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U.S. Deficit Decline to 2.8% of GDP Is Unprecedented Turn

Cutting taxes increased revenue as has been proven so please tell me why tax cuts that increase revenue aren't being paid for with that increase in revenue? Please show me the math that proves your claim that tax cuts contributed a major part of the debt generated?

What is a signature Democrat move is convincing good people that keeping more of what you earn is an expense to the govt. and has to be paid for. Keep eating that up, liberals love you

Show me the proof that cutting taxes makes more revenue than not cutting taxes. You can't because it is impossible. Revenue going up after cutting taxes proves nothing.

Here's what happened to Gov. Brownback when he made his "signature" tax cuts....

brownback.png

Tax Cuts Don’t Pay For Themselves « The Dish
 
Show me the proof that cutting taxes makes more revenue than not cutting taxes. You can't because it is impossible. Revenue going up after cutting taxes proves nothing.

Here's what happened to Gov. Brownback when he made his "signature" tax cuts....

brownback.png

Tax Cuts Don’t Pay For Themselves « The Dish

I have given you the numbers for the Reagan and Bush income tax cuts and you ignored them. I couldn't care less what happened in your state nor your opinion on what tax cuts do. You apparently don't want to keep more of what you earn therefore send it back. I know Democrats would love it.

I will never understand people like you who have no problem with the govt wasting your tax dollars and defend them for taking more of your income. That makes no sense to logical people
 
Why should I listen to any politician? Name for me the site that measure saved jobs? Thanks in advance. By the way what was the California unemployment rate with those saved jobs??

You willingly buy what you are told when that person tells you what you want to hear. I buy the data and there is no such site that measure saved jobs.

you can source the Congressional Budget Office as cited here at Factcheck.org...

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released a report in August that said the stimulus bill has "[l]owered the unemployment rate by between 0.7 percentage points and 1.8 percentage points" and "ncreased the number of people employed by between 1.4 million and 3.3 million."

linkypoo...


Now explain how you don't like that data. I'm sure you will.
 
Lower spending that could have happened all along, but NOOOOOOOOO can't have that. Reid wouldn't allow it.

I agree that we should have had lower spending long ago - like when Bush and Reagan were POTUS. If it didn't happen with republican presidents, I can't imagine why anyone would expect it to happen with a Dem.

The truth is that spending only seems to matter to republicans when we have a dem POTUS.
 
total national debt exceeds GDP.


To me, that seems like a random milestone that means nothing.

Can you explain the significance of it?
 
LOl Bushs great recession. How did Bush cause that global recession again?

Global recession? "When America sneezes, the entire world catches a cold"

Bush was asleep at the wheel. It's that simple.
 
...

Dem's had control 89 to 1994.
Reps had control 95 to 2000
Split controll from 01 to 2002
Reps had control from 03 to 2006
Dems had control from 07 to 2010
Split control from 11 to the present
...

What I want to know is during those years that we had a Republican POTUS and republicans controlled both houses of congress, why didn't they pursue serious border control and build a fence? Why didn't they eliminate welfare? Why didn't they fix SS? Why did they spend MORE money instead of less? Why did they grow the size of government? Why did they run huge budget deficits?

I'm just asken.
 
The 1990's

That was all Clinton's doing as evidenced by the fact that same Republican Congress had us back into deficit territory as soon as he got of office. The last fiscally conservative Republican was Eisenhower. The Republican Party is the party that bitches about deficits when Democrats are in power.
 
I might add that we have the Republican fiscal "experiment" running here in Kansas with Brownback and his statehouse cronies. It has been an absolute unmitigated disaster for the state.
 
Obama has been good on the deficit...

I understand you feel that way. Narrowly taking the context you've tried to present the debate in, where it should only be viewed in the context of how it looks now compared to how it looked in 2009, I'd agree. However, I don't personally think that's a good way to judge it and personally I feel he's been mildly poor when it comes to the deficit.

but if we are going to measure a presidency by the end results and not specific policies (as the Republican talk machine often does) then we have to say Obama is in fact doing well.

First, part of your issue is that you simply decide to make giant claims, wave your hand that they should be accepted as the truth, and then arguing against them (such as your "republican talk machine" thing). Not to mention you're basically taking what you think is the Republican argument and presenting it in the most skewed and caricatured way as possible based on your own world view of said stance.

