I don't know how you pitch a trillion dollars in short term budget cuts as a win for Obama, the democrats, or anything other than potentially catastrophic for the country. Cutting spending during a recession or slow growth quas-recession is an epic fail of an outcome for everyone.
Then why would you think I'd be disappointed? As it stands, Dems didn't cave to pressure to get something done - they held firm on their tax demands. That's what they were supposed to do, and this is exactly what everyone was complaining they didn't do during the debt deal and 2010 tax debates. This was the first time they had the leverage to do it, and they did it. Now, the automatic triggers go into effect, and Dems still hold the leverage. Either defense gets slashed (which I think you would be happy with), or Dems can extract concessions on their terms. Maybe they cave, in which case, they failed. But as it stands, the Supercommittee failed, but the Dems did not fail in their role at all.
Because it seems highly likely it will not work. No compromise will be reached, and the weasels are already working to declaw the trigger. The "forced compromise" will fail like the "voluntary compromise". It's really not about you Major, you have just been the most obvious and vocal supporter here. You have been optimistic that this would work...
Evevntually you have to look at the whole picture rather than these framed battles. Submitting to 1.2 trillion in cuts during a possible recession (even if half of it is defense) is the knowing acceptance of a bad idea- the democrats have lost the idea and given into the horrific, self-defeating path of the austerity spiral that is murdering Europe right now. SO they "held the leverage" by conceding a horrible idea that will hurt the country...I don't really get how you can declare victory on that.
Why? None of the cuts are in the short term. The effect on the 2012 budget was $0, I believe. Everyone is in agreement that the budget needs to be cut long term, and they made long-term-only cuts in that first debt agreement - mostly on Dem terms since a huge chunk of it was defense and Medicare provider cuts. The 2nd set of triggers don't take effect until 2013 at the earliest, so again, there is no short term impact there.
I think they had a shot at coming up with something. At the very least, they changed the terms of the debate by getting about 75 GOPers to publicly say they were open to tax increases as part of any future deal. But that said, this was my last post in the thread before today: To be clear - I'm not suggesting that this will work. My only contention is that the Dems have all the leverage to force the issue. If the GOP doesn't want to deal, then let the trigger occur. The GOP can't kill the trigger without Dems' help, so if they want to eliminate the defense cuts, Dems can just say it's all or nothing. Then Dems basically get the deal they originally wanted: a debt ceiling hike without equivalent cuts. The Dems may very well cave - but here, they have no excuses. They control all the leverage - unlike each of the previous gun-to-the-head negotiations we've had (2010 tax compromise, 2011 debt ceiling). I don't think think anything has changed here. They went through step one and let the trigger occur. Everyone's probably going to agree that the trigger isn't good, so Dems again have the ability to force concessions from the GOP to kill the trigger. Obama and the Dems have their first opportunity to play hardball, and they passed the first test by not caving here - that was the entirety of what I was suggesting: that the Dems now have leverage they never had. Dems got bashed for caving in the last two deals, but they had a bad hand and really had no choice. Now they have a good hand, and so far, they are playing it properly. We'll see if that continues.
Major seems to be a "process guy" with no appreciation for the results of that process. If your opponent wins at designing the game and then you win the game, it does not mean you won.
2013 is 13.5 months away, that's not exactly long term. Do you think that GDP is going to rebound so quickly in the next FY that the economy can survive a 1.2 trillion contraction in 2013 without huge issues? Good luck with that.
We're really stuck in a ****ty position unless the economy goes up drastically. (I don't see that happen for at least another 6 or 7 years, unless some great new innovation comes) I don't think the middle class and lower class could survive a drastic cuts to entitlement, at the same time I don't think the economy could survive unless we (and the rest of the world) reign our debt in.
That's what I'm afraid of, both sides are playing chicken right now. If the democrats cave, then the right keeps electing hardliners, and the left replaces their moderates with hardliners. Believe me, two maniacs playing chicken is a recipe for disaster.
And congress is beholden to the corporate welfare that is the other component of our debt problem. (although to be honest, I don't think entitlement has much to do with it directly at all)
For starters, it won't be a 1.2 trillion contraction in 2013. That 1.2 trillion is over a decade, and it accelerates over the course of those ten years. Second, they constantly tinker the short term to stimulate. For example, there will likely be a $100+B payroll tax cut extension next month for 2012. If the economy still sucks in December 2012, you probably will repeat that process - that more than balances any cuts you make - while also pushing back other cuts as Congress is naturally prone to do. All they did is change the baseline of the longterm budget - which was absolutely necessary and something that Obama has been arguing for since 2008 when he was still campaigning. Europe austerity is a whole different animal - those are immediate, harsh cuts to across the board government services combined with immediate, harsh tax hikes. Our SS reform is potentially raising retirement age by 2 years over the course of 50 years. Greece's pension reform is raising retirement age immediately, while simultaneously cutting benefits. What's going on here is not remotely anything like what's happening in Europe.
So you're now opposed to defense cuts and cuts to Medicare providers, two long-time Democratic objectives? Because as of now, those the only results we've had from the process. That may very well be - but they haven't done it yet, and nothing that happened today suggests they are closer to caving than they were a week ago. You also thought they'd cave this time around, which they didn't do.
