The whole damn bunch needs to be locked up in the Whitehouse with no food or water until they agree on a solution that gets the Federal governments house in order.
We have elected a bunch of F--king assholes! :censored:

I wonder if that's even possible. Anything Boner proposes gets a warning of a veto before bipartisan votes in the House. Obama shows no inclination to work with the House and compromise.

Obama even promises to veto what Harry Reid proposes. Despite the strong differences in opinions and the unlikelyhood that a real solution is going to be found one way or another anytime soon, Obama doesn't even want a small debt ceiling increase that will get us pass the debt payment. Why? Because then we will be right back here with the effects of his over spending plain for all to see in the middle of his campaign. It seems to me that both the House and Senate are honestly wanting to do what's right for the country, while Obama is worried about how he's going to get re-elected.

The only way we're going to get past this is for the House & Senate to pass something with a 2/3 vote to override BO.

And did you see his speech last night? Even Chris Matthews who said he felt a chill up his leg when BO got elected and admitted he felt it was his responsibility to make Obama look good said "The President should not have gone on national television to give a political address".

After raising our debt by trillions which predictably did nothing for the economy, he had the nerve to lay the blame on others. BO ignored the efforts between the house and his only ally - the Senate to come up with a compromise to tout his own agenda. But the thing is is that Obama still has not offered his own plan! He has no specifics, just speeches. That's because he doesn't want the blame for cutting entitlements, raising taxes or defaulting on the debt. He wants others to do the hard work and make the difficult decisions so that he can point at them and say "See what they did?!" when he's campaigning for round two of his assault on America.

Polls
 

A poll conducted for CNN by ORC International showed support for a Balanced Budget Amendment at 74% among U.S. adults. Support for a proposal like the Republican “Cut, Cap, and Balance” plan was 66%.

Gallup Poll: Obama's Weekly Job Approval Ties Term Low of 43%

43% happens to also be the percentage of people who strongly disapprove of BO's performance according to Rasmussen.

And you know the expression: It's the Economy stupid!
Gallup says 73% of Americans say the economy is getting worse.

Are you smoking crack Tracy? Obama has shown a HIGH propensity for compromise which included $3 trillion in spending cuts-- including cuts to Social Security and Medicare (sacred cows for Democrats). It's the damn Republicans that refuse to budge on revenues, or as I like to call it, tax spending.

And part of the reason that the Boehner proposal for a temporary extension (that would last six months) is completely unacceptable is because it creates economic uncertainty for the entire economy. Further, this kick the can approach is almost certain to cause the US having their credit rating lowered. Ratings agencies have said there is a 50% chance of a credit downgrade in the next few months unless a credible plan to address the deficit is forwarded. A six month debt ceiling extension is HARDLY credible and would lead to a lower credit rating. This in turn would lead to a higher cost to service the debt as well as increased borrowing costs for Americans.

And regarding polls, I've seen earlier polls that indicated that a majority of Americans did not want the debt ceiling raised. In the same polls, a majority of Americans admitted to not having a basic understanding of interest rates too, or even what the debt ceiling was. Moral of the story...The voting public is stupid. You won't find many credible economists who would suggest that the most powerful nation on earth shouldn't be able to issue debt. Corporations issue debt to leverage their earnings potential. Families take on debt to invest in their future (mortgages, cars, etc.) Debt is not an evil thing. And the absurdity of "capping" spending at a percentage of GDP completely ignores demographic trends. We have a boom of retirees flooding the system; this marks a major demographic shift from our past history and in the coming decades will necessitate a higher amount of spending as a percentage of GDP to pay the benefits to these retirees. This demographic shift has spending implications. Those that support capping spending ignore the demographics-- what they are essentially saying is that we are going to renege on the promises we've made to seniors.

parr
 

Tracy, all this arrogance he has shown, is going to cost him in 2012 elections.

No, but I did have some blue bell ice cream last night.

The entire time BO has been president I have been griping about his overspending and saying that it was going to put us deep in debt, risk our credit rating and that the programs he wanted weren't going to help anything. 3 years later that is exactly where we are. It's time to recognize that the trillions BO added to the debt were for nothing other than to pay off his supporters. The liberal free for all is at an end.

