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Who's going to take the blame for the fiscal clif

Who's to blame for going of the the fiscal cliff?

  • Democrats

    Votes: 8 12.7%
  • Republicans

    Votes: 32 50.8%
  • Other (please elaborate)

    Votes: 23 36.5%

  • Total voters
    63
When we didn't have a recipient to worker ratio of less than 3. https://www.socialsecurity.gov/oact/tr/2011/lr4b2.html
What magic properties does the number "3" have? Why would a slow 75-year projected decline past that number suggest anything special at all? Especially when the decline is premised among other things on legal and illegal immigration being flat or falling across most of that 75 years and on life expectancy at retirement continuing to increase at rates that it did during the 20th century.

And one would also have to consider whether workers-per-retiree is even the right number to be looking at. In fact, that ratio is a component isolated from the larger workers-per-dependent ratio. Retired people and children are the two largest categories there. What's been going on with the children component? Are the baby boomers having any more kids? How about with the prison population? Changes in one category may be freeing up funds to devote to another at no net cost, but you won't know that unless you look.

The current employment-to-population rate is meanwhile 58.7%. As recently as December 1977, that would have been the highest level since WWII. But the best big-picture number for whether we can afford to support our dependents may simply be real per capita GDP. Here's the graph of that over the past 50 years...

View attachment 67139945

1. Why should I have to pay higher taxes into the system to get the same benefits that the last generation got?
For the same reason that they did? Look, considering the fact that 75% of scheduled benefits will be worth more by the time the SSTF runs out (assuming it ever does) than what 100% of benefits are worth today, those who will be retired in the second half of this century might want to roll the dice and just keep payroll taxes where they are. But if people are as concerned as they say they are about the financial future of the system, then lining up to pay more taxes to support it is the only logical choice for those who don't happen to be otherwise wealthy enough to have arranged for a secure retirement already.

2. Because we had an economic boom=more money into the system.
We have had both booms and busts. The early 70's, early 80's, and early 90's were hardly the best of times, to say nothing of the Bush-43 administration and since. Do you think it is realistic or pessimistic to project 70 consecutive years of growth at 1.7%, when between 1960 and 2010, we exceeded it 31 times and average growth was 12% higher than that?

But until our economy starts picking up again, it is merely wishful thinking to just assume that we will return to 4% growth rates and everything will be fine and dandy.
And at 2:00 am, it is merely wishful thinking to believe the sun will come up again until you can see the glint of some early morning rays. And we don't need 4% growth to blow the SS projections out of the water. 2% would do the job just fine. Remember: 1997 = SSTF exhausted in 2029...2007 = SSTF exhausted in 2042.

I agree. Except for the insurance mandate.
Look up the free-rider problem then do the math. A system of near universal coverage cannot be sustained without near universal participation which is not going to happen without a mandate. Which is why Republicans first proposed it.

I'd like to see some evidence?
If that were true, you would have gone off to the library by now and read up on it. The demise of employment-based pensions is hardly some well-kept secret.

After all, excessive pension obligations did actually contribute to the auto bailouts and GM going bankrupt.
No, they didn't, and the union had made years worth of concessions on compensation across the board in order to help GM et al. through their problems, many of those the plain result of poor planning and decisionmaking on the part of management. The auto industry as a whole was put in a bind by the Great Bush Recession. That is what brought about the bailouts. Ford was able to get by without assistance only because it has serendipitously arranged lines of credit totalling more than $25 billion before the crisis hit. GM and Chrysler had no such cushion to sit on.

Both? Correct me if I'm wrong, but "macro" economics is just the total aggregate of the "micro."
On the most elemenatry of scales, this must obviously be true. On any practical, sensible, analytical scale, it couldn't be further from the truth. The economics of a nation are a different animal entirely from the economics of a firm. This should have been made eminently clear in the very early days of your education.

Do elaborate.
You are too young to have learned better yet. You are still taken by neat and tidy and by the bright, shiny objects otherwise known as simplistic explanations. Your assumptions about the nature and value of land are chalkboard hallucinations. Things do not work that way in the real world. In the real world, two of the key determinants of land value are alternative capital gains rates and the existing level of real estate debt. I didn't see either one of those in your outline.
 
