One Liberal Voice Dares to Say, Cut the Budget

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Is there a strong liberal argument to be made for attacking the federal debt?

The question is a critical one for Democrats, because the party is drawing ever closer to an internecine, once-in-a-generation war over whether to seriously scale back the federal budget.

President Obama’s bipartisan panel on the national debt won’t issue any recommendations for reshaping the budget until after the November elections, but that hasn’t stopped liberals from mobilizing to discredit the panel’s work. This month, more than 70 organizations, including the A.F.L.-C.I.O. and MoveOn.org, formed a group, Strengthen Social Security, to pre-emptively oppose the panel’s findings, starting with any reduction in Social Security benefits it might propose. And they are calling on Democrats in Congress to pledge the same.

Under that kind of pressure, you would think it might be hard for the White House and its allies to persuade liberal lawmakers to go along with budget-cutting proposals. But some progressives might be swayed by a different case, like the one I recently heard Earl Blumenauer make.

Mr. Blumenauer, a seven-term congressman from Portland, Ore., is nobody’s idea of a centrist. Bow-tied and erudite in the manner of a prep school headmaster, he is known mostly as a champion of bicycle paths and light rail. (He bikes his way around both Washington and Portland and formed the Bicycle Caucus in the House.) The liberal League of Conservation Voters most recently gave him a perfect 100 rating, while the conservative National Taxpayers Union gave him an “F.”

But Mr. Blumenauer sides with the White House on the notion that Democrats need to do something now about the federal debt, starting with cuts in wasteful federal spending (like some farm subsidies and military outlays) and with changes to cherished entitlement programs.

Read more: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/26/us/politics/26bai.html