of them was Tim Huelskamp, who was later defeated in a primary by an establishment guy! Yes, that happened, and nobody payed attention because it didn't fit the popular narrative about scary right-wing primary challenges... Regardless, if anyone gets too twitchy in the House, Ryan and the Republican Steering Committee can strip them of their committee assignments. That ain't gonna happen. The point, though, is that there are stronger disciplinary tools in the House, and at least partly because of that, the House will pass some tax cuts. Will that bill look anything like the initial draft? Um... That brings me to...
4) The Freedom Caucus has to go through their theatrics. They have to look through the bill, assert that it isn't nearly conservative enough, demand concessions, call Ryan a cuckservative sell-out, and then preen for their base when Ryan gives them something. It doesn't even have to be big. Ryan just has to make a show of it. This is the modern GOP. At the end of the process, however long that takes, the House will pass something. If they could pass a "repeal-and-replace" bill, they can pass a fuckin' tax cut!
5) As I said, though, the Senate has the harder job. With 52 GOP Senators, they can lose two votes and still pass something with 50+Pence votes. Rand Paul voted no on the budget resolution. Would he cast the pivotal no vote? Probably not, but in the hypothetical world of the bill going down, he'd be happy to be one of the posturing no votes, and he'd be absolutely happiest if the bill passes, and he still gets to vote no, saying the bill didn't go far enough. Rand Paul's ideal world is one in which the House passes a bill, and the Senate passes the bill 51-49 with Rand Paul as the only dissenting Republican, claiming that the tax cuts didn't go far enough. Ooooooh, look how dramatic and pure Rand Paul would look then! On the other hand, suppose Lisa Murkowski and Susan Collins are hard-no votes, everyone else is a yes vote, and the bill has passed the House. How does Rand Paul vote? He votes yes. He's a fuckin' faker, and this is all posturing. The question marks are people like Corker. Corker has said that he won't vote for anything that increases the deficit, but... I'll believe it when I see it. Maybe Corker and McCain are hard-no votes, with everyone else in the GOP voting yes. I'm commenting on Collins and Murkowski here, and during the healthcare debate, I talked about them as hard-no votes, but they absolutely are not hard-no votes here.
Let me make that clear. I called them no-votes throughout on healthcare, but their votes are indeterminate here. Both Collins and Murkowski are gettable votes for the GOP on tax cuts. That gives McConnell a much more comfortable margin for negotiation here, and that is why this isn't a doomed prospect for the party. They could even lose Corker (who has said he doesn't want to increase the deficit) and McCain (who voted against the Bush tax cuts) and still pass something as long as they keep Collins and Murkowski on board. And that can happen.
Why is it different on taxes? Healthcare was a different issue. My reasoning on healthcare was as follows. Collins is an ideological twin of former Maine Senator Olympia Snowe, who sat on the Senate Finance Committee during the 2009-10 negotiations put together by then-Chair Max Baucus. Baucus decided that the best way to iron out the legislation was to put together a "Gang of Six," with three Democrats and three Republicans based on the premise that he could get bipartisan support for his version of the ACA. Snowe was a member of that "Gang of Six." After negotiations, Snowe voted yes to report Baucus's bill out of committee, to the Senate floor!
Yes, she fucking did!
And of the many versions of the ACA that floated around, which one actually got signed into law?
Baucus's version. The same one Snowe decided to vote yes to report to the floor. Don't fucking tell me that Snowe thought that Obamacare was the WORST BILL EVAAAAAR!!!! She voted yes because she was close to indifferent between Obamacare and the pre-Obamacare status quo. And Collins is her ideological twin, based on voting records. That's why Collins was always hard to get for a repeal vote given the batshit craziness of the "replacement" plans.
And Murkowski? On the ideology scale called NOMINATE (see Keith Poole and Howard Rosenthal's work), she's pretty close to Collins. Same deal.
Tax cuts, though? This is what makes a Republican a Republican. I haven't seen any indication from Collins or Murkowski of reluctance on this one. Corker and McCain might be idiosyncratic, as Senators can sometimes be. That's why NOMINATE doesn't perfectly predict every single vote. Hell, Rand Paul! And, if Collins and Murkowski do start getting squeamish about tax cuts, along with Corker, then this thing is as doomed as "repeal-and-replace," but until I see some real signs of that, I default to the observation that tax cuts are the glue that binds the GOP together.
That is not to say that the process will be easy. Nothing in the Senate is ever easy, and the Republican Party right now is a bunch of people who can't find their asses with both hands and a flashlight.
At the end of the day, though, this is a tax cut bill. They can probably pass a tax cut.