Speaker’s chance

House Speaker John Boehner has an historic opportunity to reach out to moderate Democrats to forge a bipartisan package to avert the fiscal cliff. He would salvage his tarnished legacy by producing critical legislation and restoring government from the center rather than from far right or left.

He may not be able to produce a workable and passable plan if he stays strictly within the Republican Party. Tea partyers to his right will block sensible plans while marching over the cliff singing Glory Rush-elujah. The Senate and the president will reject nonsense plans. By reaching out to moderate Democrats he could produce the only sensible proposal, which would include some moderate tax increases on upper middle and upper income folks and some moderate spending reductions across the board.

Anything more and we would damage the fragile recovery from the worst financial crisis since 1929. However, it would be a good plan that would put the country on track for a full recovery and gradual weaning from the deficit trough from which we have been feeding for most of the past 40 years.

Jim Avery

Wake Forest