Second, I'm going to measure the presidency based on how I feel it's reasonable to be measured, not how any particular party does...or how you say they do...measure it.

Third, if you're going to stereotype republicans and take their stereotyped argument, then you should also take their stereotyped starting point which is NOT 2009. What you're doing is trying to take their argument, apply your subjective criteria, and then dishonestly attempt to present your criteria with their argument as their argument and demand that they accept it as well.

For me personally, still being above the floor of the fiscal crisis level deficits 6 years into his administration, including multiple years over $1 trillion, combined with an estimated increase to next years deficit of nearly $100 billion and a seeming intent to maintain an over $400 Billion deficit number going forward, is not an indicative of a "good" stance on the deficit to me. Is it better than the horrendous situation at the very start of his presidency? Yes. Is the past few years better than his first few years? Yes. However an average deficit over his tenure just under $1 trillion dollars and WELL off the average during the Bush and Clinton administrations is not a "good" sign for me.

I understand that my subjective context as to what I'm judging him and his presidency against is different than yours, and that's fine. The difference is I will clearly and unapologetically note that my stance is simply my opinion, the facts I use are based on subjective choices of what I find important, and that I can understand someone having a differing opinion regarding his record than mine.

My assertion about the President alone getting credit is based on the overall idea that the president is where the buck stops.

And that's fine as your opinion, it's not fact nor the singular way to look at things.
 
What I want to know is during those years that we had a Republican POTUS and republicans controlled both houses of congress, why didn't they pursue serious border control and build a fence? Why didn't they eliminate welfare? Why didn't they fix SS? Why did they spend MORE money instead of less? Why did they grow the size of government? Why did they run huge budget deficits?

I'm just asken.

It's a great question. Similar to why didn't we get universal health care, significant firearm regulation and banning of certain types of firearms, significant increases on the income and capital gains taxes for the rich, a pathway to citizenship, greater pre-elementary care, a closure of gitmo, extraction from middle eastern military affairs, etc when we have had a full democratic controlled congress and president.

Simple answer really, that gets complicated as you delve deeper into it.

1. It's not as simple as having a majority in both parts of government
2. There's conflicting views on various issues even within each party themselves
3. Politicians are politicians first, party members second, and many realize there are issues that may not be popular even though their party generally likes them
4. There's no accounting for the unfortunate realities that the world may toss at you at any given point that may supersede ideology

The unfortunate reality that unhappy members of both parties have had to realize at the start of this century is that even with a majority control its very very unlikely you're going to get everything you want.
 
I might add that we have the Republican fiscal "experiment" running here in Kansas with Brownback and his statehouse cronies. It has been an absolute unmitigated disaster for the state.

I keep seeing people reference this. Am I crazy or something or is that just the only state with a republican governor and republican legislature?

Does Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississipi, Nebraska, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Wisconsin, and Wyoming just not count? Because all of them are completely Republican controlled as well. Can I cherry pick one of them and present that as the titular example of a republican run state at the exclusion of all others?
 
I keep seeing people reference this. Am I crazy or something or is that just the only state with a republican governor and republican legislature?

Does Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississipi, Nebraska, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Wisconsin, and Wyoming just not count? Because all of them are completely Republican controlled as well. Can I cherry pick one of them and present that as the titular example of a republican run state at the exclusion of all others?

The reason Kansas is front and center is that they've been far far more successful in actually implementing the tax policies that the GOP says they want. I mean MASSIVE tax cuts and the like. Kansas politicians have made their state the great GOP red state "live experiment" as Governor Brownback put it.

After his election, Brownback, who was a U.S. senator for 14 years and a 2008 presidential candidate, quickly moved to consolidate conservative power in the state by successfully challenging more moderate Republicans. Advised by Arthur Laffer, the father of supply-side economics, and supported by special interest groups backed by conservative billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, he pushed through legislation that cut taxes and spending, eliminated state jobs and denied far more applications for welfare assistance — not to mention that he tightened abortion regulations and loosened gun rules.

Brownback promised that the efforts would drive economic growth, create jobs and stabilize the Kansas budget. But the state is now reporting a more than $300 million revenue shortfall. The poverty rate increased. The state’s economy expanded a total of 2.3 percent in inflation-adjusted terms over the past two years, half the rate of its four neighbors. And Kansas’s credit rating has been downgraded.

link...

