Just like Eric Cantor did over a week ago, John Boehner has taken a walk on Obama's Grand Bargain plan which would include increased tax revenues along with a possible controversial COLA adjustment for Social Security.
House Speaker John Boehner is abandoning discussions with the White House on a large-scale debt deal slated to achieve $4 trillion in deficit reduction. The bone of contention is Boehner's insistence on no tax increases in the deal. Instead, Boehner said the talks should focus on reaching a smaller debt-reduction deal.
"Despite good-faith efforts to find common ground, the White House will not pursue a bigger debt reduction agreement without tax hikes," Boehner said in the statement.
So let me get this straight, even though the Obama Administration was willing to touch the third rail of politics - Beohner just can't go there if it also means increasing tax revenues in the process?
Hmm....
As I argued yesterday, this is a point to be made that Obama wasn't really risking any harm to SS beneficiaries in the short term with shifting to a different CPI since according the current formation - Social Security COLA Benefits haven't risen for the last two years straight.
Social Security checks have gone up automatically every year since 1975, when the first automatic cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) took effect. Prior to that, a separate act of Congress was required to grant any adjustment to compensate for inflation. But this January, there won’t be any COLA, for the first time in the 35 years the system has been in operation.
In point of fact, the CPI has actually been negative over the past two years - and will apparently only begin to bring by the SS COLA in December of this year.
But the long term impact of the Chain-CPI suggestion, if it were to function as has been advertised while creating a modest decrease in COLA over the course of decades - would also increase tax revenues and since one outcome was linked to the other - this was a approach that Beohner could not abide.
As a result this idea is now essentially Off the Table and it was the Republicans who took it off.
And now Beohner wants to go back to Biden Model.
"I believe the best approach may be to focus on producing a smaller measure, based on the cuts identified in the Biden-led negotiations, that still meets our call for spending reforms and cuts greater than the amount of any debt limit increase," Boehner said.
However the President is not letting go of going after Revenue Increases.
"The President believes that solving our fiscal problems is an economic imperative. But in order to do that, we cannot ask the middle-class and seniors to bear all the burden of higher costs and budget cuts. We need a balanced approach that asks the very wealthiest and special interests to pay their fair share as well, and we believe the American people agree.
"Both parties have made real progress thus far, and to back off now will not only fail to solve our fiscal challenge, it will confirm the cynicism people have about politics in Washington. The President believes that now is the moment to rise above that cynicism and show the American people that we can still do big things. And so tomorrow, he will make the case to congressional leaders that we must reject the politics of least resistance and take on this critical challenge."
Secretary Geithner on the need for Shared Sacrifice.
Right now if the Government goes into Debt Default - it will CLEARLY BE SEEN AS THE FAULT OF REPUBLICANS WHO BLINKED - not the President who was willing to put the skin of some Democratic Sacred Cows directly into the game.
Did he really mean it? Was it just a bluff to make the Republicans Back Down? Maybe it doesn't matter, because as I see it - this just things even better for the President no matter what happens.
Chuck Todd and Eugene Robinson on Beohner's Big Runaway.
Obama already had the strong hand in this argument with the American people in overwhelming support for increasing revenues from the Rich.
Despite growing concerns about the country’s long-term fiscal problems and an intensifying debate in Washington about how to deal with them, Americans strongly oppose some of the major remedies under consideration, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll.
The survey finds that Americans prefer to keep Medicare just the way it is. Most also oppose cuts in Medicaid and the defense budget. More than half say they are against small, across-the-board tax increases combined with modest reductions in Medicare and Social Security benefits. Only President Obama’s call to raise tax rates on the wealthiest Americans enjoys solid support.
We already know that historically, this kind of crisis and shutdown has benefited the President. It's quite likely that will happen again whether a crises is avoided or whether he is forced to move to drastic measures by temporarily shutting down down parts of the government to avoid additional spending or utilizing the controversial 14th Amendment Option of denying the Constitutionality of the Debt Ceiling - I'm thinking right now this is Advantage Obama.
Vyan