Things to Read in the Afternoon on November 27, 2013
Must-Reads:
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Stan Collender: The 10 Reasons There Won’t Be A Grand Budget Bargain Until 2019: “1. Democrats won’t agree to the big changes in Social Security, Medicare and other mandatory programs that Republicans want without getting a substantial revenue increase. Republicans won’t agree to a revenue increase without big changes in Social Security, Medicare and other entitlements. 2. Republicans absolutely can’t and won’t increase taxes until after the 2016 presidential election…. 3. Because of the problem with raising taxes before 2016, changes in mandatory spending are on hold until after 2016 as well…. 4. Therefore, there will be no big budget deal for the next three years…. 5. That means that, if it happens at all, the serious work… won’t begin until early 2017. 6. As the effort in the 1980s showed, tax reform is difficult and lengthy process…. 7. It also means that most members of Congress will have to express their dissatisfaction…. 8. The 1985 tax reform act took three years to enact. It was relatively easy from a budget point of view because from the start the bill was going to be ‘revenue neutral’… 9. Before Republicans will even be able to start to negotiate with Democrats, there will have to be a GOP vs GOP debate…. 10. The tax reform debate from the 1980s also took place when there was no tea party wing of the GOP and no social media…. Given these 10, it’s hard to see (1) how a process that could produce a grand bargain could get under way before 2017, and (2) how it could take less time than than it did in the 1980s.”
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Kevin Drum: Janet Yellen Is Now a Litmus Test for Right-Wing Sanity: “Steve Benen notes that the increasingly shrill and hyperbolic Heritage Foundation has decided to make opposition to Janet Yellen a ‘key vote’. That is, they’ll count it on their end-of-the-year scorecard that tells everyone just how conservative you are…. ‘It now seems likely that most Senate Republicans will oppose the most qualified Fed nominee since the institution was founded.’ That’s true, which means this has become sort of a litmus test for wingnuttery. There’s simply no serious reason to oppose Yellen, who is outstandingly qualified to be Fed chair by virtually any measure. So opposition to Yellen is now a pretty simple proposition: you oppose her if you’re some kind of hard money lunatic or if you feel like you have to pander to the hard money lunatics. That’s it. Everyone else votes to support her confirmation. Should be an interesting roll call…”
Should-Reads:
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Daniel Strauss: McConnell Challenger: Mitch Is Working ‘Actively’ To Make Sure Obamacare Is ‘Not Ended’: “Kentucky Republican Matt Bevin accused Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY)… of ‘working actively’ to make sure Obamacare is not repealed. ‘We wanted to just call attention to frankly what we’re seeing as a rather disturbing trend which is the fact that we’ve thought for some time that most of Mitch McConnell’s bluster about yanking out Obamacare root and branch was really just that. But we’re seeing yet again the fact that behind the scenes and now with increasing amounts of overtness he’s really working actively to ensure that this is not a piece of legislation that is ended’. Bevin’s comments are in response to a report saying McConnell suggested he is not averse to discussing changes of the health care law. McConnell is quoted in that report saying that the law ‘was so botched from the beginning, that it’s not fixable’. Bevin said that despite McConnell saying that the law has been botched, the fact that he suggested some level of openness to changing the law shows that he does not totally want to repeal Obamacare.”
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Ezra Klein: Obamacare is a Done Deal: “A spin through HealthCare.Gov this morning went smoothly. The site loaded quickly. The process progressed easily. There were no error messages or endless hangs…. My experience isn’t rare…. Reports from inside the health care bureaucracy are also turning towards optimism…. A political system that’s become overwhelmingly oriented towards pessimism on Obamacare will have to adjust as the system’s technological infrastructure improves.’ I think the best translation of that last sentence is, ‘Republicans will soon have to find something else to gripe about”
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Kevin Drum: Obamacare is a Done Deal: Conservatives have always known that once Obamacare is up and running, it will become a popular program…. In a few months, it will be nearly as enshrined in the American social welfare firmament as Social Security and Medicare. Republicans have run out of time, and they know it. Their fixation on Obamacare already looks sort of balmy–this weekend’s deal with Iran was designed to draw attention away from Obamacare? Seriously?–and it’s only going to look loopier as time goes by. Getting Obamacare to the end zone wasn’t easy, and Obama almost fumbled the ball at the one-yard line, but he’s finally won…”
Should Be Aware of:
Burkhard Bilger: Inside Google’s Driverless Car | Ryan Avent: Monetary policy: Low rates forever | Jeff Spross: Rapid Plankton Decline Puts The Ocean’s Food Web In Peril | ProGrowthLiberal: Dean Baker v. Greg Mankiw on Wage Inflation: I may have been too nice to Greg Mankiw… | David Keohane: Let a hundred moles be whacked | Unofficial Transcript of Larry Summers’s Speech at the IMF Economic Forum, Nov. 8, 2013 | Lawrence Summers: Edited Transcript: IMF Fourteenth Annual Research Conference in Honor of Stanley Fischer |