A LITTLE FISCAL REALITY...

Ezra Klein lets us know the furor about the super-duper debt committee is mostly nonsense:

The do-nothing plan: now worth $7.1 trillion
Posted by Ezra Klein at 10:55 AM ET, 11/18/2011
Washington Post

In the past, I’ve talked about the “do-nothing plan” for deficit reduction: Congress heads home to spend more time with their campaign contributors, and the Bush tax cuts automatically expire, the 1997 Balanced Budget Act’s scheduled Medicare cuts kick in, the Affordable Care Act is implemented, and the budget moves roughly into balance. It’s not an ideal way to balance the budget, but it helps clarify that the deficit is the result of votes Congress expects to cast over the next few years. If, instead of casting those votes, they do nothing, or pay for the things they choose to do, the deficit mostly disappears.