Dana Milbank (Washington Post, 2/13/13) has a review of the State of the Union address–and he’s not impressed:
Dana Milbank (photo: Matthew Bradley)
Obama made clear that he is not entertaining serious spending cuts or major entitlement reforms. Republicans, in their responses, repeated that they are not budging on taxes. The hard choices will have to wait for another day….
The nation’s finances are a mess, but–what the heck?–let’s have another round.
Why do we need “serious spending cuts”? Milbank assumes the answer is so obvious that it need not be explained–everyone knows the more cuts, the better. All the serious people, anyway.
The closest thing Milbank comes to defending this idea is citing the authority of Bankrupting America, a “nonpartisan balanced-budget group” handing out Mardi Gras beads while proclaiming “show us your cuts.” (Who’s paying for those beads? “We will not be disclosing our donors,” the group’s Gretchen Hamel told Talking Points Memo—3/3/10. “We want to protect the anonymity of our donors.”)
Milbank evenhandedly condemns both House Republicans for saying that revenue increases are not needed and House minority leader Nancy Pelosi for saying, “It is almost a false argument to say we have a spending problem.” Never mind that in the Fox News interview (2/10/13) he’s quoting from, she actually says, “What we do need is more revenue, and more cuts”; Milbank has his false equivalency, and he runs with it:
In reality, we eventually need both spending cuts and tax increases–and lots of them. But sacrifice will have to wait. In Washington, they’re still partying like there’s no tomorrow.
This idea that “sacrifice” is what the country needs is very appealing to corporate media pundits, especially ones like Dana Milbank who evidently might get paid up to $20,000 for giving a speech. But the reality is that austerity is the problem, not the solution; Dean Baker, probably the economist with the best track record for diagnosing what’s wrong with the U.S. economy, explains why, using actual facts and logic, in the Guardian (2/8/13).
Milbank’s column is headlined “Let the Bleak Times Roll.” It’s not clear whether he’s parodying the attitude of Obama, Pelosi et al., or if that’s a reference to his actual policy preferences–since “bleak times” are what we’ll certainly get if we adopt the politics of “sacrifice” that Milbank is calling for.
( I hope ) Dana was being sarcastic. He’s not that insensitive.
In addition to economics there are also laws of finance and mathematics. Eventually arithmetic will need to work so government should either raise revenue or cut spending or both.
I think the title of Mr.Milibank’s column refers to the bleak times that highly paid corpress pundits and star journalists have to endure when regular workin’ stiffs, the poor, the elderly, the sick, and the unemployed are not yet told in uncertain times that it is THEY who must do the sacrificin’. This bleakness will end when the weak and defenseless are made worse off than they are now.
Dana “Milktoast” Milbank? I thought he died! Maybe it’s just that no one listens to him b/c, well…b/c he’s just too milktoast?
When can we get some pundits who represent the perspective of working people instead of the corporatocracy?
Dana Milbank – or, as I call him, Our Lord of Perpetual Smirk – has never met an issue he can’t smother in Beltway banter.