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Columbus
Dispatch...
Good
choice, hard job
Portman an excellent pick for debt
panel, but success won’t be easy
Sunday August 14, 2011
Ohio
Sen. Rob Portman’s appointment to
the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction — the ‘ supercommittee’
created
by Congress as part of its recent debt-ceiling deal — is a smart move
by Senate
Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and a hopeful sign for a nation that
desperately needs competent leadership.
Portman,
elected to the Senate in
November, has an impressive resume and ideal temperament for what no
doubt will
be a difficult task: finding consensus among six Republicans and six
Democrats
for $1.5 trillion in cuts to the federal budget, and doing it by Nov.
23.
Under
the terms of the debt-deal
legislation, which Portman supported, if the bipartisan panel fails to
come up
with a plan or if Congress fails to ratify it by Dec. 23, a series of
automatic
spending cuts, including deep reductions in the military budget, will
kick in
starting in 2013.
The
partisan warfare that
characterized the lead-up to the debt bill, with its $900 billion in
budget
cuts in 10 years, shows how difficult it will be to reach agreement on
another
$1.5 trillion.
But
Portman, a Cincinnati-area
Republican, brings a full toolbox to the job. His experience as
director of the
White House Office of Management and Budget as well as U.S. trade
representative under President George W. Bush, plus 12 years as a
congressman,
give him a thorough understanding of budget-related, not to mention
political,
realities.
Just
as important, his pragmatism and
reputation for working across the aisle could make the difference in
getting to
“yes.”
Portman
talked about the pressing need
to cut government spending and reduce the staggering national debt in
his 2010
Senate campaign, and has maintained that concern since taking office.
He
told the Dispatch recently that
lower tax rates, in return for eliminating unjustified loopholes,
credits,
deductions and exclusions, ultimately could mean more tax revenue.
That’s
because a more-efficient tax system would encourage job and economic
growth,
which could result in higher tax revenues.
Portman’s
nuanced position on tax
revenues will be important if all deficit-reduction options are to
remain on
the table. Other Republicans named to the committee — Sens. Jon Kyl of
Arizona
and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania, as well as Reps. Jeb Hensarling of
Texas, and
Dave Camp and Fred Upton of Michigan — have said they oppose making new
revenues part of a greater debt deal.
House
Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi
named her three picks Thursday: Reps. James E. Clyburn of South
Carolina and
Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, as well as Xavier Becerra of California;
who
voted against the debt deal because it didn’t include tax increases
The
Democratic senators chosen by
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid — Patty Murray of Washington, Max
Baucus of
Montana and John Kerry of Massachusetts — all have been intransigent so
far in
refusing to acknowledge the obvious need to reform the entitlement
programs,
including Social Security and Medicare, which are fiscally
unsustainable.
Those
positions have to change if the
supercommittee is to have any hope of reaching a grand bargain that
could set
the nation on the road to fiscal stability. Getting there would be
painful, but
far less painful now than if the fixes are delayed until later, when
they will
have to be Draconian.
Read
it at the Columbus Dispatch
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