You don't think he takes the mortgage deduction? Do you, Kevin?

Is that supposed to be serious commentary? Does anyone not take deductions they're entitled to, even if they'd be happy to see those deductions eliminated? What cant.

For starters, Sullivan admitted he was "not an economist, so I do not know whether this would do the trick entirely, and I'm open to debate on any of the particulars." He also stated he would "prefer experts like Brian Riedl or Veronique de Rugy to propose detailed cuts" and made special mention of Charles Murray's new proposal to abolish the entire welfare state and replace it with with cash grants to individuals. Sounds good to me so far - the Heritage Foundation has plenty more recommendations.

Instead of guessng, why not try running the numbers through Nathan Newman's budget simulator?

http://www.nathannewman.org/nbs/

Kevin, I think you ignored something pretty important here.

... means-test social security benefits, index them to prices rather than wages, extend the retirement age to 72 (and have it regularly extended as life-spans lengthen)...

That's a pretty good wacking of social security outlays, and he doesn't suggest reducing payrole taxes. My guess is that we would probably suggest that the general fund default on its obligations to social security too. That would probably go a long way towards reducing deficits ... as well as ripping off the middle class.

Unless there is a complete financial disconnection in real life between general revenues and Social Security/Medicare financing, including bookkeeping shenanigans, I think your ground rule needs work.

beowulf:

Other than cutting 100% of the programs like Education, that worksheet pales in comparison to the Heritage Foundation, where you can "save" your own person federal budget to come back and tinker later. http://www.heritage.org/research/budget/index.cfm

Here are their Broad Outline Recommendations:

Freeze 2005 discretionary spending. Remember, the core problem is runaway federal spending, not the budget deficit or taxes that are too low. Budget deficits are merely a symptom of two larger problems: a sluggish economy in recent years and runaway spending. Lawmakers should priori­tize economic growth and the low taxes needed to spur growth and recognize that runaway spend­ing represents the most dangerous long-term threat to pro-growth tax relief. As long as federal spending remains low enough to maintain a prosperous, low-tax economy, the budget deficit will solve itself. A positive first step would be freezing 2005 discretionary spending at the 2004 level.

Go beyond belt-tightening by terminating lower-priority programs. President Bush’s FY 2005 bud­get proposal asks most agencies to tighten their belts with a freeze or near-freeze in discretionary spending. While a necessary first step, lawmakers must go further. A family needing to save money would not simply freeze all spending equally—including the mortgage payment, food, insurance, vacation, and entertainment—it would fully fund priorities like food, while eliminating spending on unaffordable luxuries such as expensive vacations. Similarly, the federal government should fully fund its highest priorities (defense, homeland security), and eliminate unaffordable non-priorities such as billions on corporate welfare; pork projects; waste, fraud, and abuse; and the hundreds of ineffective, outdated, and unnecessary programs.

Reform the budget process. The current budget process encourages runaway federal spending because of its incentives and rules. Budget resolutions are rarely enforced, meaningful spending caps are absent, and lawmakers can create major new entitlements without proposing any plan to pay for them. Senators and Representatives who generally support spending restraint often bristle when one of their pet programs is targeted for elimination. Budget process reform should be based on four principles: setting a limit on overall spending; presenting a full picture of future obliga­tions in the budget; bringing the President into the budget process, mainly by giving the budget resolution the full force of an act of Congress; and strengthening the enforcement of budget deci­sions.

blank:

We all need to sacrifice.

No doubt Sullivan would like to phase out Social Security (means-testing is invariably the first phase of such efforts) while keeping the blatantly regressive payroll tax that's meant to fund it. And you might whack away a few hundred billion from the deficit that way. But it's a non-starter in the real world, where most people are, unlike Sullivan, depending on Social Security for their retirement.

Don P.: I'm not an economist either. But that doesn't mean I can't look up a budget number.

Tbrosz: Social Security is running a surplus. There's no point in cutting SS unless you think it should run an even bigger surplus. That is, unless you think the payroll tax should subsidize the income tax even more than it does. Is that what you think?

Also: any reduction in SS would not seriously affect the budget for years, maybe decades. We're looking for cuts right now.

Kevin, I have it on good authority that Sullivan is not an economist.

And so we should listen to him.

And that SS is doomed, and that if we killed earmarks everything would be cool, so we should give GW that power.

And I just don't understand your hostility to these ideas, and I don't understand your hostility to Mr. Sullivan, who, if you remember, is one of the smart guys on the other side whose opinion deserves deference.

He works for Time. Got that? Time. Not the Washington Monthly. Time is big, know what I mean?

So be nice and stop using facts and listen to what Mr. Sullivan has to say.

Oh yeah, you're an elitist too with all yoru fancy numbers and knowledge and stuff.

I should add one other thing: the whole point of this exercise is to show that any kind of serious budget cuts are simply politically undoable. Things like Social Security and the mortgage deduction are extremely popular and will never get cut. Likewise, things like agricultural subsidies have strong constituencies that will never let them be cut.

It's nice to talk about this stuff, but when you really lay it on the table you can see just how much pie in the sky it really is. Bottom line: federal spending is popular. It's not going to be cut substantially once you start putting actual programs on the block.

Do you really think Sullivan does not take the mortgage deduction?

Kevin:

Any surplus money from Social Security taxes is immediately borrowed to dump into the general fund. At some point, all those T-Bills in the trust fund are going to be cashed in. Where does THAT money come from?

Your idea that Social Security, or Medicare, can somehow be dealt with off to the side doesn't hold up. Maybe if the surplus trust fund was used to buy gold bullion, you could make that case.

And yes, if Social Security can actually be made less costly, why not cut the payroll taxes? They're loaded toward the lower end of the income scale, and isn't that the ideal economy-boosting tax cut from your point of view? A payroll tax cut might make a balancing income tax increase palatable to lower and middle income groups, who would see a "wash." Upper income groups would take it in the shorts, of course, but that's good, right?

That is, unless you think the payroll tax should subsidize the income tax even more than it does. Is that what you think?

I suspect that both tbrosz and I agree that this is what Sullivan is implying. Though, we likely disagree on whether or not this is acceptable.

