Neil Cavuto on the debt commission recent recommendations….we need to show some guts:
He makes some valid points. Everyone knows we need this deficit to go down, way down, and he is asking if we are all prepared to do whats necessary?
BUT…I’m not buying it. Much of what they are recommending seem to be tax hikes and the expansion of government. Hell, they don’t even call for the repeal of ObamaCare which will GREATLY expand government
- By its own admission (page 11), the report calls for a ten-year net tax hike of $961 billion, nearly a $1 trillion tax increase over the decade.
- The stated goal of the report is to raise the long-standing historical level of federal revenues from its average of 18 percent of GDP to 21 percent of GDP. According to President Obama’s own Office of Management and Budget, federal revenues have never been this high, and their data pre-dates World War II.
- The report deceptively calls their net tax hikes “spending in the tax code.” There is no such thing, unless you assume the government has a right to all your money, and when they cut your taxes this is the same thing as “spending money on you.”
- Additionally, the report calls for a tax hike “trigger” to take effect if Congress fails to enact comprehensive tax reform. This “trigger” would take the form of a 10 percent reduction in the mortgage interest deduction, charitable contribution deductions, the exclusion for employer-provided health insurance, and a host of other tax deductions and credits. This haircut would grow over time, eventually leading to untold trillions of dollars in tax hikes.
- The gas tax would be raised by $0.15 per gallon beginning in 2013. All this money would be spent on union-dominated “Davis Bacon” construction projects. An American family with a 15-gallon tank who fills up weekly would see a tax hike of $117 per year.
- There’s a stealth tax hike which involves slowing down how fast tax brackets adjust to inflation. Over time, American families would find themselves in higher tax brackets than they otherwise would. “Bracket creep” would begin to once again rear its ugly head.
- Not counted in the $1 trillion tax hike is an expansion of the Social Security taxable wage base. Under current law, only the first $106,800 in wages and net income from self-employment are taxable. The report calls for the Social Security taxable wage base to gradually increase to nearly $150,000 (in today’s dollars) by 2050. This increases the marginal tax rate on work by 12.4 percentage points for workers in this income range.
- Finally, the report calls for an automatic tax increase in any year that the budget is out of balance.
And when politicians who love to raise your taxes start making statements like the one below we REALLY need to take another look at these recommendations:
The Senate’s top Democrat on budgetary issues said that colleagues should be willing to “sacrifice” their political careers in order to get the U.S. on a better fiscal path.
Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.), the chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, said that bringing down deficits and debt would require tough choices like the ones proposed on Wednesday by the leaders of President Obama’s fiscal commission, recommendations that have already been met with a chilly reception.
“There is no way of doing it that’s not controversial or difficult,” Conrad said on ABC’s “Good Morning America” of the panel’s recommendations. “If some of us have to sacrifice a political career to get this country back on track, then so be it.”
Be very afraid when someone like Conrad is telling Democrats to fall on the sword.
And here is Rush on his radio show (video here) on the recommendations, quoting Steve Manacek:
“A lot of introductory verbiage could have come straight from the mouth of Ronald Reagan. Cut and invest to promote economic growth, cut spending we simply can’t afford wherever we find it, reform and simplify the tax code, broaden the base, lower rates, bring down the deficit.” I shared all this with you yesterday, and so on. “There are pages and pages of more or less specific proposals, some more pleasing to conservatives, others to liberals. But here’s what I don’t get about the initial reactions,” Mr. Manacek writes. “Putting aside all the minutia and all the detail the crux of the proposal comes down to two points: Capping federal government expenditures at 22% of GDP and capping revenues at 21% of GDP.
“Each of these represents a big problem. The first is on the spending side. Except for the anomalous stimulus bailout recession years of 2009 and 2011, federal government expenditures haven’t reached 21% of GDP since the collapse of the Soviet Union,” and Mr. Manacek writes here, “Except for the anomalous stimulus bailout recession years 2009 and 2011.” The whole point — if you want to really know the dirty little secret (I know I overuse that phrase) — the truth about the stimulus package was to increase the baseline on which future budgets are built. In two years, they increased the baseline around 20%, maybe even more. He’s out there saying, “shovel-ready jobs,” and then he said there aren’t any shovel-ready jobs. It was never about jobs as we know.
There weren’t any jobs that were created. We continued to lose jobs. It was rhetoric. Jobs created, jobs saved? This was about massively increasing the budget for all time. That’s what the stimulus bill was, to up the baseline. Now, those of you have been regular listeners since the early nineties know all about baseline budgeting. We spent a week explaining it to you. The baseline is simply the amount every year that every budget item is based on, whether the item is overfunded or underfunded, it doesn’t matter. So when Mr. Manacek writes here, “Except for the anomalous stimulus bailout recession years of 2009 and 2011, federal government expenditures have not reached 21% of GDP since the collapse of the Soviet Union.”
But they did with the stimulus. Permanently. The stimulus raised the baseline, and so now this debt commission comes up and says, “We’re gonna cap federal government expenditures at 22%.” But the problem is we’ve never spent 22% of GDP. Since World War II. Spending only competed 21% of GDP during the Reagan-Bush military buildup of the eighties and nineties. For virtually all of the Clinton and George W. Bush years and during all the Kennedy-Johnson-Nixon years, federal spending ranged between 18 and 20% of GDP”, and this deficit report caps it at 22%. It raises the baseline exactly what the stimulus was.
This thing is a blueprint for the expansion of government and codifying it as law, at 22%, when we’ve never spent that, up until Obama shows up. That’s one side of this. “The more important problem is on the revenue side. According to OMB figures, federal revenues have never reached 21% of GDP. That’s what they are targeted to be in this initial report that came out yesterday. In fact, only in Bill Clinton’s final year in office and during World War II did revenues even exceed 20% of GDP. During the whole time from 1960 to 2008, federal tax revenues almost always fell between 17 and 19% of GDP, only occasionally rising above 19%, chiefly in Clinton’s second term or below 17%, George W. Bush’s first term.”
