Sequester This!

079 Capitol Hill United States Congress 1993 (Photo credit: David Holt London)

Whoever it was that said "you can't fix stupid" must have been talking about Washington, which is in yet another contrived budget crisis that threatens to grind a struggling economy to a halt.

This time, $85 billion in automatic federal spending cuts are scheduled to go into effect March 1, a provision made possible by the 2011 Budget Control Act.  The cuts, known as sequestering, affect everything from air traffic safety to unemployment benefits to educational programs to national defense.  Everything the government does, that is, except for Social Security and Medicare.  Dire warnings of layoffs, inconvenience and threats of security lapses have all been bandied about, mostly by the White House.

This sequester is supposed to force Congress and President Barack Obama to come up with some kind of plan to save the country from this terrible plight.  So far, it's not happening.  Neither side is even close to a new budget deal.  When the going got rough, Congress chose to take President's Week off.  Seriously.

The Republicans have been hollering for federal spending cuts for years, so you would think that the automatic cuts would be right up their alley.  Not so, because of what it would do to national defense, which they don't want cut at all.  A national defense that's already bloated beyond belief, and even the Pentagon says they don't need all that stuff Congress continually earmarks for them.

The President is proposing spending cuts coupled with a raise in taxes for the highest-earning Americans, which is something the polls show seems to be the way to go.  But the GOP doesn't want to hear about taxes.  Instead, they want the ability to decide which programs to cut and for how much.

This is what's called governing in crisis.  Ever since Obama became President, the Republicans have been going into Bruce Springsteen mode.  That is, "No Retreat, No Surrender" when it comes to taxes and spending, without so much as a thought as to how their actions would affect the rest of the country.

Whether the predictions of gloom and doom comes to pass or not, we know this:  Extreme politics on both sides--Republican and Democrat--is taking a major toll on this country.  How is anything supposed to get done when Congress resembles a glorified daycare center full of spoiled brats, while the economy tanks and people are hurting?  They need to grow up.