Archive

Breaking down Bernie's plan

  • ptown_trojans_1
    Con_Alma;1778749 wrote:I don't disagree with whatyou are saying which lends to my original statement of my lack of desire to cut military spending going forward.At 16% of our total expenditures last year I don't see Dod total expenditures being a smaller percentage of our counties expenses anytime soon nor do I want it to be.
    Yeah, agreed. My overall point is defense spending is not going anywhere. It will stay at current levels and will only increase in the next decade. That is the cost to maintain and replace all these systems that were built in the 1980s and nearing the end of their lifecycles.
  • Con_Alma
    Agree.
  • sleeper
    Con_Alma;1778745 wrote:As recent as 2007 the U.S. Navy met 90% of the combatant commander's requirements. Just 2 years ago they were able to meet only 43%. IN FY 2015 the Navy requested $38 billion less than the prior year. They are made up approximately of some 290 "ships". I think the last I heard the planned goal is to get to 306 by the end of the decade. In order to carry out all of the combatant commander's request it would take approximately 450 ships!

    The point is forward military security requests are being made to the respective fleets that cannot be currently met. That's fine if that's what the American people want but our leaders are asking things that there are ot enough pieces to carry out so what security activities should be cut? Those decisions are made daily based on current global affairs.....and of course the politics of the day.
    Perhaps the Navy needs a leaner mission. Let's stop being the policeman of the world.
  • Con_Alma
    sleeper;1778754 wrote:Perhaps the Navy needs a leaner mission. Let's stop being the policeman of the world.
    Perhaps but then again that's not the Navy nor any military branch's decision.
  • Con_Alma
    WaPo makes an effort to debunk some of Sanders' campaign spiel.

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/bernie-sanderss-fiction-filled-campaign/2016/01/27/cd1b2866-c478-11e5-9693-933a4d31bcc8_story.html
  • FatHobbit
    Con_Alma;1778761 wrote:WaPo makes an effort to debunk some of Sanders'
    Mr. Sanders is a lot like many other politicians. Strong ideological preferences guide his thinking, except when politics does, as it has on gun control. When reality is ideologically or politically inconvenient, he and his campaign talk around it. Mr. Sanders’s success so far does not show that the country is ready for a political revolution. It merely proves that many progressives like being told everything they want to hear.
    Boom!

    All politicians do this. It basically comes down to which guy can get the most people to hear what they want.
  • Wolves of Babylon
    QuakerOats;1778723 wrote:Regarding the post above from Sleeper and current federal spending, it is imperative to get this budget under control now. Once interest rates starts to rise, the $230 billion being spent on just interest alone will rise dramatically and that will have a negative cascading effect throughout the entire budget.

    Two observations below: first dealing with the spike in spending during the financial crisis, and second, a bold look at cuts.

    1 - Note that spending shot us drastically from $2.7 billion in '07, to $3.5 billion in '09. We know we consciously pumped up spending for TARP etc.... in '09 to 'help save the economy', however this supposed one-time 'bailout spending spree' has never gone away. Why? What is it that we are still spending an extra $800 billion per year on, 6 years after the one-time TARP deal? How in hell did this spending continue? Where's the money going?

    2 - Now is the time to initiate bold cuts, before interest rates rise. We have to start generating surpluses to reduce the total debt, so that when rates rise, the effects will not be as significant as they otherwise would. We need at least $400 billion to balance the budget, and we should shoot for $800 billion in cuts in order to go positive and start reducing the national debt. 4 departments noted above should be targeted for near extinction over 5 years: education, housing, international affairs, and energy. They total $258 billion; I would bring it down to a total of $100 billion in 5 years with dramatic cuts each year. Most of it will go unnoticed in the larger scheme. Defense --- cut $100 billion now, and freeze the remainder for 5 years. SS, unemployment & labor --- cut $50 billion immediately (by reducing the fraud in disability benefits). Medicare & health --- cut $50 billion immediately (there is no government entity in America that cannot withstand a meager 4-5% cut, without any falloff in output. After that, get government out of the health care business, and transition to a medicare/medicaid voucher system by returning the money to The People so they can purchase their own health care, which will also serve to help get costs under control. Medicare would then go from $1,051 billion now, to $1,000 billion after the immediate $50 billion cut, thereafter on the voucher system just pay out $950 billion in the new program, saving another $50 billion, and allow the new system and The People to control health care costs through natural market forces.

    All of the above cuts should total around $408 billion. This would bring spending back to around $3.1 trillion, WHICH IS STILL $400 billion (or 15%) HIGHER than 2007 levels. (Again,refer to #1 above --- we jacked up spending by $800 billion in one year, but then it never went away, so now at least half of that is going to go away ......and we won't miss it). Revenues are projected to rise to $3.5 trillion, so we would now be in a surplus situation, and we should use that to reduce the debt and stay on that pathway. We should also sell off most federal assets to further reduce the debt and move to leasing ---- the government should not be in the business of acquiring assets.

