I think we have to admit that McCain does bare some resemblance to Smeagol.
I think the problem with the Tea Partiers is that they see it as being their way or nothing. I understand their perspective and conviction but I think the issue is that they want to do it ALL at once. No compromise, every vote they make must include everything they think has to be done for the next 20 years of government. I think the problem is if we do it their way the whole economy is going to come crashing down. People complain about government spending but then seem to forget that a large % of the US is employeed (directly or indirectly) by the government. You YANK that out all at once and I think we'll be reminiscing about the good old days of only 10% unemployment.
The lack of compromise is one thing but my issue with most if them is an apparent lack of sense. Yes we all hate raising taxes but they don't seem to understand simple economics where cutting costs can only do so much without increasing revenue.
We're seeing what was predicted two or three years ago. The Tea Party is poisonous to the Republicans, not the Democrats. It's pretty clear that Boehner is at maximum frustration level, and I think it's beginning to dawn on mainline and moderate Republicans that the Tea Party tail is now wagging the GOP dog. There's a level of hysterical irrationality about the Tea Party that is now coming into full view. They're not interested in governing at all.
I'm sure the White House has a long list of contingencies in place just like Clinton did when he was up against the Gingrich mob, and is probably quite content to watch the Republicans and the Tea Party wing battle it out. I think 2012 is pretty damned safe for him.
One of my high school friends is a strong Tea Party supporter and she was upset that they media portayed them as "silly" and "hypocrits" when they first started holding their rallies and protests. She asked me if I thought she was silly. Based on the signs I saw at the rallies, I responded "Yes". But I supported her right to protest. She didn't understand the "hypocrit" label even when I explained that years earlier the same Tea Party people were labeling war protestors as "unpatriotic" and questioning
The Tea Party apparently represents the will of the people as was demonstrated by the people voting them in in large enough numbers to shake the status quo. They are poisonous to "Party Politics" and the "Culture of Washington" and that is by design. That is what the people want to change, poison, kill. They will not fall back on their promises, and you deride them for that. No wonder this country is in such a mess. It's people like you, who cannot see the forest for the trees, who can only see in blue and
The United States is a representative democracy, not a direct one. That means, some times, the representatives have to think beyond the sometimes errant, even moronic views of the masses. The masses, in turn, have the opportunity to turf those representatives at the end of their term if they feel they've been ill served.
If those voters who support the Tea Party think an absolutist stand against tax cuts leading to a default will somehow improve their lot in life, then those voters are sadly mistaken. Wha
Their point is that the US cannot and will not default - but it can cut government benefits. The outcome of refusal to raise the debt ceiling is unknown and probably unknowable right now, but it is apparent that their hope is to shrink government (I.e., what they've been after from the beginning). I doubt that they will succeed, but they do have one very good point: the US is on an unsustainable path. Sooner or later we will face a reckoning in which taxes will go way up and spending will go way down. That
If those voters who support the Tea Party think an absolutist stand against tax cuts leading to a default
Are you sure you know what is going on? The Tea Party isn't against Tax Cuts they are against Tax Hikes (increases). They aren't for having the government default, they are for reigning in reckless spending. You know the reckless spending that has tripled (you know, multiplied by a factor of 3) the entire national debt within the last decade. The trajectory of spending we are currently on is unsustainable. This is a fact, it cannot be argued against. So the question is, do we deal with it now, or wait until
I don't consider myself to be tea-party as I'm a libertarian (yeah, I know you just stopped reading and will start the ad-hominem attacks now). But you are sorely mistaken...
First of all, the US is not a representative democracy. It is a constitutional republic. The fact that people elect representatives in a democratic fashion does not make us a democracy. New laws are still supposed to follow the Constitution regardless of how popular they are.
The Constitution itself does permit congress "To borrow mo
But, really, we'll settle for him getting a friggin' clue.
Have you heard how Karl Rove talks about the Tea Party. He can't STAND those people, which is understandable considering how they've upset his apple-cart.
They voted for Tea Party people in many cases because the voters wanted something different, not because they specifically wanted Tea Partiers. Classic political ego: thinking they voted FOR you, instead of AGAINST the other guy.
Classic political ego: thinking they voted FOR you, instead of AGAINST the other guy.
It's not really ego - it is how things are supposed to be. There is no way for an individual citizen to vote against something (only Congress can do that), we can only vote for something. To the citizen, voting for a Senator, Congressman, President is not a binary choice; there are more than two options. That fact alone makes voting against someone impossible. Votes were created, intended and, for all intents-and-purposes, are an indication that someone is for the thing for which they voted. no other interp
Whatever you think of the tea party it has been spectacularly successful at "wagging the dog". Either the traditional parties will learn to get their tails back in control, or other "tails" will emerge on the far right or the far left spurred on by the success of the tea party. I rather suspect the main parties will find a way to control this better because some of the trends that have helped this along (like signing pledges) that seemed initially to be zero cost are now being seen as burdensome.
I see the current crop of Republican Tea Party Types as being very much like a cartoon super villain. For example right now they are holding our future and economy hostage and seem perfectly willing to screw us all if they don't get 110% of what they want and 0% of what they don't want. Their priorities are preventing reasonable taxes being re-instituted for the rich and corporations. Now it looks like they are trying to arrange a situation where we have a debt limit crisis every 6 months so they can hol
Except that the Tea Party has been integrated more closely into the GOP, at least that's what the GOP and the Tea Party wanted everyone to believe. Obviously it's not the case, the Tea Party feels no particular loyalty to mainline Republicans, seeming to view them not as opponents as they would any given Democrat, but as traitors to the true conservative cause.
The mainline Republicans are terrified that if they don't appease the Tea Party somehow, it will become a third party, and as a third party, the dam
I think you would be well served by checking out exactly how much money the government is spending, and on what. There is a need for some level of government, but what we have now is unsustainable. We will simply run out of money, no matter how we tax. (And remember, higher levels of taxation lead to lower levels of economic growth, and thus lower revenue generated to the government.) So really, I'm not opposed to some new taxation, but we'd be far better off by dramatically cutting spending and, especially
The three biggest areas of the federal budget are Defense, Medicare, and Social Security. Yes you can get some cost savings by cutting other programs but franky they are minuscule compared to those three. Also I've heard the same red herring about regulation before. I believe it was lack of regulation that led the entire world into the housing crisis to begin with. Cutting regulation would add tiny portions and may lead to disastrous consequences. As for taxation, the main proposal is restoring the tax
Which of these is not true:
(1)Speculation in the unregulated derivatives market was a primary cause of the financial crisis of 2008.
