America post-bin Laden

This post has nothing to do with the implications of bin Laden's death, but is rather about how his death has become the only newsworthy story in the last week.

It's great that he is dead and clearly there are a lot of important and intriguing plots going on concerning his death and its aftermath.  For the time being, I'll let those issues rest.

Because we need to return home and examine our own issues.  Bin Laden is gone, but the recession is not. Nor are other economic issues that we need to resolve.  First off, comes the debate over the debt ceiling. Republicans, particularly the Tea Party variety, have threatened to vote against raising the debt ceiling.  If that were to happen then at some point this summer the United States, for the first time in our history, would default on our debt.  For a step by step breakdown of how awful that would be for the American economy, I'll refer you to Matthew James, chairman of the Treasury Borrowing Advisory Committee for JP Morgan Chase.

Now Republicans have been playing chicken with the debt limit, announcing that they will not vote to raise it unless they get substantial spending cuts in return.  Republicans are right to push for spending cuts, but as we've seen in the past, they don't do a very good job of linking funds to outcomes.  For example cutting funding for Planned Parenthood would lead to an increase in spending on entitlement programs.  That is conveniently ignored by Republicans who lately have been in the business of making statements that are not factual and do not apply to reality.

But it is almost a forgone conclusion that House Republicans will take a stand against doing the smart thing and without raising the debt limit we will default. With that in mind, what are some smart cuts we should be making anyhow? After all, if Republicans are going to hold our country's economic future hostage, we should at least get some smart spending cuts out of them, cuts such as:

1) Military spending - Osama may be dead, but the war against his followers certainly is not over.  However, perhaps we can find a smarter way to wage that war now that we've cut the head off the snake.  Bin Laden's death is a great symbolic victory for the United States, and now that we have achieved that victory, we can and should rethink our strategy in Afghanistan.  Additionally, spending on conventional military weapons should be cut to reflect the changing nature of warfare.

2) Farm subsidies - You know what is in (almost) everything you eat and drink? High fructose corn syrup.  You know why?  Because the government pays farmers to grow corn.  You know why?  Neither do I.  In addition to being bad for you (though no worse than sugar), high fructose corn syrup is cheap meaning that it replaces sugar in processed foods, foods that cause obesity and other lifestyle diseases that ultimately raise the cost of healthcare.

3) Money to oil companies - Dirtying the planet and giving money to people who will use it to put bombs under American soldier's feet.  Let's give these people more taxpayer money!

These are only a start, a lot of the cuts that need to be made aren't so much cuts as they are changes to existing systems.  The retirement age needs to be raised, healthcare spending needs to be reined in and taxes need to go up.   Both Democrats and Republicans are loathe to touch some of these issues.  Some steps have been taken to address the issue of rising healthcare costs (Obamacare) and other steps have been proposed to ignore it (Paul-Ryan-non-care).

In the short term, there are much more important things to do than fixing the deficit, like putting Americans back to work.  If we can fix the economy, the budget problems will be at least partially mitigated.  Nevertheless, one side of the political spectrum has taken up the banner of austerity - brought to you by the same people who gave us Bush tax cuts and the Iraq war - and because they have made it their issue, they won't go quietly into the night without fighting for it tooth and nail.

Ultimately, the debt limit will be raised and cuts will probably be made.  Let's just home the former happens sooner rather than later and that the latter is done in a manner that saves essential programs and links funds to results, not in the wanton manner that Republicans have gone about this whole process recently.