"...don't call my bluff..."

[Gob]

In my opinion, the best thing that could possibly happen to get something done would be for the stock market to drop 500 points on Monday if no deal is reached over the weekend.

[Lord Jim]

We could use a man like Sir Humphrey right now...

Lord knows we've got enough Jim Hackers mucking about....

[The Hen]

He has finesse.

[Gob]

Who owns the $14.3tn debt?

US government owes itself $4.6tn
Remaining $9.7tn owed to investors
They include banks, pension funds, individual investors, and state/local/foreign governments
China: $1.16tn, Japan: $0.91tn, UK: $0.35tn
Deficit is annual difference between spending and revenue, $1.29tn in 2010
Congress has voted to raise the US debt limit 10 times since 2001

Source: US Treasury, May 2011, Congressional Research Service, Congressional Budget Office

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-14263644

[Gob]

Tell it like it is Vince!

Vince Cable has launched an extraordinary attack on "rightwing nutters" in America who are trying to block the raising of the US government's debt ceiling and who are, he said, a bigger threat to the world economy than problems in the eurozone.

Speaking on the BBC1's Andrew Marr show, the business secretary also suggested the Bank of England may have to engage in more quantitative easing – effectively printing money – as growth stalls. Cable said the deal struck in Europe last week to bail out countries such as Greece and Ireland had been a "significant step forward", but failed to the fundamental issues.

He said: "The irony of the situation at the moment, with markets opening tomorrow morning, is that the biggest threat to the world financial system comes from a few rightwing nutters in the American Congress rather than the eurozone."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011 ... ng-nutters

[dgs49]

It is both amazing and a bit humo(u)rous that the entire World has apparently bought in to a phony and partisan characterization of this situation.

The U.S. is in NO DANGER of defaulting on its debt. None. The current periodic revenue is many times what is needed to service the debt and the U.S. Treasury will NEVER allow a default. Other cutbacks would have to be made on a short-term, emergency basis, but debt service will be paid.

While the Republicans can be said to be irrational in refusing to countanance any new taxes at this time, virtually NO MENTION is being given to the fact that while the Dems (including the Chief Dem) have stated that they are prepared to reduce spending, no meaningful specifics have been mentioned. Indeed, the entire Dem strategy for the past two years has been to try to force the Republicans to propose spending cuts so that the Dems can demagogue them. Again I point out: NO BUDGET WAS EVER PRODUCED BY THE 2010 DEMOCRAT-CONTROLLED CONGRESS! NO BUDGET FOR TWO YEARS FROM THE DEMOCRAT CONTROLLED SENATE, DESPITE A LAW REQUIRING THEM TO SUBMIT ONE. BARRY'S 2011 BUDGET WAS SO IRRESPONSIBLE, IT GAINED NOT A SINGLE DEMOCRAT VOTE IN THE SENATE.

And yet, the perception is that "rightwing nutters" are holding things up.

Pretty incredible, when you think about it.

[Grim Reaper]

Remember, if you shout loud enough, you can pretend you're totally not at fault.

Also, the rightwing nutters are way off in Nutopia collecting more nuts to carry.

[Gob]

In Monday's latest round of bargaining, Senate Democratic Whip Chuck Schumer of New York introduced a plan to trim agriculture subsidies and housing programmes. However, the plan would protect health programmes for the elderly and the poor and the Social Security pension scheme.

"This is an offer that Republicans can't refuse," Mr Schumer told reporters about the Senate Democrats' plan.

Republicans had agreed to all those cuts at one point or another during the protracted budget and debt limit negotiations, he said.

"If they refuse this offer it simply means they want a default."

That plan would increase the US debt limit enough to give the government borrowing authority through 2012.

The Senate Democrats' plan won immediate endorsement from the White House, which called it "a reasonable approach that should receive the support of both parties."

Later on Monday, House Republicans unveiled their own plan that included $1.2tn (£736tn) in cuts, caps on future spending, and offered a $1tn debt ceiling increase - not enough to last through the 2012 election.
The Republican plan would require a second debt limit during 2012.

That rise would be dependent on Congress approving cuts in the health programmes for the poor and elderly, and would not include new revenues.


President Obama has repeatedly said that wealthy Americans and businesses should contribute to reducing the deficit through some new taxes.

At Monday's news conference, House Speaker John Boehner, a Republican, criticised the Senate Democrats' plan, saying it was founded on accounting gimmicks and "doesn't deal with" healthcare programmes for the poor and elderly, "which he called the biggest drivers of our debt and our deficit".

[Long Run]

Remember, if you shout loud enough, you can pretend you're totally not at fault.

Exactly, a person can pretend they did not create the budget that has trillion dollar deficits as far as the eye can see. And then they can get some people to believe that they have no culpability in such deficits and that they're the reasonable one who wants to do something about the deficits.

