Here's a prediction: when all's said and done and the debt ceiling fight is finally over, Eric Cantor is going to be a lot further away from becoming Speaker of the House than he was six months ago. Every days he's looking more and more like a petulant child playing media games and less and less like a principled statesman working in the best interests of the country. He thinks he's being clever and savvy, but the rest of the country is seeing a grasping, opportunistic politician who thinks that posturing for Fox News is more important than facing up to serious problems. He's setting his career back a decade.
UPDATE:Greg Sargent points outthat Democrats are apparently doing everything they can to speed up Cantor's demise. Harry Reid lit into him pretty harshly a few minutes ago, but Greg isn't sure this is going to hurt Cantor: "If his intransigence on revenues is earning him high profile criticism from Beltway journalists and from the Senate Majority Leader and even the President, this will only turn him into more of a crusading anti-tax hero in some people’s eyes." Maybe so. But unless he changes his tune pretty quickly, I think he's losing the support of all but the hardest of the hard core.
(Darren McCollester - Getty Images)Stan Collender is a former staffer on both the House and Senate budget committees, founder of the blog “Capital Gains and Games,” and a partner at Quorvis Communications, where he works with clients in the financial sector. He was also one of the first budget experts to address the House Republicans after the 2010 election. Looking back, he says, that meeting should have told him all he needed to know about how this budget battle has played out. We spoke earlier this afternoon.
Ezra Klein: How did you end up speaking to the Tea Party?
Stan Collender: You remember Snowmageddon? The next day, I was sitting at home with no power or heat and my cellphone rings. It was Michele Bachmann inviting me to be the first speaker at the first Tea Party meeting in the House. Now, you know my background. I was being considered for OMB in this administration. But where I come from, you don’t say no to a member of Congress.
The meeting finally took place on February 28th. This was the day before the vote on the first CR. So I spoke for 25 minutes, but it’s what came next that was interesting. After me were the Tea Party state chairs from Virginia, Pennsylvania and Florida. And they spent the next 45 minutes screaming at these members, saying, plainly, we elected you and we can unelect you. And this was at longtime members like Joe Barton, who long predated the Tea Party. I never have seen members of Congress treated like that. Especially by their friends.
EK: And was it a list of demands? What did the Republicans have to do in order to avoid being “unelected”?
SC: The marching orders were, first, you must not vote to extend the continuing resolution [that would keep the government open through 2011] unless it, in their words, “defunds Obamacare.” Number two, you must not, under any circumstances, vote for an increase in the debt ceiling. Period. No conditions. Number three, and they said this explicitly, we don’t trust John Boehner or Eric Cantor. And the state party chair from Virginia was from Cantor’s district. And, finally, the members themselves told me afterwards that what they thought they did wrong in 1995 and 1996 was they gave in too early to Clinton.
The next day, five Tea Party Republicans voted against the first extension. The second one lost 54 Republicans. The third one lost 59 Republicans. What I took from that was, first, that the debt ceiling was going to be a lot more trouble than anyone realized. They did not want a negotiation there. There was a religious-like fervor on that point: Voting for the debt ceiling was a sin, and you can’t just sin a little. Second, Boehner and Cantor were going to have a lot more trouble than anyone thought. And then the third thing was for all those who thought they could get a deal early, it was clear to me that there was no way they could come up with a compromise or agree to a deal before the deadline. Even if it was a great deal, the presumption would be that they gave up too much by not waiting till the last second, just like with Clinton. So there’s no way they won’t blow through the 22nd of July, the date that got set up for an early deadline.
EK: What do you think the chance is we see a deal before Aug. 2?
SC: Less than 50-50.
EK: What’s the scenario for that? Is it something like the talks seem like they’re going somewhere, and then whatever the negotiators come up with unexpectedly fails on the floor after the Tea Party whips on it?
