bowles simpson. we understand it. once you sit there for ten months listening to this and understand we borrow 40 cents for every dollar we spend in this country, you say it s unsustainable. at some point the bond dealers will decide the future of america. we better step in before that happens. well, i guess the question another question on the this on the fiscal front, senator, is the question of revenue. right? ic oi think one of the things that bowles simpson said that we can t keep the relative cap on revenue relative to the size of the economy. that s a lot of that they don t want to talk about either. are you guys are the democrats even comfortable talking about opening up a conversation on revenue. i know republicans don t want to do that but democrats aren t exactly champing at the bit to have that conversation, as far as i can see, either. this is called tax expenditures or the tax code, deductions, tax earmarks. it costs us $1.1 trillion a year
spending. the other said we need to spend more money to invest in things like high-speed rail and high-speed internet. megyn: president obama said that he will save us $1 trillion over 10 years. the cuts are phony. he said, i will save $1 trillion in spending over the next decade. if you take a look at it, the biggest cut is to assume that we ll spend in iraq and afghanistan at certain levels and we re drawing down troops in iraq and afghanistan, so suddenly it saves us $1.1 trillion in war costs and $200 billion in interest. that s how it was going to be anyway. nobody was planning to have surge levels for the next 10 years. in fact, the surge has ended in iraq. there is about $104 billion worth of real cuts, more than offset by additional spending being added.
spending goes up every year, $8.7 trillion in new spending. $13 trillion in new borrowing over this budget. now, smoke and mirrors have been done by republicans and by democrats in the past. and so we ve seen budget gimmicks from both political parties, from white houses in the past. this year contains a pretty good doozy. it basically assumes that we re going to be at afghanistan and iraq levels for the next ten years like we are today. we re going to have a ten-year afghanistan surge. we ll be at the current levels for ten years. everybody knows that s not true. the president has already preannounced his withdrawal dates from these excursions. and he s basically saying, so if we re not there for ten years we re going to actually ramp down spending with withdrawals and that will save us $1.1 trillion. when you pull aside the curtain and look at all the snoek and the mirrors, it looks like to me that this thing has about $8 of tax increases for $1 of spending
what specific programs cuts will democrats propose? dust off the deficit commission report. take a look at some of the things we acress there. $3 in spending cuts for every dollar in new revenue. it was serious when it came to cutting spending. you must do that. secondly, when it came to revenue, take a look at the tax code. in it all of the time i have been in washington we never put the tax code on the table and said does it still make sense. all of the deductions, all the credits, all the tax ear marks, do they make sense? they cost us $1.1 trillion each year. all of the tax code deduction taking money out of the treasury equal the personal income taxes collected in america. why don t we have that conversation? the deficit commission thinks we should and i agree. chris: and, of course, the deficit commission and as you say you voted for the bowles simpson plan also called for raising the retirement age far
what specific programs cuts will democrats propose? dust off the deficit commission report. take a look at some of the things we acress there. $3 in spending cuts for every dollar in new revenue. it was serious when it came to cutting spending. you must do that. secondly, when it came to revenue, take a look at the tax code. in it all of the time i have been in washington we never put the tax code on the table and said does it still make sense. all of the deductions, all the credits, all the tax ear marks, do they make sense? they cost us $1.1 trillion each year. all of the tax code deduction taking money out of the treasury equal the personal income taxes collected in america. why don t we have that conversation? the deficit commission thinks we should and i agree. chris: and, of course, the deficit commission and as you say you voted for the bowles simpson plan also called for raising the retirement age far