Perhaps my give-a-shitter is broken, but I think people are paying a hell of a lot more attention to the preliminary report of the deficit commission than it deserves.
First, look at the players. Alan K (for Krazy) Simpson is a homespun moron of little distinction as a legislator. Sadly, he was my Senator for a while, and he was tolerated as the son of a better man and a smarter guy than his even dumber colleague. He’s been out of the Senate for 15 years. Erskine Bowles has never served in Congress, has been out of government service for a dozen years, and wasn’t even living in Washington. Neither of these guys has the ability or connections to influence anything in DC. Though there’s been some whining about the composition of the rest of the committee, there are enough hard-core progressives on it to kill off anything really crazy.
Second, look at the problem. Social Security is the least of the deficit issues facing our country, and it can be fixed with a couple of tweaks of the tax code. Who cares if this commission drops a turd? There’s no real urgency for Obama or Congress to pick it up.
If this blind pig had found an ear of corn, then it would have been a bonus for Obama. If, as is apparent, it simply blundered around and crapped out a reeking pile of pig shit, then its report can be thrown into the recycle bin along with the output of pretty much every other presidential commission that’s ever been appointed.
cleek
for now, the real problem is this: it’s Obama’s hand-picked panel, and they’re saying things that will piss off the public – as soon as the GOP finds a way to tell people about it. and they will.
JPL
Washington Post has an article about who pays the commissioners. The Influence Industry
JPL
@cleek: The President can get ahead of this. Bowles and Simpson pulled a fast one by releasing a report that two of the members agreed on while he was out of the country. This is not the report of the entire commission.
There are actually a few things, I agree with. The tax code needs to be progressive and simple. By doing away with most deductions, you could lower the tax rate. If you listen to talk radio callers, they think they pay 50% of their salary for federal income taxes. Many deductions penalize those who can’t afford to take advantage of them, i.e. the mortgage deduction and health care deductions.
Keith G
@cleek:
I am sure that the talking points outlines have already been emailed.
From my perspective, last night the conversation really began and it began on conservative (for the most part) ground. That’s not unlike the health care debate.
SiubhanDuinne
Your points are well-taken, and make *me* feel better. However, especially in today’s 24/7 media environment, perception is reality, and a lie can circle the globe before the truth puts its shoes on. I already hear Mika and Joe bleating about these notional proposals as though they’re cast in concrete and fully reflective of Obama’s wishes. The media and the Republicans are going to hang this around the President’s neck, join in a noisy non-stop chorus of “Ain’t It Awful?” And once again we’re forced to play defense. Badly.
WyldPirate
@cleek:
fucking precisely right.
This was a Fox News Headline earlier:
“Obama Debt Panel Eyes Cutting Social Security, Home Deduction.”
goggle it, it was everywhere. It’s all over Morning Joe this AM.
I was on a road trip to an interview on Monday in Charlottesville, VA. I heard on no less than three separate redneck “morning drive” radio shows about how2 Obama’s trip to India was costing 200M a day and tying up 34 Naval warships.
In Middle America, Fox News can make shit up, verify it by referencing it themselves, and it goes viral on all of these redneck radio stations across America.
Maddow did a segment on this the other day with example after example. Fox News makes Goebbles, Pravda and TASS look like fucking amateurs when it comes to disseminating propaganda.
Linda Featheringill
Commissions do not enact laws.
Commissions make recommendations.
2/18 commission members is not even a simple majority. Or even close to a majority.
But even if 134 of the 18 commission members had signed on to the published recommendations, they still could not enact laws.
The whole report will be a service suggestion. Period.
ETA: Commissions are often good at digging up information and frequently present recommendations that are worth thinking about. They aren’t inherently bad. They are just limited in power.
AhabTRuler
What’s the upside? What positive comes from this, even granting that the commission report is a failure?
Dan
I think the mistake in this debate is to think that it matters one way or the other which programs really pose a long term threat to the deficit. The people who just got elected could care less. What pisses them off is the perception that money from their pocket is being given to anyone else. They feel this way even though they’re probably getting more from other people than they’re paying out in taxes. If anything, the fact that non-discretionary spending is stable and not a long term problem pisses these people off even more. They want it to be a problem because it is anathema to them.
jimmiraybob
Well, ya know what we say here in the Heartland, “You can’t harpoon a minnow without breaking a few eggs.”
WyldPirate
@JPL:
He hasn’t before and he won’t this time.
\He got punked on the size of the stimulus and then caved on the worthless tax cuts as stimulus. And didn’t get SHIT for his
capitulationbi[partisanship.He sat on his hands in August ’09 as the Teatards picked up steam with their death panel horseshit.
Wash, rinse, repeat.
mai naem
When will Obama and other Democrats realize that Republican politicians even 99 year old ones will [email protected]#k in the ass every time. It’s always how can they help “the party” from any situation. The Dems sit there and think about what’s good for the country, not the Repubs.
PeakVT
The only significance of this (draft) report is that it gives Very Serious Persons another opportunity to reinforce the entirely false notion that Something Must Be Done about Social Security.
Bernie Sanders slapped around my NPR station’s local program host on the issue yesterday. FF to 9:00 here. He handles her he said/she said approach perfectly.
MikeJ
@SiubhanDuinne:
At least the Democrats have his back, right?
WyldPirate
@Linda Featheringill:
not the point. The point is the framing of the Commission findings.
It didn’t matter that there were no “death panels” in HCR. The Rethugs made it up and ran with it and–they fucking sold to the people who vote in mid-terms–old racist fucks.
