• This is a political forum that is non-biased/non-partisan and treats every person's position on topics equally. This debate forum is not aligned to any political party. In today's politics, many ideas are split between and even within all the political parties. Often we find ourselves agreeing on one platform but some topics break our mold. We are here to discuss them in a civil political debate. If this is your first visit to our political forums, be sure to check out the RULES. Registering for debate politics is necessary before posting. Register today to participate - it's free!

What's the best way to reduce the deficit?

What is (are) the best way(s) to eliminate the deficit?

  • A balanced budget amendment

    Votes: 20 24.7%
  • A line item veto amenndment

    Votes: 14 17.3%
  • replace income tx with a national retail sales tax

    Votes: 9 11.1%
  • Raise taxes on the rich

    Votes: 30 37.0%
  • Raise taxes on the middle-class

    Votes: 5 6.2%
  • Raise taxes stealthily in the form of fees, a federal lottery, etc.

    Votes: 3 3.7%
  • Nationalize oil and natural gas on federal land and get into the enegry business like Saudi Arabia

    Votes: 10 12.3%
  • Cut federal spending

    Votes: 56 69.1%
  • Sell services to prizate industry at a profit, privatize then tax them

    Votes: 3 3.7%
  • other

    Votes: 23 28.4%

  • Total voters
    81
Mostly in China where they are slowly throwing off their socialist ways instead of in America where socialistic ideas and government control have been on a steady rise.
:doh
Your kidding me right?
So you wanna become more like China? Sweat Shops? Little to no labor laws?

They are more and more embracing capatilist methods, improving their educations systems and should throw off the last vestiges of communism/socialism in the mid term future,
They are a state capitalist society.
"In this system, governments use various kinds of state-owned companies to manage the exploitation of resources that they consider the state's crown jewels and to create and maintain large numbers of jobs. They use select privately owned companies to dominate certain economic sectors. They use so-called sovereign wealth funds to invest their extra cash in ways that maximize the state's profits. In all three cases, the state is using markets to create wealth that can be directed as political officials see fit. And in all three cases, the ultimate motive is not economic (maximizing growth) but political (maximizing the state's power and the leadership's chances of survival). This is a form of capitalism but one in which the state acts as the dominant economic player and uses markets primarily for political gain"
We're All State Capitalists Now - By Niall Ferguson | Foreign Policy

You were talking about education systems? Are you kidding me? China's education is terrible. They are ranked 97th on the educational index rankings whereas the US is ranked 21st.

where as America has embraced greater and greater socialis, electing it's first Socialist president in 2008,
Yea and what socailist things are those? Oh yea Obamacare. To bad its private ran healthcare. A corporatist policy.

placing to many restrictions on business and expansion of new markets and ideas , has abandoned advancement to try to maintain a status quo and will probably become a 3rd world ****hole about the sametime as China dumbs the last communist/socialist out of their government. That is unless we also start dumbing socialism and socialist idiocy or have a second Civil war and eradicate the socialist/communist/liberal bastards and bitches before then.
socialist/communist/liberal bastards tahts quite the combination of ideologies. :lamo
 
:doh
Your kidding me right?
So you wanna become more like China? Sweat Shops? Little to no labor laws?


They are a state capitalist society.
"In this system, governments use various kinds of state-owned companies to manage the exploitation of resources that they consider the state's crown jewels and to create and maintain large numbers of jobs. They use select privately owned companies to dominate certain economic sectors. They use so-called sovereign wealth funds to invest their extra cash in ways that maximize the state's profits. In all three cases, the state is using markets to create wealth that can be directed as political officials see fit. And in all three cases, the ultimate motive is not economic (maximizing growth) but political (maximizing the state's power and the leadership's chances of survival). This is a form of capitalism but one in which the state acts as the dominant economic player and uses markets primarily for political gain"
We're All State Capitalists Now - By Niall Ferguson | Foreign Policy

You were talking about education systems? Are you kidding me? China's education is terrible. They are ranked 97th on the educational index rankings whereas the US is ranked 21st.


Yea and what socailist things are those? Oh yea Obamacare. To bad its private ran healthcare. A corporatist policy.


socialist/communist/liberal bastards tahts quite the combination of ideologies. :lamo

Blah, blah, blah. Typical left wing bs.

No, we do not have to reduce to sweat shop levels in most cases, that level should be reserved for idiots that choose not to discipline and educate themselves to the level of skilled labor. While China is currently at the sweatshop level, it will not remain so, just like labor did in America, it will slowly rise upwards.

