Editorial: GOP finally stands for something

• Republicans demonstrate more political courage than the Democrats have shown.
• Federal health care spending alone is projected to top $1 trillion in the current fiscal year, more than one-fourth of all outlays.
• The new GOP plan is, to be sure, far from perfect, particularly on the revenue side.

For the past four years, Republicans have defined themselves less by what they are for than by what they are against — basically anything supported by President Obama.

Republicans professed to be deeply concerned about runaway Medicare spending, then skewered Obama during the 2010 and 2012 campaigns for making cuts to the program. They attacked him for his deficits, then broke off debt-reduction talks in 2011. And they assailed his signature health care law, even though it borrowed heavily from GOP proposals dating to the early 1990s.

But on Monday, four weeks before the so-called fiscal cliff, came a glimmer of hope that Republicans can stand for something. Speaker John Boehner and other House Republicans presented a serious, though not sufficiently specific, plan for starting to restrain deficits.

Unlike previous GOP plans, this one recognizes that new tax revenue has to be part of the solution. Boehner's proposal calls for $800 billion in new revenue over 10 years. It also includes $1.1 trillion in entitlement cuts, including such steps as bumping up the Medicare retirement age and changing the formula for calculating how Social Security benefits grow. This demonstrates more political courage than the Democrats have shown, and a recognition that benefit programs are the main drivers of long-term deficits.

Federal health care spending alone is projected to top $1 trillion in the current fiscal year, more than one-fourth of all outlays. The proposed $600 billion cut would come to roughly 4% of the $14 trillion to $15 trillion Washington is on track to spend on health care in the next decade. To be precise, it is not even a cut but a restraint of the rate of growth.

The Republican offer is based on a back-of-the envelope proposal that Erskine Bowles, a Democrat and co-chairman of a bipartisan deficit commission, offered to a congressional committee last year. It is also similar to what Obama and Boehner were discussing in private meetings in 2011 before those talks collapsed.

Obama and fellow Democrats would do well to treat it for what it is: a credible bid to start dealing with runaway deficits. In fact, it is superior to the offer Obama put on the table last week, as it more aggressively targets the government's biggest budget problems and refrains from adding costly spending.

The new GOP plan is, to be sure, far from perfect, particularly on the revenue side. Republicans continue to insist that additional tax revenue should come only from closing deductions, credits and other "tax expenditures," not from the higher rates they have pledged to oppose. This prompted Obama on Tuesday to call the plan "out of balance."

It also raises a number of practical problems. One is that major tax overhaul is not going to happen in the next four weeks, and Congress and Obama need some kind of down payment on the deficit now. Another is that an approach based solely on limiting deductions would hit middle-class taxpayers much harder than one that blended the closing of loopholes with higher marginal rates for upper-income workers.

Even so, it's encouraging to see Republicans making positive contributions. Dealing with the fiscal cliff requires leaders of both parties to level with voters, stand up to their most conservative and liberal wings, put forth bold ideas and be willing to cut deals.

OPENING BIDS

Obama plan:

• New tax revenue $1.6 trillion
• Spending cuts $600 billion
• Tax extenders/New stimulus (cost of at least $200 billion)
• Total savings $2.0 trillion

Boehner plan:

• New tax revenue $800 billion
• Spending cuts $1.4 trillion
• Tax extenders/New stimulus N/A
• Total savings $2.2 trillion

Sources USA TODAY research, Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

Notes Figures are 10-year totals and don't include 2011 Budget Control Act. Republicans estimate the Obama savings at closer to $1.7 trillion.