Can we just shut the government down already?

• WebFire

  BoatShoes;1519004 wrote:I've read that as part of the deal the debt ceiling will from now on will be raises unless there are affirmative no votes to stop it rather than needing affirmative yes votes to raise it and that this was offered up by McConnell....

  Fucking retarded.
• ptown_trojans_1

  

  Looks like Boehner will put the Senate proposal to a vote in the House.
  Whether it will pass, assuming a lot, remains to be seen, but it should.
  Senate should move on it later today.
  
  Reading through again, what was the point?
  Did the R's gain anything really?
  
  Sure, looks like it may be harder to get Obamacare, I'm for that, but it is still there, which is what the whole thing was put forth to get rid of.
  I get most people are against it, but really was it more harm than good?
  Was it the wrong tactic to address the problem?
• QuakerOats

  Whether the 'R's' gained anything is not necessarily important, so long as the amplification of our severe fiscal and economic problems was enhanced so that many might start to actually think and act in ways that force elected officials to govern more prudently. The greater the continued spotlight on our $17 TRILLION debt (41% of which is on obama), and obama's annual deficits of a TRILLION plus, and the $70 TRILLION in unfunded liabilities, the more 'splaining' the idiots in D.C. (mainly D's) have to do, and hopefully the more pressure toward actually finding the proper solutions.
  
  Raising debt ceilings without addressing the underlying causes of rising debt is simply assinine.
• ptown_trojans_1

  

  Could have did that without a shutdown.
  Everyone already knew the problems. They were going to get addressed in the sequestration cuts for FY14.
  Did it really have to go this far for what you say?
• BGFalcons82

  

  QuakerOats;1519073 wrote:Whether the 'R's' gained anything is not necessarily important, so long as the amplification of our severe fiscal and economic problems was enhanced so that many might start to actually think and act in ways that force elected officials to govern more prudently. The greater the continued spotlight on our $17 TRILLION debt (41% of which is on obama), and obama's annual deficits of a TRILLION plus, and the $70 TRILLION in unfunded liabilities, the more 'splaining' the idiots in D.C. (mainly D's) have to do, and hopefully the more pressure toward actually finding the proper solutions.
  
  Raising debt ceilings without addressing the underlying causes of rising debt is simply assinine.

  Huh.... We were told a couple weeks ago by Our King that raising the debt ceiling does NOT create new debt. I anxiously await our National Debt to either freeze or go down because Our King decreed it so.
• WebFire

  QuakerOats;1519073 wrote:
  Raising debt ceilings without addressing the underlying causes of rising debt is simply assinine.

  This this this this this!
• IggyPride00

  

  “It’d be a good idea if they stopped referring to other Republicans as Hitler appeasers because they opposed the strategy they put forward which failed,” Norquist says. “I think if you make a mistake as big as what they did, you owe your fellow senators and congressmen a big apology — and your constituents, as well, because nothing they did advanced the cause of repealing or dismantling Obamacare.”
  
  “They hurt the conservative movement, they hurt people’s health care, they hurt the country’s economic situation and they hurt the Republican party,” he says. “And a lot of congressmen and senators are not going to win because we spent three months chasing our own tail — or at least, parts of the conservative movement spent three months chasing their own tail.”
  
  “These are the people who said, ‘Plan: Step One, Invade Iraq. Step Two, It turns into Kansas,’” Norquist says. “Could I ask if there’s anything in between Step One and Step Two? ‘Oh ye of little faith.’”

  This is awfully rich.
  
  Grover Norquist of all people thinks Conservatives should be apologizing for the mayhem they caused to the Republican party.
  
  http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/361414/norquist-defunders-owe-conservatives-apology-betsy-woodruff
• gut

  BoatShoes;1518690 wrote:Your continued railing about out of control debt and deficits is simply not matched by the real world...and that would even be true if the U.S. didn't have sovereign currency control like a member of the Euro.

  The real world is not the liberal bozos you appear to read exclusively. The debt and deficits are a huge concern - far more concerning than the Reagan years when we didn't already have $17T in debt.
  
