January 7, 2013

Boehner: "At one point several weeks ago... the president said to me, 'We don't have a spending problem.' "

"They blame all of the fiscal woes on our health-care system."

Boehner's repeated response to that was: "Clearly we have a health-care problem, which is about to get worse with ObamaCare. But, Mr. President, we have a very serious spending problem."
[T]oward the end of the negotiations, the president became irritated and said: "I'm getting tired of hearing you say that."
And then there's Harry Reid:
"Those days after Christmas," [Boehner] explains, "I was in Ohio, and Harry's on the Senate floor calling me a dictator and all kinds of nasty things. You know, I don't lose my temper. I never do. But I was shocked at what Harry was saying about me. I came back to town. Saw Harry at the White House. And that was when that was said," he says, referring to a pointed "go [blank] yourself" addressed to Mr. Reid.
It's best, by the way, if you're going to say "Go fuck yourself" never to say it in anger.

There's lots more in that article (in the Wall Street Journal). I was interested in this little bit at the end:
[Boehner] sees debt as almost a moral failing, noting that when he grew up in a "little middle-class, blue-collar neighborhood" outside of Cincinnati, "nobody had debt. It was unheard of. I just don't do debt."
If he's not bullshitting, he's revealing a shocking lack of sophistication. Should families pay rent on apartments until they can put down the entire purchase price of a house? Should businesses expand only through the cash they have on hand? But it's the WSJ that inserts the phrase "almost a moral failing," so I shouldn't read too much into Boehner's simple-Cincinnati-guy posing. He didn't say debt is immoral. Only that he comes from a background where the norm was to follow a budget and pay your bills. How sophisticated is he now about the good use of debt as opposed to the bad? Who knows?

208 comments:

1 – 200 of 208   Newer›   Newest»
Synova said...

You have a mortgage, but you hate it, and most people don't count that anyway.

And I think that people used to buy a house and stay in it too, so you'd eventually get out of even that debt or at least have a payment that was affordable to you 20 years earlier.

That's a lot different than expecting to "move up" as soon as you could afford a new bigger mortgage, a never ending car payment, and credit cards.

Xmas said...

I suspect he means, "It's a moral failing to get into debt that you cannot afford." I'm sure there were plenty of homeowners in his childhood hometown that had mortgages.

If he's not bullshitting, I very afraid to hear that our President does not think we have a spending problem.

Tregonsee said...

More proof that we have a president with an ideology disconnected from reality. He is the mirror image of, not the real Reagan and Bush 43, but the image of them held by the Left. Ideology is not, as is usually held, necessarily bad. Bad ideologies can be catastrophic.

Hagar said...

I have had house mortgages and car loans, but I have never been behind on payments, and I have never had more bought on plastic than I could pay off with the next paycheck or two.

Tim said...

"How sophisticated is he now about the good use of debt as opposed to the bad? Who knows?"

Indeed. Who knows?

A penalty under the ACA is now a tax, Roberts strains all credulity to inform us; Boehner disclaims debt as almost a moral failing, and Althouse would have us believe Boehner "reveals a shocking lack of sophistication."

What would Occam say?

Who knows?

Tank said...

Zero does not think we have a spending problem. Get used to it.

In his view, the "spending problem" is that the evil Repub's keep talking about a non-existent problem.

We just need to take more money from those nasty successful [white]folk and give them to more and more Fluks and po peoples. The problem is those people who earned a lot of money and want to keep it. Damn them.

KCFleming said...

Governments never have a spending problem, only a tax revenue problem.

Never enough of the latter to cover the former.

Goddamned greedy capitalists, always harshing their mellow.

AllenS said...

If he's not bullshitting, he's revealing a shocking lack of sophistication. Should families pay rent on apartments until they can put down the entire purchase price of a house?

Oh, bullshit, Althouse. What he means, is that borrowing money and having the ability to pay it back is not the debt he is talking about. The debt the government is racking up will be impossible to pay back.

This month I pay off the debt for my 2011 Jeep. Two years of debt. In 1981 I paid off my mortgage. Eight years of debt for that note.

Unknown said...

Debt is one of the things people who went through the great depression fear. That fear is still present in small towns and places where people have traditional values. It's a product. of remembering history. Remembering history is one of the things we don't do very well anymore.

Shouting Thomas said...

The Obama admin obviously sees no limits to the borrowing/spending paradigm it has embraced. Where will this lead? Damned if I know.

I think we're headed for a long term change in financial reality that will rival the extraordinary changes that the internet has wrought in communications and merchandising.

I really don't know what that change portends.

What is money? It has long ceased to be a precious metal. Now, it's not even a piece of paper. It's just data.

So, what in the hell is it?

Unknown said...

It's a big titanium coin?

Guildofcannonballs said...

"The tax issue is resolved" but Boehner will fight for lower rates and to close loopholes.

This has nothing to do with the fiscal cliff and those tax rates and loopholes I must assume.

I am lost. Is the tax issue done? If so, why does Boehner talk about reform seconds after stating the issue is resolved?



Brian Brown said...

"I'm getting tired of hearing you say that."

That's right, Barry!

I mean, it isn't like spending over $3 trillion a year on a government that can't keep track of it or inventory it's own assests represents some sort of problem or anything.

Hell no! I mean, it also isn't like if someone handed you $1,000 per second it would take over 30,000 years to add up to a mere trillion dollars or anything.

You just keep investing Barry and tell that meanie Speaker guy to go away and all will be well!

Joe Biden Is Corrupt said...

Cruz cuts through the bullshit. Sophisticated smelling rhetoric birthed Obama, the snake oil salesman.

Unknown said...

Well, that meenie speaker guy did use the F word in anger, so there's that.

Ruth Anne Adams said...

I used to tease my mom and dad for their unsophisticated disdain for consumer debt. It was imbued in them as children of the Depression. It served them well raising 4 children on a modest income.

President Obama personally had/has a problem with debt.

Being debt-free is truly free.

Brian Brown said...

If he's not bullshitting, he's revealing a shocking lack of sophistication. Should families pay rent on apartments until they can put down the entire purchase price of a house?

Hysterical bullshit.

But you go on equating making regular payments on what most people view an asset to a government adding debt year after year (and in fact borrowing to make interest payments on said debt) as if it is sophisticated Ann.

Shouting Thomas said...

Everybody will be on the dole. (Most everybody is already.)

Everybody will be looking for a way to make cash on the side. The cash is untraceable.

Bankruptcy is embarrassing, if you have old fashioned moral values, but it isn't fatal.

Brian Brown said...

The president's insistence that Washington doesn't have a spending problem, Mr. Boehner says, is predicated on the belief that massive federal deficits stem from what Mr. Obama called "a health-care problem."

What a bizarro world Barry and his ilk live in.

But, why aren't they calling for means testing Medicare then?

Anonymous said...

There's debt and then there's DEBT.

Guildofcannonballs said...

It seems in J.B.'s world, the fiscal cliff is totally different from tax reform.

Even though J.B. claims credit for the tax reforms by claiming 99% of income tax payers kept their lower Bush rates and were not forced into the disgustingly regressive Clinton tax hikes, he claims he will have more leverage to now negotiate tax rate reform and loophole closure because the situation is somehow much better for the GOP now (or in March)

Bullshit. Boehner is trying to say "yeah I was naive to concede a bunch of shit and get nothing in return and expect the media to report this accurately but you just wait, oh boy, come the sequestration debate BAMO! I am gonna really pull out the GOP hawks supporting me from my back pocket and get some damn good rate reform and loophole closure this time. Trust me."

Shouting Thomas said...

What a bizarro world Barry and his ilk live in.

They won, and they will continue to win.

The Julias are the future.

Adapt or die.

rhhardin said...

Bankers used to match people wanting easily cashed out investments with people wanting money for a long time, serving as the middleman who converts one to the other.

It got even more efficient with banks allowed to go interstate and international, where excess demand for money in some place could be matched with excess demand for investments in another.

Neither works without debt.

