Strike One!

TOPICS:

Posted By: vickie August 1, 2011

As of this evening, the debt ceiling compromise bill has been pass by the House and is awaiting a vote in the Senate.  If Congress manages to pass the ‘compromise’ debt-ceiling bill, the Teapublicans will have delivered STRIKE ONE in their efforts to kill America.

Yes … the “compromise bill” will increase the debt ceiling by as much as $2.4T.  And yes, that should allow the government to pay its bills until 2013 … but at what cost to ordinary Americans?  At what cost to the States, who rely on Federal funding of as much as $1 out of every $3 of their spending?  If the federal government were to default on the debt, it is not inconceivable that state programs that rely heavily on federal dollars, programs such as Medicaid, food stamps or welfare, could get short shrift.

Nevada, for example, receives $14,603M in federal funding:

  • $5,689M in other direct payments;
  • $2,573M in funding for retirement and disability for its citizens;
  • $2,573M for grants; $2,274M for Procurement; and
  • $1,495M for salaries and wages for federal employees who reside in Nevada.

STRIKE TWO would be delivered during the upcoming hostage-taking budget battle.  That battle will begin upon Congress’ return from August recess and will need to conclude by the end of September.  The battle for cuts isn’t over yet as they will need to “negotiate a budget bill for 2012 and beyond.  If they manage to finally push the Ryan budget through the Senate, they will successfully cry out “Strike Two.”

The problem with the ‘compromise bill’ is that it sets us up for STRIKE THREE.  Speaker Boehner and Majority Leader Cantor have already loudly declared that they will not appoint anyone to the super-committee who would consider signing off on any revenue increases.  That means that Democrats on the super-committee would need to capitulate to even more domestic spending cuts as part of the committee’s findings by no later than Thanksgiving or the automatic trigger would get pulled.  With the trigger pulled, it’s STRIKE THREE for the middle class.  Teapublicans will be jumping up and down with glee screaming OUT as they institute draconian spending cuts across the board … just in time for Christmas.

Haven’t read the “budget CONTROL act”?  There’s a summary of its key provisions, printed in the Washington Post today.

You might want to take a look at the actual bill complete with numbers, or a summary by the Rules Committee that’s in normal English, but without the numbers.  See if you can figure out some of the shennigans they’ve pulled off in this bill.  There’s a lot of “IF” statements strewn throughout, and it appears to be decked out with a helluva lot of process without any corresponding substance.  I don’t see much in the bill that would actually address various problems that have lead to Congressional overpsending.  It basically swats at a symptom here and there, but makes no effort at addressing our tax and tariff systems that are at the root of the problem.

  • This deal would cut discretionary programs by nearly $1 trillion over 10 years, and more than half from non-defense discretionary programs: Programs such as Head Start, K-12 education, Title X family planning, job training, domestic violence prevention, meals-on-wheels and other services for vulnerable people will be cut by hundreds of billions of dollars. All this, without touching a penny of the tax breaks enjoyed by millionaires and corporations.
  • It would create a new congressional committee:In addition to the nearly $1 trillion in cuts to defense and non-defense programs over the next ten years, the deal would create a new congressional committee to propose an additional $1.5 trillion in deficit reduction by this November. That committee will have the authority to consider cuts to all spending programs, including Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security and Food Stamps, and revenue increases to help reduce the deficit. House Speaker John Boehner has already said that he will not appoint anyone to the committee who will agree to any tax increases.
  •  It would establish automatic ‘Triggers’:  The congressional committee’s recommendations will be put to a vote in Congress by the end of this year; if Congress fails to enact sufficient reductions, automatic spending cuts would take effect beginning in 2013. While the automatic cuts would exempt a number of key safety-net programs, including Social Security, Medicaid, and SNAP (food stamps), discretionary programs for vulnerable people would be subject to additional, devastating cuts. But tax subsidies and tax breaks for millionaires and corporations would not be touched by these automatic cuts.

The American People want MORE JOBS.  That means that Congress needs to look at our tax system which rewards the rich and the corporations and penalizes the middle class and the working poor.  It also means that Congress needs to look at our tariff and import tax schedules which promote the shipping of jobs overseas, allowing corporations to take advantage of lower wages.  Then it allows those same corporations the ability to bring their products back into the U.S. without having to pay any tariffs or taxes.

The direct impact of the cuts imposed by this deal will weaken an already anemic economic recovery and result in fewer jobs as public sector jobs are eliminated and fewer private sector products and services are purchased. For the millions of women and men who are still struggling to find jobs and who are already suffering from deep cuts in public services, the fact that this deal could have been worse provides little comfort.

Worse, you can safely bet that the bozos currently in Congress aren’t going to get off their arses and address the true source of our current challenges.  The Republican mantra of “we have a spending problem” is absurd. They have continually cut taxes for the rich and the corporations to the detriment of the working middle class.   Maybe they should take a close look at Illinois’ budget (37.9B in the red) and see how that “no new taxes mantra” hasn’t worked so well for them.

With what they’re proposing, it appears they want to go back to the spending limits in effect in 1959 (during Eisenhower’s term). Never mind that the population has exploded dramatically over the last 50 years, as has inflation.  They don’t care, they’ve got their blinders firmly in place, and that’s where they’ve set their focus to take our nation’s budget.

If that’s where they want to go, then it’s time the rest of us to make them take DOD back to those budget levels as well.  Not only that we need to pressure them to close a large number of overseas bases that are leftovers from World War II and the Cold War that still persist to this day.  Why?  They should have been closed decades ago.  And then there’s my pet peeve.  For all their rants about turning things over to the private sector, how about turning over the  maintenance of and promotion of 100s of golf courses around the globe?  Those monies should be removed from DOD’s budget, the assets should be sold to private sector entities and the monies gained from those sales should be applied to reduce the federal debt.

S. 365, as amended, the Budget Control Act, was passed by the House this evening.  It now needs to be voted on by the Senate before it can be sent to the President for final approval.

Other Resources: