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July 16, 2011 in Opinion
Obama talks a good game
WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama is demanding a big long-term budget deal. He won’t sign anything less, he warns, asking, “If not now, when?”
How about last December, when he ignored his own debt commission’s recommendations? How about February, when he presented a budget that increases debt by $10 trillion over the next decade? How about April, when he sought a debt-ceiling increase with zero debt reduction attached?
All of a sudden he’s a born-again budget balancer prepared to bravely take on his own party by making deep cuts in entitlements. Really? Name one. He’s been saying forever that he’s prepared to discuss, engage, converse about entitlement cuts. But never once has he publicly proposed a single structural change to any entitlement.
Hasn’t the White House leaked that he’s prepared to raise the Medicare age or change the cost-of-living calculation?
Anonymous talk is cheap. Leaks are designed to manipulate. Offers are floated and disappear.
Say it, Mr. President. Give us one single structural change in entitlements. In public.
As part of the pose as the forward-looking grown-up rising above all the others who play politics, Obama insists upon a long-term deal. And what is Obama’s definition of long-term? Surprise: An agreement that gets him past Nov. 6, 2012.
Nothing could be more political. It’s like his Afghan surge wind-down date. September 2012 has no relation to any military reality on the ground. It is designed solely to position Obama favorably going into the last weeks of his re-election campaign.
Yet the Olympian above-the-fray no-politics-here pose is succeeding. A pliant press swallows the White House story line: the great compromiser (“clearly exasperated,” sympathized a Washington Post news story) being stymied by Republican “intransigence” (the noun actually used in another front-page Post news story to describe the Republican position on taxes).
The meme having been established, Republicans have been neatly set up to take the fall if a deal is not reached by Aug. 2. Obama is already waving the red flag, warning ominously that Social Security, disabled veterans’ benefits, “critical” medical research, food inspection – without which agriculture shuts down – are in jeopardy.
The Republicans are being totally outmaneuvered. The House speaker appears disoriented. It’s time to act. Time to call Obama’s bluff.
A long-term deal or nothing? The Republican House should immediately pass a short-term debt-ceiling hike of $500 billion containing $500 billion in budget cuts. That would give us about five months to work on something larger.
The fat-cat tax breaks (those corporate jets) that Obama’s talking points endlessly recycle? Republicans should call for urgent negotiations on tax reform along the lines of Simpson-Bowles that, in one option, strips out annually $1.1 trillion of deductions, credits and loopholes while lowering tax rates across the board to a top rate of 23 percent. The president says he wants tax reform, doesn’t he? Well, Mr. President, here are five months to do so.
Will the Democratic Senate or the Democratic president refuse this offer and allow the country to default – with all the cataclysmic consequences that the Democrats have been warning about for months – because Obama insists on a deal that is 10 months and seven days longer?
That’s indefensible and transparently self-serving. Dare the president to make that case. Dare him to veto – or the Democratic Senate to block – a short-term debt-limit increase.
This is certainly better than the McConnell plan, which would simply throw debt reduction back to the president. But if the House cannot do Plan A, McConnell is the fallback Plan B.
After all, by what crazy calculation should Republicans allow themselves to be blamed for a debt crisis that could destabilize the economy and even precipitate a double-dip recession? Right now, Obama owns the economy and its 9.2 percent unemployment, 1.9 percent GDP growth and exploding debt about which he’s done nothing. Why bail him out by sharing ownership?
You cannot govern this country from one house. Republicans should have learned that from the 1995-’96 Gingrich-Clinton fight when the GOP controlled both houses and still lost.
If conservatives really want to get the nation’s spending under control, the only way is to win the presidency. Put the question to the country and let the people decide. To seriously jeopardize the election now in pursuit of a long-term small-government Ryan-like reform that is inherently unreachable without control of the White House may be good for the soul. But it could very well wreck the cause.
Charles Krauthammer is a columnist for the Washington Post Writers Group. His email address is letters@charleskrauthammer.com.
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kma on July 16 at 6:55 a.m.
