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Harry Reid Caves - No New Taxes

Doesn't matter.
The Obama refuses to compromise on the issue of taxes.
 
BDBoop said:
"Closing loopholes but lowering tax rates?" Dumb ****.
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interesting. is President Obama a "Dumb ****" then, for proposing precisely such a course in his State of the Union Address? is the Presidents' Bi Partisan Simpson-Bowles Commission a bunch of "Dumb ****'s" for proposing that course? Is Bill Clinton a "Dumb ****"?


closing loopholes while lowering rates is only "Dumb ****" if you think that increased economic growth, increased standards of living, increased wages, more jobs, and more revenue is "dumb ****" Now, if that's your position, very well. But I don't think it means what you think it means.
 
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liblady said:
just as easily true, boner et al refuse to compromise on the issue of taxes.
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on the contrary - Boehner was willing to raise effective tax rates by $800 Bn. Still is, he made clear on Sunday.
 
Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said he is working on a plan to raise the debt limit by $2.7 trillion, coupled with an equal reduction in projected future spending. In a concession to Republicans, he said that plan would not include tax increases, but that the new debt level would last through the 2012 elections....
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:lol: :doh woops :mrgreen:


Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is devising a sham that will never pass muster in the House. A Capitol Hill source with knowledge of the plan tells me: “It includes $1.2 trillion in OCO [Overseas Contingency Operations] savings . . . which was assumed anyway, $1.2 trillion (over $1.1 trillion less than [Majority Leader Eric] Cantor identified in the Biden talks) and $300 billion in interest savings.” A Senate aide says dryly that Reid “has about a trillion in ‘savings’ from ending the war in Iraq that’s already going to end.”...

We shouldn’t be too harsh on Reid. HE DID reach a bipartisan deal with the House. But the president squashed it. (Note to Congress: Next time don’t ask, just pass it and leave town.)...

It is extremely telling, however, that Reid’s plan contains NO tax hike. As I suspected, Obama doesn’t have enough support even in his own party (and particularly from Senate Democrats facing reelection) to pass the massive tax increases that he and his liberal base demand. And yet Obama at the last minute in negotiations with the speaker of the House last week threw in $400 billion in more taxes. There could only have been one purpose for that, since the Senate is as tax-hike-averse as the House: to create a crisis. We have finally found the president’s strong suit.
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As I have been saying for a couple of weeks now, ladies and gents, the President wants us to go past Aug 2, or near enough as makes no difference.
 
1Perry said:
Disagee all you want but IMO it was simply just another false goal.
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It's not a matter of disagreement. No political leader forecast a major market hit today. They only expressed concerns.

Also the goal of reaching an agreement by last night was not a "false" one, but an unmet one (and probably unrealistic). With respect to August 2, there may be an additional few days if, for example, revenue collection was somewhat better than anticipated or expenditures were somewhat lower than expected. However, that there would be a substantial adverse market reaction if the nation fails to raise the debt ceiling in a timely fashion (in time to meet its obligations) and a growing adverse macroeconomic impact should the impasse be extended is in little dispute.

The markets aren't stupid in the idea that there is any chance of the U.S. defaulting. They aren't making moves on the possibility of that happening or not as they know it's not going to happen.
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As noted previously, market expectations are in favor of a deal to avert default. The larger risk is a continuing absence of a credible fiscal consolidation program. Hence, the medium- and longer-term outlooks are worse. That's where increases in long-term yields and a possible credit downgrade would come into play.
 
Why should any of us assume that any of the politicians are telling the truth about any of this? I think they are all just blowing smoke.
If Obama allows the debt ceiling to be raised without serious cuts in spending, we are in deep crap.....
He has veto power, but does he have the balls to use it?
 
