Today’s Agenda

The Work Period has
been productive as the Senator meets with Utahns around the state and prepares
for the upcoming debates over the debt ceiling, federal spending, various
budget proposals, and public lands.

From the Senator’s
Desk

“Top economic officials in Washington continue to argue that
Congress should vote to increase the debt limit without any commitment to
reduce spending growth—in other words, a “clean debt limit hike.”
They compare linking the debt limit and spending reductions to playing a game
of chicken. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke argues that “using the
debt limit as a bargaining chip is quite risky,” while Treasury Secretary
Timothy Geithner and Council of Economic Advisers Chairman Austan Goolsbee
elaborated on the alleged risks to the financial markets and U.S.
creditworthiness.

“Yet these arguments do not consider the enormous benefits
to the economy from linking the debt limit to spending reductions. Such a link
is good economics in theory and in practice. It is essential to a credible
return to sound fiscal policy and an end to the ongoing debt explosion. Such
credibility is needed to bolster the weak recovery and reduce unemployment as
government spending levels are adjusted. A statement released yesterday that I
signed with 150 economists—including former Treasury Secretary George Shultz
and Nobel Prize winner Robert Mundell—says “Increasing the debt ceiling
without significant spending cuts and budget reforms . . . will bring further harm
to private-sector job growth in America…”

“If politicians just increase the debt limit now without
simultaneously correcting that rapid spending growth, then they will be
expected to do so in the future. In contrast, if they tie any increase in the debt
limit to a halt in the explosion of spending, then people will give them better
odds that they will control spending in the future. Linking the debt limit vote
to spending thus establishes a precedent and valuable credibility.”  — John
B. Taylor, “In Praise of Debt Limit ‘Chicken’”, Wall Street Journal Op-Ed

Around the Water
Cooler

Economy:
Obama’s economic “recovery” is faltering

Land
Grab: Interior reverses controversial ‘wild lands’ policy, Utahan’s rights
protected

Medicare:
“Left on its current trajectory, however, Medicare is headed toward insolvency
even as it consumes an ever-larger slice of federal revenues and the gross
domestic product.”

A Look Ahead

In a recent
memo on “wild lands”, the Secretary of the Interior said he would direct
the Director of the BLM to identify lands that may be “candidates” for wilderness
protection.  Senator Lee has been very
vocal about the Interior Department overstepping congressional authority to
designate wilderness and will be keeping a close eye on the issue.