Phony Deficit Hawks Criticize the Ryan Budget

Washington is filled with groups that piously express their devotion to balanced budgets and fiscal responsibility, so it is rather revealing that some of these groups have less-than-friendly responses to Congressman Ryan’s budget plan.

The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, for instance, portrays itself as a bunch of deficit hawks. So you would think they would be doing cartwheels to celebrate a lawmaker who makes a real proposal that would control red ink. Yet Maya MacGuineas, president of the CRFB, basically rejects Ryan’s plan because it fails to increase the tax burden.

…while the proposal deserves praise for being bold, the national discussion has moved beyond just finding a plan with sufficient savings to finding one that can generate enough support to move forward. All parts of the budget, including defense and revenues, will have to be part of a budget deal… Now that both the White House and House Republicans have made their opening bids, this continues to reinforce our belief that a comprehensive plan to fix the budget like the one the Fiscal Commission recommended has the best hope of moving forward.

I’m mystified by Maya’s reference to an “opening bid” by the White House. What on earth is she talking about? Obama punted in his budget and didn’t even endorse the findings of his own Fiscal Commission. But I digress.

Another example of a group called Third Way, which purports to favor “moderate policy and political ideas” and “private-sector economic growth.” Sounds like they should be cheerleaders for Congressman Ryan’s plan, but they are even more overtly hostile to his proposal to reduce the burden of government.

House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan’s budget is a deep disappointment. There is a serious framework on the table for a bipartisan deal on our long term budget crisis. It’s the Bowles-Simpson blueprint, now being turned into legislation by the Gang of Six. It puts everything on the table – a specific plan to save Social Security, significant defense cuts, large reductions in tax expenditures and reforms to make Medicare and Medicaid more efficient, not eliminate them.

That sounds hard left, not third way. But it’s not unusual. Many of the self-proclaimed deficit hawks on Capitol Hill also have been either silent or critical of Ryan’s plan.

Which leaves me to conclude that what they really want are tax increases, and they simply use rhetoric about debt and deficits to push their real agenda.

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The Most Important Election of 2011 Is a Huge Victory for…

I’ve written several times about the major fight in Wisconsin to control excessive compensation for government bureaucrats. Governor Walker basically won the first battle in that important and necessary campaign, but Yogi Berra sagely explained that “the opera ain’t over ’til the fat lady sings.”

In this case, the proverbial fat lady is yesterday’s election for Wisconsin’s Supreme Court. Leftists control three of the seven seats on the Court and were hoping to use the fight over bureaucrat compensation as a trigger to pick up a critical fourth vote. Here’s how today’s Milwaukee Journal describes what was at stake.

Interest groups on both sides had portrayed the election as a referendum on Gov. Scott Walker’s agenda and particularly on the collective bargaining law. Conservatives backed Prosser, and liberals supported Kloppenburg, even though the candidates themselves insisted they were politically neutral.

The election is critical, not just in terms of whether the Wisconsin reforms could be blocked by an ideologically motivated state Supreme Court, but also because the election has been closely watched by political activists in other states.

Simply stated, the winning side will gain lots of momentum. Unions poured lots of money and muscle into the race. They want to send a signal to lawmakers around the nation that any effort to control compensation costs will result in a political backlash.

At this stage, you’re probably saying, “enough blather, Dan, tell us who won!” Unfortunately, I can’t answer that question. Here’s the screen capture of the latest results from the Milwaukee newspaper. As of this moment, the union-backed candidate is trailing by a very tiny margin.

We’ll find out later today (hopefully!) who won the race, but I feel much better than I did last night. When I went to sleep, Kloppenburg had a lead of 18,000 votes and it appeared things were trending in her direction.

P.S. This election comes very close to debunking my cranky post from last year saying that voting was theoretically a waste of time since no single vote would ever decide an election.

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