Charles Krauthammer is such a conservative right wing nut. He would never admit it but he truly is a bigot and a racist.
I don’t care what our President does, this idiot will slam him along with the other idiots he associates with like Bachmann, Failin (Palin), Trump, Hannity, O’Reilly, Beck, and the list goes on and on. I wonder if he is on the FOX payroll….hmmmm bet he is and is just as low a scumbag as anyone associated with the MURDOCK regime!
Hey, Charles, look at what your party is offering as Presidential candidates……..what a FLIPPING JOKE!!!
“If the conservatives continue to screw up this country with THEIR, MY WAY OR NO WAY. DO AS I “SAY” NOT AS I “DO”, this country is definitely doomed. I mean they support TEA BAGGERS who don’t have a flipping clue about anything!!! Remember their lying motto….NO MORE GOVERNMENT….and look at all new legislation that has passed taking away people’s rights. What a bunch of hypocites. They say what you want to hear and then do the opposite.
NO TAXES FOR THE RICH…LIKE THIS IDIOT Charles Krauthammer. Maybe CK’s taxes need to be audited!! Oh, but wait, Republicans (rich) don’t pay taxes, that is their right and the Republican way.
kma on July 16 at 7:55 a.m.
Oops…it is MURDOCH..my error.
hawken on July 16 at 8:14 a.m.
Whenever confronted with facts they can’t logically refute, Liberals always resort to name calling, character assassination and defamation. This is rule #1 in the Liberal Playbook.
Per kma:
Charles Krauthammer is:
*a conservative right wing nut
*a bigot
*a racist
*an idiot
*a scumbag
*a flipping joke
*a liar
*a hypocrite
Don’t you just love the “intellectual depth” of liberals!??
woamike on July 16 at 8:17 a.m.
Dear kma,
Your error was not just misspelling “Murdoch”. That error pails in comparison to the rest of your baseless diatribe.
Once again, the former Mondale speech writer, now enlightened and reformed K-Man, is right on.
Sorry libs, your emperor has no clothes. He is also full of himself and is incapable of telling the truth.
Orphan on July 16 at 8:20 a.m.
KMA you mention the republicans “THEIR, MY WAY OR NO WAY.” but isnt Obama doing exactly the same thing when “Obama is demanding a big long-term budget deal. He won’t sign anything less, he warns, asking, “If not now, when?”.
I just thought I would ask how are those 2 statements different.
cheddar on July 16 at 8:21 a.m.
Kma,
Amazing how much you can type without offering a single fact to support your argument.
mikeln on July 16 at 8:34 a.m.
The only way a republican will win the presidency in 2012 will be to pull a dick/bush scam. When will you right wingers get a grip on reality? This nation is no longer going to tolorate your support of wealth, at any cost. The people you defend are u ndefendable, wars for profit, torture and many other things that are just not right for this country. You would think that you would now realize that the “information” you have been getting from fox is lies, nothing more. The people at fox lie to you and when caught, lie to you again. You are a sorry bunch of brainwashed fools without a clue.
johnclarke on July 16 at 8:43 a.m.
‘If conservatives really want to get the nation’s spending under control, the only way is to win the presidency”
Well Cons, perhaps if there was a previous example of a conservative president actually controlling spending or reducing the size of government, this statement might have value. Republicans spend like Democrats, they just don’t want to pay for it. The Cons plan: try to pin their gross mismanagement on anyone but themselves.
I’ll be waiting for someone to prove me wrong, but that is not possible. There are no “conservatives”, just Cons.
gmorton on July 16 at 9:17 a.m.
kma wrote,
“Charles Krauthammer is such a conservative right wing nut. He would never admit it but he truly is a bigot and a racist.”
Wow, all the lefty PC epithets hurled in one sentence, shotgun-style, none of which are in the least relevant to anything Krauthammer said.
And of course, utterly no substantive responses to anything K *did* say.
To the *plonk* file with you, kma.
Diana on July 16 at 9:22 a.m.
