Obama’s Budget Compromise and the Death of Ideology

“We are going to have to jumpstart the economy and there’s consensus that that requires a bold plan to make the investments in the future. But we have to make sure that those investments are wise. We have to make sure that we are not wasting money in every area.”

Those are not the words of President Barack Obama during his State of the Union. Nor is it what he said after releasing his fiscal 2012 budget this past Monday. These are President Obama’s words from November 25, 2008, when he was still President-elect.

On that day Obama 2008 sounds eerily like Obama 2011, spelling out a vision of government: 

“I think what the American people want more than anything is just commonsense, smart government. They don’t want ideology; they don’t want bickering; they don’t want sniping.”

Onideology, Obama has delivered. With the $3.7 trillion fiscal year 2012 budget his administration released on Monday, ideology is dead and its been replaced with the alluring and pragmatic “winning the future” axiom.

For progressives, the swap is not a good one. While ideology could articulate a positive progressive vision of government’s role in society, “winning the future” cannot. So instead, the game is being played by conservative rules.

As a refresher, under conservative rules, budget cuts are a good in and of themselves, and any increased spending on the domestic budget means largesse.

Under conservative rules, budgets must be discussed as though they exist detached from the federal government’s missions.

Under conservative rules, cutting taxes does not raise deficits and, under conservative rules, raising taxes or adding fees cannot be used to lower the deficit, or for that matter, pay for anything.

Under conservative rules, the deficit rules all. The continuing jobs crisis and increased joblessness—“so be it.”

To be fair, “Winning the future” brought more than just an incredibly agreeable slogan capable of summing up a four volume, 1000-page document. The 2012 budget has admirable sections, including a huge boost in energy, transportation and education investments and increased funding for Wall Street regulators like the SEC and the CFTC.

But, the president’s budget and the administration’s talking points basically follow conservative rules. There is no articulation of what a progressive or liberal government should stand for.

The budget calls for $2.5 billion in cuts from LIHEAP, the heating and cooling-assistance program for he working poor, $300 million from Community Development Block Grants, which help finance public projects in working-class communities, and $350 Community Service Grants, which fund grassroots groups.

Let’s call a spade a spade; the dollar amounts are little more than rounding errors in the deficit. But the cuts cause significant harm for America’s working class. The President is essentially saying to Republicans: “I can step on poor people to save a penny, too. I can do it better than you. I can win by your rules.”

While the administration slashes small programs geared at helping the working poor, it does not adequately address either the massive military budget or the less than just tax code. Military spending is being cut at less than an eighth the rate of domestic spending. The difference, of course, is that the United States military already spends nearly half of the world’s total military expenditures—there’s a lot of room for some trimming.

On the tax side, repealing the Bush tax cuts would immediately stabilize the long-term deficit picture, Kevin Drum pointed out. And it’s not as though there are a dearth of other progressive options to bring in more revenue (Robert Reich and Dean Baker suggest two). The problem is that Obama has refused to set that ideological agenda.

None of this, needless to say, is “commonsense, smart government.” Commonsense, smart government requires articulating fundamental values to stand by and “winning the future” can’t do that.

George Warner is a staff writer with Campus Progress.

Related Stories

• Public Opinion Snapshot: Millennials Want a More Equitable Society
• Student Loan Debt Seems to Rise No Matter What the Economy Does
• INFOGRAPHIC: House Republican Cuts for Kids by the Numbers
• GOP Proposes Cuts In Prevention To Keep Student Loan Interest Rates From Doubling
• During President Obama’s Visit, UNC Students Discuss #DontDoubleMyRate