OMB DEADLINE: passing
CONGRESS DEADLINE: January 2, 2013
Sword of Damocles: SEQUESTRATION OF $1.2 Trillion Dollars against the federal 'deficit.'
Background:
In order to properly prop up the political theater, and prove which team can best cast blame on the other, we never did get a true fiscal policy out of our presumably "competent" political leaders and their appointees.
After torturing the national economy with prevarication and vacillation for months; they just played the "do-over" card and kicked the can down the road; leaving us without a Federal spending bill to review, and more importantly, leaving us with a decimated economic outlook due to their apparent "inability" to control their pork spending and 'political/financial' promises to corporate (and other) benefactors.
Here was the "sweet" deal that made America coyly cock her head and say "OK, if you say so..."
"We promise to pass a spending bill by January 2, 2013... and if we don't we will summarily (and radically) eliminate $1.2 Trillion from the spending budget" ... of course, the media told us this was so, and they told us this was OK, and they told us that this was "the way it works."
Well... it's September.... and guess what... somehow the Office of Management and Budget finds the gargantuan task on their desk.... why?
Here's why.
Congress on Aug. 1 convened yet another hearing examining the potential implications of the sweeping budget cuts headed for Washington, but in this case unusually partisan comments from a White House official sparked fierce debate over who’s to blame for sequestration.
In a House Armed Services Committee hearing that stretched nearly three hours, lawmakers clashed with Office of Management and Budget Director Jeffrey Zients after Zients blamed Congress for the potentially disastrous fallout looming ahead once sequestration takes effect. Close to an hour and a half of the hearing involved near-unintelligible shouting matches, mainly between Zients and Rep. Randy Forbes (R-Va.) and Rep. Mike Turner (R-Ohio).
In a particularly hostile exchange, Forbes pressed Zients on whether he believes “draconian defense cuts” are a sensible way to drive agreement between the two parties on Capitol Hill. Zients in turn pointed the finger at Congress.
A word about our "acting" OMB Budget director... he got his start at... wait for it.... BAIN & Co. .... (I just love throwing in stuff that makes the partisans crazy) ... before becoming embroiled in the infamous policy-crafting lobbying group the "Advisory Board Corp." as well as the equally "important" "Corporate Executive Board" ... the revolving door led him here, to the OMB... but only as a deputy director... so now it may be that he was thrown under the bus... I'm sure he didn't sign up for this.
His preeminent effort at averting blame can be found in his memorandum about the severity of the situation www.whitehouse.gov...
The saga continues....
At the August 1st hearing... between the yelling and gnashing of teeth:
Zients warned that if sequestration does go into effect, its occurrence in the middle of the fiscal year could mean that cuts estimated at 10 percent for the Defense Department and 8 percent for the rest of the government could end up being as high as 14 percent.
The political thespians, showing their perennial inability to operate without a script from the party did themselves proud...
The bickering went well beyond just sequestration, with arguments ensuing over tax rates, President Obama’s 2013 budget and other unrelated issues.
At the end, Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.) apologized to Zients and Carter for what he deemed to be a waste of their time.
"I'm sorry that we dragged you from your governing responsibilities into this spectacle," Johnson said.
After the August 1st debacle, someone must have convinced the President to kick some bureaucratic butt, so he issued.. get this ... "The Sequestration Transparency Act." A law which requires the OMB to explain by early September what will be cut if Congress fails to pass their spending bill by January 2nd, 2013.
It is thus that the elected officials are making it "not their problem" and setting up the "cause of failure" that they can blame on ABM.... ("Anyone But Me") to be followed by the proclamation of innocence for ABU... ("Anyone But Us.")
The OMB must create a list of what will be exempted from sequestration as well as an explanation of the whys and wherefores of the sequestration.
Me thinks the fingers of blame will be jabbing out in all directions... with each group of losers trying their best to evoke feelings of pity for themselves and angst for their polar opposites.
defensesystems.com
(visit the link for the full news article)
edit on 5-9-2012 by Maxmars because: (no reason given)
edit on 5-9-2012 by Maxmars
because: (no reason given)
