Path to deficit sanity is simple to find, hard to walk
How do we possibly get a grasp on the soaring federal deficit and debt? If we do nothing, a new report from the Congressional Budget Office warns, dire consequences would result:
“Federal debt would grow rapidly from its already high level, exceeding 90 percent of GDP in 2022. After that, the growing imbalance between revenues and spending, combined with spiraling interest payments, would swiftly push debt to higher and higher levels. Debt as a share of GDP would exceed its historical peak of 109 percent by 2026, and it would approach 200 percent in 2037.”
So how do we avoid that calamity? As a CBO graphic demonstrates, in some ways it’s not as complex as it might seem:
The extended baseline scenario — the declining green line to the right of the graphic — assumes that the Bush-era tax cuts and other tax cuts are allowed to expire on schedule, while “government spending on everything other than the major health care programs, Social Security, and interest — activities such as national defense and a wide variety of domestic programs — would decline to the lowest percentage of GDP since before World War II.”
It is, in other words, a combination of tax increases and spending cuts. If that approach is enacted, CBO predicts, “federal debt would gradually decline over the next 25 years—from an estimated 73 percent of GDP this year to 61 percent by 2022 and 53 percent by 2037.”
The second option — labeled “extended alternative financial scenario” — assumes that most current tax cuts, with the exception of Obama-era payroll-tax decreases, are made permanent. It also assumes that currently scheduled cuts in defense and discretionary spending are revoked. In other words, it assumes that we keep doing things the way it looks as though we will keep doing things.
In rough terms, those are our basic choices. Sure, you can adjust the ratio of spending cuts to tax increases, and you can play around with timing of tax increases and spending cuts to ease impact on the economy, but essentially, those remain the choices available.
However, when CBO Director Doug Elmendorf appeared before the House Budget Committee to explain the situation today, Committee Chairman Paul Ryan offered a third approach, his so-called “Path to Prosperity” plan.
As always, Ryan takes any talk of tax increases immediately off the table. Instead, he proposes tax-rate deductions that will benefit mainly the already wealthy. According to the Tax Policy Center, those changes would cut federal revenues by $418 billion in 2015 alone. Ryan has suggested that he could make up for those rate reductions by closing tax loopholes that he refuses to identify, but as we’ve already discussed, and as the Congressional Research Service has confirmed, that simply is not mathematically or politically feasible. By any definition, Ryan is proposing to slash the deficit by imposing significant new tax decreases.
To try to compensate, Ryan’s budget proposes to slash Medicare by 33 percent by 2050; Medicaid and CHIP — Children’s Health Insurance Program — by 75 percent; and total discretionary spending, including all government operations, to 3.5 percent of GDP.
That 3.5 percent figure includes defense spending, which Ryan magically proposes to increase while still meeting that target. As the CBO drily notes:
“By comparison, spending in this category has exceeded 8 percent of GDP in every year since World War II. Spending for defense alone has not been lower than 3 percent of GDP in any year during that period.”
That’s where we are. We face a serious problem. The problem can only be resolved through compromise and realism. But
House Republicans refuse to acknowledge either compromise or realism, and a good chunk of Senate Republicans are trapped in a similar delusion.
Therefore, no solution is possible.
– Jay Bookman
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575 comments Add your comment
Soothsayer
June 6th, 2012
11:00 pm
Well, good night, all! I’ll leave you with this one.
jconservative
June 6th, 2012
11:01 pm
We have a $15+ trillion national debt because we cut government revenue and increased government spending. The only way to resolve the problem is to increase government revenue and decrease government spending.
But we will do neither.
josef
June 6th, 2012
11:04 pm
If they’re getting their work done by 4 or 5 they aren’t worth sh*t as a teacher is all I can say…when I was a single subject high school teacher, 150 student load, if I got through checking the homework before 10 p.m., it was an easy day and we were required to give homework four nights a week…and I gave a test every Friday…not matching and multiple choice, not something bubbled in to run through the scanner…I wanted to know what they knew…getting the picture of what I mean if the teacher is worth a sh*t…?
