Whenever my senator, Pat Toomey-- creature of the ironically-named Club for Growth--opens his mouth, I get to take a little mental vacation. Because you can rely on that this wing-nuttiest guy spouts one right-wing talking point after another. His true gift? Taking a grain of truth and wrapping it in layers of extremist thought. His staffers are even worse: Call with a question or comment about pending legislation, and you will get a snide lecture from the true believers he's hired. So when Christiane Amanpour tried to ask him a semi-serious question on This Week, I already knew his approximate answer:

AMANPOUR: Thanks, Jon. And of course, Jon will join us on the roundtable in a bit.

Of course, the week's big story was the total collapse of the super committee. Washington is now once again in crisis mode, facing yet another ticking clock. It's enough to leave even the most upbeat Americans thoroughly vexed. And joining me to discuss the way forward, former super committee member, Pat Toomey, Republican of Pennsylvania.

Senator, thank you very much for joining us.

TOOMEY: Good morning. Thanks for having me.

AMANPOUR: I just wanted to ask you, you know, the ranking Republican on the super committee, Jeb Hensarling, said he really worries for the country, and wonders how long this country has to actually put itself back on a sustainable place? Do you think anything is going to happen before the 2012 elections in this regard?

TOOMEY: I certainly hope so. I'm, look, I am terribly disappointed. I think our country would have benefited enormously from a constructive agreement by this committee. Of course, the silver lining is the $1.2 trillion in deficit reduction, which was the goal of the legislation that created our committee, will still go into effect. I think it's important that some configuration of those cuts in fact happen. The full amount, just configured differently.

And I do think that we Republicans put a very, very reasonable plan on the table, a proposal that I think would broader support. So I hope that we'll be able to advance at least parts of it, if not as a package, then sub-components. And I'm hopeful that we'll make some progress there.

AMANPOUR: You said you -- those automatic cuts will go into effect. But the president has said that he doesn't want -- he'll veto any attempt to tinker with those. Do you think that any tinkering will go on? Do you think he'll be able to veto that and it will be able to be stopped?

TOOMEY: I thought that his comments were a little bit more ambiguous than that. I thought he was suggesting that he would veto any attempt to eliminate portions of it. I don't recall him having a categorical veto threat on any change in the configuration. His own defense secretary, Leon Panetta, said that if the defense cuts go through as contemplated under existing law, it would hollow out our nation's defense. I think there's a broad consensus that too much of the cuts are weighted on our defense's capabilities and would really, really cut in deeply into our ability to defend this nation. And so, I think it's important that we change the configuration. I would be surprised if the president would simply veto every effort to make any changes.

I think he's right. I think Obama will veto any attempt to stop the automatic cuts, but not the makeup -- which means the whole thing was a political game all along.

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Discussion of the "Super Committee" debacle continues to misguide and misinform the public in an all-too-familiar way. Once again the consensus in the media and among political leaders reflects the misperceptions of an insular Washington culture, rather than the economic or political realities of most Americans.

The Republican and Democratic co-chairs said today that "we end this process united in our belief that the nation's fiscal crisis must be addressed." That's how this exercise in misplaced priorities ends: With a "bipartisan" statement about the urgency of our "fiscal crisis" - deficits - rather than our massive and much more immediate economic crisis of jobs and stagnating wages. And with that, the media onslaught begins. Now we'll see hundreds of new headlines screaming that the Committee "failed."

What we won't see are headlines explaining what really happened: That this failure was inevitable; that it reflects the wishes of most people, Republicans as well as Democrats; that Occupy Wall Street played a large part in the outcome; that Republicans never intended to compromise and Democrats shot themselves in the foot; that this "failure" will be good for most businesses - and for the rest of us too; or that a misguided and right-leaning consensus turned leaders of both parties into cheerleaders for ill-timed budget cuts even as the economy continued to burn down all around them.

Here are seven more accurate - and more eye-catching - headlines you won't see in your major media outlets.

