"Rep. Mick Mulvaney, R-S.C., told a National Journal panel on the 2012 election that he fully expected the super committee to fail and expected all of the underlying political and policy issues to be settled, at least in part, by the 2012 election"
-I truly hope that Rep Mulvaney is wrong here. If recent developments in Europe have taught us anything it is that time cannot be taken for granted when it comes to fiscal reform.
"We can all, of course, be comforted by a public review of deficit-reduction proposals that are nearly a year old. Testifying on Tuesday were Bowles; former Sen. Alan Simpson, R-Wyo.; former Clinton budget director Alice Rivlin; and former Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M. Simpson and Bowles had theirs ($4 trillion in deficit reduction by 2020). Rivlin and Domenici had theirs ($4.5 trillion in deficit reduction with $877 billion in debt reduction by 2020). Neither is new nor poorly understood. Neither contains a single budgetary insight or revelation any of the 12 super committee members has not heard before. Both commissions, however, made choices.
Choices. Policy choices. Both raised taxes and cut spending. It doesn’t matter how, which is to say it doesn’t matter how unless and until the super committee contemplates deficit reduction of that size. That means $4 trillion over 10 years. But the super committee is clawing around looking for about one-fourth of that. Bottom line: The magnitude of change to tax and spending policy contemplated by both commissions is far larger than anything the super committee is looking at now. Bowles told the super committee $4 trillion is not “the maximum” or the “ideal” figure. It is, he said with a hard glare, “the minimum.”"
The more this negotiation gets bogged down, the more I believe that President Obama made a grave tactical error in largely ignoring the Simpson-Bowles Commission's report last year. He should have had the fortitude to press for massive deficit reduction in 2010 in order to avoid running into election year politics. He also would've benefited from the bipartisan nature of the commission, which could have provided him with some cover from right wing attacks.
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