I believe in the idea that Obama won the mandate of the American people. I did not vote for him, and that does not mean his plan is the best, but he won the mandate. If a deal is not met, there is no way that the Republicans can claim that it was the Democrats fault, because they had the backing of the nation. Now in all honesty, if a deal is not met it will blow my mind. Republicans want to keep taxes low on as many upper income people as possible, and not cut defense spending. Dems want to keep tax breaks on the middle class. If we fall off the cliff, both sides lose. Taxes go up for EVERYBODY, and spending goes down in vital places. It seems like a lose, lose to me. If the Republicans are willing to let the lower and middle classes suffer just to make a point then that is extremely foolish. And I am in no way saying that Democrats are not at fault, because they are, this political game of chess that our leaders are playing is all good until the American people start to suffer more then they already are. It has been admitted from both sides of the table that this has become more of a way to see who can get more political points, and that is not what it should be about. It should be about finding the best way to help the American people.
 
Nah...they don't lack the skill. They lack the media and the tendency to lie repeatedly.
The environment is dominated by the manufactured reality of the right-wing disinformation media. Facts are ignored and papered over with myths. Reason is rejected and replaced by emotion. Those who try to remain honest and independent in their reporting are tarred with charges of "liberal media bias" along with the threat and actuality of flash-mob assaults. The Republican Party is one big Lie Machine, and it has been now for decades -- pretty much ever since the post-Watergate hookup with Jerry Falwell and his bands of lying fundie extremists. They stole most of their propaganda techniques from the tobacco companies, then passed them on to the Republicans who've been using them ever since. As Carl Rove might tell you, you absolutely CAN fool enough of the people enough of the time to get to 50%-plus-one a time or two.
 
Nah...they don't lack the skill. They lack the media and the tendency to lie repeatedly.
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Originally Posted by SomervilleAs shown by this past election season, Republicans lack the communication skills necessary to make a majority of Americans believe anything they might say about the President.
Nah...they don't lack the skill. They lack the media and the tendency to lie repeatedly.


I don't think they lack anything. They managed to convince almost half of the voters that they don't just represent the 1%. Krissakes, that's a phenomenal piece of manipulation. It's equivalent to convincing scientists that black is white. No small accomplishment, eh?
 
Wouldn't it be better if these adults talked about who's going to fix the problem, instead of whining about who takes the blame? Boring.
 
Obama will blame Bush and the republicans for the fiscal cliff and the morons of the world will eat his words up. Every single gullible nonsense he utters.

While both parties are to blame, and the american people will suffer tax hikes and probably more unemployment... the ones in charge won't care. Because they have fat checks and big salaries and awesome contributions from special interest groups.
 
No, they were merely called that because -- like almost everything Bush ever did -- they were so heavily tilted toward benefitting the already wealthy.

I am not sure how you get "heavily tilted" towards the wealthy.

It created a new bracket at 10% and lowered the previous lowest bracket by 5% down to that new 10% level. The highest bracket was reduced from 39.6 to 35%, a decrease of 4.6%. All other brackets were reduced by 3%. Capital gains was reduced from 10% to 8% for those previously in the 15% bracket and for no one else.

But since that highest bracket was already paying 24.6 percent more than the lowest bracket and under the new tax was paying 25% more, hardly a great benefit to the "rich", they are still being overtaxed by 25%, or if you prefer the bottom is being under-taxed by 15% and the highest is being overtaxed by 10%, since most people probably fall in the new 25% bracket.

True, the estate and gift tax rules benefited the wealthy more, but what do you expect when they are the only ones being taxed under those rules.

From a certain point of view, the view that all Americans shouldn't be taxed equally, I see your point. But is it really right that the wealthy should have to be taxed so much more than other American Citizens? I don't believe so.


More to the point (and almost anything would be), they were passed before the road to the credit crisis had become clear. But when they failed (as predicted) and the Fed had to jump in to freeze interet rates at 1% in a last-ditch effort to stimulate economic activity, that path became a whole lot clearer.