If Sullivan wants to get work on the budget deficit in no small part by tax INCREASES, just what kind of libertarian/conservative might that make him?

Does the man have any idea what he really stands for?

Are ALL convervatives lost in like confusions, just making things up as they go to satisfy their grumpiness when thinking about government?

If Sullivan wants to get work on the budget deficit...

above should just be

If Sullivan wants to work on the budget deficit...

Kevin, tax cuts are nearly as popular as federal spending, which is how 400 billion dollar deficits develop. The point is to try to balance the popularity of two opposing forces. I'd be happy (which isn't to say that many other would) to immediately abolish the payroll tax, and replace it with petroleum taxes of some sort, while immediately cutting off 100% of all Social Security benefits for the wealthiest 10% of recipients, in terms of current non-S.S. income, and reducing benefits for those in the 70th-90th percentile. I'd also have a 100% estate tax on all estates, until all Social Security and Medicare benefits paid to an individual had been recovered from the individual's estate. If a citizen wishes to pass wealth on to heirs tax-free, fine, just don't spend the last few years of your life living off younger taxpayers.

What are the odds of this happening? Approximately zero, but simply dismissing it becasue it is unpopular ignores the fact that a lot of politicians get elected by supporting tax cuts, which means that the taxes you prefer have popularity problems as well.

tbrosz: Any surplus money from Social Security taxes is immediately borrowed to dump into the general fund. At some point, all those T-Bills in the trust fund are going to be cashed in. Where does THAT money come from?

All the more reason that the budget must be balanced without relying on the social security surplus to do so. Unless, of course, you are advocating fiscal policy that would inevitably lead to the government defaulting on the government's instruments of debt. Only a republican would suggest that sort of fiscal recklessness.

Yo, trolls...

...What do any of the things Andy Sully mentioned have to do with balancing the budget? And how would they?

They wouldn't, because the 'Welfare State' as they call it is all these things - like roads - that they want, but won't pay for.

Dumb.

Just try and get rid of that mortgage reduction, I dare any political party. Sullivan is living on Neptune.

Oops, I mean "mortgage deduction". The only way you'd ever pass that through is to do so as revenue-neutral or beneficial to folks by corresponding lower tax rates for them. They won't give it up so it gets "simper", that's for sure.

If Sullivan wanted to raise taxes to pay off the deficit, why didn't he just say so in the first place? And is anyone going to care that their precious Bush-given income tax rate isn't going up if they lose all their deductions?

Budget process reform should be based on four principles: setting a limit on overall spending; presenting a full picture of future obliga­tions in the budget;

Tax my pot plant!!!

How dare the guy.

I'm surprised no one's mentioned the biggest item Kevin conceded, abolishing the Education Department. Most of that $65 billion goes directly to states and local school districts. So axing this would probably eliminate a couple office buildings full of bureaucrats, but would also pull tens of billions of dollars from local school systems. Also, it would be a complete elimination of all student financial aid.

This just serves Kevin's point, that Sully can't seriously suggest cuts. Nevermind the purely political reality that a push to eliminate the Education Department this year would be manna from heaven for congressional Democrats.

Dems generally oppose means-testing social security because means testing is the entering wedge to abolition of the program. The moment it becomes means tested is the moment it can be conflated with the "handouts for the poor" frame.

What political tripe!

You can have small government conservatism or you can have the worlds largest bureaucracy.

You can't have both ( unless you want to mask your fascist statism as ' Libertarianism' like so many of these cheap shills for the CATO institute do )

Some of these fascist statist ' Libertarian ' clowns even coveted the good name of anarchism for a while!

Talk about beyond chutzpah. This insane clown posse and their Austrian economic kool aid are beyond help.

Andrew Sullivan, Hitchens and all that cloud of Trotskycon locusts are beyond help.

Oh yes, fully find priorities like military spending and homeland defense. Because there's no waste or misallocated resources in either of those groups...er, or something like that.

Honestly, the quickest and most sensible way to get the budget back in balance is to cut defense spending in half. I can think of multiple Cold War era weapons development programs off the top of my head that have so little relevance at this point as to be basically pork. But good luck selling those cuts in the heartland.

The NEA, on the other hand...

Something that should be added to the discussion should be the way that changes in federal budget policy shapes how states form their own budgets. Cuts in some programs or departments (for example education) are likely to force states to tax and spend more money. Such a policy might reduce the federal deficit in a small way, but it's not likely to reduce the typical American's tax burden. W's tax policies have already place greater burdens on the states. But none of these things really matter to tax cut proponents like W or Sullivan or just about every conservative out there. For them "tax cuts" are a religous truth justified by faith alone.

Want to get rid of $400 billion by cuts alone? Cut every discretionary budget program across the board by 50%. You'll hear whining from all sides, but if you're going to do it by cuts alone that's the only way.

A better idea would be cuts at 10-20% across the board plus tax hikes.

Why is Charlie posting as Don P. now? I've been away and missed the, er, "transition."

More than 20 years ago when I worked in the Senate, a thinktank came up with a game that was supposed to teach how politically difficult it would be to actually balance the budget. The idea is that ordinary citizens would be assigned roles -- social workers would play the Pentagon, retired military officers would run HHS -- and then be forced to look at the actual programs to be cut. Then you'd re-do the game, with the players changing chairs.

In EVERY case, to the surprise of the designers, ordinary citizens knocked off the Reagan deficits in less than the time allotted. Why?

Because the choices were CLEAR, and decisive -- there was no 'phasing out', no second and third bites at the apple.

Regardless of party, Congress is generally rewarded for stretching out decisions and blurring responsibility. It's better to get partial credit for three decisions than complete responsibility for one.

And in the end, it wasn't cuts, it was Clinton's prosperity that balanced the budget, AFTER a wholly partisan vote that cost some Democrats dearly -- but Republicans, not at all.

Take the hint.

Sean nailed it. There is no more wasteful govt. program than the Pentagon. For Gods sake, they can't even account for billions in the money they are appropriated. "Defense spending" is a misnomer in any case, given this Administration\s proclivity for wars of aggression.

