Democrat SequesterMania

Legendary liberal journalist Bob Woodward, of Watergate fame, apparently maintains a shred of integrity and so broke with the liberal media palace guard protecting the Democrat president and called Obama’s dishonest rabble rousing behavior on the sequester “madness”.  Of course, we all now know, thanks in part to Woodward himself, that the so-called sequester, or automatic budget cuts, was Obama’s idea.

The Democrats are wailing about cutting about 2.4% from the federal budget, or as it seems, as it usually is, cutting 2.4% off the rate of growth of the federal budget.  That’s cutting just a bit off a federal budget that’s already mushroomed beyond recognition under Obama.  Larry Kudlow writes (link):  “The White House and the CBO are predicting a 0.5 percent to 0.7 percent decline in GDP, post-sequester, and a loss of 750,000 jobs. All this from a spending reduction of roughly 2.4 percent over the next ten years, in which Uncle Sam’s spending growth will be $44.8 trillion rather than $46 trillion.”  And while Obama and his minions and acolytes have been wailing, new US Secretary of defense Long John Kerry just promised $250 million more to the Islamist government of Egypt.  Can’t possibly cut there!     

To listen to Obama and Democrats, 2.4% less spending will cut the federal government to the bone and will impact countless essential services.  Democrats are of course claiming that they can’t possibly find even 2% of fat to cut, or even 2% of non-essential services.  Not a penny is there to cut.  On local Chicago CBS news radio, a woman identified as chief economist for Mesirow Financial, apparently a money management firm, talked about some seniors losing their government subsidized housing and being forced out onto the street in the cold of late winter.  It seems Mesirow is on board with the Obama agenda.

Mark Steyn writes (link): “Can you pierce the mists of time and go back all the way to the year 2007? Back then, federal spending was 40 percent lower than it is today. In a mere half-decade, has all that 40 percent gravy become so indispensable to the general welfare that not even a teensy-weensy sliver of it can be cut?”

 

Obama is not trying to find a negotiated settlement with Republicans – far from it.  For the Obama Democrats, this whole debate is really not about trying to find a budget solution to the massive deficit.  It’s really about a radical position to spend, spend, and spend, borrowing all the way, until the system breaks down, until it collapses upon itself, and in the ensuing crisis of their own making, Democrats think they will be able to expand and solidify their centralized control over a bigger piece of America and every person in it. 

John M Greco