Defining Sequestration

The debate continues in Washington, D.C. between the White House and Congress over the federal budget, this time in a new attempt to avert the looming sequestration process.  This is a series of automatic, across-the-board cuts to government agencies, totaling $1.2 trillion over 10 years. The cuts would be split 50-50 between defense and domestic discretionary spending. It is all part of attempts to get a handle on the growth of the U.S. national debt, which exploded upward when the 2007 recession hit and now stands at more than $16 trillion. The sequester has been coming for more than a year, with Congress pushing it back to March 1 as part of the fiscal cliff deal at the end of the last session.  Clemson University Political Science Professor Dr. Joseph Stewart weighs in on sequestration. “They passed a law a couple of years ago.  Congress passed it, the President signed it, and it was to protect themselves against themselves.  It was we are going to put a law into effect that would be so stupid that no one would possible put it into effect and of course, we have gotten to the point now that by Friday, they will put it into effect, so it will be kind of a meat clever approach to federal spending.  We will just lop off a certain amount across the board.” Some people might be in favor of sequestration, adds Dr. Stewart. “We will see it a lot in terms of personnel and things of that nature.  For the people who are in favor of smaller government, I think they are about to get it.” Congress and the White House agreed to more than $2 trillion in cuts. About $1 trillion of that was laid out in the debt-ceiling bill and the rest imposed through sequestration, which many are calling a kind of fiscal doomsday device that Congress would have to disarm by coming up with an equal amount of spending reductions elsewhere. More than $500 billion will be cut from the Defense Department and other national security agencies, with the rest cut on the domestic side, like; national parks, federal courts, the FBI, food inspections and housing aid.