Alas! Speaker Johnson Folds Like A Cheap Suit To Democrats’ Spending Increases

The Federalist ^ | 01/11/2024 | Christopher Jacobs

[SeekAndFind]

Republicans had significant leverage to demand spending concessions from Democrats but let them increase spending in the latest deal anyway.

With “friends” like Mike Johnson, do conservatives really need enemies?

That question, harsh as it sounds, should echo in the minds of individuals and groups who want to restrain Washington’s inflation-causing spending. The agreement House Speaker Johnson cut with Democrats over the weekend would actually raise spending compared to what would happen under the status quo. That additional spending binge might constitute the kind of change Democrats believe in, but it shouldn’t persuade fellow Republicans to sign off on this ill-conceived plan.

Debt Deal’s Spending Caps

Almost eight months ago, I wrote about how the debt limit agreement then-Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., negotiated with Democrats virtually guaranteed another massive omnibus spending bill. As part of that argument, I noted that the debt limit deal contained provisions triggering automatic changes in spending levels should Congress not pass all 12 of its annual appropriations measures.

Back in May, those changes meant that “spending on defense programs — which Republicans generally support — will decrease, while spending on non-defense programs will actually increase when compared to the underlying spending targets laid out in the debt limit bill” (emphasis original). I argued in May that Republican “defense hawks” would push for an omnibus to avoid those automatic cuts, and Democrats would likewise have leverage to demand a bloated omnibus spending bill, because doing nothing would otherwise result in two outcomes they largely support — lower defense spending and higher non-defense spending.

But the dynamic changed substantially in the months since, in a way that gives Republicans additional leverage. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reestimated the spending caps due to budgetary “anomalies” and other technical changes. (Wonky details are available in this article.)

The end result of the CBO reestimate? If the debt deal’s spending caps kick in, non-defense spending would decrease significantly, while defense spending would get held largely flat. In other words, conservatives have significant leverage to demand spending concessions from Democrats, because the status quo under current law would result in an outcome most conservatives would support.

Shady ‘Side Deal’

Given that dynamic, what did Speaker Johnson and Republican “leadership” do? By and large, they bailed the Democrats out of the predicament they put themselves in last May.

Johnson’s office has framed the agreement as one that “represents an actual cut in non-VA, non-defense spending.” But Johnson’s statement leaves unanswered a key question: a “cut” compared to what?

Relative to spending levels in the fiscal year that concluded last Sept. 30, non-defense spending might decline by a nominal amount. But an increase in defense spending means that overall spending will still trend higher than the bloated budget passed late in 2022 under former Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.

More importantly, relative to the caps that are in current law and will take effect in a few months should Congress not pass 12 appropriations bills, spending will increase, and increase substantially. My friend Rep. Chip Roy, R-Texas, has a good chart that shows the difference:

.@HouseGOP FAILED to use its leverage to force cuts to inflationary spending

We must reject this "deal" w/ Dems that will INCREASE spending by ~$30 BILLION & fund agencies at war with our liberty & security – like Mayorkas' DHS#NoGimmicks #NoSideDeals #NoSecurityNoFunding pic.twitter.com/XRBmzUshyz— Rep. Chip Roy Press Office (@RepChipRoy) January 9, 2024

The difference between the yellow line, overall spending levels if the caps in May’s debt deal take effect, and the red line in this weekend’s agreement amounts to the additional spending Johnson agreed to. Even by Washington standards, that roughly $100 billion difference amounts to real money.

That difference in spending arises because Johnson agreed to maintain a “side deal” arrangement negotiated between McCarthy and Biden last spring to increase non-defense spending. He did so even though this “deal” was not written anywhere in law, such that neither he (who wasn’t in the room when it was negotiated) nor anyone else actually voted to support it last spring.

Johnson did receive some minor concessions that modified this “side deal.” Specifically, more of the spending in this agreement was paid for by rescinding unspent Covid money and an additional $10 billion in IRS funding that Democrats passed in the Inflation (Reduction) Act in 2022.

But rescinding Covid money that wasn’t going to be spent anyway amounts to little more than putting lipstick on a pig. Johnson had every bit of leverage to demand that the spending reductions already scheduled to take place actually go into effect — or force the Democrats into a “shutdown showdown” over their desire to spend, spend, spend. Instead, he caved like a cheap suit.

But Wait — There’s More!