(2) Removing regulations like gpf does very little to actually reduce government spending in areas like the Defense sector and does very little to increase revenue in taxes.
Deregulation is a red herring in this debate. Pro-business forces keep touting it as some sort of panacea while ignoring it might in their best estimates save hundreds of a percent while Medicare, SS, an
It's also worth pointing out that Obama and the moderate Republicans aren't talking about *only* raising taxes to cover the shortfall. The people in Washington who actually have a functioning set of synapses between their ears realize that the only way to balance the books is to decrease spending at the same time as increasing income.
It's the tea baggers who seriously don't understand that their stance is going to cause serious problems for the world economy who are screwing things over for everybody else.
It's also worth pointing out that Obama and the moderate Republicans aren't talking about *only* raising taxes to cover the shortfall. The people in Washington who actually have a functioning set of synapses between their ears realize that the only way to balance the books is to decrease spending at the same time as increasing income.
Citation needed. A quote from the President's plan would be a good start. Mostly what has been put forward is raise taxes now, reduce spending later. This approach has been tried. Several time. The spending never gets reduced.
The Tea Party is standing up and saying, "Enough, dammit! We don't have any money left. No more promises of we'll get to it later. Cut spending NOW, before we give you any more money."
What boggles the mind is the so-called educated on this forum that can't grasp the idea that y
(And remember, higher levels of taxation lead to lower levels of economic growth, and thus lower revenue generated to the government.)
Only if you're to the right of or at the optimal point on the Laffer curve. The supply-siders kept saying the US was to the right of it, again and again, but two can play that game. In truth, the Laffer curve probably looks like this [typepad.com], a chaotic mess at any significant distance from 0% or 100% taxation.
Sure sounds like you're confused about what caused the great depression and this current recession or depression, whatever you want to call it. High economic growth rates are not sustainable and lead to bubbles. Regulatory burdens as you put it slow the growth down to manageable levels and their lack of action resulted in the housing bubble and resulting collapse. A steady economy with slow sustainable growth is the goal.
If we want to cut spending how bout we slash the TSA budget in half or get rid of it a
By that logic, taxes will eventually reach 100% correct? When is the tax rate too high? We're at 70% in some brackets. Use your own life as an example. If you were spending too much money, and you knew a lot of the stuff you were spending it on was not necessary, would you stop spending so much or try and convince your credit card company to raise your limit so you can borrow more money from them? Would you spend less, especially on things you really didn't need, like infrastructure repair in the name
No, we're not at 70% in some brackets. The highest tax bracket hasn't been at 70% since 1980. It's been in the low 30s ever since Bush Jr was in office, and that's only on income that is taxable, which for wealthy people is only a fraction of their true income. In addition, capitol gains tax is even lower than that, at about 15%.
70%? Citation needed as I believe personal income is as high as 38% but few ever pay that amount as exceptions and deductions are allowed. As for economics, you can cut costs but you don't seem to grasp that some costs can never be 0. If I have a financial gap I can increase my income by asking for a raise, getting another job, getting a second job, or even temporarily selling things. If I have a business, I can raise prices. What the Tea Party is advocating is never looking at or considering the reven
That's FEDERAL tax. Now add State tax, county tax, city tax, property tax, sales tax, gas tax and fees for any service that you actually get from the government.
The Tea Party is advocating that we've alway looked at the revenue side, and it is high time we actually make some of those budge cuts that everyone is always promising. And going from spending 40% more than you make to only spending 20% more than you make still leaves you in the hole.
I think this is a great analogy as many doctors will recommend against starvation diets as it leads to more problems than it is worth and that any diet should be sensible in what is removed. Removing all protein or all carbs may be dangerous. Also recent studies have confirmed that to truly lose weight and keep it off, people need to both control food intake and exercise.
To continue your analogy, the Democrats insist we are actually starving, and we just need to keep eating like we have been to "create jobs for fat cells". Meanwhile the Republicans claim to be disgusted by our bellies and while we are eating 5000 calories today, we need to make drastic cuts and only eat 5999 calories tomorrow because the Democrats want to eat 6000 calories. Bear in mind, we only actually have 4000 calories of food per day of supply, but there's no need to cut back right now. If we start
That's a laughable and untrue perspective because the Democrats and moderates concede we need to cut some spending but highlighted that we also need to raise revenue. It's the Tea Party that refuses to look at any increases in spending. As the supposedly pro business as they claim to be they sure as hell don't know know basic accounting. If your business is experiencing loss, you can cut costs, raise revenue, or both. The Tea Party wants to declare 2 of the 3 options as unacceptable without acknowledgin
You can't loose weight unless you consume less calories than you take in. You'll have us believe that we can make a promise to see a nutritionist in a few years, at which time we'll go on a sensible calorie deficit diet, and everything will work out fine.
There's a term for people that think that way, morbidly obese, an apt description of the federal government.
2. Cut needless Federal Departments that are unconstitutional, wasteful and ineffective.
Perhaps you haven't looked at a federal budget lately but Medicare, SS, and Defense represent 60% of the budget. All other areas combined represent 40%. As for needless, just because you don't think or like the purpose of an agency doesn't mean it is needless. Take for example, Dept of the Interior. Under it, are agencies like the Bureau of Land Managment and the National Park Service. Believe it or not some people want to preserve areas of the country where it is relatively untouched by man. The tot
I think the Tea Party is upset that no one is actually cutting anything though. It's not like this is a legitimate plan that either side is presenting that puts us on a path to a balanced budget. Both plans don't even come close to balancing the budget within 10 years and still ad tons of money to the deficit and even the cuts that they do make are years down the road when there's no guarantee they happen. Personally, I'm a huge advocate for cuts. Even though I am a pure federalist and advocate any downsizi
The Tea Party has made it damned clear they won't tolerate tax increases. Despite Boehner's whining about compromise, the people he can't convince to make a compromise aren't the Democrats, but the Tea Party. That bunch of crazies is fucking the GOP over seriously.