Look, there’s a lot of numbers here. The bottom line is federal spending has never been as high as what this deficit commission report suggests, and federal taxes have never been as high as what this deficit commission report suggests. This is a trick, and it’s got all the Reagan language in there and it’s got all the stuff that sucks our side into saying, “Ohh, yeah, we’ll look at this.” You got the left not liking it because they don’t like the ratio of 75% spending cuts and 25% tax cuts, but there isn’t any cutting! It’s just like every year of the federal budget: There’s nothing being cut here. Taxes, spending, zilch. It’s all going up to unprecedented levels in our history and that’s the truth about this.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: One more reason to totally ignore the commissioner’s report yesterday on the deficit reduction panel report. They don’t even mention getting rid of health care, and if you are serious about reducing government, if you’re serious about tackling our debt, you gotta repeal it. You cannot have any element of it. They don’t even talk about it. It’s just baseless. Well, it isn’t baseless. It’s dangerous what this report does ’cause it’s a trick. It’s sucking our guys in, “Oh, wow, look, Reagan language in there, broadening the base, oh, yeah, I kinda dig the lower rates in there, I really do, love the spending to tax cut ratio.” Take your cue from the left. They hate it. They hate it, and they’re stupid. If they understood what this thing actually proposed they’d be out there trying to get it passed today.
So while Neil Cavuto makes some points, we all need to take some hits, this commissions recommendations don’t appear to be the savior some are calling it.
See author page
What a coincidence, the Debt Commission recommends the only solution that Dems have ever come up with and the one that has never worked. These guys are geniuses.
Rush may not be an economist, but he got this one right, . . . “All it does is cement the notion of expanded government spending ad infinitum.”
Don’t these clowns understand that recovery will only occur when small to medium businesses in America become confident, envision a road which will see them on a return to health, and begin rehiring? One element in that Confidence is certainly NOT the further burdening of entrepreneurs, or small and mid sized companies, with stifling regulation, paperwork, restrictions, self-righteous bureaucrats, etc.
Large corporation are not as important in this particular road to recovery. They have the size, momentum and $s to move services and facilities offshore if they have to to further reduce costs, and continue to sit on their cash – total hoard apparently closing in on $1 Trillion. AND consumers are saving at higher rates than they have in years.
Availability of credit is also not the problem, regardless what Bernanke & Co pretend to the world. There’s plenty of cash around. Lack of liquidity is a red herring. He’s slapping China in the mouth, not a punch just a slap, with ramp-up of the printing presses he laughably calls quantitative easing, but the reality is that Europe has amped-up the Euro presses, as have others. It’s all relative, . . . so to speak. And who’s going to urinate on his leg? No one really. Bernanke represents America. China might flap its lips, but it’s not about to retaliate meaningfully.
This commission reminds me of the kind of “consulting” that is hired by a weak CEO who has no vision and is clueless as where to lead his company. He hires an outside bunch that he can blame if things go wrong so that the Board will have difficulty denying him his bonus. The sycophants bring him what they think he wants to “hear,” and he pays their invoice.
This bunch on the commission will bring Obama what he wants to hear, and it won’t include anything his Union friends don’t want, nor will it include touching Obamacare.
I guess none of you cons ever bothered to look at the charts that show defense and entitlement spending rocketing WAY ABOVE 21% OF GDP as the Baby Boomers retire and draw on Medicare and Social Security. Put your head in the sand and do nothing and we will be well the beyond 21% of GDP target in Simpson-Bowles. This is especially true if you add back the Bush tax cuts, which are NOT included in the calculations and which will make the projected deficits even steeper.
And by the way, cons, the reason the Deficit Commission report does not call for repealing Obamacare? Because it DECREASES THE PROJECTED DEFICIT! Why in the heck would they call for the abolition of something that helps move toward a solution to the problem?
And another thing — it is called a deficit commission; it is not some bogus con “shrink the size of government” commission. You cons controlled the WH and the Congress from 2001-2007. Did you shrink the size of government? Of course not! You expanded the scope, the size and the intrusiveness of government. So excuse me if we don’t buy your latter day “we believe in smaller government” crapola: it smells like b.s. and your history proves it is b.s.
Let me speak as a baby boomer, which makes me a part of the “entitlement generation”: we have allowed the government to spend far too much money on us, parlaying the bliss of the 50’s into more benefits for us. The age thing for Social Security needs to be applied NOW. I am 60 years old. The social security age needs to go up asap.
Furthermore, regardless of all the other decisions which we make, we need to look at social security and medicare reasonably. It was a Ponzi scheme, and now, an unsustainable Ponzi scheme.
Social Security needs to be paid only to those who put into it (I know 3 people in their 30’s who draw healthy social security benefits (one gets nearly $3000 a month), and we need to get out of it what we paid into it.
Now, while I agree with the sentiments of many here that we ought to just abolish social security and medicare, etc., it just is not going to happen. If it is not disbanded, then we need to actually pay into these systems what we will take out.
From Curmudgeonly & Skeptical 😉
http://curmudgeonlyskeptical.blogspot.com/2010/11/real-answer-is.html
😆
I Concur. Guerrilla Capitalism Invoked!
The idea of Free Trade with Third World Nations is a major portion of the problem. Wages must be in parity for countries to have free trade or else you drain the wealthier country of its wage earning income to the advantage of the poor country, essentially creating wealth redistribution at the expense of the American worker and eventually the whole country.
