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Dave
Moderator
Username: Dave
Post Number: 4737
Registered: 4-1998
| | Posted on Friday, December 17, 2004 - 2:57 pm: | 
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Not US citizens.
http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/12/17/bush.spending.ap/index.html |
themp
Citizen
Username: Themp
Post Number: 1303
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Friday, December 17, 2004 - 3:16 pm: |
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This is when Bush's popularity will really skyrocket. Why, after four years, this sudden interest in the deficit? Do you think someone just told him about it?
"You mean you fellas are spendin' the money faster than we're collectin' it? Since when?" |
Tom Reingold
Supporter
Username: Noglider
Post Number: 4795
Registered: 1-2003
| | Posted on Friday, December 17, 2004 - 3:35 pm: |
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This was part of the plan. Grover Norquist wants to starve the beast.
When it suits the administration to increase spending for its causes, it does so. When it suits them to cut, it does so. They have made it so that they look like they are forced to cut by decreasing revenues. (Whatever happened to the Laffer curve?) Yet in the face of dropping revenues, they see no problem in increasing spending that they feel is necessary.
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cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 2915
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Friday, December 17, 2004 - 7:54 pm: |
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"The Beast" will never be starved. Democrats didn't allow it to happen during Reagan, and they won't allow the domestic beast to be starved with Bush either. Their claim to fiscal responsibility is hollow. |
Rastro
Citizen
Username: Rastro
Post Number: 513
Registered: 5-2004
| | Posted on Friday, December 17, 2004 - 11:53 pm: |
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cjc,
Given that Liberals have been rendered irrelevant by the election with Republican control of the Senate and House, how do you suppose they will prevent the domestic beast from being starved?
Or will it be those damned traitorous liberal Republicans joining forces with their commie brethren across the aisle?
Bush has no intention of starving the beast. This is all just a ruse to give Conservatives more ammo against Liberals. Bush is one of the biggest mortgage-the-future-and-spend conservatives we're ever had in office.
As much as I hate tax and spend liberals, at least they get the money from us, and not our kids. |
cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 2916
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, December 18, 2004 - 8:19 am: |
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I don't think you can make the argument that the national debt is entirely from republicans. I don't recall Reagan shutting down the government over runaway spending (and it wasn't all military spending either).
And yes, spineless Republicans (some left, some right) will join Democrats to go above whatever spending restraint Bush offers up. Because that's the beast -- congress. You get returned to office by how much money you bring home from DC. Always is, always was. There are not enough right-wing conservative republicans to honestly hold spending at the level the president is proposing, and they're primarily in the House. |
Duncan
Citizen
Username: Duncanrogers
Post Number: 3656
Registered: 12-2001
| | Posted on Saturday, December 18, 2004 - 11:07 am: |
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quote:There are not enough right-wing conservative republicans to honestly hold spending at the level the president is proposing, and they're primarily in the House
And on MOL |
cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 2918
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Saturday, December 18, 2004 - 5:14 pm: |
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Rastro
Citizen
Username: Rastro
Post Number: 514
Registered: 5-2004
| | Posted on Saturday, December 18, 2004 - 10:50 pm: |
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(apologies in advance for my wild thread (and post) drift...)
I would never argue that Republicans are the cause of our national debt. But the rally cry of the Republicans has, for years, been against the "tax and spend" liberals. In reality, tax-and-spend or borrow-and-spend, the issue is spend, not the source of funds.
And since no President (or Congress) that I'm aware of has successfully significantly reduced our national budget (even as a % of GNP or GDP), I'd rather pay now than make my kids pay later.
We're paying now for the large jump in national debt in the 80s. That's not to say it wasn't a good investment. Many argue it led to the demise of the Soviet Union. But how do we decide what is worth forcing our kids to pay for?
