"Obama Calls Out Republicans, But Nobody's Home"

[ayabe]

Well...that's certainly an interesting perspective. If it's not HIS spending...who's spending is it?

Your error is in attributing 100% of the deficit to Obama, you know it's disingenuous. If Obama spent zero deniro, we'd still be swimming in red.

"The story of today’s deficits starts in January 2001, as President Bill Clinton was leaving office. The Congressional Budget Office estimated then that the government would run an average annual surplus of more than $800 billion a year from 2009 to 2012. Today, the government is expected to run a $1.2 trillion annual deficit in those years.

You can think of that roughly $2 trillion swing as coming from four broad categories: the business cycle, President George W. Bush’s policies, policies from the Bush years that are scheduled to expire but that Mr. Obama has chosen to extend, and new policies proposed by Mr. Obama.

The first category — the business cycle — accounts for 37 percent of the $2 trillion swing. It’s a reflection of the fact that both the 2001 recession and the current one reduced tax revenue, required more spending on safety-net programs and changed economists’ assumptions about how much in taxes the government would collect in future years.

About 33 percent of the swing stems from new legislation signed by Mr. Bush. That legislation, like his tax cuts and the Medicare prescription drug benefit, not only continue to cost the government but have also increased interest payments on the national debt.

Mr. Obama’s main contribution to the deficit is his extension of several Bush policies, like the Iraq war and tax cuts for households making less than $250,000. Such policies — together with the Wall Street bailout, which was signed by Mr. Bush and supported by Mr. Obama — account for 20 percent of the swing."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/10/business/economy/10leonhardt.html?_r=1

This one is actually a little nicer to the former POTUS:

http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2009/08/deficit_numbers.html

"President Obama’s policies have also contributed to the federal deficit—but only 16 percent of the projected budget deterioration for 2009 and 2010 are attributable to those policies. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, designed to help bring the economy out of the recession is, by far, the largest single additional public spending under this administration."
******************************************************************

Just be honest, that's all I'm asking.

 

[werepossum]

This argument is then premised on the assumption that there is no common ground between the two major political parties? I am following your line of argument, right? So let's take this to its logical conclusion.

Let's assume the republicans retake Congress and the WH at some point in time. Since there is no common ground between the two parties, and according to you, all opposition is truly principled and not political, then the dems will be duty bound to fillibuster every single piece of proposed republican legislation?

Are you really certain that all opposition is on grounds of principle here? Is the idea of a tax credit for small businesses another Bolshevik plot that republicans are duty bound (in all their high moral piety) to oppose? How about setting up a bi-partisan commission on deficit reduction? A bill co-sponsored by 7 republicans who backed out and didn't vote for their own bill when the time came. Was that too another Bolshevik plot which the republicans, valient protectors of the Holy Free Market with zero interest in getting re-elected by causing the opposing party to fail, of course, were duty bound to oppose?

- wolf

Craig? Have you take over Wolf's mind, or merely his computer? Or is this reductio ad absurdum?

Of course there is common ground between the political parties. There is damned little between Republicans and the current Democrat leadership triad, though. I expect that Republicans can agree on some issues such as tax cuts, but that depends on what else makes its way into the bill AND whether they have time to digest the bill. Even the staunchest sponsor of a bill can find it so loaded with pork and/or poison pills that he must abandon it. What we have seen so far from this Congress has been bills not available to read before voting, phantom amendments that change the bill between committee and Senate vote, amendments that the Democrat sponsor withdrew rather than have them read, even in one case a bill that hadn't even been finished when it was being voted on - the Dems had to prolong the vote when the Pubbies refused to dispense with the reading to allow the bill to be finished so that it could be read. Third world banana republics have nothing on this Congress. You ask if all opposition is on moral grounds - I'd be quite surprised if it was. I'd be quite surprised if all of anything in D.C. is done on moral grounds. But with this Congress I want my Representative and Senators to assume any bill or amendment proposed is a bad idea unless they have the time to read it, consider all the ramifications, and have it priced by at least two reputable and independent sources.