You are also full of **** if you think China, outside of the Capitalist zones is a anything other than a socialist state. Oh, wait, thats right, your the "socialist" that apparently has never actually read or understood Marx. Forget the rest of your diatribe, it is apparently of a waste of time to keep trying to get you to actually know and understand true socialism and Marx.
 
"Reducing growth"?

yup

Where is the growth now?

Well, in the US, in Fracking. But you can have negative growth, which is looking more and more like a possibility in the near future.

Where has been the US job growth for the bast 20 years here?

Well, up until our massive keynesian experiment in increasing the productivity of resources by allocating them according to political incentives rather than economic ones, and encouraging employment by punishing employers, doing pretty well.
 
Blah, blah, blah. Typical left wing bs.
So your telling me that China is a pure capitalistic nation (we have never even been a pure capitalistic nation)? Your telling me that China has no sweat shops? China environment is awesome!?
Its not "left wing BS" when its true..


No, we do not have to reduce to sweat shop levels in most cases, that level should be reserved for idiots that choose not to discipline and educate themselves to the level of skilled labor. While China is currently at the sweatshop level, it will not remain so, just like labor did in America, it will slowly rise upwards.
Sure it will... Been there for a very long time. A **** ton of 3rd world countries have been that way for a while. **** we still have some sweat shops in this country.

You are also full of **** if you think China, outside of the Capitalist zones is a anything other than a socialist state. Oh, wait, thats right, your the "socialist" that apparently has never actually read or understood Marx. Forget the rest of your diatribe, it is apparently of a waste of time to keep trying to get you to actually know and understand true socialism and Marx.
:doh
Claiming that China is socialist is hysterical.
 
You mean the paul ryan whose plan has been totally rejected twice by the american people and congress.

actually it's been rejected by half of congress, and the American people haven't gone to the polls yet over it.
 
Claiming that China is socialist is hysterical.

China actually does adhere socialist principles when it comes to things such as economic planning. They also cannot neccesarily qualify as being capitalist as the government pretty much runs the general economy. China strong arms any company who wishes to do business in China. Which has lead to numerous copyright infrigments and theft of U.S. technology. They also have a nasty reputation of currency manipulation, which has hurt U.S. business abroad. China may not be pro labor, but the government is still the one calling the majority of the shots.

As for "third world sweatshop" status, obviously certain countries inheritantly have less resources than others. But also when you look at a lot of third world countries, they all have inheritant problems that have zero to do with labor strength. Much of Africa has spent a majority of its time killing each other for resources and power and certain countries in the middle east are too preoccupied stoning women to make any improvements in living conditions. "Sweatshop" countries in SE Asia have actually seen double digit economic growth for many years. See "Four Asian Tigers."

And yes, China's environment sucks. But 1.2 Billion people are not going to suddenly supply all their energy demands with a couple windmills and solar panals. This is what drives me crazy about the left, they sit here and whine and complain about energy policy yet have no real, feasible solution. We do not have the land, money, or technology to supply the world strictly on "green" energy sources. To me, the solution for climate change is improvements in efficency standards, expansion of nuclear power (the only alternative energy source with superior economic fundamentals to coal), emissions and waste taxes (nonstarter with Republicans, but they need to get over it; the costs of polution need to be bourne by the poluter), temporary replacement of oil with natural gas (until we have the technology to be purely electric), and funding of research for fusion power plants.
 
A year or two ago, a large number of think-tanks (left, right, and center) participated in a grant from a certain foundation that presented their means of reducing the deficit. Look it up, parse it, come up with your own conclusions.
 
Stop FUCKING SPENDING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
A year or two ago, a large number of think-tanks (left, right, and center) participated in a grant from a certain foundation that presented their means of reducing the deficit. Look it up, parse it, come up with your own conclusions.

So, at some point in time, some people, funded by some other people, thought about how to reduce the deficit.

That's helpful.
 
So your telling me that China is a pure capitalistic nation (we have never even been a pure capitalistic nation)? Your telling me that China has no sweat shops? China environment is awesome!?
Its not "left wing BS" when its true..

I am not for sure exactly how you came to these conclusions from what I said in previous posts. But then again, you posted only a single data point, current status, to argue against them "improving their educations system".



Sure it will... Been there for a very long time. A **** ton of 3rd world countries have been that way for a while. **** we still have some sweat shops in this country.

