What does Dr Tom Really Want?
by digby
So, according to Lil' Luke on Dylan Ratigan earlier it's all the Democrats' fault that Coburn left the Gang 'o 6 because they refused to cut Social Security and Medicare when the Republicans Coburn and Chambliss were willing to raise taxes. This is nonsense. The Republicans want to cut Medicare and Social Security in exchange for pretending to raise taxes (and even that is off limits apparently.)
Remember this?
Yellin: Senator Chamblis do you believe that Senate Republicans will agree to a package that includes any sort of tax changes?
Chambliss: Well, the fact of the matter is that you can't solve this debt problem just with reductions in discretionary spending. You can't solve it just by attacking and reforming entitlements. You've got to look at the revenue side also.
What we are looking at proposing is actually a reduction in corporate rates and personal individual income tax rates, which will put more money in people's pockets and we're going to do that with the reduction in tax expenditures. Every time we've done that in years past whether it was under President Reagan or president Bush we have seen revenues increase. And we've got to have an increase in revenues if we are going to retire this debt... revenues have to be on the table if we're serious about attacking that debt.
I think you can see the bait and switch there, can't you?
Furthermore, it appears at this point that the Democrats have been willing to cut Medicare and Medicaid and go along with that "revenue" nonsense, but Coburn wouldn't take yes for an answer. He came back and demanded more. Greg Sargent reports on what the Democrats are saying happened in the Gang:
“Coburn came in on Monday and said, `I want $130 billion,’” the aide says. “The conservation was heated. There was yelling. Durbin said, `I am not doing this. That destroys Medicare. That goes even further than Paul Ryan. We’re not doing it.’”
The conversation went on for three hours or so, the aide says, but the senators could not break the impasse. “Because Coburn couldn’t get his way, he walked,” the aide says. Coburn called Durbin on Tuesday to tell him he was pulling out.
Now that account doesn't say that they have already agreed to 400 million in cuts as other accounts have, so it makes Durbin sound much more like he's taking a hard line.And even if he isn't, I still have to think this is a poison pill.
And again, here's that notion of "releasing the plan" from Coburn's aide this time:
I’m not going to comment on his private conversations with his colleagues. Dr. Coburn had numerous concerns with the state of the Gang of Six proposal. As the Trustees recently concluded, Medicare is going bankrupt and will be destroyed if we do nothing. If the group wants to release their proposal to save Medicare and achieve long-term deficit reduction they are certainly welcome to do so.
And yes. I still love the the logic that say because Medicare will not have enough money in the future we need to cut it. I seem to be the only one who finds that odd, so I guess it's just me.
Obviously, I have no real idea what's going on. But it isn't just a straight-up disagreement about suddenly slashing more of Medicare than previously agreed. Coburn has a reason for doing this. Maybe that Ensign thing is more of a problem than we know.
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