I love it when Kevin goes past the rhetoric to the core. The armaments industry has this country by the .... But in a service economy with a shriveling manufacturing base you will have a hard time selling military cuts. Not because it is about homeland security, but because it is about jobs in valley's and burgs across this country. In some places the military is the Employment Office.

Actually, abolishing earmarks in and of itself would not save a dollar. Appropriations language is typically written "$x, of which y is for Kevin", or more frequently the earmark isn't even law but is contained in the report language, which agencies follow because they don't want to piss off the appropriators. The point is that if you get rid of "of which y is for Kevin", or have agencies ignore the report language, the appropriation is still $x.

Sullivan is not an economist. His degree is in political science.

With regard to his specific kvetches:

>I'd repeal the Medicare drug entitlement

Ain't going to happen. Unless it is a part of a more comprehensive package than the looney one that they passed a couple of years ago.

>abolish ear-marks

Ain't going to happen. Ear-marks are one way that congressmen and senators pay off their constituents and donors. For which they get campaign contributions in return.

>institute a line-item veto

That would require a constitutional amendment. What congressman or senator would vote to give the president more power--which a line item veto would do?

>pass a balanced budget amendment

That's been tried, but the proposals have always had loopholes, such as, except in cases of national emergency. Now, who determines whether there's a national emergency? Why congress, of course! It is a meaningless exercise.

>means-test social security benefits

This isn't going to happen either. It would turn SS into a welfare program. SS, as originally envisaged, was an income-replacement program that was intended to induce older workers to leave the work force to make way for younger workers.

BTW, it would be relatively easy for someone to maximize his take under a means-tested SS program: spend (while you're earning it) and don't save. This would exacerbate America's savings rate problem.

>index them to prices rather than wages

Note the above--it was intended to be an income-replacement program. If SS benefits were indexed to prices, and not wages, where is the "income-replacement"?

>extend the retirement age to 72

This is silly. The retirement age is whenever anyone wants to retire. The issue isn't the retirement age, it is the age at which someone starts collecting SS.

>abolish agricultural subsidies, end corporate welfare

These aren't going to happen. Republicans have discovered that the constituencies that they need to get elected love their subsidies and welfare. Regarding corporate wellfare, it would be good to remember that there are actually two constituencies involved: the corporations themselves and the workers. More than a few of the workers at these corporations would not have their jobs were it not for corporate wellfare.

>legalize marijuana and tax it

Not going to happen, either.

>eliminate all tax loopholes and deductions, including the mortgage deduction

This isn't going to happen, either, especially regarding the mortgage deduction. There are too many constitutencies who benefit from the mortgage deduction. Buyers, more than a few of whom could not afford the houses they want but for the mortgage deduction. And sellers, who can price their houses a bit higher than they might be able to in the absence of the mortgage deduction. And, of course, the real estate agents, whose commissions are based on the selling price.

>I'd get rid of the NEA and the Education Department

As Kevin has pointed out, the amount spent on the NEA is in the noise. Defunding the Education Department would do little more than place more of the funding burden for local schools on the state and local levels. In other words, it might reduce federal spending a bit, but it would raise it at the state and local levels. Of course, some states and localities might choose to not increase their funding, but that would probably leave their kids in the lurch.

Andy has shown, once again, that he is an idiot.

How come Tbrosz says we can't take social security and medicare off the table in this discussion because they are funded by payroll taxes and those payroll taxes are currently running in the black? And how come when I hear somebody like Sullivan or Tbrosz talk about tax inequities they always limit their discussion to income taxes, putting payroll taxes over to one side?

Sullivan's list and Tbrosz defense seems to be another attempt to tilt the tax burden even more to the middle class while allowing the rich to continue skating.

Excellent fisking, raj!

Actually, abolishing earmarks in and of itself would not save a dollar. Appropriations language is typically written "$x, of which y is for Kevin", or more frequently the earmark isn't even law but is contained in the report language, which agencies follow because they don't want to piss off the appropriators. The point is that if you get rid of "of which y is for Kevin", or have agencies ignore the report language, the appropriation is still $x.

Well, in fairness to Sullivan (never thought I'd say that) drug prohibition costs us $35 billion a year, or more. Simply ending it would leave us no worse off, because the feds have no meaningful treatment programs today anyway, so no meaningful prevention or cure would be lost.

Cutting the military by half would save about $200 billion. As with drug prohibition, no meaningful programs would be lost. Getting out of Iraq is another $50 billion saved each year- that spending is 'off-budget' now so it's not part of cutting the military budget.

And, face it, by the time Bush leaves office, some agencies will be so rotted with Bushite deadwood that the only realistic way to cope will be to abolish the agency and start over.

But hey, in America, reality is a daydream, right?

Hell, rescinding the Bush tax cuts for those who made over $150,000 would have reduced the 2004 deficit by about $180 billion, plus lotsa interest. But for some reason, the onerous tax burden suffered by people who were so affluent in the pre-Bush years and the terrible prosperity they endured is just too much to bear the thought of returning to.

How surprising that Sullivan didn't mention any cuts that affect him personally.

I'm waiting to hear Andy, as a principled "small government conservative" call for the elimination of government funding for AIDS research. After all this is something that the private sector can handle with far greater efficiency, right?

C'mon Andrew be a consistent small goverment conservative and issue a call for the elimination of government funded AIDS research, asshole.

I love it, Andrew Sullivan proposes A Small Government Conservative's Guide to Balancing the Budget by Shrinking Spending, and we get:

5 tax hikes--gas, estate tax, marijuana, closing loopholes & ending corporate welfare;

3 borrowing proposals--lowering social security payouts so we can borrow from the American people and businesses enough through payroll taxes to offset lower income taxes;

2 laws (BBA and line item veto) that would empower legislators to make the touch choices that even he, as a pundit who doesn't run for re-election, doesn't dare advocate for;

5 totally unrealistic cuts that still add up to less than 1/4 of the current deficit.

Here we have a conservative giving us his pie-in-the sky wish list and even then, more than half of it is increased taxation and borrowing, and the remainder is a collection of almost hilariously inconsequential spending cuts that, even if they had a chance of passing, STILL don't amount to a hill of beans.

