"Chairman Ryan knows I'm not going to vote for his budget, and I know he's not going to vote for mine," says Murray. "We're going to find the common ground between our two budgets that we both can vote on and that's our goal."
The thing to remember that Ryan is working to get cuts to earned-benefit programs onto that common ground.
Ryan cast his "no" vote on the deal that set up the conference committee in order to begin organizing his troops for a fight that will set up the next shutdown and debt-ceiling struggles. The committee has a deadline of December 13. That makes its report -- or the lack of one -- the first deadline on a schedule that proceeds toward new continuing resolution and debt-ceiling votes in January and February. That creates tremendous pressure for a deal, and Ryan's at the ready.
That answer to his supplications must be a firm "No."
That's what Senator Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, is proposing. Sanders, one of a member of the conference committee says: "it is imperative that this new budget helps us create the millions of jobs we desperately need and does not balance the budget on the backs of working people, the elderly, the children, the sick and the poor..."
"The Senate budget protects Medicare while the House version would end Medicare as we know it by providing coupons for private health insurance. Unlike the House budget, the Senate resolution does not repeal the Affordable Care Act, which would prevent more than 20 million Americans from getting health insurance. The House version would eliminate grants for up to 1 million college students while the Senate plan protects Pell grants. The House version would kick up to 24 million Americans off of Medicaid while the Senate budget would protect their benefits. The Senate budget calls for new revenue while the House version would provide trillions of dollars in tax breaks mainly for the wealthiest Americans and profitable corporations offset by increased taxes on the middle class."
Ryan would be more than happy to settle for a "common ground" agreement that opens the way for a little bit of privatization, a little bit of movement toward vouchers, a little bit of means testing, a little bit of an increase in the retirement age. But if he gets that, the big "blink" that everyone was talking about during the shutdown fight will have happened.
If that is where this thing ends, it might not be the Democrats who get the last laugh.
It might yet be a Republican named Paul Ryan.
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