[The Hen]

How long has Obama been in charge?

Do you honestly think the crappy mess you are in is all his fault and the Bush the Brain-dead had NOTHING to do with it?

Gee it must be nice to live in la-la land, I prefer reality.

[Long Run]

Hen, it is a bipartisan bit of bad governance. Those who want to make the R's out as the bad guys, though, need a reality check since the D's have been every bit as culpable and game-playing as the R's. And at least the R's have actually put actual spending increase reductions on the table as opposed to just fancy talk about trying to do better in the future.

[Grim Reaper]

The Republican spending decreases are almost always social services and the like, while also not doing much to increase revenue. So they're not really offering anything real to work with. Just kick the poor and let the rich accumulate more money.

And no, the Democrats are not just as bad. They're not the ones acting like children because they didn't get their way. They're not the ones holding the US hostage because the US dared to elect a Democrat.

The Republicans said it themselves. They will do anything to make sure President Obama only gets one term. Now we have to see how far their insanity will take the rest of us.

[Long Run]

And no, the Democrats are not just as bad. They're not the ones acting like children because they didn't get their way. They're not the ones holding the US hostage because the US dared to elect a Democrat.

You may be right. They may be worse. Ignore the hypocrisy of Obama playing the same game when he was Senator Obama, demagogueing against deficit spending and voting against an increase in the debt limit. Ignore that Obama and the D-Congress implemented budgets with ongoing trillion dollar deficits in his last two budgets. Just know that there was a deal for actual spending decreases and increased revenue through deduction eliminations, and then Obama reneged and demanded tax rate increases (one can argue the right and wrong of the mix between cuts and revenues, but breaking deals shows someone's true colors, and Obama is every bit as bad or worse than anyone out there in that regard). That the Biden deficit reduction effort resulted in $2billion of savings says it all about how (un)serious Obama is. The only progress that will happen is if the semi-grown-ups in Congress do what they do and make some ugly legislation that the follower in chief has to sign.

[Grim Reaper]

They may be worse.

Or, not. That would be the more accurate assessment.

Ignore the hypocrisy of Obama playing the same game when he was Senator Obama, demagogueing against deficit spending and voting against an increase in the debt limit.

Right. Because different times and different situations are 100% comparable. Also, there's no chance whatsoever that you're oversimplifying the situation to pretend to have a point.

Ignore that Obama and the D-Congress implemented budgets with ongoing trillion dollar deficits in his last two budgets.

Only if we ignore the trillions spent by President Bush over his two terms. What President Obama has put forth so far is still a far cry from the previous administration.

Just know that there was a deal for actual spending decreases and increased revenue through deduction eliminations, and then Obama reneged and demanded tax rate increases (one can argue the right and wrong of the mix between cuts and revenues, but breaking deals shows someone's true colors, and Obama is every bit as bad or worse than anyone out there in that regard).

Accepting a bad plan would be worse than trying to get the other side to grow up and stop trying to shit on poor people and women. Especially when the Republicans keep throwing hissy fits over the idea of raising taxes on rich people and would rather tax poor people more.

That the Biden deficit reduction effort resulted in $2billion of savings says it all about how (un)serious Obama is. The only progress that will happen is if the semi-grown-ups in Congress do what they do and make some ugly legislation that the follower in chief has to sign.

What grownups? The Republicans? You're seriously joking right? They're stomping their feet and throwing a tantrum because the US put a Democrat in the presidential office. They are not acting rationally. They are willing to put everything on the line just to ruin President Obama and make us realize that we were wrong for not electing a Republican.

[Gob]

One trader, Ben Willis, told me: "We are very upset our elected officials are behaving like children, continually drawing lines in the sand and jumping over them.

"It's an embarrassment to the world. Today the Philippines told us that we had to take care of the dollar! I don't know what is left after that... the Ethiopians telling us how to grow crops? It's an embarrassment."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-14302452

[Gob]

[Andrew D]

There are two core facts about the debt-ceiling debate:

(1) Whether or not to raise the debt ceiling is not about future spending. It is about whether or not the US will default on the obligations it has already incurred.

(2) Republican economic policies got us into this mess in the first place.

With respect to the first core fact, the Republicans are holding the credit of the US hostage, because they know that they cannot win on the merits. Sure, on the whole Americans favor reducing spending in the abstract. But when it comes down to specifics, most Americans do not want what the right-wing nutjobs in Congress want. Poll after poll after poll all come to the same results: Most Americans do not want Social Security cut; far more Americans favor eliminating the income cap -- the mechanism by which the working poor pay Social Security (FICA) tax on the whole of their incomes while the high-income-receivers pay FICA tax on only part of their incomes -- than favor cutting benefits. Same kind of results for Medicare. Etc.