Can't condemn all Republicans for this because after he called it a live experiment in republican conservative policies many Republicans got pissed. Mostly because the experiment is failing miserably.

Here's Brownback's position on it:

Brownback didn’t just keep his promise, he embarked on a radical “real live experiment” in conservative governance. As he later explained to the Wall Street Journal, “My focus is to create a red-state model that allows the Republican ticket to say, ‘See, we’ve got a different way, and it works.’ ”​

Brownback stepped out and tried to take a lead position by bragging on what conservative governance is and should look like so it's mostly a case of a guy building a giant pedestal to put himself on and watching it collapse in upon itself.
 
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To me, that seems like a random milestone that means nothing.

Can you explain the significance of it?

It isn't of consequence. Whether or not it is significant 10-15 years from now depends on what the interest rates will be then when these shorter term bonds become due, along with the longer term bonds at a time when Japan that is in far worse shape needs to pay its pensioners. China is the only nation that really seems to maintain a good balance of debt to GDP.

That it is not of consequence today however does reflect that additional government spending is not creating velocity in GDP growth. There is no economic magnification happening. The lack of multiplying effect in additional government spending means we are either spending it on the wrong things or we are in a real dollar recession that is being masked. I am not sure which I think the case is. This is not a democrat-republican thing. Clinton and Bush policies are horrible for us today even if they were good for people then. The federal reserve has done an amazing job avoiding the Greater Depression. Obama probably put money into the wrong things with no short-term payoffs and the GOP probably has blocked things that could have worked better for us economically, but neither side has the cleanest or the dirtiest hands. The business environment has been tilted over decades in favor of Wall Street/Asia over Main Street/North America.
 
I keep seeing people reference this. Am I crazy or something or is that just the only state with a republican governor and republican legislature?

Does Alabama, Arkansas, Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Indiana, Iowa, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississipi, Nebraska, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Wisconsin, and Wyoming just not count? Because all of them are completely Republican controlled as well. Can I cherry pick one of them and present that as the titular example of a republican run state at the exclusion of all others?

I think that is a perfectly reasonable point you are making. I brought it up because I live here. I would point out that Arkansas has a Democratic Gov. (most popular in the nation). I would also point out that Kansas is where almost all the moderates were purged from the state government, and the conservatives in the state took full control. They implemented the fiscal ideas conservative Republicans have been campaigning on for a generation, and it has indeed been a disaster. This in a state that for decades was a very well run, pragmatic state.
 
U.S. Deficit Decline to 2.8% of GDP Is Unprecedented Turn - Bloomberg



OMG, we need to stop Obama from spending us into ruin!!

Oh, wait.... the deficit is SHRINKING? Whodathunkit! I guess he's NOT the spender in chief as he's been labeled by the consistent and reliable deficit increasing Republicans.[/FONT][/COLOR]

It would be nice if everyone understood the Constitutional separation of duties. The President is supposed to faithfully execute the will of Congress. Congress is responsible for the budget. All revenues bill must start in the House.
 
It would be nice if everyone understood the Constitutional separation of duties. The President is supposed to faithfully execute the will of Congress. Congress is responsible for the budget. All revenues bill must start in the House.

So is the executive branch. The Executive Branch puts forth the budget. The congress then votes on it or modifies it and then votes on it. The budget generally originates in the executive branch with the executive branch putting in a budget request to congress.
 
Republicans in the old confederacy have little in common with those in the Great Plains like one of my favorites Sen. Coburn.

Unfortunately, with idiots like Reid in charge, I don't expect DEMs to see the Populist wave any better than GOPs.

I expect Obama to cooperate with Boehner/McConnell as well as they've cooperated with him .

The reason Kansas is front and center is that they've been far far more successful in actually implementing the tax policies that the GOP says they want. I mean MASSIVE tax cuts and the like. Kansas politicians have made their state the great GOP red state "live experiment" as Governor Brownback put it.

After his election, Brownback, who was a U.S. senator for 14 years and a 2008 presidential candidate, quickly moved to consolidate conservative power in the state by successfully challenging more moderate Republicans. Advised by Arthur Laffer, the father of supply-side economics, and supported by special interest groups backed by conservative billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, he pushed through legislation that cut taxes and spending, eliminated state jobs and denied far more applications for welfare assistance — not to mention that he tightened abortion regulations and loosened gun rules.

