sportchampps wrote:

 True but spending was not his strong point. I would prefer to spend less than what we take in. I’m hoping Doge and cuts can put us on that track. BTW Clinton fired a ton of federal workers to reduce spending

That was back when at least someone in Congress had a backbone. 

Remember the first couple years Clinton wanted a spending spree, he wanted Obamacare before that was thought of. 

The country flipped the house from D to R for the first time in decades and Clinton was smart enough to compromise and work with the Rs to balance the budget. That’s only reason he won a second term.

Clinton went from being stupid to a great POTUS when he realized his agenda caused the HoR to flip. 

That’s the last time the potus and congress truly worked together on a budget and magically it was balanced until 9/11

geeblock wrote:

Never mind the quote just the context 

Some of those responses makes me smh. Blaming all of our country's financial woes on Dems. 

2001 is calling.

jmog wrote:

That was back when at least someone in Congress had a backbone. 

Remember the first couple years Clinton wanted a spending spree, he wanted Obamacare before that was thought of. 

The country flipped the house from D to R for the first time in decades and Clinton was smart enough to compromise and work with the Rs to balance the budget. That’s only reason he won a second term.

Clinton went from being stupid to a great POTUS when he realized his agenda caused the HoR to flip. 

That’s the last time the potus and congress truly worked together on a budget and magically it was balanced until 9/11

Adding to that was the Gore Government reform commission that was previously mentioned that consolidated federal jobs and agencies.

There was also the end of the Cold War and drastic reduction of the defense budget and BRAC. 

Add them all up and you get a balanced budget and a short time where the debt wasn't growing.

Again, the blueprint is there.....

ptown_trojans_1 wrote:

Adding to that was the Gore Government reform commission that was previously mentioned that consolidated federal jobs and agencies.

There was also the end of the Cold War and drastic reduction of the defense budget and BRAC. 

Add them all up and you get a balanced budget and a short time where the debt wasn't growing.

Again, the blueprint is there.....

We are in such a polarized era now. Much, much moreso now as compared to then. 

I really don't think anything can be done at this point by a Republican.

ptown_trojans_1 wrote:

Adding to that was the Gore Government reform commission that was previously mentioned that consolidated federal jobs and agencies.

There was also the end of the Cold War and drastic reduction of the defense budget and BRAC. 

Add them all up and you get a balanced budget and a short time where the debt wasn't growing.

Again, the blueprint is there.....

not only is the blueprint there, but they have the majority to pass whatever they want.  They dont need musk to do it, they could do it by the books.

geeblock wrote:

not only is the blueprint there, but they have the majority to pass whatever they want.  They dont need musk to do it, they could do it by the books.

Both sides have kicked this can down the road for 30 years. This isn’t an R problem this is both sides that have had majorities and POTUS at times and punted with CRs and deficit spending budgets.

Acting like this is now on the Rs because they have control is asinine. Congress in general has had no spine, either side, when it comes to the budget for 25+ years. 

jmog wrote:

Both sides have kicked this can down the road for 30 years. This isn’t an R problem this is both sides that have had majorities and POTUS at times and punted with CRs and deficit spending budgets.

Acting like this is now on the Rs because they have control is asinine. Congress in general has had no spine, either side, when it comes to the budget for 25+ years. 

I get that.  But we are discussing right now.  If the dems were in charge right now i would say the same about them.  Im acting like its on them is because it is on them right now and they are making it the number one issue.  I would do the same if it were the dems.  Relax

geeblock wrote:

I get that.  But we are discussing right now.  If the dems were in charge right now i would say the same about them.  Im acting like its on them is because it is on them right now and they are making it the number one issue.  I would do the same if it were the dems.  Relax

You didn’t have much to say about deficit spending the last 4 years….be real…

jmog wrote:

You didn’t have much to say about deficit spending the last 4 years….be real…

was there a billionaire randomly cutting gov't programs at will with little to no thought process for the last 4 years?

geeblock wrote:

was there a billionaire randomly cutting gov't programs at will with little to no thought process for the last 4 years?

