“It’s sort of like the majority of voters want A) less spending, and B) no actual spending cuts to almost any program.”
Not surprising since that’s the way it is for many people’s personal lives. They may want to spend less and save more, but they just can’t give up their old spending habits.
It’s going to be a real challenge for Romney/Ryan to cut or scale back on government spending. But, they can make a good case for eliminating a lot of programs where waste and redundancy are obvious. And there’s an abundance of such examples, including several large federal agencies.
I agree. I don't think they are likely to succeed at cutting much of anything to be honest. In the short term, my only expectations are that they are more business friendly, scale back on the regulatory state, and slow the growth of spending such that our economy gets off the ground. A growing economy alone will help cut down our deficits.
As far as actually cutting things. Honestly, I think these entitlements may need to implode before we really do anything about it. The public may just need to learn the hard way. I'm hoping Europe's implosion will be a lesson, but I am just not sure even that is going to be enough. I just don't think a majority of the American public, such that it exists these days, is capable of accepting real cuts. Just look at Greece. These people are flat bankrupt and taking handouts from the Germans, and STILL they protest every proposed spending cut. After all this supposed austerity, they are STILL slated to have a primary deficit in 2014. Italy, Spain, California, etc, etc, aren't far behind - and nor is the US as a whole.
What Romney/Ryan can do is slow the rate of our downward spiral. They can make our courts less bad than Obama would, and we are going to need those courts when things really go to hell in a handbasket. R/R can cut back on the regulatory state, open up for more drilling, etc. Maybe, just maybe, R/R can hold things together long enough that the American public will get to see Europe's social welfare state entirely implode and perhaps realize we need to take drastic steps to avert that here. I have very low expectations, so it won't take much for R/R to meet them.