In defending the Obama administration’s budget, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner responded to a query from House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan with a now infamous non-answer. “We’re not coming before you today to say we have a definitive solution to that long-term problem,” Geithner testified. “What we do know is, we don’t like yours.”

It is therefore no surprise that the president used what was nominally a budget address — before an unabashedly friendly audience of Associated Press editors and writers on Tuesday — instead as a campaign speech. When by your own lights you have no plan on offer to prevent a predictable and potentially catastrophic debt, it is best to try to render your political opponents as granny-gutting demons and their budget as a kind of occult document.

Keep reading this post . . .

Last year, we were proud to be one of the first websites to publicly promote the Republican Study Committee’s Cut, Cap and Balance (CCB) plan.  What started out as an idea hatched by a few principled conservatives grew into a unifying rallying cry for the entire conservative movement.  Sadly, GOP leadership jettisoned the universally-heralded CCB plan in favor of the Budget [Out of] Control Act, which gave Obama another $2.1 trillion in debt authority, while cutting nothing significantly except for defense.

Now, thanks to the indefatigable work of Reps. Jim Jordan, Scott Garrett, Mick Mulvaney, Tom McClintock, and Tim Huelskamp, CCB is back in the form of the annual RSC budget – and it’s here to stay.  The RSC budget – Cut, Cap, and Balance – immediately cuts discretionary spending in FY 2013 by $112 billion from last year’s spending levels, caps future spending at 18-18.7% of GDP, and balances the budget in just 5 years!  Overall, the RSC budget will cut $7.6 trillion relative to Obama’s budget and even $2.3 trillion more than the Ryan budget.

The amazing thing is that the balanced budget is achieved without accounting for the reforms to the biggest drivers of the deficits; Social Security and Medicare.  The budget proposal includes Paul Ryan’s Medicare premium support plan, and even adds Social Security reform (unlike the Ryan budget).  However, those changes don’t begin until after the 10-year budget frame.  As such, none of the savings are included in the budget.

While it is clear that those two leviathans must be reformed in order to maintain a balanced budget in the long-run, this budget illustrates something unique in budget land.  It is the first proposal that shows how to balance the budget in 5 years, even without reforming SS and Medicare immediately.  This does not diminish the importance of reforming those programs; rather it shows how much dead wood is lodged into the rest of the budget – an observation that is often overlooked.

Here is a detailed breakdown of the budget proposal:

Discretionary Spending: This budget sets the FY 2013 discretionary spending cap at $931 billion,roughly equal to 2008 levels.  That’s hardly too much to ask for.  It takes the $1.028 trillion level established in the Ryan budget and bakes in the $97 billion of impending sequester cuts (slated to begin on January 2) into the budget from the beginning of the year.  Specifically, it parries away the cuts from defense spending and directs it to the harmful, wasteful, and unconstitutional government programs and agencies.  The list of programs that will be terminated includes the National Labor Relations Board, Trade Adjustment Assistance, the Presidential Campaign Fund, the Legal Services Corporation, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the Universal Service Fund, the Economic Development Agency, and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Here is the key point: All discretionary spending is frozen at the $931 billion level until the budget balances in FY 2017.  From FY 2018-2022, growth of discretionary spending is capped to inflation.  Moreover, in order to keep total discretionary spending at this level, while simultaneously providing for our national security needs, the sub-category of defense spending is allowed to rise gradually (the same levels as the Ryan budget), as non-defense discretionary spending actually declines every year until FY 2018.  Overall, the RSC budget saves about $750 billion more in discretionary spending than the Ryan budget.

Medicaid and Welfare: The paramount entitlement reform of the budget is Medicaid reform.  The proposal incorporates the recently-introduced State Health Flexibility Act (H.R. 4160), which combines Medicaid and SCHIP into one block grant to the states, allowing them to do with it whatever they deem prudent.  Unlike the Ryan plan, this proposal would freeze the block grant at FY 2012 levels (in nominal dollars) for ten years. Overall, the RSC budget saves $760 billion more than the Ryan budget from Medicaid/CHIP proposal and over $2 trillion from the current baseline.

