Why America Needs the Bowles-Simpson “Treaty” Right Away

Every time a senator or House member makes a joke about how low their approval ratings are, I always tell them the same thing: “They are now at a place where it isn’t funny.” The United States is slipping away both economically and fiscally, and with it go its democracy and the hearts and minds of the country’s citizens. I won’t go through a bunch of Gallup polls to prove this -- just trust me, it’s getting deadly.

I have a solution.

Put the Bowles-Simpson plan on the floor of the House and Senate and pass it. And here’s an idea: Change the name from “plan” to “treaty.” I am serious about this -- call it the Bowles-Simpson Treaty. I know that the formal definition of a treaty is between sovereign states, but that doesn’t matter. Call this a treaty -- it will signal peace between our country’s warring factions.

Everything in the U.S. would be different the day after this treaty passed. It would represent a new way forward for a divided country.

Here’s what must happen right now: President Obama, Speaker Boehner, Majority Leader Reid, as well as Mitt Romney, the Bushes, the Clintons, the talking heads from Fox to MSNBC, and you and me -- every single one of us has to rally America and say, “If your representatives don’t vote for this, their stubbornness amounts to treason. We’re all for the treaty because of the fiscal and budgetary give-and-take it contains -- the mix of spending cuts and tax increases, the shared pain and sacrifice across the board -- creates the ‘fairness’ we all demand. And it saves the country from fiscal ruin.”

Gallup finds the country more divided now than it has been in at least 75 years. The biggest divide is over the role the government plays in people's lives. But citizens and lawmakers can’t argue raising taxes, or cutting spending, or making Social Security solvent as individual items, as one-offs. That won’t work. Everybody has to give up something dear to them. That’s what Bowles-Simpson proposes. The solution lies within passing this one big treaty -- not in a hundred highly partisan knife fights.

Passing the Bowles-Simpson Treaty 435-0 and 100-0 would be one of the most profound moments in the history of American leadership and democracy. But this must happen soon, because the pressure to act is becoming unbearable. The United States is, honest to God, sitting on a fiscal and budgetary Titanic, and Congress and the administration are moving around the proverbial deck chairs.

“Americans Pass Bowles-Simpson Treaty.” That would be the headline in papers around the whole world. Instantly, everyone would know that America is back on track, Congress would be admired as much as the military, and the president would once again be leader of the free world. The chance for this miracle for American democracy is right in front of us.