As the November 23 deadline looms for the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction — the “supercommittee” — to approve a deficit-cutting proposal or disband, the GOP again seems to be running the substantial risk of stealing defeat from the jaws of victory.
Recall that in the early part of the summer, House Speaker John Boehner was in the thick of negotiations with President Obama over the parameters of a “grand bargain” on the budget. The deal that was then under discussion would have required the GOP to agree to an $800 billion tax increase in return for Democratic support for entitlement reform.
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If consummated, this deal would have been a political and substantive debacle for the GOP, as it would have ended their two-decade record of holding the line on tax increases, and it would not have secured anything of real value from the Democrats. Yes, under the terms of the suggested bargain, Democrats would have had to sign up for certain cuts in entitlement programs — but those cuts came more from the Democrats’ playbook than from the GOP’s. Among other things, Obamacare would have gone completely unscathed, and the cuts to Medicare and Medicaid would have come largely from more government micromanagement of the programs, not from market-based reforms. In short, the GOP would have abandoned its main source of electoral support — an unwavering commitment not to raise the federal tax burden — in return for affirmation of the Democratic welfare state. Some deal.
Fortunately, the speaker and the wider congressional GOP came to their senses before the Boehner-Obama talks ever reached the point of a deal. The bargain that was eventually struck to raise the debt limit in early August was far superior to what had been floated earlier in the summer, as it included no new taxes and placed enforceable caps on discretionary spending. Most observers concluded that the congressional GOP got the better of the president in the debt-ceiling fight.
Unfortunately, as the supercommittee heads toward its endgame, the same impulse that almost led to a disastrous Boehner-Obama deal in July now could lead some GOP members, on and off the supercommittee, to sign on to an equally ill-advised “bargain” with the Democrats. Recent news stories have suggested that the GOP members have offered to raise taxes by $300 billion over the coming decade as part of a deal that would also include some reductions in entitlement spending. But once again, the entitlement changes will do nothing to change the basic, cost-inflating structures of Medicare, Medicaid, or Obamacare. Indeed, if the GOP were to strike such a deal, it would make it that much harder to do what really needs to be done, which is to replace the entire health-entitlement status quo with reformed programs that rely on cost-conscious consumers in a functioning marketplace.
Moreover, the deal that is apparently under consideration would also rely on Senate Finance Committee chairman Max Baucus to write the actual tax and entitlement legislation, along with his GOP counterpart in the House, Dave Camp. This is hardly a process that builds confidence, as Baucus was a primary architect of the massive government overreach that is Obamacare. Indeed, if the supercommittee’s contribution to deficit cutting is to cede power back to the regular committee process, one has to wonder, what was the point of having the committee at all?
The problems for the GOP began as soon as the supercommittee was announced as a component of the August debt-limit deal. It was quite predictable based on the structure of the committee that the president and his allies in Congress would never let a proposal emerge if it didn’t include a tax increase that would violate the GOP’s core commitment to voters. That being the case, GOP leaders should have signaled in unmistakable terms that they would far prefer no deal to a tax increase. Instead, what we have gotten is a steady stream of statements from both House speaker Boehner and Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell that the supercommittee’s failure is not an option, thus raising the stakes and driving the GOP right into the dead end they now find themselves facing.
Remember tax increases go into effect at once. The proposed reductions in the rate of spending increase, not real cuts, only go into effect, if ever, many years later.
McConnell and Boehner have done a lot of damage, from agreeing to the deal in the first place and then by who they appointed to the committee, the establishment fights harder against conservatives than they do against the Left and who suffers, all of us $15Trillion in debt and on track to $25Trillion in ten years...there needs to be a changing of the guard GOP leadership is weak.
We have been down this road before under Bush Sr. The taxes were on the front end and were implemented. The cuts never happened. This reminds me of Lucy and the proverbial football. Don't we ever learn?
These are real problems that will take more than political posturing to fix. We all know spending cuts alone is mathematically impossible to resolve the issue and we know raising taxes on its own will also not work.
Time to compromise and work for America. Quit with the hyper partisan BS.
We don't know that spending cuts alone can't do it.
We do know that spending cuts acceptable to liberals alone won't do it. But then, the only spending cuts liberals want is to eliminate the dept of defense.
The truth is that we are already over taxed, the problem is 100% on the spending side.
Why do you expect the RINOs to grow a spine? They never will. Boehner, McConnel and their bunch want the Democrats and the mainstream media to pat them on their collective heads and tell them what good boys and girls they are for going along with more taxing and spending. Until the Republican part is flushed down the toilet and replaced with a party that is truly conservative nothing in Washington will change. The current choice is between Socialism and Socialism lite.
Right on the money. Unless and until it is accepted that there is no substantive difference between these corrupt parties, nothing will change other than the continued slide toward third-worldism.
It always makes me laugh that whenever Republicans agree to raise spending, shills like Capretta and the rest of the (alleged) right-leaning Beltway media refer to it as "the GOP losing its way on the budget and taxes".
Losing its way?!? This is what they are, and always will be. One day the Tea Party will realize how they've been used by Rove and the rest of the establishment scum, and we really will get a third party. There may be some years of pain, but it is the only way we'll ever have a prayer of escaping the looming disaster.
If sequestration should occur there is NO guarantee that a future Congress will restore the military cuts. We would be left with a military that could not defend this country. The risk is too dire to take. It is not a choice.
Absolutely right. If the sequester is triggered, the military will be completely gutted, and there is NO guarantee that the Congress, half of which is controlled by extremely leftist Democrats, would reverse those defense cuts. If anything, it is very likely they would fight like two alpha male cats in a bag to keep all of these defense cuts, even if it means gutting the military. And there is no indication that Republicans would even try to reverse these defense cuts.
