"Never send a monkey or RINO to do a man's job."
~ Captain Leo Davidson
Posted on 07/13/2011 9:00:08 AM PDT by Qbert
Shortly after Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell unveiled his “contingency” plan for a debt limit increase, the Associated Press bulletin read: “GOP Leader McConnell proposes giving Obama new power for automatic debt limit increase.”
It’s surely not the headline McConnell wanted, but unlike much of the media coverage of the debt fight, it’s accurate. And that’s a problem.
It is not, however, the main problem with the McConnell plan. Far worse, in my view, is that the plan isolates House Republicans, it undercuts their (tentative) plan to offer an aggressive debt limit proposal of their own, it turns their principled intransigence from a possible strength to a certain liability, and it virtually ensures that, in the event of default, Republicans – not the White House – will be blamed.
McConnell’s plan gives the president the ability to raise the debt ceiling through 2012, in three separate increments, by requiring Obama to propose spending cuts greater than each request. Its main virtue is that these hikes would have to pass largely with Democratic support – something that McConnell and others believe will redound to Republicans’ benefit heading into the 2012 election cycle. And, the theory goes, if President Obama offers phony spending cuts, as he almost certain to do, his posturing as the “adult in the room” on entitlements and spending will be exposed as unserious.
But there’s the catch, too: the spending cuts do not have to be real or even implemented in order for the president to get his debt ceiling increases. McConnell acknowledged this at the press conference to announce the plan Tuesday afternoon. ABC’s Jonathan Karl asked: “Does it guarantee you’ll get your spending cuts or not?” McConnell responded: “No, it doesn’t.”
That fact means the McConnell plan will be nearly impossible to get through the House of Representatives. “There is zero chances it’ll pass the House,” said one House leadership aide. “Zero. I’m not sure it would get any votes from our side.”
A second leadership aide agreed. “It won’t pass.”
If that’s true, and there are many reasons to believe that it is, the McConnell proposal sets up House Republicans – and only the House Republicans – to be the villains. Here’s why.
In the negotiations pre-McConnell plan, Republicans in both houses were united on the three big things: major spending cuts, entitlement reforms, and no new taxes. The fact that House Republicans had been elected to cut spending and reduce the size of government was an advantage. The White House had to understand that any proposal with new taxes or too few spending cuts stood the chance of being rejected by the House. And while the White House had the upper hand in messaging on blame – in part because of the threat of withholding Social Security checks, etc., and in part because of a sycophantic media – there was at least the possibility that the White House would have owned some of the failure to reach a compromise.
The chances the White House would have been blamed could well have increased if House Republicans had decided to move forward with their own aggressive proposal – in effect, daring Harry Reid and President Obama to choose to reject it. While this option was discussed at length, there were two main concerns: 1) an aggressive and specific plan puts Republicans once again on the record voting for things that can be easily demagogued by Democrats; and, 2) the opposition to voting to increase the debt limit in the House is strong enough that coming up with a plan that would pass the House and tempt Democrats would have been difficult, if not impossible. Had House Republicans been able to craft such a plan they would have forced a choice on Senate Democrats and the White House: austerity or default. In such a scenario, President Obama, having warned repeatedly about the catastrophic consequences of default, would have had to defend that choice if he refused to accept the House GOP plan. A high-risk strategy, to be sure, but one with at least the possibility of succeeding.
Not anymore.
Now, the White House has a third option: the McConnell plan. Or, as it’s sure to be known soon, “the bipartisan McConnell plan.” Why would the White House, which originally pushed for a clean debt limit vote, however unrealistic that might have been, agree to real entitlement reform when there is an alternative that allows them to raise the debt ceiling without doing so? Democrats have made clear their willingness to misrepresent Republican plans to reform Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security and their plans to campaign on those mischaracterizations for the next 17 months. And with various Democratic leaders having tried to take entitlements off the table – Chuck Schumer, Harry Reid, Nancy Pelosi – what are the chances they’ll make those hard choices without the threat of severe economic disruption? Slim.