This Cat food Commission was appointed by Obama. It will be even easier to sell to old ignorant fucks that Obama is going to cut their SS checks and cut their COLAs in perpetuity.
Commissions in government are like committees in academia. For the most part, they just cover peoples ass so no one person can be blamed for shitty decisions
debit
@MikeJ:
Only until they can stick the shiv in.
OGLiberal
O/T but did you all see Google’s Veteran’s Day logo today? The sound of wingnuts’ heads bursting in 3, 2, 1….
Lawnguylander
Conservatives immediately began spinning the commission’s report the way that it suits them and liberals began immediately reacting to the conservative spin (see Atrios) rather than jumping on the positive aspects of the report (see Atrios again, not a word on defense cuts or elimination of oil company subsidies). Hoocadonode? Is that how the saying goes? The left in this country is so used to playing defense that hardly anyone even remembers that it’s possible to go on offense. Atrios is just the most embarrassing example of what I’m talking about. But I guess he knows what sells so who am I to question his methods?
BrklynLibrul
The so-called liberal NYTimes op-ed page slobbered wet kisses all over the proposal, thus enshrining these proposals as the correct approach to deficit reduction. Get serious, mistermix — this is a very perilous moment for the safety net.
paradox
I agree in substance, but I have a serious problem with the timing.
Lose the midterms. Assure no one in the base on 60 Minutes. Jet out of town. Then throw massive buckets of wet cow shit all over the base with the catfood commission.
Our people have the leadership instincts of a soap dish.
Linda Featheringill
@OGLiberal:
Google’s Veteran’s Day logo:
What? I think it’s rather nice. They inserted a flag in the place of the “L”.
What’s to complain about?
Corner Stone
@AhabTRuler:
I honestly wish someone could answer this. I’ve been asking it for almost a year and so far all I’ve received is 11 D answers.
Corner Stone
@Lawnguylander: Ok. Sell defense cuts then.
Corner Stone
@OGLiberal: What’s wrong with it? I can’t tell the poutrage part.
WyldPirate
@Lawnguylander:
This shit isn’t Atrios’ fault. Besides, he has a tiny microphone.
The problem is that the American people don’t want to hear or read anything that can’t be encompassed in a bumper sticker or that requires any thought.
Democrats NEVER package their message this way. When they start talking, the sheeple’s eyes glaze over.
Rethugs follow the Joseph Goebble’s method perfected by Frank Luntz: Here’s Goebble’s on “the big lie”
SteveinSC
@debit:
It appears to be the other way. Obama and his pansy advisor Assholerad are caving on the bush tax give-aways. Is there anything the One-Term-Wonder has a backbone about?
Napoleon
Ugh, wordpress ate my post.
Short version, MM even if you are right you miss the point. The point is to freak out and make it very difficult for the elites to make it easy to trash SS. Even if God appeared and promised to make this proposal go no where the best thing for the left to do would still be to run a jihad against Simpson and Boles.
OGLiberal
@Corner Stone: What’s the red thing creeping out behind the bottom of the flag? Is that just the bottom of the “e” in Google or is it something more nefarious? The word “sharia” comes to mind.
I have no doubt this will all over the internets by mid-day.
paradox
Oscar Leroy
LOL. “Get ahead” of what–his own hand-picked, unilaterally-established commission? Wow, who could possibly have foreseen that putting two people who really want to cut Social Security in charge of this panel would lead to a recommendation to cut Social Security? Quick–get out in front of this issue!
So? Did you really get out of bed this morning thinking that most, or even many, politicians only care about real solutions to real problems?
Oscar Leroy
Congress has already agreed to vote on this panel’s recommendations.
@Lawnguylander:
Yeah, why listen to a trained economist about economics?
WyldPirate
@paradox:
Yep. That is Obama’s Achilles heel. It was Dubya’s only strength even though his “leadership” was a total charade.
debit
@SteveinSC: Welcome to my pie filter. Try the apple!
SiubhanDuinne
@MikeJ #14: You’re making me weep here.
Oscar Leroy
@MikeJ:
What, I’m supposed to back up the president in his commission to cut Social Security? Fat chance.
General Stuck
Must be whackjob Thursday. Good day for a vacation.
Linda Featheringill
@Oscar Leroy:
[#30]
You have a point. Let me get another cup of coffee.
cleek
@Lawnguylander:
there are no “positive aspects” here which can be used for the Dems. who would run a pro-Obama commercial saying that Obama’s panel came up with a draft proposal that recommended cutting the defense budget?
but, nearly all of it can be used against them: Obama wants to cut defense! Obama wants to eliminate tax breaks! Obama wants to make your gas more expensive! he wants to cut SS!
the problem is that nobody really gives a fuck about the deficit. the GOP just uses the the deficit as a way to punish Dems, they don’t actually care about reducing it.
Oscar Leroy
Who?
WyldPirate
@General Stuck:
Another finger in his ears “la-la-la-la-la, i can’t hear you” person.
Watch the Rethugs wrap the Cat Food commision chairs’ recs around Obama’s neck and make him own it.
Rethugs will have people believing that Obama wants to cut SS and Medicare by 2012. President foldObama?–he’ll still be gibbering about “bipartisanship and cooperation”.
mistermix
As Alan Simpson would say, a lot of you are turning a silk purse into a sow’s ear.