Come to think of it, I want them to do that with ANY Congress.

 

[PokerGuy]

Let's call it 80/20 for arguments sake, so where's the 20% of the GOP who wants to solve problems?

It takes both parties to tango with real ideas, not 10 page outlines which do nothing.

The fact that none of the R's will vote for the controversial legislation should give a good indication of how far left the Pelosi/Reid/Obama triad are trying to push. If they had a centrist approach they would have had at least some GOP'ers joining them.

 

[woolfe9999]

Your error is in attributing 100% of the deficit to Obama, you know it's disingenuous. If Obama spent zero deniro, we'd still be swimming in red.

"The story of today’s deficits starts in January 2001, as President Bill Clinton was leaving office. The Congressional Budget Office estimated then that the government would run an average annual surplus of more than $800 billion a year from 2009 to 2012. Today, the government is expected to run a $1.2 trillion annual deficit in those years.

You can think of that roughly $2 trillion swing as coming from four broad categories: the business cycle, President George W. Bush’s policies, policies from the Bush years that are scheduled to expire but that Mr. Obama has chosen to extend, and new policies proposed by Mr. Obama.

The first category — the business cycle — accounts for 37 percent of the $2 trillion swing. It’s a reflection of the fact that both the 2001 recession and the current one reduced tax revenue, required more spending on safety-net programs and changed economists’ assumptions about how much in taxes the government would collect in future years.

About 33 percent of the swing stems from new legislation signed by Mr. Bush. That legislation, like his tax cuts and the Medicare prescription drug benefit, not only continue to cost the government but have also increased interest payments on the national debt.

Mr. Obama’s main contribution to the deficit is his extension of several Bush policies, like the Iraq war and tax cuts for households making less than $250,000. Such policies — together with the Wall Street bailout, which was signed by Mr. Bush and supported by Mr. Obama — account for 20 percent of the swing."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/10/business/economy/10leonhardt.html?_r=1

This one is actually a little nicer to the former POTUS:

http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2009/08/deficit_numbers.html

"President Obama’s policies have also contributed to the federal deficit—but only 16 percent of the projected budget deterioration for 2009 and 2010 are attributable to those policies. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, designed to help bring the economy out of the recession is, by far, the largest single additional public spending under this administration."
******************************************************************

Just be honest, that's all I'm asking.

Yup, this is all just math. It isn't a matter of opinion or interpretation. But they're not going to listen.

What I want to know is why it's so unfair to point to an inherited recession and inherited fiscally irresponsible policies now, but it was OK for the republicans to blame JIMMY FREAKING CARTER for the financial meltdown in 9/2008:

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-s...er-more-blame-financial-crisis-bush-or-mccain

No, it wasn't Bush's fault. It was a democrat who left the White House 28 years before.

But the statute of limitations for blaming Bush for anything is now what, 12 months?

Give me a break.

- wolf

 

[ayabe]

The fact that none of the R's will vote for the controversial legislation should give a good indication of how far left the Pelosi/Reid/Obama triad are trying to push. If they had a centrist approach they would have had at least some GOP'ers joining them.

There's nothing leftist in any element of the HC bill, the left wants a public option/single payer, not to force the uninsured to buy insurance that they can't afford from the same people that are screwing the rest of us.

You can keep repeating that people are only rejecting the leftist agenda, but the left hates the current bill even more than you do. It went from "not happy" to "outright incensed", we're rewarding the insurance companies and the congressmen they support, that's all.

Again, this rejection of the leftist ideal meme is just a smokescreen and an excuse to defend the status quo.

 

[ayabe]

Let's not forget that Reagan was still blaming Carter for the economy 2-3 years into his first term and we're facing bigger problems now than we had in the 80's.