Despitebrepublican claims to the contrary, the Bush tax cuts did not increase government revenues by stimulating the economy. Those cuts have resulted in a direct reduction of revenue around 1.8 trillion dollars. in any case, we need massive spending cuts and some tax increases to get out of the mess. The tea party has neither the integrity or the knowledge to play any role in balancing the budget.
The misguided people who voted in these "ordinary people" should have looked for reasonable ordinary people
To put it backwards, I think they probably have too much integrity, fanatical and idiotic, but they honestly seem to believe that compromise on tax increases is akin to signing a deal with the devil. They're a naive populist movement that seems to have drunk way too much of their own kool-aid. Worst of all, they don't see how forcing this divide in the Republican caucus isn't going to make their movement stronger, but simply marginalize it. Obama still can probably sneak past this either by a controlled
You can argue their effectiveness and impact but the facts are that federal revenues did increase after the original Bush tax cuts, and at a historic rate.
Some people have hypothesized that they would have increased at a higher rate if not for the cuts and some have hypothesized the opposite, and both have some evidence to back their claims, but the hard numbers do show a rise in revenues above the norm. The problem was there was also a rise in spending to offset any revenue gains.
According to the CBO [cbo.gov] revenues increased every year after 2003 (the year the Bush tax cuts were fully implemented) and at a rate more than 2 times inflation. You can argue the "why", but not the numbers. It could have been a natural bounce back after a tech bubble recession and an unprecedented terrorist attack on American soil or it may have been an affect of the tax cuts increasing disposable income and making investing more appealing, or it may have been any number of other things or all of the above.
Citation needed. Please show me, in writing, from a reputable source, how the US economy is doing better now than it was when Clinton was still in office.
Are you even in the right thread? We were discussing Bush tax cuts and revenue, not the Clinton vs. Obama economies.
But for the record both Clinton and the Republican Congress lucked out in that the economy they oversaw was riding high on both the tech and start of the housing bubbles without ever really having to deal with the downturns. It was a dream time in the US economy before people started to wake up and realize that maybe some of these companies who produced no real goods and had no real income s
They don't need to balance the budget by August 2, they need to raise the debt ceiling. The debt ceiling is a legislated limit saying "this is how much we're allowed to borrow, not a penny more".
The debate isn't whether the debt ceiling needs to be raised. Everybody but the tea baggers knows that it needs to be raised, and August 2 is merely the deadline for getting the legislation passed in time for it to pass through the channels it needs to in order to be signed into law. The debate is about how they're
Smeagol is actually Joe Lieberman, I forget who pointed that out, I think it was probably the Daily Show back a couple years ago when he switched parties to keep his Senate seat.
Since the democrats are the ones that borrowed well over half the money that the federal government owes, its not a very far stretch to blame them for the money we owe, or the mess we are in.
The score over the past 30 years is $7.9 trillion borrowed when the Democrats controlled both House and Senate, and another $3.6 trillion when control was split between Republicans and Democrats, with only $1.7 trillion borrowed when Republicans controlled both House and Senate.
The Bush Tax Cut was already passed when Pelosi and Reid became Speaker/Leader.
When Pelosi and Reid because the dynamic duo, they didnt need a single Republican votes to pass anything. The evidence of this is the Health Care bill which between both House and Senate got exactly 1 Republican vote. This is in fact another fine example of their talk being a disconnect from what they do. When they were drafting that Health Care bill, they told the country that all those "compromises" were to please Republicans... but wait.. only 1 Republican voted for the thing in both House and Senate (c
I demonstrated quite succinctly that they could have raised taxes, in spite of any previous tax cuts.
They didn't. How is this changing the subject?
You appear to be uncomfortable with watching the Democrats instead of listening to them. Why is is to hard for you to take things at face value? Is it the years of investment you have put into believing what they said rather than noticing what they did?
Borrowing money isn't bad. Not paying it back is bad.
You need to look at how much of that money was paid back while the Democrats were in office, too. More appropriately, you need to look at which presidencies ended with a budget surplus, and which ones ended with a budget deficit.
Borrowing money isn't bad. Not paying it back is bad.
The problem is the borrowed money, that we cant afford the minimum payment, and the solution according to you is to borrow more money. Anything to keep the illusion alive I guess... right?
There's a nice little graph for you:
A graph that breaks it down by president during this specific crisis... really? Doesnt this crisis prove that the president doesnt have shit-all to do with spending, or the budget? Doesn't it? Are you eyes even open?
Anything that seems to support your preconceived notions no matter how dishonest, is that it? What is wr
Polling in the last few months consistently shows the American public are blaming(what passes for...) Republicans more than Democrats in regard to the budget debacle, and Congress' inability to make a deal. Both the American public, and the business community understand that compromise is needed. This is reality, not a game. Politics is all about compromise. You rarely get exactly what you want, unless of course you run a totalitarian state. Getting exactly what you want is a fantasy that the baggers h
I understand their perspective and conviction but I think the issue is that they want to do it ALL at once. No compromise
A friend of mine has a nice analogy about compromise.
"Let me stick my dick in your mouth"
"Come on. Let me."
"You should compromise with me. How about just the tip? Can I stick just the tip of my dick in your mouth?"
The point being that when the opposition wants something unacceptable, its always going to be unacceptable. It doesnt magically become acceptable just because its only the tip of his dick.
Except, in this case, your analogy fails almost 100%. This isn't a case of someone trying to do some sexual assault on you or something. We're trying to balance the books. That's done in two ways, lower expenses and increase revenue. Revenue has not been keeping pace with expenses due to tax cuts, a large number of baby boomers retiring, and the rapid increase in medical costs. Tack on the enormous recession which caused a further drop in tax receipts and the enormous hole we were already in and you can get
This isn't a case of someone trying to do some sexual assault on you or something.
Its worse. Its a case of congress stealing the futures of hundreds of millions of people that havent even been born yet.
Furthermore, my anaology had nothing to do with sexual assault. It had to do with asking someone to do something unacceptable and then asking for a compromise that is still completely unacceptable.
