NYT analysis: Silver lining in deficit panel's failure?

``"There could be a bit of a silver lining," said Rosanne Altshuler, an economist at Rutgers University who served on President George W. Bush's 2005 tax reform panel. "It forces us to come to terms with cuts in areas that have been difficult to touch -- the military and Medicare. We may not like how the cuts are going to be done, but we better start dealing with the fact that cuts are going to have to be made."'' -- Though its still just $1.2T over 10 years, and tax increases on the non-rich are a pretty bad idea right now.