Initially there is amazement at how cheap the products of China and Mexico are produced. Quality is overlooked, occasionally you throw a new purchase away because it doesn’t work, but in the long run it doesn’t matter because everything is so cheap; however, a few Americans lose their manufacturing jobs each day and no one cares, because of unemployment compensation. In the interim, whole factories are leaving our country to relocate where they can hire child labor, have no environmental concerns, where labor problems are dealt with by the police and the revolver. The loss of jobs increases from a trickle to a flood and soon we have become a nation of consumers and we have traded our economic might away to become silly people walking around the mall listening to music on little machines like it is a life force we need to survive while we do the only thing our people can do well, consume! The music becomes the immediate cheap opium that allows our people to lose their grip on reality while our country slides onward toward destruction, like a pacifier for a child that is too old to be dreaming of his time of sucking on the teat, we hold desperately to music as our world disintegrates around us.
In the mean time, our Marxist leaders in Washington tell us how great it is to redistribute our wealth to third world Communists and that we will no longer be heating our at 72 degrees and we will no longer be driving our gas guzzling SUVs, we have traded the soul of freedom for the slavery of Socialism and we are now International Socialists. We should be glad to accept a few sacrifices and a new level of poverty, for we are truly being good neighbors in the international community of Socialists, terrorists, thieves, and slave masters. How’s that yoke on your shoulders and those chains on your ankles working out? you’ll get used to it, just remember the Uncle Bo knows what is best for you.
Skook,
“The idea of Free Trade with Third World Nations is a major portion of the problem. Wages must be in parity for countries to have free trade or else you drain the wealthier country of its wage earning income to the advantage of the poor country, essentially creating wealth redistribution at the expense of the American worker and eventually the whole country.”
You’ve nailed the heart of the trade imbalance.
At the price of repeating a prior post…. of over 2 years ago:
“Between countries of approximately equal standards of living, the impact on the participants is tempered and there is no overwhelming and imbalanced loss or gain. One example is the U.S. Canada trade relationship which is the world’s largest. Although there is no such thing as absolute Free trade, the current arrangement has contributed positively to both countries. There are many factors that affect the impact, but overall the outcome is positive.
When there is serious imbalance such as has existed between the U.S. and China or the U.S. and Mexico the long term impact on the respective societies can be extreme. Furthermore the current “arrangement” with China hardly resembles anyone’s definition of free trade since China has made it difficult for anything American to be brought in. Meanwhile, the American consumer has fuelled the creation of a vast Chinese middle class almost equal in size to the population of the U.S.”
Canada is the only country America can have Free Trade with. Time to revisit all tariffs instead of measures such as devaluing the dollar against the renminbi which is an action against all countries.
There is also NO Free Market when trading with a country that rigs the game. China has been attractive because it has so cheaply made goods. We couldn’t resist.
Great post – thanks.
B-rob, even the obama admin these days essentially admits that obamacare does not cut costs. I would also take exception to your lumping defense in with entitlement spending. Apples and oranges, and defense has never been a smaller portion of the budget since WWII. We should spend more on defense. But you are right about the expansion of government under GW Bush – but that doesn’t mean conservatives agreed. I certainly want our federal government slashed quite a bit – we ought to lose energy, education, commerce, EPA and those portions kept should only be recordkeeping functions. Lose all the czars as well. I am sure there is more to cut.
JR, it is time to tell the Chinese freighters to turn around or head for some other port, we must start to manufacture again or we will be a country of super rich Elites and serfs. Exactly what the Obama/Soros Open Society wants, an economically crushed and demoralized North America, so that they can gain control.
They are laughing at the Democrat Party, they were merely a bunch of Useful Idiots that were used to bring America to its knees and now they should fall on their swords with the satisfaction of knowing they were the Obama Dupes. They willingly served Obama as stupid sacrificial lambs sacrificed the country to enable the damnation that is Obamanation.
The Elites are a circle of radical Marxists; they don’t include the Useful Idiots, the idiots are disposable and can be recruited on any street corner or college campus.
The Big Joke is on the Democrats as they watch their party disintegrate down the outhouse hole. 😉
It should also be pointed out that one reason European countries have smaller armed forces than we do is because we have been their umbrella. They have been able to get away with their utopia chasing social spending because they had us to protect them.
We don’t have socialized medicine because we’d rather have an aircraft carrier. It’s because socialized medicine is a failure and enough people here knew that. Unfortunately they believed the dems when they said they would be fiscally responsible and politically moderate. They know better now.
1st: If I have a choice…..I’d rather have the italics, bold, quote, link features than the line of funny faces, thank you.
Now, as to the topic:
Obama rewarded his unions buddies in his first month in office by applying the Davis Bacon Act to EVERY dime, EVERY penny of federal money spent on a wage of any worker, anywhere.
That means we have GOT to cut Davis Bacon back to pre-Obama applications before we can EVER control government spending and waste.
Next, James Raider @#2 is correct.
Confidence has got to be restored to American businesses and consumers IF we are ever to get growing ourselves out of these economic doldrums.
That can only happen if we all have CERTAINTY in what to expect in TAXES, HEALTH COSTS, etc., in our futures.
Then, and only then, can people PLAN.
And businesses don’t hire unless they can plan.
Also, as to the baby boomers.
This is a demographic bump.
It is temporary.
Putting a permanent fix on all of government because of a temporary problem is both stupid and expensive.
Look at how baby boomers were dealt with as they hit each of their other milestones.
A housing boom.
A public school expansion.
A public college expansion.
Lots of jobs.
Practically free abortions.
Later a growth in the medical systems.
BUT when each of these was passed by, as the baby boomers aged out of it, there was a vacuum filled by illegals, undocumented, what-ever-you-want-to-call-thems.
And now, here we are.
The baby boomers are retiring.
I hear that over 60% of them haven’t made very good plans and are planning to rely on their Social Security alone.
