Jeff Spross gets it wrong again.
Barring a miracle of bipartisan cooperation over the next 12 hours, the sequester — a series of across-the-board spending cuts — will kick in tonight.
Part of the Budget Control Act of 2011, the sequester will likely shave 700,000 jobs and 0.6 percent worth of growth off the economy. Its cuts were designed to be so crude and damaging they would incentivize all sides to replace it with more well-thought out deficit reduction.
Designed by…the President and White House economic advisors.
Why do they hate the economy so much?
But thanks to the GOP’s single-minded fixation on spending cuts over tax increases, that effort failed. Republicans spent the last two years treating every debate over the deficit as if it were occurring in a historical vacuum, accusing Obama of failing his own commitment to balance, repeatedly scoffing at new tax revenue, and insisting that “it’s finally time” to “get serious” about cutting spending, even as trillions of dollars in cuts mounted.
In short, the GOP has repeatedly thrown the spending cuts from each previous deal down the memory hole, demanding more and more while claiming that Obama and Democrats have unreasonably wanted to balance those cuts with new revenue.
Say you have a friend who is in credit card debt to the tune of $10k, which is pretty average in America.
They tell you they’re gonna save money this year. They’ve been spending too much, and by golly, they’re gonna save.
What’s their plan?
To cut out a cup of coffee one day out of the year…next year.
That’s how serious spending cut proposals have been. That’s not a spending cut. It’s an insult. A promise to pay slightly less in the future helps us out now 0%.
Between the spring 2011 budget fight, the debt ceiling debacle, and the so-called “fiscal cliff,” the United States has cut almost $1.5 trillion in spending over the next decade, plus saving roughly $200 billion more in lower interest payments.
Despite the fact we’ll be spending from $25-30 trillion more in the next decade.
Like I said, one drop in the piss bucket.
In fact, at the Wall Street Journal breakfast featured in the video, reporter Lori Montgomery brought up all these previous cuts point blank with Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI). Ryan’s rejoinder encapsulated the entire bizarre kabuki dance: “That was last session. We’re going forward now.” Montgomery and the other reporters literally busted out laughing in response. (Ryan’s logic doesn’t even work on its on terms. The new tax revenues in the fiscal cliff deal were part of the last congressional session as well, but he wants to count those.)
Saying “we can do better” is laughable? Expecting more from ourselves is something to mock?
Good god, we’ve lost our values.
Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the budget ledger, the country will raise only $630 billion in new tax revenue over the next decade. That’s the context in which Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) insists “the tax issue is finished,” even as both he and Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) claim to be seeking a “balanced” agreement. As a result, everything from Medicare, to the military, food safety, air traffic control, nutritional support for women and infants, disaster relief, law enforcement, and health research looks likely to get the axe.
Somehow a few years ago we managed just fine on trillions of dollars of less spending.
Since then, the population of our country has not tripled, nor has some catastrophic event required an enormous budget outlay.
Medicare, the military, food safety, air traffic control, nutritional support for women and infants, disaster relief, law enforcement, and health research managed to do just fine a few years ago.
Why is their funding all of a sudden a crisis? Because it doesn’t automatically increase and then increase again with new spending requests.
It would be inconceivable to run a business that way. It would be finished in months. Why is running government that way acceptable?
