Broken and Unfixable?

There is one huge philosophical theme that the Republican Party and their Tea Party faction embrace that resonates with practically everybody, myself included. The federal government is wildly inefficient, bloated and in too many ways, simply doesn’t work. While Democrats may agree at some level, the often vote to introduce new programs without extinguishing or repairing older programs that are failure personified. The question, of course, is all about priorities. If you take away the labels and the agencies, it’s pretty clear what government has to do.

We need to be safe (at every level), our laws need to be fair and non-discriminatory, opportunity needs a level playing field, our ability to trade with the world needs to be maximized, our workers need to be paid and treated fairly, people need commercially viable access to healthcare (debate remains here, but really, let millions suffer and die to support tax breaks?), retirement needs to be managed and supported, we need a functioning infrastructure, we need planning and design to cope with present and obviously future issues (water availability, power generation, etc.), research both for problem-solving and opportunity creating values, and we need a citizenry that is competitively and affordably educated to sustain a productive and comfortable future.

The battle within our Congress is what the priorities/timing for the above must be, how to pay for it while managing massive interest payments on an existing budget deficit (gaining on $19 trillion), and what needs to be deferred or eliminated. We also don’t seem to be able to ask the tough questions, like was creating a mega-new bureaucracy – Homeland Security – worth it (or did we already have enough agencies to deal with security threats)? Is our policy of substituting very expensive contractors in the place of significantly-lower cost federal employees the modern version of three-card-Monte? What exactly are we supposed to do with a military that consumes almost half of the entire world’s aggregate military budget? Why do we have a criminal justice system that incarcerates a quarter of the world’s prisoners when we only have one-twentieth of the earth’s people? And so on and so on…

Since all federal appropriations bills are constitutionally required to originate in the House of Representatives, budget focus has to start there. Both houses of Congress are dominated by the GOP, with the latter heavily focused on deficit reduction and keeping the tax rates at the top of the food chain low. If you are remotely dependent on the federal government, for access to healthcare, or because of disability or age, the GOP doesn’t think you are worth supporting at past levels, that the country can no longer afford you. You are disposable. Government can make those decisions, and they are valid policy considerations, whether you agree with them or not. Kindness is not a constitutional right. Hmmmm.

As we hit up against our deficit borrowing cap – which could send us into international default if we cannot back up our borrowing needs with supporting Congressional permission – and as the new federal budget comes up for consideration, the battle between the White House and the Republican Congress augurs badly for going-forward fiscal stability. Even within the GOP, there is a struggle between defense-spending and deficit reduction… but social programs are the sacrificial lamb across both factions. “House Republicans released a proposal [March 17^th] that would balance the budget in a decade by revamping Medicare and Medicaid, repealing the Affordable Care Act and making cuts in domestic programs.

“The plan, which pares more than $5 trillion from the federal budget, will instantly renew long-running hostilities with the White House and Democrats regarding spending and debt. But the biggest clash is likely to be between GOP budget hawks determined to reduce spending and defense hawks who want to bolster the Pentagon in the face of rising threats from the Islamic State and other terrorist groups.

“While budget resolutions do not have the force of law, the proposal has greater significance now because Republicans control both chambers of Congress. The budget season allows the two parties to lay out their competing visions, framing a likely fiscal showdown this fall that could resemble those of previous years between President Obama and Republicans on Capitol Hill.” Washington Post, March 17^th.

For those who scream that we need to allow the free market to determine our future, there are a few harsh realities. First, there is no free market here or in most places on earth. A tax rate scheme that favors some forms of making money over others, allowing companies to inflict measurable environmental damage but forcing taxpayers to bear that economic burden, farm insurance subsidies, tilting the playing field in favor of big business and affording them tax loopholes and access to capital denied to mid and small-business, allowing trading firms super instant access to financial information not accessible to the vast majority of us, etc., etc., etc. all suggest that the market is anything but free. Government created or allows those anomalies, but there is almost no appetite in the current Congress to deal with any of this, setting the stage for another bubble and another international financial downfall.

So there is nothing on the horizon that will deal with the reality of bloated unfairness of our federal government. Neither party is facing the fact of our own slow demise of political and economic power. We are treading water, ignoring our future and kicking the can down the road, at which time it may be too late to stem the decline. If you care, raise your voice. Write your elected representatives. Talk to those who live in denial… or sit back for a really horrific tragedy we call the “decline of Western Civilization.”

I’m Peter Dekom, and we really need to return to the real world, not the mythical world in which our Congress seems to want to live.