Yeah, wormlike. Kma’s spelling of Murdoch’s name “pails” in comparison.
Bagger, please.
gmorton on July 16 at 9:34 a.m.
johnclarke wrote,
“Well Cons, perhaps if there was a previous example of a conservative president actually controlling spending or reducing the size of government, this statement might have value. Republicans spend like Democrats, they just don’t want to pay for it. The Cons plan: try to pin their gross mismanagement on anyone but themselves.”
You have a valid point there, John. Repubs are indeed as responsible for the debt as Dems. But the Dems don’t want to pay for it either – they want someone *else* (the “rich,” businesses, “that fellow behind the tree”) to pay for it.
But that is history. What matters now is how to stop that spiral. And the only ones apparently willing to do that are the freshman Repubs in the House.
HINT: You do not break the spiral by raising taxes. That merely ratifies and perpetuates the spiral. And with each turn of the spiral, the government grows fatter, devouring a larger share of the people’s wealth.
gmorton on July 16 at 9:53 a.m.
It is interesting that none of the lefties here have attempted to dispute anything Krauthammer said.
He’s exactly correct. Obama has not outlined a single cut in a single program. His “$4 trillion deal” is a sham; it is based on a contrived baseline, not on current spending, and would make all of its (unspecified) cut in the “out” years, after the next election, and which future Congresses would have no obligation to enact. When his $4 trillion is adjusted to the correct baseline the $4 trillion shrinks to $1.35 trillion over 10 years – against an additional deficit of over $10 trillion over that period.
But of course, his tax increases would happen *now*.
Obama is peddling snake oil, and the Repubs (some of them, at least) are not buying it.
kma on July 16 at 10:28 a.m.
Snakeoil…wow…guess all the RIGHT WING NUTS POSTING HERE are for all the rich and all the tax right offs.
Wahhhhhhhh, why is everybody always picking on me.
LOL, LOL, LOL.
MURDOCH, FOX AND ALL its affiliates are lying, cheating, scum bags!! Ahhhh, feel much better now.
HEY RIGHTIES, TELL ME AND EVERYONE ELSE HERE JUST WHAT THE REPUCKS HAVE DONE SINCE TAKING OVER THE HOUSE!!! Now, be specific, don’t just generalize.
NOTHING, ABSOLUTELY NOTHING!!! All they have done is bring this country down. Taken peoples rights away, aren’t they good little repuks.
Oh My God…the plonk file….help me….help me…… LMAOAU gmorton. Thanks for making me laugh so hard, it is good for the soul gmorton.
kma on July 16 at 10:30 a.m.
Krauthammer is a nut case. Can’t reason with a nut case.
Ok, ok……I DISPUTE EVERYTHING HE SAYS. Does that make you feel better gmorton.
johnclarke on July 16 at 11:07 a.m.
gmorton, the only problem with your plan - it’s never ever happened in our history, and it certainly is not going to magically happen if a Republican is in office. Also, I really wish you would get off of your “free lunch” and “making someone else pay” mantra. We are talking about adjusting higher end rates by small percentages, and the Cons turn that into “job killing tax hikes.” This is nonsense, and you know it. History proves out that higher tax rates - much much higher than the increases being suggested - have seen some of the best economies ever.
Reagan adjusted taxes, up. The other Bush adjusted taxes up. Clinton adjusted taxes, up. The economy improved.
Also, drastically slashing spending is knee jerk and just plain stupid. Gentler changes to revenue and spending is the wisest course, and you also know that. Reagan learned the hard lesson about big changes.
Dazzeetrader11 on July 16 at 11:56 a.m.
See how popular Dear Leader is? His brand of nonsense simply isn’t selling anymore. Just like last Novemeber, the American people are waking up again. He wont be around soon enough so all the leftist arguments don’t matter. And there’s more…later. Malignant ( is there any other form???) form of socialism will never sell…and it looks like it isn’t.
http://www.gallup.com/poll/113980/Gallup-Daily-Obama-Job-Approval.aspx
Charles is absolutely correct.
hawken on July 16 at 12:11 p.m.
