Darned if you do, darned if you don't...

bring things(and people) to the table. There is a dynamics of griping in this piece(Sam Steins HuffPo), but one in particular I must note:

For one, various areas of policy disagreement within the White House remained unresolved. In particular, officials familiar with the discussions say, Obama's economic advisers warned against calling for a final balance of three dollars in spending reductions for every dollar generated in additional tax revenue, arguing the ratio was too explicit.

From his (President Obama's) Fiscal Speech:

I believe reform should protect the middle class, promote economic growth, and build on the fiscal commission’s model of reducing tax expenditures so that there’s enough savings to both lower rates and lower the deficit. And as I called for in the State of the Union, we should reform our corporate tax code as well, to make our businesses and our economy more competitive.

So it seems the realization could be made that the ratio is much more balanced, recognizing loopholes as spending not additional tax revenues. While this may seem like semantics it is actually a valid accounting of rhetoric. And in some ways it is similar to the gripe that the President as leader is either "the one" or is supposed to leak his strategy to followers. By this I refer to the complaints that he kept some in the dark, yet allowed the Republicans to go first on the fiscal plan. There are many fronts in the process called government, but it is different than partisan politics or military strategy.

[Future pacing? i.e. thanks to Thom Hartmann for reference to "previous pacing" in regards to: Why don't we call it the Republican Debt and Deficits?

But after Democrats and Republicans committed to fiscal discipline during the 1990s, we lost our way in the decade that followed. We increased spending dramatically for two wars and an expensive prescription drug program -- but we didn’t pay for any of this new spending. Instead, we made the problem worse with trillions of dollars in unpaid-for tax cuts -- tax cuts that went to every millionaire and billionaire in the country; tax cuts that will force us to borrow an average of $500 billion every year over the next decade.

To give you an idea of how much damage this caused to our nation’s checkbook, consider this: In the last decade, if we had simply found a way to pay for the tax cuts and the prescription drug benefit, our deficit would currently be at low historical levels in the coming years.

That is not all...(later referred to as "hanging chad" .]

[The above presaged the Facebook Townhall with President Obama (video).(ABC? Real Clear or Misc?)]
[Then there is bold or miss-taking taxes.]

[Italics mark - editing - and I note here additional gripe from Sam Stein:

Several members of Congress also expressed agitation with the timing...(cont.) ]