Consensus rarely builds for anything in Washington. So when it does, it makes sense to jump on the opportunity and make it happen. That chance, though, is slipping through the fingers of Congress. They’re back at work for eight of the next nine weeks in both the House and Senate. That’s the perfect time to make a deal that would end the threat of sequestration, the automatic budget cuts written into the Budget Control Act that inflict salami-slice cuts across both the good and bad programs agencies execute.

I wrote last week that it’s hard to find someone — anyone — who thinks the mechanism of sequestration is a good idea. Some budget hawks believe the numbers in the Budget Control Act are reasonable, but that’s a different debate. Some members want to lump together the top-line budget numbers and the mechanism of sequester. That’s irresponsible, because it’s not leveling with your colleagues and your constituents. The debate over the numbers, both at the top line and underneath, is a debate for another time. The sequestration mechanism, as we saw in 2013, requires agencies to cut an arbitrary percentage of their budgets to reach the levels required by the BCA. In 2013, the Defense Department had to cut $37 billion in seven months, according to a new report from the Government Accountability Office. It’s hard to imagine cuts of that size, even in a half- trillion dollar budget, being executed in a way that is beneficial to the operation of the agency (and thereby the safety and security of the American people). But they did it, because they had to. No doubt we will learn in the coming months and years that other agencies performed similar budget-cutting feats, and no doubt we’ll learn more about the success, or failure, those agencies achieved in minimizing the impact of the cuts on the citizens they serve. The GAO also pointed out, “DoD is missing an opportunity to gain valuable institutional knowledge that would help facilitate future decision making about budgetary reductions should sequestration occur again.” That’s too bad, and certainly DoD should do something — most likely follow GAO’s recommendations — to collect lessons learned. But the best possible outcome of this experience is to end the sequester, forever, this year. The consensus on the Hill in favor of a Murray-Ryan 2.0- type solution is fine, I guess. But it’s only a two-year solution. Sequestration is the law of the land until 2021, which is plenty of time for Congress to change hands, for the presidency to change hands, and for the whole mess to get even messier. I know a six-year deal is an extremely hard pull. I haven’t heard anyone discuss it as even a remote possibility. But it’s the deal that makes the most sense. The most common excuse I’ve heard from the Hill against that deal, or any deal, is, “2016 is a presidential election year, so it’ll be harder to get a deal done before then.” That’s a silly excuse. One can make excuse after excuse like that to push off making hard decisions and taking tough votes.

• 2015: Presidential election next year, senators running for President won’t want to vote on changing the BCA.
• 2016: Presidential election this year, all House seats up, a third of the Senate up, anyone running for reelection won’t want to vote on the BCA.
• 2017: New President’s first mid-term election is next year, party of sitting President won’t want to vote on changing the BCA.
• 2018: New President’s first mid-term election is this year, see above.

News flash to the Hill: There will always be another election coming on which you can blame your inaction. In 2019, the new President will be planning his/her reelection campaign, and the opposing party will be lining up candidates to beat him/her. In 2020, the presidential campaign will suck all the oxygen out of the room. By that time, we’re at the beginning of the cycle again — and the Budget Control Act is almost kaput anyway. So Congress, do the deal — the whole deal — this year. Untie the debate over the top line and the sequester mechanism. The fight over the right amount of money to budget can wait for future years; it should wait for future years. But the agreement to fix the wrong way to get to those budget numbers can’t wait for future years, and shouldn’t. Not if Capitol Hill expects a functional, effective, efficient executive branch. It won’t get one, no matter how much it rants, until the sequester goes away.

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Francis Rose is host of Federal News Radio’s In Depth radio show, which airs weekdays from 4-7 p.m. MORE COMMENTARY FROM FRANCIS ROSE: Make a budget deal already! Three takeaways from Management of Change 2015 Postal Service needs some transformation pain now to avoid desperation later Time is right for a civilian employee compensation commission New Congress ‘worst places to work’ hotline: right idea, wrong question FY2016 budget: put up or shut up time for Congress

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