A Welcome Failure

The Supercommittee failed to do its job: it was unable to reach an agreement on trimming the budget deficit within the time allotted. What a freaking shame.

I am not at all unhappy by the results. First of all, this extra-constitutional construct was a questionable idea to begin with. If Congress as a whole couldn't come up with a deal, what made it think the panel of twelve members of Congress, meeting in secret, was going to be able to do so? Even with the penalty of automatic cuts should the committee fail to reach an agreement, there were no guarantees because the Republicans wanted no such agreement. That much was clear right from the start.

Truth Out focused on the Republican intransigence and buttressed its analysis with a telling time line on negotiations between the parties, both in Congress and with the White House:

The notion that both sides share in the blame is an easy line for commentators to repeat, but it isn’t true. Time and time again, the only thing preventing an agreement on long-term deficit reduction has been the Republicans’ absolute refusal to consider any tax increases on high-income households as part of the solution. Michael Linden and I created a timeline of major events in the past six months of deficit talks... [Emphasis added]

What follows this paragraph is the time line which stretches back to February and is very revealing. I'm not going to paste it all here. Click on the link and read it, however, because it is so very clear about what was going on. Every time the Democrats went to the Republicans with a plan which included tax increases of any kind, they were rebuffed. What is so startling is that the Democrats kept coming back with "sweeteners" to the deal, including putting Social Security and Medicare on the chopping block, and each time they were rebuffed again. That's not negotiation, that's extortion. The Democrats never did get it. Fortunately time ran out before the Democrats could give the entire government away as part of the deal.

So now what?

Well, the Republicans in Congress are now scrambling to undo the deal setting up the Supercommittee. The automatic cuts, mostly to the Pentagon, triggered by the failure are looming and it's an election year. Rather than admit that the failure was due to their intransigence, Republicans want a mulligan, one that the White House is unwilling to provide.

Several Republican lawmakers immediately jumped to the next step in the process, vowing to block the steep cuts in defense spending triggered by the failure.

"As every military and civilian defense official has stated, these cuts represent a threat to the national security interests of the United States and cannot be allowed to occur," said Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said in a joint statement.

Obama warned members of Congress that he won’t let them put off the automatic cuts without agreeing on a debt- and deficit-reduction plan.

"My message to them is simple," Obama said. "No. I will veto any effort to get rid of those automatic spending cuts.... There will be no easy off-ramps on this one." [Emphasis added]

That's a somewhat welcome display of spine, but it's rather late in the game and it keeps everything on the table, including cuts to social and domestic programs that benefit the 99%. A little more leadership and a little less posturing would have been more welcome, even in an election year.

I guess that means it's up to us. Copy and paste that time line mentioned above into an email or fax to your congress critter, or read it to them over the phone. Deluge those offices with your anger and disgust especially if the target is facing re-election. Drop by their local offices if you can for a friendly little chat and take all of your family and friends with you. Apply a little pressure the way the lobbyists have been doing all along. Occupy their time with your firm presence.

It's time.

Bought And Paid For

One of the best discoveries I've made this year is Open Secrets, a site which follows the money when it comes to our elected officials. I make regular visits and during my latest one I found this brief article posted on the Supercommittee and the lobbyists who are undoubtedly swarming all over the members of that august body.

After the short introduction, a gallery of photos of the members follows. I knew there was only one woman and only one African American on the committee, but I was still shocked by the reminder. I guess only white guys know how to deal with deficits.

What follows is just as shocking, and very, very illuminating. Two interactive charts are provided. The first one breaks down campaign contributions to the members, listing the contributors and how much each gave by party from 1989 to 2011. It starts with the top 25, but can show the top 100. It will also show just one party, or both. The reader can make the adjustment.

The second chart shows donation by sector to each of the committee members for the same period. One can select the sector and scope out who got how much, and how that ranked in the candidates total donations. That one is a shocker as will. For example, the money given by Agribusinesses pretty much assures that farm subsidies are not going to be cut by the committee. Same-same for the financial industry and the insurance industry. Click on over and play around with the charts.

Is it any wonder that the Supercommittee is working in secret?

I am not optimistic.

Medifraud

It appears that the Obama administration is getting serious about fraud in the Medicare and Medicaid systems. One official, Peter Budetti, deputy administrator and director for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services' Center for Program Integrity even responded to an Los Angeles Times opinion piece which attacked Medicare's electronic billing system as one just made for the criminals to take advantage of.

Here's a few of his comments from that response:

Since President Obama took office, we have conducted an unprecedented crackdown on those who steal from Medicare, giving law enforcement greater resources, putting more boots on the ground and increasing penalties. In 2010, these efforts recovered a record $4 billion in taxpayer money.

But we're not just prosecuting fraud. We're also taking steps to prevent it. In the past, nearly anyone could fill out a form with the right information and become a Medicare provider. Criminals could set up false clinics, enlist willing accomplices and vulnerable seniors to submit false claims and begin collecting payments they had not earned for care they had not provided.

That's changing.

First, we're paying closer attention to who is signing up in the first place. Now, before you can become a Medicare provider, you have to go through a rigorous third-party review process that will make sure you have the correct licenses and meet all the requirements to bill Medicare. The days when you could just hang a shingle and start billing Medicare are over.

Second, if criminals do get into the system, they're now a lot more likely to get caught. Starting last month, our Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services have for the first time a comprehensive picture of Medicare claims nationwide. This means that our investigators can see billing patterns in real time and analyze those patterns. They can identify potentially fraudulent claims before they're paid, investigate them and take action quickly. And we are doing this without placing an undue burden on honest providers, allowing them to focus on providing high-quality care to Medicare beneficiaries. [Emphasis added]

Mr. Budetti makes it clear that the very system attacked as being designed for fraud has itself made it easier to spot fraud. The electronic billing system provides CMS with ongoing, real-time snapshots of its use in much the same way credit card companies use their system to spot unusual credit card usage. He contends that it works to make the entire system more efficient and it also works to highlight suspicious activity.

If the supercommittee really does want to tinker with Medicare/Medicaid, here is one area that might make sense. Make the elimination of fraud from the system a priority and back that priority up with an increase in penalties for the crime and an increase in the budget of the Department of Justice to investigate and prosecute the crime. Rooting out the criminal element from our health care system would be a lovely gift to the country.

It also would represent change we could believe in.

Just So You Know

Our friends at Open Secrets have an interesting chart for your perusal, one that shows the net worth of each of the members of the "supercommittee" which will be meeting soon to decide on how to cut the deficit.




You'll have to click on the image to enlarge it. Then come on back here. Oh, and Sen. Kerry's part of the chart isn't to scale: it would have to be fifteen times longer, too wide for my screen.




Now, for the important part:

Education funding, nutrition programs, affordable housing, community health centers and many other programs may soon be on the chopping block as the 12-member Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction works to cut the national debt by $1.5 trillion by Thanksgiving.

And the decisions about which programs will be axed will be made by lawmakers, who, by and large, are far wealthier than the average American.

According to a Center for Responsive Politics analysis, the 12 members of the debt supercommittee range in net worth from just over $100,000 to more than $238 million.

As a whole, the Democratic members of the supercommittee are less wealthy than their Republican counterparts, according to the Center's research -- with the exception of Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.), who is the richest member of the U.S. Senate. ...

The median American family, meanwhile, had a net worth of $96,000 in 2009, according to the Federal Reserve Board.

Those numbers don't inspire much confidence when it comes to raising the revenue stream by raising taxes on the wealthy, do they. Nor do they inspire confidence that the members of the committee will have great empathy for the rest of us, especially those of us whose net worth is south of the national median.

I am not optimistic.