Oh, and that two weeks at Christmas? Semester finals, average and record (in how many places!) the semester grades…
Thulsa Doom
June 6th, 2012
11:04 pm
“There are many great economists. Problem is that imo many get to rigid in a certain school of thought”
I agree and that’s a good point TBS. What’s funny about economics is that in economics 90% of economics is stuff that is readily agreed on. Its the 10% where they vehemently disagree. Krugman as Jm points out is a brilliant economist and did some fine work back in the day. I think that he as a typical example though lets his ideology get in the way and uses his knowledge to distort towards his ideological spectrum.
Jm,
The “dismal science”. You must know your econ cause not many people know that term. Dismal cause it tells the truth and tells you things you don’t want to hear or know such as” there aint no free lunch.”
Bruno
June 6th, 2012
11:10 pm
Again, josef, a lot of the financial benefits of being a teacher are on the back end, when the pension kicks in. I’ve known many, many teachers who retire with 30 years of service in their early 50s. Their pension money adds up to be over $500,000. I make a pretty good salary, but that’s it. No insurance, no pension, nada. Because I blew my savings a few years back, I’m looking at having to work until 65 at this point.
0311/8541/5811/1811/1801
June 6th, 2012
11:14 pm
“Are you worried about the end of life as we know it? Then don’t just look to the sky for that catastrophic asteroid that could be heading our way. The end may come from right beneath your feet.
Super-volcanoes have probably caused more extinctions than asteroids. But until now it has been thought that these giant volcanoes took thousands of years to form — and would remain trapped beneath the earth’s crust for thousands more years — before having much effect on the planet.
But new research indicates these catastrophic eruptions, possibly thousands of times more powerful than the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens, may happen only a few hundred years after the volcanoes form. In other words, they may have a very “short fuse,” according to researchers at Vanderbilt University. “
0311/8541/5811/1811/1801
June 6th, 2012
11:14 pm
…………… and more pollution than mankind has ever produced !!
0311/8541/5811/1811/1801
June 6th, 2012
11:16 pm
Well, here it is !
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9lceeNQMwk
Thulsa Doom
June 6th, 2012
11:16 pm
Sooth,
There ya go again. Citing a liberal professor from one a them Cali colleges. Couple points- When the guy starts droning about “trickle down” economics he instantly lost all credibility. There is no such thing as “trickle down” economics. Its just a catch phrase coined by far left folks who cling tenaciously to this catch phrase despite the fact that there is no conservative politician or economist who advocates any such thing as “trickle down” economics.
Secondly your last paragraph states that America has the widest gap in the world between rich and poor among industrialized nations. Lets suppose for the sake of argument that that is true. So what. Take a look at our poor and the most recent census data. In terms of modern material wealth, comfort, and such measurables as cars owned, and especially in terms of square footage of living space the average poor person in America is better off than a middle class German or Frenchman. And that is a fact sir.
Jm
June 6th, 2012
11:17 pm
Doom
Dismal indeed
getalife
June 6th, 2012
11:17 pm
scout,
Are you always scared?
Thulsa Doom
June 6th, 2012
11:18 pm
One other thing sooth, when this professor Akbar E. Torbat achieves the same level of prestige or accomplishment as Friedman please let me know. Because I think the odds of that happening are about the same as the proverbial snowball in hell.
getalife
June 6th, 2012
11:19 pm
bruno,
Stop gambling and you might save some money.
Thulsa Doom
June 6th, 2012
11:22 pm
Scout,
There is a cool discovery channel special on the supervolcano in Yosemite national park. People don’t realize it but this supervolcano is 50 miles across if I remember correctly. Scientists say it will blow sometime in the next 50,000 years and when it does it could produce so much gas, debris, and smoke that it could block out the sun for a lengthy time of up to a year, trigger something akin to a nuclear winter, and extinguish most life on earth as a result. Not sure if I believe all that but it was an interesting special.
Josef
June 6th, 2012
11:22 pm
Bruno
The pension is not bad, if that’s what you are counting on…but it’s not exactly what it appears on the surface… You have to be judicious…for instance, I have an SS account as well. If I file for it, that will result in a decrease from the pension…it’s a mare’s nest…
Jm
June 6th, 2012
11:22 pm
Scout
Don’t buy Jackson hole prop
G Mare 71(PLEASE VOTE NO ON TSPLOST)
June 6th, 2012
11:23 pm
Josef@10:57, did not know that. COOL. But ineffably sad, too, that he could not acknowledge or even accept who he was. Ah, there is no way we can ever make it up to the people “we” have injured over all the years. Yeah, “see these Christians, how they love one another.”
