I wrote last week about the sad and expected demise of the CLASS Act, a long-term care insurance program that was included in the Affordable Care Act. The Administration has effectively stopped implementation of the measure, and the recently departed chief actuary basically said that the office was shutting down. The main worry is over [...]

I was fairly certain that the Catfood Commission II, the new bipartisan supercommittee of 12 that will find at least $1.5 trillion in deficit reduction recommendations, which will then get fast-tracked through Congress, would be referred to colloquially as the “Conrad-Ryan Commission.” The heads of the Budget Committees of each house of Congress would get [...]

I have a piece in the American Prospect today on five turning points in the debt limit fight. I think they’re actually in descending order of importance, and the biggest one is right at the top – this deal is the function of horrible economic stewardship in 2009 and 2010. OBAMA AND DEMOCRATS COULD HAVE [...]

I think people are getting a little theatrical about this Boehner showdown, with their focused whip counts and the like. The Washington Post says Boehner is still looking for votes, but I’m really not sweating this. It turns out that Boehner actually needs 216 votes, not 217, because Maurice Hinchey (D-NY) is out of the [...]

In remarks before the Senate today, Majority Leader Harry Reid appeared to endorse the Rube Goldberg plan to allow the debt limit to increase with a series of tough votes for Democrats to take. Here’s the relevant portion: I am glad to hear that the Republican Leader has come forward with a backstop proposal to [...]

Kent Conrad will present his long-term budget plan today, and you’ll be surprised to know that it shares no meaningful difference with the budget plan Bernie Sanders has been touting of late. Indeed, it includes a 50/50 ratio between tax increases and spending cuts. We’re in a topsy-turvy world when a plan that cuts the [...]

Senate Democrats will put forward their own budget next week, instead of leaving town for the 4th of July weekend. The biggest near-term consequence of this is that there will be no recess appointment of any Presidential nominee, meaning that the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau will indeed lose powers when it transfers over to the [...]

With friends like these…. The debt-reduction package emerging in talks between the White House and congressional leaders would not “fundamentally change” the alarming rate of growth in the national debt, the chairman of the Senate Budget Committee said Tuesday. Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) said the goal of slicing more than $2 trillion from the federal [...]

Kent Conrad has decided to shelve his budget while high-level talks continue on a long-term deficit reduction solution tied to the debt limit. Conrad’s plan got mixed reviews initially from within the caucus, but he altered it to capture the votes of Democrats on the Budget Committee, including Bernie Sanders (I-VT). The latest reports claimed [...]

Sarah Babbage wonders if the budget debate in Washington has moved to the left. So far this week, Sens. Pat Toomey and Kent Conrad have both released budgets, although Conrad’s has yet to go public. What they both show is a response to the backlash to Paul Ryan’s budget and the GOP’s current budget strategy. [...]

As we get more clarity on the menu of options in the upcoming budget debate, we’re seeing a narrowing of differences between the two parties. The Republicans may not want to admit it, but they’ve given up on changing the structure of Medicare. You can be sure of this by looking at the proposal of [...]