Would it change anything if he were poor?

CenterBHSFan wrote:

Would it change anything if he were poor?

No. I really don’t care that he is a billionaire. I care that there seems to be no transparency, lots of untruths being told, random and seemingly targeted programs that seem to be not the most important if you really wanted to lower the deficit. Also what do we know about the people who work for him. 

geeblock wrote:

was there a billionaire randomly cutting gov't programs at will with little to no thought process for the last 4 years?

So you have a bigger problem with cutting wasteful spending if its done the "wrong way" but ok with wasteful spending if no one even tried to stop it?

No one was cutting spending at all the last 4 years, or the last 20+ years for that matter. That's the f'ing problem. Neither side has really wanted to tackle the problem in Congress head on. Now that someone is, even if not the way that we, as  a country, are SUPPOSED to do it, you are upset.

I would much rather Congress tackle this as well, but Ds and Rs alike have had zero balls for 25 years so something has to wake them up, maybe this will.

Your response is rather odd.

geeblock wrote:

No. I really don’t care that he is a billionaire. I care that there seems to be no transparency, lots of untruths being told, random and seemingly targeted programs that seem to be not the most important if you really wanted to lower the deficit. Also what do we know about the people who work for him. 

No transparency? They literally gave receipts at multiple press briefings and congressional hearings lately and corrected a few of the untruths/exaggerations/etc. 

No transparency would be the American people having zero idea that we spent millions of dollars teaching Moroccans how to do pottery...something they have done longer than we have been a country.

I think its rather transparent to call out, even if on twitter/X these types of idiotic spending grants out in the open. That's the opposite of "no transparency".

We've had no transparency about where our money is going for decades, now that someone is throwing it right out in the open, and bringing receipts and correcting things that they jumped the gun on (the condoms to Gaza thing has been corrected for instance) is near the definition of being transparent.

And what do we know about 99.9% of the people who work in the federal government? We know basically zero about nearly all of them, why is it a problem that we don't know a bunch about the people working in DOGE?

Your response to this is rather telling. I think everyone on this board knows if this was Obama or Biden making cuts you would be praising them "see, Ds care more about government oversight than Rs" or something similar.

You are the one that is quite transparent in your biases.

jmog wrote:

No transparency? They literally gave receipts at multiple press briefings and congressional hearings lately and corrected a few of the untruths/exaggerations/etc. 

No transparency would be the American people having zero idea that we spent millions of dollars teaching Moroccans how to do pottery...something they have done longer than we have been a country.

I think its rather transparent to call out, even if on twitter/X these types of idiotic spending grants out in the open. That's the opposite of "no transparency".

We've had no transparency about where our money is going for decades, now that someone is throwing it right out in the open, and bringing receipts and correcting things that they jumped the gun on (the condoms to Gaza thing has been corrected for instance) is near the definition of being transparent.

And what do we know about 99.9% of the people who work in the federal government? We know basically zero about nearly all of them, why is it a problem that we don't know a bunch about the people working in DOGE?

Your response to this is rather telling. I think everyone on this board knows if this was Obama or Biden making cuts you would be praising them "see, Ds care more about government oversight than Rs" or something similar.

You are the one that is quite transparent in your biases.

So we cut the CPFB before we audit the pentagon?  that makes zero sense.  The misinformation with the gaza thing is still out there and being repeated and yes i gave credit to them for correcting it.  But this week they have a whole new misinformation going about "9 million dollars to Rueters"

The other "reciepts" they show imo arent "fraud", they dont agree with them and yes they could/should  be deemed  wasteful, but that isnt fraud.  Every single thing DOGE is "discovering" isnt new and was public record and a lot of it that they go on about came in with trump lol. 