That's done in two ways, lower expenses and increase revenue. Revenue has not been keeping pace with expenses due to tax cuts
Revenue has not been keeping pace with spending ("expenses") because spending has gone through the roof over the past 30 years.
Furthermore, those tax cuts you are talking about increased re
What tax cuts increased revenue? The Bush tax cuts cost about 1.4 trillion dollars over 10 years (the cost will keep increasing the longer they stay in place). Reagan's initial tax cut was so drastic that he had to raise taxes just a couple of years later (although we've had large budget deficits ever since, with the one exception of the last year of Clinton's presidency).
The fastest rising expenditure of government is costs resulting from entitlements, primarily Medicaid and Medicare. This is because medic
The so-called Bush tax cuts. Which ones did you think?
You keep going on about the President(s) and Taxes and Budget. Why is this? Have you not taken a civics class?
The President does not draft budgets, nor can the President increase or lower taxes. If that were true, wouldnt the current crisis be Obama's fault for not lowering spending and raising taxes? Why hasn't Obama done that?
Every single time you attempt to pin the Federal fiscal situation on the President, you are demonstrating your ignorance.
If they increased revenue compared to what would have otherwise occurred, then why did they add the sunset provision? The answer is they knew it would not, so had to add a sunset provision so that it wouldn't violate the senate rule designed to stop legislation like this from passing (legislation that would add to the deficit for 10 years or more).
FYI, this law is commonly referred to as the Bush tax cuts. This isn't some liberal/conservative or intelligentsia/ignorant issue. Heck, Fox News even has a secti
It's added 1.4 trillion dollars to the federal deficit, you know, the thing we're trying to get rid of? Happy now?
The Heritage Foundation is a very conservative think tank. Got a non-biased source? Almost any other source will be less biased (or at least not more biased)...
In addition, notice when that article was written, prior to 2008? Most of those arguments ring pretty hollow now.
This isn't a case of someone trying to do some sexual assault on you or something.
Either you don't have a job, or haven't looked at your paycheck lately.
We're trying to balance the books. That's done in two ways, lower expenses and increase revenue.
To continue with the sexual assault analogy, let's say you work the corner of Main and 5th St. One particular patron got his service last week and then ran away. I mean, he promised that he would pay up at the end, but he didn't. And your pimp beat the snot out of you for not getting him his money. Do you trust the John when he comes around the second time, or do you demand to see the money up front?
I don't know what you're referring to. Tax rates are at the lowest rates they've ever been since I've been alive (late 70s).
My healthcare costs have gone up, but that's been going on ever since I started working back in the late 90s.
One of the most prosperous decades in the US was during the 50s, when tax rates on the rich were above 90% and tax rates for others were higher as well. We managed to grow the economy, pay off debt from WWII and carry out another war in Korea all at the same time. I think people
I think the problem with the Tea Partiers is that they see it as being their way or nothing. I understand their perspective and conviction but I think the issue is that they want to do it ALL at once.
You're forgetting how Reagan struck a deal with Tip O'Neal. In exchange for the tax hikes Reagan agreed to, there would be tax cuts. We got the taxes raised, but the cuts never came. "their way or nothing" translates to we ACTUALLY get the cuts before we raise the taxes. You've heard the cliche, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.", right?
The political reality, which McCain and the WSJ are all to quick to ignore, is that if the TP gives in, there will never be a tax cut and the FED
And sometimes you don't. Sometimes it's not a band-aid, but a society. I know there is a fraction of you vocal keyboard commandos that would love to go back to the early 1800's, but it's not going to happen. If you actually hate this society so much, just move. We won't miss you.
By 1800s, you mean the year 2000 right? Spending 18.2% of GDP as opposed to the current 25%. Because the government has added so much in the past 10 years that we just can't live without now.
Forcing a default on the US government, sending massive shockwaves through the global economy, which is already trying to deal with a potential partial Eurozone meltdown, that's not a sensible solution. That's the solution that self-destructive nihilists would take. It's almost like a financial Armageddon cult has taken over Congress.
And Obama, well, he gets the chance to do a number of things, including the 14th Amendment stunt, and look like the calm, collected rational president, just like when Bill Cl
Then what's your solution dipstick? Cause playing kick the can with a hand grenade when the further down the road you go the more inflammable your surroundings get is not an answer.
The solution is a compromise, accept some tax increases and then work towards a rational solution. Pulling the pin on the hand grenade will help US interests how?
There you go, swallowing those lies and mistruths you've heard blasted louder than anything else, on every major media outlet (and on some of the smaller ones). Refusing to not borrow more money will not, in fact, force the government to default on it's loans. The government still has enough money to pay the interest on the loans, no muss, no fuss. It may not be able to pay other people; foreign aid, congress, defense contractors, but it will not default on it's loans unless the President chooses to. Not to
The teabaggers don't give a shit about the finances. They have seen an opportunity for a major power grab and are on to it now. They redefined a routine move, that was expected to come when the last budget was voted for, into a make-or-break moment for the US. And they are perfectly willing to break it for their power gains.
If by "power" you mean, power to reduce the size of the Federal Government, then you are right. Redefining a routine move? If you don't understand that raising our borrowing limit and borrowing more money being a "routine move" is a major problem that needs to be corrected, then I'm afraid you are mind controlled.
Ah, one dollar for everyone without an argument making a snipe at my username. It's a pretty good idiot trap, isn't it? Helps me recognize the point when further discussion is useless.
We have to deal with it fast, but if you deal with it the TEA party way, what we'll end up is exactly what the US founding fathers rebelled against: A thin layer of rich aristocracy with poor peasants underneath them to shove around as they deem fit. This is essentially what you end up with if your solution is to reduce tax to next to nothing and thus take away the government's ability to actually govern. If you want that, ok. But unless you are one of the thin layer, I definitely doubt that you really want
The founding fathers had no problem with rich aristocracy: they WERE rich aristocracy. What they had a problem with was the unfettered power of unelected government and its intrusion into the everyday business of the common man.
