I understand that you'd want to see the budget balanced entirely by spending cuts; but that's not going to happen, and no party will be able to do that. There's just too much politically powerful stuff in the budget that you'd have to slash, in order to get there that way. But it's a misuse of language to identify "fiscal responsibility" only with spending cuts. It is just as fiscally responsible to raise revenues to meet expenditures as it is to cut spending to reach revenue -- and most likely what we'll need is a very large dose of each kind of measure, because of the spectacular irresponsibility of the currently governing crop of Republicans. (Bringing back the estate tax would be a very good first step, imho.)

Second of all... have you tried to look for a liberal version of fiscally responsible policies? They aren't that hard to find. Here's one from the Brookings Institute:
http://www.brookings.edu/comm/policybriefs/pb130.htm
and here's one from the Progressive Policy Institute
http://www.ppionline.org/ppi_ci.cfm?contentid=252356&subsecid=162&knlgAreaID=125

And that was just with about 5 minutes of light googling.

phil,

I'm not surprised liberal think tanks have plans for balancing the budget, but I haven't heard anything from Democrats other than "tax the rich"--and the "rich" in those proposals usually includes a hefty segment of the mid-to-upper middle class--a demographic with a high voting turnout. That's not a proposal that's likely to win over many swing voters. If the Democrats are going to make this a winning issue for themselves, they need a "Contract with America" sort of package to present to voters.

Anyone who really thinks the Democrats will take back Congress this year is seriously fooling himself. The system doesn't change that quickly - it took 40 years for the Republicans to regain control of Congress, and it will probably take at least half that time for the pendulum to swing back. The grim reality is simply that gerrymandering, demographic forces, and political factors will keep the Democrats in minority status for a long time - far longer than the blogosphere and 24-hr cable news media will have patience for.

but I haven't heard anything from Democrats other than "tax the rich"--and the "rich" in those proposals usually includes a hefty segment of the mid-to-upper middle class...

Eric, how much would be raised if the only tax increases were to return the marginal rates for the top 1% of earners to pre-2001 levels? Just the top 1%?

Ohmigosh, Nash is playing at class warfare! Yup...

(oh, and it's a trick question, because I know the answer and hoping to make a point to you, as well.)

Republicans re-discovering a commitment to fiscal responsibility in Republican terms would give the Democrats control of the House and the Senate. Why? Because as much as Eric hates taxes on the wealthy the majority of Americans aren't willing to see Medicaid, Medicare and every program benefitting the poor and lower middle class eliminated. And if Eric cares to be honest he has to admit that all of these things and more would have to be done to retain the tax cuts he wants to keep and to almost balance the budget. Notice that it would only almost balance the budget.

Nash and Jim make the two main correct responses to Eric's argument -- i.e., there aren't really _that_ many of the people who would most likely have their rates go up; and many Americans are perfectly willing to tax themselves, if they think it's necessary. One number that gets bounced around a lot as the income level above which to start massively jacking the marginal rate is $200,000 -- and I think that's only about 4 or 5% of the population. And if it is presented not just as "we're raising taxes" but "we're raising taxes to bring down the deficit, and improve homeland security (like port security, which has been very oddly neglected by this administration & this congress)", then I think a lot of people will be receptive to that message.

Of course, the GOP response, from elected officials and the likes of O'Reilly or Limbaugh, will just be, "Raising taxes! They're raising taxes! Look, look, look, they're raising taxes! TaxandspendliberalstaxandspendliberalstaxandspendliberaAAAAAAAGHHHHH!" and more generally, as usual, try to keep the country from having a sane, mature debate about the budget.

Phil(osopher),

One, we have a federal estate tax already. The exclusion amount is higher, but the estate tax lives until 2010, and then the sunset provision makes the repeal expire. In 2011 the estate tax, after a one year non-existence, is resurrected at 2001 levels.

Two, the revenue from the estate tax is fairly small. Less than 20,000 estates annually are subject at 2001 levels, and the revenue was a relatively small amount of the budget.

There may be good reasons for having an estate tax-- I'm sure Josh, Zach, David, etc. can debate the pros and cons in a helpful fashion. But even an estate tax at 2001 levels would only help with a small part of the budget deficit.

"But even an estate tax at 2001 levels would only help with a small part of the budget deficit." Oh, I don't doubt that -- as I indicated above, it's just one piece of the budget puzzle that will surely have to include multiple tax raises and spending cuts. But once we accept the fact that taxes will indeed need to be raised, the immediate un-repealing of the estate tax becomes, I think, an obvious place to start.

Jim and phil are for some reason assuming that I would oppose any tax increases at all. Not true. But given that the size of the federal budget has increased by "nearly half" (according to Ed Feulner, and I've heard similar numbers from other sources) since George W. Bush took office, a great deal of reduction in spending needs to take place.

Stiglitz and Bilmes ( http://www2.gsb.columbia.edu/faculty/jstiglitz/download/2006_Cost_of_War_in_Iraq_NBER.pdf ) put the cost of the Iraq war at between $1 and $2 trillion dollars.

That's breathtaking in and of itself, however they make the interesting observation that since the government has been running a deficit since the war began, and is likely to continue running a deficit, and that no new taxes have been levied during the war's conduct, that we're essentially buying the war on credit.

In other words, every dollar spent on the war is a dollar that was borrowed. Of course we've borrowed to finance wars in the past, with instruments like war bonds, etc. But I'm not sure we've ever paid 100% of the cost of a war through credit.

If they're right about the ultimate cost being in the $1-$2 trillion range, that alone will have an apocalyptic effect on the national debt. We're already pissing away $400 billion a year in interest payments on the debt. What happens when one out of every three dollars in federal income has to go out for nothing more than debt service?

greg

Regarding changing the current leadership in congress; the burgeoning size of gov't may be the straw that breaks the back of grassroots Republicans, but for the rest of America, the straw appears to be Iraq, closely followed by the economy and jobs. Then comes healthcare, terrorism, and energy costs. Interestingly, Americans appeared to have separated the war in Iraq from the "War on Terror."