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Politics : American Presidential Politics and foreign affairs -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: DuckTapeSunroof who wrote (41663)	3/5/2010 10:32:44 AM
From: TimF	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 71588

I know you like structural means of changing things, but I think it biases you to see any structural change put in place for the purpose of bringing down deficits as important; when this new commission isn't and even the non-watered down version would not be very significant. The efforts we have to not oppose are actual efforts to cut spending or keep new spending from occurring, not setting up talking groups. And if any supposed solution, strong or weak, is biased towards tax increases over spending cuts (either intrinsically in how its set up, or as part of the partisan bias in who has power in the group, or in the way it applies theoretically neutral rules in a context that means applying the rules will allow all sorts of spending increases, but even maintaining current tax rates has to be "paid for", or by some other mechanism) than I'll oppose it. You want a paygo, fine make it include every additional dollar of spending, including increased spending in entitlements, as an increase that has to be paid for, and make it count current tax rates as the baseline rather than an increase, and I'll be all over it. You want a commission? Well they seem more a distraction, something that enables politicians to say they did something about deficits without actually decreasing deficits, but create one the democrats don't control, and that it set up in such a way that there is no other form of bias to tax increases, and I won't oppose it.

To: DuckTapeSunroof who wrote (41663)	5/26/2010 8:32:38 AM
From: Peter Dierks	2 Recommendations Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 71588

The Paygo Con Paygo rules notwithstanding, Democrats aren't paying for any of their new entitlement spending. MAY 22, 2010. By STEPHEN MOORE A day after beating incumbent Arlen Specter in a Pennsylvania Democratic Senate primary contest, Rep. Joe Sestak announced that he would make "enforcement of the pay-as-you-go budget rules" a priority if he wins in November. Good luck to him. Pay-as-you-go, or paygo, rules require that new entitlement spending and new tax cuts must be paid for dollar-for-dollar with entitlement spending cuts or tax increases. As Paul Ryan, the ranking Republican member of the House Budget Committee has noted, the Democrats under Speaker Nancy Pelosi "have violated pay-as-you-go rules by nearly $1 trillion" over the past three years. And they're not done. In the coming weeks, say Congressional Republicans, we should expect some $300 billion of expenditures that Democrats will declare "emergency spending" and thus do not have to be offset by other spending cuts. The list includes $60 billion for a military supplemental spending bill; $23 billion for education; and $170 billion for jobless and other welfare benefits. All said, the deficit could climb to $1.7 trillion from the current record high $1.4 trillion. "I really can't think of the last time the Democrats paid for anything they want to spend money on," Mr. Ryan grumbles. The reality is that paygo is designed to stop tax cuts rather than check spending, which is why Democrats will soon return to singing its praises. Before the end of the year, look for Republicans to push for a continuation of the Bush tax cuts. And look for Democrats to insist they must be paid for. To read more stories like this one, please subscribe to Political Diary. online.wsj.com