It's official: Hillary vs. Trump

[MyGodWearsAHoodie]

Katrina Pierson is starting to remind me of Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf.

[Dave Gray]

I think that if there's going to be real fiscal reform, it can't come from the current GOP, but will have to come from the Libertarian wing.

The biggest piece of the spending pie comes from military spending + veterans.  If you don't work to cut that down BIG TIME, the little stuff doesn't matter.  Both parties are pretty hawkish at the moment, with the GOP leading the way with expansion. 

Libertarians are a step towards isolationism and a smaller military.   Maybe they'll take over after Trump embarrasses the party and some of those parts of the platform will be adopted.

It only makes sense, politically.  I think the GOP really hurt themselves and had the opportunity to go left of the Dems on certain small-government ideas -- legalizing vices (drugs, sex, gambling) ...being the anti-prohibition party, essentially, like they do with guns.  And then, be the anti-war party.  Instead, they claimed to be small government, but not for social issues -- and then unable to follow through on the fiscal ones, either.

[MyGodWearsAHoodie]

If Trump loses bad, and Johnson has a good showing you may either see many repubs leave switch parties or the republican party modify to become more libertarian. 

[pondwater]

  If you really care about the national debt and budget deficits, then you should never vote Republicans into federal office, because their first move will be to pass deficit-exploding tax cuts.

Entirely untrue. It's the republicans pushing for a constitutional convention for the states to ratify a bill to mandate a balanced budget. It would be kind of hard to pass " deficit-exploding tax cuts" when you have to have a balanced budget.

[Spider-Dan]

It's the republicans pushing for a constitutional convention for the states to ratify a bill to mandate a balanced budget. It would be kind of hard to pass " deficit-exploding tax cuts" when you have to have a balanced budget.

Of course the GOP is pushing for a balanced budget amendment when a Democrat is in the White House.  Republicans are extremely concerned about deficits when they aren't in power.  But when they are in power, it's deficit-exploding tax cuts, now and forever.

To wit: when last the Republicans had control of the White House and both houses of Congress, they didn't balance the budget or fight for a balanced budget amendment... instead, they passed deficit-exploding tax cuts.

[pondwater]

Of course the GOP is pushing for a balanced budget amendment when a Democrat is in the White House.  Republicans are extremely concerned about deficits when they aren't in power.  But when they are in power, it's deficit-exploding tax cuts, now and forever.

To wit: when last the Republicans had control of the White House and both houses of Congress, they didn't balance the budget or fight for a balanced budget amendment... instead, they passed deficit-exploding tax cuts.

So, is it a good or bad thing that government has given itself the power to create near-infinite amounts of money and near-infinite amounts of debt out of thin air?

Is it a good or bad thing when government can run up trillions in dollars in debt, so that it must seize a surprising percent of the average American's taxes just to pay the interest?
 
Is it a good or bad thing that this in effect makes every single person in the "land of the free" a DEBT SERF?

Republicans and Democrats both have run up the debt and had deficits.  Fuck Carter, Reagan, Big Bush, Clinton, Little Bush, and Obama. They are history don't matter at this point. Regardless of who the next POTUS is, we need term limits and a balanced budget mandate. You're trying to argue that one is better than the other, when in fact they are both the problem. You act like the Republicans don't realize that a balanced budget mandate would apply to them if they win.

[Spider-Dan]

You act like the Republicans don't realize that a balanced budget mandate would apply to them if they win.

Republicans literally don't care about the deficit when they are in a position to do something about it, only when they are not.  When they are actually given control, they only care about tax cuts and reducing spending on social programs that they are already ideologically opposed to; for example, Social Security has run a surplus for decades and the Republicans still can't stop talking about how we need to slash it (i.e. "entitlement reform").

If we returned to the Bill Clinton-era tax rates (across the board) and raised the cap on Medicare and SS earnings, we could eliminate the deficit and start paying down the debt.  But no one is interested in that; even Democrats are running scared from the very idea of raising taxes on anyone but the ultra-rich.

So if there is no longer a constituency for raising taxes high enough to pay for spending that we have already authorized, and the party that purportedly wants to "cut spending" wants to cut revenue even faster than spending, why should ANYONE care about the deficit?  Again, as Cheney said, "Reagan proved that deficits don't matter."  When Bill Clinton actually took the deficit seriously and raised taxes enough to pay for spending we have already authorized, he immediately lost both houses of Congress.

[pondwater]

Republicans literally don't care about the deficit when they are in a position to do something about it, only when they are not.  When they are actually given control, they only care about tax cuts and reducing spending on social programs that they are already ideologically opposed to; for example, Social Security has run a surplus for decades and the Republicans still can't stop talking about how we need to slash it (i.e. "entitlement reform").