The bankers used to work out the quality of the debt problem by being on the hook for mistakes.

Now they're too big to fail.

Vet66 said...

"What is money? It has long ceased to be a precious metal. Now, it's not even a piece of paper. It's just data.

So, what in the hell is it?"

It is a contract, a promise, that you recognize the value that money has to the lender who is recognizing the value you place on it and your integrity to repay after maintaing and/or increasing value. It is also a measure of shared values.

Need I say that the process of increasing value is anathema to the entitlement mentality? And spare us the Alinsky rebuttal regarding those who can't help themselves. If they want help (Church, etc.) it is available. That is unless liberals continue their attacks on Church and religion. Don't ignore those who lose the work ethic and treat entitlements as a handout and not a helping hand up. Like Dr. Frankenstein the liberals and progressives created this monster and will ultimately be consumed by it. Hopefully, it won't take the rest of us "Bible thumpers" with it.

Ned said...

"he's revealing a shocking lack of sophistication. "

ONLY from a lib government employee! As we stare at 16 trillion owed...and a "president" who could give a shit!

rhhardin said...

Boehner is too stupid to be speaker.

I don't know what he thinks about debt or if he even understands economics.

He understands votes and vindictiveness, and cries a lot.

Shouting Thomas said...

Now they're too big to fail.

Just about nobody was prosecuted for the great subprime mortgage/derivatives scam. The worst offenders are still in the same positions, or have been promoted. Barney Frank wants to be promoted to the Senate.

Obama gets his financial advice from the perps.

Can you blame the people at the bottom of the pyramid for wanting their share of the swag?

Joe Biden Is Corrupt said...

harry Reid calling anyone a dictator is rather hilarious.

rhhardin said...

What makes something money is that the buyer would accept it back as money.

That makes the seller accept it too.

As to value and debt, that's a risk that each side takes. You can hedge the risk by laying it off, if it bothers you, but the usual way to compensate is the interest rate agreed on. An inflating currency needs a high interest rate to compensate the lender or no loan happens.

machine said...

and we know how truthful Boehner and the GOP are...

SGT Ted said...

C'mon Ann you know he means charge debt not related to a mrotgage. Quit playing Ignorant Liberal.

Seeing Red said...

Didn't those citizens go thru The Depression?

As little debt as possible.

Only buy the house you could afford.

We did what we were supposed to do and we're the suckers in the end.

We are taking it in the backside w/out lube. By the end, all 3 orifices and they'll be making some new ones to support moving FORWARD!

Aridog said...

I am older than the Speaker...and I recall the 40's and 50's very well. In the city many folks had mortgages, and some had car notes, but not credit card debt. I recall no one with "revolving" credit debt.At most, for some, was a store card like Sears-Roebuck. You paid that off at month end, or 90 days if for something large like an appliance.

WWII was just over with and after ration coupons and limited access to some items, the habit was to be restrained and plan any "debt" carefully. Then along came the Korean War and fear that the limitations would return.

THAT is the careful and deliberate" environment Boehner is talking about. We grew up understanding that frivolous debt made everything more expensive. We also grew up knowing that if a neighbor needed help, we were responsible to provide it...it was "neighborly" and not "collective"....most of our parents came from farms to the city, and farms share resources. So did we.

mark said...

Sophistication? ...

The rich rule over the poor, and the borrower is servant to the lender. (Proverbs 22:7)

Most contemporary mathematics courses ( the class that can replace the typical college algebra requirement in core skills general education ) covers the mathematics of money. Go check out any of the texts used for your university's course and read the sections on money, loans, debt, and exponential functions.

garage mahal said...

Dick Cheney said "Reagan proved deficits don't matter". Did Republicans have a change of heart, or a change of Presidents?

Seeing Red said...

BTW - the "sophisticated" ones got us into this mess. The Educuated Ones from the Universities of Note. They make the policy.

Corzine is still walking around.


We're the ATM. They will shake bloody, pulp us up, grind us down for every last cent or nickel.

Peter said...

With interest rates as low as they are, there's a lot to be said for borrowing. IF you can do something productive with the money.

Then again, something like a third of credit card users carry a significant balance ($1000s). And somehow borrowing at 18% to buy a pair of shoes (or a fast-food meal) isn't quite the same as borrowing for a productive purpose.

In any case, sovereign debt is different from household debt. BUT there's enough sovereign debt in trouble in the world- and enough historical precedent of nations that went into decline due to excessive government spending- to raise legitimate fears over where rising federal gov't spending is taking us.

Brian Brown said...

garage mahal said...
Dick Cheney said "Reagan proved deficits don't matter".


Bullshit, you silly quote truncator you.

test said...

The moral failing of debt is using it to fund current consumption and sticking our grandchildren with the bill. They're stuck paying for our medical bills and retirement so how will they afford their own?

mark said...

machine said...
and we know how truthful Boehner and the GOP are...

Projecting much? Just because President "I never met a lie I didn't say" Obama is rather adverse to the truth doesn't say anything about the GOP's honesty.

It would be shocking if you could come up with a speech that Obama didn't lie in.

Michael K said...

My father bought our first house in 1944 with cash. It was $12,000 and he rented until he had saved enough. I don't think he ever had a credit card.

Seeing Red said...

You can keep your insurance.

We can play this game 4eva.

McTriumph said...

In the context of Boehner's life he's right. No one used credit cards, unsecured debt. Credit cards were hard to get and most that had them used them for emergencies or reimbursed expense account business travel and entertainment. Sovereign debt is like a credit card, unsecured debt, it's collateral is nothing, but the promise to repay.

sakredkow said...

If he's not bullshitting, he's revealing a shocking lack of sophistication.

Shocked, offended, outraged...it's all good.
Boehner was also shocked. You'd think you can win arguments by professing to be shocked.

Shouting Thomas said...

I think, from President Obama's point of view, he's correct in saying that we don't have a spending problem.

What we're arguing over here is who should direct the spending... business, consumers or the government.

Obama, empowered by the Julias, government employees and other tax eaters, wants the government to direct the spending.

So, of course, we don't have a spending problem.

Seeing Red said...

...Debt is one of the things people who went through the great depression fear. That fear is still present....


I think today's college kids are getting the life lesson with their student loans.

KCFleming said...

"'Reagan proved deficits don't matter," Dick Cheney told Paul O'Neill during a Cabinet meeting. "We won the (2002) midterms. This is our due."

No one is disputing the words of the former Treasury secretary in the new book, "The Price of Loyalty." Since Cheney had been responsible for bringing the "straight shooter" O'Neill into the Bush administration, we can take O'Neill's words for the truth.

Cheney's remarks bring this question to mind: What kind of a government is this? The idea that it is the Bush administration's "due" to run deficits and leave the bills for future taxpayers is a startling one. Governments run deficits, but it is the rare one that believes they are its right.

By "due," Cheney meant that because Republicans won the midterm elections on a platform of more tax cuts and deficit increases, they could pass still more tax cuts and run up still more deficits. Voters knew that a Clinton surplus of $200 billion had been transformed into a $200 billion deficit under Bush (it is now $450 billion), and voted for Republicans anyway.

That's what Cheney meant by "Reagan proved deficits don't matter." For Cheney, Reagan proved there was no political cost to big deficits.
"

So Cheney was a moron, not unlike Obama and Nobel economics laureate Krugman.

Evil, too, for deciding to saddle our grandchildren with a terrible future.

Synova said...

So... one thing is owing money against something that has value, and if managed right has more value than is owed so... it's sort of a wash if you can't pay, you sell it, or the home is forclosed on by the bank and you got to live in it and they get their money. Basically, along with the debt you've got assets equal to the debt, sort of.

And people still used to hate it, even if they got a mortgage, and felt like it was a sort of slavery owing the bank.

And then there is credit card debt that's not secured with any assets whatsoever. It's just debt. The value is consumed and long gone.

That's more like government debt and there are no assets to cover it and everyone just sort of hopes for a raise or a bonus or to win the lottery because the only option is a bigger income and you already work a full time job.