Since you didn't like the previous source, how about Fannie Mae Eases Credit To Aid Mortgage Lending - NYTimes.com , which was sourced by the previous link. Funny, you don't want to accept something published at San Jose State University. Or is just anything that actually shows the probability that the crises didn't originate with Bush?


That's quite irrelevant and also a hoot. ... In fact, having been told by outgoing Clinton staff that terrorism would be the number one problem on their watch, the Bush administration completely ignored the matter until they were blind-sided on 9/11.

In August 1998, Al Qaeda carried out two attacks on US embassies. Clinton launched a few cruise missiles and it has been reported by some that they actually manged to kill a camel used by Al Queda.

The attack on the USS Cole happened in October 2000, to the reaction to it can be blamed on Clinton and Bush, not Bush alone.

Some other Attacks that Al Qaeda or groups that it was affiliated with, Kobar Towers bombing. Previous attempt on World Trade Centers, FBI evidence links OBL to funding of the attack.

So clearly Al Qaeda grew and was able to take actions long before Bush came into office, despite attacks and provocations, Clinton did very little to deter or eliminate them. Clinton didn't do his job, he just passed it along. Yes, I accept that Bush was initially lax in his handling of Al Qaeda, but he only had that ability because Clinton didn't take actions and allowed the threat to grow.

Meanwhile, military and intelligence downsizing had kicked in under Bush-41 concurrent with the fall of the Soviet Union. That's just a matter of historical record. Total obligational authority for DOD was repeatedly cut over Bush's four years, including by 9.8% in 1992 and 8.1% in 1993. Meanwhile, force levels declined by nearly 20% -- from 2,202K to 1,776K.[/QUOTE]

You are correct. However the difference was in how the cuts were applied and carried out. G.H. Bush was instituting stepped planed out reductions. Clinton just did a massive cut and that was carried out piecemeal because it had not been planed out.

And of course Bush-43 would fight his lovely wars in Afghanistan and Iraq using only and exactly the military that Clinton had left to him. You know what they say...

A commander-in-chief leads the military built by those who came before him. There is little that he or his defense secretary can do to improve the force they have to deploy. It is all the work of previous administrations.
-- Dick Cheney

Fortunately, that Clinton hand-me-down military was one that even in the face of declining budgets had moved forward into advanced command and control systems, precision weapons, expanded use of robotics, and communications protocols with real-time links between remote intelligence posts and boots on the ground. JDAMs and drones were Clinton products as well. Every time you hear about what a Predator or Global Hawk did, you should think of Clinton. The overwhelming speed and efficiency of military operations under Bush were owing to the quality and capacity that Bill Clinton had put together for him. Clinton also took care to boost military pay, retirement, and health care benefits -- all of which right-wingers naturally hate him for.

No we did not use "the same military" that Clinton left Bush in both wars, or even one of them. What you apparently are not aware of is that the reports of readiness and training status were complete fabrications.

Whole navy flying units were ground on a rotating 6 month basis because they didn't have funding for training operations.

Air Force units were using "Cannibalization" of equipment to keep other equipment working because there were no spare parts. One unit I was in, over 40% of our warfighting equipment was down due to cannibalization the whole time I was there. The practice of "Cannibalization" was never authorized and was denied by senior commanders. Of the "working" equipment, 35%, sometimes more, degradation of system capabilities was considered "acceptable".

Due to high utilization rates, non-deployed training was kept to a minimum because there was no budget for it and quite often, no working equipment to work with. Some units I know of spend whole quarters and sometimes half a year with zero training accomplished because they didn't have spare parts to keep equipment running. What spare parts there were went, necessarily to deployed equipment. Training was prohibited in deployed areas. A large portion of training, that could occur, was focused almost entirely upon getting deploying personnel qualified so they could deploy.

Live fire weapons training was suspended except for deploying personnel. The army was constantly complaining that they didn't have training ammunition so they were not in fact accomplishing required training.

