Parsing the Deficit Commission Vote

Gotta admit it, I was surprised by the number of yes votes on the President's deficit commission. It got a solid majority -- 11 in favor.

That is an accomplishment. This commission laid out the very tough choices facing the country and some serious folks voted to back it.

That said, it is important to look at the votes that matter most: What did people with power do?

There the record is more mixed. Looking at the elected officials on the commission, the plan got a split decision 6 yeas, 6 nays. That's pretty good. There are a lot of toxic political chunks in this soup -- higher taxes, increased Social Security retirement age, more taxes, tough spending cuts.

But to see the trend, you have to look deeper. Two yes votes come from members of Congress who are retiring. Sen. Judd Gregg (R) of New Hampshire and Rep John Spratt (D) of North Carolina. Spratt lost his re-election bid and joked, "As I read through [the report] I thought frequently, 'Thank God I'm not running again.'"

Taking out retiring members, the elected vote was 6 nays, 4 yeas.

Still, that is quite an accomplishment. Especially surprising was the yes vote by Sen. Dick Durbin, who is Assistant Majority Leader in the Senate, the Democrats number two man there. Durbin, however, was quick to point out his yes vote was only a vote to get the process going and to claim a seat at the table in future talks. He added the caveat, "I wouldn't vote for this commission report on final passage."

Durbin left that last part out of his op-ed in the Chicago Tribune.

What about the other no votes? Every re-elected member of the House voted no. The man in charge of writing tax law in the Senate, Max Baucus, voted no.

The deficit commission made more progress than I thought it would, but it still hasn't changed the political calculus on deficit reduction. I might add one other thought on the votes for deficit reduction. The votes that count the most right now are taking place on plans to extend the Bush tax cuts. That's where the real political action is.

Source: http://www.pbs.org/nbr/blog/2010/12/parsing_the_deficit_commission.html

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