Josef
June 6th, 2012
11:24 pm
Getalife
A word from the wise with the voice of experience, eh?
Bruno
June 6th, 2012
11:24 pm
In terms of modern material wealth, comfort, and such measurables as cars owned, and especially in terms of square footage of living space the average poor person in America is better off than a middle class German or Frenchman. And that is a fact sir.
Which is the point I have tried to make on this blog many times, Doom, with no acknowledgement from the Libs. As I mentioned earlier tonight, my secretaries all live more lavishly than I do. I’m sure that I could live better than they do if I chose to, but I’d rather save my money than spend it all now. One of the ladies told me she plans to blow $3000 next week in Panama City. Maybe that’s why I have assets and she doesn’t.
getalife
June 6th, 2012
11:26 pm
“the Congressional Budget Office calculated that the three largest drivers of the ongoing national debt are in this order: 1) the Bush tax cuts, which continue to carve a massive chunk out of government receipts, increasing deficits and adding to the debt, 2) the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, which Bush didn’t pay for and never once asked the richest Americans, especially those in the oil and defense industries, to help cover the bill, and 3) the Great Recession, which began under Bush and was the direct result of deregulatory Reaganomics. A distant fourth are the recovery measures, which were implemented by President Obama and which successfully mitigated an even deeper and costlier recession.” Aol.
Great economists?
Where?
0311/8541/5811/1811/1801
June 6th, 2012
11:28 pm
getalife:
You miss the point. I’m ready to go.
It’s the pollution thing I was pointing out.
Josef
June 6th, 2012
11:28 pm
Gmare
True, but I’m a subscriber to that old Southernism, “I’m not as good as I ought to be, I’m not as good as I want to be, but thank G-d, I’m not as bad as I was.”
Bruno
June 6th, 2012
11:29 pm
Stop gambling and you might save some money.
It’s not “gambling” when you win consistently, getalife. If it weren’t for bad beats, I’d win at hold’em every time out.
What?
June 6th, 2012
11:29 pm
Traitorous white house actions
http://www.politico.com/blogs/on-congress/2012/06/more-outrage-in-senate-over-intelligence-leaks-125461.html
They BOTH suck
June 6th, 2012
11:32 pm
“One of the ladies told me she plans to blow $3000 next week in Panama City. ”
Well know that she is doing her part to stimulate the economy
getalife
June 6th, 2012
11:34 pm
France just lowered their retirement to 60.
What crisis?
getalife
June 6th, 2012
11:35 pm
Where are you going scout?
getalife
June 6th, 2012
11:36 pm
bruno,
Vegas was built on your attitude.
Thulsa Doom
June 6th, 2012
11:39 pm
Bruno,
I think we’ve made that point in vain several times regarding the latest census data on what constitutes “poverty” here in the U.S. Somehow or another facts simply don’t seem to matter.
One thing that I was reading about in Germany that’s pretty popular is 4 or 5 neighbors pooling money together to buy or lease a car. They take turns renting the car out and using it to do things like go grocery shopping or run errands for an hour here or there. I was reading it and thinking how surprised a lot of Americans- even the poor ones, would be if they knew this is what some Germans have to do to have access to a car. When my dad was over there he rented an apt. from a middle class German and his family. The man was wealthy enough to own rental property but not wealthy enough to own a car. People here just don’t get it.
Bruno
June 6th, 2012
11:41 pm
Well know that she is doing her part to stimulate the economy
TBS–The point is that this isn’t any type of isolated example. Scratch below the surface on any of these supposedly “poor” folks who we’re supposed to feel sorry for and pay for their food, housing and cell phone, and you’ll see thousands of dollars per year being wasted on crap. I’ve known many “single” mothers, who have a guy in the picture. Just not on paper. That way they also get welfare and help with child care.
