Why Oh Why Can't We Have a Better Press Corps? Friends Don't Let Friends Trust the Politico Edition
Over at Politico, Jonathan Allen and Jake Sherman write:
Jonathan Chait points out that these rules are actually looser than the ones currently in effect--the right summary is "GOP loosens House rules":
Rules For (Republican) Radicals: Politico reports on the House Republicans' "strict" new rules.... This is not a strict new rule. This is a slackening of an existing rule... [that] any new entitlement spending or tax cuts had to be offset with entitlement cuts or higher taxes. Republicans hated this rule, and suspended it in 2001.... Democrats reinstated the rule in 2006, leaving a loophole for the Bush tax cuts. Republicans have now eliminated it again.... [T]he GOP new rules mean that new tax cuts do not require any offsets at all.... [T]hey are replacing a rule that prevented policies that add to the deficit with a rule that enables policies that add to the deficit.
They may call that "strict," but it is the opposite...