...House Speaker John A. Boehner, Ohio Republican, pitched his colleagues on a plan to raise the borrowing limit by about $1 trillion and match that with similar sized spending cuts — enough to last through the rest of the year, and leaving for later the heavy lifting on taxes and bigger spending items.
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this quote from OP says all, the republicans are just trying to delay the solving of the crisis to next year by doing just a short term fix if you can call it that, the trick here is by delaying to next year they hope the debt issue would cloud Obama reelection chances, this is just a pure political move, not an honest attempt to solve this looming problem!
 
hilarious. would you consider counting "not keeping surge levels in Afghanistan for 10 years" to be "honest" cuts in expenditures?

there is only one party in Congress that has consistently put forth plans, done their job, and acted the grown-up. the other has generally played the Mediscare game and thrown poo.
 
Only thing can save this country is a combination of medium-strength taxes and ultra-heavy spending cuts. If we cut so far down we're making a net-profit of a couple trillion each year, then I'll say we're getting somewhere. Retreat back to the days of Clinton and before when we had a surplus...now that would avoid hitting the debt ceiling, wouldn't it. The reason Obama and Boehner are having such a hard time finding compromise is it's hard to do both of those things....tax reform is especially difficult. If you don't believe me, at least don't complain until you have person empirical evidence. I'm all for the smashing of like 75% of government programs, but only with sufficient taxes will all those cuts actually accomplish anything. I'm not talking about avoiding an inflation- currently, our inflation rate is actually quite solid. I'm talking about yanking the trillions of dollars we're throwing nowhere out of a broken system and instead use that to pay the Chinese the 20 trillion we owe them...but no, we'd rather go have 5 foreign wars, give our unemployed a better salary for sitting on their ass then people across the world get for working 10 hour days to provide scant scraps for their starving families, and we'd rather give a guy who has to downsize to an apartment from his town-house because he has to take a month off work to heal with money he's spending on medical concerns that our tax money provided. I'm not saying conservative dogma is right because it isn't...but we won't satisfy the likes of Boehner and the conservative majority of HOR until we act least act like we care about our ridiculous spending.
 
donsutherland1 said:
As noted previously, I believe the negotiating approach undertaken in the debt ceiling-deficit reduction talks has been a bad one. It was an approach that invited posturing and an embrace of almost theological positions. At one point, the talks on the "grand bargain" had each side within $10 billion of one another. At that point, a genuine act of leadership would have had one side making the proposition that the difference be split (conceding $5 billion out of a potential $3.7 trillion plan is inconsequential). Speaker Boehner made no such offer to bridge the differences. President Obama threw dynamite into the emerging agreement with the suggestion to add $400 billion in revenue. Hence, even as the parties advocated their positions in good faith, the opportunity for a credible deficit reduction agreement might have been squandered.

From the sidelines, individuals arguing that the debt ceiling should not be increased at all and, to some extent, that a failure to raise it would not inflict serious harm made an already difficult negotiation even more challenging. Such individuals are irresponsible, as they simply do not comprehend the vast degree of linkage between the U.S. and global economies, much less the macroeconomic impact and contagion risk associated with a failure to raise the debt ceiling. Certain others advocated that entitlement programs be kept off the table, insisting that the compact to older Americans is almost sacred in nature. They, too, are irresponsible. Those programs are the leading source of the nation's long-term fiscal imbalances. In the absence of reform, those programs will consume a growing share of the nation's finances, squeezing out other important programs, including but not limited to Defense.

The stage is now set for the "great punt." A deal to raise the debt ceiling will likely be reached in time to avert a default. Deficit reduction associated with that deal will very likely be smaller than it would have been under the "grand bargain." At the same time, the extent of the nation's political dysfunction has been exposed and no responsible ratings agency should overlook it. Moreover, that dysfunction will almost certainly be reinforced when a significant number of representatives vote against hiking the debt ceiling.
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Which programs for older Americans should be cut?
 
cpwill said:
there is only one party in Congress that has consistently put forth plans, done their job, and acted the grown-up. the other has generally played the Mediscare game and thrown poo.
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There's a party in Congress which acts like adults? Really?
 
today:

Speaker John Boehner’s two-step plan to raise the debt ceiling by upwards of $2.5 trillion would require the White House to accept much deeper spending cuts than he was negotiating only last week with President Barack Obama.