What would you call a person who advised getting another credit card?

Seeing Red said...

If we stayed in our old house, it would have been paid off before hubby was in his mid-40s. We r in it now.

Seeing Red said...

...Voters knew that a Clinton surplus of $200 billion had been transformed into a $200 billion deficit under Bush (it is now $450 billion), and voted for Republicans anyway...


Well, there's a baldfaced lie - there was no surplus.

mark said...

garage mahal said...
Did Republicans have a change of heart?

No. We just aren't idiots. We can count, understand exponential functions, interest, and other stuff that President Obama skipped while getting his BA rather then BS degree. Wonder if we should have at least Business Calculus as a minimum requirement for any 4 year degree (BA or BS).

Especially in a world where carrying debt is sophisticated.

Shouting Thomas said...

Eunuchs of the Universe: Tom Wolfe on Wall Street Today.

Just in the process of reading. I have the feeling there are some answers within.

edutcher said...

I see the trolls have finally sobered up. and sobered is the right word because now they find out they're all millionaires.

And the issue here is Choom, not Boehner.

machine said...

and we know how truthful Boehner and the GOP are...

When was the last time anyone said of any Republican, "Everything _____ says has an expiration date".

Brian Brown said...

Voters knew that a Clinton surplus of $200 billion had been transformed into a $200 billion deficit under Bush (it is now $450 billion), and voted for Republicans anyway.


Alternatively, voters knew that there was a recession and a terrorist attack on 9-11 and realized the "surplus" went away due to reduced economic output commonly called GDP.

Hagar said...

The other thing that has not been rmarked upon in the comments here and elsewhere is that Harry Reid was genuinely puzzled as to what John Boehner was so upset about.

It says something about how far apart we are that the Senate Majority Leader is not even aware that Republicans tend to take exception to such accusations. It is what makes them Republicans in the first place.
For harry Reid and his ilk dishonest dealings and financial chicanery just comes with the territory, and accusing them of such things is like throwing water at a duck; makes no impression.

chickelit said...

@garage croaked tu quoque!

Seeing Red said...

Via ZeroHedge:

Pamplona's locksmiths join revolt as banks throw families from their homesIn the years of the housing boom, Spain's banks offered 100% mortgages. Now, while receiving millions in public aid, they are throwing people out of their homes. But there's a rebellion under way, report Monica Muñoz and Giles Tremlett


Are we in the farce portion of our program? This was tragic about 80 years ago.

McTriumph said...

garage mahal said...
Dick Cheney said "Reagan proved deficits don't matter". Did Republicans have a change of heart, or a change of Presidents?

Keynesian economist have always taught that deficits and sovereign debt don't matter. They, along with Dick Cheney never anticipate the magnitude of Obama's appetite except in times of the existential threat of war.

chickelit said...

garage quoque'd tu and I don't care
garage quoque'd tu and I don't care
garage quoque'd tu and I don't care

The mastur's gone awry!

Synova said...

Of course, giving a tax break on interest payments encourages people to take out longer term and continual new "moving up" bigger house payments so you get a tax break on the payments instead of paying full taxes on saving up for a house or saving a bigger down payment or making payments that are mostly principle and you never really get equity unless the total price of houses go up... which it hasn't been for a while.

No?

Chip Ahoy said...

Hello there Everybody, my name is ☾⚀⚇☇ and I'm from Mars.

We've been studying you very closely indeed, but we've only had a few minutes. We'd would like to check a few things before submitting our report before moving on.

We do want to make sure we've got this right, your own records are garbled. You have there a "tax freedom day" This confuses us. You are slaves? We will report you are slaves until [check ] April 17th of last year, then free citizens thereafter. We note your complaints about your condition. Our confusion arises by the choices you made collectively recently. It is clear to us that you have chosen collectively to push that date farther out to an unknown date, but by at least a month, that is, you've decided to extend your own annual slavery that you already complain about collectively.

If you'd like to amend this report it's important you reply as soon as possible. The slavery return to slavery is beyond comprehension. Your nation must be regarded as irrational until it is seen that you have this persistent slavery conflict sorted.

Oops times up. Goodbye.

sparrow said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
sparrow said...

Whatever good use there is for debt it's safe to say the government has long since past that point.

Sunslut7 said...

Ann,
Exactly, what is this 'good use of debt' that you write of? Where and when does this occur?

Please cite actual cases proving your assertion.

How about the FRB and its balance sheet?
Or, the primary dealer banks and their balance sheets?

What about government motors (GM) and its financials?
Or, the Euopean Union and its 'solvent' member stats?

Not to mention the American home owners who went deep in to debt to buy homes.

The debt bomb that this country and the world have built over the last 70 plus years will detonate soon and all your dreams will vanish in a blaze of flame and smoke.

Instead of reviewing the Great Gatsby you should have reviewed a history book entitled ' When Money Dies'. Its written by a man named Fergerson and its only available online. But it is free and you may download a PDF copy if you find it.
Its quite a read and it details the super-hyperinflation that Germany experienced from 1919 to 1924.

There is a reason why our parents generation were and are ambivalent about debt. They remember the US depression. When this bond bubble of Ben Bernanke blows up we will understand why debt is dangerous.

Hagar said...

And Obama's statements do not come with an expiration date; they are carried away by the wind as they leave his lips.

DADvocate said...

As many others have mentioned, Boehner sure means debt you can't repay within a reasonably short amount of time. Boehner is one of 12 kids from a blue collar family. He mopped the floors at his grandfather's cafe as a child. He knows the value of hard work and a dollar. He's also a good example of the American Dream. Not a spoiled, pretty boy like our president.

I'm lukewarm on Boehner, but you can't deny his hard work and personal accomplihsments.

Shouting Thomas said...

A pertinent snippet from the Wolfe article. I'm not going to hit you over the head and explain the significance of it to you:

The Masters of the Universe had the same sort of terminology for referring to clueless citizens in their world—but who were they? According to Michael Lewis, a onetime salesman for Salomon Brothers, there was a running joke at Salomon that went:

“What’s the second-lowest form of human being?”

“I don’t know, what?”

“An equities dealer in Dallas.” This was the sub-punchline. At the time, the 1980s, the action, the big money, was not in equities, i.e., stocks, but in the bond market and certainly not in Texas.

“So what’s the lowest form of human being?”

“A customer.”

That was Salomon Brothers. At Goldman Sachs they called customers “muppets.” Other investment banks called their customers “guppies,” “suckers,” “marks,” “sheep,” “chumps,” “lambs,” “baby seals”… Words like suckers, marks, and lambs had considerably more bite than hooples. After all, where do lambs go? To the slaughter.

SGT Ted said...

People who voted for Captain Bullshit(D) in 2012 have no business criticizing GOP veracity.

Anonymous said...

I will refer back to my Mr. Creosote curve from the Hillary thread a few days previous.

Mr. Obama is an 'A'.

For him our current size of federal government is the absolute, rock-bottom, minimum size it could possibly be. Cutting 100 billion is cutting to the bone, no fat here. Having a government reduced to the size of the Clinton era: preposterous.

Brian Brown said...

Chicago is carrying a lot of debt too.

Look what it has gotten them:

(NBC Chicago ) The first week of Chicago violence is on the books, and the city’s killers are already on a pace to beat last year’s total of 516 and make sure the title of “Murder City” stays right here in the Windy City.

In the first six days of this year, 12 people were murdered in Mayor Rahm Emanuel's Chicago. That’s two ahead of last year’s six-day total. And at two a day, it puts us on a pace for 730 this year, which would be our highest total since 1997.


What a great mayor they have!

Brian Brown said...

Racists!

In 2011, the most recent year for which a racial breakdown is available, 74.6 percent of murder victims were African-American, 19.5 percent were Latino, and 4.3 percent were white. Citywide, the population is 42.6 percent white, 38 percent African-American and 26 percent Latino. That means a black Chicagoan is 20 times more likely to be a murder victim than a white Chicagoan

Brian Brown said...

