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Harry Reid: "We're going over the cliff"

Jack Fabulous

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I swear this is starting to read exactly like the last chapter of "1984".

Reid says fiscal cliff dive likely; blasts Boehner for lacking leadership | The Ticket - Yahoo! News

"Boehner will be to blame “if we go over the cliff, and it looks like that’s where we’re headed,” Reid insisted as the Senate returned to work for a post-Christmas session focused on disaster relief for Sandy victims and renewing key government surveillance powers."


How much does anyone want to bet that a "miraculous last minute deal" will be struck that avoids the cliff yet does absolutely nothing to address the problem? All just another well played episode of "Kick the Can", I'm afraid...
 
Actually. Everybody will be to blame. But only the people will suffer.

Harry Reid just wants to avoid taking on more responsibility. He successfully managed, for 3 years, to not pass ANY budget and effectively, not doing ANYTHING while still receiving a fat paycheck and lobby interest group money, and now he wants people to believe the it's the other guys' fault alone. And guess what, some may even believe him.
 
Sounds like someone gets to go back to Hawaii!
 
Reid a idiot. He honestly thinks that during a Democrat run Presidency the Republicans are going to be to blame ?

Nope.

Obama and Reid are willing to sacrifice the economy of the Country because their priorities are not a healthy economy but to attempt to destroy the Republicans and to redistribute money.

ITs Obamas cliff, why should the Republicans care.

End result Obamas going to associated with 8 years of suffering, chronic unemployment and dependence.

Hes going to be associated with a Country that saw States and the Federal Treasury go bankrupt during his term.
 
I swear this is starting to read exactly like the last chapter of "1984".

Reid says fiscal cliff dive likely; blasts Boehner for lacking leadership | The Ticket - Yahoo! News

"Boehner will be to blame “if we go over the cliff, and it looks like that’s where we’re headed,” Reid insisted as the Senate returned to work for a post-Christmas session focused on disaster relief for Sandy victims and renewing key government surveillance powers."

How much does anyone want to bet that a "miraculous last minute deal" will be struck that avoids the cliff yet does absolutely nothing to address the problem? All just another well played episode of "Kick the Can", I'm afraid...

Both parties are at equal fault. There was a time in politics that the leaders of both houses -- and the minority leaders -- would put six minions in a room and say, "Don't come out of the damned door until you've found a compromise."

Now? It's all about the blame game. Clowns, every last one of them.
 
Reid a idiot. He honestly thinks that during a Democrat run Presidency the Republicans are going to be to blame ?

Nope.

Obama and Reid are willing to sacrifice the economy of the Country because their priorities are not a healthy economy but to attempt to destroy the Republicans and to redistribute money.

ITs Obamas cliff, why should the Republicans care.

End result Obamas going to associated with 8 years of suffering, chronic unemployment and dependence.

Hes going to be associated with a Country that saw States and the Federal Treasury go bankrupt during his term.

Ya why should they care about suffering, chronic unemployment, and dependence as long as its someone else's fault. Now that's a party I can vote for!

Everyone needs to sit down, ****ing get over themselves, and make a deal happen.
 
Both parties are at equal fault. There was a time in politics that the leaders of both houses -- and the minority leaders -- would put six minions in a room and say, "Don't come out of the damned door until you've found a compromise."

Now? It's all about the blame game. Clowns, every last one of them.

I think we should lock them all up in a building, stick the national guard outside, and not let them leave until a deal is done. These people are ****ing children.
 
I'll take a guess that the Democrats will blame the Republicans 100% and the Republicans will blame the Democrats 100% and the non-partisan will just shake their heads in baffled bemusement and wonder how we became such a mentally challenged 3rd world country.
 
I give the dollar about 6 months

images
 
I think we should lock them all up in a building, stick the national guard outside, and not let them leave until a deal is done. These people are ****ing children.

I think we should lock them all up in a building, stick the national guard outside, and not let them leave. Ever.
 
Are you ready for the total economic collapse? Been stockpiling and all that?
It won't be total economic collapse. It will be more like a slow march to serfdom. Deficit spending can't last forever. Our credit will get downgraded at some point which means it will just cost us that much more to service our debt and at that point deep cuts will be the only choice left. This is when everyday people will begin to suffer. And what will we do then? Try to figure out who is to blame? What's the point?

Most people haven't come to grips with this yet. We're being led to our own slaughter and we're arguing about who should be the ones to serve us our last meal.
 
Both parties are at equal fault. There was a time in politics that the leaders of both houses -- and the minority leaders -- would put six minions in a room and say, "Don't come out of the damned door until you've found a compromise."

Now? It's all about the blame game. Clowns, every last one of them.

I agree.

First, the President and Congressional leaders were naive to expect that, after they had so much difficulty finding a means to raise the debt ceiling during the summer, they could then wash their hands of the issue for much of the rest of the year with a solution magically developing weeks before the deadline. Once the debt ceiling was raised, the parties should have immediately engaged in negotiations to have a package in place well before December 31. No other issue commanded such priority. Political expedience and naivete produced exactly the kind of outcome that is currently in place.

