When you hear about the sequester, the number you hear for this year’s cuts is $85 billion.
But according to the Congressional Budget Office (and they ought to know), it’s actually about half that, with discretionary spending falling by $35 billion and mandatory spending by $9 billion.
The rest of the $85 billion would be a result of this year’s cuts and would take place in subsequent years.
Sen. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Kentucky) said today: “The tax issue is finished, over, completed. That’s behind us. Now the question is what are we going to do about the biggest problem confronting our country and our future, and that’s our spending addiction.”
Then for good measure McConnell threw in the Greece canard, which is very effective in scaring people, but is irrelevant to our situation. Greece’s problem is not having its own floating currency and its own central bank.
I agree that we need to cut spending (How about getting out of Afghanistan ASAP?), but you cut spending by negotiating on stuff you haven’t bought yet. You don’t demand spending cuts by refusing to pay for the things you’ve already bought. And we need to balance spending cuts by reforming the tax code to get additional revenue.
If the GOP were so concerned about the national debt, they wouldn’t be willing to mess with our credit rating, driving up borrowing costs and throwing away money on interest payments.
Embattled Farmers 