TIME: The day-to-day of Washington political debate is often little more than misdirection. All sides craft messages aimed at attracting the sympathies of select groups of voters, even if the soundbites have little or nothing to do with what is actually happening. These red herrings make headlines, but they poorly reflect policy or political realities. Here’s a look at the biggest red herrings of the debt ceiling debate:
President Obama doesn’t have a plan. First, the back story: Earlier this year, Republican Rep. Paul Ryan put out a budget plan that would eventually transform Medicare into a voucher system. Democrats pounced, attacking it as an effort to take money out of seniors’ pockets, but refused to release their own plan for dealing with the unsustainable entitlement. Republicans found this unfair and cowardly, and so began the “Where’s their plan?” refrain. At some point in July, this same refrain was transferred over to a new debt ceiling debate. Republicans began saying that Obama had no plan to craft a compromise that would lift the debt ceiling. “He doesn’t like our plan, but he has not put a plan forward yet,” announced House Majority Leader Eric Cantor on July 26. This “Where’s his plan?” refrain quickly became a GOP koan, repeated ad nauseam on cable television and later by reporters in the White House briefing room. In fact, the President has presented House Republican leaders dozens of different plans behind closed doors in the hopes of crafting a compromise. After talks collapsed on July 22, White House aides briefed reporters about one version of this compromise plan, including $425 billion in cuts to Medicare and Medicaid and $1.2 billion in new revenues. The White House never released the plan as legislative text, but that was a strategic political decision. In fact, House Republicans have been told exactly what sorts of plans the White House was willing to accept…
Republicans reject the idea of compromise. White House officials have made “compromise” and “balanced approach” their watchwords during this debate, as part of a broader effort to woo non-ideological voters. “All they have to be willing to do is compromise one inch,” White House Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer said in a recent interview. Republicans by contrast have mostly avoided the same rhetoric, since it is frowned upon among the conservative base. But that does not mean that Republicans leaders have either refused to compromise or rejected the idea of a balanced approach. The plan that Speaker John Boehner put forward this week, for instance, is dramatically more centrist than the plan Republicans passed last week, representing significant compromises. (Although it still cedes no ground on tax increases.) Nonetheless, it is not a plan that shows any hope of passage in the Senate. As with the compromises that Obama has pushed, the balance is in the eye of the beholder. …. (more)
