03.24.09

President Obama’s first budget – A primer

Posted in Around The Nation, Commentary, District 31, Good Stuff, Health Care, The Budget, The Economy at 2:50 pm by wcnews

As President Barack Obama’s first budget heads to the committee process we again need to remember where we are, how we got here, and  what’s at stake.  We shouldn’t lose focus, as this post from OutFuture points out, Time To Deliver.

In the introduction to his budget proposal, Obama focused on sometehing that’s been missed or ignored in the past two weeks. Much has been said and written about the public anger over the AIG bonuses, but less attention has been paid to the deep roots of that anger.

We start 2009 in the midst of a crisis unlike any we have seen in our lifetimes. Our economy is in a deep recession that threatens to be deeper and longer than any since the Great Depression. More than three and a half million jobs were lost over the past 13 months, more jobs than at any time since World War II. In addition, another 8.8 million Americans who want and need full-time work have had to settle for part-time jobs. Manufacturing employment has hit a 60-year low. Our capital markets are virtually frozen, making it difficult for businesses to grow and for families to borrow money to afford a home, car, or college education for their kids. Many families cannot pay their bills or their mortgage payments. Trillions of dollars of wealth have been wiped out, leaving many workers with little or nothing as they approach retirement. And millions of Americans are unsure about the future—if their job will be there tomorrow, if their children will be able to go to college, and if their grandchildren will be able to realize the full promise of America.

This crisis is neither the result of a normal turn of the business cycle nor an accident of history. We arrived at this point as a result of an era of profound irresponsibility that engulfed both private and public institutions from some of our largest companies’ executive suites to the seats of power in Washington, D.C. For decades, too many on Wall Street threw caution to the wind, chased profits with blind optimism and little regard for serious risks—and with even less regard for the public good. Lenders made loans without concern for whether borrowers could repay them. Inadequately informed of the risks and overwhelmed by fine print, many borrowers took on debt they could not really afford. And those in authority turned a blind eye to this risk-taking; they forgot that markets work best when there is transparency and accountability and when the rules of the road are both fair and vigorously enforced. For years, a lack of transparency created a situation in which serious economic dangers were visible to all too few.

Obama in his message also goes on to point out what must be done to get us out of this crisis.

This irresponsibility precipitated the interlocking housing and financial crises that triggered this recession. But the roots of the problems we face run deeper. Government has failed to fully confront the deep, systemic problems that year after year have only become a larger and larger drag on our economy. From the rising costs of health care to the state of our schools, from the need to revolutionize how we power our economy to our crumbling infrastructure, policymakers in Washington have chosen temporary fixes over lasting solutions.

In other words we must invest in the future by investing in what has been neglected these last 30 years. But in order to deliver we must “make him do it“. Not just Obama but several in his own party who already want to go back to the failed policies of the last 30 years. The make-him-do-it dynamic, is not that we have to force Obama, or the Democrats in Congress, to do anything they don’t want to do. It’s about giving them political cover to do it.  Making them understand that a large majority of Americans “got their backs” and they won’t pay a political price for supporting the change the majority of Americans voted for in November.

We have to make Democrats like Evan Bayh and others, understand that if Americans didn’t want health care, better education,  infrastructure spending, etc.., they would have voted for more of the same, or worse, in 2008.  They didn’t, they voted for change.  Any Democrat who is thinking they need to counter President Obama’s budget needs to remember that he won in 2008 on a platform counter to the last 30 years.  His budget for the first time in a long, long time puts the interests of average Americans ahead of corporate interests, and addresses the neglect.

Democrats should be the focus since as this post points out, GOP support is not needed for the budget .

Republicans can’t kill this budget, only Democrats can. The Budget Resolution operates under special rules—it is NOT subject to filibuster. So the budget can easily pass both the House and Senate without a single Republican vote.

And as Kuff points out GOP support isn’t likely to begin with:

The first step in the process is the House Budget Committee, on which Texas Rep. and Vice Presidential contender Chet Edwards sits. My main hope here is that every Democrat on that committee, especially those who wear the “moderate” or “centrist” labels (whether they are self-defined or media-bestowed), has learned something about the Republicans from the stimulus debate. In particular, what I hope they’ve learned is that the Republicans don’t have any actual interest in passing a good budget. They’re in full-on opposition mode, bound and determined to say “No!” more often than Audrey does these days, and at the end of the day unless the budget eliminates spending and taxes altogether, they’re going to vote against it, most likely in unanimous fashion as they did with the stimulus package despite President Obama’s much-touted efforts to reach out to them. That’s perfectly logical as a political strategy, and everybody should be able to see this coming a mile away, but I fear that it won’t stop the “moderates” from trying to placate them to some degree, in the inevitably vain hope that they can buy some crossover support. I’m sorry, but that just ain’t gonna happen. We’ve seen their dance moves before: Scream about anything that can be turned into a sound bite in order to press for its removal, vote against the final bill regardless of how successful they are in altering it to their liking, then claim credit for any benefit it brings to their district while simultaneously slamming it for being wasteful. It’s as predictable as a slasher movie, yet the temptation to open that door anyway persists.

Not to mention Williamson County’s representative in Congress, who is making some inaccurate statements, Ignorance or dishonesty, Take your pick.

So, let’s get this straight: We’ve had a GOP congress for 12 of the last 14 years, and a GOP presidency for the past 8 years, leading up to this economic meltdown. And the Federal Reserve had been led, until just three years ago, by conservative free-marketeer Alan Greenspan (who recently admitted that his deregulatory ideology turned out to be flawed).

Yet John Carter wants you to believe that conservative deregulatory dogma and the GOP had nothing to do with where we are right now. According to Carter, it’s all the Democrats’ fault.

There are only two possibilities here: either Carter is utterly ignorant of the history and economics of the situation, or he is being dishonest about things.

Not exactly what we want in a Representative, is it?

President Obama will be taking heat from many different angles, and that shouldn’t surprise anyone, it goes with the job. As President Obama stated at the end of his message, it won’t happen overnight, but change will come.

Our problems are rooted in past mistakes, not our capacity for future greatness. We should never forget that our workers are more innovative and industrious than any on earth. Our universities are still the envy of the world. We are still home
to the most brilliant minds, the most creative entrepreneurs,
and the most advanced technology and innovation that history has ever known. And we are still the Nation that has overcome great fears and improbable odds. It will take time, but we can bring change to America. We can rebuild that lost trust and confidence. We can restore opportunity and prosperity. And we can bring about a new sense of responsibility among Americans from every walk of life and from every corner of the country.

Peruse the budget on you own here.

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