Thulsa Doom
June 6th, 2012
11:45 pm
I’m going to Gulf Shores later this month for 10 days and I’m going to spend more likely probably about a grand because I’m going on a couple of fishing charters and will be eating out quite a bit. But $3,000 for a week in Panama City on just spending? Those are the kind of people that wake up one day at 65 and realize they have nada and expect their SS to take care of them. I know quite a few people like that who spend everything they make and have no concept of planning for the future. And that’s a damn shame.
Thulsa Doom
June 6th, 2012
11:52 pm
“I’ve known many “single” mothers, who have a guy in the picture.”
Yep. The last apartment I rented years and years back the guy above me and his girlfriend planned and had a child together. But they stayed unmarried so that she could draw food stamps, medicaid for the child, and other benefits. I was also having a discussion with a good black friend of mine and we were talking about the high incidence of out of wedlock birth rates in the black community. The rate is now at 72.5%. He told me that this was dishonest statistically and that a lot of black men are with the women that have they have a child with. They just chose not to marry. In black, white, and other communities I think people have figured out that they are better off not marrying if the woman can simply draw benefits and be a stay at home mom. They shoulda seen this coming 40 years ago but they didn’t.
0311/8541/5811/1811/1801
June 7th, 2012
12:22 am
getalife:
You don’t care.
0311/8541/5811/1811/1801
June 7th, 2012
12:22 am
Hey guys !
Here’s why I still use “Old Spice” !
http://www.youtube.com/user/oldspice?feature=results_main
getalife
June 7th, 2012
12:26 am
scout,
Of course, I care.
I have that pesky empathy gene.
JKL2
June 7th, 2012
12:29 am
getalife- How do you do it cons?
1: By remembering 9/11
2: When is that hopey-changey thing going to kick in? I swear I read something about a Democrat being elected president awhile back. When is he going to take control?
getalife
June 7th, 2012
12:32 am
jk,
His second term but his first term did make history.
He is waiting on the people to vote.
Needs a new mandate from the people.
G Mare 71(PLEASE VOTE NO ON TSPLOST)
June 7th, 2012
12:42 am
So now you are bashing teachers!?! Aarrrgg! Most of my teachers were nuns, bless ‘em, the used, abused women of patriarchal church. And two of my sisters & a brother-law and a nephew are teachers. Yeah, we also have several lawyers in the family.
Okay, not sure where I was going with that except GET OFF the TEACHERS. Wherever would we be without them?!?
Okay, it is past my bedtime.
ERS
Obama is over
June 7th, 2012
1:03 am
Getalife needs to read more. Maybe get out of the basement. Get some sunshine…a
void small children.
Oblama
June 7th, 2012
1:07 am
Jay – I agree with cutting wasteful spending starting with the do nothing Congress. Cut their salaries 5% across the board immediately and freeze it there until the budget is balanced. Outlaw former Congress people from becoming lobbyists forever. Eliminate government unions and their inflated overpaid workers. Freeze Obama’s salary until he agrees to compromise .
Obama is over
June 7th, 2012
1:25 am
Is this seriously your attempt to jusitify your “Obama is a Frugal Hip Dude” blog from last week? I went out tonight with a Canadian friend, drank many beers, listened to the Tragically Hip, and discussed health care. He pays a 50% income tax. In his mind, Obamacare is toast (because he earns money off of it), but from my perspective, we could learn from our neighbor’s experience, mistakes, and success.
JKL2
June 7th, 2012
1:36 am
getalife- His second term but his first term did make history
Agreed. Numerous milestones acheived.
First african american president to pick nose in oval office.
First african american president scratch balls in White House
First african american president to clog toilet in white house.
First african american president to fail to break 40 in a game of bowling.
first african american president to be unable to name a single player, past or present, on his “favorite” baseball team.
first president to add over $5T to deficit in single term.
Soon to be first african american president to have cornerstone legislation overturned by supreme court.
