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FAA to Close 149 Air Traffic Towers Under Cuts......

At least Obama has money for the America hating Muslims that he loves so much. US unblocks $500 million in aid for Palestinians - Your Middle East

He does seem to be throwing Money away overseas these last 2 weeks. Just add that onto the 200 million he is offering Jordan so that they can take care of Syrian Refugees. Throw in 60 Mil to the Syria Rebels. 50 Mil to Mali. 485 mil to Egypt.

Now Kerry is over in Iraq talking to them. So more than likely Team Obama will offer them several million while telling them don't let Iran Use your Airspace. The Iraqis will smile say thank you for the money. Then let Iran still keeping using its Airspace.
 
You seem to have missed the part where they were cutting "bureaucrats."

No, they are cutting the jobs of people who were on the front lines, not those who shuffle papers. That's the way it goes in these games.
 
The government can afford to buy several billion rounds of hollow point ammo, and a load of full auto rifles for DHS (what is the Army for?), but it cannot afford to keep certain towers open or certain social programs for the needy going?

Love them bureaucrats!
 
No, they are cutting the jobs of people who were on the front lines, not those who shuffle papers.
Not quite.

Almost everyone at the FAA is getting furloughed, including management.

They're cutting ATC at these small airports because they're contractors (and easier to let go), because those airports have low volume, and because it means fewer furloughs / layoffs for ATC at the major airports.

The sequestration law also didn't give agency heads all that much latitude; it requires across-the-board cuts for the agencies. For the nth time: The sequestration was never designed to be an intelligent budget cut that targets waste. It was intentionally designed to be a big enough cut that no rational person would want it to go through. And yet, here we are.
 
Not quite.

Almost everyone at the FAA is getting furloughed, including management.

They're cutting ATC at these small airports because they're contractors (and easier to let go), because those airports have low volume, and because it means fewer furloughs / layoffs for ATC at the major airports.

The sequestration law also didn't give agency heads all that much latitude; it requires across-the-board cuts for the agencies. For the nth time: The sequestration was never designed to be an intelligent budget cut that targets waste. It was intentionally designed to be a big enough cut that no rational person would want it to go through. And yet, here we are.

Obama didn't see it coming?
 
Obama didn't see it coming?
Obama helped put the law together, signed it into law, and has been warning about it since mid-2011.

The Republicans knew about it as well, and for most of the time they didn't want it either. However, they expected Romney to win the election, in which case they could modify the budget as they wished. And, let's face it, they've been throwing collective snits about Obama since January 19, 2009. Even before he was in office, Republicans were insisting they were going to kill his agenda and make him a one-term President.

When Obama was re-elected, they were forced to raise a handful of taxes on the wealthy in January. They continued their extended temper tantrum, and decided they'd rather deal with sequestration cuts than pass another tax hike.

In addition, Obama was saying as early as August 2011 that he wasn't going to modify the law and blunt its effect.

So I'd say that while everyone should have seen this far enough in advance to avoid it, no one (from either party) really expected it to happen until a few weeks before it actually hit. Nor is "insufficient notice" the fundamental problem.
 
Obama helped put the law together, signed it into law, and has been warning about it since mid-2011.

The Republicans knew about it as well, and for most of the time they didn't want it either. However, they expected Romney to win the election, in which case they could modify the budget as they wished. And, let's face it, they've been throwing collective snits about Obama since January 19, 2009. Even before he was in office, Republicans were insisting they were going to kill his agenda and make him a one-term President.

When Obama was re-elected, they were forced to raise a handful of taxes on the wealthy in January. They continued their extended temper tantrum, and decided they'd rather deal with sequestration cuts than pass another tax hike.

In addition, Obama was saying as early as August 2011 that he wasn't going to modify the law and blunt its effect.

So I'd say that while everyone should have seen this far enough in advance to avoid it, no one (from either party) really expected it to happen until a few weeks before it actually hit. Nor is "insufficient notice" the fundamental problem.

So Obama saw it coming but decided not to act.
 
So Obama saw it coming but decided not to act.
I'd say that Obama, Boehner and many others saw it coming, and failed to reach a compromise.

Both parties are responsible, but I for one lay much more blame on the Republicans than Obama. They've repeatedly shown their intransigence and refusal to compromise, even after losing an election when Obama was very clear on his intentions to raise taxes (mostly on the wealthy) as well as cut spending.

I'd also say if we were at 90% top marginal tax rates, or 75% or even 60%, I'd agree that tax hikes on the wealthy would not be acceptable. Considering that the effective tax rate for top earners is below 20%, and that a great deal of their income is from capital gains, I'd say that bumping up their rates by a modest amount is not an ethical or practical disaster.
 
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