Debt Man Walking: The Verdict

So, after reading this bill over and letting it peculate a little, I've come to a conclusion about it. In short, the entire affair is a sham.
Allow me to explain. After displaying unparalleled brinksmanship and a profound ignorance about the potential consequences of defaulting, Congress agreed on a plan that is almost entirely spending cuts. However, to satiate the Left, the debt deal included the creation of a "Supercongress", which is really nothing more than a committee whose task is to come up with a plan to reduce America's deficit. This group of 12 people is made up of six conservatives and six liberals; six from the House and six from the Senate. They've got until December to present the nation with their grand plan, at which point their resolution must get an up or down vote; if it doesn't, then huge spending cuts go into effect- half from domestic spending and half from military spending.

Here's the problem.

Section 402(e)(2) states that if the House accepts the Supercongress' resolution first and sends it to the Senate, then the thing must be voted on posthaste and cannot be sent to another committee to be altered. BUT, if the Senate accepts the resolution first and sends it to the House, the House can send it to a committee- if the resolution contains any revenue. In other words, the House can shuffle the entire Supercongress' work off to a committee if it has tax increases (or a removal of tax cuts to pre-Bush levels, for example).

Why is that bad?

The House, as you may know, is largely Republican. Many of these representatives have taken this pledge to never increase taxes on anybody. It's the brainchild of Grover Norquist and the Americans for Tax Reform group that champions such causes as elimination of the Fairness Doctrine in the name of "free speech" (or, rather, speech only for those who can afford prime time costs without any government regulations stating channels must allot equal airtime for opposing viewpoints)... but I digress. Through Mr. Norquist's influence, it has become conservative dogma that increasing taxes on any business at all, even enormous multinational conglomerates, is unacceptable. The House, therefore, has the unique composition to push the entire Supercongress proposal into committee (should it contain any revenue language) where it will be detained at length, preventing meaningful debate on the House floor until the last minute. This is, of course, all before the overwhelmingly Republican House votes on it- which, if it contains revenue, will be a vote of (in all likelihood) "no". In this scenario, the bill fails, and cuts are enacted- but no revenue.

The inclusion of cuts to defense should the Supercongress' measure not pass is the only reason a Republican would vote on it; such an action could, in an election year, be painted as being "against the military" or "against jobs" (as a base closing in someone's district would be terrible press). But just as likely, in my eyes, is the opportunity that military cuts present the Republican party: the chance to say "Look how serious about reigning in government spending we are! We even slashed the parts of the budget we like!", without ever addressing the other half of the budget-balancing equation. Their corporate patrons, with their newly-minted Personhood thanks to Citizens United, will surely thank them for not pressing them to pay taxes.

The idea of the Supercongress as a compromise is, at its core, a falsehood; manufactured bipartisanship and nothing more. I expected more from the President's negotiations.