Unveiled Monday, the proposal appears to take back Boehner’s prior offers to allow an $800 billion increase in tax revenues but his new spending demands are significant in themselves and could amount to $600 billion more over 10 years when compared with the White House talks.

This breakdown follows the basic framework discussed with the White House but leans forward in each case toward demanding more savings.

The Boehner plan gives less credit than the White House for the savings that would come from the proposed cuts in appropriations. And this makes it harder for lawmakers to meet the next goal of coming up with another $1.8 trillion in savings for the second debt increase installment.

That assignment will fall to a proposed joint committee to report back to Congress later this year. The White House talks identified significant savings from entitlement programs with the administration estimating the total at almost $800 billion while Republicans hoped for close to $950 billion.

But even taking the higher GOP number and adding 20 percent for future interest savings, the net deficit reduction would be less than $1.2 trillion—or $600 billion less than the goal set by the Boehner plan. The committee would then have to make new entitlement cuts or revisit the question of discretionary spending, since Republicans have refused to consider any tax increases.
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John Boehner's debt ceiling plan pushes even deeper spending cuts - David Rogers - POLITICO.com
 
I am glad nObama is out of the negotiations. He was screwing thing up,....... again.
 
BDBoop said:
Good point, but as I understand it, Boehner threw the first stick by asking for the repeal of Obamacare.
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Moreover, as I understand how last minute negotiations went between the President and Boehner, the $80 billion in additional revenue was merely an inquiry not a hardline negotiations point. And the reason the President asked about it was because it would have raised the total amount of proposed revenue equal to that as proposed by the Gang of Six. I don't know if the request was a "tit-for-tat", i.e., "since you're asking to repeal the individual mandate from health care law I'll ask for that additional $80 billion one of your Republican colleagues has proposed." If that was the case, I can certainly understand it..."You want something more from me, I'll ask something more from you."

A Republican aide e-mails me: “The Speaker, Sen. Reid and Sen. McConnell all agreed on the general framework of a two-part plan. A short-term increase (with cuts greater than the increase), combined with a committee to find long-term savings before the rest of the increase would be considered. Sen. Reid took the bipartisan plan to the White House and the President said no.”

If this is accurate the president is playing with fire. By halting a bipartisan deal he imperils the country’s finances and can rightly be accused of putting partisanship above all else. The ONLY reason to reject a short-term, two-step deal embraced by both the House and Senate is to avoid another approval-killing face-off for President Obama before the election. Next to pulling troops out of Afghanistan to fit the election calendar, this is the most irresponsible and shameful move of his presidency.
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Actually, there's more to this than that.

Between 2001 and 2008, the debt ceiling has been raised five times, but each were short-term measures. (See the report, "The Debt Limit: History and Recent Increases" for details). Each time the debt limit was raised it was a short-term fix ranging anywhere from 6-months to a year. I don't think it's unreasonable for the President to want the timeline for addressing the debt limit the next time around stretched out over a longer period of time and not have to deal with this issue during an election year. I mean, it wasn't made an issue in the 2004 Presidential election and the debt limit was raised on November 19 of that year. So, why should Pres. Obama have to deal with it for 2012?

Red Crow said:
I am glad nObama is out of the negotiations. He was screwing thing up,....... again.
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He shouldn't have been part of negotiations in the first place. This was Congress' responsibility to resolve, not the President. But Boehner all but insisted that he get involved. Wanna blame anybody for the screw-up in negotiations, blame the party leadership who walked out on negotiations - TWICE!

Process, ladies and gentlemen. Understand it...
 
