Obama Debt Commission: Erskine Bowles, Alan Simpson To Chair Panel, Says Obama Official

WASHINGTON — Determined to have a deficit commission with or without Congress' backing, President Barack Obama plans to announce on Thursday that he is establishing a panel similar to – although weaker than – the one lawmakers rejected.

Former White House chief of staff Erskine Bowles and former Republican Senate Whip Alan Simpson would lead the panel, a senior administration official said Tuesday. The official spoke on the condition of anonymity because the president's executive order creating the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform had not been announced.

The deficit spiked to an extraordinary $1.4 trillion last year and could top that figure this year as the struggling economy puts a big dent in tax revenues. Even worse from the perspective of economists and deficit hawks, the medium-term deficit picture is for deficits to hit around $1 trillion a year for the foreseeable future.

Obama and his economic team have said repeatedly that this is not sustainable. He told lawmakers during his State of the Union address that he would go around their vote and appoint a version of a deficit commission.

Obama's version of the commission is a weak substitute for what he really wanted: a panel created by Congress that could force lawmakers to consider unpopular remedies to reduce the debt, including curbing politically sensitive entitlements like Social Security and Medicare.

As rejected, the bipartisan 18-member panel would have worked for much of the year and, if 14 members agree, report a deficit reduction blueprint after the November elections that would be voted on before the new Congress convenes next year. The 14 would have to include at least half of the panel's Republicans.

That idea crashed in the Senate, defeated by equal numbers of Democrats and Republicans – some of whom initially supported the idea.

Although Obama's commission will lack any requirement for Congress to act on its advice, it will provide some political cover and big-name backing.

Bowles, the president of the University of North Carolina, served as Democratic President Bill Clinton's chief of staff from 1996 to 1998. Simpson, a senator from Wyoming from 1979 to 1997, was the No. 2 Republican and the top GOP member of the Social Security subcommittee.

Obama planned to announce the plan on Thursday before he heads west for political events in Colorado and Nevada.

Comments

[jmb27]

07:21 PM on 02/17/2010

Predatory Lending is a major contributor to the economic turmoil we are currently experiencing.

Here is an example of what I am talking about:
Scott Veerkamp / Predatory Lending (Franklin Township School Board Member.)

Please review this information from U.S. Senator Jeff Merkley regarding deceptive lending practices:
"Steering payments were made to brokers who enticed unsuspecting homeowners into deceptive and expensive mortgages. These secret bonus payments, often called Yield Spread Premiums, turned home mortgages into a SCAM."

The Center for Responsible Lending says YSP "steals equity from struggling families."
1. Scott collected nearly $10,000 on two separate mortgages using YSP and junk fees. 2. This is an average of $5,000 per loan. 3. The median value of the properties was $135,000. 4. Clearly, this type of lending represents a major ripoff for consumers.

http://merkley.senate.gov/newsroom/press/release/?id=A09C6A80-537A-4EB1-83C5-31925F046B6F

[lauraj400]

06:20 PM on 02/17/2010

Bush made OBAMA do the bailouts?WOW.All I know is without SS I'm screwed.

[TSAQ]

02:56 PM on 02/17/2010

(CHALLENGING [1] OF GOD'S CHOSEN) - [PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA] - [ESTHER 3:8] Haman now approached the king about the matter. "There is a [CERTAIN RACE OF PEOPLE] scattered through all the provinces of your kingdom," he began, "and their laws are different from those of any other nation, and they refuse to obey the kings's laws; therefore, it is not in the king's interest to let them live. [ESTHER 4:13-14] This was [MORDECAI'S] reply to Esther: "Do you think you will escape there in the palace, when all other [JEWS] are killed? If you keep quiet at a time like this, [GOD] will deliver the [JEWS] from some other source, but you and your relatives will die; what's more, who can say but that [GOD] has brought you into the palace for just such a time as this?" [ESTHER 7:9] Then Harbona, one of the king's aides, said, "Sir, Haman has just ordered a 75-foot gallows constructed, to hang [MORDECAI], the man who saved the king from assassination! It stands in Haman's courtyard." "Hang Haman on it," the king ordered. [THE LIVING BIBLE PARAPHRASED]

[RevJimIII]

02:45 PM on 02/17/2010

The true theory of our Constitution is surely the wisest and best, that the States are independent as to everything within themselves, and united as to everything respecting foreign affairs. Let the General Government be reduced to foreign concerns only, and let our affairs be disentangled from those of all other nations, except as to commerce, which the merchants will manage the better, the more they are left free to manage for themselves, and our General Government may be reduced to a very simple organization, and a very inexpensive one; a few plain duties to be performed by a few servants. - Thomas Jefferson

[TheFriendlyAtheist]

05:55 PM on 02/17/2010

Thank god Jefferson had nothing to do with writing the Constitution. I suggest you study the historical record for his change of heart on such things as quoted above when he became President.

[billobasher]

02:37 PM on 02/17/2010

Obama's budgets are HONEST. Bush budgets HID the war costs. I'll bet Rush never told his sheep about this.

[billobasher]

02:35 PM on 02/17/2010

Ahother absurd thing is when soundbite politicians run for office comparing the national budget to household budgets. The claim "You have to balance your budget, why doesn't the government?' That sounds so good to people who are misinformed.

Almost every household owes more than they make. What about having a mortgage? What about credit card balances? As long as you pay those bills on time they do not hurt you.

[TheFriendlyAtheist]

05:58 PM on 02/17/2010

Good point billobasher. Most households are much more in debt than the fed. gov.

[billobasher]

02:30 PM on 02/17/2010

Are right wingers so du-mb that they think all we need to do is get rid of "Pork" and we would have no deficit?

[billobasher]

02:30 PM on 02/17/2010

For too long pols have been selling American's a bill of goods.

