When it comes to the looming, automatic sequestration cuts, there seem to be two broader debates happening simultaneously. The first, more important question deals with what's going to happen with the policy itself, and the scope of the damage it could do to the economy, the military, and the country.
The second question is a little pettier: who came up with this awful idea in the first place? A Republican National Committee spokesperson, echoing his party's favorite new talking point, insists this is all President Obama's fault.
Tim Miller obviously isn't the only one making this argument. On the contrary, every speech, interview, and press release I've seen from GOP officials in recent weeks includes an obligatory reference to Obama having come up with the sequester.
I certainly understand the point of the argument. If sequestration kicks in three weeks from now, it's likely to do serious harm. Republicans don't want to be blamed, so they're laying the groundwork now, trying to convince the public now that the dangerous policy wasn't their idea. If the deep, automatic cuts hurt the military during a war and pushes the economy closer to a recession, it's in the GOP's interest to start avoiding responsibility now.
Does the GOP have a point on this? Was the policy actually Obama's idea? No. The argument is not only wrong, it's dependent on the entire political world having a very short memory.
Since this has become such an important element of the larger fight, let's take a minute to set the record straight.
In 2011, for the first time in American history, the entirety of the congressional Republican caucus held the debt ceiling hostage. GOP leaders presented the White House with a non-negotiable ransom note: give Republicans over $2 trillion in debt reduction or GOP lawmakers would crash the economy on purpose.
Left with no choice, Obama agreed to negotiate, and accepted over $1 trillion in spending cuts, in exchange for literally no revenue at all. Republicans said this was insufficient, and demanded more than $1 trillion in additional savings -- and if the president refused, they'd crash the economy on purpose.
Ultimately, policymakers agreed they needed more time to negotiate additional debt-reduction measures, so they created a mechanism: a "super-committee" that would work on a bipartisan deal. That, of course, failed, when the panel's GOP members refused to compromise.
But policymakers, assuming the super-committee would probably not work out, had a back-up plan widely referred to as "the sequester." The idea was to force both sides to the negotiating table -- a sword of Damocles hanging over Washington's head that would be so severe, Democrats and Republicans would have a strong incentive to strike a deal to avoid the drastic consequences.
Both sides put some skin in the game: Democrats would be forced to swallow over $500 billion in deep domestic cuts, while Republicans would be forced to swallow over $500 billion in deep cuts to military spending during a war. (Originally, the White House asked that Republicans face a threat of automatic tax increases, but Republicans refused -- even hypothetical tax increases were deemed outrageous -- so they settled on deep Defense cuts instead.)
At the time, House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said the deal gave him "98 percent" of what he wanted. Did Boehner complain at the time about Obama forcing him to accept a sequester idea the Speaker found outrageous? He did not. Not even a little.
Republicans now want Americans to believe this was all Obama's fault. Let's consider the evidence:
1. Republicans created the debt-ceiling crisis.
2. Republicans wrote the ransom note and named their price.
3. Republicans endorsed, accepted, and voted for this plan, saying they'd accept the consequences.
and 4. Republicans now refuse to compromise (again) to deal with the mess they created.
So we're supposed to believe this is Obama's fault? That's only true if you ignore literally every detail and pretend reality has no meaning.
Let's make this plain: the sequester is a key part of the ransom the GOP settled for during the debt-ceiling crisis they created. It's a little late to pass the buck now.
That said, if Republicans don't like the sequester, they have a terrific option available to them: they can cancel it and end this stupidity once and for all.
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I fear, Steve, the republicans are not stupid, cruel and calloused, ok, oh wait, they are stupid...
Right. The left is rending garments with wailing and gnashing of teeth for the apocalypse is nigh over a lousy $60 billion in cuts. Big whoop. We just gave away that much to Sandy victims.
For those of you in Palm Beach Florida, $1.2 trillion over 10 years is $120 billion/yr. Half of that is paid for by the tax hike on the rich leaving $60 billion that Washington DC will actually cut. OMFG what ever will we do!
You guys crack me up.
Well shooter all we see you righties doing is whining that no one tried to stop you from committing the stupidity that you whine about non stop. Really shooter all this concern now and nothing but cheerleading from behind while Reagan took the US from the worlds biggest lender to the worlds biggest borrower. If there is any fault it is at the hands of stupid conservatives that believe they can take the country back to the dark ages.
The Repubs are lying again?
Those tax and spend Dems are responsible for the sequester?
Really?
If it weren't for the pain it would inflict I'd let it go through and leave Repubs to turn in the wind.
Hey Dribbler, if the amount of money involved is "trivial," why are your wingnuts running around saying "The sky is falling and it's all that crypto-fascist-marxist Nigerian's fault!"
"But policymakers, assuming the super-committee would probably not work out, had a back-up plan widely referred to as "the sequester."
l
This is actually complete BS.