  You basically ignored everything I wrote. It is all fact, which you could actually learn if you would stop seeking out and drinking the kool-aid. Your deficit is going to explode when the interest rates rise (and, ZIRP, by the way has not really demonstrated to be a pro growth policy). We are talking debt service approaching $1T and 20% of spending. That's a hell of a lot of money to be flushing down the toilet.
  
  This is why our country is in such trouble. People like you who are supposedly intelligent are just horribly ignorant about markets and economics. You live in your little bubbles with a bunch of other people who don't know shit and convince yourselves you understand the problems and have the solutions.
• ptown_trojans_1

  

  IggyPride00;1519080 wrote:This is awfully rich.
  
  Grover Norquist of all people thinks Conservatives should be apologizing for the mayhem they caused to the Republican party.
  
  http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/361414/norquist-defunders-owe-conservatives-apology-betsy-woodruff

  It didn't make any sense.
  Nothing substantially was changed.
  They were probably going to have conference committees on future cuts and the budget anyways.
  
  I mean, what was the point?
  And, was it really necessary to close the Government, costing us more (again according to the estimates by CRS and CBO on the costs of the last shutdown)?
  
  If you are going to shutdown the Government, at least do it with more to exchange with.
  
  But, oh well, on to the next crisis.
• ptown_trojans_1

  

  gut;1519093 wrote:The real world is not the liberal bozos you appear to read exclusively. The debt and deficits are a huge concern - far more concerning than the Reagan years when we didn't already have $17T in debt.
  
  You basically ignored everything I wrote. It is all fact, which you could actually learn if you would stop seeking out and drinking the kool-aid. Your deficit is going to explode when the interest rates rise (and, ZIRP, by the way has not really demonstrated to be a pro growth policy). We are talking debt service approaching $1T and 20% of spending. That's a hell of a lot of money to be flushing down the toilet.
  
  This is why our country is in such trouble. People like you who are supposedly intelligent are just horribly ignorant about markets and economics. You live in your little bubbles with a bunch of other people who don't know shit and convince yourselves you understand the problems and have the solutions.

  Look man,
  I get ya. But, unless people are willing to part with their SS, Medicare, Medicaid, and Defense spending, what you are talking about will never get solved.
  Until the R's, or D's start talking that, everything else is BS about debt and deficit reduction.
• I Wear Pants

  QuakerOats;1519073 wrote:Whether the 'R's' gained anything is not necessarily important, so long as the amplification of our severe fiscal and economic problems was enhanced so that many might start to actually think and act in ways that force elected officials to govern more prudently. The greater the continued spotlight on our $17 TRILLION debt (41% of which is on obama), and obama's annual deficits of a TRILLION plus, and the $70 TRILLION in unfunded liabilities, the more 'splaining' the idiots in D.C. (mainly D's) have to do, and hopefully the more pressure toward actually finding the proper solutions.
  
  Raising debt ceilings without addressing the underlying causes of rising debt is simply assinine.

  
• I Wear Pants

  Are you saying that debt increased during the worst economic downturn since the depression? That's insanity.
• SportsAndLady

  

  I Wear Pants;1519127 wrote:Are you saying that debt increased during the worst economic downturn since the depression? That's insanity.

  Haha typical
  
  I swear, arguing with someone like IWP is the absolute worst. Just so liberal and will refuse to give in to Obama being anything other than the savior.
• IggyPride00

  

  “Do you think Ted Cruz is a bit like the David Koresh of the Republican party?” Bashir asked on Wednesday. “He’s a bit like a character who believes himself to anointed, believes himself to be a prophet, ignores everything, and torches the place in the process.”

  Martin Bashir comparing Ted Cruz to David Koresh.
• WebFire

  
• like_that

  

  SportsAndLady;1519130 wrote:Haha typical
  
  I swear, arguing with someone like IWP is the absolute worst. Just so liberal and will refuse to give in to Obama being anything other than the savior.

  +1 I gladly admit bush did shitty job, but Obama could forcefully shit down someone like iwps throat and still defend Obama.
• gut

  IggyPride00;1519080 wrote:This is awfully rich.
  