A huge part of all of our nation’s financial issues could be solved by encouraging business.
But our government has discouraged business at every turn.
1979.
The last year a nuclear power plant opened in the USA.
15.
The number of nuclear power plants to be opened this year elsewhere.
Government has made opening a business almost impossible.
Now, ObamaCare adds 13,000 new IRS agents just to enFORCE the new burdens on business caused by the $600 rule.
Lawyers are the fastest growing jobs industry, as more of them are necessary to simply owning a business, any business.
And finally, yes, cutbacks should be made in government.
I noted ”pork” was not cut back in the recommendation of the two co-chairs as it is “only” $14 billion in federal money.
Well, for a couple comparisons:
JCPenny just announced its yearly numbers and it earned $6 billion…..BIG NEWS.
Obama just went to Asia with businessmen so he could (hopefully) ink deals worth $7 billion.
That was also BIG NEWS.
So, WHY isn’t $14 billion in cutbacks a great idea?
Not big enough?
It would send a message on top of being a big deal.
Here is a paper you might find useful: How Many U.S. Jobs Might Be Offshorable? by Alan S. Blinder, @ Princeton University.
It seems that Postal workers and advertising sales agents have nothing to worry about. The rest of the employed masses are screwed.
Congress needs to pay attention to this. Employment is priority number ONE for most taxpayers. While Mr. I-will-not-sleep-until enjoys the perks of the Presidency, some serious vision is called for. Jobs will not materialize just because Bernanke continues printing more dollars.
http://michaelscomments.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/dec-unemployment-by-industry.gif
This graph is from January, but it still accurately illustrates the point:
Yes, you would be best off if you work for the government.
Just not ”offshorable.”
Although, I did hear horror stories last tax season about the IRS hot line being fielded by foreigners.
Simply false. Please show me any scoring that indicates that Obamacare does not reduce the deficit. And, no, that the b.s. Paul Ryan calc where he adds on stuff that is unrelated to Obamacare, then claims his hypothetical scoring raises costs.
I agree in a sense: entitlements are a statutory animal; we are required by law to spend X amount on those who are entitled to the benefit. Defense spending, however, is entirely discretionary. We spend what we chose to spend and there is not statutory mandate to spend any particular amount.
So what? The fact that it has in the past been a bigger portion of the budget (when we raised a multi-million man army to fight a world war against two industrialized military powers) does not in any way justify what we are spending today. That is like saying “I used to spend $400 a week on crack five years ago. Since I still spend $400 per week and I make more money, that is not a problem.” The heck it isn’t!
For what? What are the current needs that are not being met with a budget that swallows more than 20% of every single dollar spent? What does the Pentagon need that it does not have?
It’s funny, cons always say “you can’t throw money at a problem” where education or health care is considered; yet they insist on doing just that for only ONE government agency. And that is all the military is — a government agency. It should be no more sacrosanct that Energy or Commerce or Education. Indeed, you cons want to cut Education and Energy and EPA NOT because there is any great cost savings there, but because of your ideological opposition to those agencies. That is silly, especially seeing as how little, compared to defense, is spent on those departments.
In fact . . . can you identify ANY “waste, fraud and abuse” in the EPA? Or Energy? Or serious issues with Education — especially since much of its dollars are sent directly to states who would then be responsible for any resulting “waste, fraud and abuse”? In comparison, billions of dollars in cash sent to Iraq simply disappeared, and billions more was wasted in military contractor ripoffs. Where is the outrage on that “waste, fraud and abuse”? Why no calls to have the military crack down on that before they get any more money?
The best thing about the teabaggers is that some of them have called for reductions in military spending. Why do we need thousands of troops in Germany in defense of a Soviet tank invasion that will never happen? Why have thousands in Japan to “keep down” its non-existent offensive military ventures? That is billions upon billions wasted right there.
@ Nan G,
“Lawyers are the fastest growing jobs industry, as more of them are necessary to simply owning a business, any business.”
I love this one because it’s another truth. I happen to be part of the Boomer crowd you mention, but good fortune has removed stressing over what government might ever do with my pension, however, . . . in recent years I’ve applied much time counselling businesses and individuals. As such one of the repeated themes has revolved around “protection” from the vagaries of drive-by lawyers constantly chasing ambulances. In Comment #40, @ Skookum’s Thanks Mr President, I am Your Enemy, the advice is rooted in protecting one’s future from lawyers.
Too many of them are out there chasing the same dollar, and they have had much to do with what ails the landscape – ridiculous laws, out-of-control health care costs, fear that someone with trip over your kid’s skateboard, corporate insurance and protection for all manner of endeavour, etc.
Is it any wonder companies are fleeing to offshore havens? Not much. Answer: REIGN IN THE LAWYERS in a serious and meaningful way. Throw judges under the bus who accept to hear cases that should never see light of day. There should be a law specifically for judges – If you’re stupid, you go jail – just on very subjective grounds. 😉
As to this:
[T]his debt commission comes up and says, “We’re gonna cap federal government expenditures at 22%.” But the problem is we’ve never spent 22% of GDP. Since World War II. Spending only competed 21% of GDP during the Reagan-Bush military buildup of the eighties and nineties. For virtually all of the Clinton and George W. Bush years and during all the Kennedy-Johnson-Nixon years, federal spending ranged between 18 and 20% of GDP”, and this deficit report caps it at 22%. It raises the baseline exactly what the stimulus was.
This thing is a blueprint for the expansion of government and codifying it as law, at 22%, when we’ve never spent that, up until Obama shows up.
~~~~~~~~~~
I’ve got graphic proof:
http://calculatedriskimages.blogspot.com/2010/09/government-spending-as-percent-of-gdp.html
That a crock this co-chair recommendation is!
All it is is trial balloons.
