There is a repugnancy that permeates our political system, a malodor that wafts from Capitol Hill across this vast nation. It hovers not only in the air around us, but also reaches deep into our social consciousness, and leaves a stench that overwhelms ours and the nation’s souls. Occasionally, though, a strong wind comes through providing us with a cleansing or a reprieve.
The deal to avert the so-called fiscal cliff was such a moment. For a short time, it seemed that Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill smelled what the rest of us had smelled for the last four years. Our lawmakers in Washington came together, albeit at a late hour, to keep us from plunging in what many had described as an economic abyss. Although the deal was less than perfect, it gave many a moment of hope, a sense that the best way to pass meaningful legislation is to begin in the U.S. Senate.
Of course, it was a fleeting moment. Before the fiscal cliff bill could reach President Barack Obama’s desk for signature Republicans had already returned to their recalcitrant ways.
House Speaker John Boehner, who had thrown the fiscal cliff debacle to the President and Senate, announced to the nation that his party would again use the debt ceiling in seeking to wrest spending cuts from the President and Democrats.
His statement was reinforced by Sen. John Cronyn of Texas, who declared that the GOP is willing to shut down the government in order to extract concessions from Obama.
“The coming deadlines will be the next flashpoints in our ongoing fight to bring fiscal sanity to Washington,” Cornyn wrote in an op-ed for the Houston Chronicle not long after a fiscal cliff deal was reached. “It may be necessary to partially shut down the government in order to secure the long-term fiscal wellbeing of our country, rather than plod along the path of Greece, Italy and Spain. President Obama needs to take note of this reality and put forward a plan to avoid it immediately.”
Cornyn, like many of his GOP colleagues, has decided that the only way to go is to slash the safety net that helps to support as many people in the red states as it does those in the blue states.
“Republicans are more determined than ever to implement the spending cuts and structural entitlement reforms that are needed to secure the long-term fiscal integrity of our country,” Cornyn wrote days after Sen. Pat Toomey, a Pennsylvania Republican, said Republicans should be ready to tolerate a partial government shutdown in the battle over the debt limit.
The declarations by Boehner, Cornyn, Toomey, and other Republicans of course sent the pundit class into a tizzy. Within hours of the fiscal cliff deal and the Republican announcements, pundits began debating, pontificating on, and dissecting the winners and losers of that deal as if the obstinate players were the only ones that mattered.
But while the talking heads search for new ways to describe the game they help promote the rest of us should look deeper for answers and connections. The problem is we may not find many.
The Jan. 1 deal does bring much needed revenue – granted not as much as desired – to the federal coffers. It also preserves unemployment insurance – while not a substitute for employment – for 2 million people without incomes. It will keep the cost of milk – already high – from rising through the roof. And it will allow poor, working, and middle-class people to continue using the child and tuition tax credits to lower their tax bills.
But what price will we have to pay?
Indeed, the fiscal cliff deal fell short on many fronts. It failed to include a stimulus package. It failed to avert another battle over the debt ceiling. It allowed the temporary payroll tax cut to expire. It did not raise taxes on capital gains and estates high enough. And it did not solve any long term fiscal problems.
More important, it put us back where we were 18 months ago, preparing to fight another battle with a political party that believes not only in taking hostages, but in executing them as well.
That is why we may not find those deeper answers and connections.
The fact that the deal was negotiated by Vice President Joe Biden and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell signals just how bad things have become in Washington in general and the House of Representatives in particular.
That so many urged the President to allow the Bush-era tax cuts to expire in an effort to gain greater negotiating leverage over the Republicans shows that too many people in Washington fail to recognize the real consequences of such actions. Theirs are arguments steeped in politics not policy.
For the millions of people whose unemployment ran out a few days before the deal was struck, it was no game. Yes, Congress could have passed a bill after Jan. 1, resulting in retroactive benefits. But unless one has lived from paycheck to paycheck one does not understand how a delay, even of a few days or weeks, can create havoc. Allowing those benefits to expire would have caused real harm to real families, something lawmakers should avoid at all costs.
The problem of course is that Washington is unable to do anything – even the things on which all parties agree – until the last moment
“Debt-ceiling dilemma: In the short run, it enables Republicans in Congress to excite their base about entitlement reform that base doesn't really want. (After all, it's the over-65 Republican base that collects most entitlements.) In the long run, it hardens the image of the congressional GOP as a collection of desperadoes who can never safely be trusted with power," David Frum, a The Daily Beast writer and former speechwriter for George W. Bush, said after the fiscal cliff deal.
