Unbalanced on budgets

New budget proposals this week from influential members of the House Republican and Senate Democratic leadership are the stuff of political caricatures. House Budget Committee Chairman Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.), last year's Republican nominee for vice president, reprised the spending-cut talking points from his failed campaign with little change and no apparent irony. Senate Budget Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray (D-Wash.), meanwhile, offered the outlines of a budget that increases taxes and spending, while doing little more than buying time on the entitlement programs at the heart of Washington's long-term problems. Neither approach offers a realistic way forward. Instead, they give Republicans and Democrats yet another arena in which to fight their ideological battles over the size and scope of government.

March 13, 2013