Obama watches as the rest of the commission, and the business media and the pundits, and the public tear it to shreds THEN he will weigh in.
Maybe.
But it will not be put in front of the House.
Skook,
China is not the only headache for bringing trade anywhere near some reasonable balance. Germany’s success is also throwing things askew on the trade imbalance front.
Germany’s export engines, . . . cars, drugs, heavy equipment, are on a tear (eg.: ($122.4 billion in September = 18% increase over 2009), and are driving its growth.
America has to revisit its whole trade policy, not just radically stimulate the small to medium businesses with huge doses of energy.
I suppose this is about what should have been expected.
Everybody talks about balancing the budget and reducing the debt, but no one is willing to make the sacrifices or ideological compromises that are necessary to accomplish that. Everybody would rather hold out in hope of getting everything their own way.
Which isn’t going to happen.
If we don’t do something serious and soon, we’re headed for total financial disaster. Not as an abstraction, but as reality. Nobody will be immune. I hope the richest among us still like their debt-swelling tax cuts when their hoards of dollars, or Euros, yuan, or whatever the hell they try to escape with isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on.
Well, Democrats are mad enough at the ObamaCare they just passed without reading that they are vowing…VOWING… to reverse, at the very least, the 1099 filing rule from it.
In case you don’t know, that’s why ObamaCare needed 13,000 new IRS agents (I wonder if these same Dems will defund them?) who would oversee every transaction in business involving more than $600.
http://thehill.com/blogs/healthwatch/health-reform-implementation/128971-baucus-vows-effort-to-repeal-1099-filing-requirement-
@ Greg, I got news for you. This situation will put the Nation as a WHOLE in the Hurt Locker. Not just the Classes of Folks that you seem to have an axe to grind with.
Think Big Picture instead of your “Class Warfare” issue that you keep harping about. When the Dollar loses value, it is Everyone that gets hurt. Industries shutter the windows and lock the gates when no one can buy their goods. You don’t want that.
The US Treasury is printing up 600 Billion Dollars of Currency that will come on rolls like Toilet Paper. Just like Post WWI Germany. Bread will be $100.00 a loaf then? This is the Current Regime at work. Total Economic Illiterates!
OOPS!
Regarding post #19.
Those silly Democrats!
they forgot that the ObamaCare law contains a ”severability clause.”
One segment CANNOT be repealed.
Either it all goes (my suggestion) or it all stays.
@ Greg…Don’t look now but…
White House Staffers Got a Bigger Raise Than You Did Last Year
http://gawker.com/5687778/white-house-staffers-got-a-bigger-raise-than-you-did-last-year
Now, how big was Your Raise? 9%? Mine was 5% give or take a farthing or two…
Old Trooper 2,
It seems we’re on the same page here, with “lawyers,” including Judges, filling the top of the Need-to-change list of priorities.
Perhaps a decisive Action Paper emanates from this post and gets forwarded to Washington.
To be added:
– The Fed gets folded in and under Congressional control and oversight.
– The fifty year Inflation stupidity-inducing hallucinogen, triggered when the dollar was disconnected from gold, gets reigned in and attached to something tangible, like the boots of the Worker, since there is probably not enough gold in the world to make it viable any longer, . . . and who wants to be forced to turn over their gold fillings at gun point?
@ James Raider, The New Elite Ruling Class that gets support from Class Warfare, Entitlement Favorable and Capitalist Hating dolts may get their wish. When the Treasury prints up $100.00 bills on rolls like toilet paper these Progressives that asked for this situation will be wondering WTH happened. By then they will be out raising cane because their Hero & his Merry Band of Manipulators pulled a fast one on the Nation. It will be too late when they are enjoying a standard of living that rivals Ethiopia or Somalia.
@ Old Trooper 2, #22:
The Debt Commission co-chairs are also proposing a federal pay freeze, cutting the federal workforce by 10%, a 1% per year cut in discretionary spending, a phased-in increase in the full Social Security retirement age, etc.
The recommendations aren’t designed to please democrats any more than republicans. They’re designed to actually deal with deficits and debt.
Have the conservatives who have been howling about fiscal responsibility got some secret plan that allows the nation to have its cake and eat it too?
All through this past election cycle, as republicans stood on their soap boxes and talked about fiscal responsibility and how they’d balance the budget, I’ve been asking Where are the details? I’m still waiting. Thusfar, all they seem intent on doing is to trash someone else’s proposed solutions, while back-pedaling on campaign promises that no longer seem so convenient, now that they’ve won some elections.
The Deficit Commission’s Report Draft #11.10.10:
http://www.fiscalcommission.gov/sites/fiscalcommission.gov/files/documents/CoChair_Draft.pdf
Much will be discussed of this, and nothing will come of it. . . . Funny thing, it doesn’t say anything about keeping Obama off Airforce One.
This Plan is exactly what America needs – a commission filled with lawyers telling it what to do. When in doubt, check the source, then check motivation. . . . The insanity continues.
@ Greg, Yep like last year and they got a 9% raise for White House Staffers. I think your Useful Idiots set the stage for “austerity for thee but not for me.” You don’t see the pattern. More Gummint Jobs and the Private Sector gets meddled with.
Get off your soapbox. The Regime does not Want to reduce spending, the size of Government or get Fiscally Responsible. Are you really that naive? Don’t waste your talking points on me. I am not fooled by obvious lies or half truths. I get information from multiple sources that tell me otherwise. I run a business, pay cost increases, tax increases, get regulated by Fools and still make a profit regardless of Government interference.
When You run a business, make a payroll and employ directly and indirectly several thousands of people, you can relate your experiences.
Private Sector = Producers
Public Sector = Consumers of Wealth but produce NOTHING.
You really don’t get it.
