Many or even most Congressmen are conscientious after a fashion. However, the most important skill set for re-election is not wonky immersion in policy details, but the ability to walk into a crowded room and create an immediate rapport with constituents. While some politicians nurture core beliefs or at least dispositions, they often rely on aides and especially a few fellow Congressmen who have the aptitude and the seriousness to study policies in detail. Representative Paul Ryan (R-WI), now Chair of the House Budget Committee, is one of the followed Congressmen.
This afternoon, Paul Gigot, Chief of the Editorial Board of the the Wall Street Journal interviewed Congressman Ryan at the National Press Club in a forum sponsored by E21.com and the Manhattan Institute
The reader can obtain their own impression of the exchange by viewing the interview on C-SPAN. However, it was clear that Representative Ryan believes that substantive budget discipline can only be obtained if President Obama compromises. This is in not likely to happen. Hence, much of the work of this Congress will be to set the stage for Americans to make a choice in 2012.
The first real test between the President and Congress will occur when the debt ceiling has to be increased this spring. While it is clear that no one wants the US to default on its debt, Ryan says that Congress will not be a rubber stamp. There will not be a naked debt ceiling increase bill. Any bill that increases the debt ceiling will include as many spending concessions as Congress is able to negotiate
Gigot reminded Ryan of the fact the government shuthown in 1995 backfired on the Republican Congress and in large measure guaranteed the election of President Bill Clinto. Doesnt this mean that Congress is likely to blink in any budget showdown. Perhaps the one bit of news this afternoon, is that Ryan suggested that Congress willl pass a debt ceiling increase bill with budget cuts and try to arrange it so that President Obama will either have to sign the ceiling increase or he will shut down the government. Unlike 1995, Ryan believes people understand that budget discipline is needed now to forestall greater austerity in the future as the Baby Boob generation retires.
If experience ins any lesson, Ryan and Congress will not be able to phrase the budget question to their benefit. The press will be happy to make it appear that it is Congress that is holding the government hostage. The best the Republican Congress can hope for is to make it clear that Obama refuses to cut the budget.
Keep Your Hands Off My Social Security
Sunday, January 2nd, 2011Last year during the protests by the Tea Party, some on the Left smugly mocked the protesters who wanted the government to keep their hands off their social security. At face value, this appeared to be hypocrisy or stupidity. On one hand, one of the key themes of the Tea Party is limited government. On the other hand, some Tea Party followers wanted to make sure that the government program they benefited from was unaffected by any new government action.
However, the confusion of some of these protesters can be traced to the fact that they have bought into the governments myth of Social Security. It is not portrayed as an income transfer program paid for by taxes, but rather as a social insurance program into which people invest, much like any retirement program. Many social security recipients are convinced they are just getting out what they put in. Hence, they believe they own the same proprietary interest another person might have in their 401(k) investment. The Roosevelt Administration and successive administrations have deliberately cultivated this view of Social Security so that people would not feel that it was an income redistribution program which might loose popularity. The government wanted Social Security recipients to feel an entitlement to the payments rather than the an embarrassment about being beneficiary of welfare program.
While the Franklin Roosevelt Administration described Social Security one way in public, they were forced to argue something else entirely in court. The Federal Government does not have the Constitutional authority to institute a mandatory social insurance program, so they argued that payments into the social security system were really taxes. Even so, it was not clear that the Federal Government had the authority for this tax. In Helvering v. Davis an intimidated Supreme Court acquiesced to this large increase in Federal power.
At present, there is a similar misrepresentation about the nature of the medical reform package passed last year. During the 2008, presidential campaign, then Senator Barack Obama made a “firm pledge to not raise taxes on those making less than $250,000 per year.
The final medical reform legislation included an “individual mandate compelling people to pay for some form of health insurance. In an seminal interview George Stephanopoulos challenged President Obama on whether this mandate constituted, in effect, a tax increase on those at all income levels, including those making less than $250,000. Here is the exchange:
Recently, there have been a number of suits challenging the constitutionality of the individual mandate. The Administration has now argued in court that the mandate is essentially an exercise of Congresss power to tax.
If a policy requires one public face and a contradictory legal argument to buttress it in court, even if wise, such a policy serves to undermine trust in government and weaken the moral authority important for the implementation of that policy.
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