Not surprisingly, the proposal has received a warm reception from Democratic leaders. Harry Reid said Tuesday that he was open to considering it. White House spokesman Jay Carney said that the McConnell proposal means “defaulting on America’s past due bills is not an option.” And two sources familiar with the discussions at the White House Tuesday afternoon said that Nancy Pelosi offered McConnell “congratulations.”
Republicans are divided. A source close to Senator Jim DeMint tells TWS that he is “opposed” to the McConnell plan. Orrin Hatch tweeted that the only plan he supports is “Cut, Cap and Balance.” Senator Ron Johnson declined to endorse the McConnell plan and offered a similar statement. “I will continue to focus on getting the Cut, Cap and Balance legislation passed – which does increase the debt ceiling but only contingent upon us actually fixing the problem.” Sources close to two other senators tell TWS their bosses oppose the plan.
As one might expect, the House Republican reaction to the McConnell plan was almost uniformly negative. “The rank-and-file were ripping him today,” says one House Republican. Although Boehner told Fox News Channel’s Bret Baier that he did not feel undercut by the McConnell proposal, other sources suggest he does. One Republican source tells TWS that House leadership “made it clear that it would be tough sledding in the House and among conservatives, but he wanted to float it anyway.” Asked repeatedly about the McConnell plan, House majority leader Eric Cantor praised the Senate leader and his resolve but noted that it was clear it had little to no chance to passing the House.
McConnell’s proposal ensures that Senate Republicans would not be blamed for any of the economic disruptions that would accompany a default – or those caused by the White House in advance of a default. But it also virtually ensures that House Republicans would be.
McConnell seemed to understand this at his press conference Tuesday. A reporter asked: “Why would you agree, why would Republicans in the House agree to essentially raising the debt ceiling without getting spending cuts?”
He responded: “What we’re not going to be a party to – in the Senate, I’m pretty confident – is default.” The “we” in his response does not mean “Republicans,” but “in the Senate.”
But what if, somehow, the McConnell plan does get through the House? Would that be the end of the world? Not really. It would mean Republicans passed on an opportunity to reduce the debt down to $24 trillion by 2020 instead of $26 trillion (or, theoretically, $22 trillion with tax hikes). That’s not much of a difference if you don’t actually reform the programs and put them on a path to sustainability. If we drown in debt, it doesn’t much matter whether the lake is 24 feet or 26 feet deep.
On the other hand, it seems early to cave. As one Republican skeptical of the McConnell plan put it: “If we give up three weeks early just because the president said ‘Social Security checks,’ (which we all knew was coming six months ago), why did voters elect us in the first place? New GOP slogan: ‘Fighting for limited government is too hard, but if you keep electing us, we’ll keep promising to really, truly, finally fight for limited government when we control all three branches with big majorities.’”
“Oh wait, that was the old slogan.”
Giving up is not a plan.
The McConnell plan would be the absolute worst possible outcome for us and America.
McConnell needs to retire so we can get a real Conservative Republican in his place.
"Never send a monkey or RINO to do a man's job."
~ Captain Leo Davidson
The Republicans would be wise to just do what’s right for the country.
Pravda will blame the Republicans for everything from economic ills to the onset of parvo in puppies.
If the Republicans decide to attempt to appease Pravda, the base will splinter and the Tea Party will become a real 3rd party, (2nd party after the demise of the GOP).
Someone must have pictures of mitch w/ a goat.
Secession is looking more and more attractive.
I’ll be damned if some a$$clown from Kentucky is to enslave this native Virginian and his descendants to the government just so the Washington Post won’t say bad things about him.
By next year, the results of this will be forgotten by most people. Next election, folks’ attention will be on something else.
So as long as it’s “resolved” by next year, repubs will be ok.
Look at just a few months ago - remember that continuing resolution to keep gov’t open when a shutdown was threatened? They didn’t shut it down, but the “cuts” they got were about 2 billion, not the orignially intended 60 billion.
Anyone complaining about that now?
@1:05 - "There is a good deal of conservative support for what I laid out yesterday beginning with the Wall Street Journal editorial page today."
@1:44 - "Doing the right thing for the country is our first obligation, but we cannot force a result, we need to do the next best thing and that's clarify the differences between the two parties."