 

[PokerGuy]

There's nothing leftist in any element of the HC bill, the left wants a public option/single payer, not to force the uninsured to buy insurance that they can't afford from the same people that are screwing the rest of us.

You can keep repeating that people are only rejecting the leftist agenda, but the left hates the current bill even more than you do. It went from "not happy" to "outright incensed", we're rewarding the insurance companies and the congressmen they support, that's all.

Again, this rejection of the leftist ideal meme is just a smokescreen and an excuse to defend the status quo.

Hmm.. and yet, when it came time to vote on the credit card reform act they were able to vote together and get it done. Strange, considering you keep saying the R's will only vote "no". The truth is that they will only vote "no" on stupid democrat ideas, and that's how it should be.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

Your error is in attributing 100% of the deficit to Obama, you know it's disingenuous. If Obama spent zero deniro, we'd still be swimming in red.

"The story of today’s deficits starts in January 2001, as President Bill Clinton was leaving office. The Congressional Budget Office estimated then that the government would run an average annual surplus of more than $800 billion a year from 2009 to 2012. Today, the government is expected to run a $1.2 trillion annual deficit in those years.

You can think of that roughly $2 trillion swing as coming from four broad categories: the business cycle, President George W. Bush’s policies, policies from the Bush years that are scheduled to expire but that Mr. Obama has chosen to extend, and new policies proposed by Mr. Obama.

The first category — the business cycle — accounts for 37 percent of the $2 trillion swing. It’s a reflection of the fact that both the 2001 recession and the current one reduced tax revenue, required more spending on safety-net programs and changed economists’ assumptions about how much in taxes the government would collect in future years.

About 33 percent of the swing stems from new legislation signed by Mr. Bush. That legislation, like his tax cuts and the Medicare prescription drug benefit, not only continue to cost the government but have also increased interest payments on the national debt.

Mr. Obama’s main contribution to the deficit is his extension of several Bush policies, like the Iraq war and tax cuts for households making less than $250,000. Such policies — together with the Wall Street bailout, which was signed by Mr. Bush and supported by Mr. Obama — account for 20 percent of the swing."

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/10/business/economy/10leonhardt.html?_r=1

This one is actually a little nicer to the former POTUS:

http://www.americanprogress.org/issues/2009/08/deficit_numbers.html

"President Obama’s policies have also contributed to the federal deficit—but only 16 percent of the projected budget deterioration for 2009 and 2010 are attributable to those policies. The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, designed to help bring the economy out of the recession is, by far, the largest single additional public spending under this administration."
******************************************************************

Just be honest, that's all I'm asking.

So what I'm hearing is that the current administration owns only 16% of the deficit and we can chalk up the other 84% to all previous administrations. It's curious why you don't include 2 years of congressional control prior to Obama...but I expect that kind of spin and won't argue about who's being 'honest' here. But wait a second...doesn't our current super-majority administration have a say so regarding whether or not to continue spending and or continuing policies authorized by previous administrations? And, by not doing so...are they not also complicit?

If Dems think Bush's Medicare prescription drug benefit plan was excessive...they have they power to scale it back or eliminate this spending. If they think taxes are too low...they have the power to raise taxes. If they think the Iraq and Afghanistan wars are too expensive...they have the power to withdraw from these conflicts saving tons of money and many lives to boot.

Our current administration owns these budget deficits...not Bush, Clinton or whoever. If our current administration doesn't like having the responsibility they should have never run for office....it's their job to effectively deal with these problems rather than blaming others. If they don't take ownership...who does? Our current administration is so damn intent on pointing figures at everyone but themselves.

And I'm the 'disingenuous' one of questionable honesty? Please.

 

[woolfe9999]

Craig? Have you take over Wolf's mind, or merely his computer? Or is this reductio ad absurdum?