If they mayor of Chicago where white, black agitators would be calling what is happening to the city's black residents "genocide"

Tank said...

Jay

I know white people in Chicago. The attitude there is, generally, as long as it's just the gangs killing each other, it's not a big deal. When it leaks out of that area, then it's a problem.

Like Syria. They're killing each other. OK. Not our concern.

Aridog said...

Instead of reviewing the Great Gatsby ...

... he's revealing a shocking lack of sophistication.

I'm trying to figure out which is the most inane topics so far this year...an incredibly irrelevant novel or an intentional commentary deception regarding financial sophistication?

Brian Brown said...

My mistake, Rahm Israel Emanuel is indeed considered White by the US Census Bureau.

So why is the White Mayor of Chicago allowing all the black residents to be killed?

Wince said...

In minds of the frugal, there's a distinction between debt for past consumption, and secured credit for the acquisition of lasting assets.

In the former there's nothing left to secure repayment for the past consumption, while in the latter the credit is secured by the asset acquired.

Optimally, the credit is amortized faster than the asset is used.

Brian Brown said...

Tank,

Me too. I'm going to Chicago in a few weeks!

Tank said...

Gatsby continues to be relevant today. Do you know what it's about?

Tank said...

Jay

This is not the time of year I'd go, but have a great time there. It should be easy to do.

Seeing Red said...

Wait, wait, so Barry agrees w/the Dark Lord?

Did GM's head explode yet?

Seeing Red said...

LOLOL

Barry may be walking all over Harry again.

If it didn't suck for us, he deserves it.

Who needs a Senate?

Robert Zaleski said...

Think about how many people live off their credit cards? Think of how many people are not growing their net worth most months, as little as they probably could.

Yeah I agree with him. Yeah, investment is good, but financing everything isn't. Student loans if you know what field you want to get into and it'll get you there. Mortgage on a house you can AFFORD, yeah.

But he's right, most people have spending and debt problems, and very little back up. And then they complain because they are broke.

Nonapod said...

I don't care whether Boehner views our spending problems as some kind of "moral failing" or not. I just care whether or not a majority of people in our country are able to see this spending, specifically the entitlement balloon, as a very serious problem that needs to be addressed.

As for Obama... when it comes to cutting spending, our president said (without irony): "One thing I will not compromise over is whether or not Congress should pay the tab for a bill they've already racked up,". It's clear to me that he has never viewed our insane spending level as anything more than a political problem to either be circumvented or better yet to be used as a device to further demonize his opposition as selfish evil rich people.

Rumpletweezer said...

The two parties have become like divorced parents. The Dems are the non-custodial parent who only sees the kids on alternate weekends and feeds them candy and cheeseburgers and buys them everything they want. The Reps are the custodial parent who has to try to bring the kids back to reality--they can't have everything they want and they have to come down from the sugar high. The kids, by the way, are the voters. We saw in the last election who the kids like better.

rehajm said...

If he's not bullshitting, he's revealing a shocking lack of sophistication. Should families pay rent on apartments until they can put down the entire purchase price of a house?

I believe this is a fair reaction. Republicans are supposed to have the intellectual high ground when it comes to economic matters. If you aren't so quick to conflate sovereign and household debt Boehner's comments do come with a whiff of unsophistication. Have we come so far we can no longer recognize or understand responsible and beneficial uses of leverage?

Michael said...

Garage: I think you should consider the scale of the deficits at the time of Reagan's remark and the current situation. A 30 year old remark on necktie widths or gas mileage would be equally non applicable.

dreams said...

"If he's not bullshitting, he's revealing a shocking lack of sophistication."

I don't agree that he is showing a lack of sophistication and I don't think he means that people shouldn't go into debt to buy homes. I had a totally different reaction than yours. I think he was saying that when he was growing up people were grown ups and were encouraged to save their money and to be responsible with their debt. I can remember that too and I come from an even more humble background than Boehner.

When I grew up in KY in the fifties I knew of only one family on welfare which made it a big deal though they were treated as well as anyone else for I know this to be true as they were our neighbors, we played with their children and nothing was ever said to them about it by any of us. And even years later the father of this family got into politics and was elected jailor of the county. I had about thirty classmates through out school and they all came from two parent families, no divorces.
Things were different back in those days despite the liberals lies that we constantly hear and read today.

We all have different backgrounds and life experiences which shape our perspectives but Like Boehner I can remember when the adults really were adults.

Writ Small said...

Mocking a deliberately misunderstood version of your opponent's argument?

That's just, just completely unthink-. . .

Well, let's face it. It's pretty much the main form of argumentation in politics.

rhhardin said...

I propose Robert Mugabe for the new trillion dollar coin.

Tank said...

Debt as a moral problem.

To the extent that we are spending our childrens' money, our grandchildrens' money, and our great grandchildrens' money now, so that we can live beyond our means, yes, that is a moral problem.

campy said...

The two parties have become like divorced parents. The Dems are the non-custodial parent who only sees the kids on alternate weekends and feeds them candy and cheeseburgers and buys them everything they want. The Reps are the custodial parent who has to try to bring the kids back to reality--they can't have everything they want and they have to come down from the sugar high.

I would say you've got it backwards. The dems are the moms who won custody (with the help of bogus charges of abuse), and the reps are the dads who were forced out and whose only role now is to provide the money for everyone else to live in the style they've become accustomed to.

edutcher said...

Hagar said...

And Obama's statements do not come with an expiration date; they are carried away by the wind as they leave his lips.

Precisely. Zero will say anything to get what he wants.

Rumpletweezer said...

The two parties have become like divorced parents.

If you reflect on it, that is a very scary thought.

jr565 said...

Shouting Thomas, they won, but stop saying that this has to be inevitable.
Obama is on record calls g for a balanced approach, which includes spending cuts. He's also on record saying that libs are wrong to not demand cuts on Medicare because they aren't sustainable.
And heis now at the mercy of the results of his policies. Just the other day the SS payroll tax kicked in and libs all. Over the Internet had their heads explode about why their taxes just went up.
The thing that People like Inga will never address is that to adequately fund the spending he wants taxes will need to go up on the middle class. And even then it still won't pay for it.
Now, after raising rates, Obama is now talking about implementing Romneys idea of limiting deductions which will drive up rates even further.
Costs will go up due to EPA rules, health care has already gone up despite the claims to the contrary. And will continue to rise.
What won't go up will be jobs.
Sometimes the best course of action is to give people enough rope to let them hang themselves.
Even if you say Obama is super popular, he can't run for another term, and the person coming after him has to run on Obama's record.
Republicans can say we raised taxes, it did nothing, you promised a balanced approach, where are the cuts. And that's a winning hand. Specially when people's costs go up everywhere without the growth.

This reminds me of Will smith on French TV. Here he was talking about raising taxes on the rich and the anchorwoman told him the tax rate in France and after hearing it he got all flummoxed and hemmed and hawed then said "all I can say is God bless America"..

Sometimes giving people what they want is the best way to show them they don't want it. The more successful the dems are in passing their legislation, long term the worse their prospects will be.

dreams said...

A lot of people are better off renting rather than owning a home. All those poor people that were encouraged to buy homes thanks to the Community Reinvestment Act sure would have been better off renting rather than owning a house. I wish liberals would just consider the unintended consequences of their do good actions instead of just doing what makes them feel good and to hell with the consequences.

jr565 said...

Garage mahal wrote:

Dick Cheney said "Reagan proved deficits don't matter". Did Republicans have a change of heart, or a change of Presidents?

did the dems? I remember when Bush was wracking up debt it was the dems acting like fiscal hawks saying deficits do matter. In fact it was Obama himself saying that raising the debt was both dangerous and unpatriotic even.

So I would leave you hypocrite charges at the door since they are so off base.

Seeing Red said...

The libs' heads exploded because once again, they don't listen.

Payroll taxes are not income taxes.

Barry said he didn't raise income taxes.

Then the argument becomes, "I thought you wanted to save Social Security, but you raided your retirement for the past 2 years."

machine said...