@2:14 - "They want to blame the economy on us and the reason default is no better an idea today than it was when Newt Gingrich tried it in 1995, is it destroys your brand, and it gives the president an opportunity to blame Republicans for a bad economy."
@3:03 - Laura: "While it puts the burden, it shifts the burden to the greatest extent to Obama, in effect there is kind of a vote at the beginning to raise the debt ceiling because you are ceding..." McConnell: "No, no. It only authorizes the president to ask for it. There will be no vote to raise the debt ceiling I suspect by any Republican."
Laura: "Isn't that passing the buck, Senator? Isn't that passing the buck of leadership to the White House?"
McConnell: "We've been trying to get this liberal president to sign a deal worth signing. You know it makes a difference when you only control a third of the government. If we were able to run the government out of the House of Representatives we would be able to get a result that we would like."
@4:40 - Laura: "When I see the New York Times on the other hand, praising the deal, Harry Reid seeming to be open to it, and even the White House murmers that it might be something acceptable I get a little nervous, why do you think they are embracing it?"
McConnell: "Because they want to raise the debt ceiling and of course we know that is going to happen. Just like we knew shutting down the government in 1995 was not going to work for us, it helped Bill Clinton get reelected. I refuse to help Barack Obama get reelected."
@5:34 - "If we go into default he [Obama] will say that Republicans are making the economy worse and try to convince the public, maybe with some merit, if people start not getting their Social Security checks, military families start not getting letters saying that service people overseas don't get paid, you know that's an argument he would have a good chance of winning and all of a sudden we are co-ownership, we have co-ownership of a bad economy. That is very bad positioning going into election."
@8:34 - "We had hoped this would present an opportunity to cut spending. It looks as if, it may change, but it looks as if it is only going to be an opportunity for him to try to entice us top raising taxes and as I said when I started I'm not going to be a part of turning the Republicans into tax collectors for the welfare state."
“Pravda will blame the Republicans for everything from economic ills to the onset of parvo in puppies.”
They always have, and they always will.
This proves what putz McConnell is. When RINO of RINO’s Orrin Hatch says he can’t support this idiotic plan, McConnell has to know he’s in trouble. I realize Hatch fears a primary challenge, but that aside, it has to make you wonder what McConnell thought this was going to resolve? Who was it did he think would get on board with this nonsense, which looks on the face of it as borderline unconstitutional. So who did McConnell think his audience was? Did he honestly think guys in the Senate like Rubio, Paul, Toomey, Johnson, DeMint, Lee would say “Oh Goodee!!”?? Which makes the point even more clear: McConnell as leader has got to go. When Republicans take over the Senate in 2012, the Conservatives have to mount a leadership challenge to McConnell.
Tea Party went RINO hunting in 2010, and this is the RINO's payback.
I propose that Congress give up their Constitutional authority and
give President Obama unprecedented power to raise the debt ceiling
by $2.4 trillion in three installments through the end of his term!
Is he talking about whenever Obama comes in with a debt ceiling hike and it's voted on, or does he mean House approval of McConnell's plan overall? And if the latter, would they not be voting on it rather soon?
Screw Conservatives, screw America, screw producers, screw the responsible, save all Rats, RINOs, Marxists, Communists, non producers, degenerates, and perverts, and blame Republicans for everything that goes wrong, which will be everything.
A brilliant RINO plan to reelect Zer0.
“By next year, the results of this will be forgotten by most people. Next election, folks’ attention will be on something else”
All the more reason then to do the right thing now.
Kcuf McConell. The Senate Republicans are irrelevent. The action is in the House. Time for Boenher and the boys to lay down the marker. $2 trillion in cuts and no tax increases. Take it or leave it. Oh, and by the way Mr. President, if you violate the 14th amendment by not honoring the debts of the United States, articles of impeachment will be served immediately. Have a nice day Jug Ears.
“All the more reason then to do the right thing now.”
Yes, that was my intended point. Thanks for bringing that up explicitly. I should’ve had it or something in my original reply.
You can just see it running through all of his comments: he’s still terrified of 1995 and what “they will say”...
How about you follow the lead of the new Conservative (Palin, Rubio, etc.) and open up your mouth, Mitch and defend yourself instead of ducking under the table every time the Dems demagogue?
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