The GOP's dual-trigger nightmare - Ezra Klein - Washington Post

I have been of the view that President Obama actually came out pretty well on the debt limit fiasco and on last year's budget negotiations.  Key to this view is that the Bush tax cuts were extended until after the election - when they expire.  That puts them at the center of the presidential campaign - a point in the Democrats' favor - because the focus will be on middle-income tax cuts and upper-income tax increases.  Do nothing and taxes go up for both.  Obama's veto power is effective there.  The "automatic trigger" cuts are defense-tilted and exempt Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare benefits.  Ezra Klein explains.  - GWC
Wonkbook: The GOP's dual-trigger nightmare - The Washington Post:

by Ezra Klein

There are two triggers. One is an extremely progressive spending trigger worth $1.2 trillion that goes off on January 1, 2013. The other is an extremely progressive tax trigger worth $3.8 trillion that goes off on...January 1, 2013. If you count reduced interest payments, the two policies alone would reduce future deficits by about $6 trillion. That's far more than anything the supercommittee came close to discussing. It's distributed far more progressively than anything the Democrats have even considered proposing. And all that needs to happen for it to pass is, well, nothing.

Republicans can't stop these triggers on their own. They need Senate Democrats and President Obama to join them in passing an alternative, or they need House and Senate Democrats to join them in overturning President Obama's veto of their alternative. So the only way for Republicans to avoid this dual-trigger nightmare is to somehow convince Democrats to bail them out. And for that, they have two points of leverage.

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