If we returned to the Bill Clinton-era tax rates (across the board) and raised the cap on Medicare and SS earnings, we could eliminate the deficit and start paying down the debt.  But no one is interested in that; even Democrats are running scared from the very idea of raising taxes on anyone but the ultra-rich.

So if there is no longer a constituency for raising taxes high enough to pay for spending that we have already authorized, and the party that purportedly wants to "cut spending" wants to cut revenue even faster than spending, why should ANYONE care about the deficit?  Again, as Cheney said, "Reagan proved that deficits don't matter."  When Bill Clinton actually took the deficit seriously and raised taxes enough to pay for spending we have already authorized, he immediately lost both houses of Congress.

And that's exactly why we need balanced budget amendment and term limits. You're still playing the "we're right, you're wrong" game. I don't know about your household, but when money is tight for me. The first thing I do is curtail my spending, not look for a new job or income. Clinton lost Congress because no one wants to pay higher taxes for an out of control government to flush down the toilet.

[Spider-Dan]

I don't like comparing my personal finances to those of a government that:

a) is accountable to the will of the electorate
b) can print as much money as it pleases

To me, talking about curtailing spending is a non-solution, as everyone can think of lots of spending that they never agreed with in the first place to cut.  Anyone that talks about cutting spending is exclusively talking about cutting spending they don't like; if spending cuts aren't important enough to also cut things you are in favor of, then spending cuts aren't very important at all.

But more to my point: I have zero interest in talking about spending cuts with people who think it's a good idea to cut taxes when we are already running a deficit.  Anyone who is really serious about the national debt would not propose a SINGLE tax cut until AFTER we have cut spending enough to be in surplus, and even then would not propose any tax cut that would take us into deficit.  The last 20 years of American politics have proven that these people do not exist.

[Spider-Dan]

Just one more important point to add:

The reason why no one really cares about the deficit can be summed up in the famous quote from Upton Sinclair: "It is difficult to get a man to understand something, when his salary depends upon his not understanding it."

- If Republicans take office and start slashing spending on anything that matters (specifically: our three biggest expenditures, Social Security/Medicare/military), there will be a voter revolt and they will be thrown out.
- If Democrats take office and start increasing taxes on anyone but the ultra-rich, there will be a voter revolt and they will be thrown out.

It is incredibly difficult to convince a politician to vote for policies that will result in his own unemployment.  So instead, Republicans take office and slash spending for people who don't vote (primarily: the poor) while doing huge tax cuts, and Democrats take office and increase taxes almost entirely on the rich while increasing safety net spending.

[pondwater]

Republicans literally don't care about the deficit when they are in a position to do something about it, only when they are not. 

Kind of like Obama and his filp flopping double speak.

[Spider-Dan]

In short, yes: opposing a raise of the debt ceiling is a normal action for a minority party that's powerless to stop it.
But it was unheard of for the majority party to block a debt ceiling increase, as such an action would immediately devalue the dollar more than having the Treasury print up and pay out the entire debt at once.  It makes no sense whatsoever to "protect our currency" by instantly destroying it; the entire value of the dollar is literally the "full faith and credit" that the United States will pay its debts.

I do find it funny that you like analogies to household finances, because refusing to raise the debt ceiling is like "saving money" by refusing to pay your bills.  The spending has already been allocated by previous gov't actions, and refusing to raise the debt ceiling does not change that fact.

[pondwater]

I do find it funny that you like analogies to household finances, because refusing to raise the debt ceiling is like "saving money" by refusing to pay your bills. 

Actually it would be like buying a new house, car, and boat and they paying the monthly bills with a credit card and then making the minimum monthly payments until they become too expensive to pay. You see Spider, if you keep your bills manageable, you don't have to go into more debt to pay your bills, it's common sense math. Do you go into debt to pay your monthly bills? If so, you're living beyond your means, just like our government. That's why we need a balanced budget amendment. So that regardless of who's in power, we will stop bleeding money before it's too late.

[Spider-Dan]

I don't think you understand how the debt ceiling works.

If we refuse to raise the debt ceiling our debt obligations still exist and continue to accumulate, so we are simply choosing which of these obligations to default on.  Defaulting on a debt is not "making minimum payments"; it is refusing to pay a debt that you owe.

[pondwater]

I don't think you understand how the debt ceiling works.

If we refuse to raise the debt ceiling our debt obligations still exist and continue to accumulate, so we are simply choosing which of these obligations to default on.  Defaulting on a debt is not "making minimum payments"; it is refusing to pay a debt that you owe.

They are not all obligations. Plenty of it is willful overspending. Pay our obligations and eliminate the fluff. You don't eat steak and lobster when you are essentially bankrupt. You pay your essential bills and eat bologna sandwiches. It's called being responsible. It's called having a budget and sticking to it. That's why there needs to be a balanced budget amendment. Just because you don't raise the debt ceiling doesn't mean that you don't pay your bills. It means that you don't spend more than you make.