Just in case there is any doubt on the Make-up of this DEFICIT COMMISSION and who they are/were:
Co-Chairmen:
Sen. Alan Simpson. Former Republican Senator • Juris Doctor and career politician
Erskine Bowles, • Actually had a job, Fund raiser for President Clinton
Executive Director:
Bruce Reed, Chief Domestic Policy Adviser to President Clinton • Political gadfly from the start
Commissioners:
Sen. Max Baucus (D., Mont.) • Lawyer
Rep. Xavier Becerra (D., Calif.) • Lawyer
Rep. Dave Camp (R., Mich.) • Lawyer
Sen. Tom Coburn (R., Okla.) • Doctor
Sen. Kent Conrad (D., N.D.) • Civil Cervant
David Cote, Chairman and CEO, Honeywell International • Personal Friend of Obama
Sen. Mike Crapo (R., Idaho) • Lawyer
Sen. Richard Durbin (D., Ill.) • Lawyer
Ann Fudge, Former CEO, Young & Rubicam Brands
Sen. Judd Gregg (R., N.H.) • Lawyer
Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R, Texas) • CEO of Family business
Alice Rivlin, Senior Fellow, Brookings Institute and former Director, Office of Management & Budget Rep.
Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) • Always a politician
Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D., Ill.) • Always activist & politician
Rep. John Spratt (D., S.C.) • Lawyer
Andrew Stern, President, Service Employees International Union • Is there doubt?
OLD TROOPER 2: hi, THE deficit is deeper than meet the eye, and while they,
all have fun spending in INDIA, where does the DEFICIT stand in there,
the way they do it, is like a drug addict who promise to stop after he finish his drug supplied
bye
@James Raider,
Nowhere in the report is there any mention of reducing administrative overhead or eliminating or reducing the funding of more than just a few non-essential government agencies or programs, except for the following concise recommendations:
– End redundant, antiquated, ineffective spending.
– Cut ALL excess spending –defense spending, domestic discretionary spending, entitlement spending, & spending in the tax code.
Really? REALLY? Aren’t these already supposed to be what “faithful stewards of the peoples’ money” are supposed to be doing?
If this is the best they can come up with, and I realized it’s just an “executive summary” (something policy makers can absorb and agree to without really agreeing to DO anything,) then it’s time to start over. These jokers are an insult to the American people.
Jeff
JVerive: hi, the only name audible in there is DEFENSE SPENDING, and the WAR is not even finish yet,
SO, It’s not very smart to cut DEFENSE at this time, but they should cut OFFENSIVE SPENDING,
OFFENDING AMERICANS with those ABUSIVE trips and partys, and monetary gifts to
OTHER COUNTRYS and none to AMERICA.
bye
So… What is the republican plan to balance the budget?
All I can find online is this:
The Republican Plan to Balance the Budget
GREG: hi, YOU KNOW WELL, with a DEFICIT such as this and still digging deeper,
It is a challenge to even begin to calculate specially that was done the most in such a short period,
adding up to the difficulty of making the effect it had on the PEOPLE’S lifes,
OF loosing their jobs and becoming so insecure as not being able to refocus on the near future needs, just because GOVERNMENT MAJORITY was MERRILY spending THEIR hard earned ASSETS,
VERY hard to calculate INDEED while they still spending
@B-Rob,
Your disdain for millions of Americans who call themselves “Tea Partiers” is appalling. Why resort to name-calling? Does it make you feel bigger to attempt to belittle others with vulgar comments? Maybe we should refer to you and your ilk as “pillow-biters” because you don’t mind taking it up the butt when Obama, Pelosi, and Reid tell you to bend over!
Tea Party backers and other true conservatives (and I include civil libertarians in the mix) are just as opposed as liberals and progressives to excessive military spending AND the accompanying waste inherent in the defense budget. The majority of hard-working conservative Americans detest excess government and government waste because it’s against their moral backbone – even if they have different moral standards than others. Most of us contribute freely to charities and would happily give even more if we had more to give. Government has for too many decades decided which charities we should support involuntarily, with the result that the politically connected charities are the ones who get a disproportionate amount of funds that would otherwise have been voluntarily offered by the general public. These connected groups claim that charities would never get enough funding if the government didn’t do the collecting for them, but what they really mean is that they themselves don’t want to compete with other charities, especially those without the same political connections. When charitable giving becomes mandated, it’s no longer charitable.
Just like you are being far from charitable by incessantly referring to the vast majority of decent Tea Party supporters as “teabaggers.” You think you’re being clever, but you’re just showing how low you are willing to go in what otherwise should be a civilized discussion. If you can’t keep from using vulgar ad-hominem atttacks and slurs, go spew in another blogosphere and leave the discussions here for the adults to handle.
Jeff
JVerive,
Unfortunately, the most important thing to heed in this commission’s report, is Who Authored it.
That is why I listed them in #29 with my note. There’s no point reading any further, once you’ve analyzed the authors, yet reading it, serves to confirm initial suspicions.
JVerive, here is a bit of info from Dr. Sanity, a psychiatrist who explains leftists like braindead-rob.
• The denier must then place the blame for the unacceptable reality on someone else (“I inherited all these problems from Bush and the mess–including all the things that are worsening under my watch, are all his fault!”) and that leads to increased conflict between deniers and non-deniers. Efforts to maintain their denial consumes them and will lead them to escalate their anger and rage as their denial becomes untenable and ever more obvious. You’ve got to wonder if all the desperate attempts to control the media and demonize Fox News (the only outlet that routinely uncovers evidence that “the mess” in question has increasingly more to do with Obama and his associates.
• The denier will begin distort language and logic to rationalize and justify their behavior(examples of this are too numerous to mention– but just listen to the Obamites when they come on and continually change the rationale behind their lack of decisionmaking on Afghanistan, for example)…
http://drsanity.blogspot.com/
JR, I just happened to catch the trade situation with Germany on the radio while driving today; who would have thought Germany could produce heavy equipment on the other side of the world and sell it to us cheaper.
