The Week: Most Recent congress

Will 'Taxmageddon' trigger a new recession?

The Week — Thu, 24 May 2012 09:15:00 -0400

The Congressional Budget Office reported this week that the economy will slip back into a mild recession next year if Congress allows Bush-era tax cuts and other breaks to end just as automatic spending cuts take effect on Jan. 1, 2013. The tax hikes and spending reductions — which some are calling "Taxmageddon" — would siphon $607 billion out of the economy. If that happens, the nonpartisan CBO estimates, the economy will shrink by 1.3 percent in the first half of the year. If the changes are canceled, the recovery will gather strength. Can President Obama and a divided Congress work...

The messy tax fight that will ruin Christmas

The Week — Wed, 23 May 2012 18:15:00 -0400

Up and up they go, America's twin pillars of profligacy: The $1.3 trillion annual federal deficit and the $15.7 trillion total national debt. The numbers, so massive that they are nearly incomprehensible, grow ever larger while politicians in Washington blame each other for the mess.

It's about to get messier. Because Republicans and Democrats can't agree on how to soak up this ocean of red ink, automatic tax hikes and spending cuts — enormous and indiscriminate — are scheduled to rock the economy starting in January 2013. There's still time to avoid this meat cleaver approach, but...

3 reasons Congress sounds less intelligent than ever

The Week — Wed, 23 May 2012 10:45:00 -0400

The language employed by members of Congress in their public speeches has fallen a whole grade level in the last seven years, according to a new study. Using the Flesch-Kincaid test, which assigns higher grade levels for the use of longer words and more complex sentences, the Sunlight Foundation concluded that the average lawmaker speaks at a 10th grade level, down from the 11th grade level in 2005, but still two or three grades higher than the typical American. Why do our elected leaders sound like high school sophomores? Here, three explanations:

1. Extremism makes lawmakers sound stupid
"Polarization...

Why John Boehner wants another debt ceiling showdown: 5 theories

The Week — Thu, 17 May 2012 07:00:00 -0400

After House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) vowed on Tuesday to block an increase in the federal debt ceiling unless Democrats agreed to steep spending cuts, he and other GOP congressional leaders met with their Democratic counterparts and President Obama at the White House. If the hope of the meeting was to head off "a reprise of last year's nasty showdown over raising the federal debt limit," say Reuters' David Lawder and Jeff Mason, things "are not off to a good start." According to his aides, Boehner repeated his threat to Obama. Given the potential political and economic carnage from another...

Are the GOP's budget cuts anti-poor?

The Week — Fri, 11 May 2012 16:00:00 -0400

This week, the Republican-controlled House passed a bill to cut nearly $250 billion from the budget deficit over the next 10 years, and a large chunk of the cuts come from programs to aid the poor. The GOP plan — which has no chance of passing in the Democrat-controlled Senate, but will inevitably become an election issue — would cancel food stamps for two million struggling Americans, cut health insurance for children, and scale back programs for the elderly and disabled, like Meals on Wheels. Such draconian cuts fail a "basic moral test," says the U.S. Conference of Catholic...

Boehner vs. Obama: Who's really responsible for the mess in D.C.?

The Week — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 09:55:00 -0400

The long-running feud between President Obama and the GOP House leadership is raging once again. Obama has been telling college students in swing states that Republicans aren't committed to preventing federal student loan rates from doubling, scolding Congress for playing politics instead of passing laws. House Speaker John Boehner responded Sunday by charging that it's Obama who's poisoning the atmosphere in Washington, "diminishing the presidency by picking fake fights" with the GOP. Whose fault is it that the two parties can't seem to work together?

That's easy. Republicans are the problem...

5 reasons deficit hawks should lay off global health initiatives

The Week — Tue, 24 Apr 2012 07:10:00 -0400

Government spending is about to get chopped — no matter who wins the next presidential election. President Obama and his GOP challenger Mitt Romney have both prioritized deficit reduction, which, of course, is a worthy goal. However, not all cuts are created equal. And many surveys put global health at the top of the list of things to slash. That's a mistake, and here's why.

1. Global health initiatives save lives abroad
Investments in global health pay off a lot more quickly and dramatically that you might think. PEPFAR, initiated by President George W. Bush and strongly embraced and expanded...

Is it immoral for Congress to cut food stamps?

The Week — Wed, 18 Apr 2012 09:08:00 -0400

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops sent a letter to the House Agriculture Committee this week, criticizing the House Republican budget for cutting food stamps and other social programs too drastically. Rep. Paul Ryan, the House Budget Committee chairman, says his Catholic faith served as a guide when he wrote the spending plan, and that runaway government debt is what will really damage programs for the poor. But the bishops say making disproportionately large cuts to the food stamp program — $33 billion in reductions over 10 years — fails to meet the church's "moral criteria"...