OCCUPY MOVEMENT WINS MAJOR VICTORY
Unpopular 'Supercommittee' Deal Stymied by Popular Opinion

Democrats tried. They really tried. They were ready to accept deal points that the polls - and their hearts - should have forced them to refuse: Benefit cuts to Social Security and Medicare. A permanent extension of the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy. A deal that was heavily weighted toward spending cuts, rather than revenues, even during an economic crisis.

They might have done it, too, except for one thing: The Occupy movement has changed the subject from the Washington-driven theme of deficits to the economic hardships faced by most people in this country. Sure, the Tea Party is getting credit (yes, I said "credit") for killing a disastrous deal, and it's true that it played an important role.

But so did the Occupy movement. There was talk of occupying Congress, and even occupying the "Super" meeting's meeting space in the now-infamous Room 200. A march and rally is scheduled for tomorrow, and an Occupy group walking from Wall Street to Washington is scheduled to arrive the day after tomorrow.

Democrats who signed on to this deal were going to feel the wrath of the 99%, and there's no way they couldn't have known it. People who have spent the last two years wishing that they had a Tea Party of their own, one that would pressure Dems the way the Tea Party pressures Republicans, can now rest easy. It's here. And it's changing things.

The moral for Democrats? Embrace jobs and growth, not cuts and austerity. You'll thank yourself next November. And some Republicans will probably thank you, too, as you'll see from the next headline.

GOP VOTERS HOLD "EXTREME" VIEW OF CUTS - EXTREMELY "LIBERAL," THAT IS
"Left" Anti-Supercommittee Views Supported by Almost 3 Out of 4 Republicans

We're already hearing that the unwillingness of some Democrats to sign on to cuts in Social Security and Medicare - the few, the proud, the real Dems - is a sign of "ideological rigidity on the extreme left." Pundits are referring Senators like Bernie Sanders and Representatives like the members of the House Progressive and African-American Caucuses.

Extreme left? Their position is supported by three out of four voters - Republican voters, that is. A new poll confirms what previous polls have shown: Once voters have these proposed deals explained to them, they hate them.

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Who could have predicted that a crappy undemocratic back-door deal over a trumped-up deficit "crisis" could come to this? Oh, that's right - we all did!

WASHINGTON — With a little over a week left to reach a deal, members of the Congressional deficit reduction panel are looking for an escape hatch that would let them strike an accord on revenue levels but delay until next year tough decisions about exactly how to raise taxes.

Under this approach, the panel would decide on the amount of new revenue to be raised but would leave it to the tax-writing committees of Congress to fill in details next year, well beyond the Nov. 23 deadline for the panel itself to reach an agreement. That would put off painful political decisions but ensure that the debate over deficit reduction stretched into the election year.

Hah! What could possibly go wrong with that? If the Republicans give their word, you can take it to the bank! (And we all know how dependable banks are.)

“There could be a two-step process that would hopefully give us pro-growth tax reform,” Representative Jeb Hensarling of Texas, the top Republican on the panel, said Sunday on the CNN program “State of the Union.”

Members of Congress and their aides said they were still skeptical that the panel could agree on a mix of spending cuts and revenue increases to reduce budget deficits by $1.2 trillion over 10 years, the minimum set by law.

If the panel falls short, a series of automatic cuts, split evenly between military and civilian programs, would take effect, starting in 2013. Some fear that such a failure could lead to the kind of stock market slide and loss of investor confidence that accompanied stalled efforts to raise the federal debt limit earlier this year.

Yes, because otherwise, the economy's in tip-top shape! Paul Krugman comments:

It’s a bird! It’s a plane! It’s a turkey!

I thought I had worked out all the worst-case scenarios for the supercommittee (there was never a best-case). But this is even worse than my worst imagining: a deal to undermine key social insurance programs in return for a promise that Congress will come up with a plan for raising revenue at some future date. If you think that promise has any credibility whatsoever – if you have any doubts that the end result would be to gut Social Security and actually cut taxes for the wealthy – I have this Nigerian bank account that can be yours if you send me $100,000 in expenses.