Not to worry...the GOP will simply hold the full faith and credit of the United States hostage again...

Aridog said...

Tank said...

Gatsby continues to be relevant today. Do you know what it's about?

Apparently not. Please enlighten me on its deep relevant message.

It is fiction and a trite hedonist escapist bit. I'd rank it right up there with "Dune" and "Star Wars"....but Gatsby has more assholes represented.

PS: In school I was also forced to read and relate to "The Brothers Karamazov" and found it equally inane....and painful to endure to the last page.

jr565 said...

For example, Obama has suggested he and the dems are going to go for strict gun control. Some dems have even come out saying its an extreme position.
We hae Obama on record saying he wasn't going after people's guns, yet here he is going after people's guns.
But let him try it. Long term, how will that play out for dems?

HTey might et the short term victory of gun control, but they will then have to deal with millions of gun owners who will become single issue voters who will punish the. Dems for denying them of rights.
Dems are assuming that they have these mandates and are suggesting extreme positions that WILL have consequences for them in future elections.

So lets them them try.

jungatheart said...

"...or an intentional commentary deception regarding financial sophistication?"


It helps if you think of her as a little kid poking a turtle with a stick. There are levels of reaction from the kid, the turtle, and the observers.

dreams said...

I heard the former CEO of Wells Fargo say this morning on CNBC that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac caused all the financial meltdown problems because they guarantee 70 to 80% of all home loans which the private sector would never do. If the government had not guaranteed all those sorry high risk loans we would not have had the financial mess we had. It is the government that is the problem, there are no adult Dems or any adult liberal media. Some of us are old enough to remember when there were adults still living.

Aridog said...

machine said...

...the GOP will simply hold the full faith and credit of the United States ...

What's to hold hostage? Bwahahahaha.

There is little faith in that left and the credit will shortly be downgraded again.

I don't think you understand how sovereign debt relates to credit.

But let's give it a try...what would you say is the terminal date for amortizing our current United States sovereign debt?

Seeing Red said...

How about just going back to the old standards of 20% down & no more than 33% of your gross?

In short, your total income is $60K, you can afford $180K house unless you have a really fancy car you're paying for or high credit card debt.

I knew someone who had to sell his fancy car to get a home loan because he exceeded the formula, but that was in a more responsible era.

Seeing Red said...

The "full faith & credit of the US Treasury" will be backing your IRAs.

Kiss it goodbye.

Seeing Red said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Aridog said...

Deborah said ...

There are levels of reaction from the kid, the turtle, and the observers.

Yep. And I gave my reaction didn't I?

Levi Starks said...

soph·ist·ry [sof-uh-stree] Show IPA
noun, plural soph·ist·ries.
1.
a subtle, tricky, superficially plausible, but generally fallacious method of reasoning.
2.
a false argument; sophism.

I would say Obama show a shocking amount of sophistry.....

mark said...

machine said...
Not to worry...the GOP will simply hold the full faith and credit of the United States hostage again...

Yeah. Because pointing out that a family bringing home $50,000 a year should not have their credit card limit raised above the $350,000 in credit card debt they are currently carrying ... is a "hostage" situation.

Or, just maybe, I know this is "CRAZY" to you ... we are topped out. And we can't carry debt greater then 7 times what we even collect a year.

We have a spending problem. If you murder everyone making above $200K a year and take all their money ... you wouldn't cover what Obama's yearly bill is.

And if you think TAXING a percentage of their money will pay for your Obama dream world ... you might be an idiot democrat.

Seeing Red said...

And just wait until California & IL & NY blue socialist paradises all, come for the bailout.


LOLOLOLOLOL



Did anyone see the story, I think in the NYP? about where NY EBT cards are being cashed?


The usual places, liquor stores, casinos & strip joints.

Aridog said...

Times up @machine...as the zero balance amortization date approaches never, credit approaches zero.

garage mahal said...

We have a spending problem. If you murder everyone making above $200K a year and take all their money ... you wouldn't cover what Obama's yearly bill is?

Perhaps not, but you would have A LOT of money!

Paul said...

"If he's not bullshitting, he's revealing a shocking lack of sophistication."

No Ann,

He is showing a shocking amount of smarts. HELL YES don't go in debt if you can. Rent and save. Stop this 'I want it now now now!!' crap.

Debt strangles while saving money free you. Nothing better than having a bank account full of cash. That leaves you mobil in case you have to change jobs or move to a better locality.

Brian Brown said...

machine said...
Not to worry...the GOP will simply hold the full faith and credit of the United States hostage again...


That's funny.

Hey dum-dum, precisely at what level of debt does the phrase "full faith and credit" cease to have meaning?

20 trillion?
30 trillion?

Or do you think borrowing to pay interest on the debt is sustainable in perpetutity along with a good bond rating?

Seeing Red said...

GM went to the Nancy Pelosi & Hilda Solis School of Economics.


You proved our point GM, thanks.

bagoh20 said...

You have to be pretty unsophisticated to take Boehner quote that way, but if you voted for Obama once, the secret is out anyway.

cubanbob said...

I say put congres and the president on a commision basis.
For every $100 in actual spending they reduce give them a buck. The deficit will be solved in one election cycle.

Perhaps one day politicians in general and democrats in particular will learn the difference between an expense and an investment. However I doubt I will live to see the day.

Aridog said...

garage mahal said...

Perhaps not, but you would have A LOT of money!

Wow. I am surprised you "bit" on that one. With deceased rich and a left over pile of money, which is consumed on the spot, or used to pay debt interest on prior consumption, and not re-invested with a practical ROI in mind ...the "lot of money" you think you have is zero...due to prior claims on you...e.g., the government debt.

Brian Brown said...

I wish liberals would just consider the unintended consequences of their do good actions instead of just doing what makes them feel good and to hell with the consequences.

Yes.

Kind of like when you publish a map of gun owners and one of the people on said map is a woman who got a gun because her ex-husband tried to strangler here. And now, said ex-husband knows her address.

Or, Rockland County Sheriff Louis Falco, who spoke at a news conference flanked by other county officials, said the Journal News' decision to post an online map of names and addresses of handgun owners Dec. 23 has put law enforcement officers in danger.

"They have inmates coming up to them and telling them exactly where they live. That's not acceptable to me," Falco said, according to Newsday.



Hey, you want an omelete, you gotta break a few eggs...

edutcher said...

Thomas Jefferson wanted an Amendment than would not have allowed the Feds to borrow. Of all the ideas that didn't make it, that one could have saved us all this.

machine said...

Not to worry...the GOP will simply hold the full faith and credit of the United States hostage again...

You mean try to get us to live within our means?

Brian Brown said...

So I guess the moral of the story is, too fucking bad if you work at a prison and own a gun. The newspaper is doing good by publishing your address.

So shut up.

cubanbob said...

Not to worry...the GOP will simply hold the full faith and credit of the United States hostage again...

1/7/13 10:03 AM


My children will be most greatfull if that actually were to happen. Lets see how popular government spending is today when most people would actually have to pay the tab as opposed to sticking someone else with the tab. A government partial shutdown will have almost no effect on the private sector workforce. The sky won't fall and those who don't live of transfer payments will barely notice a partial shutdown. That's what the left really fears.

garage mahal said...

The newspaper is doing good by publishing your address.

Where were YOU when the Tea Party/MSM published the names of everybody that signed a recall petition!!??

Aaron said...

Cheney was wrong about deficits not mattering, but only as follows:

Deficits are not bad at all if they are invested wisely in productive goods, especially if your total debt load is low.

Does anyone truly think the government invests our debt wisely? Paying off voters with tomorrow's money buys votes, but is not investment. Most of the truly useful investment like a railroad connected NYC and Chicago were done long ago. Not much low-lying fruit still around. We probably would do better by investing in some process reform, ala Six Sigma.

Deficits are not bad if they run at a slower pace then the economy as a whole, i.e. revenue will outpace debt growth.

