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Republicans Losing Debt Ceiling Fight as McConnell Won’t Say He’ll Shut Down Government
Republicans are already losing the debt ceiling fight. Sen. Mitch McConnell was asked repeatedly on ABC’s This Week if he would shut down the government, and he wouldn’t back the idea.
Transcript from ABC’s This Week:
STEPHANOPOULOS: And the question is, how will you follow through on your strategy? And, you know, there are — a lot of your allies are worried about the — about that prospect. The Wall Street Journal editorial page said the political result will be far worse if Republicans start this fight only to cave in the end. You can’t take a hostage you aren’t prepared to shoot. Do the two GOP leaders have a better strategy today than they did in 2011?
And I guess, you know, you’re hearing that phrase more and more now, shoot the hostage. Are you prepared to do it, to see the country default, if the president won’t sign the spending cuts you demand?
MCCONNELL: Well, look, it’s not even necessary to get to that point. Why aren’t we trying to settle the problem? Why aren’t we trying to do something about reducing spending? We know we need to do it. When are we going to do it? We don’t need to use the deadline. We could go through the regular order. Congress could pass bills. They could have conferences between the House and Senate. The president could be engaged. I mean, he’s good at campaigning…
(Not satisfied with McConnell’s non-answer, later in the interview Stephanopoulous asked him again.)
STEPHANOPOULOS: I accept that that’s your point of view, but the division still seems to be there. So I’ll go back to my original question. How far are you willing to take this strategy? Is — is it acceptable to you that the government default if the president won’t agree to discuss spending cuts over the debt limit?
MCCONNELL: My answer is, hopefully we don’t need to get to that point. The president surely must know we’re spending way too much. So why don’t we do something about reducing spending?
The only reason these deadlines become significant, George, is because the Democratic majority in the Senate and the president of the United States don’t want to cut any spending of any consequence. They don’t want to do anything on the entitlement side.
You know, 60 percent of what we spend every year is interest on the national debt and very popular entitlement programs. Until we address the entitlement programs and make the eligibility for entitlements meet the demographics of our country, we can’t ever solve this problem.
If we want to have the kind of country for our children and grandchildren that our — that our parents left behind for us, the time to do that is now. Ironically, divided government is the perfect time to do it, because you can pull both sides together and do things that need to be done for the future, and the American people will understand, since you did it together, it was absolutely necessary.
Instead of saying that he would support a government shutdown, McConnell has already staked out the weak kneed position of backing off the threat of a shutdown while blaming Democrats for refusing to cut spending. McConnell gave every indication that his party is repeating that all bark and no bite tactics that have led to them talking a tough game, but repeatedly caving to the president over the last 18 months.
What Republicans never seem to understand is that the American people always support spending cuts in the abstract. When they are asked if they support cutting spending, the vast majority of people will always say yes. The problem occurs when people are asked about cutting specific programs. By wide margin, the public does not support cuts in Social Security, Medicare, or Medicaid. The left supports defense cuts, but most on the right do not.
This isn’t matter of Democrats not supporting cuts. For decades this country has not been able to agree on what should be cut.
McConnell can declare all he wants that there will be no new revenue, but he and his party are going to lose that fight. Obama’s balanced approach remains extremely popular. The president is going to use the same argument on the debt ceiling that won him reelection and almost everything he wanted on the fiscal cliff.
Republicans are playing a very weak hand, and if leaders like McConnell refuse to shut down the government, they’ve already lost.
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14 Responses to Republicans Losing Debt Ceiling Fight as McConnell Won’t Say He’ll Shut Down Government
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Mary
Jan. 6th, 2013 at 11:45 am
Time after time the repugs show us The defit war is really only about protecting their wealthy puppet masters and corporations. Sadly the faux news cult members will never see that.
tz
Jan. 13th, 2013 at 11:47 am
That, and doing their best to roll back the New Deal.
Military spending? They are blind to that.
Reynardine
Jan. 6th, 2013 at 11:54 am
Of course, once you shoot the hostage, you don’t have one.