  Grover Norquist of all people thinks Conservatives should be apologizing for the mayhem they caused to the Republican party.
  
  http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/361414/norquist-defunders-owe-conservatives-apology-betsy-woodruff

  I'm guessing Norquist is not a fan of the Tea Party taking over his mandate and reducing his influence. Which aside from why his "pledge" is so influential in the first place, it is odd that he rejects the Tea Party when they would seem pretty closely aligned with his goals.
  
  What the Tea Party seems to have accomplished here is to build a lot of animosity for incumbents. We don't have the votes or reps with the stones to tackle the hard issues, so what we ultimately need to do first is clean house. But it's not productive to just replace incumbents with a clone, however what the Tea Party also appears to have done is frame the 2014 elections issues. A lot could change between now and then, but as it stands the critical economic and fiscal issues are front and center.
• QuakerOats

  I Wear Pants;1519109 wrote:

  
  Maybe you should start with when obama took over ........ hopefully you are just peddling the talking points and are not so inept as to really believe the completely false impression you are trying to portray.
  
  Average spending under Bush was about $2.1 trillion; under obama $3.6 trillion --- a massive 50% INCREASE!
• BoatShoes

  gut;1519093 wrote:The real world is not the liberal bozos you appear to read exclusively. The debt and deficits are a huge concern - far more concerning than the Reagan years when we didn't already have $17T in debt.
  
  You basically ignored everything I wrote. It is all fact, which you could actually learn if you would stop seeking out and drinking the kool-aid. Your deficit is going to explode when the interest rates rise (and, ZIRP, by the way has not really demonstrated to be a pro growth policy). We are talking debt service approaching $1T and 20% of spending. That's a hell of a lot of money to be flushing down the toilet.
  
  This is why our country is in such trouble. People like you who are supposedly intelligent are just horribly ignorant about markets and economics. You live in your little bubbles with a bunch of other people who don't know !@#$%^&* and convince yourselves you understand the problems and have the solutions.

  1. Interest payments on tsy securities primarily go to U.S. citizens. Why it is bad for U.S. citizens to have interest income would be interesting to hear. The interest payments that go to the Chinese et al are lousy compensation for all of the real output they send us in exchange for our surrounding them with air craft carriers. That's right the so-called national debt is an asset to the domestic private sector and not a burden, there are no children and grandchildren in sight when the FED effortlessly credits and debits securities accounts every day, and you couldn't get a bargain with foreigners if we colonized them.
  
  2. You keep saying over and over and over again..."When the interest rates rise"..."when interest rates rise"...You've been saying this for half a decade now really but that will only happen and in such a way that will harm the domestic economy if the federal open market committee is completely incompetent. Which, Jeremy Stein looks like he is but we know Janet Yellen isn't. Should we go back and copy and paste your quotes from the last debt ceiling episode when your debt and deficit scoldery proved wanting???
  
  3. Cutting government spending and raising taxes as was done in the fiscal cliff is what is the anti-growth policy. Using the Debt Ceiling as a political football is an anti-growth policy. Putting 800,000 workers on the couch for no good reason and not crediting their bank accounts is an anti-growth policy. Cutting government spending and deficits on par with war demobilization's when unemployment is at depression-levels is an anti-growth policy. Monetary offset from the policies of the Federal Reserve are the only thing that is providing channels for growth in the face of our contractionary fiscal and political policies. We should have an expansionary fiscal policy but it's better than nothing and surely what I imagine you would propose.
• O-Trap

  

  I Wear Pants;1519109 wrote:

  You pulled this from Forbes (where I believe it originated). They've cleared up their position, including a rather apt comparison about weight gain:
  
  http://www.forbes.com/sites/realspin/2012/09/03/yep-obamas-a-big-spender-just-like-his-predecessors/
• BoatShoes

  SportsAndLady;1519130 wrote:Haha typical
  
  I swear, arguing with someone like IWP is the absolute worst. Just so liberal and will refuse to give in to Obama being anything other than the savior.