He has added over $4 trillion in debt in his term. His $3 trillion in cuts that he wants is over 10 years. That's $300 billion/year. That's pocket change. So basically he wants us to live with this debt he added, oh and by the way let's get more tax too for his mismanagement of our economy. That's really going to help in a big-ass recession.

The debt situation BO has put us in creates uncertainty for the economy. As far back as 1940 Congress had to pass 37 short-term debt extensions. They have all provided funding for less than six months. He is focused on his campaign, pure and simple. Like what Rahm Emanuel says "You never want a serious crisis go to waste".

That's a blanket statement. Certainly you must realize that at some point the interest payments become too big of a burden on our economy.

Wouldn't it be nice if the $157 billion we're paying for interest on our debt could go to the boom of retirees flooding the system instead? We have to live within our means. If there's a boom of retirees flooding the system, then we'll have to cut something else. You want to add more money to the budget? Create more tax payers.

And notice how the part about the Boehner proposal leading to a credit downgrade-- that didn't warrant a response.

One of the major reasons to not kick the can down the road with a 6 month extension.

So they have pulled the "balanced budget amendment" out of the closet. Dear old Ronny yammered about this years ago. When he got elected, he appointed a committee of people OPPOSED to it to "study" it. It died a quiet death.

Kick the can???

Ok, well this isn't what I was talking about before. I was talking about just raising the debt ceiling enough to pay the interest payments for the next 6 months. What S&P is saying here is that they want more than that. They want to see us actually bring down the debt at least $4 trillion in 10 years. I would like to see that as well. I've always been a big proponent of seriously cutting spending and bringing down the debt. Basically they want the debt rolled back to where it was before Obama took office LOL. That's certainly something they can do, I only hope congress and BO are listening.

Tracy Do you actually believe the money spent, by Congress, to save the countries financial institutions during the meltdown was unnecessary?

I think at most it only bought us time, and in the meanwhile, it left us with a larger debt. The ramifications of that are not over. I think as Ron Paul says, we were left worse off in the long run than if we bit the bullet and took the hit.

Jay Carney (White House press secretary) just said if we don't reach a deal by August 2nd, we will lose our borrowing authority.

Why is that? We do have enough money to pay the interest on the debt. If we don't do it, it's because the president and treasurer chose not to. And because Cut Cap and Balance got shot down in the senate, and congress won't come up with anything else sufficient, we're likely to get our credit rating downgraded.

But we will still be able to borrow, just at a higher rate. So why is the Carny lying?

He ( Carney) is not lying. It's part of the Obamesiah stratagy. It's to create a hate war between groups.

Moodys gives the GOP junk status. LOL

Exactly what they deserve. :censored:

The 2008 election is proof of that.
http://youtu.be/_mfMG66LtVU

Most of these families try to live within their means. That includes paying their bills, paying off their loans and mortgages, trying to stay within a budget. The problem with our national debt is that our government shows no intention of paying off its loans and they will not live within their means (unless forced to by -ohh IDK, maybee a- Constitutional Ammendment, and maybee not even then).

I couldn't respond to you about debt any better than this:
"The fact that we are here today to debate raising America?s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. Government can?t pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our government?s reckless fiscal policies. ? Increasing America?s debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that ?the buck stops here.? Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better." Barack Obama - 2006

Well--- That's was before he inherited the Bush meltdown. I got no answer from you on what would have happened if Obama had not poured cash into the economy as the country melted down, where would we be today?

I just read a newspaper article today that says that every US president from Eisenhower on has raised the debt ceiling.

I do agree that the US has a debt problem that no one is willing to fix. I also agree that there is a leadership failure. As I see it, it is due to a weak president. That's not to say that a strong president would come up with better solutions. It just means that there is no leadership and hence no direction. The US ship of state is afloat and rudderless with an impending hurricane.

The US is going to have to get its act together. If it doesn't it will put the whole world economy into chaos and cause problems for generations to come. The reason it will cause problems to the world economy is because most money traders are based in the US and they have no idea that there is any other country beyond its borders. They are blinkered and shortsighted. There only concern is maximum profit for minimum effort regardless of the long term consequences.

There are some very important elements to this entire debt ceiling "crisis" that are getting buried in the hyperbolic bullshit that substitutes for honest discourse (not what ila wrote above, but generally). I put all of this in the following context: I am not a supporter of Barack Obama, and am not a Democrat.