The worst of it is that Democrats might actually go for it.

Anyone want to quote the odds on this?

In a recent appearance in Kalamazoo, Michigan, Rep. Fred Upton, a member of the "supercommittee" that will negotiate deficit reduction in coming months, expressed his opposition to cutting benefits for current Social Security recipients. Beyond that, he also said he opposed raising the retirement age above 67.

It’s critical…that the people that are benefitting today from Medicare and Social Security that they not see benefit reductions. It’s awfully hard to tell someone… who might be 82, that they’ve gotta go back to work, because their benefits are gonna be chopped. That’s not gonna happen. We’re not gonna allow that to happen.

One of the "reforms" that has been floated is the idea of changing the way annual cost-of-living adjustments are calculated for current Social Security recipients, moving it to a chained consumer price index formula, which would almost certainly lead to lower payments for people currently on Social Security. Upton's implied opposition to this plan led to applause from groups dedicated to protecting Social Security:

“We applaud Rep. Upton for his strong, common sense statement. We hope his public statement will encourage other Super Committee members and President Obama to similarly pledge to leave current beneficiaries alone,” said Nancy Altman, Co-Chair of the Strengthen Social Security Campaign. “This summer President Obama proposed cutting Social Security for current beneficiaries. The Campaign opposes all cuts to Social Security, whose benefits are modest but vital.”

...

“Social Security is a public trust. Slipping the proposed ‘chained-CPI’ into the Super Committee’s negotiations violates that trust. If enacted, this provision would erode the purchasing power of current and future beneficiaries as they age,” explained Eric Kingson, Co-Director of Social Security Works. “That’s not a ‘grand-bargain.’ That’s ‘grand larceny!’ Social Security does not contribute a penny to the deficit. Plain and simple, it should not even be considered by the Super Committee. Current beneficiaries should be reassured that they will not be injured by those elected to represent them. Hopefully Rep. Upton’s support can help get Social Security off the table.”

Watch Upton's full remarks:

This will be absolutely devastating. Even though we know these draconian cuts will not heal the economy but will actually make things worse (all you have to do is look at the results from similar measures in the UK and Europe), you have to wonder about our so-called leaders and their fervent faith in the same economic voodoo that has never worked to date.

Because with the same cast of characters, I think we can assume the same kind of outcome. At most, I expect the closing of some small tax loopholes that will count as "revenue" -- and the rest will be taken out of the hides of the most vulnerable.

Moral of the tale: When a corrupt rating agency says, "Gee, I notice you haven't cut your safety net programs for the elderly and poor all that much," the craven politicians respond, "How much would you like me to cut, sir?"

WASHINGTON — The downgrade of the United States government’s credit rating by Standard & Poor’s is almost sure to increase pressure on a new Congressional “supercommittee” to mute ideological disagreements and recommend a package of deficit-reduction measures far exceeding its original goal of at least $1.5 trillion, lawmakers said Sunday.

Even before the panel is appointed, its mission is expanding. Its role is not just to cut the annual budget deficit and slow the explosive growth of federal debt but also to appease the markets and help restore the United States’ top credit rating of AAA. Otherwise, taxpayers may eventually have to pay more in interest for every dollar borrowed by the Treasury.

The report certainly got the attention of Capitol Hill. “I think this is one of the most telling, important moments in our country’s history right now,” Senator John Kerry, Democrat of Massachusetts, said Sunday on the NBC program “Meet the Press.” He added: “This poses a set of choices not just about a recession. It’s about a financial crisis and the structure of our economy, which really has been misallocating capital.”

In the S.&P. report on Friday outlining the reasons for removing long-term Treasury debt from its list of nearly risk-free investments, the company cited doubts about the ability of the two political parties to bridge their gulf on fiscal policy.

Credit rating agencies have thus emerged as a powerful constituency whose concerns are taken seriously by Congress.

[...] S.&P. did not advocate a specific mix of increased revenue and spending cuts. But it did say that overhauling entitlement programs was “key to long-term fiscal sustainability” and that the debt deal “envisions only minor policy changes on Medicare.”

