https://www.forbes.com/sites/stancol.../#4bedeb8a5e08

House and Senate Republicans, who should be jonesing to pass a budget this year, are instead running away from doing that as fast as they possibly can. In spite of the legal requirement that Congress adopt an annual budget resolution, the GOP is increasingly likely to violate federal law by refusing to do one this year.

The White House and congressional GOP insisted the big tax cut bill would pay for itself so there would be no negative impact on the federal deficit or national debt. They also said the Trump/GOP economic plans would result in a balanced budget within 10 years. The fiscal 2019 budget resolution — the one Congress is supposed to debate and adopt this year — would be the first one considered since the tax bill was enacted and, therefore, the first with projections that should validate and confirm those promises.

That means House and Senate Republicans should be rushing to get it done, take another victory lap and prove themselves to be budget seers, sages, oracles and truth tellers.

But the GOP is doing the exact opposite.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) was the first high-level Republican to say Congress might not even consider let alone adopt a budget resolution this year. Then, at the GOP retreat last week, in what was close to his first official act as the new chairman of the House Budget Committee, Rep. Steve Womack (R-AR), let it be known that he and his committee had much better things to do than a 2019 budget resolution.

Not doing a budget resolution means there can't be reconciliation, and without reconciliation the biggest parts of the GOP's legislative agenda will be virtually impossible to enact. This includes a "technical corrections" tax bill, House Speaker Paul Ryan's (R-WI) intense desire to cut Medicaid and other mandatory programs and most of the Trump infrastructure plan. It also means that the White House and congressional Republicans have to give up whatever remains of their plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act. In other words, the GOP can't be making the decision not to do a budget — basically the equivalent of admitting that Congress and the White House aren't going to accomplish much of anything significant this year — without a great deal of thought.

So why isn't the GOP going to do a budget? Because the vote on the 2019 budget — the last one Congress will consider before the 2018 midterm elections — will reveal that all the Republican promises on the deficit and debt, including its blind belief on dynamic scoring, were completely bogus.
Continue Reading