Obviously you either don't know a lot about it or choose to ignore certain factors involved. I won't repeat what someone else has already said, but will add that a large number of the third world countries, even those that are not socialist, have closed and protected market systems. They tax heavily on imports to protect domestic markets, even markets that do not and will not exist in their countries. They also restrict ownership of business to at least majority owned by citizens of their countries. They have very limited and usually very poor education systems which limits and will not allow development needed.

In China, people spend their life savings just to travel in hope of getting a job in "sweat shops" because the meager pay from them is a vast improvement in their lives over what is provided to them by the Socialist state. China has many factors depressing their economic development, however I do think that conditions there are changing and there is a real chance and possiblity of improvement unlike many other 3rd world nations that show no movement towards improvements.


:doh
Claiming that China is socialist is hysterical.

Once again, Socialism derives from Marxist Theory. The theories of Socialism from Marx was/is a transitional state where the economy and society is moved from Capitalism to Communism. Government control/ownership is a halmark of this transition because it takes a government to enforce the change. All Communist are Socialist. What many now call Socilist and the primary difference between many proclaimed Socialist and Communist is that these Socialist beleive in the accomplishing the goals and theories laid down by Marx but do not transition into Communism. Because Socialism is a transitional state, any government or society that has entered and implemented changes directed towards acheiving Communism or Socialism as an end goal are Socialist. China clearly and definitively is very much Socialist.

There are those who wish to alter some of Marx's theories or limit the goals, however; these sudo or proto-socialist still derive from Marx. If your theories do not originate with Marx's definition of Socialism, then you are not a Socialist. Liberals, as they currently exist in the US, preach that they are not socialist, however, the end result of their socio-economic theories of Regulated Capitalism still end the same place that non-communist Socialist work towards, societal control of the economy and redistribution of wealth and resources equally without consideration for contributions to society. Because their end goals are the same, they are, by any reasonable definition, Socialist, even if their method to accomplish it differs, they are still trying to acheiving goals derived from Marxist theory.
 
China actually does adhere socialist principles when it comes to things such as economic planning.
Every nation uses some socialist principles. Even the most capitalistic countries like ours.

They also cannot neccesarily qualify as being capitalist as the government pretty much runs the general economy.
Hence state capitalism.

China strong arms any company who wishes to do business in China. Which has lead to numerous copyright infrigments and theft of U.S. technology. They also have a nasty reputation of currency manipulation, which has hurt U.S. business abroad. China may not be pro labor, but the government is still the one calling the majority of the shots.
Hence state capitalism.


As for "third world sweatshop" status, obviously certain countries inheritantly have less resources than others. But also when you look at a lot of third world countries, they all have inheritant problems that have zero to do with labor strength. Much of Africa has spent a majority of its time killing each other for resources and power and certain countries in the middle east are too preoccupied stoning women to make any improvements in living conditions. "Sweatshop" countries in SE Asia have actually seen double digit economic growth for many years. See "Four Asian Tigers."
Yea growth for who?


And yes, China's environment sucks. But 1.2 Billion people are not going to suddenly supply all their energy demands with a couple windmills and solar panals. This is what drives me crazy about the left, they sit here and whine and complain about energy policy yet have no real, feasible solution. We do not have the land, money, or technology to supply the world strictly on "green" energy sources. To me, the solution for climate change is improvements in efficency standards, expansion of nuclear power (the only alternative energy source with superior economic fundamentals to coal), emissions and waste taxes (nonstarter with Republicans, but they need to get over it; the costs of polution need to be bourne by the poluter), temporary replacement of oil with natural gas (until we have the technology to be purely electric), and funding of research for fusion power plants.

No one is calling for a "couple". Calling for a lot.
 
Great for him, sounds like he has at least some policies I can support.


We already out spend Iran by $68006100000.....Sounds like a bunch of wasteful spending to me...
 
We already out spend Iran by $68006100000.....Sounds like a bunch of wasteful spending to me...

Not really, the military needs some serious upgrades to it's systems. Even if the technology is the best and viable the systems are just too damned old. Our primary Bomber fleet is still B-52s, next year, they will start turning 60. And the military is something that benefits all citizens, not just a few like welfare and other "social" programs. The military is also a necessity and a natural function of government will wasting money on lazy idiots that contribute nothing but use up large amounts of available resourses and not available or used by all citizens is not only not a natural government, it is a useless and illogical waste of resources.
 