Sully's defense? He's not an economist. But what he's shown us is that he's not really a small government conservative. Because, I'm sorry to report, when you actually look at the math it is immediately apparent that no such creature exists. There is just a pack of liars who want someone else to pay their taxes.

Ironinc that Bush campaigned on a pledge to make hard choices. Instead, as illustrated by the last 5 years and in this exchange, Conservative slogans are easy, governing and making real choices isnt.

Bottom line: federal spending is popular. It's not going to be cut substantially once you start putting actual programs on the block.

Of course, Kevin. The GOP has been in control of both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue for years now, and you don't see them putting the Department of Education on the chopping block. Republican rhetoric about "small government" is just that -- rhetoric.

Since Congress under either party -- and, by extrapolation, the American people -- want to keep Federal spending at a certain level, the question becomes how to pay for it. The Democrats would prefer to pay for it with tax revenue; the Republicans press their "tax cuts forever" hot button for folks like tbrosz, and wind up borrowing the money.

tbrosz admits that the Republicans spend as much as the Democrats. Yet, for months now, he has refused to admit that GOP deficit spending is more irresponsible than paying for it with tax revenue. That single fact tells you all you need to know to evaluate tbrosz' so-called contributions to this discussion.

Well, in fairness to Sullivan (never thought I'd say that) drug prohibition costs us $35 billion a year, or more. Simply ending it would leave us no worse off, because the feds have no meaningful treatment programs today anyway, so no meaningful prevention or cure would be lost.

I wouldn't be fair to Sullivan on this matter. He ignores the fact that more than a bit of "drug prohibition" is intertwined in the "prison-industrial-politician" complex. In other words, there are two many constituencies--from prison guards to corporatized prisons to politicians that both pay off--for any meaningful reform to take place. It would be nice if there were meaningful reform, but the likelihood of it happening is between slim and none.

With the corporatizing of the US military--what with the military's use of mercenaries (a/k/a "contractors"), the likelihood of there being any substantial reduction in military spending is also between slim and none. Not that more than a few of the "contractors" are ex-military, who can earn more after they leave the military and become mercenaries--er--contractors.

simply dismissing it becasue it is unpopular ignores the fact that a lot of politicians get elected by supporting tax cuts, which means that the taxes you prefer have popularity problems as well.

Sure, Will, because Republicans deliver tax cuts and keep on spending, and the costs of massive deficits aren't as obvious to the taxpayer. The Republicans pretend they can offer for free what the Democrats insist needs to be paid for. I agree that Republican dishonesty is, as ever, a disadvantage for Democrats, but that doesn't excuse the mendacity of the Republicans, or those who vote for them.

frankly0,

Many libertarians favor "vice" taxes on things like drugs, cigarettes, booze, gambling, etc., so his marijuana taxation makes sense.

Moreover, ending corporate welfare is extremely consistent with libertarianism; corporate welfare and tax loopholes are extremely anti-libertarian; they explicitly grant assistance or favoritism to some segment of the population.

I'm with Kevin on the basic premise of this exercise, but I don't think Sullivan proposed anything here that would remove his libertarian credentials. (His mathematical and economic credentials, maybe, but not his libertarian ones.)

On whether or not cuts in SS benefits should count toward cutting the budget deficit:
Anyone who says that "it's all federal revenues, separate accounts or not, so cutting benefits will cut the deficit" should be fair and increase the size of the deficit they're trying to eliminate. If they do that, they'll find they're running faster just to stay in the same place.

Legalizing and taxing pot would quickly lead to pot subsidies for Dole and Monsanto. Total savings - $20 billion

If we legalized pot, we'd have the Dutch coming down on our case for making ourselves a worldwide drug-smuggling center and screwing up their law enforcement efforts. Pot possession isn't legal in Holland; it's just not prosecuted below a certain threshold. But it would be typical of the US to move from one stupid extreme on marijuana criminalization to the other, without admitting the possibility of a middle ground.

Two areas of substantial government spending I would cut are:
1) The U.S. Dept. of Education. Probably 99% of these employees never, ever have direct contact with students. Really the only possible purpose for them was to produce the No Child Left Behind Act or something like it. Every state has its own Department of Education lavishly staffed with people who have no direct student contact and do nothing but generate reports that teachers don't have time to read and memos to each other about their next conference in Las Vegas

When I was a teacher and small-school principal, I tried for years to get hired into my state's department of education. Even though I was an active Democrat at the time, I never had the pull to get on that gravy boat.

2)The other big-ticket items at the federal level I would seriously look at cutting are the Joint Strike Fighter program and the Navy's new X-class aircraft carriers, the first expected in 2015 or so.

The JSF airplane was an attempt to save money by building one basic airframe that could be configured to do the job for the Navy, the Air Force, and the Marines. The JSF is intended to be a generalist, which could replace airplanes (in some roles) as varied as the F-16, F-15, F-18, the Marines' Harrier jump jet, and even the venerable A-10.

The pricetage on the JSF has jacked up for two reasons: first, all the services demanded maximum stealthiness, and stealth is very expensive. Secondly, the modifications necessary to make the generalist suitable to all the specialist roles the services demand are still being developed even as the airplane nears production. This makes the delivered aircraft much more expensive every day.

I believe the Pentagon should have held fast to the idea of just going out and buying the best possible airplane to do a specific kind of role.
Do you know what are the most-feared aircraft in the U.S. inventory are, if you happen to be the commander of an enemy ground force? The B-52, which was designed in 1947. The A-10, designed in the late 1960's, the AC-130 gunship, and any of the American helicopter gunships.

The B-52, A-10, and AC-130 have absolutely no stealthiness. They basically appear in the sky and announce, "Here I am, do something about it."

I would put all of the JSF money into updating the old warhorses that work and the rest into buying more F-22 air superiority fighters, then put the rest of the money back into the treasury.