I like the Mercedes, but they have been making them here for several years now, is this part of the answer?
Without jobs, you can print money and give it away to your entitled classes and other Democrats until it takes a wheel barrel full of hundred dollar bills to buy a loaf of bread, but what have you accomplished besides making old debts easier to pay?
This has devolved into the P&P economy or economic situation, parasites and producers. The producers don’t stand a chance if they are outnumbered by parasites. It will work fine until you no longer generate enough income for the parasites to maintain the standard of living they have come to expect.
Jeff, Maybe we should refer to you and your ilk as “pillow-biters” because you don’t mind taking it… thanks for the laugh. 😆
@ James Raider, #36:
The republican members of the Debt Commission were selected by Mitch McConnell and John Boehner.
I was under the impression that Paul Ryan of Wisconsin had considerable support among conservatives as a deficit fighter, and that Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma had long been an advocate of lower taxes and reduced spending. These guys are suddenly without credibility, just because they’re on the Debt Commission?
Skook,
Until about 20 years ago I refrained from purchasing a Mercedes Benz – just had a huge problem with doing anything that would in any way financially support the remnants of the Nazi regime. I just couldn’t do it, although I loved their engineering, and their attention to quality control.
Once they became too old to have much of a hand in the German economy, I lightened up a little. Even now, the one I have is made in the U.S.A. – I caved somewhat. 😉
And you make an excellent point, . . . why do we import such extreme-made-in-Germany hardware that should be made here less expensively? . . . Or from Japan for that matter. Problem is – we can’t. The “Overburden” is overwhelming. Unions, laws, lawyers, regulations, etc. Some foreign companies have done a good job of getting around the lunacy with local help, and installed successful assembly plants.
I love the fact that Japan barely knows what a Lawyer is. It’s refreshing. The relative number of lawyers per capita in Japan in embarrassingly low. We should listen.
Alas, with the ideologically obsessed Administration in the White House and its millions of supporters in worshipping tow, the problem won’t be reversed anytime soon.
. . . . P&P indeed!
@ Greg,
Come on man, are you like the other couple of trolls here? Don’t you read?
JR, the unions with their more recent silly demands have cut their own throats and guaranteed their own demise. Trade Unionism isn’t really an American tradition, why have we let this outgrowth of Marxism lead us down the path of perdition? Between the unions and the environmentalists, America is lucky to be able to stand up to foreign enemies.
If no one else will call the unions Marxist front groups, I will. They once had a role to play: now with laws and courts they have outlived their usefulness and can only exist by promising their members such outrageous promises that the membership sticks with them to realize unheard of benefits and wages; the fact that they are strangling America doesn’t enter into their consciousness.
SKOOKUM: hi, IT’S so easy for civilians ignorant to give opinions of what the war zone fighters need to win the war, to also stay alive, and fonction properly in HELL, with their minds focussing
ON THE END WIN, along with their chance to come back in their beloved COUNTRY,
THE NEWS reach them too, and IT is surely depressing for them when members of commitees,
talk of reducing the cost of their needs, AS they ARE GETTING BLOODY HITS FROM ENNEMIES
THEY CANT ELIMINATE with the proper WAR RULES,that was used to win previously,
SWIFLY and effectively: WHAT they have is not waste moneys, but IT’S WASTED TIME to do the right job and FINISH IT, WITH THE PROPER INTELLIGENCE COMING FROM THE LOCAL POLITICIENS
THAT”S WHAT IS MISSING, DELEGATING ORDERS IS CRITICAL, BY THE COMMANDER IN CHARGE
SO REDUCE AT the COMMANDER IN CHARGE FIRST THING, AND those AROUND HIM.
JR, I thought about the P&P Theory of Economics and have have expanded the idea in its simpler form so that even i can understand the issue.
It is like the teeter totter at the playground.
When the producers are in the majority and producing well, they can support a certain segment of the society that either wont work or can’t work. The portion of cant work is usually handicapped to a degree and they are essentially wards of the state. Under normal conditions they represent a small proportion of the population and it s no problem supporting them. The other segment of the Entitlement group is the ‘wont work’ group. They are always present to a degree; but in the Democrat phases of government they are encouraged and nurtured to become permanent wards of the state and when Republicans gain power they have an ever increasing Entitlement Group to contend with, the benefits and enticements may not increase but the policy of rewarding people who have welfare and anchor babies with an ever increasing check is a sure-fire method for increasing the welfare roles. The granting of Entitlement Class to Illegal Aliens is another contributing factor in the ever increasing Entitlement Class that insures Democrats of winning elections.
A healthy economy, Producers/parasites
A stricken economy, Parasites/producers
The slash represents the weighted teeter totter tipping from one side of the fulcrum of fiscal health to fiscal disaster. For the economy to recover with an ever increasing parasitic class, requires an even more robust economy than would normally be necessary because of the ever increasing parasitic deficit.
I call it Skook’s, Theory of Economic Relativity
@ James Raider, Nope. Some of the folks that post here are suffering from both reading comprehension ability and are economically illiterate. Those that offer lame criticism of Capitalism have never run a business, employed anyone, made a payroll, produced a marketable product or depended on making a profit to make an honest living. Add a lack of Critical Thinking Skills as well.
The ratio of Consumers to Producers is not sustainable. The size of Government is not sustainable. The degree of over regulation and Government over reach from the Current Regime has proven to be historically unsuccessful in growing an economy anywhere it has ever been tried. The Legacy of LBJ’s Great Society has in fact created generations of consumers and not producers. Throw in the Liberal concept that”Bread and Circus” and that Big Government solves problems and you have the perfect recipe for the current economic nightmare and deficits that are eroding the Republic.
