David Brooks -
The report from the chairmen lists some of the best ways to raise revenue and cut spending. But it comes with no enactment strategy. In this climate, asking politicians to end the mortgage deduction and tax employer health care plans and raise capital gains taxes and cut benefits for affluent seniors is like asking them to jump on a buzzing sack full of live grenades. They won’t do it.
Now we will get serious or collapse. Barring an unbelievable economic surge from a great scientific or technical leap, the free-ride is coming to an end. No more wars of choice without taxes to pay for them, no more hare-brained schemes from the left, we are exposed. We won't have the money for infrastructure. We can no longer afford to be a military force for world stability. We haven't done the supposed easy things like means testing social security let alone dump the mortgage interest deduction, the unacknowledged black hole in the housing crisis. Taxing employer health plans would hurt like hell but ask the Greeks what it is like to have all your greatness behind you.