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There's no such thing as a party that acts like adults. The only parties in America are examples of individuals who have to have a bunch of supporters to rally themselves around when they parade like idiots, just like drinkers at bars like to have a bunch of fellow drunks when they make their meaningless speeches. The party system in American is just as broken as a clock that can't tell time...
 
donsutherland1 said:
It's not a matter of disagreement. No political leader forecast a major market hit today. They only expressed concerns.
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That's mostly the same thing as they had nothing of substance to even state the concern.

Also the goal of reaching an agreement by last night was not a "false" one, but an unmet one (and probably unrealistic). With respect to August 2, there may be an additional few days if, for example, revenue collection was somewhat better than anticipated or expenditures were somewhat lower than expected. However, that there would be a substantial adverse market reaction if the nation fails to raise the debt ceiling in a timely fashion (in time to meet its obligations) and a growing adverse macroeconomic impact should the impasse be extended is in little dispute.
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I stated what I said pretty poorly. Sorry. I just meant the rhetoric on the markets this weekend was based upon nothing other than hot air.

As noted previously, market expectations are in favor of a deal to avert default. The larger risk is a continuing absence of a credible fiscal consolidation program. Hence, the medium- and longer-term outlooks are worse. That's where increases in long-term yields and a possible credit downgrade would come into play.
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IMO the markets really don't care because they will find a way to create a bubble or run up commodities or something to make money.
 
this bit about the repeal of the obamacare mandate...

it was a very late entry in the obama-boehner negotiations, that search for the "grand bargain"

that agreement, pared down to 3T in deficit reduction with 800B in revenues, was nearing a deal, the nyt got the whole city abuzz with that friday morning headline, deal may be close

the phone calls had been made to staff members!

the hang up that morning on coffee joe was---how can you confirm that these promises, both sides, get kept

here, let politico tell it, they're on msnbc every morning anyway:

The size of the revenue target is still a sticking point, as is the mechanism to ensure that the needed legislative changes — for tax and entitlement reform—get done before this Congress ends.

Boehner and Obama are discussing some sort of trigger mechanism that would threaten each party with the loss of almost its first born child — policy wise.

Democrats have suggested that if Congress fails to act, taxes will go up on those earning over $250,000. Republicans have countered that if the added taxes take effect, the law would also rip out portions of Obama’s prized healthcare reforms, such as eliminating the individual mandate.
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Latest debt deal under fire - David Rogers and Carrie Budoff Brown - POLITICO.com
 
1Perry said:
Here is my prediction. Cuts with no new taxes that takes us past 2012.
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the last thing Pelosi and Dirty Harry wants in the fall of 2012 is a bill from Boehner maintaining the now normal tax rates. Dirty and Botox would have to either 1) vote for an increase of taxes on EVERY TAX PAYER or maintaining the current rates

1) if they raise rates on the 53% who pay income taxes they are going to get filleted at the polls

2) if they agree to maintain the normal tax rates, they are going to get thrashed by the marxists and the radical welfare socialists
 
Objective Voice said:
I mean, it wasn't made an issue in the 2004 Presidential election and the debt limit was raised on November 19 of that year. So, why should Pres. Obama have to deal with it for 2012?
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because the american people care about it today

and the debate is just beginning, there is no long term deal that can get thru the house caucus

the president's preference to push this past 2012 is now, thanks mostly to his political incompetence, impossible

barack the slasher obama has raced in reverse some six to eight trillion dollars, disparaging stimulus, embracing austerity, since february

where's he gonna be in september

leadership, anyone?
 
Objective Voice said:
He shouldn't have been part of negotiations in the first place. This was Congress' responsibility to resolve, not the President. But Boehner all but insisted that he get involved. Wanna blame anybody for the screw-up in negotiations, blame the party leadership who walked out on negotiations - TWICE!

Process, ladies and gentlemen. Understand it...
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nObama won't accept any deals unless they give him enough money to keep on spending, is either his way or the highway and this ridiculous conference that he had last night was another step TRYING to under mind the American people, he believes that the American people is stupid and they will believe anything he says. FAILED.
 
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