Budget Control Act of 2011 Revisited
You remember the so-called “compromise,” which brought us the Budget Control Act of 2011. It also brought us the “Super Committee,” the unconstitutional, doomed-to-failure panel that couldn’t even find a trillion dollars to cut in 10 years.
Well change the batteries in your 14-digit calculators’ folks, ‘cause another great part of that grand “compromise” is upon us.
Yesterday, President Obama asked for another $1.2 trillion in borrowing power, cashing in his third and largest increase under the debt deal struck last August. Nothing about the request should come as a surprise. The Treasury Department had predicted the government would be bumping up against the $15.2 trillion limit when they raised it last summer. And since neither party seems willing to draw a line in the sand over real spending cuts, a bigger credit line is the only way to keep Washington’s excess afloat.
If I hear another Republican lawmaker say “We had to do it” or “At the end of the day, we have to govern,” I’m gonna puke.
Under the Budget Control Act, Congress has 15 days to object to the hike. In reality, there’s not much leaders can do to stop it from taking effect. Even if the House and Senate passed a bill to oppose the bump, President Obama would simply veto it. Only a two-thirds majority could override him. When the House passes a resolution of disapproval next week, it will be a symbolic rejection of a problem they helped create! Most of them voted for the bill that gave Obama the power to raise the ceiling.
If Republicans are outraged by that, they have only themselves to blame.
Rather than holding firm and demanding a reduction in out-of-control spending when they had the leverage last summer, they started playing political games. Now, as Investors’ Business Daily argues, members will try to leverage the manufactured crisis as opportunity to score political points. “Both parties in Washington [are playing] the rest of us out here in the audience,” writes Andrew Malcolm, “building politically profitable conflict into everyday life, even by the President who’s loving travel into the countryside to denounce Washington’s gridlocked partisan ways that he helps prolong.” While the House can’t fix Washington on its own, it can (and should) serve as the biggest obstacle between the Left and financial ruin. That’s what voters expect, and given the promises of this leadership, it’s what they deserve.
Like us, voters see the troubling signs. Just last week, economists announced that the national debt now equals the U.S. economy. “The 100% mark means that your entire debt is as big as everything you’re producing in your country,” one expert explained. “Clearly that can’t continue.” Neither can the political charades.
To pull America out of this mess, we need leaders who are willing to make tough decisions. Apparently we don’t have any of those animals in the barn now, so let’s just hire some on November 6.
***Ed Randazzo, is a nationally syndicated author. He has been a conservative activist and consultant for over 30 years and is currently the Chief News Editor of Life and Liberty Media***
