Now that the election is over, those of us who try to discern the future via myopic readings of news events—as opposed to via objective analysis of quantitative data, like a jerk—have to find something new to conjecture about. Fortunately, by which I mean to our grave misfortune, there’s that fiscal cliff. If Congress does not reach a deficit-reduction agreement by the end of the month, it will trigger massive automatic cuts to domestic and military spending that coincide with the expiration of temporary tax cuts to wreck our economy. Or Congress can decide that won’t happen, since they’re the ones who put the sequester in place to begin with, but we’re going to pretend that’s not an option. They need to make a deal. What that deal might look like has gotten a little clearer, maybe, depending on how you read this.