Clarke: Your Marxist retort is a Red Herring on two levels:
1- We are in historically, underrepresented times since the paramount of FDR to get us out of the same crisis.
Obama is FDR on Keynesian Steroids!
2- The next closest, example we’ve had in history is the Liberal, left, Carter years.
Reaganomics was the clear, historical cure for Charter’s Keynesian fiasco.
Supply-Side Reaganomics Has Always Worked.
No matter how hard Clarke and others try to re-write history, Reaganonmics did in fact work.
Supply-Side Economics has always worked. See the history going back to 1913 when the progressive income tax was first implemented.
I’ve posted Supply Side relating to Reagan only. You can read the whole history of Supply Side at the link below.
hawken on July 16 at 12:12 p.m.
More on the solution to our economic crisis, see my post above.
More on Reaganomics:
Republican, Reagan, House plans? Anyone?
hawken on July 16 at 12:24 p.m.
Followup:
Clarke is a self-admitted “Marxist.”
I am NOT name calling. I am quoting Clarke himself.
We all make posts based upon our world view. I am a small government, Individual Freedom, Anti-Marxist, Conservative. Feel free to label me as the same.
I am not a Marxist.
Karl Marx
Democracy is the road to socialism.
Karl Marx
For the bureaucrat, the world is a mere object to be manipulated by him.
Karl Marx
Religion is the opium of the masses.
Karl Marx
The first requisite for the happiness of the people is the abolition of religion.
Karl Marx
The meaning of peace is the absence of opposition to socialism.
Karl Marx
The production of too many useful things results in too many useless people.
Karl Marx
The theory of Communism may be summed up in one sentence: Abolish all private property.
Karl Marx
________________________________________
Clarke’s Marxism is “antithetical” to a free America and American Capitalism.
Beware, before you agree with Clarke’s Marxism. By his own admission.
gmorton on July 16 at 12:32 p.m.
johnclarke wrote,
“Also, I really wish you would get off of your ‘free lunch’ and ‘making someone else pay’ mantra.
I’m sure you would. But since those are the salient – indeed, central – factors responsible for the current crisis and thus the paramount issues in the current debate, they cannot be pointed out too often.
But let’s be clear as to what they mean: a “free lunch” is simply a benefit or service granted to someone who has done nothing to earn it – who has provided nothing of value in exchange for it – and which is paid for by seizing the means to do so from someone else.
And that, of course, is exactly what “big government” does – it delivers free lunches, as above defined, to an ever-expanding roster of constituencies in exchange for their votes, and attempts to pay for them by seizing wealth from people who actually earn it, who produce goods and services others value and are willing to pay for. Or when the seizures become politically too difficult, it *borrows* the money, thus making the “someone else” who must pay for the free lunches some unspecified and unwitting person in the future.
I’m sure you’d like to sweep those realities under the rug and pretend they don’t exist. Or perhaps wish that the persons whose pockets you want to pick would just sit still for it, and allow the leeches to nibble away at them until they’ve devoured the last drop of blood. That isn’t gonna happen.
” … the Cons turn that into ‘job killing tax hikes.’ This is nonsense, and you know it. History proves out that higher tax rates - much much higher than the increases being suggested - have seen some of the best economies ever.”
Sorry, John, but (nearly) all taxes are “job killing.” Any increase in the costs of producing any product or delivering any service is “job killing,” whether it is an increase in taxes, the cost of the raw materials, in shipping costs, in labor costs, in rent, whatever. They are all “job killing” because any increase in costs, of any kind, will force an increase in the price of the product. An increase in the price of the product reduces demand, which means less of the product can be sold. Which means fewer jobs producing that product. That is Econ 101 John.