Read Ezra Klein’s piece on this:
http://feeds.voices.washingtonpost.com/click.phdo?i=595e489274f01c3e22fae0f5a29ee6ff
He points out that the commission could have been a binding one, but it isn’t, because Obama set it up instead of Congress. And this isn’t the official report. And even if it were, so fucking what?
And so on.
Rhoda
This is a two week story; max. And then it will all be forgotten.
Chyron HR
@WyldPirate:
I’m confused. Did Mandingobama set up this commission because he hates Social Security (for some as yet unexplained reason), or is he a monkey dancing to the Republicans’ tune? It would really help if you guys could go 30 seconds without completely reversing your own opinions.
Lawnguylander
@Corner Stone:
Are you saying saying it’s my job alone to sell defense cuts? Or is it that defense cuts even when recommended by a bipartisan panel are not worth pushing for? That people who I would expect to support something like cutting overseas bases by 1/3 shouldn’t even bother to mention that that’s part of the preliminary report’s recommendations because it’s too tough a sell? I can’t be sure.
@WyldPirate: Who said anything was his fault besides writing stupid blog posts?
@Oscar Leroy:
No they haven’t agreed to vote on the recommendations which, BTW, haven’t even been made yet. And I said nothing about economics. WTF are you talking about? I’m saying don’t listen to him about politics. He’s a moron on the subject.
El Cid
It probably is significant that the pre-report was released not just by two members of the commission, but by the two nominated co-chairs, one from the Republican Party and one from the Democratic Party.
My concern, though, is that I think their view is actually the mainstream among many conservative Democrats, the consultant class, the pundit world, and of course many in the business community and their hired representatives.
In short, it’s the sort of thing I figured would be happening at some point, whether or not the more radical Bush Jr. effort failed. It’s the sort of approach I (and others) figured would happen — there’s some things that are and/or appear to be increased taxes on the wealthy, and decreased future payouts to Social Security and Medicare.
The latter especially doesn’t surprise me. Virtually everyone I know, senior citizen or not, happy Medicare recipient or not, are convinced that Medicare is going broke because of fraud and because the money is going to some sort of people unworthy of it somehow. So I don’t think it’s that hard to sell Medicare cuts as making it more efficient.
I’m not saying I know the future, or that Obama’s current statements (apart from nominating the commission leadership whose preliminary work is being discussed here) say that this approach will be adopted.
I’m saying that in the end I see it likely that something like this will be adopted, and within the next few years, whether or not it’s likely to have an awful effect upon the Democratic Party.
Just my opinion, or intuition. I certainly haven’t always been right.
cleek
@mistermix:
binding-shminding. Obama’s panel just recommended cutting defense, SS and tax breaks for families. the attack ads write themselves.
Keith G
@General Stuck: A good vet’s day to you.
Uloborus
@General Stuck:
Yeah, I think this topic deserves some discussion, but I also knew what would happen the moment I saw the post. This commission is pretty much the favorite topic of the Obama Is Worse Than Bush crowd. And behold!
@cleek:
So? Turn this around. Think of it as an IOKIYAR double standard, because that’s exactly what it is. They’re quite happy to lie and distort anything. This commission is meaningless in that score. They’ll make up something if they have to. 200 million a day to visit India, for pity’s sake. They don’t have better messaging, the media has just utterly renounced its job.
But for Obama all he has to do is something as meaninglessly normal as dumping his enemies on a committee with no power so that they can run around in circles uselessly, and the DEMOCRATS start bitching and wailing.
aimai
@paradox:
Correct.
aimai
Oscar Leroy
http://www.retiredamericans.org/newsroom/friday-alert-archives/view/2010-07-friday-alert-july-2-2010
I’m surprised at how many people here don’t believe in looking ahead a month or two.
General Stuck
@Keith G:
Gracias sir
cleek
@Uloborus:
and it apparently attracts strawmen, too!
sweet.
chopper
@paradox:
lol, that’s awesome. bush stole the election and screwed shit up for eight years and your response was to get off your ass and write some blog comments!
chopper
@cleek:
obama’s panel didn’t recommend shit. 2 dudes on the panel of 18 wrote up a minority report. the rest of the commission is going to take a huge shit on it.
what’s the freak-out for? you guys understand you’re helping the conservative lie/frame of this whole thing by joining them, right?
Oscar Leroy
If only Anonymous Blogger Guy could use his immense powers for good instead of ill.
LarsThorwald
There are an awful lot of really hardcore, excuse me, pussy chicken littles posting here who are handwringing and kvetching about how the Repubs will try and hang this around Obama’s neck! and Obama did this to himself!
There is nothing to hang on Obama’s neck. There will be no vote in Congress. This report is dead.
General Stuck
@Uloborus:
It will all be a forgotten footnote when the real wingnut commission takes over the House in Jan. . They will paint in red letters what the right wing is about, as compared to the democrats, and the musings of two washed up pols will find it’s place on the dustbin of history, like nearly all the other presidential commissions that came before it.
It does give the firebaggers some clown fuel to fly about the room for a while, with their colored balloons.
cleek
@chopper:
i’m not actually saying they did. what i was saying is that “Obama’s panel recommended…” is going to be the basis for a lot of GOP attacks.
i’m pointing out that this was shitty politics by Bowles, Simpson and Obama. if denying this makes you feel better, then by all means, deny away!
Oscar Leroy
Here’s the second aspect to this commission:
This entire article is worth reading.
Link
MikeJ
@cleek: So what? They’re going to attack no matter what happens. They’re going to lie about this report. It’s existence or non-existence doesn’t change that.
Why freak out over something meaningless?