First, this "crisis" has been completely manufactured for political ends. Every single president since Franklin Roosevelt, including every Republican president, has raised the debt ceiling. The radical reactionaries elected under the Tea Party banner manufactured this crisis in an effort to starve the U.S. government of the money it needs to function, because they do not believe in the system under which the United States operates. They are willing to dismantle the social compact that has served the U.S. people (albeit, poorly) since the Great Depression not because it incurs debt, but because they are against its principles and the social solidarity implied by it. It is NOT ABOUT MONEY.

Second, the debt ceiling is a very simple thing that has typically been addressed in legislation no longer than a single piece of paper. It simply gives the Treasury Department the authority to borrow money Congress has already approved for spending. That authority involves going to the bond market and selling U.S. Treasury Bonds, long the most trusted investment in the entire world.

Third, the U.S. Constitution says not a word about the debt ceiling. There is only one other country in the world that has a provision like our debt ceiling, and that's Denmark. The U.S. debt ceiling was an invention of 1917, when federal budget controls were not nearly as stringent and sophisticated as they are today. The debt ceiling votes in Congress have always been more or less routine: some people (Obama when he was a senator, for instance) will symbolically vote against raising them with the full understanding that it will pass, because it must. It has nothing to do with spending in the future.

Fourth, it is a complete fabrication of the Tea Party (and aped by Tracy Coxx in multiple posts) that Barack Obama is some kind of crazed taxer who overspends and threatens to put the United States into bankruptcy. (Yes, Tracy Coxx will pretend that because Tracy Coxx never used those precise words Tracy Coxx is not responsible for such specific, hyperbolic, idiotic views.) The facts are otherwise, though. U.S. indebtedness runs around $14 trillion. Over the past 10 years, $5.07 trillion was run up during the Bush administration. Obama is responsible for $1.44 trillion. The Tea Partiers are liars (in addition to being ignorant).

Fifth, as the Tea Party seeks to delegitimize Obama, it is clear that should they succeed in obstructing all the way to "default," Obama can then order the secretary of the treasury to issue bonds as needed. There is ample legal opinion, highly respected, that the debt ceiling is an unconstitutional infringement on the executive branch, and opinions by very conservative justices now on the Supreme Court (and appointed by Bush) that provide precedents.

I did answer here:
And here's what Ron Paul said in September of 2008. I still agree with him...

Is this to imply that Obamesiah is not qualified to be prez by virtue of his birthplace?

... like shooting fish in a barrel ...

From Dean Baker, Business Insider
Corporate profits

So back to this GRH... The senate is working on a bill that cuts $2 trillion over 10 years. Why? If S&P says we need to cut $4 trillion over 10 years why is the senate trying to cut $2 trillion over 10 years? And why has the senate tossed the only bill so far that does cut at least $4 trillion over 10 years?

This would solve the debate pronto.

BECAUSE CUT CAP BALANCE DOES IT ALL ON THE BACKS OF THE SENIORS POOR AND LOWER MIDDLE CLASS WHILE THE TOP 10 PERCENT INCOME MAKERS GET EVEN MORE TAX CUTS

CAP CUT BALANCE IS A TYPICAL GOP FU TO MOST OF AMERICA WHILE TAKING CAR OF THE RICH
:eek: JG J

Of course, "fuck you" to everyone but the rich should come as no surprise.

Is the building in the cartoon is the wrong one for what is supposedly going on inside? I'm pretty sure that the House of Representatives and the Senate in the US do not hold legislative sessions in the White House.

It looks like the back of the Whitehouse. Anything goes in a cartoon.

Parr
 

I guarantee you that Cut Capt and Balance does nothing like this:

Before Obama became president, i.e. $4 trillion ago, the seniors, poor and lower middle class have been doing relatively ok. Certainly better than they will be when the above happens. And we haven't even got to the part where medicare goes bankrupt because fiscal responsibility is not a trait of democrats. It is your party that will break the backs of seniors, the poor and lower middle class as well as at least the upper middle class. Pat yourself on the back libs.

p.s. you know that the necessity to raise the debt ceiling has been known since at least before last November right? And did you know that Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi could have easily raised it back then before the newly elected GOP took office? They chose not to because they wanted the GOP to share the blame of raising the debt ceiling. Not that that would have kept us from losing our credit rating, we still need to cut all that debt that the dems added in the last 3 years.