Im all for making cuts as i have said dont put words in my mouth and try to have a whole conversation with yourself and imagining what i might say lol.  What im saying is we should be making cuts with large parts of the budget not start with a cut a consumer protection bureau or the FDIC or the department of education for example.  I dont think that is a contraversial take on this subject.  I dont think its way out there to be skeptical of someone i know very little about having this much power and just saying "trust me I am in charge of holding myself accountable and I have done nothing and will do nothing wrong".  No way you think that makes sense.  What if biden hired george soros and put him in charge of cutting the budget? you would be cool with that?

geeblock wrote:

So we cut the CPFB before we audit the pentagon?  that makes zero sense.  The misinformation with the gaza thing is still out there and being repeated and yes i gave credit to them for correcting it.  But this week they have a whole new misinformation going about "9 million dollars to Rueters"

The other "reciepts" they show imo arent "fraud", they dont agree with them and yes they could/should  be deemed  wasteful, but that isnt fraud.  Every single thing DOGE is "discovering" isnt new and was public record and a lot of it that they go on about came in with trump lol. 

 

Im all for making cuts as i have said dont put words in my mouth and try to have a whole conversation with yourself and imagining what i might say lol.  What im saying is we should be making cuts with large parts of the budget not start with a cut a consumer protection bureau or the FDIC or the department of education for example.  I dont think that is a contraversial take on this subject.  I dont think its way out there to be skeptical of someone i know very little about having this much power and just saying "trust me I am in charge of holding myself accountable and I have done nothing and will do nothing wrong".  No way you think that makes sense.  What if biden hired george soros and put him in charge of cutting the budget? you would be cool with that?

I wouldn't have given two shits if George Soros was in charge of cutting the budget...

You know why? Because of the part about CUTTING THE BUDGET.

You just made it quite obvious that you are all about bias vs results. You are upset its Trump and Musk and not Biden/Soros. You think everyone else thinks like you, that they are upset only when the other side does something not what that thing actually is. Only the far left and the far right act like that, those of us in the actual middle don't care who does something, we only care if it was the right thing to do. And cutting the budget is the right thing to do. I don't give a flying fuck if it is Musk, Soros, Trump, Biden, Obama, Harris, JD Vance, or all of the above. That's the difference between people who are bias to one side (you) and those of us who aren't.

I want government spending to be cut, in nearly all areas. Education, foreign aid, welfare, medicaid, and yes, ESPECIALLY defense budget.

Why do I care if its Musk or Soros or Joe Smoe from Paduca Kentucky? We spent 27% more than we should in 2024, the federal budget should be 27% lower than it currently is. You arn't doing that without cuts in nearly every department.

If Congress refuses to do the job, let an outsider do it, maybe it will wake them up finally?

Again this isn’t something you can just read a line item and not know what it is and just say hey let’s cut this with no planning. Usaid pays billions to farmers who will now be left high and dry. Reports of millions in food and medicine already paid for just going to waste at docks. Federal workers being stranded in foreign countries etc.. we also have to have common sense cutting 1 percent of NPR budget seems more like an agenda than it is about cutting the def

jmog wrote:

I don't give a flying fuck if it is Musk, Soros, Trump, Biden, Obama, Harris, JD Vance, or all of the above. That's the difference between people who are bias to one side (you) and those of us who aren't.

It's actually WHY Elon might have been the right guy for the job.

Obama talked about getting rid of waste and inefficiency.  I think he even appointed a task force.  They got nowhere, likely because useless govt employees are really good at running out the clock.  I forget the exact comment Obama made after leaving office and failing on this...something like "too much for 1 man in 8 years" or something.  Loosely translated into "the govt is too big to reign in".

But Musk and his band of "hackers" can get the data and analyze it themselves and trace things back.  So much tougher to delay and obfuscate.

Par for the course that the Dems are resisting this every step of the way, and somehow people are like "yeah, I'm concerned...let's do nothing".  Which is hilarious because traditionally it's people on the left who scream "but we have to do SOMETHING....even if we fail at least we tried".  Now they're quoting Homer Simpson "the lesson is never try"

geeblock wrote:

Again this isn’t something you can just read a line item and not know what it is and just say hey let’s cut this with no planning. Usaid pays billions to farmers who will now be left high and dry. Reports of millions in food and medicine already paid for just going to waste at docks. Federal workers being stranded in foreign countries etc.. we also have to have common sense 

Move the goalposts when you are wrong. Got it. 

