It's the Topic of the day. But what is it?
Let's ask the geeks ...
The sequester, explained
by Suzy Khimm, blogs/ezra-klein -- Sept 14, 2012
[...]
What is the sequester?
It’s a package of automatic spending cuts that’s part of the Budget Control Act (BCA), which was passed in August 2011. The cuts, which are projected to total $1.2 trillion, are scheduled to begin in 2013 and end in 2021, evenly divided over the nine-year period. The cuts are also evenly split between defense spending — with spending on wars exempt — and discretionary domestic spending, which exempts most spending on entitlements like Social Security and Medicaid, as the Bipartisan Policy Center explains. The total cuts for 2013 will be $109 billion, according to the new White House report.
[...]
Why does everyone hate the sequester so much?
Legislators don’t have any discretion with the across-the-board cuts: They are intended to hit all affected programs equally, though the cuts to individual areas will range from 7.6 percent to 9.6 percent (and 2 percent to Medicare providers). The indiscriminate pain is meant to pressure legislators into making a budget deal to avoid the cuts.
[...]
Who supported the debt-ceiling deal?
Party leaders, the White House and most members of Congress supported the debt-ceiling deal: The BCA passed on a 268-161 vote in the House, with about one-third of House Republicans and half of House Democrats opposing it. It passed in the Senate, 74-26, with six Democratic senators and 19 Republican senators opposing it.
Sounds like it was a Bipartisan Cliff.
But, what's it all mean?
What's it all mean?
If Congress "wants to control" where and how, and how fastly, our Budget is balanced,
-- then it's about time, they DID THEIR DAMN JOBS.
And prove to America, they DO know how to govern.
Including the Raising Revenues part in Article 1 -- Section 8.
It's about DAMN TIME they honored their Oaths to the Constitution and the American People,
-- and shred their Oaths to Grover Norquist. An Unelected hack has-been.
That dog don't hunt, anymore. Smell the Coffee, GOP.
Your Fantasy Camp is over.