It was Jack Lew's idea (funny his name isn't even mentioned in the piece) because as a former OMB director he was the only guy smart enough to come up with the idea.
For a history of the sequester, see:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/scott-lilly/mitt-romney-sequestration_b_1874854.html
Only pacifists like the Joint Chiefs want fewer tank purchases. Al Madrigal had a pretty hilarious story on how stupid economic forces and not patriotism is driving insanely wasteful military spending. (link to Daily show segment)
Brilliant!
for a good working society there is a ratio of BUILD:MAINTAIN:DEFEND. When you get to the point you have nothing to defend but defense itself, you are F'D and F'D up.
And of course the MSM, when they report on this, will reveal this as the lie it is so....oh wait. Never mind. The MSM doesnt do that any more.
Report? The job of the corporately owned media is to provide an echo chamber and media amplifier for their masters. Most often, those messages are consistent with repuke messages.
Republicans painted themselves into a corner that has no way out for them that will allow them to save face. They are going to cave. This lie allows the Republicans to blame Obama when in fact, their campaign contributors, banks and Wall Street are forcing the Republicans to back down. What really hurts them is the campaign contributors are doing what Obama could not achieve with just Dems in Congress. And it appears this is going to happen every time Republicans try to take the budget or economy hostage. The reality of the situation is that Republicans are being held hostage by their financial backers.
Aha! Now we're talking! Something that should be plain as the nose on someone's face, but then we hear, the Dems do it too…. neener, neener… Sheesh!
I just cannot avoid flashing back to Blazing Saddles. For those too young to have seen it... (warning, the language is not *PC*, which is part of the humor.)
To set the scene, Bart, the newly appointed black sheriff enters the (lily-white and inbred) town of Rockridge, where everyone has the last name of Johnson.
[the Johnsons load their guns and point them at Bart. Bart then points his own pistol at his head]
Bart: [low voice] Hold it! Next man makes a move, the @!$%# gets it!
Olson Johnson: Hold it, men. He's not bluffing.
Dr. Sam Johnson: Listen to him, men. He's just crazy enough to do it!
Bart: [low voice] Drop it! Or I swear I'll blow this @!$%#'s head all over this town!
Bart: [high-pitched voice] Oh, lo'dy, lo'd, he's desp'it! Do what he sayyyy, do what he sayyyy!
[Townspeople drop their guns. Bart jams the gun into his neck and drags himself through the crowd towards the station]
Harriet Johnson: Isn't anybody going to help that poor man?
Dr. Sam Johnson: Hush, Harriet! That's a sure way to get him killed!
Bart: [high-pitched voice] Oooh! He'p me, he'p me! Somebody he'p me! He'p me! He'p me! He'p me!
Bart: [low voice] Shut up!
[Bart places his hand over his own mouth, then drags himself through the door into his office]
Bart: Ooh, baby, you are so talented!
[looks into the camera]
Bart: And they are so *dumb*!
Great Art imitates life.
Boner: Hold it right there, Or the American economy gets it!
MSM: Careful they are not bluffing
Boner: Hand over all your expensive entitlement programs Now!
Thanks for the laugh, John. That scene is classic!
Nailed it! Ah…. Mel Brooks!
Someone is going to have to go back and get a @!$%#load of dimes
LAWYER: Hold everything! I am here for the rescue! i didnt cause these problems, the other lawyers did. but i can fix it. After all, being as i am a lawyer means i can negotiate between 2 sides and best of all, leadership is not necessary with qualfied experts like me around. I can give each party half of what it wants.... aint that cool?
MORALIST: you mean like cutting the baby in half?
News flash: Republicans lie and their word cannot be trusted.
In other breaking news, sun continues to rise in the east.
I wonder if there would be any talk of reducing the deficit if the sequester was not out there. I will say no.
Re: #7
Perhaps if we didn't have to talk about the sequester, we could work on creating jobs. (Jobs Jobs Jobs!!!)
An effective way to reduce the deficit is getting people back to work - increase revenue (people paying taxes) and decrease safety net spending like unemployment, food stamps and Medicaid.
Since the current deficit is due to discretionary spending (defense, Medicaid, and many much smaller programs) exceeding proceeds available from the Federal Income Tax, I would say there is little talk of reducing the deficit.
What we have heard is talk of cutting Social Security and Medicare, which do not significantly contribute to this year's deficit.
What would you cut, Skip? Defense weapons programs (as I would)? Medicaid payments to pay for nursing homes for the over 80 crowd? Head Start? Student loans and Grants?
That is where there is money to cut... are we going to leave grannies out in the snow?
