Charles Krauthammer on Thursday called an offer to fix the fiscal cliff from the White House, presented to House Republicans by Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, “not just a bad deal, this is really an insulting deal.”
“What Geithner offered, what you showed on the screen, Robert E. Lee was offered easier terms at Appomattox, and he lost the Civil War,” Krauthammer said on Fox News on Thursday. “There are not only no cuts in this, there's an increase in spending with a new stimulus. I mean, this is almost unheard of. What do they expect? They obviously expect the Republicans will cave on everything. I think the Republicans ought to simply walk away.”
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The proposal from Geithner would bring the federal debt down by about $4 trillion over the next decade, and includes proposals to increase revenue into the federal government by $1.6 trillion, according to the
Washington Post.
Although there are reportedly about $400 billion in cuts from federal entitlement programs, the $100 billion that must be cut from the Pentagon budget because of the fiscal cliff is put off for a year. The plan, effectively, is to raise revenues and use the money to both pay down the debt and stimulate the economy.
Letting Bush-era tax cuts on upper earners expire at the end of year would bring in $960 billion, and changes to the tax code would likely net about $600 billion more — helping reach the $1.6 trillion Obama would like to see.
The plan also includes an extension of unemployment benefits, the payroll tax cuts, and a $50 billion stimulus package in 2013.
Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell told the Weekly Standard that he “burst out laughing” at the offer, because it isn’t the kind of balanced deal Republicans hope to reach with Obama and the Democrats.
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“Nothing good is happening” in the negotiations, McConnell said, because the focus of the entire plan is on increasing revenue while keeping cuts, if there are any, vague.
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