The Navy's next generation X-class large, nuclear powered aircraft carriers are much improved even over carriers as new as the Ronald Reagan. The problem is that they will still be extremely expensive and a lot of people feel the best solution to this role is going to be unmanned aircraft launched from submarines or other, smaller, faster, more stealthy ships, and longer-range refueling aircraft to let more warplanes reach their targets from distant launch points on land (a little plug for Boeing, here.)

The current budget is unsustainable due entirely to two factors. The Bush tax cuts and increased war and national security expenses.

My vote. End the Iraq war and eliminate the tax cuts, and then we'll talk to Sullivan. That would put the deficit within a reasonable percentage of GDP, and nothing more would have to be done, unless you're an idealogue from the Heritage Foundation.

I can see this is going to be real fun.

At some point in the future, the countries we owe money to are going to point out that we could pay our debts if we cut the military.

And then the shiste is really going to hit the fan.

Say, Gregory, is it also mendacious to completely lowball what the likely cost of a program will be, as has been done (most notoriously; there are plenty of other examples) since Medicare's inception? Or did Democrats have nothing to do with the creation of Medicare, and thus had nothing to do with the completely dishonest cost projections that have been used from the beginning?

That Heritage idea about abolishing the welfare state and replacing it with cash payments to individuals reminds me of George McGovern's "thousand dollars for everybody" idea in 1972. It was quickly dismissed as inflationary.

It also reminds me of a old line by, I think, Dick Gregory: "If you put a billion dollars into the ghetto, all you'll get is the biggest four-day craps game you ever saw."

Will Allen -- we all know that Bush low-balled the cost of his pharma program, to the dismay of many here and Democrats in Congress as well. What other low-balling are you talking about? The cost of Medicare has grown over the years but largely due to techonological advances made long after its inception. Was it low-balled at the time it was passed?

wvmcl on March 21, 2006 at 10:21 AM |

That Heritage idea about abolishing the welfare state and replacing it with cash payments to individuals reminds me of George McGovern's "thousand dollars for everybody" idea in 1972. It was quickly dismissed as inflationary.

True, but that was only part of it. McGovern's proposal was to be administered through the IRS, based on income that was reported on the 1040s (and elsewhere). That recognized that there would need to be a burocracy that would determine whether the individuals were entitled to the cash payments.

That would also be the case with Heritage's idea. The welfare state would not go away. It might be changed a bit, but I doubt it. There would still have to be a burocracy somewhere that would determine whether the individuals were entitled to the cash payments.

To be fair, presumably legalizing marijuana would lead to significant reductions in spending on law enforcement, the legal system, and especially prisons. Not that it's going to happen.

C'mon Andrew be a consistent small goverment conservative and issue a call for the elimination of government funded AIDS research, asshole.

Well, see, in Andy's world, AIDS drugs are gifts from Big Pharma. If he's aware of a little thing called "basic research", it's a dim awareness only.

Is it just my impression, or is scientific illiteracy a requirement for scoring one of those sweet pundit gigs? It's not just Sullivan. If the gasbags who appear on the Sunday afternoon yammerfests had a sophomore-level understanding of physics and chemistry and biology, much of the administration's pre-war disinfo would have been laughed off the stage...

"Hell, rescinding the Bush tax cuts for those who made over $150,000 would have reduced the 2004 deficit by about $180 billion, plus lotsa interest."

And you're absolutely sure that those tax cuts aren't the only thing that is holding the economy together? Despite all the flaming from libs, I understand there is a lot of evidence that suppy-side economics works. No one denies the Laffer curve is real, the only point of contention is where the maximum occurs.

And regardless, why should someone be taxed more just because they're more successful? Libs love to reward failure. maybe that's why they're hoping Gore will run again.

Tom,

I'll speak slowly so you can process it.

This little liberal has two guiding principles that seem to cause Loony Libertarians like yourself to pop a gasket:

1) People should pay back to society in proportion to what they get from society.
2) The strong should protect the weak.

Knock yourself out, Libertarian. Refute either one of these. I dare you.

Sullivan:

"extend the retirement age to 72 (and have it regularly extended as lifespans lenghten)"

Wow. Just...wow. I'm Andrew Sullivan, and I want you punching a clock until you're in your 70s.

I'm sure Mr. Sullivan would just love having a 71-year-old ambulance driver take him to the hospital if his appendix is bursting.

Un freaking believable.

Great work, Kevin.

I'd like to see serious attention to moonbiter's proposal to cut EVERY discretionary program by 50%.

Is it to include security spending: defense, intelligence, prisons, border control, TSA? What about the courts?

If not, then I don't think you can balance the budget even if you cut 100% of the remaining discretionary spending. That is, unless you consider veteran's benefits, pensions, and interest payments to be "discretionary".

No one denies the Laffer curve is real, the only point of contention is where the maximum occurs.

Riiiiight. And that's a trivial problem.

Libs love to reward failure. maybe that's why they're hoping Gore will run again.

This from that camp that's given us Donald "Ain't My War" Rumsfeld, and that most spectacular lifer fuck-up, G.W. Bush himself.

Deport British ex-pats. That ought to save something.

Getting rid of "missle defense", which isn't and likely won't be, would really be a help.

One thing to remember about the Education Department, one of the keys to the Bush "victory" in 2000 was the fact that he distinquished himself from the, by then, highly unpopular Gingrich/Class of 1994 revolution by being a "compassionate conservative." One of the few actual policies Bush had to back up the claim for the compassionate half of that brand was his support of the Department of Education and opposition to its abolution. In the 2004 campaign, his domestic record, aside from tax cuts, was the almost ceasless repetition of the phrase "No Child Left Behind." The Sullivan deficit reduction plan simply does not take into account the fact that small government conservatism is not popular -- otherwise Bush would have run on that basis in 2000. It is not a politically viable choice.

How about this for a wacky proposal I've been mulling over?

We all know the baby boomers are reaching standard retirement age and may not see all the benefits they had saved and paid for. Pensions and SS benefits.

It is not fair to take these away from them. On the other hand, it may be a burden to everyone else to supply those benefits.

How about we take away some of the benefits but give them some new benefit? It can't be money, so what else can we offer them?

