gut;831042 wrote:Are you for real? This is the Repubs fault? The $1.7trillion deficit that's raised the debt ceiling issue to begin with is the Repub's fault?!? And it's the Repubs fault for rejecting a plan with some $300B annually in tax increases when we have a $1.7trillion deficit to deal with?!?

LMAO, so let me get this straight...You don't want to vote for Obama because of the deficit, but because they can't balance the budget (or even come up with a budget), you're going to vote for Obama? So you're happy if I keep spending you into oblivion so long as I reject reasonable plans to STOP spending you into obliviion?

The reason derek bomar believes the republicans have gone insane is because Obama has made an offer of a Moderate Republican!

The average Republican wants to see a deal with 26% revenue increases (nevermind that BHO has offered this through cuts in inefficient tax expenditures which is just government spending through the tax code) and 74% spending cuts

BHO has OFFERED that 20% of the budget deal accompanying the debt ceiling raise be from revenue increases which again are really just cuts of spending by another name. So, BHO's offering position is Further to the right than the average republican.

As David Brooks says this is the mother of all no brainers but people like Eric Cantor are unbelievable....they would rather see the Tim Geithner pick and choose what is necessary to spend on and watch the economy contract at an alarming pace causing massive harm for millions and millions of people out of the principle of not eliminating spending through the tax code because he thinks it's a tax increase...and the Prez wants to do even less than the average voter in Cantor's party.

This is not stupid it is evil.





^^^^^^^^^^^Obama's bargaining position has been To The Right of the Average Republican voter!

BoatShoes;831093 wrote:The reason derek bomar believes the republicans have gone insane is because Obama has made an offer of a Moderate Republican!

The average Republican wants to see a deal with 26% revenue increases (nevermind that BHO has offered this through cuts in inefficient tax expenditures which is just government spending through the tax code) and 74% spending cuts

BHO has OFFERED that 20% of the budget deal accompanying the debt ceiling raise be from revenue increases which again are really just cuts of spending by another name. So, BHO's offering position is Further to the right than the average republican.

As David Brooks says this is the mother of all no brainers but people like Eric Cantor are unbelievable....they would rather see the Tim Geithner pick and choose what is necessary to spend on and watch the economy contract at an alarming pace causing massive harm for millions and millions of people out of the principle of not eliminating spending through the tax code because he thinks it's a tax increase...and the Prez wants to do even less than the average voter in Cantor's party.

This is not stupid it is evil.





^^^^^^^^^^^Obama's bargaining position has been To The Right of the Average Republican voter!

QFT. People just don't fucking get it.

I mean, ffs, you have Obama on record saying he's ok with means testing for medicare, raising the age of social security, and cutting other spending...and this thing is being held up because these fuckers on the right just want to Blame him instead of work with him. It is purely political, and it is fucking disgusting.

BoatShoes;831093 wrote:The reason derek bomar believes the republicans have gone insane is because Obama has made an offer of a Moderate Republican!

The average Republican wants to see a deal with 26% revenue increases (nevermind that BHO has offered this through cuts in inefficient tax expenditures which is just government spending through the tax code) and 74% spending cuts

BHO has OFFERED that 20% of the budget deal accompanying the debt ceiling raise be from revenue increases which again are really just cuts of spending by another name. So, BHO's offering position is Further to the right than the average republican.





^^^^^^^^^^^Obama's bargaining position has been To The Right of the Average Republican voter!

Democrats know one thing: the Republican majority in the House was given that majority by the Taxed Enough Already Party. They know that if they can get the Republicans to cave (yet again) on the 3 to 1 spending cuts to revenue increases deal (which is the ultimate Lucy-pulling-the-football-away-from-Charlie Brown deal, because the cuts never happen or they vaporize into thin air over the next 10 years or whatever), then they can pin the "See, you can't trust those guys and their word" label on Republicans in Congress- just like they did to George HW Bush.

The Republican position is not unreasonable. You and David Brooks may not agree with it, but it's not like they're inventing it out of thin air. They came to power with a mandate, and I hope they follow through on it.

derek bomar;831169 wrote:I mean, ffs, you have Obama on record saying he's ok with means testing for medicare, raising the age of social security, and cutting other spending...and this thing is being held up because these ****ers on the right just want to Blame him instead of work with him. It is purely political, and it is ****ing disgusting.

He has put ZERO on the table in terms of an overall plan. He and the Dems in Congress are playing the ultimate political game, waiting to Republicans to cut one dime off of one Democrat Holy Grail entitlement (which is really every entitlement) so they can demagogue that plan to death and promise utopia (yet again) to their constituents.

