Sequester Works? Of Course
P. Schultz
March 7, 2013
Well, that
intellectual heavyweight, E.J. Dionne, has finally figured it out: The
sequester will work! Here is a link to his column in the Washington Post today,
entitled “A way out of our budget wars.” Only what Dionne doesn’t get, even
now, is that the sequester is working exactly as its designers wanted it to
work: To prepare the way for taking more of our retirement money and health
care money. Consider the following quote from Dionne:
“Obama’s lieutenants argue that, while Republicans are aware that the president is seeking new revenue through tax reform, many did not fully grasp the extent to which he has offered significant long-term spending cuts. These include reductions in Medicare and a willingness (to the consternation of many Democrats) to alter the index that determines Social Security increases. Obama has proposed $930 billion in cuts to get $580 billion in revenues.”
This is like my response to those who had argued that Bush’s “Surge” in Iraq had worked: “Of course it did, exactly as it was intended to work: To get Bush to the end of his presidency without his Iraq war looking like the fiasco it actually was.” Now, those who designed the sequester did so in order to “justify” going after Medicare and Social Security, while leaving most tax “loopholes” alone as well as the “defense” budget.
So, Mr. Dionne, the sequester does offer “a way out of our budget wars.” But of course there is little that is justifiable in that “way.” But note the psychology the sequester “imposes” on Dionne: He and we are looking for “a way out of our [alleged] budget wars,” not the best way out or even a justifiable way out. Any way out will do, just as those alleged “incompetents” in D.C. intended.
No comments:
Post a Comment