I don't know if it was a consideration, but one very logical reason for attacking Iraq was to free up units and equipment that was tied down with ongoing operations there. Operations that had continued since the end of Desert Storm. Major portions of some very limited assets were being used up to maintain those operations. And contrary to what some have said, Iraqi forces did indeed sometimes shoot at US Forces. Operations Northern Watch and Southern watch continued until the actual invasion.

During the whole time, Senior leadership was blowing smoke up Clinton's and the Public's ass and lying through their teeth.

As one of the "troops on the ground", actually in the air for my specific job, I can tell you that there was significant differences between the forces we employed under Clinton and those under Bush.

Well yes, the back story includes the Asian and Russian financial crises of the late 1990's that wiped out a significant number of the finance companies, That plus Bush's antagonism toward CRA helped create a credit vacuum in low- and moderate-income communities that unscrupulous private brokers could then easily push into, abusive practices and all;.

Wow, an actual admission that it wasn't all "Bush's Fault".


The rest of what? Can you explain what it is you are trying to add up?

The rest of the nearly $7 trillion dollars that Obama and the dems have spent and added to the debt since Bush left office. You blamed it all on Bush. I admit that some of it was for issues that came up under Bush, but that only account for a minority of the money spent by Obama and the dems. So where it the rest of it? Where is the money that was borrowed and given out as loans during the bailout that financial institutions have been repaying?


Yet more unfounded slop. Led by right-wing rising star Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina (remember him proudly, right-wingers), a handful of whackjob southern governors walked away from free money for those struggling in their states to make an entirely partisan point. They put their own political needs ahead of the financial needs of people in their states. "Slime" is a good word for those folks.

Not really. The biggest problem with what was offered up was the mandate that states pay unemployment to not only those who had paid into the system, or their employers did, but to everyone unemployed and also that the state had to cover unemployment from other states when people moved looking for work. Texas was offered $500 million, to a fund already paying out more than a Billion. No where near enough to cover just the addition of those who had never paid into unemployment, much less any job seekers that wandered in. At the time Texas had an unemployment rate of around 6% and Cali had over 12%. We certainly did not want massive amounts of Californians, New Yorkers and other wandering into the state to look for work and we would have to foot the bill for their unemployment.

As to it being only "right-wingers". Gov. Brad Henry of Oklahoma, who's state also rejected it, was a Dem.


We had people being denied credit when they had more assets in the bank they were seeking to borrow from than the amount they were seeking to borrow. Their applications were denied simply because of their street address while similarly situated borrowers in other parts of town were being routinely approved for loans. Does that meet your definition of "fair," or would you oppose practices such as that?

That would depend totally on the individual situation. For one, if they already had those assets in the bank, why were they borrowing in the first place. Second, average home values are done by areas, if you are trying to borrow $150k for a house where the average value is $60k, then yeah, the bank/lending institution is probably going to turn you down. Even if you have the "assets", that does not translate into a favorable income-to-debt ratio.

It also did not justify the extension of zero down loans, sub-prime loans, interest only loans, etc, using variable interest rates, to people who's credit and income could not cover it if interest rates changed. The were bad lending practices, encouraged by the government through Fannie and Freddie, to meet low/moderate income home ownership goals. All of which was taking place prior to Bush ever entering office.

They absolutely WERE the originators of the crisis along with the cowboy capitalists they cheered on and opened doors for and then refused to regulate even when evidence of credit market abuse began piling up to the rafters. Warnings of an eventual crisis building in a stock of poorly underwritten adjustable-rate loans had begun to appear in professional and scholarly writings by late 2003. The chorus grew from there, but it was all ignored. Like the Wall Streeters, the Bush administration wanted its profits now and didn't care about bills that would come due in the future. We tend to descibe that sort of thing with words like "incompetence" and "malfeasance". These were in fact the hallmarks of the entire Bush-43 era.

I still don't get the "Bush is entirely to blame" line since almost all of the factors involved were in place before he took Office. Did he and the republicans in some cases exacerbate an existing problem, sure. Did they create it, no.

Outsourcing was happening since at least the 1950s, GM had moved plants to Brazil even earlier than that. Bad lending practices were going on long before 2001. Al Qaeda was attacking US interest long before 2001 also. Operations in Iraq had been going on since 1990.

