Stuck on "No"

Capitol maintenance workers should check the wiring on the voting buttons for GOP senators, I think they're stuck on "no."

Yesterday the Senate voted to reinstate the "pay-as-you-go" or pay-go rules for budgeting, under which any new expenditures have to be paid for either by increasing tax revenues or cutting something else - so basically you can't borrow and spend. The rules were in place from 1991 through 2002 (you know, when we balanced the budget and had a surplus) and then were discarded in 2003 when the Bush administration wanted to cut taxes (drop revenue) and implement the Medicare prescription drug benefit (increase spending) and didn't want to cut anything to pay for it.

You would think that, after all their complaints about "sky high deficits" and "irresponsible spending" that the GOP would be all in favor of reinstating pay-go... but not so. Yesterday's vote passed 60-40 in a straight party-line vote with such famed deficit hawks as Mitch McConnell and "Debt and Deficit Dragon"-slayer Chuck Grassley voting against.

Gotta be the wiring, right? Nobody would be that cynical...