Personally, I think every government organization should be required to re-evaluate every project or program every year, and justify the expense. There are too many pork projects in every department. Much has been made about how NJ gets back so little of the money we send to DC. I don't care how much money NJ gets back from the Feds, as long as the Feds spend the money "wisely." |
dave23
Citizen
Username: Dave23
Post Number: 163
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Tuesday, December 21, 2004 - 9:10 am: |
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cjc,
What spending restraint has Bush shown up to now? |
cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 2929
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, December 21, 2004 - 10:30 am: |
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dave23 -- Bush hasn't shown much spending restraint, but Congress overall has shown even less. |
Joe
Citizen
Username: Gonets
Post Number: 558
Registered: 2-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, December 21, 2004 - 12:21 pm: |
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and Congress is controlled by the republicans. |
cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 2932
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, December 21, 2004 - 1:01 pm: |
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And your point would be....? Go back to the Democrats of the 80s -- those deficit hawks and slashers of discretionary spending??? Much of the Clinton surpluses were due to the brake on spending that republicans had in the 90s. Even with that 'brake', there was still a 4-8% growth in spending year in, year out. |
Joe
Citizen
Username: Gonets
Post Number: 559
Registered: 2-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, December 21, 2004 - 1:23 pm: |
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My point is obvious. Republicans talk a good game about fiscal responsibility, yet they are anything but fiscally responsible.
It's not surprising to see that you seem to think that Clinton really didn't have anything to do with the surplus that occured under his watch. True to form the "Contract with America" era republicans talked a good game about fiscal prudence, but the class of 94 indulged in quite a bit of pork once they came to power. |
cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 2934
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, December 21, 2004 - 1:33 pm: |
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I'm not saying either party is pure on fiscal responsibility, but I'd place my bets on republicans rather than democrats. Who's called inhuman for proposing cuts in domestic spending? Not democrats.
And while we're at it, how did Clinton's tax hike spur the economy, and if it did why wasn't a tax hike proposed by Democrats as an answer to the recession of 2000? |
Joe
Citizen
Username: Gonets
Post Number: 561
Registered: 2-2004
| | Posted on Tuesday, December 21, 2004 - 2:22 pm: |
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Not all domestic spending cuts are considered inhuman. There are plenty that are a long time coming but it's a prime piece of pork that keeps some keeps some powerful congressman's constituents very happy and thus keeps him in office. Cuts to programs like school lunches, worker retraining, daycare, clinics, etc. are the ones considered inhuman. At least those are the ones I consider inhuman, and just as you place your bets on republicans being the fiscally responsible ones, I place my bets that it's they're the ones advocating the inhuman cuts. Hence the association. Meanwhile to show how fiscally responsible and innovative they are republicans also champion privatization at every turn. The promise is that the private sector is always more efficient and therefore cheaper than government. Sometimes this pans out. More often than not it's just a shifting of numbers. In the case of privatizing traditional military duties, privatization ends up costing taxpayers a boatload more money, because of insurance issues alone it's going to cost a private firm a lot more money to serve meals to troops in warzone than it would cost the army to do it the way they always did. The good news for the republicans is that though their privatization schemes may have actually cost us more money, they've lined the coffers of companies who will be loyal campaign contributors.
Re. your tax hike question..
Has anyone claimed that Clinton's tax hike spurred the economy? It has been claimed (rightly so) that it wouldn't hurt the economy. Milton Friedman an economist who loves deep tax cuts says the boost a tax cut gives to the economy is minimal at best. The reason he favors deep tax cuts is to starve the beast.
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cjc
Citizen
Username: Cjc
Post Number: 2938
Registered: 8-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, December 21, 2004 - 3:04 pm: |
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I'm not sure it's a starve the beast thing with Friedman, unless you've got a quote to that effect and I'll concede that point (but disagree with Friedman). Tax cuts spur economies and ulimately increase revenue to 'the beast.'
Privatizing doesn't always work out to the best in terms of quality and cost, but should be investigated regardless. And in terms of military privitization, here's from "The Progressive Response" on the Clinton policy of privatization and the military:
"While major threats have diminished in the post-cold war period and U.S. forces have been downsized, ethnic conflict, humanitarian emergencies, and the desire to prevent further problems with the U.S. engagement strategy have boosted the number of operations involving the U.S. military. In scrambling to meet more requirements with fewer personnel and a more competitive labor market, policymakers have turned to private contractors to conduct some of their foreign military training programs. The current generalized push toward the privatization and outsourcing of government functions only abets this trend."