I wonder if we would do better with a rule that every other year, the government could only decrease regulation not increase it. And by this, I don't mean cutting regulation but improving, simplifying, and getting rid of old stupid laws and rules.

Seeing Red said...

Via Drudge:

Democrats say they want to raise as much as $1 trillion in new revenues through tax reform later this year to balance Republican demands to slash mandatory spending.

Democratic leaders have had little time to craft a new position for their party since passing a tax deal Tuesday that will raise $620 billion in revenue over the next 10 years.


In short - KEEP SPENDING!


Read more: http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/275815-democrats-looking-for-up-to-1t-in-new-tax-revenues-this-year#ixzz2HJF5imkv

Robert Marshall said...

Debt is immoral when it is used to shift current expenses to future taxpayers.

Why should our children and grandchildren be burdened with paying for today's PBS broadcasts or today's food stamps?

Debt incurred to pay for long-term assets (a home mortgage, or an building an interstate highway) is okay. But the feds are racking up debt for day-to-day expenses, and that is terribly wrong.

dreams said...

Here is an example of what we're going deeper in debt for.

"(and Destiny, Crystal, Bambi…) That’s the headline on this New York Post expose of the food stamp/TANF program in New York. Federal welfare spending has exploded under the Obama administration, now accounting for nearly as much as defense spending. The food stamp and TANF (Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, i.e., cash) programs are among the largest. EBT (electronic benefit transfer) cards are issued to participants in these federal programs; EBT cards can be used to purchase food and other products under the food stamp program, and to obtain cash from ATMs under the TANF program"

http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2013/01/weet-charity.php

Tank said...

Aridog

I'm no expert, but good novels have timeless and universal themes. And Gatsby is that. Take a look at the themes set forth here. I think those themes work quite well today.

jungatheart said...

Sucker :)

Seeing Red said...

So who believes Dems don't know what they want to tax?

It's all Kabuki, they could have had a comprehensive deal.

Brian Brown said...

garage mahal said...


Where were YOU when the Tea Party/MSM published the names of everybody that signed a recall petition!!??


Really?

You have a link to that?

mark said...

@Democrats and Liberals ... some simple math.

You got $620 Billion in new taxes and want an additional $1,000 Billion in new taxes... over the next ten years.

That is an extra $162 Billion a year more. Problem: Obama is spending $1,200 Billion a year to much. And it is an easy argument that the extra $162 Billion a year will cripple our weak economy.

I suppose we could just kill all the $200K+ people and spend their money on the Obama Unicorn World of Free Birth Control. That would get Obama $3,500 Billion to pay towards his $3,720 Billion in spending. For one year. Then it goes to zero the next year.

Or we can live in the rainbows and clouds that float above the heads of dems. Living there everything is free, republicans are always stupid, democrats are smart, unicorns eat rainbows and poop butterflies, $100 can pay off a $1000 debt, platinum coins can save the day, and Obama is honest.

mark said...

Jay said...
garage mahal said...
Where were YOU when the Tea Party/MSM published the names of everybody that signed a recall petition!!??

Really?

You have a link to that?

... http://www.iverifytherecall.com

Anonymous said...

GOP freshman saddened by failure to shut down government in first day

I almost feel sorry for Boehner having to deal with these people, no wonder he's always crying.

Aridog said...

Tank said...

Aridog...I'm no expert, but good novels have timeless and universal themes. And Gatsby is that. Take a look at the themes set forth here. I think those themes work quite well today.

I surrender. :)

We all, I suppose, have some fictional works we can find meaningful themes within. "Gatsby" is certainly one of those for a majority of English speakers. Just not for me...it misses a whole lot of what was happening in the 1920's...something like "Dr Zhivago" does for Russian history.

I therefore no longer disparage Gatsby as a topic...for others, not for me. I still think the Boehner "unsophistication" bit was contrived and pointless. It was of course a "trick."

Amartel said...

Blowing right by "we don't have a spending problem" and focussing on, and taking the literal interpretation of, "I just don't do debt."

Aridog said...

Inga...I feel sorry for the freshmen, of either party, who actually believe they have any control over our government by fiat and fiat accompli today. Congressional power is ancient history.

Shouting Thomas said...

Inga, what's the problem with shutting the government down?

Shouting Thomas said...

Or, to be more specific, what is it about government that brings a tear to your eye, Inga?

Hagar said...

@Aridog,
For Obama, the Democratic Party is a vehicle to be used for his own agenda, which is different from theirs. Party loyalty is not a big thing for him other than as means to an end and a tool in his bag of tricks.

Michael said...

Inga. I almost feel sorry for your grandchildren whose share of the debt is now over 50,000 each. And growing. And growing.

Shouting Thomas said...

I don't feel any sort of personal warmth toward any politician, not even the ones I vote for... or, maybe, especially the ones I vote for.

Why is anybody personally, emotionally invested in any politician?

Anonymous said...

What happens of government shuts down

Here are 14 things that will happen if government shuts down from the Business Insider. I'm sure this is just the short list.

Lawyer Mom said...

The "fiscal cliff" is tidily winks.

The Federal Reserve is buying 90% -- NINETY PERCENT -- of new bonds with journal-entries, creating money from nothing. Keep an eye on the yields, people. Bernanke can't prop up treasuries forever.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-12-03/treasury-scarcity-to-grow-as-fed-buys-90-of-new-bonds.html

When the bond market wakes up, it's over.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-01-06/magic-compounding-impact-1-change-rates-total-2022-us-debt

Here's link to free pdf of "When Money Dies" mentioned in an earlier comment.

http://thirdparadigm.org/doc/45060880-When-Money-Dies.pdf

Happy New Year.

Shouting Thomas said...

I didn't see anything very terrifying in that list, Inga.

Saw a lot of foolish hyperbole, too.

Shut 'er down! Won't bother me a bit.

Anonymous said...

No? Yes it's a bit tongue in cheek, but you don't think our troops should be paid? Also the Borowitz Report is satire:).

Shouting Thomas said...

Troops might not get paid, but they'll sure as hell still be housed and fed.

You didn't answer me. What in the world causes you to get emotionally invested in some politician or political party?

Shouting Thomas said...

I'm against whoever currently occupies every government office.

No matter whether I voted for them or not.

Seems the only sensible outlook.

Known Unknown said...

Dick Cheney said "Reagan proved deficits don't matter". Did Republicans have a change of heart, or a change of Presidents?

What would behoove all of us is to remember and stand by our principles, regardless of party, because playing this "so-and-so did or said this too." is useless.

GM, either deficits matter or they don't. Don't be a coward, and tell us what you really think of the issue at hand.

I think they matter, and I think they're too high currently. At some point, you've accumulated enough debt.

Krugman and company believe you deficit spend to boost economic activity, and then you recover the debt within a larger economy. The problem is, I think we are beyond that point at which you can get the debt back under control after accelerating deficit spending. The only way out is growth and broadening the tax base.

Anonymous said...

ST, why do you think I'm emotionally Invested in government or any politician? I am emotionally invested in people who are affected by bad governing, as are you and most other Americans who give a damn.

Aridog said...

Inga....that article is over the top for a business publication. I was in the federal government shut down under Clinton, and nearly none of that crap happened even temporarily. I had to work as an "essential" but the bulk in civil service went home on unpaid furlough. I got paid for my time at work...and, upon their return to work, so the the fuckers who got 3 weeks off at home.

If the government shuts down under Obama, with his perverse Cloward-Piven motives, it will likely be far worse as he purposely fails to do things and blames the opposition.

It will work. He won...remember? Now he gets to rule by fiat. Piss him off and he shall punish everyone and blame his enemies.

garage mahal said...

GM, either deficits matter or they don't. Don't be a coward, and tell us what you really think of the issue at hand.

Right now, I don't feel it's the nation's most pressing need. Jobs are. And jobs will take care of a lot of the deficit.

Seeing Red said...

LOLOLOL

Nope.

Michael said...

Garage: You are right about jobs. And the way to get them is to tax the shit out of the rich. Fool proof.

mark said...

@Inga ...