And you cannot escape that fact by pointing to periods when taxes have been (relatively) high yet the economy (and thus jobs) have grown. Taxes are not the only factors which drive economies, or even (usually) the most important one. If taxes are raised slightly at the same time other factors are *reducing* costs, or creating new demand or opening new opportunities for profit, then the negative effect of the tax increase can be overwhelmed by the growth resulting from those other factors. That is what happened with Clinton’s tax increase – two brand new, “monster” technologies appeared during the 90s, the Internet and World Wide Web and cellular telephone technology. The tax increases barely put a dent in that boom (the “dot com boom”).
“Gentler changes to revenue and spending is the wisest course, and you also know that.”
I agree that cuts should be made gradually. You cannot suddenly snatch away everyone’s free lunches; that would be both morally reprehensible and economically catastrophic. But there is no need to grant government any more revenue. To stop the spiral you have to set a firm limit on the responsibilities of government, and the portion of the nation’s wealth it is allowed to consume.
mikeln on July 16 at 1:38 p.m.
“I want what I want when I want it cantor and some of his close buddies have invested thousands on wall street, making money only if the debt limit is not raised. These people have somehow decided they are some type of royalty, all of them, Ds’ and Rs’. We have a government that is comprised of people that care only about thier own personnel wealth, passing laws that let them and the wealthy live above the laws the rest of us have to obey with no morale obligations to the rest of us. I cringe when I think about these people making any decision that affects my life. I think the majority of americans feel the same but so far are powerless to do anything about it.
Dazzeetrader11 on July 16 at 2:12 p.m.
Mike..no…you can see your suspects’ financials online if you want. It’s public. Nowhere will you see investments in Wall St.
Not sure why you would say that…do you know something different? If you do, please publish links for us to see.Pretty Please?
mikeln on July 16 at 2:22 p.m.
You missed the part about royalty and laws. You really think what they show is all there is? These people are corrupt, through and through and would sell thier grandmother down the river for a buck.
Arch_Druid on July 16 at 5:34 p.m.
I find it rather interesting that some on this forum started pushing “communism.”
I guess some people here forgot that only a few years ago, the SCOTUS decision had definitely approved of the “taking” of private property by local gvt on the behalf of commercial interests. Shades of communism anyone?
Other wise, had to laugh a bit about the “jobs killing” anything by way of…
For that commenter here is a run down: competition for raw materials drives costs up. Supply and demand. So, the mere facts of capitalism “kills jobs.” Upscaling land and housing prices to meet a new pricier market by way of wealthier buyers would also “kill jobs.” Actually, what it does is kill affordable housing and rent for anyone not in the high income bracket. Again, the consequences of capitalism. Distribution of goods and services may be more cheaply produced hi-tech, off-shored jobs, etc. only in some cases is a labor pool mandatory for the location of goods to local chain stores. Again, the result of “capitalism” as it exists today. So, where does “jobs killing taxation” come into play when the definition of “capitalism” as it exists now kills jobs all the time? An increase in taxes on the very wealthy means that their abilty to maximize profit as a free lunch program through the gvt is simply somewhat reduced. Mainly through the closure of loopholes, the ending of subsidies, and etc.
Why don’t all of you guys look at the reality. If a product is made in Venezuela and shows up at the local WalMart, that is a jobs killer. Taxes have nothing to do with it. And it happens to be a fact even when taxes were greatly reduced during GW’s years in office. I fail to find where any arguments here hold water.
gmorton on July 16 at 7:34 p.m.
Arch_druid wrote,
“For that commenter here is a run down: competition for raw materials drives costs up.”
Yes, it does. And as a result, more people invest in exploring for and developing sources for those raw materials, or substitutes for them. And those costs come back down. The net result: a larger economy, with more people employed. You see, Arch, that cost increase stimulates production of new wealth. A raise in taxes to pay for a new free lunch does not.
“Upscaling land and housing prices to meet a new pricier market by way of wealthier buyers would also ‘kill jobs.’”
No, Arch. Building the new, pricier houses *creates* jobs – they require more materials and more labor.
“If a product is made in Venezuela and shows up at the local WalMart, that is a jobs killer.”
Uh, Arch, why do you think those jobs relocated to Venezuela in the first place? Because the costs of producing those goods in the US became too high, and taxes are a large part of those costs.