The debt-ceiling dilemma and the Republican response so far also remind us that the slightest shift in the wind can bring back that fetid aroma emanating from inside the Beltway.
The deal to avert the so-called fiscal cliff was such a moment. For a short time, it seemed that Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill smelled what the rest of us had smelled for the last four years. Our lawmakers in Washington came together, albeit at a late hour, to keep us from plunging in what many had described as an economic abyss. Although the deal was less than perfect, it gave many a moment of hope, a sense that the best way to pass meaningful legislation is to begin in the U.S. Senate.
Of course, it was a fleeting moment. Before the fiscal cliff bill could reach President Barack Obama’s desk for signature Republicans had already returned to their recalcitrant ways.
House Speaker John Boehner, who had thrown the fiscal cliff debacle to the President and Senate, announced to the nation that his party would again use the debt ceiling in seeking to wrest spending cuts from the President and Democrats.
His statement was reinforced by Sen. John Cronyn of Texas, who declared that the GOP is willing to shut down the government in order to extract concessions from Obama.
“The coming deadlines will be the next flashpoints in our ongoing fight to bring fiscal sanity to Washington,” Cornyn wrote in an op-ed for the Houston Chronicle not long after a fiscal cliff deal was reached. “It may be necessary to partially shut down the government in order to secure the long-term fiscal wellbeing of our country, rather than plod along the path of Greece, Italy and Spain. President Obama needs to take note of this reality and put forward a plan to avoid it immediately.”
Cornyn, like many of his GOP colleagues, has decided that the only way to go is to slash the safety net that helps to support as many people in the red states as it does those in the blue states.
“Republicans are more determined than ever to implement the spending cuts and structural entitlement reforms that are needed to secure the long-term fiscal integrity of our country,” Cornyn wrote days after Sen. Pat Toomey, a Pennsylvania Republican, said Republicans should be ready to tolerate a partial government shutdown in the battle over the debt limit.
The declarations by Boehner, Cornyn, Toomey, and other Republicans of course sent the pundit class into a tizzy. Within hours of the fiscal cliff deal and the Republican announcements, pundits began debating, pontificating on, and dissecting the winners and losers of that deal as if the obstinate players were the only ones that mattered.
But while the talking heads search for new ways to describe the game they help promote the rest of us should look deeper for answers and connections. The problem is we may not find many.
The Jan. 1 deal does bring much needed revenue – granted not as much as desired – to the federal coffers. It also preserves unemployment insurance – while not a substitute for employment – for 2 million people without incomes. It will keep the cost of milk – already high – from rising through the roof. And it will allow poor, working, and middle-class people to continue using the child and tuition tax credits to lower their tax bills.
But what price will we have to pay?
Indeed, the fiscal cliff deal fell short on many fronts. It failed to include a stimulus package. It failed to avert another battle over the debt ceiling. It allowed the temporary payroll tax cut to expire. It did not raise taxes on capital gains and estates high enough. And it did not solve any long term fiscal problems.
More important, it put us back where we were 18 months ago, preparing to fight another battle with a political party that believes not only in taking hostages, but in executing them as well.
That is why we may not find those deeper answers and connections.
The fact that the deal was negotiated by Vice President Joe Biden and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell signals just how bad things have become in Washington in general and the House of Representatives in particular.
That so many urged the President to allow the Bush-era tax cuts to expire in an effort to gain greater negotiating leverage over the Republicans shows that too many people in Washington fail to recognize the real consequences of such actions. Theirs are arguments steeped in politics not policy.
For the millions of people whose unemployment ran out a few days before the deal was struck, it was no game. Yes, Congress could have passed a bill after Jan. 1, resulting in retroactive benefits. But unless one has lived from paycheck to paycheck one does not understand how a delay, even of a few days or weeks, can create havoc. Allowing those benefits to expire would have caused real harm to real families, something lawmakers should avoid at all costs.
The problem of course is that Washington is unable to do anything – even the things on which all parties agree – until the last moment
“Debt-ceiling dilemma: In the short run, it enables Republicans in Congress to excite their base about entitlement reform that base doesn't really want. (After all, it's the over-65 Republican base that collects most entitlements.) In the long run, it hardens the image of the congressional GOP as a collection of desperadoes who can never safely be trusted with power," David Frum, a The Daily Beast writer and former speechwriter for George W. Bush, said after the fiscal cliff deal.
The debt-ceiling dilemma and the Republican response so far also remind us that the slightest shift in the wind can bring back that fetid aroma emanating from inside the Beltway.
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