For other mandatory programs, the budget incorporates the RSC’s Welfare Reform Act of 2011 (H.R. 1167).  Once unemployment dips below 6.5%, this bill would freeze all spending on the 77 means-tested programs at 2007 levels (pre-recession welfare payments), rising only with inflation.  It would also place some budget constraints on these “mandatory” programs, and subject the Food Stamp program to the same work requirements that were placed on TANF under the 1996 welfare reform bill.  Total savings from welfare reform will be $260 billion over 10 years.

Other reforms include:

• Requiring current federal workers to contribute more to their pensions and health benefits, while limiting the rate of growth of federal pensions to the “Chained-CPI.”
• Cutting agriculture subsidies by abolishing the Direct Payment farm subsidy, the Foreign Market Development Program, and the Market Access Program.
• Privatizing Freddie and Fannie
• Eliminating all mandatory spending for Pell Grants, subjecting 100% of price tag to the annual budget process.

Taxes:  In addition to balancing the budget in 5 years, the RSC plan would also enact pro-growth tax reform, “The Jobs Through Growth Act,” aiming for the same revenue baseline as the Ryan budget.  It would offer an optional transition to a new, flatter system that contains just two rates: 15% (first $50,000 taxable income for single filers, $100,000 for joint filers) and 25% (taxable income above that).  In order to ensure that there is no increased burden on middle-income families with several children; couples would get a $25,000 standard deduction and an additional $12,500 deduction for each dependent.  After this generous pro-family deduction, all other credits and deductions are eliminated, thereby putting an end to market distortions through the tax system.

The bill further calls for abolishing the death tax and AMT.  The corporate tax would be lowered to 25% and transformed to a territorial system.  Capital Gains taxes would be capped at 15% and indexed for inflation, so only the amount of gains beyond the level of inflation would be taxed.  Some other tax proposals offer slightly bolder plans for the capgains and corporate taxes, but the beauty of this plan is that it facilitates a balanced budget, even working with the inaccurate static scoring of the CBO.

In conclusion, this budget offers the broad contours for any serious plan to balance the budget, and more importantly, shrink the size of government.  On Thursday, the Cut, Cap, and Balance budget will be proposed as a floor amendment (H. Con. Res. 113) to the Ryan budget.  This will be one of those votes that shows who is willing to substantiate their commitments to spending cuts and limited government with real action.  It will also grant those who voted to kill CCB last year a second chance to right the ship.

Long live Cut Cap and Balance!

Last year, we were proud to be one of the first websites to publicly promote the Republican Study Committee’s Cut, Cap and Balance (CCB) plan.  What started out as an idea hatched by a few principled conservatives grew into a unifying rallying cry for the entire conservative movement.  Sadly, GOP leadership jettisoned the universally-heralded CCB plan in favor of the Budget [Out of] Control Act, which gave Obama another $2.1 trillion in debt authority, while cutting nothing significantly except for defense.

Now, thanks to the indefatigable work of Reps. Jim Jordan, Scott Garrett, Mick Mulvaney, Tom McClintock, and Tim Huelskamp, CCB is back in the form of the annual RSC budget – and it’s here to stay.  The RSC budget – Cut, Cap, and Balance – immediately cuts discretionary spending in FY 2013 by $112 billion from last year’s spending levels, caps future spending at 18-18.7% of GDP, and balances the budget in just 5 years!  Overall, the RSC budget will cut $7.6 trillion relative to Obama’s budget and even $2.3 trillion more than the Ryan budget.

The amazing thing is that the balanced budget is achieved without accounting for the reforms to the biggest drivers of the deficits; Social Security and Medicare.  The budget proposal includes Paul Ryan’s Medicare premium support plan, and even adds Social Security reform (unlike the Ryan budget).  However, those changes don’t begin until after the 10-year budget frame.  As such, none of the savings are included in the budget.