Name a single thing contributing to the debt or the economic downturn that was not already happening prior to Bush taking office. Even when Clinton had a surplus, the debt still increased every year he was in office.
 
Wouldn't it be better if these adults talked about who's going to fix the problem, instead of whining about who takes the blame? Boring.

The cannot even agree on what caused the problem, how are they ever going to fix it without first knowing the causes?
 
The cannot even agree on what caused the problem, how are they ever going to fix it without first knowing the causes?

If our obviously unselfish professionals can't solve this problem, we could be screwed. /Sarcasm; politicians only care for themselves and their parties.
 
Republicans will probably take the blame, but it's both parties at fault.

I really doubt they will take the blame, although the media and President Obama will certainly insist the blame is theirs. Why do liberals think its OK to borrow more than 40 cents for every dollar spent. It's ludicrous. Cut the damn spending!

This tax hike for my family means we pay at least $3,000 in additional taxes next year. That's pretty tough to accept for a middle class family.

Families making between $49,999 and $70,000 will be hit the hardest. Their tax rate will go up from 15% to 28%.

Didn't Obama state he wouldn't raise taxes on the middle class? So let's see, which number lie would this be?
 
Μολὼν λαβέ;1061292926 said:
I really doubt they will take the blame, although the media and President Obama will certainly insist the blame is theirs. Why do liberals think its OK to borrow more than 40 cents for every dollar spent. It's ludicrous. Cut the damn spending!

This tax hike for my family means we pay at least $3,000 in additional taxes next year. That's pretty tough to accept for a middle class family.

Families making between $49,999 and $70,000 will be hit the hardest. Their tax rate will go up from 15% to 28%.

Didn't Obama state he wouldn't raise taxes on the middle class? So let's see, which number lie would this be?

I'm not going to be that affected by the tax hike. But undoubtedly this will be the 5th year a row without a cost of living increase, or much of one. With what food, gas and other essentials have risen during that time period, it is not "hurting" yet, but I am definitely starting to feel a little pinch.

But I do know others that will be greatly affected by it, including a few that will probably join the ranks of the unemployed because of it.
 
Nah...they don't lack the skill. They lack the media and the tendency to lie repeatedly.


Hysterical laughter ensues - They lack the media???? Seriously? - yet we are constantly reminded that Fox News has the highest viewer numbers of the 24 hr news channels

lack ... tendency to lie repeatedly??? HELP! I can't stop laughing



from Newt and his multiple sex 'offenses' to Paul Ryan's "2:50 marathon time" to our most recent incident of a hypocritical Republican, Crapo of Idaho, and the attempted justifications thereof, the modern Republican Party congress critters have shown an extreme tendency to lie like 5 year olds caught crapping in the sandbox
 
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I am glad we are going over the cliff. I have grown tired of doing all I can for my family while paying my fair share of taxes only to see people on unemployment for two years now which is ridiculous. My taxes will go up but at least the government won't be able to continue these silly programs that reward people for bad behavior.
 
Hysterical laughter ensues - They lack the media???? Seriously? - yet we are constantly reminded that Fox News has the highest viewer numbers of the 24 hr news channels

lack ... tendency to lie repeatedly??? HELP! I can't stop laughing



from Newt and his multiple sex 'offenses' to Paul Ryan's "2:50 marathon time" to our most recent incident of a hypocritical Republican, Crapo of Idaho, and the attempted justifications thereof, the modern Republican Party congress critters have shown an extreme tendency to lie like 5 year olds caught crapping in the sandbox

Fox has higher numbers than any other network...for sure...but they are not higher than the rest of the mainstream media in total. Yes, the Republicans lack the media.

You mention individual lies...I'm talking about Party lies that are repeated by every Party talking head and pundit and repeated by every liberal mainstream media outlet.

Keep laughing while you ignore my point.
 
I am glad we are going over the cliff. I have grown tired of doing all I can for my family while paying my fair share of taxes only to see people on unemployment for two years now which is ridiculous. My taxes will go up but at least the government won't be able to continue these silly programs that reward people for bad behavior.

