No Serious Budget Plan

While this administration hasn't proposed a serious budget in 1000 days and there is not one in sight, any attempt to bring sanity to our nation's fiscal nightmare is derided as irresponsible or worse!  The President has excoriated Paul Ryan's serious plan to tame entitlements and reduce deficits.   Meanwhile, not a finger is raised in the White House to come up with any new ideas.

As usual, the President or the Democrats don't have a plan. The plan is more of the same, kick the can down the road and criticize anyone in the opposition for trying to fill a vacuum of leadership.

If you can't budget, you can't lead!  A 'fluffy' budget proposal from the White House was defeated 97-0 recently in the Democratically controlled Senate and a previous year's "fluff-bomb" was defeated almost unanimously last year in the House.

I hate it when the President and other politicians called a reduced increase a "cut". Take the House GOP budget plan. It increases federal outlays from roughly $3.6 trillion this year to nearly $4.9 trillion in 2022. In the AP speech the president called this a "cut" because he wants to increase spending to $5.8 trillion in 2022.     Oh, and by the way, Government Spending is rarely "Investment."

From James C. Capretta at National Review,

....So we hear from the president that the GOP favors creating a “you’re-on-your-own economy,” wants to “end Medicare as we know it,” seeks to revert to “social Darwinism,” and plans to eviscerate the social safety net to pay for a tax cut for the rich.   None of this is true. No matter. The president has decided that the only path to electoral victory is to become attack-dog-in-chief.

But what about the actual substance? Is there anything at all to what the president is saying?

The president is attempting to argue in these speeches is that the keys to higher economic growth in the United States are higher marginal tax rates on the successful, no reforms to entitlement programs, and more government spending on selected “investments.” To say that this is a pathetic plan for growth would be to give it too much credit.

Medicare may indeed "end as we know it" if we do nothing.  The President's sole idea for budget reform is the wimpy, trivial and ineffective "Buffet Rule" which failed a vote in the Senate this week; perhaps because it would raise just $5 billion in taxes each year when the deficit is $1,300 billion per year!    Trivial!

How dare Obama claim that he deserves a 2nd term!