John,
Yes I can see cuts in defense. No problem there. The problem is actually doing it. We just increased the revenue with tax hikes on the rich which took care of less than one month's worth of the current annual deficits. Of course you could always tax more (along with closing tax loopholes), but there has to be some spending cuts/curbs. There are many small and medium programs that could be take some cuts that I like to call "want" programs as opposed to "need" programs. A need program are things like medicaid and welfare whereas a want program would be something like the national endowment of the arts or money to say, build a new monument or to "beautify" a roadway or national park- which in better fiscal times I am all for, but right now is not a definite "need" for people to survive.
I suspect that all this hoopla about the need to cut spending is really code for implementing the policies that Libertarians Ed Clark and David Koch, respectively Pres and VP candidates in 1980, were promoting for this country. They wanted to abolish Social Security, the Federal Reserve Board, welfare, minimum-wage laws, corporate taxes, all price supports and subsidies for agriculture and business, and US. Federal agencies including the SEC, EPA, ICC, FTC, OSHA, FBI, CIA, and DOE.
See, doing it through the free and fair election process didn't work out so well for them. The Kochs, who had plenty of money to burn, decided to try a different tack when they surreptiously founded the Tea Party. Just scare people into believing conspiracies and thinking their future was doomed, and voila!, an end-run success.
JL, I strongly suspect you're right. In fact, I'm convinced of it.
Their plan has been in place for decades, just when it gets close, the people wise up and see what they really want. Let's hope the people don't forget this time?
It's not just a scare tactic, like my Mom said, it's for real. They do want to end FDR's legacy. And throw out all those acronyms except for the CIA and FBI, I think they will keep those, but trash all the others.
http://zfacts.com/p/486.html
They actively worked to shape thinking, to sway people to think SS will be gone and they could be rich if they didn't pay FICA.
Do we need any more proof that the policies of forced austerity and spending reductions are worthless, pointless, and damaging our economy? Americans need real, good-paying jobs, not a lecture from the Tea Party, John Boehner and other Washington insiders about how we need to cut back and make do with the status quo. That attitude is offensive and is insidiously anti-growth. The GOP's reckless partisanship is dangerous for our country and is tantamount to political sabotage to rank our economy and hurt working Americans. - progressive
TheActivist,
I agree.
In fact it is becoming more than reckless partisanship.
Either they really want to take this country dowm, or they are unfit for office for their incompetence.
They (R's) absolutely did say you must agree to this or we won't raise the debt ceiling.
Now they say it is Obama's bluff. People that know better:
http://www.businessinsider.com/sequestration-cuts-republicans-obama-defense-sequester-charles-krauthammer-wsj-2013-2
http://www.businessinsider.com/white-house-sequester-cuts-2013-2
I just want to know when the R's are going to stop playing politics and do something. They can't, they only know how to threaten and say if you don't do what we want, we will kill it, blow it up, torch it.
They keep blaming Obama for what they did and people buy it. Please stop buying this b.s.
We have done cuts, deficit is down. What can actually be done without causing the floor to fall out?
That is what needs to happen, but theT-Pubs have a so called majority. Maybe it's because they are not all on board with cutting what and which loopholes they said they would eliminate.
They prefer to put on dramatic scenes and blame Obama, who has asked for balanced approach. They can't do it, so point fingers.
Congress wants Obama to tell them what to do, he has told them and they would rather make scenes and accusations and do nothing that is actually sane and sober.
All of the drama surrounding the economy for the GOP is wrapped in what I call the "Carpet Bagger" syndrome. The term referred to the observation that these newcomers tended to carry "carpet bags," a common form of luggage at the time (sturdy and made from used carpet). It was used as a derogatory term, suggesting opportunism and exploitation by the outsiders. Together with Republicans they are said to have politically manipulated and controlled former Confederate states for varying periods for their own financial and power gains.
The GOP is the "Carpet Bagger"party. The various complaints about spending is ruse to sabotage the US economy, so the wealthy can buy up properties at a reduced price and further tighten strangle hold on the poor and the middle class. For the sake of children fight them, they're fighting you for the sake of theird!
I do not think they are fighting for their children’s sake, but for the sake of the numbers in their bank accounts.
The one with the biggest number wins!
This has actually become quite sickening, when they try to give excuses of why certain people become terrorists. The news just keeps skirting around it and perhaps it is those big fat paychecks they have become so comfortable with that hardly a news reporter will even mention it and just want this killing machine going and extreme greed existing. Let’s really get down to the reasons why people reach of a point of where they have nothing to loose. First of all you have rich bastards that want to keep driving people to poverty without a care or concern of what they are doing. As long as the rich bastard has his or her huge wealth, they don’t really give a load of crap if anybody else is living in a crap hole or even care if a person is killed. You see everywhere in this world, especially in third world countries, of where rich bastards have people living in extreme poverty where there are hazardous health risks and a damaged environment. Why do you think these rich bastards want to move our industries to these countries? It is not to help these people, it is because they can get slave labor and do want they want to the environment as they make huge profits at inflated prices of products or services you purchase. Why do you think the middle eastern poor man when his little food cart was taken away was so finally fed up with it all that he started himself on fire? Stop making excuses of why we need to kill terrorists, when it is these rich bastards using excuses so they can continue the outright wrongs of what they have done and still are doing. We have no need to keep fighting poor people, when it is these rich bastards that cause all this trouble and we can find better solutions than listening to these rich bastards all the time.