I have to agree with you. I didn't support the bailouts for pretty much the same reasons. We are falsely holding up parts of society, not providing them with what they truly need and the government is not working because real working solutions will not be popular. Let it come, hell, let the whole damned system crash to the ground, then when people face real hardship, then maybe they will start making and voting for working solutions.

My only caveat is that we should take proper care of our veterans, especially those who were disabled while serving.
 
I have to agree with you. I didn't support the bailouts for pretty much the same reasons. We are falsely holding up parts of society, not providing them with what they truly need and the government is not working because real working solutions will not be popular. Let it come, hell, let the whole damned system crash to the ground, then when people face real hardship, then maybe they will start making and voting for working solutions.

My only caveat is that we should take proper care of our veterans, especially those who were disabled while serving.

I totally agree about taking care of the veterans. I can't wait to see these people that have time to hang out in coffee shops and pretty much do what they please have to go back to work if it means cleaning houses or washing cars. Never in my lifetime have I known of as many people sponging off the government. I hope the farm subsidies take a hit as well.
 
In my ideal world we would not be here. I think had we stuck to the tenth amendment we could have decided more things at the state level so if one state screws itself over with debt it doesn't sink the country.

In the current situation the fact that we got here is 100 years of government overextending its bounds, an inevitable feature of democracy, but focusing on things from a purely political Machiavellian sort of way there can be no question Republicans will take the brunt of the blame.

Obama won reelection running on a soak the rich platform. While I disagree with that platform he won 51-47 over Romney. Democrats picked up seats in the Senate. Yes Republicans still have the House but only because of gerrymandering, Democrats actually won a million more votes nationwide. In a parliamentary system they would have the a majority across the board.

Obama is simply fulfilling the promise the US voted for. Republicans may not like it but they are stonewalling him on this. It is them who are holding it all hostage for a trinky little tax cut on the rich. So they will get the blame, all other ideological and economic questions aside.

The Republicans don't realize their glasses are filled with poison kool-aid and committing political suicide. As a hardened cynic I must say that it will be laughable to see Republicans try to blame Obama even when Obama has cleverly set up the narrative that Republicans held middle class tax cuts hostage to those of millionaires and the polls are bearing this out.

We are just out from an election and 2014 is a long time in politics though so I can't say it will have an effect of the election results two long years down the road. But in the short term it will desecrate the Republican brand. Republicans should just suck up to the fact that they lost on the tax issues.
 
Kevin Wilson, 1376 Germaine Street, Sioux Falls, SD.


It's his fault.
 
A much simpler and fairer solution would be raising the amount of income subject to FICA (presently at $110,000). If that level were to be raised to say $1,000,000, SS and Medicare - if the funds were protected, remember some guy saying something about a "lockbox" - would be solvent into the foreseeable future

How about if we quit allowing public employees to retire at the age of 45 or so? That might be a good start too. Early retirement needs to come to an end, ESPECIALLY if you are in a public sector union.

I totally support unions, and I think the working man needs some leverage, but you must admit that a lot of these public sector unions have gotten greedy.
 
How about if we quit allowing public employees to retire at the age of 45 or so? That might be a good start too. Early retirement needs to come to an end, ESPECIALLY if you are in a public sector union.

I totally support unions, and I think the working man needs some leverage, but you must admit that a lot of these public sector unions have gotten greedy.

Just as a note, with the limited amount of work I've done with budget and how it applies with Public Employees and early retirement.

EARLY retirement (I don't believe retiring at 45, outside of in the military, is the standard for federal public employees) is being offered more regularly by the government currently because in many situations it provides for a net SAVINGS, not cost, by doing so.

The way this works is because it's combined with attrition.

Say a person is 5 years away from retirement. You can continue to pay them their full salary for the next 5 years, at which point they begin pulling in their retirement which we'll say is (pulling a number out of my head) 20% of what their normal salary was. So over the next ten years you're paying them:

100% + 100% + 100% + 100% + 100% + 20% + 20% + 20% + 20% + 20% = Paid 600% of their sallary over the next 10 years.