That is disgusting.

jhay78;831175 wrote:He has put ZERO on the table in terms of an overall plan. He and the Dems in Congress are playing the ultimate political game, waiting to Republicans to cut one dime off of one Democrat Holy Grail entitlement (which is really every entitlement) so they can demagogue that plan to death and promise utopia (yet again) to their constituents.

That is disgusting.

It is disgusting but it's SOP. Count on the media to assist with the demagoguing.

BoatShoes;831093 wrote:...
BHO has OFFERED[/U][/I][/B] that 20% of the budget deal accompanying the debt ceiling raise be from revenue increases which again are really just cuts of spending by another name....

No deal. If it includes going further into debt, no deal. If we must raise the debt ceiling, no deal.

In addition, give the U.S. citizens a plan to balance the budget and begin eliminating the debt. Make this negotiation part of that plan...whatever the plan is! Do not come to the people and say that you have cut some spending but need the debt ceiling raised. No deal.

Planning spending increases of 100B and then only increasing by 60B isn't a 40B spending cut. Spending still goes up 60B. Are the so called spending "cuts" actually going to reduce spending or are they more funny accounting by the government?

BoatShoes;831093 wrote:The reason derek bomar believes the republicans have gone insane is because Obama has made an offer of a Moderate Republican!

The average Republican wants to see a deal with 26% revenue increases (nevermind that BHO has offered this through cuts in inefficient tax expenditures which is just government spending through the tax code) and 74% spending cuts!

Wow. This is why Washington isn't accountable. Learn to read your own chart. What that chart says is Republicans favor spending cut over tax increases by 3:1. It says NOTHING about supporting a 26% increase in revenues....Your chart even says Democratic voters favor spending cuts over tax increases.

And, by the way, a major sticking point is Obama hasn't put any REAL spending cuts on the table and has apparently started pulling back what he has offered.

jhay78;831173 wrote:Democrats know one thing: the Republican majority in the House was given that majority by the Taxed Enough Already Party. They know that if they can get the Republicans to cave (yet again) on the 3 to 1 spending cuts to revenue increases deal (which is the ultimate Lucy-pulling-the-football-away-from-Charlie Brown deal, because the cuts never happen or they vaporize into thin air over the next 10 years or whatever), then they can pin the "See, you can't trust those guys and their word" label on Republicans in Congress- just like they did to George HW Bush.

The Republican position is not unreasonable. You and David Brooks may not agree with it, but it's not like they're inventing it out of thin air. They came to power with a mandate, and I hope they follow through on it.

ashfsdhfldjs First of all I've already told you that the "Revenue Increases" that BHO is proposing are eliminations of inefficient government spending through the tax code....the elimination of carrots that deviate from economic norms and distort the investment decisions of capitalism and intervene in the free market place.....Tea partiers should be for these revenue increases because they eliminate big government distortions in the market...that is if they had any coherent ideological footing to stand on!

Never mind that easily more than HALF of the taxed enough already party doesn't pay a dime in federal income taxes based upon their demographics according to Gallup!

The TEA Party is intellectually bankrupt. They say that we're taxed too much despite being the lowest taxed country in the OECD and then go on to complain that 47% of Americans don't pay any taxes, when their demographics suggest that an even greater percentage of TEA partiers don't pay taxes either! They say the wealthy pay too much in taxes but if we listened to them even more of the tax burden would fall on the wealthy. Tea Party apologists on TV will explain that what they're really asking for is lower rates and a broader tax base to diffuse America's tax responsibility. But if half the Tea Party doesn't pay income taxes today, a broader tax base -- even with minuscule rates -- would raise many of their taxes!
That's what they don't get, these tax expenditures which are really just government spending make it so they don't pay any taxes and yet they complain about being taxed to much when the crux of the matter is that What amounts to government spending has preserved the fact that most tea partiers don't pay taxes and yet they don't understand this and rail against government spending. Oh but then they mystically support the Paul Ryan plan which shifts the tax burden Onto TEA Partiers by eliminating the distortionary tax expenditures that they're calling "tax raises" in the current budget debate.


The party's labyrinthine position on tax policy isn't worth untangling any further. They have no solid intellectual foundations. It's a Gordian Knot that deserves a guillotine. It is a political movement that has taken over the news cycle like a particularly aggressive strain of ragweed.