“And it happens to be a fact even when taxes were greatly reduced during GW’s years in office.”
Arch, the cost spiral which drove those jobs to Venezuela began long before GW Bush. It has been growing for decades, and it is driven not only by federal taxes, but state and local taxes, federal regulations and mandates, state and local regulations and mandates (land use restrictions which reduce the supply of available land, “open space” mandates, wildlife habitat and wetland set-asides, building height restrictions “to protect views,” health insurance mandates, State minimum wage laws, etc.), and government-imposed labor costs.
It will require much more than retaining the Bush tax cuts to reverse that spiral.
Arch_Druid on July 16 at 8:57 p.m.
No they don’t GMorton invest in anything but the business interest’s stocks. Nor do they invest in the manufacture of raw material in this nation of turning it into a finished product. Rather, it is shipped cheaply to a receiving country such as China and then pay for the finished product that is returned to this nation.
Kind of hard to argue the facts. Nothing more is to be said.
gmorton on July 17 at 12:30 p.m.
Arch_druid wrote,
“No they don’t GMorton invest in anything but the business interest’s stocks.”
Arch, don’t be silly. No business “invests in its stocks.” It cannot make a profit that way. It has to produce a product people are willing to buy, and do it competitively.
“Nor do they invest in the manufacture of raw material in this nation of turning it into a finished product.”
That’s correct, if producing the raw material or the finished products in this country would make those products uncompetitive. Which it would, in many cases.
That is the fact you have to address.
johnclarke on July 18 at 7:22 a.m.
gmorton;
“I’m sure you would. But since those are the salient – indeed, central – factors responsible for the current crisis and thus the paramount issues in the current debate, they cannot be pointed out too often. ”
Actually, the current “crisis” was created by about 3.2 trillion dollars in spending that was not funded.
Hawken, heritage.org? Really?
gmorton on July 18 at 8:34 a.m.
johnclarke wrote,
“Actually, the current ‘crisis’ was created by about 3.2 trillion dollars in spending that was not funded.”
Yes, it was. Which confirms what I said – hand out free lunches, and send the bills to future taxpayers.
johnclarke on July 18 at 9:28 a.m.
So, my friend…you need to adjust those Con goggles. The credit card spending has nothing to do with free lunches with one big exception. Reagan’s “good” numbers that keep getting pasted again and again and again and again by Hawken are easy enough to explain. You can draw the same conclusion about Bush’s so called growth. They were not paying for what they were spending. In one case, I will agree with you. Medicare Part D is a free lunch, and Bush bought the senior vote with it.
Wars are not “free lunches”.
johnclarke on July 18 at 9:34 a.m.
And let me add….all this cheerful banter is entertaining and all that, but until guys come up with an actual conservative to run, you are basically stuck with liars and frauds. No one, Republican or Democrat has ever, ever reduced spending or the size of government. The last Con expanded just Homeland Security to the point where there are 200 agencies involved, and ran up debt like a crazy liberal.
Regardless, believe in fairy tales all you want, but there are no conservatives, just cons.
gmorton on July 18 at 10:00 a.m.
johnclarke wrote,
“Wars are not ‘free lunches.’”
That’s true. They represent another form of government overreach and waste.
“No one, Republican or Democrat has ever, ever reduced spending or the size of government.”
That’s true too. They are all, first and foremost, politicians who wish to gain and retain power. Free lunches are the principle tool in all their toolboxes.
gmorton on July 18 at 10:06 a.m.
Another tool is arousing fear:
“Civilization, in fact, grows more maudlin and hysterical; especially under democracy it tends to degenerate into a mere combat of crazes; the whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by an endless series of hobgoblins, most of them imaginary. Wars are no longer waged by the will of superior men, capable of judging dispassionately and intelligently the causes behind them and the effects flowing out of them. The are now begun by first throwing a mob into a panic; they are ended only when it has spent its ferine fury.”
— H.L. Mencken
And don’t forget Randolph Bourne: “War is the health of the State.”