Hard to even image what he could acheive with a second term…
ODD OWL
June 7th, 2012
3:29 am
The figures don’t lie… Reagan, Bush-1 and Bush/Cheney ran up about $16 trillion dollars worth of debt and a $1.5 trillion dollars yearly deficit over a period of 20 years… About half of that borrowed and wasted $16 trillion dollars went to the wealthest 10 % of the population as tax cuts for the rich.. During the same period of time, taxes on the non rich 90 % of the population nearly doubled… Reagan begin shipping jobs overseas.. He claimed that America would become a service economy… Today America has a $15 trillion dollars debt and a $1.5 trillion dollars yearly deficit… There is only one way out of this hell hole; “Share the wealth, TAX THE RICH, pay down the debt.”
ODD OWL
June 7th, 2012
3:39 am
Why are hard working lower middle class union workers OVER PAID ??? The corporate bosses and upper managerment of corporations collect tens of millions of dollars a year but there aren’t any serious criticisms of their inflated salaries… WHY ???
Florida's Stand Your Ground Defense More Likely To Succeed If Victim Is Black: Study
June 7th, 2012
5:49 am
A newspaper report has found that the Stand Your Ground self-defense statute in Florida is more likely to succeed when the victim is black.
The Tampa Bay Times looked at 200 cases and found that in instances in which the victim was black, the person who invoked the defense went free 73 percent of the time. If the victim was white, the person walked free 59 percent of the time. The report also found that more than two thirds of all the people who invoked the law were acquitted, and that the defense is being invoked in more and more cases.
“People often go free under ’stand your ground’ in cases that seem to make a mockery of what lawmakers intended,” wrote the Times reporters. “One man killed two unarmed people and walked out of jail. Another shot a man as he lay on the ground. Others went free after shooting their victims in the back. In nearly a third of the cases the Times analyzed, defendants initiated the fight, shot an unarmed person or pursued their victim — and still went free.”
The reporters acknowledged that there is no comprehensive data on “stand your ground” decisions, since police departments and prosecutors often don’t indicate why they chose not to arrest or press charges against someone.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/06/stand-your-ground-defense-study_n_1575686.html
MiltonMan
June 7th, 2012
6:37 am
Ask Stockton, CA how increasing taxes and “reducing” spending has worked for the city.
TaxPayer
June 7th, 2012
7:10 am
Ask Republicans how reducing taxes and increasing spending has worked out for the debt.
Normal Free...Pro Human Rights Thug...And liking it!
June 7th, 2012
7:12 am
Taxie@0710,
There are none so blind as those who will not see, huh?
Jm
June 7th, 2012
7:16 am
4 years
And the deficit is essentially the same as when Obama started
Bad Obama
Jm
June 7th, 2012
7:34 am
If Obama had done nothing as president the deficit and debt would be far lower
Obama made the deficit worse
TaxPayer
June 7th, 2012
7:49 am
President Obama should not have given in to the Republicans and extended the Bush tax cuts. He should have found another way to help the millions of unemployed in need of help. A reduction in Congressional staff and benefits could have provided the needed funding, for example.
Jm-pass Tsplost unless you really love congestion
June 7th, 2012
7:49 am
Romney is a fix it guy
America needs fixing
Romney 2012
stands for decibels
June 7th, 2012
7:50 am
I think letting the tax cuts lapse immediately would be very dangerous. A gradual reintroduction of Clinton-era rates would be the best approach.
Been saying that myself for quite awhile now. We shouldn’t ever impose some massive penalty all at once, whether it’s in the form of tax increases or (say) eliminating a large deduction.
stands for decibels
June 7th, 2012
7:52 am
If Obama had done nothing as president the deficit and debt would be far lower
That’s debatable, what isn’t, is that lots more people would be out of work.
I’d love to know just why it is so many are willing to crucify mankind on a cross of deficit reduction. Maybe if we knew the root causes of this psychosis, we could begin to treat it.
stands for decibels
June 7th, 2012
7:54 am
A reduction in Congressional staff and benefits could have provided the needed funding
I very seriously doubt that such reductions would have amounted to enough to provide any kind of boost (although if you have some projections handy I’m willing to look at them.)
And the blowback? I suspect you’d just wind up with Congrefscritters trying to scrounge free labor, which is only another invitation to bribery and corruption. Hey look, those helpful folks at ALEC are willing to lend a hand!