Second, the negotiations should have been private with no comments by any side to the Press nor information provided to anyone not involved in the talks. Sensitive negotiations need to remain closed to all non-participants because there are too many opportunities to blow up the talks. Only once an agreement were reached in principle (and ideally initialed by the President, House Speaker, House Minority Leader, Senate Majority Leader, and Senate Minority Leader) should the terms of that deal have been presented to the full House and Senate. At that time, the Congressional leaders should have made a unified effort to produce a successful vote.

Instead, the relatively open process led to posturing (as no individual wants to appear weak) and gimmickry before the House and Senate where each side tried to evade responsibility for the absence of a deal. All of those actions poisoned the atmosphere for productive negotiations.

Far more than any one individual's being responsible, this outcome--and a "punt" on the big issues would be little different--is a collective failure of American leadership. It is yet another illustration of the kind of dysfunction that S&P cited in downgrading the nation's credit rating to AA+. A "punt" to avoid the worst of the fiscal cliff impact could provide another illustration that the nation's leaders are incapable of addressing the nation's biggest challenges. After all, if they couldn't resolve the fiscal cliff with a six-month window of opportunity, why should one have much confidence that another six- or even twelve-month window would produce a much better outcome?
 
It's amusing to see people simultaneously say "we can't go over this cliff" and "we have to get the deficit under control!"

It's spending cuts and revenue increases. Do you want to do this or not?
 
Going over the cliff will not bring ruin to the world. The best option is a real deal that does something effective. Absent that, the cliff is the next best option.
 
It's amusing to see people simultaneously say "we can't go over this cliff" and "we have to get the deficit under control!"

It's spending cuts and revenue increases. Do you want to do this or not?

My view is that there are much better ways to reduce the nation's deficits, stabilize, and then reduce its debt relative to GDP. Having said that, I believe the combination of tax increases and spending reductions produced in the fiscal cliff is preferable to sustaining a business-as-usual course of inaction, even as it would result in a period of recession. I still hope for the former, but believe a minimalist course (neither of the above two options) that falls short of stabilizing the nation's debt relative to GDP is probably the most likely scenario in the weeks ahead.
 
My view is that there are much better ways to reduce the nation's deficits, stabilize, and then reduce its debt relative to GDP. Having said that, I believe the combination of tax increases and spending reductions produced in the fiscal cliff is preferable to sustaining a business-as-usual course of inaction, even as it would result in a period of recession. I still hope for the former, but believe a minimalist course (neither of the above two options) that falls short of stabilizing the nation's debt relative to GDP is probably the most likely scenario in the weeks ahead.

The right-wingers have even been clamoring that lower-income folks aren't paying enough taxes. But suddenly when those taxes are about to go up, the right-wingers throw a fit.
 
The right-wingers have even been clamoring that lower-income folks aren't paying enough taxes. But suddenly when those taxes are about to go up, the right-wingers throw a fit.

IMO, the ratio of intransigent prophets/crusaders-to-policy makers has become too high in Washington. As a result, those with the most extreme positions have gained a de facto veto to block the kind of pragmatic bipartisan agreements that would benefit the nation as a whole. The former elements believe compromise and capitulation are synonyms. The latter recognizes that negotiations are not zero-sum exercises and compromise can lead to win-win, mutually-beneficial outcomes. Although the backgrounds of House and Senate Membership are more diverse than they were 20-30 years ago, the caliber of today's Members pales in comparison to those earlier Congresses, where there had been the prevalent assumption that policy making is about solving problems, not posturing in an almost theological sense.
 
I read an article earlier that said as of January 1st, individuals making over 200k (250k for couples) are going to see a 3.8% tax increase on investment income, in addition to a 0.9% increase in payroll taxes. The former goes into the government's general fund, the latter into the Medicare fund....all a part of the ACA.

In addition to that, Obama's proposal asks for (I think) a 4% increase on the top income tax bracket. Boehner has already conceded, in part, on taxes for the "rich". Where are the spending concessions? Last I heard, the house-passed bill and the senate-passed bill are several hundred billion apart on spending. I didn't realize compromise was a one-way street these days. Nor was I aware that the senate's most pressing issue is apparent disaster relief funding (this, after no budget in how many years? No contribution via proposals for the fiscal cliff? Nothing but finger pointing and ridiculous demands???).

I'm sick of it. People rail about a lack of bipartisanship, but who's putting Reid to task on the left? Everybody, the media included, is approaching this as if Boehner and Obama are the only two people with any responsibility to address this issue. That's bull****. The senate is more than capable of coming to the table with proposals and working with the house and the president to compare/contrast. Instead, they sit around like petulant children. Honestly? I'm not even pissed at Obama. At least he's doing SOMETHING, even if I disagree with his proposal. Nor am I pissed at Boehner. The house republicans and the entire senate, on the other hand? Give me a goddamned break.
 