And what, exactly, do you think is going to happen when a government with zero income tries to enforce the laws its passed in an effort to reign in the rich aristocracy that's trying to push around the middle and lower classes? How, with no money, do you think they're going to pay for the enforcement of the laws that are established to prevent the unelected corporations from exercising their unfettered power over the everyday business of the common man?
So you're saying that the US founding fathers - all well-educated and almost all well-heeled, many slave owners - in establishing laws that were significantly preferential to land-owners, were all the time rebelling against a thin layer of rich aristocracy with poor peasants underneath" ?!?
When you said "US founding fathers" did you actually mean "USSR founding fathers"?
Let's stop the thread here. The USSR founding fathers were hiding behind a veneer of support for the working class, while themselves being rich aristocracy who liked their power and opulence. That wasn't communism, it was fascism parading as communism.
That's completely incorrect. The Democrats have been willing to compromise; Obama's facing a backlash among his own party for being too willing to compromise. If you've been following the news you know where the Democrats started and where they are now and can see what they've compromised on. The Republicans still refuse to compromise at all on taxes.
The trick to a healthy government is for the population to pay attention to what they do, don't just wave your hands vaguely in the air and say both parties are equally culpable.
Really? When? In fact, the Democrats haven't even proposed a single bill to correct this situation in either house. They just sit there and vote "No" to all options being presented without presenting one of their own. They are, in effect, refusing to cut spending, period. They want to raise the debt ceiling and taxes and not make any real cuts in spending. True to form - Tax-and-Spend-Democrats bankrupting this country, one election at a time.
When have the Republicans? When Mitch McConnell woke up on the day of his "negotiation" with Obama and published an open letter about how he refuses to raise taxes? "I'm going to a negotiation but refuse to negotiate!" Lovely. We pay this man hundreds of thousands of dollars for this.
In fact, the Democrats haven't even proposed a single bill to correct this situation in either house.
Tax bills must originate in the House -- which the Republicans control. The only reason they bothered wri
The Republicans and Democrats compromised once when they agreed to the spending back when they passed this thing called the Budget. This bill is working out how to pay for the spending they already approved.
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We're seeing what was predicted two or three years ago. The Tea Party is poisonous to the Republicans, not the Democrats. It's pretty clear that Boehner is at maximum frustration level, and I think it's beginning to dawn on mainline and moderate Republicans that the Tea Party tail is now wagging the GOP dog. There's a level of hysterical irrationality about the Tea Party that is now coming into full view. They're not interested in governing at all.
I'm sure the White House has a long list of contingencies in place just like Clinton did when he was up against the Gingrich mob, and is probably quite content to watch the Republicans and the Tea Party wing battle it out. I think 2012 is pretty damned safe for him.
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The Tea Party is poisonous to the Republicans
The Tea Party apparently represents the will of the people as was demonstrated by the people voting them in in large enough numbers to shake the status quo. They are poisonous to "Party Politics" and the "Culture of Washington" and that is by design. That is what the people want to change, poison, kill. They will not fall back on their promises, and you deride them for that. No wonder this country is in such a mess. It's people like you, who cannot see the forest for the trees, who can only see in blue and
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The United States is a representative democracy, not a direct one. That means, some times, the representatives have to think beyond the sometimes errant, even moronic views of the masses. The masses, in turn, have the opportunity to turf those representatives at the end of their term if they feel they've been ill served.
If those voters who support the Tea Party think an absolutist stand against tax cuts leading to a default will somehow improve their lot in life, then those voters are sadly mistaken. Wha
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If those voters who support the Tea Party think an absolutist stand against tax cuts leading to a default
Are you sure you know what is going on? The Tea Party isn't against Tax Cuts they are against Tax Hikes (increases). They aren't for having the government default, they are for reigning in reckless spending. You know the reckless spending that has tripled (you know, multiplied by a factor of 3) the entire national debt within the last decade. The trajectory of spending we are currently on is unsustainable. This is a fact, it cannot be argued against. So the question is, do we deal with it now, or wait until
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I meant tax hikes.
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I don't consider myself to be tea-party as I'm a libertarian (yeah, I know you just stopped reading and will start the ad-hominem attacks now). But you are sorely mistaken...
First of all, the US is not a representative democracy. It is a constitutional republic. The fact that people elect representatives in a democratic fashion does not make us a democracy. New laws are still supposed to follow the Constitution regardless of how popular they are.
The Constitution itself does permit congress "To borrow mo
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The Tea Party are shills for Karl Rove, and the rest of the Neo-Cons who blew the budget surplus left over from the Clinton administration.
Citation needed.
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But, really, we'll settle for him getting a friggin' clue.
Have you heard how Karl Rove talks about the Tea Party. He can't STAND those people, which is understandable considering how they've upset his apple-cart.
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Classic political ego: thinking they voted FOR you, instead of AGAINST the other guy.
It's not really ego - it is how things are supposed to be. There is no way for an individual citizen to vote against something (only Congress can do that), we can only vote for something. To the citizen, voting for a Senator, Congressman, President is not a binary choice; there are more than two options. That fact alone makes voting against someone impossible. Votes were created, intended and, for all intents-and-purposes, are an indication that someone is for the thing for which they voted. no other interp
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Supervillain (Score:2)
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Except that the Tea Party has been integrated more closely into the GOP, at least that's what the GOP and the Tea Party wanted everyone to believe. Obviously it's not the case, the Tea Party feels no particular loyalty to mainline Republicans, seeming to view them not as opponents as they would any given Democrat, but as traitors to the true conservative cause.
The mainline Republicans are terrified that if they don't appease the Tea Party somehow, it will become a third party, and as a third party, the dam
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Good thing that we don't need tax dollars to pay for Medicare and Social Security and other private services...
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There are a LOT of people that have tried to start small businesses that would vehemently disagree with you about both the cost and effect.
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It's also worth pointing out that Obama and the moderate Republicans aren't talking about *only* raising taxes to cover the shortfall. The people in Washington who actually have a functioning set of synapses between their ears realize that the only way to balance the books is to decrease spending at the same time as increasing income.
It's the tea baggers who seriously don't understand that their stance is going to cause serious problems for the world economy who are screwing things over for everybody else.
