Republicans To US: If You Don't Cut Social Security & Medicare, We'll Kill This Dog

Well, actually, what they're threatening to do is refuse to increase the debt ceiling, essentially forcing the federal government to shut down, which is about as insane as shooting a dog (thanks to National Lampoon for this classic magazine cover).

I'm not really a government economist, and I don't play one on TV, but let me see if I understand the sequence of events that has led us to the brink of this abyss.

By the end of the administration of President Bill Clinton (D), the federal budget actually had a surplus. Then President George W. Bush (R) took over, and federal budgets started running deficits again. First came tax cuts for the rich, which reduced the amount of money coming in. Then came invasions and occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq, resulting in increased spending. The Medicare prescription drug plan, which obligates the federal government to pay whatever prices are set by pharmaceutical companies for seniors' prescriptions, has also increased spending.

Now, however, that there's a Democratic President, the Republicans in Congress have suddenly declared that deficit spending must be stopped immediately. The logical approach would be to undo the Bush-era policies that contributed to the national debt, right? Raise tax rates on wealthy individuals and corporations to where they were ten years ago, bring the troops home from Afghanistan and Iraq, and allow Medicare to negotiate lower prices on prescription drugs as is done in most other countries. That would be the logical approach.

Logic, however, seems to be in short supply in DC these days. Instead, Republicans in Congress are demanding deep cuts, or even a dismantling, of Social Security and Medicare. Somehow, they want us to pay for ten years of corporate tax breaks, military operations, and subsidies to for-profit drug companies by cutting back on our parents' and grandparents' income and making it more expensive for them to go to the doctor or hospital.

Never mind killing the dog in the above photo; the Republicans are trying to kill Grandma.