However, say that person is offered an early retirement with an incentive that they will be paid an additional 10% over their standard retirement for the next 10 years. This means over the next ten years you're paying them:

30% + 30% + 30% + 30% + 30% + 30% + 30% + 30% + 30% + 30% = Paid 300% of their sallary over the next 10 years.

By offering the early retirement, even with the "incentive" bonus, you're actually SAVING half of what you'd have paid the person otherwise. Now, this number fails completely if you end up replacing the retiring person with someone whose making the same (or even a certain percentage lower) salary as the former employee. However, when you combine it with attrition...IE that position isn't filled with a new employee but rather the duties are ended/shuffled to others...then you have a net savings.

This is why the government has been offerring up early retirements more lately. They can't get out of the notion of the pention plans they've already agreed to, so they're going to be paying the retirement costs. If they can get the person retired earlier however, and don't need to actually hire someone to replace that persons spot, then over the long term they SAVE money compared to what would alternatively happened if they didn't offer the early out.
 
How about if we quit allowing public employees to retire at the age of 45 or so? That might be a good start too. Early retirement needs to come to an end, ESPECIALLY if you are in a public sector union.

I totally support unions, and I think the working man needs some leverage, but you must admit that a lot of these public sector unions have gotten greedy.

Well Zyphlin supplied a rational response to your statement but I wonder how many "public employees" are actually retiring at age 45? Sure there's some corruption in the process but isn't it the reality that those few who are making out like bandits are known about because of certain media outlets who like to hype up their specific political views by providing examples to 'prove' said views?

and what does your response have to do with my post about increasing the level of income subject to FICA?
 
I am not sure how you get "heavily tilted" towards the wealthy.
The same way everybody else did.

Since you didn't like the previous source...
The previous source was an atrocity. This one is from late 1999 noting a pilot program being run by Fannie Mae in selected markets. The success of CRA portfolios had opened the eyes of traditional lenders to the profit potential available in underserved markets, but serving them would require a blend of prime and subprime lending. The GSE's already defined conformance parameters in the world of prime mortgage contracts and Fannie was setting out to do the same thing for subprime lending. They were looking to develop and test fixed-rate instruments with upfront premiums to offset rated extra risk that borrowers could earn their way out of with consistent payment performance. The 1% two-year premium was just one of the models they were interested in. But before Fannie could ciomplete its research and design efforts, Wall Street and the private brokers jumped the gun on them, pulling an end run around the GSE's and creating the first of cascading waves of adjustable-rate contracts packed with high-cost, high-profit terms that could only get worse for borrowers over time. With nobody in the Bush administration willing to do any sort of oversight, Wall Street went wild, and it ended up being those exotic and volatile adjustable-rate contracts that became the standard in subprime and near-subprime markets. To tragic effect.

In August 1998, Al Qaeda carried out two attacks on US embassies. Clinton launched a few cruise missiles and it has been reported by some that they actually manged to kill a camel used by Al Queda.
That's actually a quote taken from bin Laden. Did you admire him or something? There were more like 75 missiles involved than a few. bin Laden had been at one of the camps blown to bits, but the arrest earlier in the day of one of the people he was supposed to meet with there spooked him, and he left the camp a few hours before the missiles arrived.

The attack on the USS Cole happened in October 2000, to the reaction to it can be blamed on Clinton and Bush, not Bush alone.
It took several months to unravel the plot that culminated in the bombing. The CIA report on responsibility was presented to Cheney and Bush in February 2001. They decided to walk away from the matter. I suppose they had other things on their minds.