Oscar Leroy
Nobody could have foreseen etc. etc. etc.
Oscar Leroy
@MikeJ:
Why? There’s no reason to. It’s bad enough on its own.
cleek
@MikeJ:
of course they will attack, that’s politics. but it doesn’t seem smart to open yourself up to the particularly devastating attacks.
Corner Stone
I hope people are listening to Kent Conrad on MSNBC right now. He has a D by his name but he’s talking a different game.
chopper
@cleek:
‘obama is a muslim kenyan’ is the basis of a lot of GOP attacks. so the fuck what? they’re going to attack anything he does.
and yes, bowles and simpson pulled a dick-ass move, waiting for the president to go overseas and dropping this steaming turd.
lacp
I like Dean Baker’s response: http://www.cepr.net/index.php/press-releases/press-releases/statement-on-deficit-commission-proposals
chopper
@Oscar Leroy:
dumbass, there is no report.
so yes, the GOP is going to lie about it. they already are, just like you – they and you are screaming up and down about a report that doesn’t even exist yet.
Oscar Leroy
@chopper:
You must have been president of the debate society.
Chopper at work:
Boss: “I think we need to put more people to work on the Peterman account.”
Chopper: “You idiot, that’s a sucky idea! You’re a moron!” etc.
Where am I screaming about a report that doesn’t exist? I pointed out that Congress has already agreed to vote on the commission’s recommendations.
cleek
@chopper:
the fuck what is that this shit costs Dems elections. for example, last week.
yes, they make up shit. yes they lie. but sometimes they don’t have to lie all that much; they just need to tweak the truth a wee tiny little bit. and those things are the hardest to defend against because to defend, you have to explain – and people don’t listen.
Corner Stone
Who? Who are the 5 hard core progressives?
Oscar Leroy
By the way, Mistermix, if “there are enough hard-core progressives on it to kill off anything really crazy,” who are they? I’d really like to know.
JohnR
@Rhoda:
Respectfully, baloney. It has already been added to the package of anti-liberal lore: “See, even Obama’s own people want to do this, and The Hated Pelosi-Korps is blocking the will of the entire nation!” That’s why this whole exercise was obviously (and repeatedly condemned from the beginning by anyone with smarts as) a particularly stupid way to stab yourself in the back. What possible good could come from such a commision, headed by (of all people!) Homer K. Simpson? It was always going to be only of benefit to the GOP, and a weapon to further eviscerate the Dems.
PurpleGirl
@Linda Featheringill: It’s way too simple. It’s “just a flag.” There is no monument or stuff around it.
(Not that I’ve gone looking to see if there is any commentary on it; this is more my idea based on the criticisms of the Viet Nam Memorial Wall that resulted in the bronze soldier statue placed nearby.)
Corner Stone
@chopper:
People keep saying this but IMO it isn’t accurate. This was the baseline. They’ll tweak a couple things, change the mortgage deduction a little, keep EITC (possibly), and a couple other small things. But the broader strokes are staying, and IMO we will see 14 members vote on something similar and a report will be issued.
Oscar Leroy
This was the lede on the Washington Post’s story about this yesterday:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/10/AR2010111004029.html?hpid=topnews
Obviously the Republican Party is a bunch of liars. . . but what in this factually-true statement do they even need to twist or distort to turn people off to Democrats?
In the latest election, Democrats lost senior citizens by 38% to 59%. So maybe putting Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson in charge of this commission was not a good idea.
Corner Stone
@JohnR: And this is the point I’ve been making for a year. This commission was never needed and it distracted putative allies at a crucial moment ramping up to a big midterm election.
So many state legislatures are now R that once redistricting is over the D’s may not control the House again for a generation.
chopper
@Oscar Leroy:
oscar leroy at work:
oscar: oh noes! peterman’s going to cancel his contract with us! we’re bankrupt! oh noes!!
chopper: how do you know that?
oscar: one of the guys on the board says he wants to cancel it!
chopper: aren’t there like 10 guys on the board? aren’t the rest of them pretty happy with us?
oscar: oh noes!! quit now, we’re done for!
don’t get so excited that you piss yourself in fear, oscar.
Corner Stone
@OGLiberal: Oh. I see. Carry on then.
scarshapedstar
Sure, it’s overblown, but it’s still the Obama Shooting Himself In The Foot Commission.
Republicans will now run against every single thing they proposed without skipping a beat.
In fact, given that the Wise Men were a GOP idea to begin with, this was pretty clearly the plan all along. Obama tried to kick the football, grabbed the tar baby, threw them in the briar patch, etc etc etc.
Wtf.
Corner Stone
@Lawnguylander: No, my response was to your comment that the D’s should be playing “offense” with this report. My suggestion that you try and sell Defense cuts as “offense” while the other side is selling SS cuts by the D’s as their story and let’s see which side wins.
Or more simply, please show us how to lead the charge with this report.
Bob In Pacifica
Alan Simpson used to hang out with WACL, the World Anti-Communist League, an international collection of genuine fascists. Guys who goosestepped and so forth. Not just pretenders like Iott, but would actually disappear people. He always struck me as a dim bulb, but you don’t need a PhD to drive the train.
Oscar Leroy
@chopper:
That’s probably an analogy to the makeup of the commission. I suppose you don’t think there are enough people on it who want to cut Social Security.
