Republicans were at the meeting too? What a surprise. Let’s connect the dots, shall we?

1) Money is power.

2) Power corrupts.

3) All those trillions go somewhere.

4) The recipients of all that federal largesse form a bloc of very powerful special interest groups.

5) Those powerful special interests have a vested interest in keeping the cash flow going.

6) Those powerful special interests are the politicians’ principal contributors.

7) Meanwhile, the taxpayers are aghast at run-away government spending.

8) Politicians are whipsawed between their powerful special interest contributors and the voters who are aghast at their spendthift ways.

9) The solution? Keep the money flowing while giving the Rubes (that’s us) the impression that they’re doing something about run-away spending.

That’s why we have Boehner’s ever so special “Pledge to America” with pages of photos of children and puppies and flags all awave, and then you get to page 21 where they promise to “put common sense limits on the growth of government”. Yes, they don’t promise to cut government spending, they only promise “common sense” limits on the growth of spending. They’d might as well have pledged “business as usual”.

That’s why we have the push for the balanced budget amendment. Not only does it have a snowball’s chance of passing, if it does pass in Congress it only passes the buck to the states. They’ll keep right on spend, spend, spending until the states tie their hands. If we had responsible adults in Congress we wouldn’t need a balanced budget amendment, would we?

That’s why we have Obama’s proposal to freeze spending a the current unsustainable levels for five years and then trim a whopping $80 billion a year from their deficit spending.

The Pledge to America, the balanced budget amendment, the proposed freeze in spending, all that sounds very good until you realize it’s just a smokescreen for business as usual.