CONGRATULATIONS! You reduced the debt to 53% of GDP in 2018, and kept it at a sustainable level through 2030.

Congressional Republicans have abdicated all attempts at a reaching a compromise on revenue.   But it's good to know that the Wall Street Journal is at least entertaining the possibility of revenue increases.   The deduction of mortgage interest creates a perverse incentive to build ever larger houses while doing nothing to encourage home ownership for poorer individuals.

Here's the question I'd love Speaker Boehner to answer...  In exchange for doing away the mortgage interest deduction and a $.50 increase in the gas tax, what revenue neutral cuts would he propose?

The same problem, viewed from different perspectives, frequently yields multiple solutions.  There is no doubt that government revenues have failed to match spending for decades.  Against that, conservatives have fought tooth and nail for tax cuts.   But tax cuts without spending cuts simply drives deficits.  Why not allow taxes to be enacted by a simple majority, but require a super-majority for spending? 

In 2008, the salary of the Florida Circuit Court judge empowered to sentence you to death was less than:

• Seven employees of Miami-Dade's Clerk of Courts;
• Eleven employees of Miami-Dade's Corrections Department; and
• Fifty employees of Miami-Dade's County Attorney's Office.

 As we contemplate Governor's Scott's proposal to reduce benefits for State Employees, perhaps we should inquire as to the fairness of pay for those we rely upon most for fairness.

It's quite fashionable to attack public-sector unions and fiscal exploitation.  To a certain extent, I am reluctant to follow suit. The interests of public sector unions generally align with mine.  Their demise would weaken the coalition which supports the 'liberal,' social goals I endorse:  gay marriage, privacy in the bedroom, and the right of a woman to control her medical decisions even when pregnant. Even so, the strength of public-sector unions at the city and county level has led to absurd disparities in the salaries of federal, state and county employees.

Consider this:
After 10 years of services, a U.S. Navy Captain (Grade 0-5) makes $79,912.8 annually.
A lieutenant with the Miami-Dade Fire Rescue Department <b>starts at $93,387.30.</b>
As of January 2008, the Chief Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court made $217,400.00 annually.
By comparison, 32 individuals in the Miami-Dade County Attorney's office made more.

Why is it that county government, in position after position, finds the ability to pay so much more than our state and federal governments?   It seems the most compelling argument is local, public-sector labor unions.

<b>blockquote<b>
[C]onsider the function of public-sector unions. If they do anything at all, it is to protect their members' claims on future government revenue from democratic discretion—to limit the power of the elected representatives of the democratic public to set the terms on which union-members will receive transfers from taxpayers.</b>blockquote</b>

Whatever truth their is to that quote, it is nowhere stronger than the local level.  That is, paradoxically, at the level 'closest' to the voter.

Matthew Yglesias writes:

If the entire population of Bangladesh dropped dead tomorrow, [the world's] per capita GDP would go up. A 20 percent increase in the death rate of Americans over the age of 65 would cause our per capita growth rate to accelerate. It’s important to understand these facts, but it’s strange to think of them as optimistic scenarios...

I'm embarrassed how often I need to be reminded of economics' limitations.  But I'm not surprised it's Yglesias who brings me back.

Tea Partisan:  One who attacks the propriety and capacity of the U.S. government's control over our nation while simultaneously faulting the government for failing to predict and shape the destinies of foreign states.  See also: hypocrite.

(Paraphrasing George Will)