Is The New GOP ‘Pledge’ A Way To Bring Ryan’s Radical Budget Plans In Through The Backdoor?

Today, House Republicans released their “Pledge to America,” a document styled after 1994’s Contract with America that the GOP claims is “an outline of the party’s targetsin the final weeks of the legislative session.” We’ve already explained how the Pledge promises to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act with portions of the Affordable Care Act and how it represents a blood oath to Big Oil, so let’s turn to another aspect: its effect on the deficit.

Of course, the Pledge includes a promise to extend all of the Bush tax cuts — including those for the richest two percent of Americans — for a total price tag of $4 trillion over the next decade, while laying out spending cuts that, even if the numbers are taken at face value, don’t come close to covering that cost. ABC’s George Stephanopoulos asked Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) — the ranking member of the House Budget Committee — to explain how the GOP can square its desire for huge, regressive tax cuts with its supposed commitment to deficit reduction:

STEPHANOPOULOS: How are you going to pay for that $4 trillion, if you’re going to reduce spending?
RYAN: I brought a budget to the floor last year that cut $4.8 trillion in spending, which would have more than compensated for these tax cuts. [...]
STEPHANOPOULOS: But you do concede that you do not have a plan to balance the budget and you don’t pay for the tax cuts you’re extending?
RYAN: Well, we can pay for the tax cuts we’re extending. I have provided budgets that do that in the past.