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It's also worth pointing out that Obama and the moderate Republicans aren't talking about *only* raising taxes to cover the shortfall. The people in Washington who actually have a functioning set of synapses between their ears realize that the only way to balance the books is to decrease spending at the same time as increasing income.
Citation needed. A quote from the President's plan would be a good start. Mostly what has been put forward is raise taxes now, reduce spending later. This approach has been tried. Several time. The spending never gets reduced.
The Tea Party is standing up and saying, "Enough, dammit! We don't have any money left. No more promises of we'll get to it later. Cut spending NOW, before we give you any more money."
What boggles the mind is the so-called educated on this forum that can't grasp the idea that y
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Only if you're to the right of or at the optimal point on the Laffer curve. The supply-siders kept saying the US was to the right of it, again and again, but two can play that game. In truth, the Laffer curve probably looks like this [typepad.com], a chaotic mess at any significant distance from 0% or 100% taxation.
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Sure sounds like you're confused about what caused the great depression and this current recession or depression, whatever you want to call it. High economic growth rates are not sustainable and lead to bubbles. Regulatory burdens as you put it slow the growth down to manageable levels and their lack of action resulted in the housing bubble and resulting collapse. A steady economy with slow sustainable growth is the goal.
If we want to cut spending how bout we slash the TSA budget in half or get rid of it a
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By that logic, taxes will eventually reach 100% correct? When is the tax rate too high? We're at 70% in some brackets. Use your own life as an example. If you were spending too much money, and you knew a lot of the stuff you were spending it on was not necessary, would you stop spending so much or try and convince your credit card company to raise your limit so you can borrow more money from them? Would you spend less, especially on things you really didn't need, like infrastructure repair in the name
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No, we're not at 70% in some brackets. The highest tax bracket hasn't been at 70% since 1980. It's been in the low 30s ever since Bush Jr was in office, and that's only on income that is taxable, which for wealthy people is only a fraction of their true income. In addition, capitol gains tax is even lower than that, at about 15%.
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That's FEDERAL tax. Now add State tax, county tax, city tax, property tax, sales tax, gas tax and fees for any service that you actually get from the government.
The Tea Party is advocating that we've alway looked at the revenue side, and it is high time we actually make some of those budge cuts that everyone is always promising. And going from spending 40% more than you make to only spending 20% more than you make still leaves you in the hole.
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So where is the President's list of spending cuts for his side of the compromise?
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To continue your analogy, the Democrats insist we are actually starving, and we just need to keep eating like we have been to "create jobs for fat cells". Meanwhile the Republicans claim to be disgusted by our bellies and while we are eating 5000 calories today, we need to make drastic cuts and only eat 5999 calories tomorrow because the Democrats want to eat 6000 calories. Bear in mind, we only actually have 4000 calories of food per day of supply, but there's no need to cut back right now. If we start
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You can't loose weight unless you consume less calories than you take in. You'll have us believe that we can make a promise to see a nutritionist in a few years, at which time we'll go on a sensible calorie deficit diet, and everything will work out fine.
There's a term for people that think that way, morbidly obese, an apt description of the federal government.
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2. Cut needless Federal Departments that are unconstitutional, wasteful and ineffective.
Perhaps you haven't looked at a federal budget lately but Medicare, SS, and Defense represent 60% of the budget. All other areas combined represent 40%. As for needless, just because you don't think or like the purpose of an agency doesn't mean it is needless. Take for example, Dept of the Interior. Under it, are agencies like the Bureau of Land Managment and the National Park Service. Believe it or not some people want to preserve areas of the country where it is relatively untouched by man. The tot
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I think the problem with the Tea Partiers is that they see it as being their way or nothing.
Isn't that the party line that got them elected into office in the first place?
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I think the problem with the Tea Partiers is that they see it as being their way or nothing.
Isn't that the party line that got them elected into office in the first place?
It sure is. The problem is that the sane people in society have to pay for the votes of those idiots.
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The Tea Party has made it damned clear they won't tolerate tax increases. Despite Boehner's whining about compromise, the people he can't convince to make a compromise aren't the Democrats, but the Tea Party. That bunch of crazies is fucking the GOP over seriously.
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Despitebrepublican claims to the contrary, the Bush tax cuts did not increase government revenues by stimulating the economy. Those cuts have resulted in a direct reduction of revenue around 1.8 trillion dollars. in any case, we need massive spending cuts and some tax increases to get out of the mess. The tea party has neither the integrity or the knowledge to play any role in balancing the budget.
The misguided people who voted in these "ordinary people" should have looked for reasonable ordinary people
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To put it backwards, I think they probably have too much integrity, fanatical and idiotic, but they honestly seem to believe that compromise on tax increases is akin to signing a deal with the devil. They're a naive populist movement that seems to have drunk way too much of their own kool-aid. Worst of all, they don't see how forcing this divide in the Republican caucus isn't going to make their movement stronger, but simply marginalize it. Obama still can probably sneak past this either by a controlled
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You can argue their effectiveness and impact but the facts are that federal revenues did increase after the original Bush tax cuts, and at a historic rate.
Some people have hypothesized that they would have increased at a higher rate if not for the cuts and some have hypothesized the opposite, and both have some evidence to back their claims, but the hard numbers do show a rise in revenues above the norm. The problem was there was also a rise in spending to offset any revenue gains.
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As %GDP, it still hasn't recovered (part of this is due to the recession, naturally).
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According to the CBO [cbo.gov] revenues increased every year after 2003 (the year the Bush tax cuts were fully implemented) and at a rate more than 2 times inflation. You can argue the "why", but not the numbers. It could have been a natural bounce back after a tech bubble recession and an unprecedented terrorist attack on American soil or it may have been an affect of the tax cuts increasing disposable income and making investing more appealing, or it may have been any number of other things or all of the above.
Cl
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Citation needed. Please show me, in writing, from a reputable source, how the US economy is doing better now than it was when Clinton was still in office.
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Are you even in the right thread? We were discussing Bush tax cuts and revenue, not the Clinton vs. Obama economies.
