Biden, the Democrats, and the dark cloud of austerity economics

David Dayen is keeping his eyes on the let-grandma-eat-catfood caucus. Which never goes away. Republicans like Mitt Romney and nominal Democrats like Joe Manchin will never stop pushing to cut Social Security and Medicare. This is just how they roll (Mitt Romney Wants to Use the Crisis to Cut Your Social Security The American Prospect 07/23/2020):

Romney has been pushing publicly for including a bill of his in the relief package called the TRUST Act. Written with Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV), Romney’s TRUST Act would create bipartisan 'rescue committees' to come up with plans to make each federal trust fund — Social Security and Medicare primarily, but also the Highway Trust Fund and others — solvent for the next 75 years. It’s modeled after the "Catfood Commission" in the Bowles-Simpson process [during the Obama-Biden Administration]. Like with that, once the plans are approved, they get a fast-track delivery to the House and Senate floor, with no ability for amendment. The plans would still need to reach a 60-vote final threshold to pass the Senate. ...

This would be appalling. No federal trust fund, by definition, can reach bankruptcy; Congress can always replenish it. What Romney wants to do here is create a process to force a resolution to earned benefit programs on his terms. While it doesn’t fully eliminate the filibuster for Social Security cuts, it builds a process to invite those cuts to be made. Just a decade ago, Barack Obama favored some cuts, remember.

Moreover, it’s designed to trap Democrats. Mitch McConnell wants nothing more than to kill social insurance spending while keeping his fingerprints off it. Passing the TRUST Act would set in motion a runaway train that has to move inexorably toward chipping away at Social Security and Medicare. It would restart the fiscal mania in Washington, and pressure Democrats to be 'serious' by degrading the most popular programs the party ever created. Fierce grassroots pushback stopped this cold during Bowles-Simpson, but the deficit hawks only have to be right once. It would also conveniently be an enormous distraction during what’s expected to be an extended economic downturn. [my emphasis]

We in a big recession already in the US. The last thing the country needs is for the Democratic Party to fall into the snakepit of budget-balancing Hooverish austerity economics.

Here's a reminder from Sam Seder and The Majority Report 11/29/2012 in 2012 of what that means, Simpson - Bowles Make BIG Money For Saying Your Pension Should Be Cut!:

Also, why is Dick Durbin a Democrat? Here he is in 2011 demanding to adopt the let-grandma-eat-catfood program while talking smack with the CNN Business reporter about deficits and debt. Without real pressure from the Democratic base and incumbent fears of primary challenges from progressives, we'll be right back here in 2021 under a Biden Administration. Sen. Durbin: Adopt Bowles-Simpson plan now 06/29/2011:

Democrats, PayGo, and the "Simpson-Bowles" mentality

PayGo is just the ultimate in Democratic politics -- an utterly unnecessary bit of infighting caused by an utterly unnecessary self-punishment caused by an utterly unnecessary sense of defensiveness & self-loathing, all in a futile attempt to impress ... who exactly?

— David Roberts (@drvox) January 3, 2019

The Democrats just passed new House rules including the notorious PayGo rule, which is what David Roberts there characterized it to be in that tweet. (Lindsey McPherson, House adopts rules package with few Democratic defections over PAYGO provision Roll Call 01/03/2019)

Even though almost all House Democrats voted for the rules including PayGo, the Dems‘ obsession with the deficit is a political ball-and-chain they‘ve put on themselves. The ”Simpson-Bowles“ mentality by the Dems was a big factor that opened the way to having the Orange Clown in the White House. Barack Obama repeatedly tried to cut Social Security and Medicare in his ”Grand Bargain.“ Even though today‘s Republican leaders would gladly do away with both, they successfully used that in campaigning against Dems, including in 2010.

The Reps‘ strategy was dishonest but politically shrewd. They blasted projected savings in Medicare from Obamacare/ACA as cuts to Medicare. The Democrats were hamstringed in responding because Obama was pushing for cuts in Medicare. It‘s hard for the Democrats to ridicule Republican hypocrisy on the deficits. Because Republican cynicism on the issue is beyond hypocrisy. They really, really don‘t care about deficits. They only pretend to when they push for ”entitlement reform.“

Sarah Kliff gave an explanation of this during the 2012 Presidential campaign in Romney’s right: Obamacare cuts Medicare by $716 billion. Here’s how. Washington Post 08/14/2018. As the headline indicates, this WaPo presentation was going out of its way to give credit to Both Sides. But she does tell the story correctly. The "cuts" to Medicare were savings, the biggest part of which came from fixing a well-known and much-discussed problem with Medicare Advantage.

And Medicare savings were realized without reducing services: Obamacare program generates 'substantial' Medicare savings CNBC 05/04/2015; Bruce Japsen, Hillary's Right: Obamacare Reduces Medicare Spending Forbes 10/23/2016.

The Democrats should have been able to make this case more straightforwardly. That's too mild. It should have been a slam-dunk. But they would have to give up the neoliberal obsession with deficits and especially the Simpson-Bowles be-all-end-all of cutting Social Security and Medicare.

There is actually a very good case that economists like Jamie Galbraith make that in the post-Bretton Woods world, the US deficit really doesn‘t matter for the foreseeable future. But the Democrats won‘t be able to make even a mild version of that case until they flush the Simpson-Bowles mentality out of their political calculations.