So, who are the 5 sure-fire votes against such cuts? Please, tell me. Which 5 names can we be certain are rock-bottom supporters of Social Security?
chopper
@Corner Stone:
i’m cynical, but not that cynical. nothing even close to bowles/simpsons’ recommendations are going to make it out of this committee.
the whole point here is to demonstrate that the goopers and the teabaggers are lying sacks of crap telling everyone that they can balance the budget without cutting SS, medicare or the pentagon. the problem here is we shouldn’t even be having the debate on how to balance the budget as we shouldn’t even be discussing austerity measures at this point. the deficit can wait. austerity measures are just going to push the economy back into recession.
Oscar Leroy
@Bob In Pacifica:
“you don’t need a PhD to drive the train”
And you sure don’t need one to drive it off the rails.
Bob In Pacifica
The easiest explication of all this, the one that will never penetrate the MSM, is to ask and answer the question: What’s the difference between now and back when the budget was always balanced?
And the answer is tax rate for the wealthiest and their corporations. “Trickle Down” is a myth that has never worked. Pretty simple message that no one will admit.
When Eisenhower was President the top tax bracket was 91% and I don’t recall a shortage of wealthy people.
Oscar Leroy
@chopper:
“the whole point here is to demonstrate that the goopers and the teabaggers are lying sacks of crap telling everyone that they can balance the budget without cutting SS, medicare or the pentagon”
White House, Democratic lawmakers cut deal on deficit commission
This is NOT an intellectual exercise. People can say it is, but it isn’t.
chopper
@Oscar Leroy:
who are the other 12 people you’re sure will vote to cut social security? show me the other 12 who’ve come out and said ‘yeah, i want to slice and dice SS’?
SS is called the third rail of politics for a reason, sport. your hatred for obama has made you so cynical you should really just go take a break or something. go to a park. plant a tree.
RobertB
This whole commission was an 11-dimensional step-on-your-own-dick moment. I thought, “Never ask a question you don’t already know the answer to,” was the first thing they taught you in law school.
cleek
@RobertB:
:) a lovely phrase
Corner Stone
@chopper: So far I can count 12. The only 2 I’m really hopeful for are Durbin (maybe) and Rep Schakowsky. The rest seem pretty squishy, IMO.
chopper
bottom line is this: the commission is not going to pump out these two dudes’ recommendations.
the actual report will include some shallow cuts to entitlements, and might include some cuts to medicaid. recommendations to raise the SS cap, maybe the retirement age. strong stuff given the economy, but not the apocalypse.
it’ll get voted down in congress. maybe the hardcore teabaggers will vote for the cuts, but most all of the goopers on the hill, including many of the new ones, know that they got the job on the backs of elderly voters who showed up in droves in the midterm, so voting to cut SS and medicare even a little is a no-go.
obama won’t even have to threaten a veto. though the firebaggers will run around crying that deep down inside obama wants SS and medicare slashed to the bone because he’s a bad, bad man, and he totes would have signed it into law using the blood of a homeless child for that extra flair.
meanwhile the economy dips back into recession because we’re wanking about spending cuts when we should be spending more. at least the GOP will have to go on record about how they don’t know what to do to balance to budget, not that that will matter, because there’s going to be a showdown over the debt ceiling that’s going to make the catfood commission report look like a schoolyard debate.
Kryptik
God, I read the NYT Editorial on the whole thing. It was a big sloppy blowjob to the idea of ‘Conservative fiscal responsibility!’. Yeah, they poo-pooed the inordinate focus on middle class benefit cuts, but they still acted like it was the most grown up thing EVAR and how dare libs act like greedy fucks! So who cares that they’re going to pretty much give away the whole fucking farm to the top tax bracket by slashing their taxes to literally below what the median level is NOW (and what, the poor folk will just have to work harder now since they have bigger responsibility?). All that matters is FISKAL RESPONZEBILITEES!
That’s the issue with this advance ‘proposal’. It’s gaming the refs and already priming the well for more of that sweet corporate welfare, so when anything less is proposed, the public will be prepared to get the ropes for Obama and the Dems for ‘SELLING OUT OUR FUUUUTUURRRRE!!’ for their lack of ‘fiscal responsibility’.
Fucking, fucking, fucking, fucking, fucking fucking, fucking….just…fucking make the world stop, please. This bullshit is just too much to take and it’s not even a week and a half since the Republicans apparently won the whole country.
Omnes Omnibus
@RobertB: No, the first thing they teach you in law school is how to brief a case for class.
eemom
OT, but much more interesting than this meaningless commission drivel, the WH calls bullshit on HuffPo re Obama’s alleged cave on the tax cuts:
http://voices.washingtonpost.com/plum-line/2010/11/the_morning_plum_129.html
Once again, fuck that pseudo-Greek twat and her store-bought emmessemm lackeys.
Bill H.
Since you go on to say “it can be fixed with a couple of tweaks…” I think you are on the right track, but please do note that Social Security is not part of the deficit issue at all. It is not the smallest part, it is not the easiest part, it is not a minor part, it is not any part of the federal deficit problem.
Social Security is self funded from Social Security payroll withholding and the Social Security trust fund. Not one penny of the federal revenue stream will ever be used to pay Social Security benefits, and not one penny of Social Security revenue ever goes to pay federal operating expenses. Altering Social Security will have no effect whatever, zero effect, on the federal deficit or the national debt.
