Quote:
Originally Posted by Toughy
I want the most hardcore idealogues from both sides on the super commission. When they fail to do anything because they will not compromise, all those triggers will kick in. Then the Republicans are fucked because they will have to either increase revenue or cut their precious defense budget and corporate welfare. If the triggers kick in SSI, Medicare, Medicaid, Veterans and Senior benefits are OFF the table for cuts.
All those big corporations and big pharma are shitting their pants right now as they will be the ones who are going to face the big ass cut spending knife, not the middle/working class and poor people.
I'm telling y'all, Obama royally fucked the Republicans with the debt ceiling legislation.
The real way to stop this forever is two-fold. Pass a federal Constitutional Amendment declaring Corporations are not people and money is not speech (the only way to get around the Robert's SCOTUS). The other thing would be passing legislation that requires only public financing of all political campaigns. Bye bye special interest groups and all those big money lobbyists. K Street will have a whole bunch of empty office buildings.
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I am under the impression (but could be wrong) that the trigger mechanisms are not the same for cuts and revenues under the agreement reached- that it is very much in the GOP/Tea Party's favor if the "super" commission does not make cuts (to the degree called for) as outlined in the agreement.
Gotta go do some more research... but here is one analysis that doesn't look so great for what the Dems/Obama care about the most-
http://www.tnr.com/blog/jonathan-coh...enue-tax-obama
(exerpt only)
The debate played out as a microcosm of the debt ceiling debate as a whole: Republicans threatened to torpedo the whole deal if the trigger included new revenue, so Obama retreated. It appears he’s agreed to substitute automatic defense cuts for automatic revenue increases.
The problem is that, these days, plenty of Republicans support cuts in defense spending. Or, at the very least, they don't find them as objectionable as they once did, notwithstanding the best efforts of defense contractor lobbyists. That would increase their leverage in the committee negotiations, making it more likely that the end result is substantial cuts to entitlements. (The media seems to be missing this point completely, at least based on what I'm reading and seeing right now.)
Now, I do like your federal constitutional amendment idea- and hell yes, public financing of all political campaigns is long overdue.