Tag Archives: Friday

The sequester is almost certain to kick in on Friday: the GOP hopes you won’t notice

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The only thing the Republican Party has going for it right now is the hope that the $85 billion in automatic spending cuts set to take effect on Friday won’t be felt immediately by very many people:

On Sunday, the White House released 51 fact sheets describing the effects a sequester would have on every state and the District of Columbia.

Republicans have questioned whether the nation would feel the cuts as much as the Obama administration suggests. They’re essentially gambling that the public outcry will be slight, giving them leverage to call for more spending reductions during the months ahead.

Democrats, on the other hand, know that a public backlash could bolster their cause to replace the sequester with increased tax revenue and more discriminate cuts. GOP leaders have said they won’t accept a proposal with new revenue after they already agreed to more taxes under the Jan. 1 deal to avert the fiscal cliff. A White House budget official last week acknowledged that the impacts of the sequester will “get worse over time” but that “the pain points are there,” according to an article in Sunday’s Washington Post.

Democrats wouldn’t have much time for the public to grow weary of the cuts. Another big budget battle looms next month, with lawmakers required to approve a new spending plan before Congress’s last short-term funding measure expires on March 27. Failure to pass a new budget — or at least another temporary plan — before that deadline would result in a government shutdown.

Congress could stop the sequestration cuts with an alternate plan, a compromise by both parties. Republicans could agree to close tax loopholes for the wealthy as a source of income and a more balanced approach to deficit reduction. Austerity hasn’t worked in Europe and it won’t work for us. But without a public outcry, it just doesn’t appear that the teaparty wing of the GOP has any reason to consider a compromise.

And even if there were a public outcry, it would have to come from these members’ own deep-red districts which elected them to office in the first place. Many of these “Republican” congressmen have no interest in what’s good for the entire nation or what ‘most’ people wanted or voted for in 2012. They’re in Congress to collect a paycheck and get re-elected (worst, most do-nothingest, congress in history). Republicans seem to feel pretty confident that there will be no political repercussions now or later if the sequester kicks in. They’re partly right — for now, not a lot of people are paying attention to the landslide of terrible that’s set to begin rolling on Friday. But Democrats think that will change sooner rather than later:

Administration officials insist the pain will be immediate and acute. Though furloughs of federal workers won’t begin in earnest until April, notices could begin rolling out before the March 1 deadline. On Friday, cash-strapped governors and mayors will be notified of cuts to social-service grants and reductions in education funding that will impact the coming school year. And actual federal payouts will decline immediately for at least two programs: Emergency unemployment benefits for the long-term unemployed and nutrition assistance for women, infants and children, known as WIC.

“We have a very diverse parade of horribles,” said a top White House budget official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss implementation plans. “It’s going to be all over the map . . . and it’s going to hit both Democratic and Republican constituencies in a significant way.”

[...] Scott Lilly, a budget expert at the Center for American Progress, a Democratic think tank says, “I think Social Security will have to close a lot of offices. And the ones that make sense to close are the ones in the smallest communities. Which, by the way, happen to be predominantly Republican.” While Social Security benefits are protected, Lilly said, “the White House would be advantaged to let people know that they’re going to have to drive 40 miles to put in their application or get information about their benefits.”

Maybe when the federal government has to cut back on the programs and services that the WeThePeople-Real-’Merican crowd holds sacred (and stops handing out Scooter Chairs like candy) the Republican Party will finally feel some pressure to “work” on an alternative, and maybe they’ll be less inclined to blow off the other half of the country. Time (and individual congressional district suffering) will tell.

Japan Friday

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*cry*

Toshihito Aisawa’s father, mother, grandmother and two cousins are all missing. For days the 9-year-old has been desperately searching for them at evacuation centers in the Japanese city of Ishinomaki, holding up hand written signs pleading for information. On one is written their names, on the other the simple message “I will come again tomorrow.” (msnbc)

BBC:

  • Japan has raised the accident level at a stricken nuclear plant from four to five on a seven-point international danger scale for atomic accidents.
  • 1054: The number of flu cases are on the rise in the quake-affected areas, Japan’s National Infections Diseases Institute says, according to NHK. It warns that the spread of flu and similar infectious diseases would be a severe burden on hospitals in the area.

NPR:

NPR’s Chris Joyce tells Morning Edition emergency crews have laid an electrical cable at the Fukushima complex. They hope to connect it to damaged water pumps in the reactor buildings. They might be able to force more water into the building pools that hold spent nuclear fuel rods. There’s fear the pools have dried up at four reactors, exposing the rods to air and increasing the chance radiation will spread.

There are six reactors at the stricken complex and units One through Four have experienced fires or explosions or both. Reactors Five and Six have been quiet so far. Chris tells NPR Newscasts temperature levels at those two reactors have gone up slightly but are not at worrying levels.

CNN:

  • [8:03 a.m. ET Friday, 9:03 p.m. Friday in Tokyo] The governor of Japan’s hard-hit Miyagi prefecture on Friday asked residents who’ve lost their homes to the earthquake and tsunami to move to other areas while recovery efforts are under way, according to a Kyodo News service report in the Japan Times. Displaced residents could be gone for six months until temporary housing is built, the report said.

Japan quake live blog: Displaced residents asked to leave Miyagi prefecture
Dozens of coffins are pictured on the floor of a hall in the town of Rifu in Miyagi prefecture, Japan, on Friday. (CNN)

Reuters:

  • On the one hand: TEPCO says it may connect power to reactor 4 on Saturday. A few hours ago it said it expects electrical cables to be connected to the generators at reactors 1 and 2 by Saturday morning.
  • On the other hand: Japanese engineers conceded on Friday that burying a crippled nuclear plant in sand and concrete may be a last resort to prevent a catastrophic radiation release, the method used to seal huge leakages from Chernobyl in 1986.