Oligarchs mourn decline in federal deficit, fear window for gutting Social Security has closed. http://t.co/UZp0To8Px5 #WallStreetHasaSad
— billmon (@billmon1) May 14, 2014
Let us summon up an entire orchestra of very tiny violins! Alex MacGillis, at TNR, on “The Hypocritical, Bipartisan Fearmongering of the Fiscal Summit“:
These are not happy days for the fiscal fear-mongers. The deficit has been falling rapidly even in the absence of a grand bargain to slash entitlements and raise taxes. Both sides have given up for now on the elaborate charade of super-committees and debt commissions, which, for several years now, have accomplished nothing but nudging the country toward a premature austerity that, many economists now agree, undermined our economic recovery. Instead, today’s New York Times reports that “in a shift from deficit concerns,” the Senate is on the verge of passing the extension of a whole swath of business tax breaks without finding any way to pay for them.
It is, in other words, not an auspicious moment for the annual “Fiscal Summit” hosted in Washington today by the Peterson Foundation, the organization funded by private-equity titan and Social Security antagonist Pete Peterson. But when a billionaire’s footing the bill and a former president is on the guest list, it’s not like you just call the whole thing off…
Then again, carrying the event off was perhaps not so difficult to do, given that these summits have from the start been built around a different sort of truth-avoidance. Peterson and his ideological allies promote a specific, non-unanimous agenda—prioritizing deficit and debt reduction above all else via deep reductions in Social Security and Medicare and increases in taxes (in that order of preference). That is their prerogative as advocates. But the summits they host to this end are framed as if they’re being held on behalf of some universal, noncontroversial cause—a framing that, among other things, enables the participation of straight-news journalists who would shy away from engaging in similarly slanted events on different issues. Those involved act as if the summits are but a wonkier cousin of a Take Back the Night rally or a breast cancer awareness promo. They are not…
Zach Carter, at HuffPo:
At this year’s Peterson fete, attendees seemed to recognize that their moment had passed. House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) — the living patron saint of American austerians — didn’t bother to show up. The most politically salient comment to contemporary Washington was former President Bill Clinton’s mockery of Karl Rove’s recent suggestion that Hillary Clinton has brain damage. And while Peterson still attracts big names — in addition to Clinton, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R), House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan all spoke — much of the discussion focused on what might have been…
“I’m concerned people will take some of this lull in the action, this drop in the deficit, as a harbinger for the future,” said Erskine Bowles, who co-chaired President Obama’s bipartisan debt commission. “My guess is nothing substantive will happen before 2017.”…
One can only hope!
Open Thread: Oligarchs Mourn At Peterson’s Austerity SummitPost + Comments (76)