Nevermind that they've actually been successful as they've gotten the entire government....even the socialist prince himself to believe in the myth of expansionary austerity! austerity programs cast shadows: raise unemployment now via austerity cuts in government spending, and some of that increased unemployment sticks around permanently as higher structural unemployment worsening the long run debt and deficit picture so long as S (Stuck Around Unemployment) + G (the Long Run Growth Rate which is around 3%) is greater than R (The Interest Rate on Government Debt which is around 2%); And S+G is definitely greater R

thirty-year Treasury inflation-indexed security rate at 1.62% per year is lower than the expected long-run growth rate of the real economy right now of close to 3% per year. The NeoClassical (not Keynesian) "Golden Rule" for optimizing economic growth is that f the economy ever gets itself into a situation in which risk-adjusted long-run interest rates are lower than the risk-adjusted expected long-run growth rate of the economy, it is dynamically inefficient--and government should borrow and spend and keep borrowing and spending until at least it drives long-term interest rates up to and above the risk-adjusted expected long-run growth rate. This all true without even appealing to a single Big Gubmint Socialist Keynesian idea or admitting to the fact that we're in a Liquidity Trap.

Yet Republicans and Obama are at a stalemate over how to make our economy more dynamically inefficient over the long run because some tea partiers started yelling.

just look at this beautiful St. Anthony Falls Bridge;



It was a collaborative project, paid for by the much derided stimulus funds.

Every engineering body in the country has put in one report or another on the terrible state of America's highways, bridges, sewers and what-have-you. Hell, when you drive from Toronto to any place in the auto-manufacturing belt, the way you know you've left Canada is that the highway suddenly goes all to hell. Hitting the States is like taking a trip ten or twenty years back in time.

Imagine if we'd just follow basic, classical economics text books (IF S+G > R then Borrow!) and borrow money from Uncle Ben for 5 years at -0.52% and start putting people back to work instead of listening to the tea party!

tk421;831201 wrote:Planning spending increases of 100B and then only increasing by 60B isn't a 40B spending cut. Spending still goes up 60B. Are the so called spending "cuts" actually going to reduce spending or are they more funny accounting by the government?

No matter how many times this is said, some people just don't get it. 3 to 1 spending cuts for tax increases (which isn't even on the table realistically) would still leave us with a deficit of several hundred billion. The whole lot of Dems should be impeached for somehow shifting the focus to tax increases when fully 80% of this solution will have to come from spending cuts.

gut;831211 wrote:Wow. This is why Washington isn't accountable. Learn to read your own chart. What that chart says is Republicans favor spending cut over tax increases by 3:1. It says NOTHING about supporting a 26% increase in revenues....Your chart even says Democratic voters favor spending cuts over tax increases.

And, by the way, a major sticking point is Obama hasn't put any REAL spending cuts on the table and has apparently started pulling back what he has offered.

I Agree with your interpretation of the chart...

I don't know what I said to make you think I was conveying what you thought I was....the Point still remains that Obama originally offered 4 spending cuts to 1 revenue increase (with the revenue increase coming from a cut of a tax expenditure that distorts economic activity) and that is more conservative than the average republican voter. I'm not that great of a writer so I can imagine I might have conveyed the wrong idea.

And, if his numbers have dropped it's because obviously he's getting no movement from the Pubs in a negotiation...And despite your point that yes we're going to need $800B more in spending cuts to balance the budget right now you of course know that this would depress the economy even further in a liquidity trap and be very, very bad. The deficit will not be closed in this negotiation and it is not reasonable to think it should!

I mean dang the guy has floated two of the most poisonous ideas in the mind of his base....means testing medicare and raising the age of social security!

Even if the Spending cuts in this deal are not enough to close the deficit it doesn't change the fact that this would be an impressive deal for the Republicans (especially when you consider that the revenue increases come from the type of expenditures that would be eliminated in the Ryan plan all the R's in the house just passed). Take the deal and get the debt ceiling raised and move on to close the deficit further another day!

BoatShoes;831232 wrote: I don't know what I said to make you think I was conveying what you thought I was....the Point still remains that Obama originally offered 4 spending cuts to 1 revenue increase (with the revenue increase coming from a cut of a tax expenditure that distorts economic activity) and that is more conservative than the average republican voter.

For crying out loud man, it's a poll...Do you favor tax increases OR spending cuts. It's not people saying they want $3 for every $1 in tax increases. If you want to interpret that poll correctly, 3 Repubs favor cuts for every 1 favoring tax increases. It says nothing more than that, and nothing more to read into like you keep trying to. It says absolutely nothing about what the average voter feels the mix of cuts/taxes should be, or how much taxes should be raised, or anything like that. It's funny how you ignore the thing that jumps out the most about that poll - over 50% of Dems favor spending cuts OVER raising taxes.

And the cuts have already been discussed - they aren't real, they are mostly lower rates of future increases. The cost of all programs will continue going up, he's just offering to raise them more slowly. That's not a cut.

