Quote of the Day
November 21, 2011

'Now that the supercommittee seems to have gridlocked,
we default to the automatic cuts-the sequester. The
fact that these are split evenly between defense and
non-defense has some members of Congress* talking about
"reconfiguring" the deal to take less from defense, and
implicitly more from non-defense spending (entitlements
are largely exempted from the sequester).

'This is pure bait and switch. I'm sorry they don't
like the deal they cooked up to get out of the debt-
ceiling mess they created. I'm not a big fan either.
But the trigger was structured as tough on defense to
make it something they'd want to avoid. And let's
remember: the $900 billion of cuts already on the books
came exclusively from the non-defense part of the
budget from important programs that are already
strained-Head Start, child care, education,
infrastructure, R&D, and more'

Economist Jared Bernstein
blog
November 21, 2011

http://tinyurl.com/6og9owh