How about legalized (or decriminalized) drugs? Make the legal age for pot 65. Mild opiates and tranquilizers the same thing.

It will ease their pains and help them pass the time. Any addictions won't really matter. We don't expect them to be productive members of society any more. None of those drug classes are terrible on the body, certainly not as bad as tobacco, ETOH, or God forbid Meth.

Other than totally negating the "DRUGS ARE BAD" meme are there any other negative side effects?

Come on, shoot me down.

"1) People should pay back to society in proportion to what they get from society.
2) The strong should protect the weak."

1) I think conservatives would argue that the rich have given more to society than they have recieved. They are the ones that innovate,that create jobs, that provide opportunity for others.

That's obviously an inaccurate generalization. But it may be only mostly untrue. In any case, a better argument would probably be that it's impossible to accurately measure what a person has recieved from society.

2) The chivalric ideal. It would be interesting to see a culture that lived up to that. I don't think there will ever be one, which is sad.

And he didn't mention missile defense or all the egregious defense spending that has nothing to do with the troops. Social Security pays for itself. Bush just lied a few minutes ago and stated that social security and medicare were mandatory spending that created the deficit. narry a word about 500billion plus for defense and off budget wars.

I think that best solution to the Sullivan problem is to legalize gay marriage.

The resulting silence of Andrew Sullivan will be good both for the Democrats as well as the Republicans.

"Wow. Just...wow. I'm Andrew Sullivan, and I want you punching a clock until you're in your 70s."

I think male life expectancy in the US is around 74.5 years. So a man could expect to collect about 2.5 years of SS benefts. Women would be the big winners, as they'd expect to live till 79 and get a whopping 7 years of benefits.

This is anecdotal, but most people I know in their 70s really aren't in shape to do serious labor. I can only assume that since Sullivan's job entails so little effort (witness his inability to actaully look up numbers), he assumes all jobs are that way. What a shock it would be to him to find out that not everyone makes a living by semi-randomly typing away at a computer.

Legalizing marijuana would reduce spending a lot--have you ever lived in marijuana-growing country? There are helicopters in the air all day, every day, all summer--lots of heavily armed DEA units to destroy the pot--and on and on. Don't worry about the tax revenue--just the savings from stopping enforcement would be considerable.

And I don't see why SS and Medicare should be off limits--they are a large portion of government spending. (I mean--I see money coming out of my paycheck to fund them, and I know people who get checks from them--I suppose that makes them spending funded by taxes).

I think its important to understand that while Sullivan is an easy target because he portrays himself as a "small government" conservative, it is important to understand that he is just symptomatic of the systematic dishonesty of conservatives when it comes to the federal budget.

When it comes to the management of the economy, conservative economics, as it is actually practiced, is nothing but a great fraud perpetrated on the American people and has been that way for 25 years. Ever since Ronald Reagan’s first budget in 1981, conservatives have behaved in a spectacularly irresponsible fashion. The fact is that spending grew under Reagan as well, even after the huge tax cuts in 1981. The Reagan legacy, when it comes to conservative attitudes to the economy, was neatly summed up by Dick Cheney when he said that “Reagan proved that deficits don’t matter.”

Sure, in theory, conservative economics means small government. It’s a great sound bite on the campaign trail. But conservatives have never actually taken it seriously. Why? Because they know that taking a meat cleaver to the federal budget would be wildly unpopular. So in the meantime they focus on cynically handing out goodies to the people in the form of tax cuts, like some banana republic leader bribing the people to vote for him, while never actually intending to fight for the level of spending cuts that would be needed to keep the deficit under control. It was true under Reagan and it was true under both Bushes.

The fact that Sullivan continues to support this nonsense (“I supported the tax cuts. Still do.”) all the while knowing that spending cuts of the magnitude needed to balance the budget will never happen, even if Bush pushed for them, shows that he is just as bad as an out-of-control liberal who wants a new social program for everything. For all his protestations about being a “real conservative”, he endorses the most reckless, irresponsible, un-conservative economic policies possible.

It used to be that "conservative" financial management meant keeping debt low and saving something for a rainy day. No longer. That is now a Democratic value, as Bill Clinton proved. A real conservative would have said let’s see the spending cuts BEFORE the tax cuts. A real conservative would have resisted tax cuts in the middle of a war. A real conservative would have denounced a half-baked Social Security “reform” plan that was guaranteed to add even more debt in the transition.

When it comes to economics, Democrats are the real conservatives, and should be loud and proud about that.

No one denies the Laffer curve is real, the only point of contention is where the maximum occurs.

This is ridiculous. Given that federal revenue a mix of a number of taxes, including income, payrole, excise, import duties, estate, and many, many fees, the Laffer curve makes no sense whatsoever. Laffer drew a little diagram on the back of a cocktail napkin--that's what passes for analysis among conservatives?

Tbrosz and the rest rest of the idiots on the right continue to cling to the notion that changing Social Security benefits has anything to do with the deficit. The ONLY thing that Social Security has to do with the deficit is that the surplus in the SS trust fund MASKS the true federal deficit by using Enron style accounting. If one does not include the SS surplus in calculating the actual spending defict, the true deficit is about $600 billion per year, not the $380 the administration advertises.

The Congress finances their drunken sailor spending and their giveaways to the rich by borrowing the money from the SS trust fund. In other words, the money pissed away today is being borrowed from the wage earners who are paying the payroll taxes with some expectation of getting the money in the future.

Although Sully and tbrosz continue to place their hands over their ears and yell "nah nah nah nah, I can't hear you" , that is the undeniable fact of how this Congress's reckless actions are being financed. That and borrowing from foreign bond purchasers. Talking about SS payments in the future has nothing to do with borrowing from the surplus now. I'm no economist but I can understand that simple concept.

Another factor which the noneconomist idiots can't grasp is interest. The national debt was $3.3 trillion when W. took over. It is presently $9 trillion. The CBO estimates that by 2010 it will be $11.2 trillion. Under the Repub Congress and Pres., the national debt will explode 340% in just 9 years! What does that mean? It means that by 2010 the amount of interest will be $561 billion per year, more than the entire spending for Medicare and Medicaid combined!

