I am so tired of hearing the Republicans say that President Obama isn't "Leading". I've never seen a President work harder at trying to find compromise and get things done. But you can't compromise with those who will NEVER budge. Democrats have proven they are willing to work out a compromise on many issues - including health care reform and the Bush tax cuts. Republicans just say NO. That's not compromise.
Since I mentioned health care reform - was the President "leading" when he supposedly forced it down their throats? I think it would have been better leadership if he simply pushed the reform through the way it was originally drafted. But the President did lead and compromise happened - which totally ruined the reform in my opinion. But You can't have it both ways.
Apparently the GOP form of "leading" is to just have the water delivered to the resting horse so the horse doesn't have to bother to get up.
Personally I think President Obama should lead by telling all the spoiled Tea Party brats to just go home. That would be great leadership in my opinion.
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24 comments:
Frankly, I thought I voted for a Democrat when I voted for Obama. To have SS or Medicaid even on the table for cuts is against the Democratic principals I voted for.
I am pissed off!
My Mother lives off her pension and SS and I can't make up the difference when they cut her monthly check. I simply can't afford to!
Whatever compromises they make, I wished they'd leave SS off the table. It's a separate fund, it doesn't add to the deficit and is very healthy, thank you very much. This posturing in Washington is pure B.S.
If Obama thinks he'll get my vote by cutting SS, then he is in for a huge surprise come Nov 2012. I will not yield. The only person in Washington making any sense right now is Senator Sanders.
Lisa in Indy
ANY cuts to SS would be a huge mistake. there are a lot of voters like me who have been paying into the system since we were in our teens and now getting ever closer to retirement. It seems to me that the baby boomers are just a temporary drain on the system - it should even out after they have passed through. But nobody can seem to view into the future at all. I think they should remove the cap on the income tax and put one on SS benefits. That system would automatically reverse the Ponzi type trend. Of course the GOP would never accept that because wealthy people would never get back all the money they put in. Meanwhile, they expect the working poor to do exactly the same thing with the proposed cuts.
All that asside, it should be noted that at least we are putting SOMETHING on the table to discuss. The GOP has put nothing out there.
Lisa:
"My Mother lives off her pension and SS and I can't make up the difference when they cut her monthly check. I simply can't afford to!"
Andre
Well, then it is a good thing that NO ONE is proposing to cut her benefits. isn't it?
If you are aware of some "plan" that has been put forward that does cut current recipients benefits, please provide a link to it, because I have not heard of it (and I have been paying some attention to these issues...but I may have missed it).
Lisa
"It's a separate fund, it doesn't add to the deficit and is very healthy..."
Andre
Huh?
How, by any rational person's definition, can a "trust fund" that contains not one single dollar, but only a pile of Government I.O.U's that will have to be paid for by our children and grandchildren through hugely increased taxation, be, in any conceivable way, characterized as "healthy"?
The only way it doesn't "add to the defect" is if you dishonestly choose not to include it in your deficit calculations; in other words, just stick your head in the sand and pretend that it doesn't exist.
You once asked me what I was smoking. It is taking every once of restraint that I posses to resist the temptation to ask you the same question right now.
Den:
"All that asside, it should be noted that at least we are putting SOMETHING on the table to discuss. The GOP has put nothing out there."
Andre:
I AM going to ask you: What the hell are you smoking?
How can you make such a absurdly erroneous statement?
The Republicans are the ONLY ones who have put forward a plan!
You may not like it. You may think it completely sucks. But to so blatantly lie about a fact that anyone can confirm with a 20 second wed search, just blows any credibility you might ever have had.
Get a grip on yourself, man! You are diving head first into cuckoo land!
Leave that whacko real estate to Lisa.
The Republican "plan" is this: Democrats cut spending in a huge way and we will allow you to raise the debt ceiling. Compromise?? No - because the Republicans are not offering anything on their side. Nothing. Once again it is holding the country hostage. Republicans MUST also share in the burden of our financial mess.
Andre said:
"The only way it doesn't "add to the defect" is if you dishonestly choose not to include it in your deficit calculations; in other words, just stick your head in the sand and pretend that it doesn't exist"
This actually made me chuckle out loud. It is exactly what the Bush administration did with their budgets while in office. We always heard "the national budget is x Trillion Dollars - not including the cost of the wars." I always wondered why we were not including the cost of the wars when they were in fact one of the largest expenses we had!