So clearly Al Qaeda grew and was able to take actions long before Bush came into office, despite attacks and provocations, Clinton did very little to deter or eliminate them. Clinton didn't do his job, he just passed it along. Yes, I accept that Bush was initially lax in his handling of Al Qaeda, but he only had that ability because Clinton didn't take actions and allowed the threat to grow.
When Clinton took office, nobody had ever heard of al Qaeda or bin Laden. They had grown up in the shadows and backwaters out of Bush-41's graceless exits from Afghanistan in 1989 and Iraq in 1991. This came as a new threat in a new area. There were no resources available. Dealing with it would require new units, new contacts, new networks, new alliances, new tactics, and new means of tracking and gathering information. Clinton did not inherit any of it. He had to invent the entire counter-terrorism apparatus from the ground up. And did. The final impetus was not the botched WTC bombing in 1993, but the successful Oklahoma City bombing in April 1995. Even with no public or international support for major counter-terrorism actions, Clinton put the US in high gear preparation for that. While political pressure on Sudan did yield the expulsion of bin Laden into Afghanistan in 1996 -- a serious setback for him -- it would still be Clinton's second term before the new counter-terrorisn infrastructure reached the early stages of effectiveness. Intelligence services believed they had disabled a cell discovered in Nairobi by raiding it and seizing computers and people. A lesson in the resilience of al Qaeda would be learned at the embassy some weeks later. Of course, Monica Lewinsky was still more important to Republicans. As for the assertion that Clinton "did very little" after the embassy attacks, try a little of this on for size...

Broad Effort Launched After '98 Attacks
 
The previous source was an atrocity. This one is from late 1999 noting a pilot program being run by Fannie Mae in selected markets. The success of CRA portfolios had opened the eyes of traditional lenders to the profit potential available in underserved markets, but serving them would require a blend of prime and subprime lending. The GSE's already defined conformance parameters in the world of prime mortgage contracts and Fannie was setting out to do the same thing for subprime lending. They were looking to develop and test fixed-rate instruments with upfront premiums to offset rated extra risk that borrowers could earn their way out of with consistent payment performance. The 1% two-year premium was just one of the models they were interested in. But before Fannie could ciomplete its research and design efforts, Wall Street and the private brokers jumped the gun on them, pulling an end run around the GSE's and creating the first of cascading waves of adjustable-rate contracts packed with high-cost, high-profit terms that could only get worse for borrowers over time. With nobody in the Bush administration willing to do any sort of oversight, Wall Street went wild, and it ended up being those exotic and volatile adjustable-rate contracts that became the standard in subprime and near-subprime markets. To tragic effect.


That's actually a quote taken from bin Laden. Did you admire him or something? There were more like 75 missiles involved than a few. bin Laden had been at one of the camps blown to bits, but the arrest earlier in the day of one of the people he was supposed to meet with there spooked him, and he left the camp a few hours before the missiles arrived.


It took several months to unravel the plot that culminated in the bombing. The CIA report on responsibility was presented to Cheney and Bush in February 2001. They decided to walk away from the matter. I suppose they had other things on their minds.


When Clinton took office, nobody had ever heard of al Qaeda or bin Laden. They had grown up in the shadows and backwaters out of Bush-41's graceless exits from Afghanistan in 1989 and Iraq in 1991. This came as a new threat in a new area. There were no resources available. Dealing with it would require new units, new contacts, new networks, new alliances, new tactics, and new means of tracking and gathering information. Clinton did not inherit any of it. He had to invent the entire counter-terrorism apparatus from the ground up. And did. The final impetus was not the botched WTC bombing in 1993, but the successful Oklahoma City bombing in April 1995. Even with no public or international support for major counter-terrorism actions, Clinton put the US in high gear preparation for that. While political pressure on Sudan did yield the expulsion of bin Laden into Afghanistan in 1996 -- a serious setback for him -- it would still be Clinton's second term before the new counter-terrorisn infrastructure reached the early stages of effectiveness. Intelligence services believed they had disabled a cell discovered in Nairobi by raiding it and seizing computers and people. A lesson in the resilience of al Qaeda would be learned at the embassy some weeks later. Of course, Monica Lewinsky was still more important to Republicans. As for the assertion that Clinton "did very little" after the embassy attacks, try a little of this on for size...

Broad Effort Launched After '98 Attacks

We don't know that "everyone else did"? Unprovable statement, You saw it the way you did, me the way I did and others made their own opinions. Since I have seen other post supporting flat even taxes, I can say, without doubt that not everyone saw it the way you described.

As to the rest, did the factors exist prior to Bush/republicans taking office? Yes. If they existed prior to Bush taking office, is Bush/republicans solely responsible for them? No. So, can Bush/republicans be held entirely responsible for current problems? No.
 
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