taxedout

Borrowing fiat money from china, one of the largest recipients of IMF loans(fiat money, mostly from the FED), and currently on the brink of a banking collapse due to their obscene fractional reserve banking practices that make ours look like school boy antics. HMMMM ? very interesting.

The FED creates plenty of fiat money other than tha from lending to the US gov.

US citizens making Interest payments on goverment debt, for loans which have no asset backing ?
How novel.

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Originally Posted by Iriemon
That is the Fed, not the Govt, and it has done a reasonable job controlling the money supply, in my opinion. The deficits have been largely financed by borrowing from China and our SS trust fund, not by expanding the money supply.

It is not just one nation's money supply that affects one currency's exchange rate compared with another's -- balance of payments and trade and even debt all have play.

I agree you can criticize Fed policy. However we have not had runaway inflation in this country since the early 80s, which I view as a fundamental success.

Money printed faster than it is taken out of circulation would expand the money supply. When you say money borrowed, I'm not sure what you mean. Borrowed by the Govt? Borrowed by the Fed?

The fact that the Govt borrows a huge amount of money does not mean the Fed is printing more money. The Govt does not pay its debt obligation directly by money printed by the Fed. You could argue that when the Fed lends money to the Govt (which is one mechanism utilized to control the money supply) it is indirectly doing the same thing. But that is not the primary purpose of the Fed -- the Fed has not expanded the money supply 8.5 trillion because of the Govt debt. The Govt pays the debt (either principal or interest) with either tax revenues, or borrowing more money (the perferred course of the Republicans).

I know few of the pass the buck generation that would accept blame or responsibility; it is not in our character to do so. It's always the other guy's fault. Nonetheless, it is our generation which has repeatedly voted for politicians that have pandered to them with promises of painless tax cuts which have resulted in a growth of almost 8 trillion in debt since 1981. Republicans have won repeatedly during the past 25 years with just that strategy.

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Goobieman

Why not?
All it takes is people who really care about fairness, the middle class and fiscal responsibility, right?

The Democrats said that was them -- now that they cntrol congress, why can't they cut spending to make up for the revenue lost in a repeal of the AMT?

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ARealConservative

Again, this is fiat currency. You can't differentiate between money borrowed and money printed. It's all just electronic credits. Yes, we borrow more then we print, but so what. Printing money is a tool in paying down debt.


Obviously they haven't printed 8.5 trillion new dollars. In that case we would be out of debt and the democratic supporters would actually be paying for their programs through inflation, not through progessive taxation. Can't have that!


Let's break this down and show me where by blame is any greater then yours:

I vote for politicians that promise to reduce spending and reduce taxes. Because my elected representatives aren't dictators, they don't get everything they want. They haven't been able to reduce spending at all and the best they have down with taxes is slow the rate of increases.

How about you? I would assume you vote for politicans that support these great social programs and support raising taxes to pay for them. Apparently they are giving you the programs, but are unable to give you the progressive tax increases to pay for the program. So what do you do? You continue to send the politicans that are willing to increase spending even when they can't increase taxes to pay for it..

How convenient that I'm to blame and you share no role in it. Not once have I passed this blame on to you, but guess what, you share more of the burden. It's your desire to spend that put us in this hole. If my wife charges to much on the credit card, she doesn't come back and blame me for the amount of money I make. She knew how much money I made when she made those charges.

Frigging pass the buckers. Quit spending money you don't have. You're killing your children and your children's children.

Iriemon

How so?

Exactly.

I didn't mean to directly implicate you. If however you supported Bush in 2000 based upon a promise to slash taxes, you fit right in the pass the buck generation classification. The Republicans did *not* run on a platform of slashing spending in 2000 or 2004, but on a repeat of the voodoo econimics that by cutting taxes the economy would take off and grow so much faster that the econimic growth when compensate for the lost revenues. That same promise was made and sold during the Reagan administration, where it didn't work, and repeated in 2000, despite the fact that the previous administration had almost miraculously created a surplus budget.

Rather than support policies that got us out of the red, Bush and the Republicans talked about how the surplus was *our* money (despite the fact the Govt was almost $6 trillion in debt at the time) and promised pain free tax cuts. The pass the buck generation eagerly gobbled it up. Who wants to pay higher taxes when you can borrow it and stick it to the next generation?

My main criteria is attention to the budget, however it is done. The Republicans have borrowed as fast as they can, they don't even bother giving lip service to fiscal responsibility these days. One of the Dems planks was pay-go, a huge step in the right direction. I hope they have the guts to prevail on that, thought the Repandericans will fight them hard.

It is the fault, and shame, of our generation.

I wouldn't use killing as accurate, but I agree certianly agree with the sentiment.

Kandahar

You say "all it takes" as if people who care about those things were easy to find in Congress. Given the fact that the budget has increased almost every year since WWII, and given the fact that demographics and current entitlements mean it will continue to increase even WITHOUT new spending programs, and given the fact that spending continued to increase even when the GOP controlled all three branches of government, it seems highly unrealistic that we will cut spending any time in the near future.

Because then the question arises, "What do we cut?" The American people claim to want a balanced budget, but spending cuts are even more horrendously unpopular than tax hikes.

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Goobieman

None of this -- and that's NONE of this --has to happen. All it takes is people who are willing to make the tought decisions on what gets cut.

The dems are the self-proclaimed party of fiscal rsponsibility -- will they do what they promised to do?

Oh I see...
Think this had something to do with why spending wasnt cut 2001-2007?

taxedout

Are they in office to do what is right or what is popular?

ARealConservative is correct. The gov could spend as much as it wanted to, without taxation, and we would pay through inflation. Progressive taxation however, creates a much better system for political manipulation of the masses.

Now they have it both ways. They spend at will. We pay through both
a manipulative progressive tax system and inflation.
A lose/lose proposition.

....And there is never an end to the spending. Why should they stop ?
The spend, we fight each other to get in line and pay for it.

Iriemon

Absolutely. Cutting taxes is easy. Everyone likes cutting taxes. Raising spending is easy. Everyone likes new spending programs.

What takes political courage is raising taxes or cutting spending. And courage is something we have certainly not seen from the Govt in the past 6 years.

Iriemon

We, the pass the buck generation, have generally chose candidates who promised to do what is popular rather than who what is right. Which is why the Govt has almost $9 trillion in dead and the SS trust fund is empty.

I agree, as long as we the people tell our leaders we'd rather have spending and tax cuts rather than balanced budgets, that is what we get. Though to be fair to our generation, we have been mislead by leaders who have said things like tax cuts make the economy grow faster and won't cause deficits, which have mislead some that might not have supported the cadidates had they been honest.