Won’t Let It Go
by digby
Mrs Greenspan is on a roll this morning. After presidential adviser Melody Barnes announced that Obama was going to freeze federal spending, here’s her reply:
Mrs Greenspan: I think you’ve just made some news in talking about the Pentagon freeze and as well the five year discretionary spending freeze, but we all know you’ve got to do what Willie Sutton did, you’ve got to , you know you rob a bank because that’s where it is, that’s where the money is and you’ve got to deal with social security, Medicare and huge entitlement growth if you’re really going to get spending cut and that’s not addressing any of that.
Barnes: remember this is the president who put in place the fiscal commission. He did that because he is serious…
Mrs Greenspan: But he hasn’t responded Melody! He has not yet told us what he thinks of their recommendations.
Barnes: No actually he has responded Andrea, After the commission came out with his report, he thanked them for the work they had done. He asked our colleague jack Lew, the office of Management and Budget to talk to the members of the commission to analyze their ideas so that we can go forward. And in a couple of weeks, the president is going to be putting forth a budget that will articulate very clearly where we want to go in the future.It will be a balance of the right investments, that I just talked about and dealing with our deficit spending in a very serious way.
Mrs Greenspan: Well if he’s responded other than to thank them and commend them for their work, we’ve yet to hear that. And earlier today your colleague Valerie Jarret said that response to the deficit commission will be in the budget itself, which we of yet … of course that will be in February
Barnes: Just a few weeks.
If President Obama thinks these villagers are going to allow him to avoid taking a position on this, he’s nuts. He’s going to have to make his position clear at some point — evidently, it’s not going to be tonight.
I’ve been getting some blowback for failing to “trust” Obama not to cut social security. I have no idea what’s in his heart, but I do know that there is tremendous pressure coming from business, the political establishment and the media to slash social security. Mrs Greenspan was practically spitting nails. So, I think it behooves those of who give a damn about this to try exert some pressure from the other side. It’s not personal. If the president does want to protect social security as everyone says he does, then he will welcome this cover as he goes into negotiations. If he doesn’t, he will know that people in the base will be unhappy. It’s not much power but it’s all we’ve got.
And obviously, we have to keep our eye on this budget.
Also: The commission did not issue a report. The two chairmen pre-emptively issued their own with no legal basis, the commission could not get enough votes. Once again, Cokie’s Law prevails. I’m guessing that well over 50% of what people erroneously believe about their government is directly caused by journalistic malpractice of this sort.
Update: I only use the term “Mrs Greenspan” for Andrea Mitchell when she channels her famous husband’s Randian economic views.
.