Not really, the military needs some serious upgrades to it's systems. Even if the technology is the best and viable the systems are just too damned old. Our primary Bomber fleet is still B-52s, next year, they will start turning 60. And the military is something that benefits all citizens, not just a few like welfare and other "social" programs. The military is also a necessity and a natural function of government will wasting money on lazy idiots that contribute nothing but use up large amounts of available resourses and not available or used by all citizens is not only not a natural government, it is a useless and illogical waste of resources.

Our military is among the best equipped in the world. We outspend the whole world combined. We do not need to spend more money on the ****ing military. A spending spree for some reason isnt gonna do **** to Iran. We already spend the most in the world, why if we spend more why would Iran all the sudden say "ohh ahhh yep you got us"?
 
So, at some point in time, some people, funded by some other people, thought about how to reduce the deficit.

That's helpful.

I know, Google's a pain in the ass isn't it? Google chrome let's you look stuff up in the URL bar. Firefox has that neat little google bubble next to their URL bar that allows searches. Look, you can type in "think tanks reduce deficit foundation" and then look at the commentary from news organizations all around the country.

Crazy? I know!

Maybe I should help you out.

Oh, look at this, the first search result with the above search term.

http://taxvox.taxpolicycenter.org/2011/05/25/six-think-tanks-tackle-the-budget-deficit/

Wow, check this out. In that blog they have a hyperlink (some blue stuff that allows you to connect to some other stuff) to something rad, like the actual document. http://pgpf.org/Issues/Fiscal-Outlook/2011/01/20/~/media/88A2881EBE18412EB569ECFC626DA220

Ooooh, look, just in case you didn't want to actually read the thing, right below Google has a thing linking to a CSPAN video of the summary of the work done.

http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/299693-6

Thank goodness I helped you out on that. It would be difficult to find and I understand that Google is so hard to use.
 
Last edited:
Great for him, sounds like he has at least some policies I can support.

That was addressed to someone that was concerned about US spending.
 
Our military is among the best equipped in the world. We outspend the whole world combined. We do not need to spend more money on the ****ing military. A spending spree for some reason isnt gonna do **** to Iran. We already spend the most in the world, why if we spend more why would Iran all the sudden say "ohh ahhh yep you got us"?

You are right. We should stop spending and actually use what we have bought.
 
Yea growth for who?


No one is calling for a "couple". Calling for a lot.

1. The general Chinese public has seen a large number of benefits from economic growth. Only a few decades ago they were practically a super sized Cuba. The rich always make the majority of the gains, but the middle class has grown rapidly with the overall economy.

2. We do not have the resources or technology to completely rely on green energy. Not to mention their implimentation puts us at a competitive disadvantage with countries who do not. That's why I advocate nuclear power and natural gas. It would be a competitive advantage instead of a disadvantage and we would still see huge environmental benefits over the status quo.
 
No, but we can reduce the monetary cost by increasing efficiency, and cutting waste.

Very true. There will always be a need for the military and I believe we should keep as well equiped as we can. I also believe it is well worth the cost of overseas bases so that if attacked we fight on someone elses territory instead of in our own country.

One of the biggest costs in getting updated and new systems is Congress. A good example of this is the Air Forces new F-22 Fighter, role, Air-Superiority/intercepter. Developement for it was started in the 1980s and due to congressional funding issues and other issues it has taken more than 20 years to actually get it into service and even then, at current acquistion rates, it will never actually fully replace the F-15, which first entered service in 1972, and has cost us Billions more than it should. Congress votes on each major system independent of the Defence Budget. As a result of this process, it was neccessary to get a majority of Representatives and Senators to vote for it everytime funding came up. To win the votes neccessary, the contractors had to create jobs in congressional districts, thus it has no real centralized production, parts of it are spread out pretty much through all 50 States. As you can imagine, this greatly increases the cost for the system as you have far more facilities and management personnel than needed. At a rough guesstimate, the system now cost over twice what it would if congress had simply given the Air Force an annual budget for research, development and acquisition and allowed it and the contractors to centralize development and production.

Another fine example of Congress messing with military contracts, the C-130J. The Air Force did not request a new C-130 model. While it did need some new airframes because some were getting very old, they would of been just as happy, probably happier, with the previous C-130H-3 models. The C-130H models cost approximately $40 million each, the C-130J models $80 million each. Congress forced the purchase and delivery of these new Aircraft, even though the service didn't want them.
 
Back
Top Bottom