Of course there is common ground between the political parties. There is damned little between Republicans and the current Democrat leadership triad, though. I expect that Republicans can agree on some issues such as tax cuts, but that depends on what else makes its way into the bill AND whether they have time to digest the bill. Even the staunchest sponsor of a bill can find it so loaded with pork and/or poison pills that he must abandon it. What we have seen so far from this Congress has been bills not available to read before voting, phantom amendments that change the bill between committee and Senate vote, amendments that the Democrat sponsor withdrew rather than have them read, even in one case a bill that hadn't even been finished when it was being voted on - the Dems had to prolong the vote when the Pubbies refused to dispense with the reading to allow the bill to be finished so that it could be read. Third world banana republics have nothing on this Congress. You ask if all opposition is on moral grounds - I'd be quite surprised if it was. I'd be quite surprised if all of anything in D.C. is done on moral grounds. But with this Congress I want my Representative and Senators to assume any bill or amendment proposed is a bad idea unless they have the time to read it, consider all the ramifications, and have it priced by at least two reputable and independent sources.

Come to think of it, I want them to do that with ANY Congress.

So it isn't so much about substance now, it's mostly about process? Mmm hmm.

The tax credit to small business idea I mentioned they jumped on immediately disagreeing with it after it was mentioned in a speech, before it was put into a bill (which is coming later today I believe).

The idea of a bi-partisan commission on deficit reduction was co-sponsored by dems and reps, and the rep sponsors pulled out and voted against it, even though the bill hadn't been changed. They can't agree on a bipartisan commission on deficit reduction? I thought they were in favor of being bi-partisan, and in favor of deficit reduction.

Look, you can make whatever assumptions you want about republican motives. However, how many hundreds of fillibusters on every issue under the sun does it take before it starts to become naive to attribute a motive of pure ideological principle to their actions? I'm afraid that your own disappointment with the dems and Obama is causing you to give way too much credit to the opposition party, the type of credit that assumes they do not behave like politicians tend to behave - to jockey for votes in an upcoming election.

- wolf

 

[Craig234]

Hmm.. and yet, when it came time to vote on the credit card reform act they were able to vote together and get it done. Strange, considering you keep saying the R's will only vote "no". The truth is that they will only vote "no" on stupid democrat ideas, and that's how it should be.

What pathetic logic. "Hey, I found something the Repubs voted no on I think was a bad idea, this proves everything the Repubs vote no on is a bad idea!"

The CC bill passed with Repubs because it's one of those 'the public will kill you if you vote no' bills, and they still got concessions like a 9 month delay until it took effect and no rate caps.

Concessions directly won by the credit card industry. More terrible provisions worth opposing, how terrible had it taken effect sooner. Now the Repubs are trying to kill the consumer protection agency.

 

[ayabe]

So what I'm hearing is that the current administration owns only 16% of the deficit and we can chalk up the other 84% to all previous administrations. It's curious why you don't include 2 years of congressional control prior to Obama...but I expect that kind of spin and won't argue about who's being 'honest' here. But wait a second...doesn't our current super-majority administration have a say so regarding whether or not to continue spending and or continuing policies authorized by previous administrations? And, by not doing so are they not also complicit.

If Dems think Bush's Medicare prescription drug benefit plan was excessive...they have they power to scale it back or eliminate this spending. If they think taxes are too low...they have the power to raise taxes. If they think the Iraq and Afghanistan wars are too expensive...they have the power to withdraw from these conflicts saving tons on money and many lives to boot.

Our current administration owns these budget deficits...not Bush, Clinton or whoever. If our current administration doesn't like having the responsibility they should have never run for office....it's their job to effectively deal with these problems rather than blaming others. If they don't take ownership...who does? Liberals are so damn intent on pointing figures at everyone but themselves.

And I'm the 'disingenuous' one of questionable honesty? Please.

Again, this is about Obama and HIS reckless spending. You still haven't come up with anything, I had to do that FOR YOU and now you're the one spinning away. The numbers do not lie, please come up with some different numbers from your source of choice, I will read them I promise.