Dreadful idea.
stands for decibels
June 7th, 2012
7:57 am
Ryan’s budget proposes to slash [...] Medicaid and CHIP — Children’s Health Insurance Program — by 75 percent
How that pig can stand to look at himself in the morning, I can’t even begin to fathom.
Jm-pass Tsplost unless you really love congestion
June 7th, 2012
7:59 am
Sfd 7:50 agreed
Normal Free...Pro Human Rights Thug...And liking it!
June 7th, 2012
8:01 am
“Romney is a fix it guy”
Romney is a psychopathic liar. He is a poor excuse for a human being, let alone a candidate for president.
Unhappy Vet
June 7th, 2012
8:03 am
Why do these columns always just mention entitlement cuts and then never discuss them as if they are untouchable? Medicare, Medicade and Social Security all must be drastically changed so they are no longer money pits for people who don’t deserve the benefit. We can no longer afford to sponsor citizen inactivity (i.e. contribution to society) and government waste. Pass a fair tax, reduce the government back to where it was intended to be by the founding fathers and stop trying to take from the rich and give to the poor.
Jimmy62
June 7th, 2012
8:06 am
Any budget that is mostly income redistribution is a budget I reject. That kind of budget is Roman style bread and circuses. What a wonderful objective the left has.
Ol' Timer
June 7th, 2012
8:09 am
Since tax revenues, as a percentage of GDP, are at a 60 year low it stands to reason that a twin approach — cuts to reduce spending and taxes to increase revenues — should be applied; but Grover Norquist wouldn’t stand for the increases and he runs the House of Representatives!
The uncompromising Republicans in the Congress who are beholding to Grover Norquist care more about their jobs and being re-elected than doing the right thing for the country. And, I’d like to be proven wrong on that assumption.
kayaker 71
June 7th, 2012
8:13 am
Normal, 8:01,
Bozo is the walk away candidate for liar of the century. He wouldn’t know the truth if it rose up and bit him on the arse. “You can keep your own doctor”. “This will only cost the American taxpayer 940B dollars”. “No tax increases on anyone making less than 250K/yr.” “This stimulus will create 2M jobs”. “Green energy is the answer to higher gas prices”. “We will have no lobbyists in the WH while I am president”. “This will be the most transparent administration in American history”. And that’s just for openers. I don’t know if psychopathic fits Bozo but yes, he was and is, a poor excuse for a human being and it is obvious, probably even to you, that as a President, he serves the Peter Principle like no other.
Doggone/GA
June 7th, 2012
8:21 am
“How that pig can stand to look at himself in the morning, I can’t even begin to fathom.”
I wish I could draw cartoons. I had an idea several years ago for a different politician, but it would apply here too: You’re looking over the shoulder of a man looking in a mirror and the mirror reflects “then man in the white hat” type of hero…but what he is ACTUALLY wearing is black.
Mick
June 7th, 2012
8:28 am
yaker
Here’s a clue for you – they are all liars, with that being said, the mittsiah takes the cake…
Peadawg
June 7th, 2012
8:31 am
“they are all liars, with that being said, the mittsiah takes the cake…”
I love lines like this. Both sides suck donkey balls but your side is worse nanny nanny boo boo!!!
stands for decibels
June 7th, 2012
8:31 am
Any budget that is mostly income redistribution is a budget I reject.
What, pray tell, would constitute a budget that wasn’t “mostly income redistribution?”
I mean, I think I have some idea of what this loaded term means. So I have to ask: What kind of country could function if every single taxpayer had to be assured of getting more-or-less precisely what he or she had paid in taxes, in the form of direct services, in any given year?
Do you know of any country where that actually occurs?
stands for decibels
June 7th, 2012
8:34 am
And, I’d like to be proven wrong on that assumption.
Well, I’ll nitpick and say that if Grover Norquist didn’t exist, the plutocracy would have to invent him.
Jm-pass TSPLOST unless you love congestion
June 7th, 2012
8:36 am
The vitriol is out early this AM
stands for decibels
June 7th, 2012
8:38 am
The vitriol is out early this AM
Didn’t you know? June 7th is national “your side sucks donkey balls” day.
lars
June 7th, 2012
8:42 am
I keep hearing, “Get the government out of the way.” Well, we got the government out of the way in the financial sector, and look what happened.
