WaPo Misses a Tree for the Forest: Is Canada the Biggest Sequester Winner?

By Keith Edmund White
Editor-in-Chief

WaPo misses the mark, and Canada may be the sequestration-avoidance winner.

Today the Washington Post (WaPo) reports on how one federal program 'beat' the sequester, highlighting Department of Agricultural's ability to snag meat inspectors funding. WaPo's take on the strategy: If one Agricultural program could win, so can others; ergo, sequester isn't playing out the way we want.

Well, the conclusion's sound: Sequestration isn't playing out the way some commentators said it would. But seeing as sequestration really starts today, it seems a little early to be writing sequester's post-script. And sequester 2.0, i.e. next year's cuts called for in the 10-year cost-cutting plan, still have to be played out.
But, less impressive, is WaPo's omission that the FY13 continuing resolution that enshrines sequester in the final six months of the current fiscal year (FY), which one Agr. program avoided, came along with four new FY13 appropriation packages.
So, really, Defense, Homeland Security (DHS), Commerce/Justice/State, Veterans Affairs/Military Construction all 'beat' sequestration to varying extents. In fact, DHS got roughly the same agency-wide funding as it did last budget cycle.
I doubt these agencies will be asking Agr. Secretary Tom Vislack for sequester advice any time soon.
To sum-up: WaPo mistakes a tree for the forest, and--in so doing--misses the gravity of sequestration's interesting FY13 implementation. And then WaPo gets tree myopia, and doesn't really illuminate sequestration's 10-year 'loop'.

But, perhaps more interesting to readers, is figuring out what country has benefited the most from FY13's unusual sequestration implementation.Given the extensive military acquisition, trade, and border security relationship between Canada and the United States, maybe WaPo should cast Canada as sequestration's Biggest Winner.