Don't need to include anything relating to 2006-2008, most of these problems predate that, both wars, tax cuts, Medicare happened before that.

Are you high? Repeal Part D? They'd be blood on the streets. Neither party would support that.

Raising taxes? It'll happen and there will be more crying about that than any concern over the deficit.

Iraq - getting out.

Afghanistan - can't get out. Neither party would support that either.

You act like anything is possible by just waving the magic wand, it doesn't work that way. It also kind of sucks that we have to include the true cost of the wars in the budget now, funny how that works.

 

[werepossum]

So it isn't so much about substance now, it's mostly about process? Mmm hmm.

The tax credit to small business idea I mentioned they jumped on immediately disagreeing with it after it was mentioned in a speech, before it was put into a bill (which is coming later today I believe).

The idea of a bi-partisan commission on deficit reduction was co-sponsored by dems and reps, and the rep sponsors pulled out and voted against it, even though the bill hadn't been changed. They can't agree on a bipartisan commission on deficit reduction? I thought they were in favor of being bi-partisan, and in favor of deficit reduction.

Look, you can make whatever assumptions you want about republican motives. However, how many hundreds of fillibusters on every issue under the sun does it take before it starts to become naive to attribute a motive of pure ideological principle to their actions? I'm afraid that your own disappointment with the dems and Obama is causing you to give way too much credit to the opposition party, the type of credit that assumes they do not behave like politicians tend to behave - to jockey for votes in an upcoming election.

- wolf

I agree that the Pubbies should support tax breaks for small business, assuming this isn't bundled with tax increases to "pay for it". Typically it's the left that opposes tax cuts, though, even if Obama suggests them. I think the prevailing idea on the bi-partisan deficit reduction commission is that it is simply something to give Democrats cover to raise taxes, since the recommendation came from a "bi-partisan commission" even if not a single Republican endorsed its Democrat majority recommendation. I would be extremely cautious supporting it. But this could easily be simply politics as well.

I tend to support the Republicans in this behavior as they are doing what I want done, behaving fiscally responsible as they did under Clinton 1995 - 2000. I like this much more than their behavior under Bush, 2001 - 2006, when they spent like Democrats. This is, after all, what Republicans supposedly stand for, smaller government and lower spending. So I am predisposed to give them credit for principle which may or may not be due.

And not voting for things you haven't read isn't process, it's the essence of substance for either party.

 

[Robor]

Lol...I heard that a million times when Bush was in office. The shoe is on the other foot....or do you have trouble remembering?

Speaking of remembering... Who broke their own record for filibusters?

 

[Robor]

Hmm.. and yet, when it came time to vote on the credit card reform act they were able to vote together and get it done. Strange, considering you keep saying the R's will only vote "no". The truth is that they will only vote "no" on stupid democrat ideas, and that's how it should be.

The CC reform act is a watered down POS. The banks are still fvcking over people - just in a different way. Frontline had a great show on this.

Here's a good one... My wife got a CC offer in the mail today. It was a 'Visa Black Card'. It offered 0% interest until 2/2011. The kicker? The annual fee was $495 for the primary cardholder and $195 for the secondary. Of course, there were all of the $39 late and over-the-limit fees included in that great deal. I wrote 'Fvck Off' on the offer and mailed it back in their pre-paid envelope.

 

[Dari]

Is that ever an understatement.





Careful.

You may expose The Right for the duplicitous hypocrites they are ...

The Cons are committed to a 'race to the bottom' in negative opposition to the majority. They have no interest in solving problems, or an interest in a successful rebound from the Bush Disaster.

I particularly like their opposition to banking and immigration reforms, and their commitment to spending $1.6 trillion over the next ten years in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Without paying for it. Of course.






--

Dude, you are soooo radical with your one-liners...

 

[heyheybooboo]

I'm the 'disingenuous' one of questionable honesty?

Yup.





--

 

[Darwin333]

You mean like the ~$300B in tax cuts that was rolled into ARRA?