Remember the shut-it-down fights between President Clinton and the Republicans.

Was that a disaster?

OR

Did all those spending fights lead to actually spending on the necessities and reduced waste?

Personally I think those fights were good for the country. And they would be good for us now. There was lots of hand wringing like you are doing now. But, looking back we were better off for the fights.

Would refusing to add debt force spending down to $2,500 billion a year versus the $3,700 billion a year the dems are screaming for? Yes.

And $2,500 billion a year is enough for any reasonable government.

Known Unknown said...

Would refusing to add debt force spending down to $2,500 billion a year versus the $3,700 billion a year the dems are screaming for? Yes.

And $2,500 billion a year is enough for any reasonable government.


It's like having an argument over a teenager's allowance.

bagoh20 said...

In real life when you have to cut back you don't pick the most essential items first, unless your an idiot or a politician. If you accept all those horror stories, you are nothing short of a sucker. The idea that everything the government spends money on is more important than paying the military is ridiculous. You really believe that? Or do you believe that the politicians you voted for would force that choice just to avoid doing their job responsibly? Well then why the hell did you vote for them?
Stop being a sucker.

Brennan said...

I kid with the builders in my area asking if they will build be the grandest of all "Debtors Suite" rather than a "Master" or "Owner".

Seeing Red said...

Nancy Pelosi & Hilda Solis don't agree, GM. Via ZeroHedge last week:

Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis made her ubiquitous post-NFP appearance on CNBC this morning and spouted the usual propaganda. However, while discussing how wonderful the ATRA was, the seemingly slap-happy Solis noted how great the fact that emergency unemployment benefits were extended for millions of people was - and that thanks to that (and the magic of the Keynesian multiplier), millions of jobs were saved. So, to sum up, paying people not to work, saved millions and millions of jobs? Indeed America, indeed.

Nancy Pelosi proudly defended the welfare party.

CNN: At a press conference in her home town of San Francisco, Pelosi explained that the program’s multiplier effect –the amount of money generated in the local economy as the result of the subsidy– far exceeds the nearly $60 billion spent this year by the federal government and is a sure-fire way to stimulate the economy. For every dollar a person receives in food stamps, Pelosi said that $1.79 is put back into the economy. The U.S. Department of Agriculture cites an even higher figure of $1.84.

“It is the biggest bang for the buck when you do food stamps and unemployment insurance. The biggest bang for the buck,” she said.

Seeing Red said...

Via Vodkapundit:

It’s been a busy day of make-beleive, going from fiat-fiat-fiat money all the way to fiat governance. Wynton Hall has the latest:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has reportedly told President Barack Obama that he would back the president overriding congressional authority and unilaterally raising the debt ceiling.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) was more forceful: “I’ve made my view very clear on that subject: I would do it in a second. But I’m not the president of the United States.”

That last line has already given me several nearly-orgasmic shudders of relief, but it’s not really germane to the story. The story is that the two highest-ranking Democrats in each chamber don’t give a good got-dam about the rule of law, so long as the gravy trains run on time. And if that means a one-man junta? So be it.

It’s time we realized there’s no more gravy and the train is ready to derail.


Oh, it was also floated we don't need that pesky senate for treaties anymore. It'll just be "understandings" between our president and other countries' leaders.

Rusty said...

garage mahal said...
GM, either deficits matter or they don't. Don't be a coward, and tell us what you really think of the issue at hand.

Right now, I don't feel it's the nation's most pressing need. Jobs are. And jobs will take care of a lot of the deficit.


Where do jobs come from?

Seeing Red said...

Ohhh, and since this is a part of budgets and fiscal cliffs, via Insty from the NYT:

For the first time in more than a quarter-century, Social Security ran a deficit in 2010: It spent $49 billion dollars more in benefits than it received in revenues, and drew from its trust funds to cover the shortfall. Those funds [an accounting reality but economic fiction]— a $2.7 trillion buffer built in anticipation of retiring baby boomers — will be exhausted by 2033, the government currently projects.

Those facts are widely known. What’s not is that the Social Security Administration underestimates how long Americans will live and how much the trust funds will need to pay out — to the tune of $800 billion by 2031, more than the current annual defense budget — and that the trust funds will run out, if nothing is done, two years earlier than the government has predicted.




Kind of makes one wonder how much was siphoned off for our 2 year P/R Tax Holiday, doesn't it?

mark said...

Stealing from Seeing Red ...

Pelosi: "For every dollar a person receives in food stamps $1.79 is put back into the economy."

... Okay. Democrat logic at work. Government food stamps are the perpetual money machine.

Holy President Obama Poop! (my new curse word for the day) With amazing thinkers like The One and Nancy they will surly bring us all to the land of plenty. Well ... all except the heathen rethuglicans whose blood must water the sand.

Seeing Red said...

Cali may be have the most poor in the country, you would think with all that money flowing in, they wouldn't have been over $900m shy in revenue collection. It wasn't all FB's fault. LOLOLOL

Seeing Red said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Seeing Red said...

Bonehead should have insisted on the negotiations being televised.


Hmmm, from Barry's POV he's right, it isn't a spending problem, it's all that IRA money he can't get his hands on.

Spending it is the easy part.

Original Mike said...

"If he's not bullshitting, he's revealing a shocking lack of sophistication."

Drinking a martini is sophisticated. Drinking 20 martinis a day, every day, is just being a drunk.

garage mahal said...

Where do jobs come from?

From people like you and me spending money. The real job creators, if you will.

Known Unknown said...

From people like you and me spending money. The real job creators, if you will.

So, do you support taking more of that money via tax to suppress spending, or not?

Rusty said...

garage mahal said...
Where do jobs come from?

From people like you and me spending money. The real job creators, if you will.

For there to be any job anywhere. Some individual has to provide a product or provide a service. Only then can the product or service be taxed and the employees be taxed to make a government job. In other words. Somewhere along the job train wealth has to be created.

Brian Brown said...

garage mahal said...

From people like you and me spending money. The real job creators, if you will.


Your ignorance and stupidity are embarrassing.

Brian Brown said...

garage mahal said...
Where were YOU when the Tea Party/MSM published the names of everybody that signed a recall petition!!??


By the way stupid shit, where is your link to this allegation?

Bryan C said...

"Kind of makes one wonder how much was siphoned off for our 2 year P/R Tax Holiday, doesn't it?"

I hope it was a lot. Any dollar that wasn't plowed into the bottomless pit of Social Security is a dollar well spent.

Hagar said...

Wrong again, Garage.
Jobs come from people that go about creating something we want to buy.
Just churning money won't do it. That is one of the fatal misconceptions of the Democrats since 1930.

Aridog said...

Seeing Red said...

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has reportedly told President Barack Obama that he would back the president overriding congressional authority and unilaterally raising the debt ceiling....House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) was more forceful: “I’ve made my view very clear on that subject: I would do it in a second.

Oh, my I guess what I said a week ago and a couple times since is true, eh? That the debt ceiling is already breeched and it can just be validated by fiat. As I have said: Game, Set, Match.

Oh, and that two year hiatus on the individual portion of payroll taxes?....that cut 16.5% per year from Social Secutiy "Trust" funding. 16.5% also happens to be the annual revenue shortfall versus spending for SSA benefits...which is right there in Obamessiah's executive budget...which neither house has ever passed 4 years running now.

Michael said...

Garage wrote:"From people like you and me spending money. The real job creators, if you will."

Well, you are clamoring for jobs so why not just go all in and spend all you have. Because you love your country and you are for jobs aren't you?

Hagar said...

cf. Mark Twain's village, the inhabitants of which earned a precarious living taking inn each other's wash.
Everybody was spending money, but there was no net benefit.

Seeing Red said...

...From people like you and me spending money. The real job creators, if you will....


The P/R Tax holiday is over POOF that's gone to taxes, Obamacare has caused my insurance rates to rise, POOF more money, gas is going up POOF more money to my tank, which causes food prices to rise POOF.