As if the speaker’s failure to use his leverage on spending weren’t bad enough, Johnson also conceded late last week that he would not insist on border security provisions being added to the annual spending bills. As a result, Johnson and any other Republican who votes for these spending measures will continue to fund the Biden administration’s fecklessness at the border.

And lest one think that the humiliation was not total, Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., among others, have publicly stated that “obviously” Congress will have to pass at least one more short-term continuing resolution to allow lawmakers to draft specifics of the spending agreement into law. Recall that Johnson publicly committed last year that he was “done” with more short-term spending bills. So much for that promise.

However, there still is another way. Johnson can — and should — put a continuing resolution on the floor. But this one should fund the entire government at current spending levels through Sept. 30, the end of the fiscal year. Passing this type of continuing resolution would allow the spending cuts included in the debt limit bill to take effect — i.e., the outcome Johnson claims to support.

If Democrats want to filibuster that continuing resolution in the Senate, i.e., shut down the government because they want to bust through the spending caps negotiated not nine months ago, then let them. Republican “leaders” should stop trying to beat the Democrats at their own big-spending game.

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Chris Jacobs is founder and CEO of Juniper Research Group, and author of the book "The Case Against Single Payer."

[Olog-hai]

IOW, they’re both on the same side of the aisle, even with a physical aisle between them.

[whitney69]

“...they’re both on the same side of the aisle, even with a physical aisle between them.”

There are two separate theories though. One tells everyone what they are going to do and the other accepts it. If they didn’t accept it, which would be the real aspect of governing, then there would be hopefully in time compromise and something that pushes closer to getting the problem taken care of over time. As long as one says this is it and the other says “okay,” thern you don’t have a democratic government. You have one group in charge and one nonexistent+.

The theory of democratic govenernment is where the majority can make the decisions in the best interest by vote. That means that less than half can’t make the decisions, in theory. In the house right now of the 435 seats, 220 are republican and 213 are democrat with 2 vacant. So how can it be that the majority is not getting its way? Simple, the republicans are not doing anything and the democrats are doing it all because the republicans are letting them. It’s ain’t because of numbers, it’s one party letting another run the show. So you have two parties, just one in charge completely due to the failure of the other to do their job.

I won’t let the conservatives off by saying they support the liberals. I blast them because they don’t support the conservatives. Two different reasons to blame everyone. One for each party.

wy69

[Olog-hai]

If you’ll permit me, let me bottom line this for you.

Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States.

— Goal #15 of the 45 communist goals for the USA

Franklin Roosevelt’s rapid conversion from Constitutionalism to the doctrine of unlimited government is an oft-told story. But I am here concerned not so much by the abandonment of states’ rights by the national Democratic Party — an event that occurred some years ago when that party was captured by the socialist ideologues in and about the labor movement — as by the unmistakable tendency of the Republican Party to adopt the same course. […] Thus, the cornerstone of the Republic, our chief bulwark against the encroachment (on) individual freedom by Big Government, is fast disappearing under the piling sands of absolutism.

The Republican Party, to be sure, gives lip service to states’ rights. We often talk about “returning to the states their rightful powers”; the Administration has even gone so far as to sponsor a federal-state conference on the problem. But deeds are what count, and I regret to say that in actual practice, the Republican Party, like the Democratic Party, summons the coercive power of the federal government whenever national leaders conclude that the states are not performing satisfactorily. …

— The Conscience of a Conservative (1960), pp. 24-25

There are no two separate theories. Nor are there two separate political parties apart from in name.

And we are a republic, not a democracy. There is a big difference, and this is how the left sees democracy:

… The thesis of the state socialist is that no line can be drawn between private and public affairs which the state may not cross at will; that omnipotence of legislation is the first postulate of all just political theory.

Applied in a democratic state, such doctrine sounds radical, but not revolutionary. It is only an acceptance of the extremest logical conclusions deducible from democratic principles long ago received as respectable.

For it is very clear that in fundamental theory, socialism and democracy are almost, if not quite, one and the same. They both rest at bottom upon the absolute right of the community to determine its own destiny and that of its members. Men as communities are supreme over men as individuals. …

— Woodrow Wilson, Socialism and Democracy, 1887

In other words, democracy, being the same as socialism, is a totalitarian vehicle where individual rights are not recognized. Republicanism (literally the “small r” that normally distinguishes from the US political party similarly named) is therefore the governmental theory that recognizes individual rights, limited government, states’ rights, in other words all the rights and freedoms the US Constitution recognizes in word and that the Uniparty refuses to, being for “democracy” (socialism).

