Paul Ryan's insane budget proposal

[Puppycow]

The biggest thing to notice about this proposal is what it leaves out:

1) It promises huge spending cuts in the discretionary part of the budget (from 12.5% of GDP to 3.75%), but doesn't say what those cuts will be.

2) It claims that its huge tax cuts for the rich will be paid for by closing "loopholes" but doesn't say what those loopholes would be.

Even that radical lefty magazine Forbes can see that the promises it makes are ridiculous:

Paul Ryan Proves It: We Can't Balance The Budget With Spending Cuts

Paul Ryan may not have intended it, but his 2013 budget is the strongest argument I’ve seen for why any serious fiscal plan must include new revenues. It’s far more convincing than partisan Democratic complaints.

Ryan says he wants to balance the budget only by cutting spending. But he proved with hard, relatively specific numbers (on the spending side, at least) that he can’t get there from here. And if you take the second page from the Republican hymnal and add huge tax cuts to the mix, you may find yourself headed off in just the wrong fiscal direction.

 

[Corsair 115]

As RandFan has posted before, the Republicans themselves commissioned a study to look at tackling the budget deficit. Its conclusion was that a plan which involved 15% increased revenues and 85% spending cuts was the best mix. The report came out early in 2011, if I recall correctly.

 

[Puppycow]

Here's another analysis, also from Forbes:

Paul Ryan's Mystery Meat Budget

I am weary of mystery meat. The latest serving was dished out today by House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI), who released a fiscal plan that airily promises both trillions of dollars in tax cuts and a nearly balanced budget within a decade, but never says how he’d get there.

Ryan isn’t saying that his budget implies cuts of $4.6 trillion in popular tax deductions, credits, and exclusions over 10 years, according to new estimates by the Tax Policy Center. And that ignores the $5.4 trillion in revenue lost from permanently extending the 2001/2003 tax cuts.

Ryan proposes big, specific spending reductions such as cutting Medicaid in half and slashing other federal spending (except for Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid) by nearly 75 percent from current levels by 2050. But his budget still can’t add up without eliminating or sharply scaling back those popular tax preferences. Which ones, it seems, remain a state secret.

 

[Tsukasa Buddha]

I saw him being interviewed about this on CNN. Relying on cutting loopholes is insane. Everyone says they want to do that anyway. And it relies on crazy revenue from tax cuts.

How drastic? According to the budget office, which analyzed the plan using assumptions dictated by House Republicans, the proposal calls for spending on items other than Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid — but including defense — to fall from 12 percent of G.D.P. last year to 6 percent of G.D.P. in 2022, and just 3.5 percent of G.D.P. in the long run.

That last number is less than we currently spend on defense alone; it’s not much bigger than federal spending when Calvin Coolidge was president, and the United States, among other things, had only a tiny military establishment. How could such a drastic shrinking of government take place without crippling essential public functions? The plan doesn’t say

Linky.

 

[Puppycow]

Linky.

That column seems to be from last year:

Published: April 7, 2011

Essentially Ryan released the same proposal he made last year with a few minor tweaks, so the analysis is basically as valid today as it was last year.

 

[Tsukasa Buddha]

That column seems to be from last year:


Essentially Ryan released the same proposal he made last year with a few minor tweaks, so the analysis is basically as valid today as it was last year.

D'oh! Thanks .

 

[leftysergeant]

Essentially Ryan released the same proposal he made last year with a few minor tweaks, so the analysis is basically as valid today as it was last year.

It sucks as much this year as it did last year.

For that matter, it sucked when Bush the Lesser tried a watered-down version of it.

Now that little whackadoodle thinks he can fix the budget by doing the same crap that broke the budget and the ecconomy with the vigor of a Samurai on crack.

Sounds like symptoms of a mental disorder to me.

 

[KwamiFabu]

At least give Ryan (and Ron Wyden) credit for addressing Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security in a serious way. Meanwhile Obama and Senate have not managed to even pass a budget for almost 3 years. What is more insane?

 

[BenBurch]

At least give Ryan (and Ron Wyden) credit for addressing Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security in a serious way. Meanwhile Obama and Senate have not managed to even pass a budget for almost 3 years. What is more insane?

 

[RandFan]

As RandFan has posted before, the Republicans themselves commissioned a study to look at tackling the budget deficit. Its conclusion was that a plan which involved 15% increased revenues and 85% spending cuts was the best mix. The report came out early in 2011, if I recall correctly.

The silly experts that the GOP commissioned to write the report did not sign the Norquist tax pledge.

 

[elbe]

The silly experts that the GOP commissioned to write the report did not sign the Norquist tax pledge.

I saw the Norquist interview on the Daily Show and he came across as someone deeply naive.

 

[RandFan]

I saw the Norquist interview on the Daily Show and he came across as someone deeply naive.

Agreed.

 

[Lowpro]

I saw the Norquist interview on the Daily Show and he came across as someone deeply naive.

He came across as a moron who couldn't even just address what Stewart mentioned that it's ONE thing to promise no more spending cuts, but NOT promise what to actually DO to improve the economy and that Norquist and his cabal are deluded.

 

[joobz]

He came across as a moron who couldn't even just address what Stewart mentioned that it's ONE thing to promise no more spending cuts, but NOT promise what to actually DO to improve the economy and that Norquist and his cabal are deluded.

He came across as a true believer. The moment historical fact was presented to him, he shut down mentally repeating his beliefs like a mantra.

 

[RandFan]

I Was Wrong About Paul Ryan

...

Where I was at least somewhat wrong was in my expectations about how the Very Serious People would treat his latest outing. I thought they would still treat him as a heroic deficit hawk, never mind the fact that his plan is really about transferring money from the poor to the rich, with no credible deficit reduction at all. That, after all, is what they did last year — he even received an award for fiscal responsibility.

But I’m not seeing that this time. Overall, the response seems muted, maybe out of embarrassment. But leaving aside the predictable right-wing cheerleaders, it looks as if the emperor’s nakedness is now common knowledge.

Yeah, seems mostly a non-issue this year.

 

[Peephole]

At least give Ryan (and Ron Wyden) credit for addressing Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security in a serious way. Meanwhile Obama and Senate have not managed to even pass a budget for almost 3 years. What is more insane?

Actually Obama and the Democrats passed a law reigning in Medicare costs. And social security isn't a real problem anyways.

 

[KwamiFabu]

Actually Obama and the Democrats passed a law reigning in Medicare costs. And social security isn't a real problem anyways.

Right... And S&P didn't really downgrade America's credit rating to AA+ because Obama and the Republicans on the Hill couldn't agree to cut $4 trillion over 10 years. Wake me when this nightmare is over...

 

[leftysergeant]

Right... And S&P didn't really downgrade America's credit rating to AA+ because Obama and the Republicans on the Hill couldn't agree to cut $4 trillion over 10 years. Wake me when this nightmare is over...

Why does it have to be all cuts? Only dimbulbs think that cutting is the only way to solve the problem. Going back and shaking down ther greed heads who took advantage of the tax cuts without doing what they were supposed to do would have the same effect as cutting programs that the whiney babies refused to fund.

 

[RandFan]

Right... And S&P didn't really downgrade America's credit rating to AA+ because Obama and the Republicans on the Hill couldn't agree to cut $4 trillion over 10 years. Wake me when this nightmare is over...

I'm not sure how much fault Obama deserve if any. The GOP refused to negotiate in good faith.

 

[tyr_13]

S&P directly cited the use of the debt ceiling as a barging point as one of the reasons for the downgrade. Who was doing that again?