SC: Something like that. In the back of my mind I keep remembering something Peter Orszag said, which was you were going to need a combination of Democrats and Republicans in the House, and the only way that vote would be acceptable for Boehner to schedule is after negative market reaction that spooks people. It’s not unlike how TARP got through. The average member of Congress has got to be sitting there saying if I don’t vote for this, it’ll be a disaster, and if I do vote for it, it’ll be a disaster. So without the negative market effect, there’s not enough pressure. But remember Bachmann is running around saying there will be no negative effect.
EK: Which suggests to me that a market reaction could have a more significant effect on the psychology of some of these members of Congress than we give it credit for. They’re not prepared for it, and if it comes, it disproves some of the assumptions they’re working with.
SC: Right. And remember the general idea on Wall Street right now is that there will be a deal because there’s always a deal. But Wall Street works off of expectations. So if the market realizes they got this wrong, the reaction could be larger than expected.
As Democrats hammer Republicans for refusing to put taxes on the table, entitlement cuts remain a non-starter among leading Democrats – even as President Obama has offered to take on some of his party’s sacred cows.
On ABC’s “Top Line” today, Rep. Chris Van Hollen, the ranking Democrat on the House Budget Committee, said that while Democrats support cost savings inside of Medicare, he and other leaders in his party staunchly oppose benefit cuts, higher premiums, or increased use of “means-testing” to scale down benefits based on recipients’ wealth.
“There are lots of ways you can modernize Medicare without slashing and hurting benefits, and we put those ideas on the table,” Van Hollen, D-Md., told us.
Pressed by Jonathan Karl whether he could accept benefit cuts as part of a broad deficit deal, Van Hollen said he doesn’t think that’s the right path.
“I've said I don't think that that's the right way to do it. I agree 100 percent that we don't need to cut Medicare benefits. But there are other things you can do to save considerable amounts of money in the Medicare program without cutting Medicare benefits.”
Van Hollen added that even outright Democratic opposition to Medicare cuts should be interpreted as something that binds President Obama’s negotiating position.
“While a lot of people have voiced their strong opinions on this issue, they've given the president the running room necessary to have a major discussion,” he said. “In the context of a larger agreement where the Republicans are willing to make some tough decisions when it comes to closing corporate tax loopholes and asking the folks at the very top … we're willing to give the president some running room to get a deal. We're not the ones who said, 'We, under no circumstances, we do anything.' If the president can reach a noble agreement…”
Van Hollen defended the president’s vow to veto a short-term fix that raises the debt ceiling but doesn’t carry the country through 2013, warning that anything less than a major package would drive interest rates up.
“That's a way to hurt the economy. What we need to do is do something that sends a signal. We're not going to continue to play Russian roulette with the economy. And we are acting like a third-world country when you're going month-to-month on the debt ceiling.”
Still, he expressed some openness to a package that leaves room for additional borrowing for perhaps another year – a smaller sum than the president is seeking.
“I'm not gonna right now say 100 percent whether I would reject any option that was ever put on the table,” he said. “We're looking for solutions here. I think what [Senate Minority Leader Mitch] McConnell put on the table, coupled with other things, may offer an opportunity. But of course, that's been shot down by Republicans in the House.”
“Here's the difference: Democrats have not said that we would allow the economy to tank and people to lose their jobs if we don't get things 100 percent our way. That has been the Republican position, to take the credit-worthiness of the United States hostage in this case. Big mistake.”
Watch the full interview with Rep. Chris Van HollenHERE.
Also today, we checked in with Josh Rogin of Foreign Policy about theteams being assembledby the 2012 presidential contenders.
Mitt Romney, Rogin told us, is “by far the candidate who has the most infrastructure in place” when it comes to a foreign-policy apparatus. Tim Pawlenty, meanwhile, is the candidate who is hewing most closely to traditional neoconservative positions.
And with debt talks taking onHollywood tones, we invited “Top Line” viewers to suggest the next plot turn worthy of “The West Wing” for today’s “Top Tweet” contest.
