I follow the thinking of Rep. Eric Cantor, R-VA, with more than usual interest. Not only does the House minority whip escape from fever swamps of Washington, D.C. with sufficient frequency that he can be often spotted in local restaurants of the suburban Richmond district he represents and where I live, but he has, much to the amazement of his constituents, emerged as the leading candidate for House Majority Leader of the new Congress.
Cantor has always struck me as an establishment Republican. To be sure, he gives voice to the virtues of small government, fiscal conservatism and personal responsibility. He understands that in the long run, only the private sector, not government, can create jobs. He says we need to change the culture of Washington, and he knows that Republicans have to win back the nation’s trust. But I have never had the sense that he has the hair-on-fire sense of urgency required to steer the country away from its calamitous fiscal course.
I find little reason after reading a new missive issued under his name, “Delivering on Our Commitment,” to change my appraisal. In this document, Cantor lays out a blueprint for what he hopes to accomplish as Majority Leader.
“We’re not the same Republican Party” as the one that lost the public’s confidence in 2006, Cantor insists. The new Congress’ priorities will be to reduce the size and scope of government, block tax increases, de-fund Obamacare, and roll back job-killing regulations. I share the priorities, and I feel confident that Cantor will endeavor to advance those goals.
My problem is that Cantor offers virtually no specifics. His document describes in loving detail the process by which he will enact revolutionary change but has little specific to say about what that change will look like. Such vagueness could be excused in the House’s pre-election “Pledge to America” on the grounds that candor about whose ox gets gored would have alienated potential voters. But the Republicans have scored a resounding victory. It’s time to spell out the specifics.
“Delivering on Our Commitment” tells us how the new Congress will work. Cantor plans to bring forward a series of rescission bills, each of which will be open to amendments designed to reduce spending. “This approach,” he says, “will provide House Republicans the opportunity not only to demonstrate our commitment to fiscal discipline, but also to highlight the simple fact that government spending exploded in the last Congress.”
From an inside-baseball perspective, this legislative reform may well prove helpful. But it doesn’t tell us what Cantor wants to change out there in the world beyond Washington, D.C.
Cantor edges closer to such details when he touts “YouCut,” an online community in which citizens can recommend budget cuts. He pledges to schedule at least one YouCut proposal for committee consideration each week and to cajole every Republican congressmen into championing a YouCut initiative. Says Cantor: “This effort will ensure that when someone asks a House Republican, ‘So, what would you cut from the budget?’ we will have a lengthy list of actions and proposals at hand.”
But this is nothing more than public relations gimmickry.
I am gladdened that the GOP Congress will be open to citizen input, but frankly, most citizens look to their Congressmen for leadership! Our representatives are the ones engaged in the day-to-day process of governing. They have the power to hold hearings. They have the staffs to do the scut work. Are they so vapid that they require input from constituents on what to cut?
Cantor reserves his creative thinking for reforming the legislative process. He recommends enhancing oversight, developing clearer standards for bringing legislation to the floor, updating the legislative schedule and House calendar, and reforming the suspension calendar. His arguments all make sense. It’s just that no one outside a half-mile radius from the Capitol building really cares.
By contrast Cantor offers no vision for what a fiscally sustainable government would look like, other than listing some YouCut proposals that Republicans have previously brought to the House floor. Some of the ideas — halting subsidies for first-class Amtrak tickets, or prohibiting stimulus funding for “your government tax dollars at work” signage — are worthy but would yield a pittance. The fact is that rolling back government on the margins will not avert the looming fiscal catastrophe. Indeed, Republicans could de-fund 100% of the domestic budget and get only halfway — $500 billion — toward a balanced budget.
Cantor’s missive ignores the issue of security spending ($900 billion this year), ducks the issue of tax expenditures (another $1 trillion a year in tax credits, exemptions and deductions) and punts on the reform of entitlements ($2 trillion a year). Obama and the Democrats, the congressman says, will demagogue any entitlement cuts the Republicans might propose, and they won’t compromise unless they can raise taxes… which the GOP won’t agree to. As an alternative to doing nothing, Cantor says, we should “immediately start a conversation with the nation” about the kind of entitlement changes people would accept.
Start a conversation?
Dude, there is no time for jaw-jaw. We have a window of opportunity of no more than four or five years before the national debt grows so huge and interest payments on that debt gets so massive — even the Obama administration concedes that interest payments will soar from $200 billion a year to $800 billion by 2020 — that we effectively lose control of the budget. It will take much more than procedural reform and YouCuts to put the United States back on a sustainable fiscal path. Eric Cantor is not the problem in Washington, D.C., but he has yet to show that he is part of the solution.
James A. Bacon is author of “Boomergeddon” and publishes the blog of the same name.