It is an amazing time. The party that is self-described as the Leadership Party is in complete disarray from internal revolution. The Leadership in the GOP is more worried about their re-election than the fiscal cliff. the Tea Party which couldn't deliver a strong conservative candidate for President, lost seats in both the Senate and House still holds a knife to the cojones of Boehner and McConnell.

Mitch saw his hand picked candidate for the Junior Senate seat in Kentucky lose to Paul Ryan, he has good reason to not go on the record compromising with the democrats over taxes. Boehner got trimmed pretty good when he met President Obama on the threshold for the Tax cut. His GOP house members couldn't give him the votes he needed to pass the 1 million dollar income threshold. That is not even close to the original 250,000 or the compromise 400,000 offered by the President.

It is going to take something very dramatic for the holdouts in the GOP to budge. Seems more like fanatic last ditch fatalism than prudent governance. The GOP hold-outs seem determined to go over the cliff than admit elections do have consequences and a majority think their stance is too far to the right.

I don't think most citizens will have a problem identifying the tea party as a problem, not a solution...
 
Actually. Everybody will be to blame. But only the people will suffer.

Harry Reid just wants to avoid taking on more responsibility. He successfully managed, for 3 years, to not pass ANY budget and effectively, not doing ANYTHING while still receiving a fat paycheck and lobby interest group money, and now he wants people to believe the it's the other guys' fault alone. And guess what, some may even believe him.

Yep. Since federal spending was elevated (20%) from 2007/8 to 2008/9, due to the "one time", crisis, emergency actions (no pay go required) of TARP and stimulus 1 the demorats wanted to keep those borrowed dollars flowing, so only continuing resolutions were acceptable "budget" actions. That way congress and Obama could claim not to "increase" federal spending. Of course the MSM did not notice this charade and touted Obama's and Reid's fiscal wizardry as being "responsible" spending control, because we really had only a revenue problem.
 
I read an article earlier that said as of January 1st, individuals making over 200k (250k for couples) are going to see a 3.8% tax increase on investment income, in addition to a 0.9% increase in payroll taxes. The former goes into the government's general fund, the latter into the Medicare fund....all a part of the ACA.

In addition to that, Obama's proposal asks for (I think) a 4% increase on the top income tax bracket. Boehner has already conceded, in part, on taxes for the "rich". Where are the spending concessions? Last I heard, the house-passed bill and the senate-passed bill are several hundred billion apart on spending. I didn't realize compromise was a one-way street these days. Nor was I aware that the senate's most pressing issue is apparent disaster relief funding (this, after no budget in how many years? No contribution via proposals for the fiscal cliff? Nothing but finger pointing and ridiculous demands???).

I'm sick of it. People rail about a lack of bipartisanship, but who's putting Reid to task on the left? Everybody, the media included, is approaching this as if Boehner and Obama are the only two people with any responsibility to address this issue. That's bull****. The senate is more than capable of coming to the table with proposals and working with the house and the president to compare/contrast. Instead, they sit around like petulant children. Honestly? I'm not even pissed at Obama. At least he's doing SOMETHING, even if I disagree with his proposal. Nor am I pissed at Boehner. The house republicans and the entire senate, on the other hand? Give me a goddamned break.

Democrats have already moved more than halfway from the starting points on spending cuts, I'm not sure where you're getting this idea from.
 
It is an amazing time. The party that is self-described as the Leadership Party is in complete disarray from internal revolution. The Leadership in the GOP is more worried about their re-election than the fiscal cliff. the Tea Party which couldn't deliver a strong conservative candidate for President, lost seats in both the Senate and House still holds a knife to the cojones of Boehner and McConnell.

Mitch saw his hand picked candidate for the Junior Senate seat in Kentucky lose to Paul Ryan, he has good reason to not go on the record compromising with the democrats over taxes. Boehner got trimmed pretty good when he met President Obama on the threshold for the Tax cut. His GOP house members couldn't give him the votes he needed to pass the 1 million dollar income threshold. That is not even close to the original 250,000 or the compromise 400,000 offered by the President.

It is going to take something very dramatic for the holdouts in the GOP to budge. Seems more like fanatic last ditch fatalism than prudent governance. The GOP hold-outs seem determined to go over the cliff than admit elections do have consequences and a majority think their stance is too far to the right.

I don't think most citizens will have a problem identifying the tea party as a problem, not a solution...
Your conclusions are kind of ironic when you consider that over-spending and over-indulgence by our government is what gave rise to the tea party in the first place.
 
Democrats have already moved more than halfway from the starting points on spending cuts, I'm not sure where you're getting this idea from.

What moves have the democrats made, specifically? Not Obama, but the democrats. Because near as I can tell, they haven't submitted a plan of their own to compromise on.
 
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