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The Spectacle Blog
Did anyone actually expect anything out of the super committee? Its very existence was a product of Washington dysfunction coupled with the fact that the two parties are very far apart on how to deal with the federal government’s long-term fiscal challenges. Few of its members on either side have much of a reputation for being consensus-builders. They mostly represented their parties’ diametrically opposed views about the role of government.
If no grand Solomonic compromise could be come up with when Republicans and Democrats were negotiating the debt-ceiling statute that created the super committee, what hope did this panel ever have? The smart reaction to any 11th-hour compromise would be to question the math and count the silverware.
Our elected officials have displayed virtually no willingness to confront the unfunded liabilities of the country’s major entitlement programs or annual budget deficits that are larger than the entire federal budget as recently as when Bill Clinton was president.
“It took 40 presidents and nearly two centuries, from George Washington to Ronald Reagan, for the US government to accumulate $1.5 trillion in indebtedness,” observes Boston Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby. “The 44th president - aided and abetted by Congress - enlarges the federal debt by that amount every 12 months.” Barack Obama’s immediate predecessor — and some of those who would like to be his successor — also pushed irresponsible, unsustainable fiscal policies.
Getting beyond the super committee, there is a major dilemma the right must confront that is obscured by all the media sturm and drang about Grover Norquist’s taxpayer protection pledge. There is no reason to imagine the Democrats will accept any serious spending cuts without accompanying counterproductive tax increases designed only secondarily (at best) to raise revenue rather than legislate fairness. Recent history does not give many reasons for optimism that the spending cuts will be particularly serious even if accompanied by real tax increase. The failure of the current tax code to consistently raise enough revenue to fund our existing spending commitment regardless of the rates is a powerful argument for dealing with the matter on the spending side.
Yet there also isn’t much evidence Republicans, much less conservatives, will ever have a firm enough grasp on Washington’s purse strings to achieve meaningful spending reductions on a partisan basis. Sixty Republican senators? A Republican president and House? Striking a deal on revenues means weakening the Republican bargaining position with uncertain results on spending, especially if such a deal broadens the tax base with a VAT or similar contraption. Waiting for the Republicans to have the power to reform entitlements in an enduring way on their own may be waiting for something that will never happen.
View all comments (7) | Leave a comment
More Blog Posts by W. James Antle, III
http://spectator.org/blog/2011/11/21/the-super-committee-and-our-su
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Wayne| 11.21.11 @ 9:17AM
The purpose of forming the super-committee was to make the tea party candidates look like obstructionists. The "compromise" was used to "appear" to solve the impass on the debt ceiling and allowed the GOP establishment and Democrats to team up and have the Laura Ingrahams condemn the Tea Party as unfit to govern.
Its why we don't trust the republicans any more than the democrats.
Indy| 11.21.11 @ 12:17PM
Agreed, if the GOP establishment were serious about cuts (and I mean cuts in typical American speak not DC speak, i.e. reduced spending increases) Boehner and McConnell should have simply stated the stimulus spending is embedded in the baseline and must be removed...Americans would have agreed with them and it would have been a done deal. The stimulus spending is still costing us and adds ~$1T per year to the deficit / debt. Why didn't budget wonk Rep. Paul Ryan ever make that point, I still cannot figure that out?
Boehner and McConnell are weak leaders, either they don't care or they really don't understand the ideology driving us over the cliff, which do you think it is or is it something else?
Al Adab| 11.21.11 @ 10:35AM
The purpose was to provide cover for the automatic cuts and allow Congress to avoid the necessity of casting a vote of record for or against programs and agencies. The special interest groups will be molified when every office comment will be "we didn't get to vote". What a fraud. This is why Congress is failing us. Where are the men and women of courage who are willing to take a stand, take the heat and vote to right this ship?
WL| 11.21.11 @ 11:03AM
Yep...it was a ruse. Thank you for telling us American Spectator....Doesn't this make the third time this year...that you good folks have told us Tea Party "sympathizers" that we should accept the deal....only to "inform" us later that the deal was a fraud....
I'm starting to wonder is American Spectator is a FRAUD...
aware| 11.21.11 @ 1:30PM
Bet this was your favorite line: "The failure of the current tax code to consistently raise enough revenue....."
It's "conservatism" that is a fraud these days. It's way left of me. I've been saying it for a while now, there will be NO spending cuts. Period! Believing an election, no matter the outcome, will avert disaster is also a fraud. The Monster is now self perpetuating and is increasingly less responsive to all attempts to control it.
Your currency be continue to be debased into nothingness before your eyes. What little free market there is will continue to be manipulated and "managed" to the point of total collapse. The prudent will continue to be punished and the profligate rewarded until society is destroyed or at least in tatters. Your real liberties will continue to be stolen for the promise of security with the Garrison State. All this will be even more apparent on the next leg down shortly.
It's like a steam boiler that has passed the red line on pressure, all you can do now is run for your life.
RJ| 11.21.11 @ 12:25PM
The Super Committee was always a bad joke. It was an agreement by the Democrats and Republicans to keep increasing spending while saying they would work together to "reduce the deficit." Of course, once the debt limit was raised the Democrats called for additional spending and tax increases, never seeing the need to reduce spending. John Boehner and Company should rename themselves the "Washington Generals" the hapless basketball team that looks away from the ball so that Globetrotters can make fools of them.
johnny angry| 11.27.11 @ 2:26PM
http://youtu.be/PJvXhc0XnOw Super Committee