Our budget would have to be cut by 27% to even be balanced from 2024.

They’d hate me worse, I’d give every single department 1 week to tell me how they are cutting 28%, and I will even give them a year to actually do it, or Musk/Soros/Zuckerburg/Joe Smoe from Paduca, is coming in with a sledgehammer to break the budget.

Well, Mike Johnson is worthless and a liar. He's not going to lead any charge into writing up legislation to make recommended cuts. And even if he did it's not like there are going to be enough Republicans to approve it and send it to the Senate. And even if it got that far, I've no doubt that MM and his cronies will let it go through to be signed by Trump. There are just too many hucksters in our Congress and Senate.

Just the other day the Dems were caterwauling about the risk of big pharma losing some profits. 

What do you think will break first?

gut wrote:

But Musk and his band of "hackers" can get the data and analyze it themselves and trace things back.  So much tougher to delay and obfuscate.

The media is beside themselves this is being done by  young "juveniles" in their eyes led by the likes of "Big Balls".

jmog wrote:

No transparency? They literally gave receipts at multiple press briefings and congressional hearings lately and corrected a few of the untruths/exaggerations/etc. 

No transparency would be the American people having zero idea that we spent millions of dollars teaching Moroccans how to do pottery...something they have done longer than we have been a country.

I think its rather transparent to call out, even if on twitter/X these types of idiotic spending grants out in the open. That's the opposite of "no transparency".

We've had no transparency about where our money is going for decades, now that someone is throwing it right out in the open, and bringing receipts and correcting things that they jumped the gun on (the condoms to Gaza thing has been corrected for instance) is near the definition of being transparent.

And what do we know about 99.9% of the people who work in the federal government? We know basically zero about nearly all of them, why is it a problem that we don't know a bunch about the people working in DOGE?

Your response to this is rather telling. I think everyone on this board knows if this was Obama or Biden making cuts you would be praising them "see, Ds care more about government oversight than Rs" or something similar.

You are the one that is quite transparent in your biases.

You think federal employees who have access to the treasury aren’t vetted?

Good to see this board is in favor of the Executive Branch ignoring the laws of Congress.

Money had already been approved and authorized and by Article I, Section 9 as well as the 1974 Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act, the President cannot ignore that law. 

Yes, the President can trim the federal workforce, but not the programs that are directly tied to funds approved by Congress. 

Unless DOGE coordinates with Congress, the entire thing is simply unconstitutional.

It may be easier to have them cut the budget, as Congress is a mess, but the Constitution and law are pretty clear. 

Again, the blueprint is there. Have Doge work with the federal agencies and then report to Congress directly the cuts. 

Take everything Musk is finding and put that in a bill or through the committees. 

Then pass it. 

Going around Congress is simply against the law.

I'll hold off judgement on Elon's work with cutting gubment funding until I am able to determine if, in his estimation, that should include all the stuff he gets gubment funding for. If so, thumbs up! If it turns into "We're cutting all these programs while I continue to suck that tittie dry!", then fuck him.

ptown_trojans_1 wrote:

Good to see this board is in favor of the Executive Branch ignoring the laws of Congress.

Money had already been approved and authorized and by Article I, Section 9 as well as the 1974 Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act, the President cannot ignore that law. 

Yes, the President can trim the federal workforce, but not the programs that are directly tied to funds approved by Congress. 

Unless DOGE coordinates with Congress, the entire thing is simply unconstitutional.

It may be easier to have them cut the budget, as Congress is a mess, but the Constitution and law are pretty clear. 

Congress hasn’t made a budget cut in 30 years. So while I sure wish they were doing their job…until they grow some balls to actually do it let someone else do it.