Legal Commentary

More On The Deal: House GOP Adopts Norquist Rules

By Big Tent Democrat

The New York Times, which editorialized in favor of The Deal NOW provides this advice to President Obama and the Dems, in light of the Norquist Rules just adopted by the House GOP:

The new Republican rules will gut pay-as-you-go because they require offsets only for entitlement increases, not for tax cuts. [. . .] The new rules mandate that entitlement-spending increases be offset by spending cuts only — and actually bar the House from raising taxes to pay for such spending. Even worse, they direct the leader of the House Budget Committee to ignore several costs when computing the budget [. . .] For example, the cost to make the Bush-era tax cuts permanent would be ignored [. . .] At the same time, the new rules bar the renewal of aid for low-income working families — extended temporarily in the recent tax-cut deal — unless it is fully paid for.

This "shocking" development, after The Deal, leads the New York Times, supporter of The Deal, to counsel:

The challenge for President Obama and Democratic lawmakers is not to get drawn into that warped mind-set. They need to present an alternative, including investments — in energy, technology, infrastructure and education. They also need a plan for long-term deficit reduction that recognizes what the Republicans ignore: Never-ending tax cuts make the deficit worse. Prudent tax increases need to be part of the solution.

(Emphasis supplied.) After supporting The Deal, it takes some chutzpah to give that advice. The Deal was reckless and idiotic in every way but one (the UI benefits.) The "warped mind set" is one the President celebrated with a fancy signing ceremony.

I am stilll shocked that people do not get the damage The Deal has done. It was a terrible mistake.

Speaking for me only

Full post as published by TalkLeft on December 30, 2010 (boomark / email).