While it is clear that those two leviathans must be reformed in order to maintain a balanced budget in the long-run, this budget illustrates something unique in budget land.  It is the first proposal that shows how to balance the budget in 5 years, even without reforming SS and Medicare immediately.  This does not diminish the importance of reforming those programs; rather it shows how much dead wood is lodged into the rest of the budget – an observation that is often overlooked.

Here is a detailed breakdown of the budget proposal:

Discretionary Spending: This budget sets the FY 2013 discretionary spending cap at $931 billion,roughly equal to 2008 levels.  That’s hardly too much to ask for.  It takes the $1.028 trillion level established in the Ryan budget and bakes in the $97 billion of impending sequester cuts (slated to begin on January 2) into the budget from the beginning of the year.  Specifically, it parries away the cuts from defense spending and directs it to the harmful, wasteful, and unconstitutional government programs and agencies.  The list of programs that will be terminated includes the National Labor Relations Board, Trade Adjustment Assistance, the Presidential Campaign Fund, the Legal Services Corporation, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the Universal Service Fund, the Economic Development Agency, and the National Endowment for the Arts.

Here is the key point: All discretionary spending is frozen at the $931 billion level until the budget balances in FY 2017.  From FY 2018-2022, growth of discretionary spending is capped to inflation.  Moreover, in order to keep total discretionary spending at this level, while simultaneously providing for our national security needs, the sub-category of defense spending is allowed to rise gradually (the same levels as the Ryan budget), as non-defense discretionary spending actually declines every year until FY 2018.  Overall, the RSC budget saves about $750 billion more in discretionary spending than the Ryan budget.

Medicaid and Welfare: The paramount entitlement reform of the budget is Medicaid reform.  The proposal incorporates the recently-introduced State Health Flexibility Act (H.R. 4160), which combines Medicaid and SCHIP into one block grant to the states, allowing them to do with it whatever they deem prudent.  Unlike the Ryan plan, this proposal would freeze the block grant at FY 2012 levels (in nominal dollars) for ten years. Overall, the RSC budget saves $760 billion more than the Ryan budget from Medicaid/CHIP proposal and over $2 trillion from the current baseline.

For other mandatory programs, the budget incorporates the RSC’s Welfare Reform Act of 2011 (H.R. 1167).  Once unemployment dips below 6.5%, this bill would freeze all spending on the 77 means-tested programs at 2007 levels (pre-recession welfare payments), rising only with inflation.  It would also place some budget constraints on these “mandatory” programs, and subject the Food Stamp program to the same work requirements that were placed on TANF under the 1996 welfare reform bill.  Total savings from welfare reform will be $260 billion over 10 years.

Other reforms include:

• Requiring current federal workers to contribute more to their pensions and health benefits, while limiting the rate of growth of federal pensions to the “Chained-CPI.”
• Cutting agriculture subsidies by abolishing the Direct Payment farm subsidy, the Foreign Market Development Program, and the Market Access Program.
• Privatizing Freddie and Fannie
• Eliminating all mandatory spending for Pell Grants, subjecting 100% of price tag to the annual budget process.

Taxes:  In addition to balancing the budget in 5 years, the RSC plan would also enact pro-growth tax reform, “The Jobs Through Growth Act,” aiming for the same revenue baseline as the Ryan budget.  It would offer an optional transition to a new, flatter system that contains just two rates: 15% (first $50,000 taxable income for single filers, $100,000 for joint filers) and 25% (taxable income above that).  In order to ensure that there is no increased burden on middle-income families with several children; couples would get a $25,000 standard deduction and an additional $12,500 deduction for each dependent.  After this generous pro-family deduction, all other credits and deductions are eliminated, thereby putting an end to market distortions through the tax system.

