Respectable centrist position agrees with Obama’s position. But to agree with one party is not a respectable centrist thing to do. And so a wide stream of coverage and commentary on this issue is dedicated to actively misleading Americans about what the two sides are proposing.
The Washington Post’s editorial today offers a paradigmatic case of this bizarre dynamic in action. Headlined “The blame game over sequestration,” it argues that sequestration would be awful, but “neither party has staked out anything like a serious negotiating position.” The Republicans aren’t serious, the editorial notes, because they have offered to replace the sequester with “Obamacare insurance exchanges, nutrition aid, social service grants and other Democratic favorites” — all cuts that the Post rightly opposes. Oddly, the editorial omits the strongest piece of evidence, namely the GOP promise to oppose any increase in revenue.