Brownback promised that the efforts would drive economic growth, create jobs and stabilize the Kansas budget. But the state is now reporting a more than $300 million revenue shortfall. The poverty rate increased. The state’s economy expanded a total of 2.3 percent in inflation-adjusted terms over the past two years, half the rate of its four neighbors. And Kansas’s credit rating has been downgraded.

link...

Can't condemn all Republicans for this because after he called it a live experiment in republican conservative policies many Republicans got pissed. Mostly because the experiment is failing miserably.

Here's Brownback's position on it:

Brownback didn’t just keep his promise, he embarked on a radical “real live experiment” in conservative governance. As he later explained to the Wall Street Journal, “My focus is to create a red-state model that allows the Republican ticket to say, ‘See, we’ve got a different way, and it works.’ ”​

Brownback stepped out and tried to take a lead position by bragging on what conservative governance is and should look like so it's mostly a case of a guy building a giant pedestal to put himself on and watching it collapse in upon itself.
 
Clearly you lack an understanding of the subtlety of satire....
...or your post didn't come across as particularly satirical. You're basically blasting the concept of bringing facts into a political discussion. What should we use instead, by the way? Rock-Paper-Scissors-Lizard-Spock? <--- sarcasm


All the rest of your post is blabbering on and on attempting to explain away, give context to, or provide alternative reasonings for the facts I presented...
Actually, what I'm telling you to do is acknowledge MORE facts and more data, in order to unearth the underlying causality. Yes, truly I'm an idiot for trying to gather enough information to draw conclusions, and properly ascribe credit and/or blame for the resulting economic circumstances. <--- sarcasm


Multiple people in this thread continue to make or imply conclussions and scream loudly that they are being backed up by FACTS. When people question them about the context and actual reasoning behind those facts, as you're doing here to my post, these individuals have generally launched back with a "these are facts, deal with it" style attitude dismissing any further discussion as to the "what" or "why" behind said facts.
Yeah, that's probably because various individuals flatly refuse to acknowledge incredibly obvious facts, because of pre-existing partisan views. E.g. the refusal to recognize that the policies of one administration can have effects on a subsequent administration is self-serving and insufficient.

I don't see any problems in calling people on that type of bias, or in actually trying to gather more information in order to draw a better conclusion.


Your questioning of my facts does a wonderful job of illustrating the issue with just screaming "Facts facts facts" over again....
If you say so. Unless you missed how I didn't dispute your facts, I pointed out how they were deceptively selective -- an error we can address by introducing the proper context. Nor do I recall actually ruling out any facts -- rather, I explicitly talked about expanding an overly simplified analysis.

Do you have an alternate recommendation, by the way? Should we just stop citing any facts? Should we talk about our feelings about debt-to-GDP ratios? Give up discussing it altogether?


You have no issue with the people who initiated the providing of overly simplified and selective analysis labeled as "facts" because it meshes with your hyper partisan world view....
No, I do have issues with people are too selective with information, and exclude critical information -- regardless of "which side" it favors. I guess you missed the line where I said: "it doesn't really make sense to give any single party all the credit or all the blame. It doesn't work like that." Wow. Raging partisanship on my part. <--- sarcasm


....you suddenly do have an issue when I'm presenting it not as a serious argument but as an example highlighting the issue with their premise. Yeah, that is "nice".
Actually, I thought you were just being a garden-variety hypocrite. I don't have a problem with anyone who is willing and able to apply a more sophisticated analysis.
 
you can source the Congressional Budget Office as cited here at Factcheck.org...

The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office released a report in August that said the stimulus bill has "[l]owered the unemployment rate by between 0.7 percentage points and 1.8 percentage points" and "ncreased the number of people employed by between 1.4 million and 3.3 million."

linkypoo...


Now explain how you don't like that data. I'm sure you will.


Do you even realize what the CBO reports and how they get their information. I am waiting for you to give me the valid source that measures "saved" jobs? What Obama did was create a stimulus plan that allowed the states the freedom not to make tough choices. Obama bailed out union contracts and liberals trumpet jobs savings because that is what the liberal elites told you. Reality tells you there is no such measurement and CBO is an instrument of Congress and makes projections based upon Congressional assumptions. You really need a more credible source like BLS
 
So is the executive branch. The Executive Branch puts forth the budget. The congress then votes on it or modifies it and then votes on it. The budget generally originates in the executive branch with the executive branch putting in a budget request to congress.