Guess how many republicans voted for it.

I am going out on a huge limb here but could it possibly just maybe sorta kinda have something to do with the other $487,000,000,000 that they might have disagreed with?

I have no love for the Republicans but just because you throw something you think they should like into a damn near $1 trillion bill doesn't mean they should disregard the damn near half a trillion worth of stuff they may or may not like.

Personally, I think the stimulus bill was a huge fuckup. We could be building a new modern power grid with that money that would provide TONS of real jobs (no bullshit saved or created that you can't really get an accurate count on), it would have paved the way for renewable energy to become feasible in the near term, replaced a dilapidated and crumbling electrical infrastructure and most of the money would have stayed right here in the US.

I do concur that he probably wouldn't have gotten any Republican support regardless but at least we would have something to show for our debt and its kinda hard for anyone to argue that we don't need it. Instead we got a bunch of special interest bullshit, a few bones thrown at the taxpayers (a few of which come with a severe boning later) and a bunch of other bullshit with very questionable results.

 

[Ozoned]

I read the Time magazine column, click link:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20100204/us_time/08599195899600 : which says that Mr

Obama is reaching out to the Republcians to get them involved with running the government and has not gotten a positive response.

Do you think the GOP will work with Mr Obama? Do they have more to gain from voting no on everything?

What do you think?

I think that if Obama will do things that he can control, things that help the little guy, he won't need to reach out to the GOP because they will be tripping over themselves to get in line.

The stuff going on now with toyota is a good example. Toyota, with very strong profit trying to squeeze some more out at the expense of the little guy. Toyota is getting bitch slapped. He can do a lot of stuff like this and gain a lot of favor with people at the bottom of food chain.

 

[theeedude]

If GOP had a clue about how to run the government, they would have demonstrated it 2000-2006. All they can do is heckle then Clinton and now Obama.

 

[DietDrThunder]

Here is my opinion my ATOT friends. The debates here as well as in D.C. are more like name calling than actual debates. It seems like the rift between the Reps and Dems is at its 2nd greatest in US history. I don't see either side in D.C. is either willing or able to compromise, and most don't like where the other side is taking this country. Maybe it is time we seriously nudge our elected officials to work on peaceful means of parting ways. The country is already deeply divided. Why not work to make it official? Have the voters decide whether to split the country, split the debt, split the assets (military and everything else), and decide if they want to live in the Progressive America or the Conservative America.

Maybe the old saying "Together we stand, divided we fall" is no longer valid.

 

[spidey07]

Here is my opinion my ATOT friends. The debates here as well as in D.C. are more like name calling than actual debates. It seems like the rift between the Reps and Dems is at its 2nd greatest in US history. I don't see either side in D.C. is either willing or able to compromise, and most don't like where the other side is taking this country. Maybe it is time we seriously nudge our elected officials to work on peaceful means of parting ways. The country is already deeply divided. Why not work to make it official. Have the voters decide whether to split the country, split the debt, split the assets (military and everything else), and decide if they want to live in the Progressive America or the Conservative America.

While i feel and understand your sentiment and can somewhat agree. We are the United STATES of America.

Yes, the country is deeply divided and Obama is only forcing that wedge further (Alinski's plan). Let's take this country back in November.

 

[JEDIYoda]

Republicans will work with him where they have common goals. So far that has not been the case. Only idiots who want to be praised in MSM would work with the opposition when it wants to destroy so much of what they value.

I totally agree....
The Democrats want to turn what Bush gave them around and find solution to problems that the republican value???? huh....

 

[Patranus]

Wow, a blog post by Joe Klein

 

[First]

That's believable.

 

[nobodyknows]

Let's not forget that Reagan was still blaming Carter for the economy 2-3 years into his first term and we're facing bigger problems now than we had in the 80's.

This is nothing as compared to the 80's. Imagine if interest rates were 16% or even higher.