Armed Services Chair: No Defense Cuts And No Tax Increases
Thursday, October 13, 2011 at 4:31PMBy Adrianna McGinley
In a press conference Thursday, Republican members of the House Armed Services Committee announced the recommendations they’ll make to the Congressional supercommittee, primarily their desire to see no further defense cuts.
Armed Services Committee Chairman, Rep. Buck McKeon (R-Calif.), said defense has already taken more than enough cuts and no more will be accepted.
“One of the things we heard was that everything should be on the table, and while many of us on the Armed Services Committee didn’t agree with that, we understood where the American people were,” McKeon said. “I personally, and I think many members of the committee, feel that we have gone overboard on the cuts…defense was on the table, and in the first round, it took up half of the table.”
Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) said more cuts would put the military in a position of having to choose where to engage and where not, putting national security at risk.
“I don’t think the American people understand, and they need to, what these defense cuts mean,” Hunter said.
Rep. J. Randy Forbes (R-Va.) pointed out the effect cuts would have on the average American, saying if more cuts are implemented, using conservative estimates, there would be job losses exceeding the number of unemployed people in 13 different states combined.
When asked if tax increases would be accepted in place of defense cuts, McKeon said, “there is no one here who would vote for tax increases.” He added, “I don’t think it’s our job on this committee to do the super committee’s work of solving their problem … I don’t need to help them and try to give them ideas.”
Standing committees are set to formally present recommendations to the super committee tomorrow.
OMB Director Says More Must Be Done For Long-Term Deficit Reduction
U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Peter Orszag said Thursday that the steps currently being taken to reduce the national deficit, although effective, are not enough.
The 2001 and 2003 tax cuts to those who have an income of $250,000 or more will expire as scheduled, Orszag said. In the coming decade, this will reduce the deficit by nearly $700 billion.
Transitioning to a clean energy future by eliminating fossil fuel subsidies delivered through the tax code will reduce the deficit by about $40 billion in the next ten years.
And the three-year freeze of non-security discretionary spending will further reduce the deficit an additional $250 billion, solidifying a $1.2 trillion reduction in national deficits.
“Even with that $1.2 trillion in deficit reduction, the deficit remains higher than we’d like it to be,” Orszag said. “[This] is why we are calling for the creation of a bipartisan fiscal commission to put forward recommendations to get us the rest of the way to a stable debt trajectory.”
Orszag added that this would involve overall deficits of roughly 3 percent of the economy by 2015.
According to Orszag, deficit reduction is evident in the coming decade but he remains skeptical about the long-term fiscal challenge, saying that the root cause of the country’s deficit is the rate at which health care costs are growing.
“We are eager to continue to work with Congress to finally enact comprehensive health reform legislation, Orszag said. “[This] helps to reduce the deficit, not only over this decade, but equally important, puts in place the infrastructure that will allow us to decrease deficit by increasing amounts thereafter.”