Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Obama is a “Dirty Word”

He said so himself. Check out his latest speech.

In the year 2000, the government had a budget surplus. But instead of using it to pay off our debt, the money was spent on trillions of dollars in new tax cuts, while two wars and an expensive prescription drug program were simply added to our nation's credit card.

Which was all apparently fine and dandy with him when he stepped into the office and increased the wars, bailed out the banks, etc., etc., instead of paying off our debt.

As a result, the deficit was on track to top $1 trillion the year I took office.

And of course, he did not say what it is now. ($1.5 trillion.)

To make matters worse, the recession meant that there was less money coming in, and it required us to spend even more - on tax cuts for middle-class families; on unemployment insurance; on aid to states so we could prevent more teachers and firefighters and police officers from being laid off. These emergency steps also added to the deficit.

And of course, he didn’t mention the gigantic banker bail out.

[If] we stay on the current path, our growing debt could cost us jobs and do serious damage to the economy. More of our tax dollars will go toward paying off the interest on our loans. Businesses will be less likely to open up shop and hire workers in a country that can't balance its books. Interest rates could climb for everyone who borrows money - the homeowner with a mortgage, the student with a college loan, the corner store that wants to expand. And we won't have enough money to make job-creating investments in things like education and infrastructure, or pay for vital programs like Medicare and Medicaid.

Pretty scary. And amazingly like a raft tour guide taking you to within 10 feet of the waterfall and telling you how important it is that “we” turn around.

The [Democrats] approach says, let's live within our means by making serious, historic cuts in government spending. Let's cut domestic spending to the lowest level it's been since Dwight Eisenhower was President. Let's cut defense spending at the Pentagon by hundreds of billions of dollars. Let's cut out the waste and fraud in health care programs like Medicare - and at the same time, let's make modest adjustments so that Medicare is still there for future generations. Finally, let's ask the wealthiest Americans and biggest corporations to give up some of their tax breaks and special deductions.

OMG! Give up “some” of the “tax breaks and special deductions.” How will they survive? And of course, he doesn’t say just where those domestic spending cuts will be taken. And, I assure you he is planning on his already proposed troop drawdown in Afghanistan and Iraq (which are neither one settled) to make up those hundreds of billions of dollars being “cut” from Pentagon spending.

This balanced approach asks everyone to give a little without requiring anyone to sacrifice too much.

Let’s balance the social program cuts with “some” reduction in tax breaks for ultra-wealthy corporations. Which is the bigger sacrifice? It’s quite possible that someone who requires assistance with medical expenses is going to be sacrificing his livelihood, and maybe his life. Is that “too much?” What about just having less money to spend on nutritious food for his family? Is that “too much?” Apparently not in Obama’s mind.

And the cuts wouldn't happen so abruptly that they'd be a drag on our economy.

A drag on that man’s life, perhaps, but not our economy.

The only reason this balanced approach isn't on its way to becoming law right now is because a significant number of Republicans in Congress are insisting on a cuts-only approach - an approach that doesn't ask the wealthiest Americans or biggest corporations to contribute anything at all.

Can you believe our “leaders” are actually considering this? And yet, here we are.

The debate is about how it should be done. Most Americans, regardless of political party, don't understand how we can ask a senior citizen to pay more for her Medicare before we ask corporate jet owners and oil companies to give up tax breaks that other companies don't get. How can we ask a student to pay more for college before we ask hedge fund managers to stop paying taxes at a lower rate than their secretaries? How can we slash funding for education and clean energy before we ask people like me to give up tax breaks we don't need and didn't ask for?

Well, “we” are not asking that. He is. In degree only does he differ from the GOP. “Before.” Not “rather than.”

And again, he quotes Ronald Reagan, and I’m not even going to copy that. He always wants to compare himself favorably with Ronald Reagan. That must make every Democrat proud. The second part of that is to make Republicans ashamed that they’ve gone even beyond Saint Ronald’s standards of conservatism, as if you could make a Republican ashamed of anything.

Now, what makes today's stalemate so dangerous is that it has been tied to something known as the debt ceiling - a term that most people outside of Washington have probably never heard of before.

What bubble is he in? Thank you for patronizing your subjects, King Peace Laureate. That’s been a third of the news headlines for weeks. I bet even Fox News uses that term in its reports on how Obama is driving the country to economic ruin. And well he may be, but he doesn’t know what country it is.

The older we grow the greater becomes our wonder at how much ignorance one can contain without bursting one's clothes. --Mark Twain

Understand - raising the debt ceiling does not allow Congress to spend more money. It simply gives our country the ability to pay the bills that Congress has already racked up.

And how are we supposed to do that without spending more money? If we don’t need to raise the debt ceiling to pay our bills, then what the fuck is the problem?

We can't allow the American people to become collateral damage to Washington's political warfare.

Too damned late. Washington’s political and actual warfare. That 98% of us he says won’t see our taxes raised by his proposal have all become collateral damage.

I have told leaders of both parties that they must come up with a fair compromise in the next few days that can pass both houses of Congress - a compromise I can sign.

He tells us what he says he’s told them. He thinks that gets him off the hook. As though him telling them anything has ever brought about any result beside their telling him how it’s really going to be.

Despite our disagreements, Republican leaders and I have found common ground before.

He finds common ground with the Republican leaders every time they tell him where to step.

Yes, many want government to start living within its means. And many are fed up with a system in which the deck seems stacked against middle-class Americans in favor of the wealthiest few. But do you know what people are fed up with most of all?

They're fed up with a town where compromise has become a dirty word.

And where their president is the most compromised person of all.

But no, they're fed up the most with what he said first: the deck is stacked against them. Not "seems" stacked against them. Is.

[Obama] quoted Jefferson: “Every man cannot have his way in all things.”

Then John Boehner came out, to rebut the crazy idea that he cannot have his way in all things.

He was amazed that the federal government does not work in exactly the same way as a small business in Ohio. In fact, he was amazed that it doesn’t work like “every other business in America.” Well see, that’s the source of your amazement right there: government is not actually a business.

  WIIIAI

It is these days. And that's what's wrong with it.

....but hey, do what you want....you will anyway.

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