Over at The Washington Post, Matt Miller has a wonderful column that says what needs to be said about the current budget debate as directly and angrily as it can be stated: ““The House Republican budget adds $6 trillion to the debt in the next decade yet the GOP is balking at raising the debt limit.”
There’s more:
The supposedly “courageous,” “visionary” Paul Ryan plan — which already contains everything Republicans can think of in terms of these spending cuts — would add more debt than we’ve ever seen over a 10-year period in American history.
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The classic definition of chutzpah was a kid who kills his parents and then asks for the mercy of the court because he’s an orphan. The new definition of chutzpah is Republicans who vote for the Ryan plan that adds trillions in debt and who then say the debt limit goes up only over their dead bodies!
Several things.
First, I’ve known Matt for a long time and, honestly, I’ve never read anything he’s written that expresses so much exasperation and frustration as this piece.
Second, before anyone goes hyperpartisan on me or him, Matt does say “The Democrats’ plans are no better on the debt.”
Third, the point isn’t that Democratic plans don’t also add to the debt; they obviously do. The point, however, is that, as Matt states, “…at least Democrats aren’t rattling markets by hypocritically holding the debt limit hostage while planning to add trillions in fresh debt themselves.”
Matt suggests that Barack Obama should use as his mantra as he tours the country “…that we should lift the debt limit only by as much debt as is needed to accommodate Paul Ryan’s budget.” Along the same lines, I don’t understand why House Democrats didn’t offer an amendment during the debate on the budget resolution last week that would have raised the debt ceiling by enough to accommodate the additional borrowing in the Ryan plan. That would have forced every Republican to vote on it rather than allowing them to avoid the issue.
six trillion in 10 years? get real, at the pace we’re borrowing we’ll hit six tril by 2013. that’s two years for those with a ged. ten years we’ll be somewhere north of thirty trillion