The Other McCain

"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

Must-Read Post Of The Day

Posted on | December 23, 2011 | 8 Comments

by Smitty

Tom Blumer over at Pajamas Media has a crucial outing on the federal budget:

Here are two important but little-known and underappreciated points about the Super Dupers’ failure which cannot be emphasized enough:

  • None of the alleged “savings” under discussion (really reductions in projected spending increases) would have kicked in until the beginning of the 2013 fiscal year almost ten months from now. According to an Associated Press report, the “automatic” cuts noted earlier (if anyone believes they’re really going to happen) won’t begin taking effect until January 2013. In other words, contrary to the expectations of most, everyone involved apparently agreed during August’s debt-ceiling debacle that fiscal 2012 would be off-limits. Now, apparently, so is the first quarter of fiscal 2013.
  • Even if they had met their definition of super success, the $1.2 trillion involved would have reduced projected 2013-2021 spending of $40 trillion (Page XI at link) by only 3%. Spending for fiscal 2011 was $3.6 trillion. According to the CBO, if spending runs on autopilot for the next ten years — who’s to say it won’t, given that the government has already gone without a budget since April 27, 2009? — fiscal 2021 spending will be $5.4 trillion. Given the tendency to push most savings to further-off years, a “successful” Duper deal might have trimmed that to $5.2 trillion. Big duping deal.

Study the whole thing. And keep in mind that the budget affects the economy, which is The. Central. Issue. of the 2012 election, orbited of course by foreign policy, border security, the culture wars, &c.

And Barack is going to whine that he inherited the wound. Sure, and poured in a lick of salt. But when sober citizens attempting to address the real problems are thrown out of the halls of Congress. . .

Category: Budget, Weimar America

Comments

8 Responses to “Must-Read Post Of The Day”

  1. Serfer62
    December 23rd, 2011 @ 12:42 pm

    Boehner will pass this as he has passed all of The Won’s other destructive measures.

  2. Dcmick
    December 23rd, 2011 @ 1:50 pm

    So let me get this right.

    The federal budget is “the” “central” issue.

    Yet over here at this blog site, RSM refuses to take seriously the candidacy of the ONE guy who actually restrained the expansion of the federal budget, AND THE ONE guy who actually INSISTED upon a BALANCED budget.

  3. EBL
    December 23rd, 2011 @ 5:52 pm

    If we are not careful we might end up like Norway. 

    Butterless. 

    What shame.  What shame.  http://evilbloggerlady.blogspot.com/2011/12/butter-message-to-usa.html

  4. Adjoran
    December 23rd, 2011 @ 5:52 pm

    Big news flash:  Reid’s Senate and Obama as President will not go along with any cuts.  The House passed the Ryan plan with more than four times the cuts than the “Super Committee” tried and failed to find.  Want cuts?  We need control of the Senate and the White House.  No amount of whining will change that fact.

    The reason no cuts were put in for 2012 is because we are again operating illegally without a budget.  It is very hard to track the money.  That’s the way the Democrats like it, of course, it allowed their committee chairmen to act with restraint in spending.

    They should be held accountable, but the media won’t do it.  The average voter is too clueless to understand what is going on, thanks to 40 years of federal control of public education.  When you start to explain it, most people’s eyes glaze right over.

  5. Serfer62
    December 23rd, 2011 @ 7:14 pm

    Adjoran you’re wrong
    The House controls the money and the senate can’t do anything about it. The House could have stopped all spending instead they , actually the Speaker, gave The Won everything he wanted.
    Boehner needs replacement even before The Won

  6. Zak Klemmer
    December 23rd, 2011 @ 11:45 pm

    The Washington Diet: You don’t actually lose weight, you just slow the rate of growth.

  7. Dcmick
    December 24th, 2011 @ 11:50 am

    That’s an EXCEPTIONAL way to put it!

    I’m going to use that!

  8. BizzyBlog
    January 1st, 2012 @ 10:19 am

    […] This column went up at PJ Media and was teased here at BizzyBlog on Thursday. Update: Thanks to Stacy McCain for naming the column his “must-read post of the day” on December […]