Obama unveils debt reduction plan

[UnderAGreySky]

Obama unveils $3 trillion in debt cuts

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- President Obama unveiled a plan on Monday to cut the national debt by roughly $3 trillion over the next decade.

Obama's plan reflects his vision for how best to put the country on a more fiscally sustainable course, so it is different in nature than the kind of legislative compromise he was trying to broker this summer during the debt-ceiling debate, a senior administration official said.

A driving principle behind the proposal is that high-income individuals and corporations should pay more in taxes than they do currently so that they will bear some of the burden of debt reduction going forward.

Mandatory spending cuts: $580 billion. .. $248 billion will come out of Medicare .. Another $72 billion will come from Medicaid and other health programs. .. They include $33 billion in savings from farm subsidies; $42.5 billion from federal worker benefit program
...
Tax revenue: $1.5 trillion. .. $800 billion would be realized by letting some of the Bush-era tax cuts expire for high-income households .. Another $400 billion would result from capping the value of itemized deductions .. The remaining $300 billion would come from closing various tax loopholes
...
War savings: $1.1 trillion.
...
Interest savings: $430 billion.

1) I'd forgotten CNN could do seriously factual and detailed reporting
2) Looks like Obama has decided to come out swinging
3) By splitting his jobs and debt reduction bills, he's done a one-two on the Republicans. Jonathan Chait notes:

When you’re running a play designed to communicate to the public, you have certain advantages you don’t have when you’re trying to pass a bill. You can communicate a relatively clear message. The fight right now is between Obama’s desire to send that clear message and the GOP’s desire to muddle it.

Obama’s strategy now is to keep the two things separate. Last week, he introduced a jobs plan to cut taxes and spend more on things like infrastructure. He introduced his plan to reduce the long-term deficit today.

Republicans want to muddle up the distinction between the short-term crisis and the long-term deficit. Last week, they attacked his jobs plan for increasing the deficit, and this week, they attacked his deficit plan for killing jobs.

(more at the link)

Already the usual suspects (Paul "Voucher" Ryan et al) have started shouting "CLASS WARFARE" - lets see how well that flies with the majority that support the new taxes.

[Lord Zentei]

Well, at least he finally tried to do something, and isn't being conciliatory weak anymore.

[cosmicalstorm]

It's gonna be interesting to see how he fucks it all up this time.

[BrooklynRedLeg]

Future Congresses cannot be held to any proposed legislation unless its a law (and they could easily overturn it anyway). We could easily start cutting money by stop bombing the bejeezus out of nations that we're not at war with currently. Sort of like Congressman Grayson's The War is Making You Poor bill. Or stop giving money to rich thugs in foreign nations. Or stop giving out Corporate Welfare.

http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-h5353/show

[aerius]

Let's see how much of this plan makes it through Congress before we start celebrating. I wouldn't be shocked, actually let me rephrase that, I'm expecting this plan to be at least as much of a debacle as healthcare reform. That is if it even makes it through in the first place.

[Simon_Jester]

(more at the link)

Already the usual suspects (Paul "Voucher" Ryan et al) have started shouting "CLASS WARFARE" - lets see how well that flies with the majority that support the new taxes.

If this be class warfare, then let us make the most of it.

[UnderAGreySky]

To quote something I read: "It's only class warfare when the peasants hit back".