WASHINGTON — This past week in our nation’s capital was described as the “budget Super Bowl.” But I’ve never seen a Super Bowl in which one team played football and the other one hide and seek.
On Tuesday, House Republicans unveiled their fiscal plan for 2014. They aim to balance the budget within 10 years, in large part by defunding Obamacare, reforming Medicare and Medicaid and the tax code, and capping discretionary spending near the levels set by the recent sequestration. Their plan cements the tax increases included in the Jan. 1 “fiscal cliff” deal but does not add to them. Their proposed deficit for the entire next decade would be less than the shortfall in any one year during Barack Obama’s presidency so far.
On Wednesday, Senate Democrats returned serve. Their 10-year plan includes another $975 billion in tax increases beyond the fiscal cliff deal (the GOP says the number is really $1.5 trillion). But because it cancels sequestration and does not replace all its $1.1 trillion in cuts, their plan’s smallest deficit would be $407 billion. It would not balance within a decade, if ever.
Such is not the stuff of a neo-Era of Good Feelings in Washington.
Before Wednesday, there was at least optimism a deal might be obtainable. The president met that day with the House Republican caucus — for only the second time during his 50 months in the Oval Office — and the following day with Senate Republicans. He also met with Democrats in each chamber.
Before those meetings, some Georgia Republicans were willing to consider the possibility Obama would signal a willingness to reform entitlements meaningfully. Their optimism was always guarded at least, running to outright skepticism. But it was optimism.
Afterward, it was budget buzzkill.
“The first question out of the box,” said Rep. Paul Broun, R-Athens, “was, can we work together to balance the budget in the next 10 years? And he said we shouldn’t” balance it in that time frame.
To that point, Rep. Tom Price of Roswell, the House Budget Committee’s vice chairman, asked the president why his budget proposal was almost five weeks late. Another Georgia congressman, Republican Jack Kingston of Savannah, told me afterward it “would have been a huge difference between action and talk” — the kind of difference numerous Republicans had said they were seeking from Obama — “if we could have seen a budget proposal” from him.
To the degree Obama was specific about the way forward, his path was not satisfactory to Rep. Tom Graves.
“In essence, he was sharing that there have got to be areas of common ground [where] we can have agreement on certain topics,” recalled Graves, who represents Northwest Georgia. “When he was pressed upon that — on areas in which we do agree, why don’t we just do it — he said, well, we can’t just do everything we agree on without additional revenue and other things that our side would want.
“In fact,” Graves continued, the president said “he understands the need for reforms in entitlements so that they’re preserved for future generations, but there will be no entitlement reform in the absence of additional revenue. So I would perceive that as he’s willing to hold folks hostage until he gets additional taxes.”
There had been higher hopes for the president’s charm offensive. But the reality can’t be surprising to anyone who’s watched Washington at all the past few years.
