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There Was Nothing Super About This Committee
The failure of the deficit reduction supercommittee — so fundamental that the panel could not even agree on what should be in play let alone why it failed — was foretold. It was a bi-partisan failure in every sense, although much of the blame goes to Republicans, five of six whom would not consider tax hikes for the wealthiest Americans and instead demanded tax cuts for them.
In the end, the Democratic proposal to cut $2.2 trillion overall, including as much as $500 billion of savings in health care programs, higher Medicare premiums for high-income beneficiaries and use of a less generous measure of inflation that would reduce annual Social Security cost-of-living adjustments failed to move the Republicans, while their $2.2 trillion counter-proposal included only $640 billion of nontax revenues, which Democrats said was too modest, and permanent tax cuts at all income levels.
“If you’re going to ask every average American who drives a car, goes to work, struggles each day to pay their bills — if they’re going to somehow be part of the solution, to have something on the table that does not ask the wealthiest people in the country to share in it would be unconscionable,” supercommittee member John Kerry said.
Most of the Republican members would have none of that and their final plan included dropping the tax rate for those poor, suffering super rich from 35 percent to 28 percent.
The committee was required to submit a plan by today and its failure will lock into place deep, across the board cuts to defense and security programs, a two percent cut to Medicare providers, and cuts to other domestic programs. Those cuts will kick in on January 1 unless Congress acts to eliminate the automatic penalty passes more targeted budget cuts to keep the penalties from going into effect.
10 Responses to “There Was Nothing Super About This Committee”
You don’t go back far enough. The fact is that the committee was stacked with people who didn’t want to compromise and was notably lacking _any_ of the gang of six who pushed for compromise on the previous vote. The fact is that it failed because both parties are fundamentally unwilling to compromise.
We need to break out of the two party system. Instant-runoff voting is one thing that might help…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instant-runoff_voting
Do you think that the fact that Obama, and I’m sure a lot of Reps, treated the Simpson-Bowles report like it didn’t exist, may have influenced the SC along with the gang of six proposal. Three strikes and you are out.
With Grover Norquist as the guiding spirit of the GOP we all knew the SC was destined to fail from the start. Many of us called it a “joke” from it’s inception. The anti-tax pledge is an anti-intelligence pledge.
As I said on another thread, I instantly hated him when I saw him on TV yesterday.
Norquist openly admitted that he wants all of our social programs eliminated. I don’t see how that can mean that those who sign his pledge aren’t agreeing to that as well since it’s basically the inevitable consequence of continuing their current policies. The Democrats should really push that little factoid into the public eye.
[...] There Was Nothing Super About This Committee (themoderatevoice.com) [...]
The good news is a bunch (over 30) have now rejected the pledge. Hey, better late than never.
Reps getting a backbone. Will it spread to Dems. Tune in.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/14/opinion/zealots-remorse.html?_r=1&ref=grovergnorquist
Norquist can want all he cares to-it doesn’t mean he’ll ever get it.
He’s got it. He’s a thug in a pin-striped suit.