  I think he's being tounge in cheek. Obama or Ronald Reagan or Jesus himself could've gone into the oval office in 2008 and twiddled his thumbs and the deficit would have exploded like it did because automatic spending goes into effect without appropriations from Congress (i.e. medicaid, food stamps) and tax revenue plummeted to historic lows as a percentage of gdp.....even without a single act of congress or the president.
• QuakerOats

  Incorrect (again) -- spending increased 50% .... and stayed there.
  
  
  We can debate opinions, but the numbers are the numbers.
• gut

  ptown_trojans_1;1519103 wrote:Look man,
  I get ya. But, unless people are willing to part with their SS, Medicare, Medicaid, and Defense spending, what you are talking about will never get solved.
  Until the R's, or D's start talking that, everything else is BS about debt and deficit reduction.

  There are a number of things that can and WILL be done, eventually. I suspect most of America would not be supporting some of these policies if they had to pay for it. The reality is the tax base and revenue sources are far below that of Europe. Take FICA - approx. 50% higher in Europe (@22%). Europe also has a 19% VAT. And when you look at FICA, the contribution to SS is 5X that of Medicare, but Medicare outlays are actually greater than SS - which implies we are only paying about 20% of our Medicare premiums (which is a strong justification to cut SS benefits since people have not nearly paid for their Medicare benefits)
  
  1) Increases to FICA gradually over time
  2) SS will not be cut, but the rate of increases will ultimately be slowed to effectively cut the future real value of the benefits. It really must go hand-in-hand with increasing FICA...but increasing the benefits at slower than the rate of inflation is more hidden and will probably go mostly unnoticed by the electorate.
  3) I believe we will see a VAT within 5-10 years. It might start out at only @ 5% rate, and maybe only 40-50% of gdp (i.e. exclude food, energy and healthcare). But ultimately to grow revenues you need to add new sources. This is going to be necessary to service the debt.
  
  There is a lot of fat in the budget, and much has been added in just the last 4-5 years (they basically incorporated what was to be one-time stimulus/TARP/bailout into the baseline permanent spending). It's only a little over a decade since we had a balanced budget. Even prior to the massive one-timers, Bush deficits over 7 years averaged about $240B. And that's with $1T+ on wars and his tax cuts.
  
  Failure to address the deficits is just going to commit more and more future revenues to the complete waste of debt service. With all the other priorities and liabilities, where will $1T come from 10 years from now just to pay interest on our debt? This is all starting to look and play very much like the final stages of a ponzi scheme.
• gut

  BoatShoes;1519161 wrote:1. Interest payments on tsy securities primarily go to U.S. citizens.

  Can you ever be right? Just even once?
  
  Excluding intragovt debt and that held by the Fed, approx $10T of US debt is held by the "public"
  
  Of that $10T, $5.7T is held by FOREIGN govt and investors. The amount actually held by US citizens thru mutual funds, pensions funds and personal holdings is probably closer to $2T. The remaining $2T or so is held mostly by banks, corporations, insurance companies and GSE's.
  
  I don't know why I even continue to argue with you. You are almost ALWAYS wrong when it comes to economics.
• gut

  BoatShoes;1519161 wrote: 2. You keep saying over and over and over again..."When the interest rates rise"..."when interest rates rise"...You've been saying this for half a decade now really but that will only happen and in such a way that will harm the domestic economy if the federal open market committee is completely incompetent.

  More ignorance. Rates WILL rise because the fed will not and cannot continue the extraordinary measures indefinitely. No one know the length and depth ultimately of global deflationary pressures, but unless you want/believe the US economy is permanently in the shitter rates will return to a normative 4.5% or so. Rates on the 10UST, incidentally, have been as low as 1.5% and recently breached 3% so, ummm, rates have risen.
  
  You're again confusing the debate between rates and inflation. And while core CPI has been stable, everyone with a brain sees the inflation materializing in asset prices.
  
  We've had global deflation pressures since about 2000 or so, but rates have been 2-2.5pts higher than they have been recently. We're going to blow out public debt by another $5-$10T over the next decade....so we are talking $250B more in interest on existing debt, and another $250B or so on the new debt. $500B more just in debt service, conservatively.
  
  Even if we can continue to monetize the debt without consequence, likely not enough to absorb much of the new debt we will be creating.