Budget Battles: Republican Courage or Political Suicide?

Any thinking person observing the partisan posturing, the pandering to the party bases during the recent budget battles has to have experienced a range of emotional responses that may have went from deep disgust to amazed disbelief at the antics. With the much dreaded government shutdown looming our duly elected heroes averted disaster at the last moment by agreeing to...was it actually only 38 billion dollars? Isn't that like a rounding error in the deficit? Chump change? Hell, Bill Gates or Warren Buffett alone could just about write a check for that much.

Then came Rep. Paul Ryan to offer the Republican plan to get us out of the fiscal hole we keep digging ever deeper. Recently, Time magazine quoted Republican political consultant Mark McKinnon saying Ryan's plan "will completely transform the political debate. It will either be a brilliant blaze that illuminates Republican courage or a roaring fire that immolates the party in a spectacular political suicide."

Not being an economist or particularly well informed about economic finer points, I certainly can't critique Ryan's plan in detail. But from what I hear from those who seem informed it appears to be a flawed - but certainly brave - attempt to tackle a huge threat to our future: the deficit. It seems Ryan couldn't resist the Republican obsession with tax cuts (especially for corporations and the wealthy) and made those a big part of his plan. It also seems that most of the spending reductions will come from cutting programs for the poor and middle class. It's obvious that changes have to be made but I like New York Times columnist David Brooks call to "make everyone hurt". Share the pain equally. We all bear responsibility for getting ourselves in this situation, don't we?

Ryan does deserve credit for courage. It's a near certainity that liberal groups, no doubt still smarting over midterm election defeats that cost Democrats the House can hardly wait to run the attack ads that practically write themselves. Should we take a moment to be outraged at the partisan political games played to gain advantage? To denounce the fiddling by both parties while America's future burns? Well, we could if only we weren't so responsible for putting them in office. For aiding and abetting such a polarized political climate that moderation and compromise become impossible.

There have been calls on both sides for Obama to lead on these budget issues but he has not accepted the challenge until the Republicans made the first move. That was probably very wise (but timid). It's also a near certainity that Republicans would have loved it if Democrats had made the first move so they could do the attack ads. It's also likely that Obama will do some Democrat partisan manuevering and avoid some hard choices that will have to be made sooner or later. Unfortunately, political gridlock, voted in at the ballot box, means those hard choices will almost certainly be put off until the damage becomes catastrophic. We have seen the enemy and still do not recognize... ourselves.