Evaluating the ‘super committee’s’ super-big breakdown

Evaluating the ‘super committee’s’ super-big breakdown
Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), co-chair of the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, walks through the Capitol in Washington. AP/J. Scott Applewhite
Evaluating the ‘super committee’s’ super-big breakdown
Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), co-chair of the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, walks through the Capitol in Washington. AP/J. Scott Applewhite

Evaluating the ‘super committee’s’ super-big breakdown

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Congress’s super committee came up short of its goal to reduce the deficit over the next decade. Well, really short—$1.2 trillion short. Illinois Senator and Majority Whip Dick Durbin was not at the table for the latest go-round but he was no less disappointed in the results.

“It’s happened too many times over and over again; threats of shutting down the government threats of even shutting down the economy over the course of this year. So this is further disappointment and it won’t help the image of Congress” Durbin said.

And so came the trigger cuts. The idea was that the automatic cuts would be so unpopular that they would create an incentive for compromise.

To learn more about the fallout from the failure and the burgeoning ideological divide in Washington, Eight Forty-Eight turned to David Drucker, staff writer for Roll Call in D.C.

Music Button: Ursula 1000, “Very Leggy”, from the album The Now Sound of Ursula 1000 (ESL)