It would appear our programs have some overlap in viewership. But today’s winner,@WhatJoeThnkn, imagines a new role for Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, the former White House chief of staff: “maybe Rahm makes a sweeps-week guest appearance ala Josh Lyman, just in time to muscle a backroom deal?”
PTI | 02:07 PM,Jul 14,2011 NMITLI project was initiated last year jointly by CSIR and the Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES), along with researchers from nine institutions, including CSMCRI, IIT-Kharagpur, IICT Hyderabad, NIOT Chennai and NIO Goa.As per the National Policy on Biofuel, 10 per cent mandatory blending of ethanol with gasoline was to become effective from October, 2008.
The target has been lowered as sourcing ethanol on mass scale so as to meet the mandate is still a challenge before the nation, sources said."The present target for both blending of ethanol with gasoline and biofuels (B-5) with diesel is five per cent and Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas will be knowing about its implementation," Director, Ministry of New and Renewable Energy, Anil Dhussa told PTI on telephone.An indicative target of 20 per cent blending of bio-fuels, both for bio-diesel and bio-ethanol, by 2017 is proposed, the national policy states.The NMITLI project is significant as the use of bio-fuels has become compelling in view of the tightening automotive vehicle emission standards to curb air pollution, Ghosh said. "The production of bio-fuels must not affect food security and the micro-algal project gains significance on this count," Ghosh said.
A car that runs on micro algae biodiesel
Ahmedabad, July 14, (PTI):
Researchers have claimed to have run a car on B-20 biodiesel derived from marine micro algae. Under the New Millennium India Technology Leadership project (NMITLI), a regular diesel vehicle, Tavera, under full load condition, was successfully test driven on B-20 biodiesel (20 per cent biodiesel blend) on July 10, a top official of the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) said on Thursday.
The project was initiated last year jointly by CSIR and the Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES), along with researchers from nine institutions, including CSMCRI, IIT-Kharagpur, IICT-Hyderabad, NIOT-Chennai and NIO-Goa.
The biodiesel was prepared from mats of microalgae found growing naturally in the West coast of India by the Bhavnagar-based Central Salt Marine and Chemical Research Institute (CSMCRI).
The mileage derived from the test drive was 12.4 km, which is better than the normal average per litre of 10-11 km of the regular vehicles run on diesel, the official said.
“The aim of the project is to develop a scalable viable process for production of bio-fuel from marine algae. In the first step, road worthiness of B-20 marine micro algae biodiesel under full load conditions has been proven,” NMITLI coordinator Dr Vibha Malhotra told PTI on telephone.
“The next step would be to run vehicle under full load conditions on B-100 (neat biodiesel) marine micro algae biodiesel and to look at its economic viability,” she said.
“Although the demonstration aimed at proving road worthiness of micro-algal biodiesel, it remains to be seen whether such mat-forming marine micro algae can be cultivated inland or induced to grow rapidly and on large scale in the sea itself,” said CSMCRI Director Dr Pushpito Ghosh.
On the heels of the Administration’s recent decision to place a de facto moratorium on offshore drilling in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic, we asked readers of today’s Wall Street Journal if they knew how much that decision might cost in terms of lost government revenue.
According to a study by ICF International, expanding domestic energy development in America’s offshore areas could alone generate$1.3 trillionin government revenues over the life of the resource – along with major increases in jobs and economic activity that result from offshore development.
To put this figure in perspective, consider the following numbers:
In 2010, the U.S. federal budget deficit was$1.3 trillion.
The total U.S. national debt currently stands at about$13.8 trillion.
The U.S. oil and natural gas industry contributes more than$1 trilliona year to the U.S. economy.
The project was initiated last year jointly by CSIR and the Ministry of Earth Sciences (MoES), along with researchers from nine institutions, including CSMCRI, IIT-Kharagpur, IICT-Hyderabad, NIOT-Chennai and NIO-Goa.
Mark Charles wrote: