“Supercommittee” failure and blaming Grover Norquist

The so-called “Supercommittee” is done. Failed, kaput. The gulf between Democrats and Republicans was simply too great. Let the finger-pointing ensue. But who is to blame?

The left would point to anti-tax activist Grover Norquist and his “no new taxes” pledge for preventing Republicans from going along with Democratic demands to raise taxes. I agree that Grover has been very effective in fighting tax hikes and for this he should be celebrated, not derided.

After all, the $1.2 trillion in spending cuts that was supposed to be the target of the Supercommittee was less than this year’s deficit! And, as I’ve noted before, the size of the federal government has doubled (from $1.9 trillion to $3.7 trillion) since Clinton left office. Clearly, the “Supercommittee” needed to focus on spending cuts and, if Congress was allowed to further increase spending (absent Grover’s pledge) it would have done so.

So, thanks Grover for keeping tax hikes at bay. Now, we need to force Congress to allow the supposedly “automatic” cuts to happen.