5 Mar 2013 12:46 pm
Republicans are trying to undue the part of the sequester cuts they don't like, while leaving in place the cuts that Democrats don't like. Of course!VIDEOTranscript:MADDOW: Just before 9:00 on Friday night, the White House issued a presidential order, "By the authority vested in me as president by the laws of the United States of America, I hereby order that budgetary resources in each nonexempt budget account be reduced by the amount calculated by the Office of Management and Budget in its report to the Congress of March" -- what it means, the sequester -- or as we like to refer to it around here, congressional storm Earl -- has arrived.Earlier that same day, President Obama convened a meeting with the congressional leaders of both parties to try to stop it, to try to stop the $85 billion worth of cuts from going into effect. He said the cuts would hurt the economy and cost people their jobs. He called the cuts dumb and arbitrary. And then pretty much right after he got done calling them dumb and arbitrary, he had to go sign this boring presidential order executive ordering them into law.President Obama was not saying these cuts are dumb and arbitrary because he personally does not like them. These cuts are dumb andarbitrary by design. Both sides agree they are dumb and arbitrary, the whole point of the sequester was that they would be dumb and arbitrary so nobody would want them.The cuts are dumb and arbitrary and purposely hurtful in a bipartisan fashion, because the whole design was about it being equally unpalatable to both parties. That was the whole idea, right? That was on purpose.Democrats were supposed to hate the sequester, because of the dumb and arbitrary cuts to stuff like housing programs for the poor, and early childhood education, and WIC, the women, infant and children nutrition program which provides food and baby formula for low income families. Not to mention cuts in funding for things like national parks and scientific research.Republicans on the other hand were supposed to hate the sequester because of dumb and arbitrary cuts to national security spending. It was supposed to be a "sword of Damocles" hanging over the Defense Department. No way Republicans were going to let that happen, right?Well, all of this collective hatred of on-purpose, dumb and arbitrary cutting was supposed to force both sides to work together to avoid the cuts. That, of course, failed. The sword of Damocles failed.And now, we're budgeting what the government spends its money on using mandatory cuts that every hates, that were never supposed to happen in the first place.Well, what happens now? As you might imagine, they`re trying to retroactively undo it, but in a very specific way.Today, House Republicans introduced retroactive efforts to get rid of these dumb and arbitrary cuts, to get rid of some of these dumb and arbitrary cuts. It turns they just want to fix the parts related to national security and defense spending. The stuff put in there specifically because it was supposed to be unpalatable to them.So, their plan would not just ease the cuts on the Pentagon, it would give the Pentagon $2 billion more than the president asked for in non-war Pentagon funding.So, Republicans -- think about this -- would keep all the austerity for the programs that the Democrats don't want to see cut. But the cuts that they don't like would be mostly reversed. That`s how they`re going to fix it.To review, the sequester was supposed to be the equal pain for both parties -- bipartisan dumbness. Bipartisan arbitrariness. That was the whole point. That was the design.Today, House Republicans said the parts we do not like, we think we'regoing to undo them.But all the rest of it, the reduction in funds for housing programs that could leave more than 100,000 people homeless could force people in emergency shelters out on to the street. The reduction in WIC funding that could leave three quarters of a million low income women and children without benefits. When you're talking about WIC, that means without infant formula. Or 11 percent reduction in unemployment benefits for people who have not been able to find a job.All of that will stay gone away. It's fine for all of that to have gone away. Those cuts must be seen now as permanent. But the things that the Republicans will miss, they'll come back.House Republicans today advancing a plan to undo the part of the sequester their party doesn't like, while keeping the part Democrats do not like, which is just strategic genius, such a deal.Why didn't I think of that? If every time I had to make a deal with somebody, the part they didn`t like about it, they could undo afterwards and leave the part I didn't like intact, I would make a lot more deals.From Politico:House continuing resolution to restore $7B to military operations.