Greg Sargent Shows GOP Sequester Stance Doesn't Add Up

     Great minds think alike... Sargent also wrote aboutr the strange GOP strategy on the seqester cuts. Everything they say doesn't add up.

      http://diaryofarepublicanhater.blogspot.com/2013/01/is-sequester-gops-leverage.html

       "The news today that the economy contracted thanks to a steep drop in defense spending has sparked another exchange over who is to blame for the pending defense cuts in the sequester, which pose further danger to the economy. Republicans appear to believe today’s economic news helps their case. It isn’t immediately clear why."

      "At his press briefing today, White House spokesman Jay Carney said today’s news should renew pressure on Republicans to avoid allowing the sequester to happen. He called on them to make a deal that includes new revenues in order to avert the sequester cuts. That prompted this response from John Boehner’s office:

These arbitrary, automatic cuts were a creation and demand of the White House in 2011. Twice the House has passed legislation to replace them with common sense cuts and reforms. If there was any uncertainty late last year about the sequester, it was because the Democratic-controlled Senate, per usual, never lifted a finger to pass a plan to replace it.

    "In other words, the threat to the economy posed by the sequester is the White House’s fault, because Democrats have not proposed a plan to avert it. The odd thing about this, though, is that Republicans have explicitly and repeatedly stated that they intend to use the threat of the sequester to extract the spending cuts they want without compromising with Obama and Dems. Not long ago, before the GOP’s debt ceiling cave, Boehner told the Wall Street Journal that the sequester, and not the debt ceiling, would give Republicans their real leverage. And remember this Associated Press headline?

In turnabout, GOP lawmakers willing to risk automatic budget cuts to get their way on budget
  

      "The news today that the economy contracted thanks to a steep drop in defense spending has sparked another exchange over who is to blame for the pending defense cuts in the sequester, which pose further danger to the economy. Republicans appear to believe today’s economic news helps their case. It isn’t immediately clear why."

     "At his press briefing today, White House spokesman Jay Carney said today’s news should renew pressure on Republicans to avoid allowing the sequester to happen. He called on them to make a deal that includes new revenues in order to avert the sequester cuts. That prompted this response from John Boehner’s office:

These arbitrary, automatic cuts were a creation and demand of the White House in 2011. Twice the House has passed legislation to replace them with common sense cuts and reforms. If there was any uncertainty late last year about the sequester, it was because the Democratic-controlled Senate, per usual, never lifted a finger to pass a plan to replace it.

     "In other words, the threat to the economy posed by the sequester is the White House’s fault, because Democrats have not proposed a plan to avert it. The odd thing about this, though, is that Republicans have explicitly and repeatedly stated that they intend to use the threat of the sequester to extract the spending cuts they want without compromising with Obama and Dems. Not long ago, before the GOP’s debt ceiling cave, Boehner told the Wall Street Journal that the sequester, and not the debt ceiling, would give Republicans their real leverage. And remember this Associated Press headline?"

In turnabout, GOP lawmakers willing to risk automatic budget cuts to get their way on budget

     http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2013/01/30/puzzling-gop-logic-on-the-sequester/

     As Sargent points out-and has Krugman has repeatedly pointed out-the GOP is incoherent in both decrying the military cuts as contracting the economy's spending and suggesting that the domestic cuts could actually help the economy. Does cutting spending contract the economy or somehow expand it?

      If they agree it expands it then how do they justify the domestic cuts? Are they claiming that military spending stimulates the economy but domestic spending contracts it? That would be a hell of a claim-I'd love  to see the model for that. What that would mean though is that some kinds of spending stimulate the economy and some type-somehow-contract it.

     Then again, they haven't actually given an offer: what they've done is demand that the military cuts be cancelled while offering nothing in return. Yet if they believe that the cuts to military spending are going to be bad for the economy then yesterday's report shoud show taht they need to negotiate to mitigate against them rather than digging their hands in andy playing another game of My way or the highway.

     So it's not really clear what they're doing right now. I still think they may have to fold on this too. Recall that the sequester date was already extended for two months during the fiscal cliff deal. Certainly the negative GDP number doesn't make them it easier for them to play hostage taking.