If you downsize the military as Clinton had done, you need to contract people on a per-mission or conflict basis. It was the only govt agency I think he really did cut.
However, Halliburton has been doing business with the US since Viet Nam. I don't know if it's cost and/or quality effective to have a standing Halliburton-type unit with the military year after year. |
John Davenport
Citizen
Username: Jjd
Post Number: 457
Registered: 2-2003
| | Posted on Tuesday, January 11, 2005 - 11:31 pm: |
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Rastro, when you say, "I would never argue that Republicans are the cause of our national debt," you might want to look at a table charting the national debt during the last fourty years. It skyrocketed under Reagan and Bush senior, went down under Clinton, and is now skyrocketing back up again. Without any evaluative judgment whatsoever, it is a simple fact of the historical record that most of our current debt is due to tax-cuts without commensurate spending cuts. You could argue that more spending should be cut, but Reagan, Bush, and Bush have not done that. What they have done is far worse than the phrase 'mortgaging our future' can convey. Let me sum it up:
1. They have done the opposite of a good manager of an endowment, who leaves a base of security for the future stronger than it was in the past. Contrast these idiots with Joseph counselling the Pharoah to save grain for lean years.
2. They have created an enormous hazard to our people. We are bound in the next few years to be hit with an enormous attack. When that happens, we will not have the funds the deal with it rapidly and rebuild. We will be forced to borrow more suddenly, since we have no nest egg to fall back on. And what happens if we reach the point where the world credit markets balk at more U.S. debt? Global economic meltdown.
3. They have deprived us of the most obvious means of saving social security, which would be to stop skimming the surplus out of the Soc. Sec. Trust Fund every year, and start repaying the Trust fund what Congress has 'borrowed' out of it during the past 20 years or so.
4. They have made it impossible to tackle the biggest problem in the federal budget, i.e. unfunded education mandates. Remember that when you get your next property tax bill.
That is all due to Republicans, not Democrats. Enough of this 'both parties are to blame' ••••. |
Rastro
Citizen
Username: Rastro
Post Number: 592
Registered: 5-2004
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 5:09 am: |
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John,
First, that post was over a month ago, and this thread has been pretty much dead. Second, I didn't say Republicans were not the source of our debt. I said I would never argue it. Note the difference?
And finally, to say that the Democrats do not share the blame is being blind. Pork is not partisan, and it is not limited to Republicans. Yes, our debt did go down during Clinton's reign. And I voted for him. But much of that was done with a Republican Congress. And again, I don't give them the bulk of the credit either.
I am not a fan of the current President in the least. I think he is perhaps the worst (not least effective, but worst) President we have had, or will have for a long time. It will take years to repair the damage he and his administration have done to our country physically, economically, and politically. But to say or imply that the fault lies with only one party is being politically naive.
Republicans want cuts in everything but defense. Democrats want cuts in everything but social services. Broad sweeping generalizations are absolutely, positively never right. |
kathy
Citizen
Username: Kathy
Post Number: 1036
Registered: 5-2001
| | Posted on Wednesday, January 12, 2005 - 3:49 pm: |
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Here's an item of "fiscal restraint": The cost of providing security for Dumbya's Inaugural extravaganza is estimated at $20 million. The security is provided by the District of Columbia and for 200 years the Federal government has reimbursed the District for this cost. This year the administration has told the District that it will not provide reimbursement, suggesting instead that the money be taken out of the District's Homeland Security allotment (which had already been allocated for other needs). So what is obviously a Federal expense is going to end up on the backs of the local taxpayers.
Here's another one: The U.S. Postal Service, like various Federal agencies (of which it was once one), gives hiring preference to veterans. In addition, years served in the Armed Forces count toward one's pension. In the past the Federal government has picked up the cost of the part of the pension tied to military service, and in terms of the overall budget this would be a wash for Federal agencies. But the Postal Service has been privatized. And it has now been told that it will have to pay the additional pension portion itself. So when the cost of a first-class stamp goes up again, no complaints from those of you who have been lauding W for his tax cuts. |
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