"Look, I never said I was a math whiz."
Remember when John Boehner
rejected a CBO analysis that showed the spending "cut" deal he brokered with President Obama and Harry Reid would actually
increase spending by $3 billion?
Well, the CBO has updated its analysis...and has reached the same conclusion:
It turns out the six-month spending bill Congress passed in April increased discretionary outlays through the remainder of the fiscal year by a bit over $3 billion. In other words, total direct spending will be higher by the end of September than if Congress had just set spending on autopilot for the remainder of the fiscal year back in April.
"Total discretionary outlays in 2011 will be $3.2 billion higher as a result of the legislation, CBO estimates--an increase of $7.5 billion for defense programs, partially offset by a net reduction of $4.4 billion in other spending," reads a just-released report from the Congressional Budget Office -- Congress' non-partisan scorekeeper. Analysts there conclude that increase is due in large part to the fact that the six month spending bill shifted defense spending to more immediate activities, which means the bills will come due sooner than later.
I don't think it will happen anytime soon, but eventually Republicans need to realize that the only way to address our long-term fiscal challenges is to deal with these three things:
1. Reduce health care costs
2. End the Bush tax cuts
3. Stop funding needless wars and wasteful homeland security projects
Everything else—in other words, Social Security and domestic discretionary spending—are either rounding errors or trivial to solve. But if we want to be serious about long-term fiscal responsibility, we need deal with the above issues, and with the exception of a small (but growing) group of Republicans who want out of Afghanistan, the GOP has yet to offer a serious proposal on any of them.
It would be nice if Democrats could move more quickly on some of those items (think: public option), but if you're serious about fiscal responsibility, the Democratic Party is the only place to turn. Republicans haven't offered a single idea or plan that would actually accomplish the goals the claim to seek. Instead, they boast about historic spending cuts that actually increased spending.