Oh, if only we had real leaders in our political establishment. And if pigs had wings, they could fly.

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Sen. Bernie Sanders outlines the Democrats' history of caving in to outrageous GOP demands and cautions against a "supercommittee" deal that cuts the deficits on the backs of the middle class and the poor.

I like Ezra Klein's "Wonkbook." I do. You get the latest CBO analyses and the newest adorable animal videos too. That's not snark. I'm an obsessive reader of policy reports who also digs cute animals. Hey, I personally posted this clip of a baby kitten being hugged by its mother when it was having a nightmare.

As we all slug it out in the political battle royale, I appreciate the fact that we have another good source for data to inform us and videos to humanize us. (Although I have to say the Corgi riding a playground swing in this morning's Wonkbook video doesn't look too thrilled with the experience.) But that doesn't mean we'll always react to the same information in the same way. Far from it.

Take the "supercommittee" - please! This morning's Wonkbook tells us that Republicans on the Committee aren't just resisting a deal. They're also working to undercut the defense spending part of the "triggers" - those automatic cuts that were to take effect if no compromise was reached.

Ezra writes that Republicans are "reneging on the terms of the debt-ceiling deal," and concludes: "The reality is, the supercommittee might not just end without reaching a deal. It might end by undoing a previous deal, and by making the two sides trust each other less in future deals. That's not just failure. That's sabotage."

You say that like it's a bad thing. A supercommittee failure would be great news. It doesn't matter who blows up the process, as long as it's stopped. Sabotage the supercommittee? Don't mind if you do!

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The latest memo coming out of Democracy Corps and Greenberg Quinlan Rosner definitively demonstrates both how narrow a ledge Democrats are sitting on in terms of 2012, and the utter volatility of the mood of the electorate. Without a significant improvement in the real economy — by which I mean the economy in terms of how it feels for regular folks and small businesses, not whether Wall Street guys are still getting their bonuses — the smart money would have to be on a sour election for the incumbent President’s party. Since I’m not seeing a significant economic upturn any time soon, you won’t find me whistling past the graveyard and predicting sweeping Democratic victories. However, the raw and unadulterated anger that many voters feel toward both parties, and the extremist positions the entire Republican Party has been forced to embrace by their tea party base, make this a very unpredictable election.

There also are a number of very big variables, each of which could profoundly shake things up. Any of the following three things would clearly have a deep impact on the 2012 election, and all of them in my view are more than 50 percent likely to happen:

1. A European country defaulting on its loans, causing big economic damage to the rest of the worldwide economy.

2. A major bank, either here or in Europe, either going down or needing to be bailed out. And if it happens to any one of them, it could well happen to more.

3. A well-financed (self-financed) third-party candidate running for President.

And while I think it's less than 50-50 that this will happen, I also think that it is entirely possible that the D.C. elites on the supercommittee may end up cutting a deal that delights lobbyists and inside-the-Beltway pundits, but just ends up enraging everyone else — sort of like the lawmakers a couple decades back who were congratulating themselves on their grand bipartisan deal on catastrophic coverage for seniors, but went home to find seniors surrounding and beating on their cars. If the grand bargainers end up cutting things middle-class and senior voters depend on in these tough times, their new Chevy Impalas might end up taking a beating, and the election could get shaken up once again.

A lot of people assume that if any of the above big things happen, Obama and the Democrats will be the ones hurt, but big things happening that shake up the fundamental dynamics of the race aren't necessarily bad if you are a candidate in a tough spot. A wealthy self-funded “centrist” (as defined by the pundits) like Mike Bloomberg jumping into the race would force Obama to his populist left, and that would be a very good thing for him, because when voters are hurting and angry is generally not the best time to run as the most reasonable man in the room. And if a big bank starts to topple, and Obama were to react like he should have done with Citibank in 2009 by taking over and restructuring the bank, and firing the execs, it could show voters that he has learned his lessons and is willing to do the politically tough thing by taking on Wall Street.

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