You are both wrong. The 2012 President and Congress can reflect the will of the people in time to avoid catastrophic national security implications. (That is unless/until this administration uses extraordinary means to assume totalitarian rule, which is not necessarily unlikely.)
for crying out loud chicken little, even if the military cuts happened twice over our military would still be more than able to defend this country. Maybe we'd have to stop garrisoning Japan and Germany, but shouldn;t we do that anyway since we are broke. How about this for a plan, the GOP should cowboy up and offer a balanced budget or nothing. Then they should have the sand to point out we are broke and it can't continue...the ball is in Obama's court then. They need only pass the house budget, and then adjourn for the rest of the year....DONE.
The cuts will never happen because, (a) even quite a few Dems don't want loss of defense dollars in their districts, and (b) those cuts can be undone in the forthcoming 2012 budget wherein for defense, if sequestration cuts total $500 billion over 10 years, the House can pass a FY 2012 budget which raises defense spending by $400 billion more than needed over 10 years. Net effect of the "sequestration" is $10 billion/ yr cuts over 10 years. Such a reduction - at a minimum - is, in peacetime with no wars ongoing, should be attainable with no deleterious effect on our military capabilities.
Otherwise, let the supercommittee fail. BUT - let some GOPer with some guts stand up and offer a narrative which the party is willing to fight for, is willing to blog about, willing to go home to their districts and discuss, willing to use the web, use facebook or any other digital communication pathway to reach the people with their story. Because the mainstream biased, media will lie, deceive, and revile them every step of the way. FIGHT BACK!
And will someone please tell me why, WHY it is that GOP always - ALWAYS - gets out thought, outflanked, out maneuvered, out politicked, out played on EVERY single issue before them. I mean couldn't any of them just think 3 or 4 moves ahead and see this coming? None of them? Either the party is full of idiots or their leadership is simply not up to the task. Either way, it's time for much, much stronger new leadership.
I realize we can't have "rookies" as Speaker and House/ Senate majority and minority leaders respectively, but something has to change.It's no disgrace for Boehner or McConnell to resign their current position and call for a sort of parliamentarian structured caucus vote on leadership. Again, no disrespect to them, but it is NOT about THEM, its IS about what needs to be done, it IS about RESULTS.
Given the current record, it just might be time for a new group, a new path, a new level of engagment - and quickly!!
Not true at all! The trigger cuts do not take effect until 2013 and by then the POTUS and many in the Congress will be different. I do agree the R's want "Big Gov." as bad as the D's. Its all a game to see which Political groups can steal, rape, and pillage the American people the most.
"And even if the supercommittee fails, a sequester is not guaranteed."
Garbage, just like the entire rest of the article. The law of the land, under the BCA, is that if the Super Committee fails, the sequester WILL be AUTOMATICALLY triggered.
"There will still be a year before any cuts are implemented, leaving plenty of time for the normal legislative process to work toward an alternative series of cuts to substitute for blunt defense-spending reductions. In other words, the demise of the supercommittee would be far from the end of the story."
Garbage! The sequester would be the end of the US military as we know it, for the reasons recently stated by Sec. Panetta. And the cuts would kick in at the beginning of FY2013 - on Oct. 1st, 2012 - almost 4 months before the next President, and over 3 months before the next Congress, will be seated. This will also leave the current Congress just a little over 10 months to work out an alternative series of cuts to replace those defense cuts - even if the Congress will be interested, which it likely won't be. That's because as soon as these massive defense cuts (which the Dems, like you, Mr Capretta, are ROOTING FOR) occur, the Dems (and some Republicans) will fight like two alpha male cats in a bag to keep all of these defense cuts. And does anyone really believe that, in the unlikely event that Republicans retake the White House and the Senate in 2012, that they will, after January 2013, reverse those massive defense cuts? I don't. Since he took office, President Obama has already imposed 6 rounds of defense cuts on the DOD, and Republicans have already accepted all of them as an accomplished fact, as the status quo, and do not question them. (Does anyone hear of any Republican lawmakers or Presidential candidates calling for withdrawing the US from the New START treaty, for example?)
"The law of the land, under the BCA, is that if the Super Committee fails, the sequester WILL be AUTOMATICALLY triggered."
Wrong, sir. No sitting congress can enact legislation which permanently binds a future congress. They can overturn this if they wish to do so. This is why, for example, they have to keep reauthorizing Social Security.
Don't worry yourself, please. Relax. It's all going to be OK. This is just political theater. They are rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic, and there's no reason to get upset. You can panic about the iceberg that is the $1.5T annual deficit - that's reasonable.
Look, the $1.2 T in cuts over 10 years is only 2% of the $50 T that we'll spend. It's tiny, it's far off in the future, and it's not guaranteed to happen. External Link
It is hard not to conclude that the Republican leadership willfully puts itself in these positions because it wants to keep taxing and spending just like the Democrats, while maintaining plausible deniability. The alternative is to assume gross incompetence. Since I just cannot believe they are total idiots, I can only conclude they are shills.
There is absolutely no value in making a deal that won't do any good. Beyond the issue of compromising principle and agreeing to revenue/tax increases without getting an adequate amount of spending cuts in return, having none of the cuts take effect now, etc., even if the whole thing is cuts, none of which are defense, we're talking about peanuts here.
$1.2-1.5 trillion is virtually nothing compared to the $50 trillion+ that will be spent over the next decade. External Link