With respect to the second core fact, as I have pointed out before (and it has not been disputed), we had a sensible, conservative policy in place until the crazies wrecked it. We brought the deficit down to zero, and then we turned the deficit into a surplus. That meant that we could start paying down the debt.

And all the while, we were continuing, albeit with some cuts, to provide what most Americans want. Thank you, Republican Newt Gingrich and Democrat Bill Clinton.

That is what drove the crazies completely batshit: The idea that the federal government could provide what most Americans want it to provide was anathema to the crazies; it totally undermined their puny ideology.

So they had to stop it. And they did.

They shrunk the revenue stream via the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy. And the upped the expenditures by taking us into an immorally pointless, stupidly non-planned, and incompetently executed war in Iraq.

It worked.

The Republican loonies successfully turned a budget surplus into budget deficits for the foreseeable future, and they successfully trapped us into spendning far more than we could afford.

Why?

Precisely so that they could do what they are doing now: Blame the whole mess on Democrats and entitlement programs.

The truth of the matter, however, is that the radically reactionary right-wing pseudo-conservatives intended all along to drive the government into insolvency. "Starve the Beast!"

Why else would they have done what they have been doing? They turned down a deal for a $4 trillion deficit reduction -- 80% from spending cuts and only 20% from revenue increases. The best deal that they were at all likely to get -- remember that the Republicans control only half of one of the political branches of the government -- and they turned it down.

(In contrast, there was no deal that Obama walked away from. The Democrats and the Republicans agreed on various spending cuts, but there was not agreement that those would be all of the spending cuts.)

Why? Because they never wanted, and still do not want, any kind of deal at all. They want the government to go broke so that they can do what they have always been trying to do: Eliminate the social safety net which is the hallmark of civilized societies everywhere.

That is what this is really all about: The loony-fringers' insatiable desire to scrap the US's social safety net (along with safety regulations, workers' rights, and everything else that does not suit their infantile ideology).

But they know that thet cannot win that argument on the merits. They cannot persuade most Americans that gutting Social Security, Medicare, etc. is a good idea.

So they are bending the American people backwards over the barrel of the debt ceiling. They are nothing more than spoiled children holding their noses until their faces turn blue.

[dgs49]

Well.

I guess that's one way of looking at it.

Of course, that ignores the trillions of dollars wasted in the just-past Congress by an entirely Democrat federal government in the name of "stimulus." Money that - we were promised - would stimulate the economy and keep unemployment below 8%.

And it ignores the fact that the Democrat Congress funded the two costly wars that they now bemoan as wasted money - and the the Democrat President seems to have pretty much bought into the rationale that the previous, much maligned President put forth. I don't see us pulling out of Afgannistan or Irak, either one, within my lifetime, and that's based on Barry's assessment.

And it ignores the fact that ALL of the Democrat proposals put forth for spending reductions are - in the usual Democrat fashion - no actual cuts now, but "if you follow my projections out there for the next ten or twelve years, we'll be saving trillions in the out years."

And it ignores the fact that the size of this deficit is so horrific that one would have to tax high earners (or, in Democrat parlance, "The Rich") at a rate of approximately 500% to put a significant dent in it.

And Andrew, you are probably right that while Americans want to reduce spending in the abstract, they are unwilling to give up their beloved Gub'mint benefits.

What path forward, exactly, does that observation compel? Keep spending 50% more than we take in? Increase taxes on The Rich, and spend "only" 40% more than we take in?

The fact is that spending would have to be drastically reduced, even if the Bush tax cuts were rolled back retroactively to the first of the year. By demagoging the tax issue, the Dems avoid having to make the painful decisions that they know will hurt them in the coming 2012 elections, so WHAT IS THE PLAN, ANDREW?

Where is it? Where are these Democrat "cuts"? And exactly what tax increases are they proposing that will make a significant dent in the deficit without precipitating a depression?

The Dems propose NOTHING. They propose ephemeral "cuts" that won't materialize for years and accept no duty to take responsible action now.

I think it's now pretty much official: Barry has succeeded in supplanting Jimmy Carter as the worst President since the Civil War.

[Liberty1]

[Gob]

And you wonder why your country's finances are up shit creek?

Top Republican John Boehner and leading Democrat Harry Reid are tweaking their budget plans after nonpartisan analysts said their sums did not add up.

The US Congressional Budget Office (CBO) said neither Mr Boehner's plan nor Mr Reid's would cut the deficit by as much as they had both estimated.

House Republicans have been meeting behind closed doors to discuss the Boehner plan.

Mr Reid said Mr Boehner's proposal could not pass the Senate.

The US runs a budget deficit that topped $1.5tn (£920bn) this year, and has amassed a national debt of $14.3tn.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-14318377