So where do I cut? Oh, that's right I can't because $50 million a year Big Bird needs more birdseed, GS can't afford the interest on it's new building in NYC, there are more Solyndra's to be funded, Hollywood needs their tax cuts, and cowboy poetry must be funded.

POOF - guess it's time to monetize or clip those treasury bond holders, if it was good for Government Motor's bond holders, it's good for those who hold our treasuries. And stick it to those who don't work for Uncle Sam or the union like the 20K non-union
whose pensions went POOF when Government Motors was "saved."

test said...

garage mahal said...
Right now, I don't feel it's the nation's most pressing need. Jobs are. And jobs will take care of a lot of the deficit.


Strange it took Obama 5 years to pivot to jobs, and that Obama supporters who claim it as their top priority don't seem bothered by that delay.

mark said...

Jay said...
By the way stupid shit [speaking to GM], where is your link to this allegation?

I linked to the website that listed all the signers of the petition. It was http://www.iverifytherecall.com and it is run by Wisconsin GrandSons of Liberty and We the People of the Republic.

Brian Brown said...

Can't cut spending here either:

the annual report reveals PPFA generated nearly $1.2 billion in total income — just short of the $1.22 billion mark that was its record for income that it posted in 2010-2011.

PPFA’s income included a hefty and ever-increasing check from American taxpayers. In 2009-2010, government funding reached a whopping $487.4 million. In 2010-2011 the figure jumped to $538.5 million. The total for 2011-2012 reached a staggering $542.4 million, which represents 45.2 percent of the group’s total annual budget


Nope, Planned Parenthood is for the children!

Brian Brown said...

mark said...
I linked to the website that listed all the signers of the petition. It was http://www.iverifytherecall.com and it is run by Wisconsin GrandSons of Liberty and We the People of the Republic.


I know.

And a searchable database is not "the MSM" nor is it run by the Tea Party.

So it is in no way analogous to an actual newspaper publishing the addresses of gun owners, nor is it actually what garagie said it was.

garage mahal said...

The P/R Tax holiday is over POOF that's gone to taxes

My paycheck went up. In a big way. I'm on commission sales though and I had a banner day in receivables. I don't know why anyone would want to toil away in a dead end job with a fixed salary.

You can either complain, or make more money. Because there is literally nothing you can do about it.

Hagar said...

"You can either complain, or make more money. Because there is literally nothing you can do about it."

???

garage mahal said...

And a searchable database is not "the MSM" nor is it run by the Tea Party

Half true. MSM outlets and conservative media outlets have published several names of prominent people that have signed though. So why did they create the database in the first place??

Peter said...

Synova said, "people still used to hate it [debt], even if they got a mortgage, and felt like it was a sort of slavery owing the bank."

Before the 1930s, mortgages were not self-amortizing. Old-time mortgages were interest-only loans.

To get your house out of hock, you'd have to save up the entire principal. And you'd have to do it before the term of the mortgage loan expired, or you'd lose the house.

And if you go back far enough (i.e., 19th century) you'll run into that "Cross of Gold" stuff. That is, the U.S. was on the gold standard yet the economy was expanding; thus (unlike our time!) there was continuous deflation. Which is to say, borrowers had to pay back loans with dollars that were worth more than they had been when they borrowed the money.

So, perhaps there were good reasons why the people in those old photos were wary of debt.

Brennan said...

I don't know why anyone would want to toil away in a dead end job with a fixed salary.

Sweet. We agree on one thing. But dang I have to stare at that Packers icon at the same time.

mark said...

Jay said...
And a searchable database is not "the MSM" nor is it run by the Tea Party.

So it is in no way analogous to an actual newspaper publishing the addresses of gun owners, nor is it actually what garagie said it was.


I suppose. There really is no official "Tea Party". And a searchable database isn't a list of names, but it can easily generate a list of names for you. And yes, it isn't the MSN.

It is legal and one way to use crowd sourcing to check for valid and in-valid signatures. But, it could also be used in ways that it wasn't originally intended for. Because I see a lot of names, addresses and online images of official signatures.

mark said...

garage mahal said...
So why did they create the database in the first place??

To crowd source the recall petition. It is the only way to perform a fast check that the democrats didn't just sit down in a room and fill out page after page of falsified signatures to get a recall.

My problem with the online database ... now anyone can use those page after page of images of names, addresses, and signatures to pad any petition.

Michael said...

Garage: Congratulations on a big payday. There is nothing like being self-employed which is what you are if you are on commission. It is a good feeling to be the source of your own income and able at any minute to tell the "boss" to shove it because your skills are very portable.

Alex said...

Debt, deficits none of it matters because Obama the God says so.

Brian Brown said...

garage mahal said...

Half true. MSM outlets and conservative media outlets have published several names of prominent people that have signed though.


Bullshit.

Provide a link to these "MSM outlets" then.

I've only asked 3 times now.

Further, "several names" is not at all analogous to all registered gun owners.

garage mahal said...

Bullshit

Here is an example. In a thread you commented on.

garage mahal said...

I have no problem saying publishing names of gun owners is atrocious.

But you would spend hours defending the tea party gathering names into a database and sliming people that signed.

jr565 said...

This is pretty much the last word on the question of the issue facing us:
“The truth is, you can’t solve our deficit without cutting spending. But you also can’t solve it without asking the wealthiest Americans to pay their fair share.”

“This is not class warfare,” It’s math.”
“Either we ask the wealthiest Americans to pay their fair share in taxes, or we’re going to have to ask seniors to pay more for Medicare. We can’t afford to do both.”


This I assume is what Obama means by a balanced approach. Yes it is math, and yes you can't cut the deficit without cutting spending. Agreed. So why are the dems so adamant about not cutting spending? Since we are talking about math, as it were.

Lefties, please refute your dear leader on this assertion, or please be quiet.
If you are serious about cutting the deficit you are going to have to ask seniors to pay more for Medicaire. It's simple math. We just raised taxes on the rich (and middle class but let's ignore that for now), and how much revenue was generated? Did it actually solve the deficit?

Let's get the second half of that balanced approach you douches. The actual only real portion that is relevant.

It's the same thing with the argument that we're just going to Clinton's tax rates, what's the big deal? If you completely ignore that spending is nowhere close to
Clinton's then it almost sounds reasonable. Except that it isn't so it isn't.

The dems seem to pull numbers out of their ass that don't even make note of the fact that there is even
A deficit.

We're goin to look back on this administration and pine for the days of Carter. And the saddest thing is that this isn't an accident.
Rather, Obama is deliberately digging the grave were going to lie in out of some notion of social justice.
It's not incompetence on Obamas part, but competence. He's getting the result he's looking for.
And that is frightening.

Synova said...

garage... I don't like any of the "naming" related to the political realm; outing donors is disgusting, and sending something to your house saying "we're telling your neighbors how you voted" is just as bad. The *only* reason I'm ambiguous about the recall petition list is that it's got to be checked for valid signatures. Any use other than that I disapprove of wholly. I don't think I've seen anyone disagree if put that way.

The gun owner list had no other purpose to the FOIA request than to intimidate gun owners.

Maybe Althouse could do a poll about the use of "public" but personal information.

Maybe "I can look at this personal information therefore I should" ought to be replaced with "I can look at this personal information and if I do I'm a pervert."

Unknown said...

After slogging through these comments I'd say it's garage who displays a shocking lack of sophistication about fiscal reality.

Unknown said...

"Pay their fair share" is such a dodge. Is it a "fair share" to pay nothing?
Only if you take nothing.

garage mahal said...

The *only* reason I'm ambiguous about the recall petition list is that it's got to be checked for valid signatures.

It was checked. By the people gathering the petitions, by the GAB, and by Walker's own campaign. That really only leaves one reason why all that trouble was went through.

garage mahal said...

or, gone through

mark said...

garage mahal said...
It was checked. By the people gathering the petitions ...

You mean the people who were OK with Mickey Mouse and Adolf Hitler signing it in front of them?

I don't see a "hey you signed that petition" as smearing. I do see having scans of names with signatures online as bad.

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