[whitney69]

From your article:

“Nor are there two separate political parties apart from in name.”

My point. But having two separate parties that are working together as one and having two separate parties where one doesn’t do anything nor is accepted or even considered as part of the governing process is not the same.

I don’t believe both parties are working together. I believe only one party is working and the other has chosen not to do it’s job and does nothing. Both are contributory to the failures of this government, but in totally opposite ways. The liberals screw things up with decisions and the conservatives do with not making any or folding on them when they do when big brother calls them on it. Neither claims the other or even recognizes they may have an idea that is worthy of consideration. So no matter who is in power at the time, the liberals normally get what they want. And in the last couple of generations, basically since Reagan, the conservatives have displayed a failure at representing their party completely so we have slipped into a crime ridden, lousy economy, wrong war supporting, fear ridden society with the only desert island being Trump. And that’s only because he was not a politician but a business man and they couldn’t get anything on him. And God knows they tried and are still at it for fear he will run this year.

So it isn’t a matter of having one party because when Trump was in there was success. Imagine if the GOP actually did their job as they do exist. A small percentage of them did during Trump and look what was accomplished despite the liberals fighting every inch of the way and rino republicans doing their best to do nothing to help.

wy69

[Olog-hai]

It is the case of two parties working together and being one, because that’s what we’re seeing here. We saw it when Paul Ryan blocked his efforts for a better economic deal than what we ended up with; we saw it when the late John McCain blocked the repeal of Obamacare. And of course, we saw it when self-professed conservative Republicans certified a fraudulent election in 2021.

Sorry; not buying it, with all due respect. The masquerade is too transparent these days.

[Olog-hai]

By “his” I mean Trump’s.

[whitney69]

Funny you should mention McCain. He was a liberal in conservative clothing:

Such things as:

McCain declined to sign the pledge of the group Americans for Tax Reform to not add any new taxes or increase existing taxes.

McCain was one of only two Republicans to twice vote against the permanent repeal of the Estate Tax.

He was one of two Republicans who voted against Bush’s tax cuts in 2001. On Meet the Press he said, “I voted against the tax cuts because of the disproportional amount that went to the wealthiest Americans.”

In 2016, McCain called the F-35 program a “scandal and a tragedy”, noting a change in stance towards the topic from his 2012 position, as seen when an Arizonan airbase was chosen for the aircraft he lauded it as “the greatest combat aircraft in the history of the world”

He supported the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), and the existing General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) agreements. Trump says it undermined U.S. jobs and manufacturing, and in December 2019, his administration completed an updated version of the pact with Canada and Mexico, now known as the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA). The USMCA won broad bipartisan support on Capitol Hill and entered into force on July 1, 2020.

McCain proposed that seniors with higher incomes should pay higher premiums for government-provided prescription drug benefits (Medicare Part D) as a way to reduce federal spending on health care. They aren’t getting any extra service are they? They are already paying the highest tax amounts in the country.

He flip flopped on privatizing social security

McCain voted against the Telecommunications Act of 1996 (that includes Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act) on the grounds that it would not ensure competition enough in practice, making him and Oregon Senator Bob Packwood the only Republicans to vote against the measure. (Team player?)

McCain opposed the Post-9/11 Veterans Educational Assistance Act, introduced by Senator Jim Webb, which provides college-tuition benefits for veterans in a manner similar to that of the original G.I. Bill for veterans of World War II.

McCain said that he favored the concept of equal pay (the abolition of wage differences based on gender). He has, however, opposed specific legislation that would have given workers more time to discover sex discrimination before bringing suit under the Equal Pay Act of 1963.

Not seeing a lot of GOP favored actions there.

Your entry of the 45 communist goals was displayed by Albert S. Herlong Jr., a ten term democratic representative from Florida and every one of them is a pro liberal action of which most has been accomplished already leading to socialist conforms.

https://www.ethanallen.org/45_communist_goals_from_58_years_ago

BTW, please assist me by not mentioning the liberal GOP people like Susan Collins currently in as she is about as loyal to the GOP as Godzilla is to Tokyo. She mirrors McLain.

wy69