Yet they still want to fully fund defense and homeland security and not mess with tax cuts for the rich. Morons who can't work a calcultor.

The Education budget is closer to 73 billion for 2005 and 88 for 2006. You can go to their site and see their excel spreadsheet.

"This is ridiculous. Given that federal revenue a mix of a number of taxes, including income, payrole, excise, import duties, estate, and many, many fees, the Laffer curve makes no sense whatsoever."

The Laffer curve is an abstraction which presumes the type of tax doesn't matter much to the outcome (federal revenue). It is possible the curve is not an accurate picture (I've read that people do believe it's parabolic, but I'm not an economist and unable to judge myself).

But the Laffer curve makes at least as much sense as modeling the US economy, with all it's goods and services, as a market where consumers have complete freedom of choice and perfect information. And I've yet to see an big name economist attack that abstraction.

Legalize marijuana and tax it. This is so speculative that it seems faintly absurd to include it, and in any case it's a tax increase.

Its also a spending cut, inasmuch as federal funds are expended to enforce the criminal prohibition against possession, cultivation, transportation, sale, etc., of marijuana.

Abolish the Education Department: Total savings: $65 billion.

By abolishing the Department of Education and increasing federal taxes, Sullivan would dry up a lot of resources to actually provide education in the states. Now, this is bad in and of itself for a lot of reasons, but it also undercuts Sullivan's claimed goal of fully supporting defense and security, since doing so will make it even harder (and therefore, more expensive) for the military to meet even its lowered standards for recruits.

But the Laffer curve makes at least as much sense as modeling the US economy, with all it's goods and services, as a market where consumers have complete freedom of choice and perfect information. And I've yet to see an big name economist attack that abstraction.

I don't know about "big name economists", but its not hard to find much in the academic literature about limitations of rational choice theory, in economics and the other social sciences in which the theory is frequently applied.

Legalize marijuana and tax it. This is so speculative that it seems faintly absurd to include it, and in any case it's a tax increase. Total savings: $0.

How much money are we spending on the DEA? How much money are we wasting keeping drug addicts in jail? Are we serious about balancing the budget or not?

Kevin Drum: "Bottom line: federal spending is popular. It's not going to be cut substantially once you start putting actual programs on the block."

It isn't just that federal spending is "popular." Federal spending reflects the priorities that were established by "the people"--or at least the representatives of the people--in a government of, by and for the people. We establish these priorities based on what we believe is necessary to achieve the kind of society we want. We fight over these priorities because we have different views on what is necessary for the best society. The usual compromise is to fund agencies with less than some want and more than others want.

Conservatives hate government because they see it as stealing from them and stifling economic opportunity even as they enjoy the benefits of the free, orderly society that is achieved through wise governance.

Liberals understand the value of government but are seduced by the idea that someone else ought to pay for the benefits they receive.

That said, the priority of the federal government right now has to be funding research in sustainable energy and providing incentives for Americans to switch from their addiction to oil. Oil should be taxed heavily. Scientific research should also be a top priority.

The military budget should be cut by 30%--by closing bases used to guard oil sources, by eliminating the obvious weapon systems. We need to stop fighting the Cold War and start focusing on instability caused by competition for resources and the blowback from global climate change.

And how many times do we need to repeat that Social Security is NOT the problem??

Andrew Sullivan isn't an economist, true. But, given their policies, I have to wonder if any conservatives are economists.

Tom --

Your philosophy would be much more convincing to me if you could name a self-made rich person who got rich without somehow involving the government. By that I mean that nothing they bought or sold was delivered on federally funded highways, nothing was delivered by the Post Office, nothing was advertised on the public airwaves, nothing was promoted online (the internet, I believe, was originally a project of the Defense Department), nothing was patented, or copywrited . . . you get my drift.

People don't get rich in a vacuum. There are dozens, if not hundreds of countries around the world with lower taxes and less regulation than the U.S. And yet people still come here to seek their fortunes. Maybe it isn't in spite of our government, but at least in part because of it.

And when someone reaps huge benefits with the help of the United States government, I personally have no problem asking that person to pay a proportionally higher share of the tax burden.

Feel free to convince me otherwise.

Tom: But the Laffer curve makes at least as much sense as modeling the US economy, with all it's goods and services, as a market where consumers have complete freedom of choice and perfect information. And I've yet to see an big name economist attack that abstraction.

Right off the top of my head, Joseph Stiglitz, who won a Nobel prize for his work on imperfect information and economic decisions. Didn't even have to use Google for that one.

Legalize marijuana and tax it. This is so speculative that it seems faintly absurd to include it, and in any case it's a tax increase. Total savings: $0.

First of all, this is not speculative or absurd. Nevada will be voting on legalization and taxation in November and it has a decent chance of passing. Colorado will be voting on a watered down version, and here in Washington State, a serious drug law overhaul is closer than anyone realizes. Also, if at a national level, we legalized it (which would only be likely if other conservatives actually listened to people like Sullivan), we would save billions of dollars per year in reduced enforcement and imprisonment costs. Total savings would be quite a bit higher than 0, and since the market could be controlled within the legal market, the price of marijuana would dip, so even with taxes, it would not be a tax hike.

Much further up in this thread, someone referred to cutting social security as ripping off the middle class.

Don P. (who uses the assuredly legitimate and not at all cowardly e-mail address "I'm baaaaack@Guess.Who") responds with this comforting palliative:

"We all need to sacrifice."

The conservative caveat, of course, is that the "we" who need to sacrifice are those no-good lower income freeloaders who live off of "discretionary spending" -- never the "we" who make (or inherit) plenty of money but can't be asked to sacrifice any more of it for demonstrably beneficial social programs.

Also, people who keep pointing out the savings in cutting enforcement programs at the DEA fail to recognize two things:

(1) Marijuana is hardly the only drug regulated; and

(2) Even if the cuts were worth $35 billion, as someone speculated above, that's less than another 10% of the way toaward Kevin's $400 billion challenge.

Sully's a moron.

