It’s a basic reflection of our belief that those who benefited most from our way of life can afford to give back a little bit more. Moreover, this belief hasn’t hindered the success of those at the top of the income scale, they continue to do better and better with each passing year,” President Obama said at an address about the budget at George Washington University. April 2011
Mr. President, “give” means voluntary. “Gifts” do not occur at the point of a gun.
“spending reductions in the tax code.” – Ending tax cuts, President Obama, April 13, 2011
Clarity we can believe in.
We cannot, and will not, sustain deficits like these without end. Contrary to the prevailing wisdom in Washington these past few years, we cannot simply spend as we please and defer the consequences to the next budget, the next administration, or the next generation.
We are paying the price for these deficits right now. In 2008 alone, we paid $250 billion in interest on our debt — one in every 10 taxpayer dollars. That is more than three times what we spent on education that year; more than seven times what we spent on VA health care.
So if we confront this crisis without also confronting the deficits that helped cause it, we risk sinking into another crisis down the road as our interest payments rise, our obligations come due, confidence in our economy erodes, and our children and our grandchildren are unable to pursue their dreams because they’re saddled with our debts.
And that’s why today I’m pledging to cut the deficit we inherited in half by the end of my first term in office. This will not be easy. It will require us to make difficult decisions and face challenges we’ve long neglected. But I refuse to leave our children with a debt that they cannot repay — and that means taking responsibility right now, in this administration, for getting our spending under control. President Obama, February 23, 2009
The sad part is that he is right, but instead of doing what he said, the deficits have continued, become much worse, and will have tripled the national DEBT according to projections. In short, it is the exact opposite of “A New Era of Responsibility.” Unfortunately the actions have not followed the words.
See: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6jJvkkNmR_8 and http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/A_New_Era_of_Responsibility
If my Republican friends believe that increasing our debt by almost $800 billion today and more than $3 trillion over the last five years is the right thing to do, they should be upfront about it. They should explain why they think more debt is good for the economy.
How can the Republican majority in this Congress explain to their constituents that trillions of dollars in new debt is good for our economy? How can they explain that they think it’s fair to force our children, our grandchildren, our great grandchildren to finance this debt through higher taxes. That’s what it will have to be. Why is it right to increase our nation’s dependence on foreign creditors?
They should explain this. Maybe they can convince the public they’re right. I doubt it. Because most Americans know that increasing debt is the last thing we should be doing. After all, I repeat, the Baby Boomers are about to retire. Under the circumstances, any credible economist would tell you we should be reducing debt, not increasing it.Democrats won’t be making argument to supper this legalization, which will weaken our country. Weaken our county. Senator Harry Reid on raising the debt ceiling, 2006
Senator Reid is right here, debt is not the answer and never has been.
To the women carrying signs saying “Keep your Boehner out of my Vagina!” I say, keep your vagina out of my wallet.
If you don’t want other people’s input, don’t expect other people to pay your bills.
After seeing women carrying signs saying “Keep your Boehner out of my Vagina!” it has been a bang up day for “the new civility.” To the women who have the sign, two things:
(1) Keep your vagina out of my wallet, and
(2) we don’t want to be involved with your vagina, which is the point – stop forcing us to fund your vagina.
We don’t want the government in the bedroom, the wallet, or any part of you or anyone else.
Once you invite the government in, it becomes a political issue. The answer is, don’t invite the government in in the first place.
“At a time when you are struggling to pay your bills and meet your responsibilities, the least we can do to meet our responsibilities is produce a budget. That is not too much to ask for. That is what the American people expect of us, that’s what they deserve. You want everybody to act like adults, quit playing games and realize it is not my way or the highway,” President Obama, April 6, 2011.
Given that the Democratic House and Democratic Senate and President failed to produce a 2011 budget at any time between January 1, 2010 and January 2011 – when the Federal Fiscal Year begins October 1 – the President has a lot of nerve to say “produce a budget.” Where was the President in August 2010? September 2010? October 2010? November 2010? December 2010? Where were the calls then to “produce a budget”? I guess the President, House, and Senate preferred to play political games between July 2010 and January 2011, when the Republicans took control of the House.
Plenty of people have short attention spans, but one would expect the President to remember the facts.
After the President’s statement that “I won” on January 23, 2009, the President states today that they have to “realize it is not my way or the highway.” Yet another about face. Does he expect that to be forgotten too?
The meme is that if the Republicans don’t do what the Democrats want, they are to blame for the shutdown. Why is that? Why isn’t it that if the Democrats don’t do what the Republicans want, they are to blame for the shutdown? I guess that just doesn’t play as well in the press.
When the entire basis of your electoral success is promoting living at the expense of someone else and your voters expect you to vote them money from someone else’s income, responsibility is pretty much out the window.
Without serious spending reform, extreme tax levels will be coming from Washington. The choices are to either reign in spending now voluntarily or have it forced upon the United States sometime in the future. Spending and tax reform now are the responsible ways. Government shutdown voluntarily is better than involuntarily shutting it down in a few years. However, the extreme taxers in Washington are more interested in maintaining their own power than responsibility.
Extreme Deficits are coming from Washington without serious spending reform. The extreme spenders in Washington are more interested in saving the power over the rest of us than being responsible. For the extremists in Washington, you know the ones who are more interested in spending other people’s money, their motto is “extremism in the defense of power is no vice.”
The proper view is to maximize freedom for people, not maximize power for extremist power hungry politicians in Washington. Don’t be manipulated into trading your freedom for their power with false promises of safety.