The bill further calls for abolishing the death tax and AMT.  The corporate tax would be lowered to 25% and transformed to a territorial system.  Capital Gains taxes would be capped at 15% and indexed for inflation, so only the amount of gains beyond the level of inflation would be taxed.  Some other tax proposals offer slightly bolder plans for the capgains and corporate taxes, but the beauty of this plan is that it facilitates a balanced budget, even working with the inaccurate static scoring of the CBO.

In conclusion, this budget offers the broad contours for any serious plan to balance the budget, and more importantly, shrink the size of government.  On Thursday, the Cut, Cap, and Balance budget will be proposed as a floor amendment (H. Con. Res. 113) to the Ryan budget.  This will be one of those votes that shows who is willing to substantiate their commitments to spending cuts and limited government with real action.  It will also grant those who voted to kill CCB last year a second chance to right the ship.

Long live Cut Cap and Balance!

I was in Australia earlier this month and there, as elsewhere on my recent travels, the consensus among the politicians I met (at least in private) was that Washington lacked the will for meaningful course correction, and that, therefore, the trick was to ensure that, when the behemoth goes over the cliff, you’re not dragged down with it. It is faintly surreal to be sitting in paneled offices lined by formal portraits listening to eminent persons who assume the collapse of the dominant global power is a fait accompli. “I don’t feel America is quite a First World country anymore,” a robustly pro-American Aussie told me, with a sigh of regret.

Well, what does some rinky-dink ’roo-infested didgeridoo mill on the other side of the planet know about anything? Fair enough. But Australia was the only major Western nation not to go into recession after 2008. And in the last decade the U.S. dollar has fallen by half against the Oz buck: That’s to say, in 2002, one greenback bought you a buck-ninety Down Under; now it buys you 95 cents. More of that a bit later.

Keep reading this post . . .

As I listened to House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan describe his latest budget plan in a speech at the American Enterprise Institute this week, I couldn’t help thinking how different things will be in Britain when Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne steps out of No. 11 Downing Street with a battered red briefcase holding his budget for the forthcoming year.

Ryan’s budget will almost surely be passed by the House of Representatives, all but four of whose Republican members voted for his budget last year. But it will not pass in the Senate, whose Democratic majority, in defiance of legal requirements, did not produce a budget for the last two years and is poised to not pass one again this year.

Keep reading this post . . .

Calvin Coolidge’s moniker “Silent Cal” is something of a misnomer. While he was very famous for his economy with words, he was well known in his day for using the kinds of media available to him. In fact, he hired the best media strategists of his day to help him effectively utilize what was available to him. Because of this, he became the first President to appear speaking on film. His speech could, with a few minor edits to the particulars, be just as apropos today as it was back then. Behold:

Hit the jump for more.

American Rhetoric gives us a transcript:

[This] country needs every ounce of its energy to restore itself. The costs of government are all assessed upon the people.

This means that the farmer is doomed to provide a certain amount of money out of the sale of his produce, no matter how low the price, to pay his taxes. The manufacturer, the professional man, the clerk, must do the same from their income. The wage earner, often at a higher rate when compared to his earning, makes his contribution, perhaps not directly but indirectly, in the advanced cost of everything he buys.

The expenses of government reach everybody.

Taxes take from everyone a part of his earnings and force everyone to work for a certain part of his time for the government.

When we come to realize that the yearly expenses of the governments of this country…the stupendous sum of about 7 billion, 500 million dollars — we get…700 million dollars — is needed by the national government, and the remainder by local governments.

Such a sum is difficult to comprehend. It represents all the pay of five million wage earners receiving five dollars a day, working 300 days in the year. If the government should add 100 million dollars of expense, it would represent four days more work of these wage earners. These are some of the reasons why I want to cut down public expense.

I want the people of America to be able to work less for the government — and more for themselves.

I want them to have the rewards of their own industry. This is the chief meaning of freedom.

Until we can reestablish a condition under which the earnings of the people can be kept by the people, we are bound to suffer a very severe and distinct curtailment of our liberty.