Strong Private Sector = Producers.
Huge Government Sector = Consumers.
The Gummint never creates Procuctive Jobs.
Only the Private Sector does that.
Redistribution of Wealth is counterproductive to growth of the economy. It creates an Elite Government Ruling Class and a Serf Class that more resembles a Feudal State than the Republic that the Founding Fathers had in mind. We are as a Nation, about to be Over Reached, Over Taxed and Over Regulated to Death.
Bees, men like OT have a realistic view and knowledge of what it would take to win the war decisively; unfortunately, we have stuffed shirt generals who have never been in danger and a truly ignorant class of politicians who would be dismal failures in life without the corruption afforded by political life. These are the men who are directing this war from Washington. Just as the president has surrounded himself with Marxist Yes men to inflate his Narcissistic ego he has appointed generals who are also ready to suck up to the Idiot in Charge for the chance of advancement.
The Marine Corps now has a Commandant that favors having Gays serve openly; as someone who has worn the uniform, I can assure you, this will ruin the spirit that has been the Marine Corps for 235 years. Yet the president in an attempt to bring back homosexuals under his voting coalition has found a Marine General that agrees to this travesty of Marine Corps tradition. If you speak to a thousand Marines, i doubt whether you will find another one to agree with the policy. I know there have been instances of heroism on the battlefield by homosexuals, but there is an honor and an esprit in the marines that is difficult to explain or define, but it does not include homosexuality.
None the less these are the types of sycophants that are running our country and devising the strategy or lack of strategy for our military.
Right now, we probably have the greatest military force ever assembled, but if you abuse them, mock them, and destroy their spirit with rules that have political rather than military importance, you will destroy that morale. Without morale, an army loses its will to engage the enemy. With our present leadership in the White House with his mysteries, un-American activities and his associates of the Marxist persuasions, it is remarkable that our fighting men have maintained their morale. That is more to their credit and our benefit, for through their sacrifices, we have avoided terrorism here in America.
Of course, we have avoided catastrophe through the sheer incompetence of their bombers, the president has seen fit to appoint incompetent boobs like Janet Napolitano to protect the nation, presumably because she is an excellent ‘yes man’, because no one else has come up with another plausible qualification, and the best deterrent she can come up with is sexual assault of teenage girls and women by TSA thugs, just the sort of thing that gets the libido of someone like Napolitano pumping in overdrive, but next to useless when it comes to fighting terrorism. That is a defining characteristic of our beloved Idiot, appointing someone who wont steal the limelight and will do what ever they are told. It is more difficult to find people of intelligence that is less than the president these days, have you noticed that there are no more references to the idiot being the most intelligent man in the world or doing away with term limits for the president. There were 53% of the American people who swallowed this scam hook, line, and sinker, but they have since seen the incompetence and the results of Affirmative Action.
Not exactly on topic, but you asked for my opinion and now you have it, I think, at least if I read your post correctly.
B-Rob: YOU LIBS ,{I say it like you with YOUR YOU con}
IF it was true that military over spend, YOU would see a diffrent way of
dealing with that war; FURTHERMORE, you would NOT notice HOMELESS VETERANS
ON your STREET, don’t YOU people respect the VETERANS having no places to rest to heal their wounds, other than the streets,winter is coming make it worse;
THEY are MILITARYS,and part of the FUNDINGS and surely not CUTTINGS
FUNDS that are not but a PITANCE to help them, must be INCREASE much more,
UNTIL THE WAR end IN a WINNING factor that the ENNEMIES will never FORGET
THAT AMERICA IS VERY TOLERANT BUT also NOT TO MESS AROUND WITH,
JUST LIKE PRESIDENT BUSH’S actions PROOVED it.
Skook,
#47
“If no one else will call the unions Marxist front groups, I will. . . . the fact that they are strangling America doesn’t enter into their consciousness.”
The most powerful Unions, IMHO, are kleptocratic organizations run by goons, that subjugate their memberships into making absurd payments into coffers where billions of dollars disappear, and into which external oversight fears to tread. Some of the crap that goes on today would make scum like Capone proud. All of them operate and manage through fear, even teacher’s unions.
For some unions Fear is also their biggest weapon against prying eyes. They control vast sums that can be directed to any political force of their liking. When they need it, they hire outside “muscle” to deal with dissidence. They long ago figured out how to maintain multiple sets of books. Some of the lowlifes in their employ can be very clever.
When first out of university I worked for someone else, and my very first gig for the company was designing a data gathering network for the most powerful union on this continent. Their headquarters in the North East gathered all the money, every dime from across the continent, including Canada, and no one, not one clown in the hinterlands, would ask what was being done with it. Even the regional heads were too afraid to ever question anything. Part of the system design required that “multiple” books be incorporated subtly into the capabilities.
Technology has evolved since then, but the process has remained, . . . and what I became privy to was insane. Later years, in much different circumstances and position, I had the opportunity to view unions from a very different perspective. . . . The view didn’t get any prettier. They remain a blight on the landscape and long ago ceased to serve any positive influence on society.
Skook,
#45,
I agree with your segregation of the entitlement crowd that “won’t” work, from those who “cannot.” I have met many who cannot, and to a person, they dearly wish that they could. It is a frustration for them.
Unfortunately there is too much promotion by government of what can easily be termed laziness. It’s as if pols and government hacks want a large segment of the population to remain dumb, stupid, uneducated couch potatoes.
As we’ve discussed before, this kills the human spirit, and humans become vacant. Then, as we’ve seen by the tens of millions in Russia, the population turns wholesale to the bottle, or other mind-numbing opiates.
. . . But have no fear Skook, Bernanke and Geithner have the Quantitative Easing solution that will further fuel the engines of redistribution to parasites.