Everybody get together, try to reform entitlements right now

Will Marshall from the Progressive Policy Institute shows why entitlement reform need not be a left-wing/right-wing battle:

What unites us is fear of what unsustainable growth in entitlement spending portends. Conservatives worry that taxes on working families will have to rise to crippling levels to pay for the promises made to retirees. Progressives want to prevent automatic entitlement spending from squeezing out space in the federal budget for such vital public investments as educating the young, fighting poverty, protecting the environment, keeping our military strong, and modernizing our energy and transportation systems.

Inaction in the face of the looming budget crunch is not wise. Putting entitlements on a fixed budget will, we hope, set the stage for the long-overdue debate over how to ensure that our venerable social insurance programs continue to serve future generations of Americans.

The Brookings Institute-Heritage Foundation mind-meld is urging that entitlements that are currently "off budget" get folded back into the federal accounting so that long-term funding issues are addressed. The alternative is the "auto pilot" status quo followed by "where'd all the money go?" in a couple of decades.