These results are not fanciful; they are not imaginary. They are grimly actual and real, reaching into every household in the land. They take from each home annually an average of over 300 dollars — and taxes must be paid. They are not a voluntary contribution to be met out of surplus earnings. They are a stern necessity. They come first.

It is only out of what is left, after they are paid, that the necessities of food, clothing, and shelter can be provided and the comforts of home secured, or the yearnings of the soul — for a broader and more abundant life gratified.

When the government affects a new economy, it grants everybody a life pension with which to raise the standard of existence. It increases the value of everybody’s property, raises the scale of everybody’s wages.

One of the greatest favors that can be bestowed upon the American people is economy in government.

If only today’s Republican politicians were more willing to say these kinds of things!

Now for a few thoughts.

First of all, it is amazing how much more money our government spends today. The “stupendous sum” of Coolidge’s day of $7,500,000,000 would be $94,786,977,161.05 when adjusted for inflation. Let’s put this in perspective a little bit:

• In February of last year, Sen. Tom Coburn found between $100 and $200 billion dollars in wasteful spending through redundant government programs.
• Also in February of 2011, Speaker John Boehner promised at CPAC to cut $100 billion in discretionary spending.
• I’d love to quote you a budget figure, but you see, we haven’t had one for over 1100 days. Might want to contact Harry Reid about that.
• For fiscal year 2011, our government took in $2.303 trillion in tax receipts.
• The expenditure for 2011, meanwhile, was around $3.82 trillion.

In fairness, the population has increased since then. The 1920 Census revealed that the nation had 106,021,537 people. It has roughly tripled since then, totaling 308,745,538 in 2010. However, multiplying the sum Coolidge mentions in his speech, adjusted for inflation, would give us $284,360,931,483.15. Still a drop in the bucket for what we took in, much less spent, for 2011. For example, the debt limit agreement reached back in August promised spending cuts of $917 billion alone over ten years.

Second, Calvin Coolidge is exactly right about the basics behind taxation. It is the government taking from your earnings for its own functions. Now this in and of itself isn’t wrong. The government has to get its money somehow. It can’t just print it (well, okay, maybe it can….with problematic–to say the least–results). However, as Coolidge notes here, “They are not a voluntary contribution to be met out of surplus earnings. They are a stern necessity. They come first.” Furthermore, until the people are able to actually keep as much of their money as possible,  they “are bound to suffer a very severe and distinct curtailment of our liberty.” Barry Goldwater, in his seminal The Conscience of a Conservative, quotes the late, great Senator Robert Taft of Ohio as saying, “You can socialize just as well by a steady increase in the burden of taxation beyond the 30% we have already reached as you can by government seizure. The very imposition of heavy taxes is a limit on a man’s freedom,” (pg. 54). The spirit of Coolidge was strong with him. Unfortunately, this spirit does not appear to be strong with either the current occupant of the White House or most members of Congress.

And all of this was before the wonderful thing we know as withholding came into being.

Third, “[o]ne of the greatest favors that can be bestowed upon the American people is economy in government.” What a great thought, that. Pity most of our elected officials in Washington, much less the states and lower levels of government, don’t understand that.

This is a former Massachusetts governor I’d have no problem getting behind. There’s a good reason Ronald Reagan considered him one of his favorite Presidents.

Representative Paul Ryan, chairman of the House Budget Committee, has produced another bold budget. He knows that President Obama and the Democrats will not allow his budget plan to become law this year, but he wants to recommit the Republican party to spending restraint, tax reform, and a strong defense.

