(2 pm. – promoted by ek hornbeck)
Some of the Democrats in Congress are more the enemy of the people than the Republicans. Case in point, Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) and her unholy alliance with Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN) on a proposed budget bill that would completely destroy Medicare and Medicaid. The bill would cut $7.6 trillion over 10 years by capping federal spending at 20.6 percent of gross domestic product within a decade, down from 24.3 percent now. Achieving that goal would necessitate massive cuts to Medicare, Social Security and Medicaid.
Under the McCaskill-Corker plan, if Congress fails to keep spending under the annual cap, the Office of Management and Budget would make evenly distributed cuts throughout the budget.
If the automatic cuts took place, they would total about $1.3 trillion in Social Security, $856 billion in Medicare and $547 billion in Medicaid reductions over the first nine years, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities report.
To avoid the automatic across-the-board cuts, lawmakers would probably have to enact policies for Medicare and Medicaid along the lines of what Ryan has outlined, the report said.
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Federal spending is projected to grow rapidly in coming years as the Baby Boom generation reaches retirement age, which means the McCaskill-Corker proposal would require dramatic cuts. The reductions would total more than $800 billion in 2022 alone, which would be the equivalent of eliminating the entire Medicare program or the Defense Department.
Spending Caps: Putting Lipstick On A Pig
Hi, I’m Robert Reich. Republicans figure that if they can’t sell the pig they’ll just put lipstick on it and find some suckers who will think it’s something else. That’s the proposal emerging in the Senate from Republican Bob Corker of Tennessee and also Democrat Claire McCaskill of Missouri. It would get the deficit down, not by raising taxes on the rich, but by capping federal spending. That cap would steadily drop over time as it squeezed spending more and more.And if Congress failed to stay under the cap the budget would be automatically cut.
According to an analysis by the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities the McCaskill/Corker plan would require eight hundred billion dollars of cuts in twenty-twenty-two alone. That’s the equivalent of eliminating Medicare entirely, or the entire Department of Defense. Now, obviously, the Defense Department wouldn’t disappear, so what would go?
We’d have to have giant cuts in Medicare, Medicaid, education, and much of everything else American’s depend on.
It’s the republican plan with lipstick. It would have exactly the same result as the current Republican plan. But, by disguising it with caps and procedures Republicans can avoid saying what they’re intending to do, destroy Medicare and Medicaid, slash programs for poor and moderate income Americans, and not demand a penny from wealthy Americans.
The McCaskill/Corker spending cap would also make it impossible for government to boost the economy in recessions, which would lead to even higher unemployment, lasting longer.
Other Senate Democrats are showing interest in this lipsticked pig, including West Virginia’s Joe Machin. And not surprisingly, Joe Lieberman is on board.
But don’t be fooled and don’t let anyone else be. McCaskill/Corker is the same republican pig.
[Tell Congress: No Spending Caps That Slash Medicare]
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