Sigh. Ezra Klein: Obama to back Simpson-Bowles

[themaguffin]

So instead of offering smart policy, which would be a progressive plan with new marginal tax rates etc - responsibly taxing higher incomes, we get this?



But if the president was actually interested in passing Simpson-Bowles, this was a bit of an odd way to go about it. Leaving it out of his budget and State of the Union speeches meant it didn’t become the central issue on the table. That gave Ryan room to make his proposal, and the early signs are that his proposal has turned many Republicans against Simpson-Bowles, as they’d prefer Ryan’s plan and don’t want to weaken their negotiation position. If the process then becomes a compromise between a centrist plan like Simpson-Bowles and a hardline conservative plan like Ryan’s, that’s not going to produce something Democrats are happy with, and Obama will be blamed for not taking the initative and forcing everyone to simply consider Simpson-Bowles when he had a chance.




http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/wonkbook_obama_to_back_simpson_bowles/2011/04/08/AFO23EPD_blog.html?wprss=ezra-klein

[Mass]

1. Sigh. Hopefully, Klein is wrong.

If not, it would mean Obama has learned nothing of the previous battles.

[frazzled]

7. He has been wrong very often lately

Sometimes I think Ezra needs to step away from his graphs and talks with people inside the beltway and see things more clearly. I like him, but I think he's awfully green.

See his mea culpa regarding Paul Ryan in his blog today: boy, was he ever wrong about that.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/column-ryans-bad-joke/2011/04/12/AFyvg2PD_blog.html

[joeybee12]

2. Simpson-Bowles is a centrist plan? Yeah, if you have unfettered capitalism on

one side and facism on the other, yeah, this would land in the center.

[ProSense]

3. Frankly, Klein is a little too giddy here.

<...>

Now it’s getting a little clearer: Obama will throw his support behind the bipartisan effort in the Senate to turn the Simpson-Bowles plan into legislation (sidenote: called it). This will raise as many questions as it answers -- if Obama is such a fan of this approach, for instance, why didn’t he say more about it during his budget? -- but it is, at base, a more realistic plan both in terms of policy and politics.

For one thing, it’s plausibly bipartisan. Ryan’s budget was almost a calculated effort to appall Democrats, which means it has little chance of passing through the Senate. Simpson-Bowles was an effort to attract votes from both parties. The reason it can be bipartisan is that, unlike the House GOP’s proposal, it doesn’t use deficit reduction as cover to sneak in ideological changes to the state: there’s no effort at privatizing Medicare or block granting Medicaid, no decision to go after programs for the poor while exempting both revenues and defense cuts. The plan’s theory is that cutting the deficit is hard enough without also engaging a couple of long-running ideological wars about the shape and responsibilities of the America state. So it dodges those wars, and in endorsing it, Obama will too.

He's trying to portray Simpson-Bowles as a good alternative.

Given that he once defended Ryan's roadmap, his reporting on this issue is suspect.

Bowles-Simpson is a kitchen sink proposal, it's not something to endorse.


Edited to fix link

[themaguffin]

4. his comments on your link demonstrate the opposite, plus

He's not saying it's a good alternative. The paragraph I quoted explicitly says why its bad. Just because someone notes the relatively of something doesn't mean they endorse it.

[ProSense]

10. Really?

Here's what I said: "Given that he once defended Ryan's roadmap, his reporting on this issue is suspect."

Klein:

Just over a year ago, I wrote a column praising Rep. Paul Ryan’s Roadmap. I called its ambition “welcome, and all too rare.” I said its dismissal of the status quo was “a point in its favor.” When the inevitable backlash came, I defended Ryan against accusations that he was a fraud, and that technical mistakes in his tax projections should be taken as evidence of dishonesty. I also, for the record, like Ryan personally, and appreciate his policy-oriented approach to politics.

<...>

Right, Klein is now rejecting Ryan's budget, but he once vigorously defended Ryan's roadmap.

[themaguffin]

11. which he specifically addresses, I think that misses the entire point of Klein post today

[ProSense]

15. Interesting. Krugman slams Klein

Krugman: Wrong Is Right?

I like Ezra Klein; I find his blog an extremely useful source, and his analysis of health-policy issues in particular is invaluable. But my jaw dropped when I read this:

Just over a year ago, I wrote a column praising Rep. Paul Ryan’s Roadmap. I called its ambition “welcome, and all too rare.” I said its dismissal of the status quo was “a point in its favor.” When the inevitable backlash came, I defended Ryan against accusations that he was a fraud, and that technical mistakes in his tax projections should be taken as evidence of dishonesty. I also, for the record, like Ryan personally, and appreciate his policy-oriented approach to politics. So I believe I have some credibility when I say that the budget Ryan released last week is not courageous or serious or significant. It’s a joke, and a bad one.

Ezra is right about this plan — but the Roadmap was also a bad joke. And Ryan has been a disingenuous flake all along; if you didn’t see that from the start, it makes you less, not more, credible.

This reminds me a bit of the way things were in 2004-5, when it was more or less openly acknowledged that you had to have been wrong about Iraq to be considered serious on national security issues.

[jefferson_dem]

5. The first person to use "catfood" in a post wins a gold star.

[Pirate Smile]

6. I've seen a few different things reported on this. I'll wait and see what he actually says tomorrow.

[vaberella]

9. Exactly. n/t

[vaberella]

8. Exra Klein's title is not even a fact....Title used for headlines.

He says "if" in all this. Whatever.

So it's not worth my time.

[onehandle]

12. Atrios puts it perfectly: 'Get Ready For A Crap Sandwich'

And then a link to Ezra's article.

http://www.eschatonblog.com/2011/04/get-ready-for-crap-sandwich.html

[Mass]

13. Reminder - Titles are not written by the authors, but by people whose role is to

make the article more attractive to reader.

[Donnachaidh]

14. And who did NOT see this coming a mile off?

Honestly -- "set up the sheep" is the SOP that is killing this country.