More evidence that wooing Republicans with budget proposals everyone hates is futile: here's Paul Ryan's
response:
Ryan, however, is not endorsing the proposal, noting that House Republicans have favored an approach that would fundamentally reform entitlement programs without affecting current seniors, unlike Obama’s plan. “It’s statistical reform,” he told reporters at National Review’s office in Washington, D.C. “You can’t claim it’s great entitlement reform.”
His budget, Ryan says, is the one that
really is the
compromise, middle ground approach. So they don't need to do any more compromising.
"We put up budget that balances. We've said here how you fundamentally restructure Medicaid, Medicare. We've put lots of these things in there. The 'base,' I mean look, we represent seniors as well. We think Medicare reform is the best way to go to save this program. So, there are a lot of things we've done. The fiscal cliff was not real popular, I would add. So we, Republicans, have already done things to move to the middle, to get to common ground, that have not been entirely popular.But we have not seen reciprocal moves on the other side of the aisle. Hopefully, today, we'll see something of a change of heart on that."
Yes, Paul Ryan is (still) full of shit. Which is one of the many reasons why trying to negotiate "in good faith" or any other way with him and his party is futile. You'll remember that Ryan didn't propose
any specific Social Security cuts, not wanting to be branded with those the way he and his party were with Medicare vouchers. Instead, he has a Catfood Commission-style prescription for Social Security, requiring
a fast-track procedure to ram through cuts, but to do it in a much sneakier way than just putting it in a budget.
Because putting specific cuts in a budget is a sure-fire way to enrage a lot of people. No, it's a much better plan to con your opponent into putting those cuts in writing so that you can say they a) are totally inadequate, and b) an attack on seniors. Schizophrenic? Sure, but that's never stopped Republicans before.