Some sobering and thoughtful insight into Congressional gridlock and its effect on the real issue of fiscal responsibility and Baby Boomer futures.
Commentary from www.nashvillecitypaper.com by Cokie Roberts and Steven V. Roberts
November 07, 2003
The senior administration official allowed himself a rare burst of candor. The ăbiggest public policy fiscal issueä facing the country, he said at a background briefing, was the coming retirement of the baby boomers and their impact on Medicare and Social Security.
Ideas for dealing with the problem are plentiful, he added, but political will is not: "What's lacking is political leadership to translate those ideas into practice."
In fact, almost everything that is happening in Washington right now is making it harder for that "political leadership" to emerge, not easier.
The problem of the baby boomers is not a matter of guesswork or even debate. Every one of them who will leave the workforce in the next few years has already been born. So the persistent refusal of the political world to confront that fact is recklessly irresponsible.
Pressed on this point, the administration official insisted that it was unreasonable to expect the Bush administration to take on such a volatile question before next year's election. If we win a second term, he promised, "2005 will be the great test."
Fair enough. But the policies of President Bush and his Congressional allies will make that test even tougher, starting with their massive tax cuts. Most economists agree: those cuts have stimulated the economy in the short run but will explode budget deficits in the long run. And those deficits will make the retirement issue enormously more difficult to resolve.
Last month, a joint report by three sober-sided groups - the Committee for Economic Development, the Concord Coalition and the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities - estimated that if current policies are kept in place, the federal debt would rise by $5 trillion over the next decade. How do you fix Medicare and Social Security with that number staring you in the face?
The only debate regarding Medicare right now is how to expand benefits - by $400 billion for prescription drugs - not contract them.
But while fiscal discipline has collapsed, party discipline - and animosity - have increased dramatically. The tribal feuds and ancient grudges dominating Congress today make Capitol Hill look like Kabul or Baghdad, minus the car bombs.
The conference committees debating energy policy and drug benefits have excluded Democrats from their deliberations. The word is out: if the Democrats who have been named to the panels actually show up, the meetings will be cancelled.
When the Democrats controlled Congress did they act with overpowering arrogance? Absolutely. Is some payback justified? Of course.
But during the Democratic dominance, Republican leaders like Bob Michel in the House and Bob Dole in the Senate were always consulted, and always respected.
As one of those leaders told us recently, "you see a much harder edge" among Republicans than just a few years ago. And the Democrats have responded in kind, adopting the notion that the legislative process is a jihad, a holy war for political advantage, with no regard for the public interest.
All this comes at a time when the country, and the Congress, remains closely divided along partisan lines. In the latest ABC News poll, 46 percent of all voters identified with the Democrats and 45 percent with the Republicans.
As a result, the Democratic leader told us, both parties remain paralyzed by the fear that "any misstep or accommodation" will swing control of the Congress to the other party. In fact, the leader predicted, nothing will happen until there is "a crisis of such proportions it cannot be ignored."
One thing is certain: that crisis will happen. What's not certain is whether the political leadership will respond effectively. So far, they're only making matters worse.
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