Lawnguylander
@cleek
While I do have thoughts on the subject and see plenty of room for Democrats to go on the attack using just a little imagination, I said nothing at all about what they should do. I said that something like this is an opportunity for anyone, left or right, who agrees with any aspect of the report to jump on the opportunity to advocate for what they like in the report while criticizing what’s stupid and evil in it. Someone like Atrios or Krugman and most other liberal pundits I’ve checked out this morning, but they’re doing their ingrained thing, developed during the Bush Jr administration, which is be in opposition and on the defensive without even a word about defense cuts or the end of oil subsidies. Not even a thought given to trying something different as far as I can tell. There are for sure recommendations here that wingnuts hate but so far the only prominent one I’ve seen who has rejected the preliminary report out of hand is Grover Norquist. The rest are talking up what they like for the most part.
I guess I’m pissing up a rope by suggesting that the netroots and other lefties with platforms could possibly approach politics differently when circumstances change and to find ways to be a constructive force rather than just an inept oppositional group with some cat pictures thrown in to alleviate the misery. But I had high hopes once and that’s why I’m pissed off. I’d be better off spending more time at metsblog.com where everyone is an amateur GM but at least there’s some discussion going on besides how much this guy or that guy sucks.
WyldPirate
@Oscar Leroy:
the Obots are busily visiting the River Denial or stuffing pie, their fingers or shit in the ears, oscar leroy.
The Capitulator in Chief is going to fold like a cheap suit and repeat the mistakes of Hoover after the crash and Roosevelt in ’36.
cleek
@Lawnguylander:
i wouldn’t put too much stock in the opinions of pseudonymous blog commenters. we are spectators. even the biggest lefty bloggers are utterly minor players in the grand scheme – sometimes they can get a quote or a seat in a cable talk-fest. BFD.
it matters not a whit what we think or say. we are all pissing up ropes.
Zach
Slide 25 in the report is the deal-breaker – http://www.fiscalcommission.gov/sites/fiscalcommission.gov/files/documents/CoChair_Draft.pdf
Note that the red bars are much closer to the chairmen’s preferred plan than the blue bars. An instant 10% jump in income inequality between the top and bottom quintiles is exactly what the doctor ordered, and effectively taking away 1 to 5% of middle-class after-tax income (middle class = the 2nd through 4th quintiles) would be super popular.
Zach
@Bill H.:
I wish this weren’t the case, but (I think that) trust fund deficits, surpluses, revenues, and expenditures are included in the catch-all national debt and deficit numbers. This was really good when the trust funds were running surpluses in the 90s and Clinton “balanced” the budget, but now it’s making it impossible for Obama to propose reasonable budgets because, no matter how he rigs it, trust fund deficits will increase deficits more and more in the foreseeable future. I totally agree that it’s ridiculous to say, now, that Social Security is broken because it’s running a deficit at the moment, but it’s still included in the bigger budget picture. If you look back at the budgets that Obama has proposed, deficit increases in the out-years (years 6 through 10 usually) are entirely attributable to trust fund deficits.
Edit: To clarify, I agree that trust-fund money is kept within trust-funded programs (which subsidize American debt when running surpluses).
Kryptik
@cleek:
That’s the whole thing. The so-called ‘professional left’ and we wee bloggers don’t have power. At least not in a significant sense. We don’t get listened to in any real sense, we don’t get invited to official policy meetings with the party leaders in Washington, we don’t get plum television contracts or widespread platforms that even the least tech savvy folk could catch and absorb by osmosis.
We are where we are because the Right not only listens to their loonies but promotes them to the high heavens, while our Party leaders run from anyone to the left of Lieberman if they aren’t already an established pol, and even then. We don’t have anywhere near the power structure to actually influence anything, forget ‘harming the party’ in any real tangible sense.
Can we do more? Possibly, but we’re also against institutional ratfucking on a national scale, and without friends in high places, we’re not pissing up a rope, we’re pissing in the wind.
Uloborus
@cleek:
Actually, I thought you were a voice of reason in this discussion, much as you and I are often on the outs. You merely disapprove of the optics.
What I am saying is that this is actually a perfect example of the fun house mirror behind held up to Obama. This commission is a non-issue. Throwing trouble making jackasses on a panel with no actual power to address what you don’t think is an issue so that you can talk about how open and willing to compromise you are is just… standard administrative stuff. This is not 11 dimensional chess, it’s business as usual. Only for Obama does this somehow seem like an important mistake to his *own side*.
El Cid
@Lawnguylander: I don’t think people like Atrios or Krugman are in any way opposed to such cuts as defense or corporate subsidies and ridiculous tax breaks.
Maybe they assume that their readers would embrace them, but they just don’t say anything about it. It’s true that most of the bloggers don’t persistently present an easily visible and easy to understand and well cited positive agenda for cutting government spending in ways which are desirable, and the bloggers who do so, I guess, don’t get enough play.
I don’t think that Krugman would see those sorts of things as lowering the sorts of spending which must go on right now in order to not drive the economy even lower, though maybe defense on the industry side might get him to think of it that way.
chopper
@WyldPirate:
also, obama’s going to break into your house and steal your dog.
Lawnguylander
Cleek,
I don’t put much stock in what blog commenters say. I just see the dominant themes and stances as evidence of eternal cynicism, victimhood and learned helplessness that I think set root in the left long ago. The Wyldpirates of this world are just extreme examples of the type and in a sane environment they’d be ignored for being counterproductive assholes. I use Atrios as only one example of someone in a position to be a positive influence but who doesn’t seem to have ambitions beyond profiting by reinforcing these pathetic attitudes in his readers. Oh, and inventing lingo like “hippie punching” which is reliably propogated until it spreads to a conference call with David Axelrod. And then that event is trumpeted by a bunch of like-minded bloggers as some kind of triumph when all it really is is the political equivalent of a Howard Stern fan getting through to Larry King and yelling out “baba booey.”
chopper
@Uloborus:
this, right here. this is SOP in politics – you want to make people think you’re serious about an issue when you’re not? put together a ‘task force’ on the subject. ‘task forces’ and ‘blue-ribbon panels’ are where economic ideas go to die. sure, they get out of the pen for a bit, but are quickly put down by the realities of congress and an uninterested executive branch.
sure burns a lot of calories hand-wrenching tho.
