Outspending Dems on Medicare is a Lose-Lose Game
Boehner's plan to repeal Obama's Medicare cuts is a no-win strategy. Trying to outspend the Dems could give tax hikers the upper hand or hurt the GOP at the polls.
David Frum is right to say that John Boehner’s promise to hold a vote on overturning President Obama’s Medicare cuts shows that the Republican leader isn’t serious about governing or balancing the budget. But David is wrong to say that Boehner is being “clever.” Quite to the contrary, Boehner has created a no-win situation for himself and Republicans in Congress.
If the next speaker seriously pursues a “repeal-the cuts” bill, he will likely “succeed” in narrow terms and thereby hand tax-hikers the key to the fiscal kingdom. If he starts a media war with Obama and tries to force Democrats to vote against a plan to repeal the cuts, on the other hand, he will almost certainly lose the battle and cost Republicans dearly in the process. Let’s examine both alternatives.
While Boehner will be able to ram any bill he wants through the House, getting anything through the Senate—even in the unlikely event that Republicans capture 51 seats and nominal control—will require a good number of Democratic votes. Getting these votes, to say nothing of keeping some moderates in the Republican Senate caucus happy, is going to require a lot of horse trading on the Senate floor and then, by Boehner and his allies, in conference. Any bill that actually becomes law, therefore, would almost certainly become a big government nightmare that would actually add new benefits to Medicare and offer pork to members. Why, after all, would any Democrat cross party leadership without getting something in return? The end game here would be pretty simple: the debt grows even faster and, faced with serious problems (including, perhaps, a downgrade of United States debt in world markets) tax hikes coupled, probably, with cuts in defense spending, would become the only political possibility.
If, on the other hand, Boehner tries to turn the vote into political theater and make the process unpalatable for Democrats simply in order to score points, he’ll likely suffer an even greater defeat. As Newt Gingrich proved when he tried to go toe-to-toe with the Clinton administration, no House leader has the media reach, resources, or power to truly engage the President one-on-one. If Boehner tries this route, he’ll have to load up any “repeal the Medicare cuts” bill with lots of unrelated things—deep cuts to other domestic programs, extreme social policies—that will be quite easy for Democrats to demagogue. Democrats can then paint themselves as defenders of common sense and deal a political defeat to the Republican Party.
As George W. Bush’s eight years in office proved, Republicans cannot win political battles or elections by trying to outspend Democrats. Other alternatives, including the still ill-defined “repeal and replace” plan that many Republican have run on (that might entail restoring some of the President’s cuts), seem like much better strategies. But any effort to simply repeal President Obama’s Medicare cuts seems doomed to failure.