Barry Rhoads Quoted in Bloomberg Businessweek

How is it that a law drafted to be bulletproof turns out not to be? The trick is in the timing. The automatic cuts don’t take effect until January 2013, giving Republicans more than a year to find ways to undo them. House Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon (R-Calif.) has taken the lead in trying to maintain the military budget by holding hearings and meeting with lobbyists for the major defense companies, many of whom were anticipating a diminished Pentagon. “You could see this trainwreck coming,” says Barry Rhoads, president of Cassidy & Associates, the Washington lobbying firm. The GOP’s message: Following through on what Congress already agreed to is simply too dangerous. “These cuts would be so draconian in measure that it would impair our national security,” Senator John McCain (R-Ariz.) told Bloomberg Television on Nov. 8.