Naturally, the Obama White House is already shrieking. Ryan’s budget, it says, “fails the test of fairness, balance, and shared responsibility.” The test of balance? Ryan’s plan moves the federal budget into sustainable balance, even on the unfavorable assumptions of the Congressional Budget Office. President Obama has never produced a plan to balance the budget on any time frame. His treasury secretary, Timothy Geithner, admitted as much in recent testimony before the House. Nor have Senate Democrats, who have not produced any budget at all for three years. We doubt that most Americans will find that consistently large deficits and ever-rising debt levels meet their definition of fairness, balance, and responsibility. Nor will they favor what we suspect is the president’s real, though secret, plan: to allow taxes to rise on everyone, in effect cycling the middle class’s money back to it through Washington for the benefit of the Democratic party.

Keep reading this post . . .

“A budget is values,” says Douglas Holtz-Eakin, former head of the Congressional Budget Office and an adviser to John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign. “When you put together a budget, you display where you’re going to put the nation’s resources and what you care about.”

(HT:Washingtonexaminer)

Something went wrong with the universe after the Puerto Rican GOP Primary. Mitt Romney not only made an accidental relevant statement, he made an intelligent and acutely cutting statement. He pointed out that nobody with a time horizon much beyond November 2012 could cast an intelligent vote for the Democrats. His actual quote was “I don’t see how anyone who is a young person could vote for a Democrat, I’m going to be honest with you.”

I’m no fan of Mitt Romney, but when he said that, he explained what we need to be shouting from the rooftops about the American Left. They have no values, they have no vision, and they offer no future. Well, they do offer a future; it’s just not a particularly bright or promising one. The chart below gives you the details. Maintaining Barack Obama’s current budgetary practices will spend our great nation into its grave and they know it.

The Current Path Is A Highway To Hell

Why do I believe they will spend us into perdition? Well as Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum have told us recently; past performance is a powerful indicator of future results. CBS News explains how things have gone under the first 3 and 1/3 years of Barack Obama’s Presidency.

The National Debt has now increased more during President Obama’s three years and two months in office than it did during 8 years of the George W. Bush presidency. The Debt rose $4.899 trillion during the two terms of the Bush presidency. It has now gone up $4.939 trillion since President Obama took office.

Barack Obama Wastes More in 3 Years Than GWB Did In 8. Yells "It's All Bush's Fault!!"

It would be grossly unfair to blame just Barack Obama for this deficit. It would be meaner than going on Fox News calling the poor man a Moslem! Barack Obama had plenty of help with the deficit. Despite the unequivocal language of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, the Congressional leadership of the Democratic Party had the following things to say about the impending 2012 budget process.

“We do not need to bring a budget to the floor this year,” Reid told reporters last month, arguing that legislation setting limits on spending is sufficient. “The fact is, you don’t need a budget,” agreed fellow Democrat and House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer a few weeks ago. “We can adopt appropriations bills. We can adopt authorization policies without a budget. We already have an agreed-upon cap on spending.”

The more accurate statement of fact would be that Barack Obama, Steny Hoyer and Harry Reid do not want there to be a budget. A budget restricts your choices to something less than “all of the above”, “more than I can possibly afford” or “whatever the [barnyard epithet] gets me elected next time.” It’s always saying the magical word “No” that requires a set of nuts and a set of values.

This explains why no budget has made it to Barack Obama’s desk for 1,056 days. It explains why the US Senate has not passed one since 2009. It explains why House Minority Whip Hoyer does not want one to go up for a vote this year either.

Yet like Sisyphus, Republican Paul Ryan will try to bring Congress back into compliance with its own Federal Law. He will yet again attempt to pass his budget and cut $5.3 Tr from future domestic spending. The Democrats will predictably rerun their infamous advertisement showing him pushing Grandma Wheelchair off of a cliff. But Ryan has looked into the Abyss that is Southern Europe, and he’s seen Illinois, Rhode Island, California…(and quite possibly the other 54 states as well).

For his efforts to at least mitigate the problems of our profligacy Ryan will be castigated, stone-walled and ultimately defeated in 2012. This is when whomever we nominate needs to do more of what Mitt Romney did in his Chicago speech. When the Democrats hide from the future they arrogantly and self-righteously bluster that they represent, the Republicans need to call them on it. Those deficit charts need to be stapled to every Democratic Congressional Candidate’s forehead. This is the only way we can force our Congress to actual pass a budget. This budget is the only way to make our government actually make a choice.