Luckily, we some rich folks that do care about the people, country and earth.
Otherwise, I agree, we have too many that say I got mine, screw you.
Just having people with jobs a place to live, food… basics is viewed as too much to ask. In a great country, we really need to get back to a philosophy of lifting people out of desperate times. Desperate people do desperate things.
Many rich do care and do help. Even Warren Buffett said my taxes are too low, it's not right. Do something.
I mostly agree, but I have regretted lumping all those with money as rich bastards. I know you didn't mean offense to those exceptions.
the real terrorists are thieves who seek to kill others for profit to steal their lands and homes. israel is terrorizing palestine right now with their military rule - and the same pattern is now being applied to the citizens of the u.s. HOW MUCH ABUSE ARE YOU WILLING TO ACCEPT? if you dont answer that question, the thieves will anser it for you.
Considering Joseph that we are all really related by the proof of the Eve theory, we can learn to all get a long and help each other, as it should be. The rich bastards don’t need to be so greedy as they crush people down. We can stop having this stupid war machine going on and greed and start doing some more productive things that really help all people. In part we can stop acting like primitive primates that are worse than the chimpanzee with shiny trinkets and start acting like a superior species on this planet. Too much of this stuff that is going on in this world, as you know yourself is some really stupid crap and just leads to a destructive path, but somewhere a long the line we have to stop the madness or it will lead us to our extinction.
attention world.... thieving lawyers dont lead, they negotiate. they absolutely do not care about right, wrong, good, bad. they only care to cut you in half each time these frauds make a "deal". they are frauds.
Why are we even talking about who proposed the sequestration without pointing out who voted for it? I can remember Paul Ryan saying he voted for it. A few more cons must have voted for it since the measure passed. It doesn't matter who proposed it. What matters is that they voted for it and dug their own hole.
Do not let these idiots at CNBC fool you into believing that this is the Rebublican's sequester. OBAMA INVENTED THE SEQUESTER. LOOK AT YOUR HISTORY, PEOPLE, AND DO NOT BE FOOLED BY A PSEODO-JOURNALISM SITE SUCH AS CNBC!!!!
You are on the MSNBC site. CNBC covers business news.
As for legislation, the President does not create it, Congress does. Three quarters of the House GOP voted for it, including all the leadership- including Cantor, Ryan, and Boehner. It would have passed with or without DEM support. As it was, half of the Dems voted against it. Don't believe me? Look it up.
It seems to me you have no interest in facts.
The public is being fooled to the point being killed by too much information (internet). Pointing out errors in that flood of information, is a very busy task, and fact checking while required, does take time from pointing out higher levels of distress. The word dysfunction applies equally well to the House of Representatives as it does to the Senate, but that word impels a simple cure. The problem is Power, these bodies of government, have taken Power and divided into halves, and with those halves fighting to the bitter end. The end is bitter, because it cannot end well one side has to capitulate or take the country down with it, the other side will have to take that downed country and rebuild it. Neither this nation nor any nation can build its future using this fight over this division of Power. We may fight the tides of disinformation to exhaustion, but we cannot end this Power struggle by expecting Congress to suddenly right itself, or to remember its oaths, or to remember that it was not created by corporations seeking government franchise. The people cannot allow the Congress to act on its private interest and the ideas of conservatism and liberalism must rely on facts, if in the flood of information we can find those facts simple and compelling.
Take time to absorb the information, but also take time to look at the larger picture and see the dysfunction.
Let's go back to 2011 with a clear eye.
If the Republicans had achieved the above, this current "crisis" would be hung around the shoulders of the Democrats as they slunk off in disgrace, and the Republicans would ride to the rescue.
The problem is, the Republicans failed in all their major assumptions about the 2012 election, and now they have to figure out how to govern. Since they've failed on that for decades, it's a certainty that this is going to get really messy before it gets resolved.
When are regular, everyday Republicans going to see their party for the inept bunglers and ideologues they are and form a new party that both represents them and stands a chance of moving our nation forward?
I think I agree with Howard Dean, the best way to adjust the military budget is to let the sequester happen. Sad to think it has to happen this way, but I think it's the only way.
can we find a list of cuts that were 'out of bounds' and would never be included as a sequester cut by either side?