You don't hear that now during the Obama administration. The cost of the wars is included in all the calculations.
That reminds me - lets end these wars!!!
Den
"...the cost of the wars ... were in fact one of the largest expenses we had!"
Andre
That is a factually incorrect statement.
"The total cost of the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, over the entire last decade, is $1.3 trillion. Again, that’s over the last decade. This year alone the deficit is expected to be $1.4 trillion dollars. WAR COSTS REPRESENT ONLY 4 PER CENT OF TOTAL OUTLAYS OVER THE LAST TEN YEARS (emphasis added)."
- Sen. Jeff Sessions (R., Ala.), top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee, in remarks delivered on the on the Senate floor on Thursday, July 21, 2011
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/272476/honest-budget-debate-andrew-stiles
BTW: I corrected you on this once before just a few weeks ago, and presented you with the actual numbers, and yet you now make the same false claim a second time! That is either very sloppy on your part, or completely dishonest. In charity, I choose to attribute it to mere sloppiness.
As to your larger point about the shared responsibility among both parties for all the dishonest and gimmicky budget accounting that has gone on in Washington for years (it began LONG before Bush), I totally agree with you!
The lesson you seem to be drawing from it though runs along the lines of: "Well, since they did it, we can too."
I would have thought that the better lesson to be learned was "Stop all the B.S.!"
That certainly seems to be the lesson that the Tea Parties have drawn from this sordid history. I would say that the evidence indicates that the current and unprecedented budget realism in some quarters in Washington exists now almost solely because of the popular pressure of the Tea Parties and the freshman House members that they helped elect last November.
I think they are on to something!
The Tea Party is on to "something" alright. They are ensuring that the sick, elderly, and the needy will die without needed help. They are ensuring that our education system will fail this country. They are ensuring our roads and bridges will crumble and that working people will never make a livable wage. That's not "something" I want to see.
Did I say the wars were "the" biggest expense? No - I said "one of". 1.3 Trillion isn't bird scraps (and I think it is a very conservative estimate that likely doesn't include taking care of injured soldiers etc.) That 1.3 Trillion figure also sounds familiar............like close to the amount we are trying to shed from our deficit right now.
How does the Tea Party feel about the wars? Needed? Justified? Continue forever? They never mention it. All I hear them talk about is abortion, gays, and ending Federal help for those in need. Their priorities are way off base and their thought process is very limited in the grand scale. In short - they haven't a clue.
Once again, Andre makes assumptions and we all know what the word 'assume' means.
My Mother is a member of the century club. Meaning, she could possibly live to be one hundred. It's doubtful considering her years of smoking and drinking behaviors but likely, nonetheless. So that would mean that she would or could live at least another 20 yrs. And from what I understand about this debate is that current SS recipients will have their checks reduced after age 75 and then 85 after 2013.
Let's face it, my beef is that a Democrat is putting social safety nets on the chopping block and allowing oil companies, among others, tax breaks while the least among us have to do more with less. For the tea baggers, it's all about the bottom line, forget humanity.
I say, Tax the rich and in the 10 yrs that they've had these tax breaks, they are not creating jobs. They are doing what the banks are and hoarding their money. Remove the tax 'credits' from corporations. Don't worry about them going overseas, they already have.
END THE WARS. Period.
Or do like we are...we're planning our retirement in another country where there are 'fair' tax rates and universal single payer healthcare for everyone, no matter your station in life.
Lisa
Den:
Did I say the wars were "the" biggest expense? No - I said "one of"
Andre
Yes, and I pointed out to you (for the second time) that is NOT TRUE.
4% of total outlays over 10 years does not constitute "one of our biggest expenses".
How can Liberals make any contribution to solving our unsustainable spending and debt problems, if they can't even accurately state the problems?
Lisa:
For the tea baggers, it's all about the bottom line, forget humanity.
Andre
That is just stupid, Lisa.
Stupid and childish.
Why don't you grow up and join the adult discussion?
Again Andre proves his point by shooting the messenger. I have never ever said such awful and spiteful things to you Andre, yet you never cease to disappoint in predicting how you'll respond.
Who's the wacko now?
Lisa
I'm sorry, Lisa, if you feel my words are"awful and spiteful, but the fact remains that for you to continue to castigate and lie about millions of people that you have never met, who are struggling to save and protect their children's future from the economic disaster that incompetent and irresponsible Washington politicians have been creating for them, has been, and remains, a "stupid and childish" thing to do.