Not one more goddamn dime. The sooner you people come to grips with that, the better.

Or, you could just predictably play the race card.....again. Good ol' Sheila.....

[video]http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/07/15/dem_congresswoman_blames_debt_ceiling_fight_on_oba mas_race.html[/video]

And here's a story about how many times the GOP leadership voted to extend the debt ceiling when W was in office.

http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2011/04/14/158424/republican-leaders-debt-limit-hypocrisy/

Simply amazing how they all had the same epiphany.

stlouiedipalma;831445 wrote:And here's a story about how many times the GOP leadership voted to extend the debt ceiling when W was in office.

http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2011/04/14/158424/republican-leaders-debt-limit-hypocrisy/

Simply amazing how they all had the same epiphany.

They also put together budgets and cut taxes

coyotes22;831475 wrote:They also put together budgets and cut taxes

Don't forget the wars and expanding medicare.

I Wear Pants;831499 wrote:Don't forget the wars and expanding medicare.

I forgot Dems never start or get involved in Wars, or create Social Programs.

stlouiedipalma;831445 wrote:And here's a story about how many times the GOP leadership voted to extend the debt ceiling when W was in office.

http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2011/04/14/158424/republican-leaders-debt-limit-hypocrisy/

Simply amazing how they all had the same epiphany.

Let's not forget they lost the White House and both Houses in the 2008 election mostly due to the wars, spending, and the economy. What of that has changed? Well, basically all that has changed is Americans have had enough and gave back the House to Repubs who are now, correctly, following that mandate to reduce spending. And I'm not convinced they are completely opposed to higher taxes, nor their base, but certainly only in exchange for REAL cuts, NOW, and not simply reductions in spending increases over 10 years that may never materialize.

gut;831524 wrote: And I'm not convinced they are completely opposed to higher taxes, nor their base, but certainly only in exchange for REAL cuts, NOW, and not simply reductions in spending increases over 10 years that may never materialize.

One of the most insidious ploys the Dems practice is labeling spending INCREASES as spending CUTS. For example, if the Repubs want the increases to be, say, 5% but the Dems were hoping for 9%, the Dems accuse the Repubs of cutting spending by 4% and the media is more than happy to spin it as truth.

Those days are over or at least they should be.

We need true CUTS...not increases cleverly cloaked as cuts. When the idiots in DC put true cuts on the table, then they can come to us and ask for tax increases. Those tax increases had better go directly towards paying down debt or all bets are off.

But here's the thing, whenever politicians ask for tax increases, the additional revenues NEVER - NEVER - go towards paying down debt. The politicians salivate over the new booty and scheme ways to spend it in their home districts.

It's all a sham and a shame.

believer;831526 wrote:...

But here's the thing, whenever politicians ask for tax increases, the additional revenues NEVER - NEVER - go towards paying down debt. ...

No doubt about this. all new federal revenue in any for must, must be applied towards debt reduction.

it is so fucking laughable how blindly you guys are tied to one party

derek bomar;831589 wrote:it is so fucking laughable how blindly you guys are tied to one party

It is, and I'll admit to having been one of the partisans until recently. Truth is, arguing about which party has been the less fiscally responsible is like arguing over which breed of dog has the most fragrant turd.

derek bomar;831589 wrote:it is so fucking laughable how blindly you guys are tied to one party

What's even more laughable is the "superiority complex" exhibited by the fence riders who, believing themselves above the partisan bickering (hence the idea of - oh I dunno - political parties), are blindly and conveniently blown about by the shifting political winds.

Like it or not partisanship has kept this great nation from swinging too far to the left or to the right. Get over it.

For the record, while I'm a registered Republican, I stopped financial contributions to the party when the idiots spent like Dems the last time they controlled Congress.

And before all you fence riders call yourselves "enlightened independents" you're the morons who put Obama in the WH. Just sayin'......

believer;831605 wrote:What's even more laughable is the "superiority complex" exhibited by the fence riders who, believing themselves above the partisan bickering (hence the idea of - oh I dunno - political parties), are blindly and conveniently blown about by the shifting political winds.

Like it or not partisanship has kept this great nation from swinging too far to the left or to the right. Get over it.

For the record, while I'm a registered Republican, I stopped financial contributions to the party when the idiots spent like Dems the last time they controlled Congress.

And before all you fence riders call yourselves "enlightened independents" you're the morons who put Obama in the WH. Just sayin'......

The alternative would have been worse. And I really hope someone of substance runs against him (not Bachturd or Moosehunter).

And I don't have a superiority complex, I just know when something is wrong and can admit it, unlike people who pledge allegiance to one party and then go along with everything that party says/does, even if they actually know better.