“A budget is values,” says Douglas Holtz-Eakin, former head of the Congressional Budget Office and an adviser to John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign. “When you put together a budget, you display where you’re going to put the nation’s resources and what you care about.”

(HT:Washingtonexaminer)

Something went wrong with the universe after the Puerto Rican GOP Primary. Mitt Romney not only made an accidental relevant statement, he made an intelligent and acutely cutting statement. He pointed out that nobody with a time horizon much beyond November 2012 could cast an intelligent vote for the Democrats. His actual quote was “I don’t see how anyone who is a young person could vote for a Democrat, I’m going to be honest with you.”

I’m no fan of Mitt Romney, but when he said that, he explained what we need to be shouting from the rooftops about the American Left. They have no values, they have no vision, and they offer no future. Well, they do offer a future; it’s just not a particularly bright or promising one. The chart below gives you the details. Maintaining Barack Obama’s current budgetary practices will spend our great nation into its grave and they know it.

The Current Path Is A Highway To Hell

Why do I believe they will spend us into perdition? Well as Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum have told us recently; past performance is a powerful indicator of future results. CBS News explains how things have gone under the first 3 and 1/3 years of Barack Obama’s Presidency.

The National Debt has now increased more during President Obama’s three years and two months in office than it did during 8 years of the George W. Bush presidency. The Debt rose $4.899 trillion during the two terms of the Bush presidency. It has now gone up $4.939 trillion since President Obama took office.

Barack Obama Wastes More in 3 Years Than GWB Did In 8. Yells "It's All Bush's Fault!!"

It would be grossly unfair to blame just Barack Obama for this deficit. It would be meaner than going on Fox News calling the poor man a Moslem! Barack Obama had plenty of help with the deficit. Despite the unequivocal language of the Congressional Budget Act of 1974, the Congressional leadership of the Democratic Party had the following things to say about the impending 2012 budget process.

“We do not need to bring a budget to the floor this year,” Reid told reporters last month, arguing that legislation setting limits on spending is sufficient. “The fact is, you don’t need a budget,” agreed fellow Democrat and House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer a few weeks ago. “We can adopt appropriations bills. We can adopt authorization policies without a budget. We already have an agreed-upon cap on spending.”

The more accurate statement of fact would be that Barack Obama, Steny Hoyer and Harry Reid do not want there to be a budget. A budget restricts your choices to something less than “all of the above”, “more than I can possibly afford” or “whatever the [barnyard epithet] gets me elected next time.” It’s always saying the magical word “No” that requires a set of nuts and a set of values.

This explains why no budget has made it to Barack Obama’s desk for 1,056 days. It explains why the US Senate has not passed one since 2009. It explains why House Minority Whip Hoyer does not want one to go up for a vote this year either.

Yet like Sisyphus, Republican Paul Ryan will try to bring Congress back into compliance with its own Federal Law. He will yet again attempt to pass his budget and cut $5.3 Tr from future domestic spending. The Democrats will predictably rerun their infamous advertisement showing him pushing Grandma Wheelchair off of a cliff. But Ryan has looked into the Abyss that is Southern Europe, and he’s seen Illinois, Rhode Island, California…(and quite possibly the other 54 states as well).

For his efforts to at least mitigate the problems of our profligacy Ryan will be castigated, stone-walled and ultimately defeated in 2012. This is when whomever we nominate needs to do more of what Mitt Romney did in his Chicago speech. When the Democrats hide from the future they arrogantly and self-righteously bluster that they represent, the Republicans need to call them on it. Those deficit charts need to be stapled to every Democratic Congressional Candidate’s forehead. This is the only way we can force our Congress to actual pass a budget. This budget is the only way to make our government actually make a choice.