That is just a fact. I can understand why you might bristle at having it pointed out to you.
Please note that I am not referring to disagreeing with some of the solutions that Tea Party affiliated people have been or are advocating. I am referring to the gross lies and distortions about these people and their ideas that you constantly and shamelessly peddle (this same criticism could be directed at our host here also), and the vicious and just plain stupid ad hominen attacks against them personally that you and Den constantly indulge in.
All I can do is encourage you to take a more reasoned, thoughtful, and mature approach to these discussions.
The rest is up to you.
Lisa
"..from what I understand about this debate is that current SS recipients will have their checks reduced after age 75 and then 85 after 2013. "
Andre
Who has proposed this? What plan?
It might very well be true, I'm just saying that it contradicts everything I've been hearing and reading.
Every responsible politician that I have heard who have spoken about this issue, on both sides of the aisle (yes, there are some responsible Democrat legislators on this issue...though precious few) have all pretty much been on the same page that any needed reforms will have to be phased in over time and that there will be no changes for current recipients.
What we do know is that the current system is unsustainable and headed for complete collapse if meaningful reforms are not undertaken soon. If we continue to kick the can down the road as we have been doing that we shall soon get to the point, not too distant in our future (2037 at the latest, probably sooner) where incoming revenues will fall below outlays.
There WILL be massive cuts at that point, if we don't do something to avert that crisis soon (like NOW).
Social Security can and should be reformed. But those reforms should not involve cuts in benefits to those who will rely on the system - especially those who never earned enough in their lifetimes to have sufficient savings. It must be done on the financing side. We could start by removing the cap on the SS income tax. Then put a cap on benefits to those who earned over a certain level. This will reverse the trend of a system losing money.
I agree with you on means testing.
How about also raising the age eligibility limit (gradually, over time).
People are living (and working) much longer now then when SS was first envisioned.
Both of those reforms seem to be part of the emerging consensus.
If history is any guide, raising the cap on SS income tax will do nothing to help SS, because Congress will just spend the money as soon as they get their hands on it(that's why the current SS Trust Fund exists in name only).
If you could put some legal curbs on the ability of Congress to raid the SS Trust Fund. then you might even get me to go along with that tax increase (just maybe).
But that would probably take a Constitutional Amendment, because even if an exceptionally responsible Congress passed legislation protecting the trust fund, any future Congress could easily undo it.
I agree. This fund should not be touched for any other reason than to run the plan. And raising the retirement age (gradually) is also acceptable as long as it is done reasonably - in line with life expectancy.
This is getting boring...we are agreeing too much.
Say something crazy.
Lisa:
"END THE WARS. Period."
Andre:
Well, Lisa, it looks like you may be getting your wish fairly soon on at least one of the wars. The President's poorly conceived and incompetently executed misadventure in Libya seems to be heading towards yet another check in the Loss column for Obama:
http://globalspin.blogs.time.com/2011/07/26/the-west-slowly-backing-away-from-the-libyan-military-operation/
However one may have felt about the merits of this intervention, to lose what should have been a relatively easy conflict against Qaddafi can not bode well for America's leadership credibility in the world.
Andre - did you miss the part in the very first sentence of that story that says "NATO Led coalition"?
Still - we need to end that operation too. We have plenty of our own problems here.
News Flash for Den:
NATO = USA
The vast majority of NATO funding and operational capability (almost 75%) is provided by the USA. The rest of the world understands this, even if you don't.
Our enemies will not celebrate a victory there as a defeat for France and Great Britain, they will celebrate it as a defeat for the "Great Satan, and they will be emboldened by it.
I think we should end that war too, but I prefer that goal be achieved through victory, not through a humiliating defeat.
It's just another piece of evidence that our President is in over his head and has no idea what he is doing.
I wish him a hugely successful ex-Presidency!
President Obama will indeed have a hugely successful ex-Presidency - immediately following his wildly successful 2nd term.
So will Qaddafi, it appears.
"I am so tired of hearing the Republicans say that President Obama isn't "Leading". "
Rumor has it that Washington Democrats ("In fact, 40, 50 of the most powerful Democrats on the Hill.") are saying the same thing:
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2011/07/29/scarborough_dems_say_privately_obama_is_invisible_not_a_leader.html
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