No, there's a shortfall. I'm not sure how short we are but we can pay the interest on the debt and we have to. That will get paid first, despite what BO and the Treasurer say. Then the president has to pick and choose which groups of people (i.e. sr citizens, the military, etc) do not get paid, or who gets paid less. But I think the government gets about $200 billion/month in revenues from taxes and on gas taxes (yes, the government makes quite a bit of money on gas taxes while liberals whine that the government subsidizes oil companies). There may be some creative financing going on so that these groups are simply paid a few days or weeks late as more revenue comes in.

But the government keeps raising the deficit more and more each year. BO is running more than twice the deficit Bush did, and the deficit is projected to keep growing 7% each year.

If the Tea Party wins it's back to Voodoo economics.

More lies from Tracy Coxx. The budget for the first year of the Obama administration was Bush's budget. That's how it works. But Tracy Coxx wants to pin those trillions on Obama, so Tracy Coxx tries to make it sound as if it's Obama's fault. Of course, Tracy Coxx will say Tracy Coxx never specifically wrote that. Fortunately, most everyone reading here is brighter than Tracy Coxx wishes you were.

To repeat, as I wrote earlier: Obama is responsible for $1.44 trillion of the deficit, not the amount Tracy Coxx writes. Obama inherited unfunded wars and a budget. No matter how much lying Tracy Coxx does, it doesn't make the facts go away.

As for "doing relatively ok" ... well, that just negates 30 or so years of economic truth in the United States. But when you're trying to paint a picture for ideological reasons, why should facts get in the way?

I am no Democrat, but this is another crock of shit from Tracy Coxx. The implication is that "fiscal responsibility is, by contrast, a trait of Republicans. The war in Iraq, the war in Afghanistan, and the Bush tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans -- all of which reversed the U.S. surplus and made it a deficit -- now there are great examples of "fiscal responsibility." Oh, by the way, Bush was a Republican.

Tracy Coxx is an ideologue without conscience, which means that facts are fungible or downright ignorable if they get in the way of making the ridiculous arguments that are the Tracy Coxx hallmark.

Observe this graph:

You will notice that there is a nice downward progression from the war for both republicans and democrats until the mighty moron Reagan arrives and from that day on, Republicans have embraced his broken economic idiocy.

Except that under Clinton it went up before reducing slightly and under Obama it has gone up.

Let's add one more year to that and see where Obama is taking us. And I'm not sure where your graph came from, but this one seems a little different. It does not go down during the clinton years, and this graph shows that there's been a rise since at least the 1870s except for the period between the 1930s and 1950s.

Since we are in graphing mode , here is a comparison, if Regan and Bush had kept debt under control..

Stop blaming Obama. Note the year on the second to last red dot says "2003". Bush's second term hadn't kicked in yet, so keep going higher and that's all Bush and then like a last tiny sliver counts as Obama, as marked "2009".

I blame Obama for the trillions he spent as president, decimating high tech jobs, passing Obamacare, and generally ignoring the wishes of the majority of Americans. There is more of course, but I'm busy with the freebies section.

And btw... THE CAKE IS A LIE!

The cake is NOW a lie cuz I ated it like two weeks ago. But it wasn't a lie at the time I posted that blog. YUMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

As stated before though, many times, Obama has only spent like ~$1.5 trillion and that's from ongoing wars started by Bush, while I agree Afghanistan was necessary but totally failed in planning, Iraq was total horseshit Bush's personal agenda and also then the bailouts, which we shouldn't have bailed out those banks, let them fail and take them over under government authority. Also "Obamacare" actually will save money in the long run, as also pointed out in earlier posts.

Also it is one of the most helpful pieces of legislation passed by him, regardless of cost, to protect people from corporate corruption. If it wasn't for Obama's healthcare bill, I wouldn't have health coverage right now. I will be able to stay on my mom's insurance provider for another two years because of the extension he passed, otherwise I'd be paying for not just my doctor, hospital and dentist visits but my transition too out of pocket. There's a shitload of other things that bill did to secure people's equal right to receive treatment.