Why Nothing Will Be Done

Heh.  It's indeed "The New Civility" when it comes to entitlements.  Everyone wants to reduce the deficit but NO one wants their ox gored.  Mr. Asay has it right in his 'toon (note the audience appears old and angry):  the Geezer Lobby is prolly the loudest and most vociferous about their oxen... Social Security and Medicare... than anyone else.  Those oxen, however, account for 43% of the 2010 federal budget and the percentage will only grow as the Boomers retire.  This isn't news, of course.  Neither is it news that no politician has the intestinal fortitude required to make meaningful changes to these two programs.

Well, check that.  Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson, the co-chairs of the president's budget commission, DID make meaningful recommendations to reduce the federal deficit, including some pretty good ideas about entitlement change.  The reaction was predictable: the left went ballistic in their opposition and the right was only somewhat more controlled in their rejection of the proposals.  Messrs. Bowles and Simpson couldn't even get a majority vote on the recommendations within their own commission, largely due to opposition from liberal House members.  It appeared the commission's work was DOA.

Ah, but wait.  There seems to be some hope, after all.  From Politico:

A bipartisan effort to resurrect the recommendations of last year’s presidential deficit-reduction commission gained steam Tuesday in the Senate, where nearly half the members turned out for early morning briefing on the debt crisis and old friends of House Speaker John Boehner are taking the lead alongside the Democratic chairman of the Senate Budget Committee.

The path ahead remains extremely difficult, but the forces coming together represent the best shot this Congress has of finding the political mass needed to bring President Barack Obama and the new House Republican majority to the table.

Flickers and glimmers... that's all the hope we have right now... but I suppose it's a start.  There are other signs of progress, as well.  I read an editorial in the Denver Post this morning that Democrat Mark Udall is in favor of a balanced budget amendment and wants to see an up-or-down vote on Simpson-Bowles.  Both of these things are good ideas; it's a wonder any Democrat endorses them.  But I believe the handwriting is on the wall and it's writ large enough that even Democrats can read it.  But reading and acting are two entirely different things, no?

EIP went on the record back in November in favor of Simpson-Bowles, for what that's worth.  I'd be willing to go a bit further to reduce the deficit: the gub'mint can cut my Social Security benefit by ten percent as part of a deficit reduction plan.  I'll do my part, assuming, of course, that something VERY much like Simpson-Bowles is enacted into law.  I wanna see everyone do their part.  Yeah, I'm crazy like that.