But for the record both Clinton and the Republican Congress lucked out in that the economy they oversaw was riding high on both the tech and start of the housing bubbles without ever really having to deal with the downturns. It was a dream time in the US economy before people started to wake up and realize that maybe some of these companies who produced no real goods and had no real income s
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They don't need to balance the budget by August 2, they need to raise the debt ceiling. The debt ceiling is a legislated limit saying "this is how much we're allowed to borrow, not a penny more".
The debate isn't whether the debt ceiling needs to be raised. Everybody but the tea baggers knows that it needs to be raised, and August 2 is merely the deadline for getting the legislation passed in time for it to pass through the channels it needs to in order to be signed into law. The debate is about how they're
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Smeagol is actually Joe Lieberman, I forget who pointed that out, I think it was probably the Daily Show back a couple years ago when he switched parties to keep his Senate seat.
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Technically, young Lieberman is Smeagol and old Lieberman is gollum.
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The thing is, if the Tea Party gets everything it wants, and the whole economy does come crashing down, they will still blame the Democrats.
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The score over the past 30 years is $7.9 trillion borrowed when the Democrats controlled both House and Senate, and another $3.6 trillion when control was split between Republicans and Democrats, with only $1.7 trillion borrowed when Republicans controlled both House and Senate.
Yes. That is exactly how unbalanced th
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The Bush Tax Cut was already passed when Pelosi and Reid became Speaker/Leader. You're assigning that debt to them even though they voted against it.
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The Bush Tax Cut was already passed when Pelosi and Reid became Speaker/Leader.
When Pelosi and Reid because the dynamic duo, they didnt need a single Republican votes to pass anything. The evidence of this is the Health Care bill which between both House and Senate got exactly 1 Republican vote. This is in fact another fine example of their talk being a disconnect from what they do. When they were drafting that Health Care bill, they told the country that all those "compromises" were to please Republicans... but wait.. only 1 Republican voted for the thing in both House and Senate (c
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I demonstrated quite succinctly that they could have raised taxes, in spite of any previous tax cuts.
They didn't. How is this changing the subject?
You appear to be uncomfortable with watching the Democrats instead of listening to them. Why is is to hard for you to take things at face value? Is it the years of investment you have put into believing what they said rather than noticing what they did?
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Change the subject?
I demonstrated quite succinctly that they could have raised taxes
Raising taxes and/or cutting spending during an economic depression is bad policy.
The fact that you are unware of that further cements your status as a moron.
Have a nice day, moron.
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Borrowing money isn't bad. Not paying it back is bad.
You need to look at how much of that money was paid back while the Democrats were in office, too. More appropriately, you need to look at which presidencies ended with a budget surplus, and which ones ended with a budget deficit.
There's a nice little graph for you:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_debt_by_U.S._presidential_terms [wikipedia.org]
From Truman to Nixon, every President, both Democratic and Republican, decreased the national debt as a ratio to GDP. Since F
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Borrowing money isn't bad. Not paying it back is bad.
The problem is the borrowed money, that we cant afford the minimum payment, and the solution according to you is to borrow more money. Anything to keep the illusion alive I guess... right?
There's a nice little graph for you:
A graph that breaks it down by president during this specific crisis... really? Doesnt this crisis prove that the president doesnt have shit-all to do with spending, or the budget? Doesn't it? Are you eyes even open?
Anything that seems to support your preconceived notions no matter how dishonest, is that it? What is wr
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All that says is that the Democrats have better press agents. No small wonder given how much of the press is on their side.
I have started seeing some independent commercials lately. Those numbers *may* start to swing very soon now.
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The thing is, if the Tea Party gets everything it wants, and the whole economy comes roaring back, the Democrats will take all the credit.
And then want to increase taxes.
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I understand their perspective and conviction but I think the issue is that they want to do it ALL at once. No compromise
A friend of mine has a nice analogy about compromise.
"Let me stick my dick in your mouth"
"Come on. Let me."
"You should compromise with me. How about just the tip? Can I stick just the tip of my dick in your mouth?"
The point being that when the opposition wants something unacceptable, its always going to be unacceptable. It doesnt magically become acceptable just because its only the tip of his dick.
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Except, in this case, your analogy fails almost 100%. This isn't a case of someone trying to do some sexual assault on you or something. We're trying to balance the books. That's done in two ways, lower expenses and increase revenue. Revenue has not been keeping pace with expenses due to tax cuts, a large number of baby boomers retiring, and the rapid increase in medical costs. Tack on the enormous recession which caused a further drop in tax receipts and the enormous hole we were already in and you can get
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This isn't a case of someone trying to do some sexual assault on you or something.
Its worse. Its a case of congress stealing the futures of hundreds of millions of people that havent even been born yet.
Furthermore, my anaology had nothing to do with sexual assault. It had to do with asking someone to do something unacceptable and then asking for a compromise that is still completely unacceptable.
That's done in two ways, lower expenses and increase revenue. Revenue has not been keeping pace with expenses due to tax cuts
Revenue has not been keeping pace with spending ("expenses") because spending has gone through the roof over the past 30 years.
Furthermore, those tax cuts you are talking about increased re
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What tax cuts increased revenue? The Bush tax cuts cost about 1.4 trillion dollars over 10 years (the cost will keep increasing the longer they stay in place). Reagan's initial tax cut was so drastic that he had to raise taxes just a couple of years later (although we've had large budget deficits ever since, with the one exception of the last year of Clinton's presidency).
The fastest rising expenditure of government is costs resulting from entitlements, primarily Medicaid and Medicare. This is because medic
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What tax cuts increased revenue?
The so-called Bush tax cuts. Which ones did you think?
You keep going on about the President(s) and Taxes and Budget. Why is this? Have you not taken a civics class?
The President does not draft budgets, nor can the President increase or lower taxes. If that were true, wouldnt the current crisis be Obama's fault for not lowering spending and raising taxes? Why hasn't Obama done that?
Every single time you attempt to pin the Federal fiscal situation on the President, you are demonstrating your ignorance.
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If they increased revenue compared to what would have otherwise occurred, then why did they add the sunset provision? The answer is they knew it would not, so had to add a sunset provision so that it wouldn't violate the senate rule designed to stop legislation like this from passing (legislation that would add to the deficit for 10 years or more).
