GOP Unveils New Agenda

House Republicans gathered Thursday at a lumber warehouse in Virginia to unveil their new “Pledge to America.” So what are they promising? To make the Bush tax cuts permanent for everyone, to repeal health-care reform, and to reduce federal spending. The Pledge is 45 pages. Washington Post blogger Ezra Klein says, “Their policy agenda is detailed and specific—a decision they will almost certainly come to regret. Because when you get past the adjectives and soaring language, the talk of inalienable rights and constitutional guarantees, you're left with a set of hard promises that will increase the deficit by trillions of dollars, take health-care insurance away from tens of millions of people, create a level of policy uncertainty businesses have never previously known, and suck demand out of an economy that's already got too little of it.” The New Republic’s Jon Chait is also unimpressed: “It's a reprise of every theme of Republican economic policymaking the party has followed for 20 years.” He adds, “The Pledge to America fulminates against debt, but it should be read as a plan to explode debt through the ceiling.”