Nefer
Jan. 6th, 2013 at 12:29 pm
Let’s start spending cuts with congressional perks. You want to go to a gym? Go buy a membership somewhere. You want a haircut? Go find a barber in town. You want to lunch with a friend? Go find a restaurant you like in town. And on and on. They have a level of pampering that the rest of us can only dream of.
They can have all the amenities and benefits that the average Walmart cashier gets. A grubby break room with a wobbly table and posters reminding them of the consequences of employee theft.
djchefron
Jan. 6th, 2013 at 1:06 pm
I just wish georgie pogie,dancing dave,bubbling bob and the rest of the village idiots just once point out that it was the American Taliban tax policies their unfunded wars that is the main cause of the debt.So doesnt it fall on you and the people you represent to pay up?Oh I forgot the village idiots are those people.My bad and nevermind
Everybodhi
Jan. 6th, 2013 at 1:46 pm
Cut defense.
labman57
Jan. 6th, 2013 at 1:50 pm
There are lots of ways to reduce the debt via additional spending cuts. The problem is coming up with a set of solutions to which both sides can agree.
For example, there are still plenty of loopholes in the tax code that enable corporations and wealthy individuals — you know, the ones who can afford high-priced accountants and tax attorneys — to avoid paying their fair share of taxes.
How about if we stop spending so much money invading other nations?
We can discontinue the practice of providing tax breaks and subsidies to the fossil fuel industries when their annual profits are at record highs.
We can eliminate the tax-exempt status of religious congregations and organizations that use their congregants’ money to lobby for or against public policies or legislative proposals, as well as those that use the pulpit as a means to proselytize a specific political agenda.
And of course, the conservative response is “No, no, no, and definitely not” … and in the next breath complain that progressives offer no suggestions regarding ways to reduce government spending.
Reality check: The current agenda of most Republicans has nothing whatsoever to do with balancing the budget/reducing the deficit and everything to do with implementing their socially regressive political ideology.
Meanwhile, House Republicans pour hundred of millions of dollars into defending DOMA, and saber-rattling politicians and pundits propose an increase in defense spending, support attacking Iran, and recommend extending our stay in Afghanistan indefinitely — at a cost of billions of dollars per month.
Debra Vermaas
Jan. 6th, 2013 at 2:27 pm
A job like this might require us to RELEASE THE BIDEN.
j
Jan. 6th, 2013 at 2:34 pm
Cut tax subsidies for big oil.
Cut the bloated budget for the Pentagon.
Negotiate cheaper drug prices for medicare, like the VA.
Crack down on the billionaires hiding money in the Cayman Islands and Switzerland.
Raise the threshold amount for social security.
Bring the Afghanistan war to an end faster.
Empty the prisons of young people who are jailed for minor drug use.
I wonder how much I just saved!
markmac
Jan. 8th, 2013 at 11:20 am
Makes perfect sense, which is precisely why it’ll never happen!
Anne
Jan. 6th, 2013 at 2:58 pm
The Republicans keep painting themselves into a corner with all their stubborn refusal to do anything but be oppositional to whatever President Obama wants to do. It was only a matter of time before the inevitable end result caught up with them, and they still insist on doing the same thing expecting different results.
Monz
Jan. 8th, 2013 at 8:37 am
I’m sure the President will find some way to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.
majii
Jan. 13th, 2013 at 12:24 am
Oh, how I wish some Americans could have the opportunity to be POTUS for six months. Sometimes one has to walk in another’s shoes before one understands that standing on the outside looking in is not the same as being in the midst of a heated battle.
Virginia Nancarvis
Jan. 13th, 2013 at 10:19 pm
President Obama signed into law the Budget Control Act of 2011 that will cut spending of over a trillion dollars. The fiscal cliff deal named the Tax Payer Relief Act of 2012 cut another $740 billion.
Deficit reduction according to the CBO (Congressional Budget Office)
1 a $740 billion deficit reduction over a ten year period (the usual way budgets are done when estimating deficits)
2. a $1.7 trillion spending cut already signed into law through the Budget Control Act of 2011.
So for McConnell to harp about entitlement programs needing to be cut to reduce the deficit is the continuation of the conservatives/libertarians agenda of the last thirty years…to remove the retirement accounts/health program from the federal government’s control and privatize them for profit.