Matt Doheny and Doug Hoffman basically agree that the nation’s economic policy going forward should look something like this:<\/p>\n
The Bush tax cuts for people earning more than $250,000 should remain in place; indeed, both men want even deeper tax cuts, including a permanent end to the inheritance or “death” tax.<\/p>\n
At the same time, both men insist that Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security — the basic building blocks of the post-WW2 social safety net — should remain in place in largely the same form as they exist today.<\/p>\n
They also believe that the budget for the US military should remain untouched, especially at a time when we’re still entangled in Iraq and Afghanistan.<\/p>\n
Those programs represents more than 60% of the Federal budget, and that percentage is certain to increase.<\/p>\n
They also talk about boosting support for farmers, who already receive massive taxpayer subsidies.<\/p>\n
Add in interest payments on the debt and other mandatory government payments, and you find that both men believe that roughly 80% of the Federal budget should be off-limits.<\/p>\n
You can eliminate President Barack Obama’s controversial TARP money, zero out all earmarks, and cut out all “waste, fraud and abuse and that would all add up to only about 5%.<\/p>\n
(And really, a significant amount of that money goes to things that aren’t wasteful, including broadband access programs, road and bridge construction, small business loans, etc.)<\/p>\n
The problem with the Doheny-Hoffman plan, of course, is that when it comes to our dangerous level of national debt, tax cuts dig almost as big a hole as new spending.<\/p>\n
And if you’re not willing to make deep and systemic cuts, it’s hard to see how we can cut taxes even further without bankrupting the country.<\/p>\n
Here’s the punchline:\u00a0 We’re already spending roughly $1.2 trillion in borrowed money every year.<\/p>\n
That means we’re already spending about a dollar and seventy-five cents for every dollar that we take in.<\/p>\n
Yes, that will ease some as the recession ends and more people shift from using government programs to help make ends meet and begin paying taxes on their new paychecks.<\/p>\n
And to be sure, tax cuts will stimulate some new economic activity.<\/p>\n
But the vast majority of credible economists say that you can’t tax cut your way out of Federal deficits.\u00a0 Former Fed chairman Alan Greenspan told Bloomberg News that the 1980s Reagan-era approach has been discredited.<\/p>\n
“They should follow the law and let [the Bush tax cuts] lapse,” Greenspan concluded.<\/p>\n
The alternative, of course, is for Republicans to find deep and systemic cuts that first pay for all the red ink that we’re already running up, and then cut a whole lot more to pay for the additional tax cuts that the two Republican candidates propose.<\/p>\n
But so far, Doheny and Hoffman haven’t offered a credible plan that accomplishes that.<\/p>\n
America trusted the Republicans to get this right once before.\u00a0 From 1994 through 2006, the GOP controlled congress.<\/p>\n
For half a decade, beginning in 2000, Republicans controlled all of Washington.<\/p>\n
But they actually grew government at the fastest rate in decades, while also instituting major tax cuts.\u00a0 All of it — again, in the words of Greenspan — was done on “borrowed money.”<\/p>\n
So this time, if Hoffman and Doheny are serious, they need to provide us with particulars, with details, with some sense of the sacrifices they will be asking us to make.<\/p>\n
Are there more tax cuts in store?<\/p>\n
Will we have to forgo programs that take care of the poor, the disabled and the elderly?<\/p>\n
Will more of those programs be shifted to cash-strapped state and local governments?<\/p>\n
Obviously, in this heady conservative-leaning election year, promises of tax cuts and more tax cuts make good politics.<\/p>\n
But if one of these men wins in November, they’ll have to begin governing and legislating and passing budgets.<\/p>\n
Unless they want to face the whiplash of disappointment and disillusionment the Democrats are facing now, this is the time for straight talk.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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