    Anyhow ---- this could indeed be done, and any turnaround expert worth his salt could achieve it in a private entity without a problem. It is time to unleash that private expertise unto the government to get real results. Maybe Trump, an outsider is the guy; I cannot say for sure.

    Sorry for the epiphany.
    This is actually pretty good.

    Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N920A using Tapatalk
  • ZWICK 4 PREZ
    what exactly does it debunk? It's an op-ed.
  • Con_Alma
    ZWICK 4 PREZ;1778771 wrote:what exactly does it debunk? It's an op-ed.

    Exactly? Nothing. It was an effort not an accomplishment.

    My guess was the effort was to make him out to not necessarily be a "truth teller" and that ideology is not reality. ...but ideology is what progressive want to hear.

    That's what I got from the article.
  • sleeper
    ZWICK 4 PREZ;1778771 wrote:what exactly does it debunk? It's an op-ed.
    You don't need an op-ed piece to understand that Bernie's plans will fail, assuming they even get implemented.

    There is simply zero way he will ever garner enough tax revenue to cover all his socialist programs UNLESS he is willing to increase taxes substantially for the middle class. That is the reality.
  • Con_Alma
    sleeper;1778774 wrote:You don't need an op-ed piece to understand that Bernie's plans will fail, assuming they even get implemented.

    There is simply zero way he will ever garner enough tax revenue to cover all his socialist programs UNLESS he is willing to increase taxes substantially for the middle class. That is the reality.
    There's also almost zero way he would get his plans through the legislative process.
  • jmog
    ZWICK 4 PREZ;1778411 wrote:Do you not realize there's been a global recession since 2008 which has nothing to do with politics?
    There's no way you can be intellectually honest and say this at the same time Z4P as I am pretty sure you were one of the many that blamed the 2008 recession on Bush and the Rs policies.

    Amazing that now that a recession may come after 8 years of D/lib policies that there is no way it has political causes!

    Bernie Sanders himself has said that the middle class will see tax hikes. No matter how the far left wants to spin it, the man himself has ADMITTED to hiking taxes on the middle class.
  • queencitybuckeye
    ptown_trojans_1;1778751 wrote:Yeah, agreed. My overall point is defense spending is not going anywhere. It will stay at current levels and will only increase in the next decade. That is the cost to maintain and replace all these systems that were built in the 1980s and nearing the end of their lifecycles.
    Whether the various branches want/need them or not. Need to provide outrageously expensive jobs to certain congressional districts.
  • ZWICK 4 PREZ
    Con_Alma;1778775 wrote:There's also almost zero way he would get his plans through the legislative process.
    you'd think. But that's what everyone said about ACA.
  • ZWICK 4 PREZ
    jmog;1778781 wrote:There's no way you can be intellectually honest and say this at the same time Z4P as I am pretty sure you were one of the many that blamed the 2008 recession on Bush and the Rs policies.

    Amazing that now that a recession may come after 8 years of D/lib policies that there is no way it has political causes!

    Bernie Sanders himself has said that the middle class will see tax hikes. No matter how the far left wants to spin it, the man himself has ADMITTED to hiking taxes on the middle class.
    Well you'd be wrong .
  • ZWICK 4 PREZ

    http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/267358-sanders-on-wapost-those-geniuses-backed-iraq-war

    I liked this one too.
  • Con_Alma

    Saw it. There are a couple out there responding to the article with quotes from Sanders but none really oppose the points that were trying to be made in the wapo piece.

    It's just politics.
  • HitsRus
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/bernie-sanderss-fiction-filled-campaign/2016/01/27/cd1b2866-c478-11e5-9693-933a4d31bcc8_story.html

    WaPo......Bernie selling fiction.
  • QuakerOats

    True, but of course they are in the tank for Clinton
  • ZWICK 4 PREZ
    www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a41608/bernie-sanders-washington-post-response/
  • Classyposter58
    Someone needs to inform Zwick on inversions


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
  • ZWICK 4 PREZ
    Classyposter58;1778962 wrote:Someone needs to inform Zwick on inversions


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
    Someone needs to inform Classy that tax inversions have been going on for decades and there's ways the government can attack them and already have been by classifying where the income is still generated. So in other words... Not a big issue.
  • QuakerOats
    "government attack" is precisely why many businesses are electing to move.

    100 years ago we had a president who said "America's business is business"; today we have a president and an entire administration who do nothing but attack and assault American business, from every angle imaginable. Disgraceful.
  • ZWICK 4 PREZ
    QuakerOats;1778973 wrote:"government attack" is precisely why many businesses are electing to move.

    100 years ago we had a president who said "America's business is business"; today we have a president and an entire administration who do nothing but attack and assault American business, from every angle imaginable. Disgraceful.
    You realize Republicans are for combatting tax inversions too right? They just want to change the tax code so companies have a harder time hiding the money. Both parties are doing their damnedest to get ahold of companies monies. Quit lying to yourself.
  • QuakerOats
    I think we want total corporate tax reform so that inversions become a thing of the past. Frankly, I'm not sure why we tax them at all; imagine the economic growth and wage growth we could unleash. Well, maybe you can't imagine that.