He lives in the city and does not rely on a car for his livelihood and transportation to his job. He is unlike 95% of other Americans in that regard. Therefore, (while I *do* support a massive gas-tax increase) - his call for a gas tax is bogus.

We should do away with rent-control on apartments instead, and simply tax the runaway profits thtat will result as anyone with less than a seven figure income is forced to move out of cities, and buy cars like the rest of America.

Then I could stand there and laugh while I watch Andrew Sullivan try to figure out how to operate a manual transmission.

Yes, david, the proposed cost of Medicare was lowballed from the very day it was proposed. Nearly every government program is; that is part of the strategy of getting new government programs passed.

If one believes that the primary purpose of national government is to transfer wealth from age demographics with lower median net worth, to the age demographics with higher median net worth, then the current status quo, except with a higher marginal rate on top earners, is the way to go. If one disagrees with that proposition, however, then scrapping FICA taxes, and changing the way in which the age demographics with high median net worth access tax revenues, is the path to pursue. Of course, the age demographic with a high median net worth has fully convinced itself that it's voting decisions of the past 50 years fully legitimates their doing whatever they wish with wages of those who are younger and less numerous than them, so don't expect anything but self-serving behavior. A large percentage of the people now approaching 60 are among the most self-centered (ever see those pathetic commercials that the market research folks at Ameriprise Financial thought would resonate with baby boomers?) in our society, so an inter-generational battle looms.

Mattfwood,
It's not just the DEA rollback that would save money, it's also the cost of processing the roughly 750,000 people arrested every year, many of whom are sent to federal prison.

I realize the savings on imprisoning these low-level "criminals" as well, and am in no way blind to or a fan of the prison-industrial complex that profits from our zero tolerance policies.

Some commenters mentioned that, and it is fair to reinforce what they said.

I just thought it was also worthwhile to note that NORMLizing pot does not make the DEA go away -- and furthermore, if we are talking federal budget here, doesn't do much to decrease federal spending. If you have stats on how many of those 750,000 go to federal prisons, please share them. I'll bet that the states foot most of that bill.

"And when someone reaps huge benefits with the help of the United States government, I personally have no problem asking that person to pay a proportionally higher share of the tax burden."

Greg VA:

I'm sure I can't convince you otherwise. But I will say that many other American's will have had the same beneifts you outline and failed to become rich. While it would be a mockery to suggest that all Americans start with the same advantages, I think the conservative view is that the government has no right to target those who have earned their rewards, and who play such an important role in the economy.

Perhaps a true conservative could correct me, but I believe the view is that the rich have no obligation to help the poor. Imposing such an obligation is considered immoral. But I probably should not speak for others. For my own part, I merely think it is hard to tell what debt a person has to the state.

Why don't we count the number of elected politicians supporting Will's plan to overturn FICA. It's going to take a long time since we can't count any until they exist. There is no one that far out in loonyville. Sorry sweetie, it's not a viable suggestion. Will's primary complaint is that the program has worked to minimize poverty among the aged.

As to pretending that wealth transfer is the "primary purpose" of government right now, this is just stupid. To determine an entity's primary purpose you can look at what they spend the most money on. Transfer payments are not how the government spends money. Only the overhead involved is "spent." A bank cashing your payroll check isn't "paying" you, and only an idiot would claim it was. An honest evaluation of government spending reveals that the government's primary purpose is waging war.

I just thought it was also worthwhile to note that NORMLizing pot does not make the DEA go away -- and furthermore, if we are talking federal budget here, doesn't do much to decrease federal spending. If you have stats on how many of those 750,000 go to federal prisons, please share them. I'll bet that the states foot most of that bill.

Good points, I agree. The DEA will be with us long after marijuana is legalized, but they will have much less to do if they're not dressing up as soldiers and kicking down the front doors of grandmas with cancer to seize their stash.

I don't have the exact figures on what percentage of those 750,000 go through the Federal system, but I will argue that even many of the local arrests are the result of drug task forces, which are funded federally, but then leave some states holding a very large tab for the imprisonment costs, for which the states then ask for funding from the federal government to build new prisons. I'd imagine that these days, they're not getting that funding so easily.

I'm not a conservative either, but there are plenty of conservatives who recognize the moral obligation that the wealthy have to assist the poor, but they don't think it is the state's role to enforce all moral obligations. I actually agree with them somewhat( I do support some sort of social safety net) in this context; I just wish conservatives would be less willing to use the state to enforce moral obligations in other contexts.

Only an idiot would claim that a social security check sent to Warren Buffett is different than a check sent to Textron for a tank turrett, in terms of what it obliges a taxpayer to do, either now or in the future. Yes, heavy, I understand that my proposal is a non-starter, because most people do think that, or do not object to the fact that, the primary purpose of national government is to transfer wealth to older age demographics, without regard to need.

Will Allen: Say, Gregory, is it also mendacious to completely lowball what the likely cost of a program will be, as has been done (most notoriously; there are plenty of other examples) since Medicare's inception? Or did Democrats have nothing to do with the creation of Medicare, and thus had nothing to do with the completely dishonest cost projections that have been used from the beginning?

What David in NY said, Will:

we all know that Bush low-balled the cost of his pharma program, to the dismay of many here and Democrats in Congress as well. What other low-balling are you talking about? The cost of Medicare has grown over the years but largely due to techonological advances made long after its inception. Was it low-balled at the time it was passed?

Yes indeed, the Bush Administration deliberately and deceptively lowballed,/a> the cost of the prescription drug benefit. Now, what do you have besides your assertion that the discrepancies in the costs versus the estimate are a result of deliberate deception?

Anyway, your attempt to change the subject hardly addresses my point -- indeed, it inherently fails to. Republicans have engaged in a deliberate and cynical campaign of cutting taxes but maintaining spending in order to maximize their political advantage. Thus the electoral pitfalls fiscally responsible candidates face is a result of a deliberate pattern of deception and polices that are fiscally damaging to the nation as a whole. That the pitfalls exist hardly excuses the Republicans or those who vote for them.

Ah, I see Will Allen is too stupid to back down when he has demonstrated an inability to read what he wrote. As soon as he admitted that Social Security is a system of transfer payment