FYI, this law is commonly referred to as the Bush tax cuts. This isn't some liberal/conservative or intelligentsia/ignorant issue. Heck, Fox News even has a secti
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It's added 1.4 trillion dollars to the federal deficit, you know, the thing we're trying to get rid of? Happy now?
The Heritage Foundation is a very conservative think tank. Got a non-biased source? Almost any other source will be less biased (or at least not more biased)...
In addition, notice when that article was written, prior to 2008? Most of those arguments ring pretty hollow now.
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This isn't a case of someone trying to do some sexual assault on you or something.
Either you don't have a job, or haven't looked at your paycheck lately.
We're trying to balance the books. That's done in two ways, lower expenses and increase revenue.
To continue with the sexual assault analogy, let's say you work the corner of Main and 5th St. One particular patron got his service last week and then ran away. I mean, he promised that he would pay up at the end, but he didn't. And your pimp beat the snot out of you for not getting him his money. Do you trust the John when he comes around the second time, or do you demand to see the money up front?
Considering what previous Congress
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I don't know what you're referring to. Tax rates are at the lowest rates they've ever been since I've been alive (late 70s).
My healthcare costs have gone up, but that's been going on ever since I started working back in the late 90s.
One of the most prosperous decades in the US was during the 50s, when tax rates on the rich were above 90% and tax rates for others were higher as well. We managed to grow the economy, pay off debt from WWII and carry out another war in Korea all at the same time. I think people
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Tax rates are at the lowest rates they've ever been since I've been alive (late 70s).
We dont need to go on about "lowest ever" when we can state the actual values. The rate is currently 35% for rich people.
One of the most prosperous decades in the US was during the 50s, when tax rates on the rich were above 90%
Federal tax revenue as a percentage of GDP was at its lowest since 1950.. in the year 1950.
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I think the problem with the Tea Partiers is that they see it as being their way or nothing. I understand their perspective and conviction but I think the issue is that they want to do it ALL at once.
You're forgetting how Reagan struck a deal with Tip O'Neal. In exchange for the tax hikes Reagan agreed to, there would be tax cuts. We got the taxes raised, but the cuts never came. "their way or nothing" translates to we ACTUALLY get the cuts before we raise the taxes. You've heard the cliche, "Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.", right?
The political reality, which McCain and the WSJ are all to quick to ignore, is that if the TP gives in, there will never be a tax cut and the FED
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It turns out one way to reduce the Debt Per GDP is the grow the fucking economy, and it turns out 25% unemployment is not a great way to do that.
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Forcing a default on the US government, sending massive shockwaves through the global economy, which is already trying to deal with a potential partial Eurozone meltdown, that's not a sensible solution. That's the solution that self-destructive nihilists would take. It's almost like a financial Armageddon cult has taken over Congress.
And Obama, well, he gets the chance to do a number of things, including the 14th Amendment stunt, and look like the calm, collected rational president, just like when Bill Cl
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Then what's your solution dipstick? Cause playing kick the can with a hand grenade when the further down the road you go the more inflammable your surroundings get is not an answer.
Re:Smeagol (Score:4, Insightful)
The solution is a compromise, accept some tax increases and then work towards a rational solution. Pulling the pin on the hand grenade will help US interests how?
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Because the rational solution (Reducing spending) never happens.
It's Lucy and the football. "Sure, we'll reduce spending in the future, just raise taxes now."
Every time the Republicans fall for it, spending is never reduced.
This time they're asking for cuts NOW, and the whining, and bitching and COMPLAINING from the Democrats being forced to cut is ridiculous.
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Pulling the pin on the hand grenade will help US interests how?
By removing the hand grenade as a tool of negotiation. If you survive the blast, that's darn handy.
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Forcing a default on the US government
There you go, swallowing those lies and mistruths you've heard blasted louder than anything else, on every major media outlet (and on some of the smaller ones). Refusing to not borrow more money will not, in fact, force the government to default on it's loans. The government still has enough money to pay the interest on the loans, no muss, no fuss. It may not be able to pay other people; foreign aid, congress, defense contractors, but it will not default on it's loans unless the President chooses to. Not to
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We have to deal with it fast, but if you deal with it the TEA party way, what we'll end up is exactly what the US founding fathers rebelled against: A thin layer of rich aristocracy with poor peasants underneath them to shove around as they deem fit. This is essentially what you end up with if your solution is to reduce tax to next to nothing and thus take away the government's ability to actually govern. If you want that, ok. But unless you are one of the thin layer, I definitely doubt that you really want
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The founding fathers had no problem with rich aristocracy: they WERE rich aristocracy. What they had a problem with was the unfettered power of unelected government and its intrusion into the everyday business of the common man.
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And what, exactly, do you think is going to happen when a government with zero income tries to enforce the laws its passed in an effort to reign in the rich aristocracy that's trying to push around the middle and lower classes? How, with no money, do you think they're going to pay for the enforcement of the laws that are established to prevent the unelected corporations from exercising their unfettered power over the everyday business of the common man?
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Those are questions we could have asked ourselves before we spent all the money.
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So you're saying that the US founding fathers - all well-educated and almost all well-heeled, many slave owners - in establishing laws that were significantly preferential to land-owners, were all the time rebelling against a thin layer of rich aristocracy with poor peasants underneath" ?!?
When you said "US founding fathers" did you actually mean "USSR founding fathers"?
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Re:Compromise? (Score:4, Informative)
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The Democrats have been willing to compromise;
Really? When? In fact, the Democrats haven't even proposed a single bill to correct this situation in either house. They just sit there and vote "No" to all options being presented without presenting one of their own. They are, in effect, refusing to cut spending, period. They want to raise the debt ceiling and taxes and not make any real cuts in spending. True to form - Tax-and-Spend-Democrats bankrupting this country, one election at a time.
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When have the Republicans? When Mitch McConnell woke up on the day of his "negotiation" with Obama and published an open letter about how he refuses to raise taxes? "I'm going to a negotiation but refuse to negotiate!" Lovely. We pay this man hundreds of thousands of dollars for this.
Tax bills must originate in the House -- which the Republicans control. The only reason they bothered wri
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The Republicans and Democrats compromised once when they agreed to the spending back when they passed this thing called the Budget. This bill is working out how to pay for the spending they already approved.
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