RobertB
@Chopper – he’s welcome to do so, but only if he steals the cats too.
Corner Stone
@chopper: So here’s the question then. Why would you force the establishment of a commission that will never, ever encourage anyone to vote for you who was not going to in the first place, while simultaneously pissing the hell off your nominal allies?
Meaningless commissions like the 9/11 Commission still got the absolute hell demagogged out of it. And that one didn’t propose to alter anyone’s real day to day life.
This commission scares the bejeebus out of a lot of people that as President, Obama did not need to be scaring.
And it’s not just a couple wankers on a blog like me who are pissed that President Obama put this in motion.
There is zero to win by forming this commission. You’re not sidelining any enemies, you’re not winning votes from the other side by making “tough choices” and you’re not encouraging the people who are already on your side.
Where is the win?
chopper
@Corner Stone:
that’s a ‘when did you stop beating your wife’ question. establishing this sort of commission intends to show that the president is interested in balancing the budget, which is an important issue to voters. not as important as a lot of other issues, but everybody likes fiscal discipline and nobody likes long-term debt and deficits. also too, it’s a central issue that the goopers demagogue over, in part based on the assumption that the dems will never call them on it.
looking serious on the subject, while calling the bluff of goopers who are scared to death of having to actually vote on spending cuts, is good for most voters as long as the dems do it right.
that last bit is the problem, as watching the democratic party and liberals overall try to coalesce over a good strategy is like watching a monkey try to fuck a football. look at all the liberal hand-wringing and fainting over it so far and the report isn’t even out yet. “obama’s going to pull the plug on grandma! death panels II: electric boogaloo! tell everyone!”
Corner Stone
@chopper:
No, it isn’t. The setup was that before the commission was formed, there was no commission.
IMO, you are wildly overestimating the way this little shebang is going to go down. Even if no report is ever submitted, and no vote ever held, we will see campaign ads in 2012 about this. All of them screaming at seniors that “President Obama’s Commission wanted to take your Medicare! But honest, hard working and stouthearted Republicans gave him a resounding NO!”.
This is an own goal. It didn’t have to happen.
And I think this part is good as well:
He’s going to look serious on the subject? That’ll sway the Independents and youth back to his corner.
chopper
@Corner Stone:
i’m not saying no report will be submitted. i’m saying the report will be tame compared to the minority report everyone is going nuts about and it will still get voted down.
the GOP can make hay over this pseudo-report in the next elections as long as everyone (including professional hand-wringers and firebaggers) let them frame this pseudo-report as the real thing, or make so much noise along with them that when the real, tamer report comes out and obama still says ‘ixnay on any SS or medicare cuts’ nobody hears him.
if the dems work the issue, yes it’ll help sway independents. the youth vote, no. the youth vote can’t even get off the couch and doesn’t understand shit when it comes to economics, not that the rest of the population is much better.
liberal
@chopper:
Simply not true. Krugman has shown that during the Clinton years your average citizen had no understanding about the trends in the deficit.
So while they might pretend to worry about “DEFICITS!!!,” they aren’t worried about the actual deficit, since they have no idea what it is.
ruemara
@Oscar Leroy:
You know what’s hilarious. I’ve read the article and it seems like you’re completely cherry picking it to make that fabulous conclusion jeté. Not only is this not his “hand-picked commission”, which your article makes very clear, it also makes it clear that reason for the commission is thanks to Blue Dogs, specifically Kent Conrad, who was planning to obstruct the raising of the debt ceiling. Any recommendations can be amended.
Your freak out is because the House has committed to vote on the commission’s report. No matter how often it’s been pointed out that this is not the actual commission report, nor that the entire commission have expressed their displeasure at what the 2 chairs have done.
Mnemosyne
@Oscar Leroy:
Recommendations = report. Congress did not agree to vote on PowerPoint presentation given at a press conference by the two co-chairs. They agreed to vote on the final report approved by at least 14 of the 18 committee members.
So, yes, once again, you are running around in circles shitting yourself over a report that doesn’t actually exist being voted on at some time in the indeterminate future. I realize that telling you that — again — isn’t going to stop you from throwing your hysterical tantrum, though.
Mnemosyne
@Uloborus:
This. Have we really been out of power for so long that we actually think that commissions and blue ribbon panels and advisory boards and study groups actually do anything?
If you belong to your homeowner’s association board and they tell you to go off and form a commission to study your favorite hobby horse, they’re not telling you it’s a great idea and they’ll totally take it seriously when you come back with your report. They’re telling you to fuck off and go waste someone else’s time.
Oh, but if Obama put this commission together with its mighty non-binding resolution power, then clearly it’s THE END OF THE FUCKING WORLD!!
chopper
@liberal:
i didn’t say most voters understand the economy or the deficit. i said the debt and deficit are important issues to them and they like ‘fiscal discipline’.
Corner Stone
@ruemara:
This isn’t true. I saw the interview with Rep Shakowsky last night and one with Conrad today. They both said very similar things, essentially “the co-chair report is on the right track”.
