The Republican leadership in Washington has once again sold out to the progressive liberal establishment. The deal negotiated with President Obama is a VERY BAD debt limit deal.
The US voters spoke loud and clear in November 2010 and sent to Washington the message that the unrestrained government growth and spending must cease.
The lure of power, influence and aspirations of ascendency to leadership has apparently seduced and overcome even some of the tea party supported newly elected members of the House.
The Obama Administration and the willing co-conspirators in the GOP Congressional leadership have once again teamed up to create this artificial panic to reach a debt limit deal ostensibly to avoid default of the US Government. The urgency was fabricated by the Obama Administration as default was not necessary even if the government had reached the current debt ceiling. The Republican Congressional leadership continued their liberal-enabling capitulation by accepting the fabrication of the Obama Administration.
The newly elected Republican House members who voted for this debt limit deal have now disappointed their constituents and will join the ranks of those gone before them that will feel the wrath of the tea party in November 2012.
The debt limit deal is a very bad deal because:
1. The “dollar-for-dollar” spending cuts are not real. The debt limit gets increased by $900 billion NOW in exchange for $1 trillion in spending cuts OVER TEN YEARS. By now we should know that future “cuts” in government spending are not cuts at all.
2. Because real substantive spending cuts and spending limits have not been addressed at a sufficient level, the downgrade in the US credit rating has been virtually assured.
3. There are allegedly no tax increases in this debt limit deal but that is smoke and mirrors because the CBO is projecting that the Bush tax cuts will not be extended. If the Bush cuts are not extended, that amounts to a huge tax increase. If the Bush tax cuts are extended, the CBO projections fall apart and other tax increases will be mandated by the trigger mechanism in this bill.
From a political standpoint, the debt limit deal is a disaster for the following reasons:
1. Barack Obama wanted only one thing from this crisis……to remove the continued discussion and debate regarding the debt ceiling and unrestrained spending on the run up to the 2012 election. He got it.
2. The Democrats are coming away from this debate with one of their key goals accomplished: demonizing the Tea Party. According to Politico on Friday, the Tea Party has moved from “hostage takers” to “full-blown terrorists” who are “craven to inflict massive harm on innocent victims to achieve their political goals.” They got it.
It was especially disappointing to see that my Congressional Representative Kristi Noem, who was elected in no small part by the conservative Republicans of western South Dakota voted for this very bad deal.