First of all, only an id-iot believes we could possibly reduce our debt without tax increases. I have yet to see a credible economist who claim we do not need tax increases if we are going to bring the debt down.

To get our debt down we would need at least a 20% tax increase on every tax payer, and a 20% spending cut across the board. Good luck selling that one. How do you think that will effect our economy?

[billobasher]

02:26 PM on 02/17/2010

One of the great frauds of all time is all this alarmist nonsense about "The debt." Many respected economists from both sides say it is not that big of a problem. Sadly, pols runnign for office have found a nice soundbite with "We are passing this bill down to our children." Or just use the word "PORK" and you get a reaction.

The truth is that our debt as a percentage of the GDP is smaller than it was after WW II. China needs us. If we go under they go under so they are not going to do anything bad to us. When we factor in the assets that we have vs the debt, we are fine.

Dick Cheney said, "Deficits don't matter" and they don't.

Why do you think every president since Reagan have run on the deficit scare, but once they are in office they do NOTHING about it? It is because it is a giant strawman.

If you want to throw this economy over the edge right now, implement huge sppending cuts.

[RevJimIII]

02:40 PM on 02/17/2010

We must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and liberty or profusion and servitude. If we run into such debt, as that we must be taxed in our meat and in our drink, in our necessaries and our comforts, in our labors and our amusements, for our calling and our creeds...[we will] have no time to think, no means of calling our miss-managers to account but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow-sufferers... And this is the tendency of all human governments. A departure from principle in one instance becomes a precedent for[ another]... till the bulk of society is reduced to be mere automatons of misery... And the fore-horse of this frightful team is public debt. Taxation follows that, and in its train wretchedness and oppression. - Thomas Jefferson

[billobasher]

02:45 PM on 02/17/2010

And Jim,

What makes Thomas Jefferson so infallible? What did he know about the world we are living in today?

I have never understood why people like you hold every word uttered by the founders as sacred. Jefferson also thought it was okay for human beings to own other human beings.

So what?

[billobasher]

02:18 PM on 02/17/2010

"PORK" is a nice soundbite. The average person, especialy the tea baggers do not grasp that if we got rid of every ounce of "Pork" it would have little impact on our debt.

The only way to reduce our debt is through economic growth, real cuts in Medicare, Social Security, and the military. Also, ther needs to be a TAX INCREASE.

What pol on the left or right is going to do these things?

[billobasher]

02:16 PM on 02/17/2010

The panel was a good idea becauseit would have forced the House and Seante to vote on the reccomedations. It is incredible that the SEVEN GOp co-sponsors abandoned it once Obama came out for it.

This panel is probably a waste of time because there is no binding vote for the Congress.

[StalinsLoveChild]

01:49 PM on 02/17/2010

I love this paragraph;

Obama's version of the commission is a weak substitute for what he really wanted: a panel created by Congress that could force lawmakers to consider unpopular remedies to reduce the debt, including curbing politically sensitive entitlements like Social Security and Medicare.

How it should read;

Obama, having presented a budget to congress that calls for $1.35 Trillion in deficit spending, sought political cover by asking congress to create a debt commission to make the tough choices that he himself is unwilling to make. The "pass the buck" commission was rejected by congress outright. Plan B is a weak substitute that Obama hopes Republicans will fall for. Not.

Come on Obama, you're going to be a one-termer anyway, do the right thing and present a budget that starts to take down this trajectory and callout any dems and repubs who won't go along.

[bichn]

01:52 PM on 02/17/2010

That's right, he should freeze all spending and just send us into a greater depression. Brilliant.

[StalinsLoveChild]

01:58 PM on 02/17/2010

Where did I say freeze?

[billobasher]

02:36 PM on 02/17/2010

And the 1.3 TRILLION deficit that your boy Bush handed him?

[RevJimIII]

02:55 PM on 02/17/2010

You said deficits don't matter.. didn't you?

[StalinsLoveChild]

04:57 PM on 02/17/2010

Remember, Obama ASKED for the job and we hired him to do it. He "inherited" nothing.

[AntiSheep13]

01:43 PM on 02/17/2010

Prior to Ob@ma's election, the largest political group was the non-voters. The problem for Ob@ma is that he is losing the support of the non-voters because he is looking like just another BS politician. Those feelings of hope and change is what prompted me to vote for Ob@ma and I have been trying to keep faith in him but he is making it very difficult. Here's an example of his B@sh-like decision making that is really burning me out.
B@sh Era Medical Marijuana Foe Nominated by Ob@ma to Head DEA
http://www.salem-news.com/articles/february152010/dea_leonhart_tk.php
This link takes you to the petition page that asks the senate to block this pick:
http://criminaljustice.change.org/actions/view/ask_the_senate_to_block_anti-medical_marijuana_dea_leader”

[Rangergirl]

01:39 PM on 02/17/2010

The party of NO again shows that they don't care what the President wants to do they will say NO. They are supposed to be concerned about the deficit....Not concerned enough to come up with help in getting it under control. They just say no no no... I want you to fail.

[thetruthmustbetold]

01:20 PM on 02/17/2010

This has nothing to do with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac running wild at the behest of a few key Democrats and a flawed aproach to the housing market by the Clinton Administration. Obama quadruples the deficit and raises taxes in the middle of an economic crisis and this is somehow an undoing of the mistakes Bush made.Right. Got it.

[bichn]

01:41 PM on 02/17/2010

I guess you would have preferred he freeze spending sending us over the cliff that W drove us to.....you will understand then if we don't ask for your advice.

[RevJimIII]

02:19 PM on 02/17/2010

There is a difference between freezing and a controlled reduction. Not to mention, quit adding unnecessary debt on top of the problem.. not just Bush at fault here..