How indefinite detention snuck into Obama's defense bill

The Week — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 18:30:00 -0400

In December, President Obama angered politicians of all stripes by signing the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), a broad defense bill that included a controversial provision about indefinite detention. Specifically, the provision gave the president expansive power to seize suspected terrorists and keep them in detention without charge or trial, even on U.S. soil.

According to critics, this part of the bill essentially put the controversial policies of the George W. Bush administration into hard law, shattering Obama's previous promise to stop indefinite detention and adhere to the...

8 reasons to love -- or hate -- Paul Ryan's budget

The Week — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 11:31:00 -0400

This week, House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) unveiled the GOP's ambitious budget proposal to loud cheers and jeers. Just like the controversial budget Ryan released last year, the new plan would cut top tax rates, overhaul Medicare, and slash spending for a number of popular (but expensive) entitlement programs. "If you loved Paul Ryan 1.0 you'll love 2.0 as well," says Ross Douthat in The New York Times. "If you considered the first iteration a nightmare of social Darwinist cruelty, then the second iteration probably won't change your mind." Here, four...

Paul Ryan's 'austerity' budget: What would it cut?

The Week — Wed, 21 Mar 2012 10:57:00 -0400

The budget wars are on again in Washington, with Democrats and Republicans clashing over House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan's latest "austerity" budget. Ryan (R-Wis.) is proposing spending $5.3 trillion less over the coming decade than President Obama has suggested in his budget. The White House says Ryan is trying to give the rich a big tax cut, and paying for it by slashing spending on programs that benefit the poor. Fiscal conservatives are attacking Ryan from the right, saying deeper cuts are needed to balance the budget quicker. What exactly does Ryan want to cut? Here, a brief guide...

Paul Ryan's new 'Medicare-killing' budget: Will it help the GOP?

The Week — Tue, 20 Mar 2012 15:20:00 -0400

In a risky election-year move, House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has unveiled a sure-to-be-controversial spending plan that calls for a drastic reshaping of the nation's largest entitlement programs. Ryan says his package of spending cuts and tax changes would eliminate deficits by 2040. But Democrats are ridiculing the plan as an attempt to lavish tax breaks on the rich, and make the poor pay for them through reductions in spending on Medicare and other social programs. Indeed, says David Kurtz at Talking Points Memo, the GOP is now "firmly and irrevocably on record as planning...

Is Congress finally working together to save the economy?

The Week — Thu, 15 Mar 2012 15:00:00 -0400

"Good news, frustrated American citizens! Congress is not a clogged up, hidebound legislative slug after all," says Gail Collins at The New York Times. On Wednesday, the Senate passed a $109 billion transportation bill that lawmakers claim will save or create nearly three million jobs. Last week, the House passed a more modest measure — known as the JOBS Act — intended to help small businesses. Both bills passed with strong bipartisan support, and coming after years of exhausting, relentless bickering, observers say something new is afoot on Capitol Hill. Here, a guide to the sudden...

Why Washington needs backroom deals

The Week — Mon, 05 Mar 2012 18:00:00 -0500

Aspiring aisle-crossers everywhere bemoaned the news last week that Sen. Olympia Snowe, the famously moderate Republican of Maine, had decided to forfeit her safe seat in the U.S. Senate rather than face another six years of dodging the partisan manure that has come to be flung day and night through the hallowed halls of that institution. My reaction was just a wee bit different: Snowe's retirement is a reminder that we ought to bring back the smoke-filled room and the deals that used to get made in it. We should hope that our top leaders hold more top-secret meetings, and pray that they keep...

Congress' contraceptives hearing: 'Where are the women?'

The Week — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 16:00:00 -0500

The White House may have compromised on a new rule requiring employers to offer copay-free coverage for contraception — offering religiously affiliated employers an exemption — but the latest conflagration in the culture wars rages on. At a hearing Thursday convened by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), five male witnesses, all religious leaders, explained why the regulation still assaults their religious beliefs. When Democrats asked Issa to invite some female witnesses, he said the debate was about religious freedom, not "reproductive rights and contraception." Before storming out, Rep...

Did the GOP really cave on Obama's payroll tax holiday?

The Week — Wed, 15 Feb 2012 12:09:00 -0500

Washington is on the cusp of something unusual: A bipartisan agreement hammered out well before the 11th hour. On Tuesday evening, House and Senate leaders agreed to a package that will renew President Obama's payroll tax holiday for the rest of the year, as well as raise Medicare reimbursement rates for doctors and extend unemployment benefits for another 10 months. The biggest surprise: House Republicans dropped their insistence that the payroll-tax-cut extension (which will add $100 billion to the deficit) be paid for with cuts elsewhere, a capitulation that infuriated many conservatives. Did...