Is there any constitutional requirement (like absolute requirement) that we have a budget? And is this budget supposed to be binding?

In my business, and in a non-profit that I used to help manage, we always prepared a budget, but never thought of it as binding. To me a budget is just a guideline and projection of future needs. Even if I prepare a personal budget, if something unexpected comes up that I have to pay for, like a medical bill or auto repair bill, well I just have to pay for it, regardless of whether or not I budgeted for it.

Likewise, I really don't like the idea that if I budget $X for a project, and it turns out that the project can be done under budget, that I then expand the project just to use up the rest of the budgeted funds. Just because $X is budgeted doesn't mean that I should use all the money if it's not needed, nor does it mean that I should abandon a partially completed project just because I maxed out the budget.
 
Do you even realize what the CBO reports and how they get their information. I am waiting for you to give me the valid source that measures "saved" jobs? What Obama did was create a stimulus plan that allowed the states the freedom not to make tough choices. Obama bailed out union contracts and liberals trumpet jobs savings because that is what the liberal elites told you. Reality tells you there is no such measurement and CBO is an instrument of Congress and makes projections based upon Congressional assumptions. You really need a more credible source like BLS

I knew you'd discount the nonpartisan CBO report. You are an EXTREME partisan and no data that you don't like will suit you no matter the source. :lamo

see-no-evil-300x225.jpg
 
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Is there any constitutional requirement (like absolute requirement) that we have a budget? And is this budget supposed to be binding?

In my business, and in a non-profit that I used to help manage, we always prepared a budget, but never thought of it as binding. To me a budget is just a guideline and projection of future needs. Even if I prepare a personal budget, if something unexpected comes up that I have to pay for, like a medical bill or auto repair bill, well I just have to pay for it, regardless of whether or not I budgeted for it.

Likewise, I really don't like the idea that if I budget $X for a project, and it turns out that the project can be done under budget, that I then expand the project just to use up the rest of the budgeted funds. Just because $X is budgeted doesn't mean that I should use all the money if it's not needed, nor does it mean that I should abandon a partially completed project just because I maxed out the budget.

The binding constitutional thing about the budget is that the congress controls the purse strings. The president puts forth the budget saying, "this is how much money I need to run this government." It becomes constitutionally binding when the congress then votes and puts forth the money for the budget. That vote constitutionally puts the money in there.
 
I knew you'd discount the nonpartisan CBO report. You are an EXTREME partisan and no data that you don't like will suit you no matter the source. :lamo

View attachment 67175456

Yes, the CBO data is so correct that Obama has lost 13 percent of his support yet partisans like you still don't get it. What is it about liberalism that creates people like you. The only results that matter are BLS, BEA, and Treasury data, not CBO
 
What is also a fact is that 2/3rd cut still doesn't put us below the floor of the Fiscal Crisis deficits, established in 2008 at $458 Billion

Fiscal Crisis? You mean the financial crisis. Using nominal dollars, this is true. But so what?

What is also a fact is that the average deficit over this administrations time (giving 2009 numbers to GWB) thus far is more than double the average deficit held during the Bush Administration.

Again, so what? The federal government was forced to deal with a set of rather extraordinary circumstances these past 5 years.

What is also fact is that the average deficit over this administrations time thus far is nearly 7 times greater than the average deficit levels of the past 20 years.

Again, so what?

What is also fact is that the estimated deficit numbers for 2015 are actually slated to increase by just under $100 billion dollars, rather than decrease again. Placing it more than $100 Billion dollars higher than the floor of the fiscal crisis deficit levels.

Now you want to argue on the basis of projections? The CBO also projected the federal deficit would vanish by 2008 and the current deficit would come in at 3.7% of GDP. So much for using projections as support for your argument!

But see, that's the tricky part and why you'll enjoy going up and bamboozling someone like Conservative who you feel you can beat one easily. You are pairing an objective FACT with a subjective point of reference, and hoping that people just treat your subjective reference as fact because of the other facts you're tossing around next to it.

Conservative beats himself. I would much rather clash with likes of a civil and articulate member of the conservative movement. In all honesty, do you think you'll fare any better?
 
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