Government can be the problem with the wrong people in power – look at the war of choice in Iraq. Is anyone still looking for those WMP’s?
USMC
June 7th, 2012
8:48 am
Jobless Claims Tick Lower But Picture Remains Murky
http://www.cnbc.com/id/47719410
‘As the beat goes on’…
Donovan
June 7th, 2012
9:59 am
Wow! Even Bookman acknowledges that Obama can’t be square with the American people.
Once we are rid of Harry Reid and his merry band of tax-the-rich/no-budget senators we should be on the road to recovery. Not until November does this country stand a chance for prosperity.
We have seen the Democrat’s lust for entitlements to the detriment of this country, all in the name of vote buying. We have seen the Democrat’s out of control spending that has piled up debt to unsustainable levels. We have seen the Democrats hollaring for higher taxes to pay for their looting vices. Keep in mind that it is the Democrats who have put us into this situation while they have been enjoying their brief time in the sun. This is their doing and their doing alone.
We have just witnessed a failed recall in Wisconsin. We have also witnessed the validation of Gov. Scott Walker who has stood on his principles of fiscal responsibility. Wisconsin is now out of the red and moving forward under his tutelage. He stood against the Democrat Party of obstructionists who enjoyed fiscal irresponsibility and looting. Did I mention that Scott Walker is a Republican?
A lession has been learned in the Wisconsin recall election. Democrats love to loot while in power. Once they ruin things from fiscal irresponsibility, the populace gets angry and looks for alternatives and not excuses. As such, even in defeat, Democrats revert to whining, rejection, and obstruction of the very successful ideas that caused their defeat. Democrats cannot run on their records. Gov. Walker did.
The CBO that Bookman makes reference to is filled with Clinton hold-overs and card carrying Democrat voters. Is it any wonder that he usually makes references to the New York Slimes, the Washington Post, the LA Times, and the CBS polls?
Come November, the American people will vote for an alternative to their malaise and vote for people like Scott Walker, Paul Ryan, and Mitt Romney. As of now, we have nothing but obstructionists like Harry Reid, Obama, and Jay Bookman standing in our way.
JKL2
June 7th, 2012
10:08 am
If you take all the money the evil rich make next year, it still won’t cover the deficit. When will the Democrats get off stupid and realize we need to make some cuts. Increasing taxes 100% will help (for a year), but it’s not going to solve the problem.
Vast Right Wing Conspiracy
June 7th, 2012
5:55 pm
Jay, spending irresponsibly so you can say that everybody has to pay increased taxes to pay for your buffoonery is childish. I hope your mother will reprimand you for this; I know my mother would reprimand me for such selfishness. Anyway, as everybody knows, you will collect significantly less tax revenue as everybody avoids taxable events – it is not hard to do.
jaypat
June 8th, 2012
12:59 am
Why should “money” be debt? There is nothing in the US Constitution that says anything about “money” being “debt”. It only says, in Article 1, Section 8, Clause 5 that “Congress shall have power to…coin money, regulate the value therof and of foreign coin, and to fix the standards for weights and measures.”
Did you notice that it doesn’t say anything about “minting coins”? They could have easily have said that if they’d wanted to, but they didn’t. What they said, instead, was that “Congress shall have power…to coin money…”, which I take to mean that the Congress, the house of the public, should have power to create the “financial intermediary” that we must all use when we make trades.
Which means that they meant for the Congress to have the power of the purse. THis is in direct conflict with the Federal Reserve Board, which does this now.
Here’s the problem with that arrangement, in a nutshell: When the FED creates money, it goes through the banks, who loan it out. In order for borerowers to borrow money, they must have a clientele, who buy stuff which creates a market for whatever it is that the borrowers do.
Suppose, though, for a moment, that the government created new money and spent it directly into the economy through infrastructure spending–on projects like roads and bridges, water and sewer systems. electrical infrastructure, etc. THese type of projects have a positive impact on society–we get more out of them than we spend. I think everybody knows that, at least subliminaly.
So why don’t we do it that way?
I really wish that there was a presidential candidate who would run on this platform–of public works as a means of putting America back together again.
The math is there, there is a huge constituency for this program, and it is fairly simply explained.