(That’s a summary. not verbatim. Although IIRC Conrad said almost that exactly)
Bruce (formerly Steve S.)
Yes and no. Yes, it looks like this modest proposal is full of political non-starters. But no, you do need to pay attention to stuff like this, because if there’s one thing our righty friends have taught us over the years it’s that if there is a policy you don’t like you start bitching early and often.
Corner Stone
@chopper:
And this is the kind of fallacy I find interesting. Have you considered that Obama may not be a “bad, bad man” at all but at the same time he still believes that cutting SS is the right decision at this point and time?
Lawnguylander
@Mnemosyne:
@ruemara:
Actually, it’s not true that they even committed to vote on the final report. There was a non-binding Sense of the House resolution saying that that the House should, not would or must, vote on Senate passed committee recommendations. The idea that the final report will definitely get an up or down vote is everywhere is but is wrong. It started at FDL if you can believe it. To Dayen’s credit he did update the post with a correction but by then it was too late.
chopper
@Corner Stone:
no. obama isn’t going to be interested in proposing cutting social security in the backdrop of the worst economic crisis since the great depression. besides which, he’s not stupid, he’s not going to write off the elderly vote like that. on top of that, he knows that social security isn’t in that much trouble, it’s in the black and cutting benefits doesn’t add anything to the receipt side of the general budget. it just allays fears that down the line SS will be in the red and will effect the deficit then.
likewise medicare or medicaid, given that his biggest fight so far has been for an overhaul of the health care system which included shoring up medicare and medicaid.
i can imagine that he’d be behind a few changes to SS and medicare like raising the retirement age sometime in the far future, and i know he’s for raising the cap on earnings. but he’s not going to slash SS or medicare or medicaid.
chopper
@Corner Stone:
also, it isn’t a fallacy to describe firebaggers as thinking that deep down inside obama is a bad man. it’s the truth.
Ranjit Suresh
Chopper: i can imagine that he’d be behind a few changes to SS and medicare like raising the retirement age sometime in the far future, and i know he’s for raising the cap on earnings. but he’s not going to slash SS or medicare or medicaid.
Ranjit: Raising the retirement age *is* a cut in Social Security. So, basically you and Corner Stone agree that the President’s open to reducing benefits.
Lawnguylander
I’ve got a comment in moderation that shows why it’s not true that Congress is committed to an up or down vote on the commission’s final report. Too many links I guess but the truth is that the House passed a Sense of the House resolution saying that a Senate passed committee report should, not would or must, receive a vote. Note the “Senate passed” part because if the Senate does pass it, how is the House not going to hold a vote anyway?
Also, check out this diary by Citizen K at DKos. It’s an example of someone who has actually read the report and picked out the good parts that are worth pushing for.
chopper
@Ranjit Suresh:
of course, it is an indirect reduction of benefits. i certainly don’t think the president would be behind slashing SS or medicare tho. there’s a big difference between raising the retirement age over the course of two decades and ‘slashing benefits’ in SS and medicare.
Corner Stone
@chopper:
The fallacy is that anyone who disagrees or criticizes the President does so with the belief that he is a “bad, bad man” and therefore a “firebagger”.
Your original comment didn’t lay the groundwork that Obama can make decisions we disagree with because that is what he truly believes to be correct. It was a de facto that if we disagreed with him it was because we believed him to be a “bad, bad man”.
Ranjit Suresh
@chopper:
The full retirement age is already rising and will reach 67 for new retirees in 12 years. Suggesting that we should raise it further is extremely reactionary. Should the FRA be raised to 70 as people like Boehner and Pence suggest?
Maintaining the status quo of a full retirement age gradually rising to 67 is a *moderate*, even small-c conservative position. Suggesting further raising it is right-wing, plain and simple.
chopper
@Corner Stone:
jesus, that’s inane. when the fuck did i say that? i said that firebaggers think obama’s a bad person, not that any disagreement or criticism of obama makes you one.
if i believed what you’re peddling i wouldn’t have even said ‘firebaggers’, i would have said ‘every goddamn person who disagrees with or criticizes the president’.
christ almighty, that shit was dense.
chopper
@Ranjit Suresh:
depends on how high you raise it. raising it again to 68 by, say, 2040 isn’t that reactionary, given that by then, assuming our quality of life continues to rise (hah!), people in this country will be living longer, and 68 will be the new 65 health-and-productivity-wise. end-of-life care will be even costlier then as well.
per capita payouts in 2040 are definitely likely to be higher than they are today.
Corner Stone
@chopper:
Well since I don’t know any firebaggers it’s hard for me to tell. And further, since anyone on this blog who disagrees with the President (except for The One Approved Category of Dissent ™ ), automatically gets called a firebagger by about a dozen people then it does actually seem like “every goddamn person who disagrees with or criticizes the president” is a firebagger.
But on the whole I can see why you’d have a hard time figuring out where you fucked it all up as anyone who’s moronic enough to use the term firebagger to describe someone is too stupid to do much proper analysis.
chopper
@Corner Stone:
oh, boo fucking hoo. yeah, it’s my fault that you epic failed basic reading comprehension. also too, everyone’s out to get you.
jesus tapdancing christ, people are fucking victims these days.
Bruce (formerly Steve S.)
@Corner Stone:
Interestingly, the BJ Lexicon does not provide a definition but merely a partial etymology. So it seems that on Balloon Juice the term actually can mean whatever you want it to mean.