by Jack
We’ve avoided doing something meaningful. Just another tepid response to a crisis that demands more of our Congress people than they are apparently capable of delivering.
“This is a bad bill that made a bad situation worse,” Richard Haas, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations. “The only thing it did was avoiding sending the signal (to the rest of the world) that we’re reckless and out of control,” he added.
Thanks to this grand failure by Congress we can all expect more economic drama coming our way soon. To say that I’m really disappointed with the GOP is an understatement. This was a missed opportunity to do something meaningful and restore some of that lost confidence in the party of Lincoln. Here’s a new year’s prediction, this is going to come back to haunt the GOP in the next election cycle. They lost ground in the November election and they’ve done nothing to enhance their position with the voters for the next election.
Now here’s a few comments from some others that know far more about this situation than we will ever be privileged to know or perhaps understand: Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson, who headed a deficit commission said in effect, this was our chance to do something about reducing our long term fiscal problems and we totally blew it. The Wall Street Journal probably had the best editorial on this. Here’s an excerpt; “”Having been cornered into letting Democrats carry this special-interest slag heap through the House, Speaker John Boehner should from now on cease all backdoor negotiations and pursue regular legislative order. House Republicans should pursue their own agenda and let Mr. Obama and Senate Democrats pursue theirs. Mr. Obama has his tax triumph. Let it be his last,”
The republicans were outplayed by Obama, it’s that simple. They were cornered because they didn’t have the courage or the moxie to stick with their convictions. Now n Obama looks stronger and smarter to his base than ever and that’s not good for the republicans and it’s sure not good for our fiscal future!
Some key republicans can go around crowing that they held out for the best compromise possible, but I see this akin to Neville Chamberlain landing at the Neston Aerodrome, c1938, waving a piece of paper on high and claiming peace in our time! That celebrated document was short lived and it became known as the Munich agreement, signed by Heir Hitler to avoid a world war. Well, you know how that worked out and this appeasement with Heir Obama will fare little better. It will not avert the financial cliff we keep drawing closer too. This is still a pay me now or pay me later situation.
I guess when you reach the end of your rope, just tie a knot and hang on.
We have said it before, but just to repeat, get rid of Boehner he is not equipped with the necessities to fight.
I dunno. You keep on with all this ideological purity … dig in yer heels and refuse to do anything at all … and we’re getting the House back in two years.
Government … the art of compromise … remember?
More pork and bringing home the bacon.
Yup, campaign promisses broken to buy the necessary votes to pass a bill by using billions of our money.
Two articles one recent the other from 2009.
8 Huge Corporate Handouts in the Fiscal Cliff Bill:
“Here are the corporate subsidies in the fiscal cliff bill that you may not know about.
Throughout the months of November and December, a steady stream of corporate CEOs flowed in and out of the White House to discuss the impending fiscal cliff. Many of them, such as Lloyd Blankfein of Goldman Sachs, would then publicly come out and talk about how modest increases of tax rates on the wealthy were reasonable in order to deal with the deficit problem. What wasn’t mentioned is what these leaders wanted, which is what’s known as “tax extenders”, or roughly $205B of tax breaks for corporations.”
http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/8-huge-corporate-handouts-fiscal-cliff-bill
Reform Lite: Obama goes soft on pork
By JONATHAN MARTIN | 3/11/09
“The old bulls won.
Pulled between his campaign rhetoric and his own party’s congressional barons, President Barack Obama largely sided with his Hill allies in unveiling an earmark proposal Wednesday that shies away from any strict crackdown on the practice.
Obama proposed further transparency for the spending goodies prized by many members of Congress – but stopped far short of the kind of serious limits reformers wanted.
“Rather than trying to fine tune a fundamentally flawed process, we should take aggressive steps to prevent unauthorized earmarks,” said Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wisc.), a leading anti-earmark critic on the Hill.
Feingold’s GOP partner – and Obama’s former presidential rival – went further.
“The president’s rhetoric is impressive, but his statement affirms we will continue to do business as usual in Washington,” said Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), who has led the fight against earmarks. “The President could have resolved this issue in one statement – no more unauthorized pork barrel projects – and pledged to use his veto pen to stop them. This is an opportunity missed.”
Steve Ellis, head of the Taxpayers for Common Sense, put it more simply: “Some of his campaign promises have met congressional realities and he didn’t overcome them.”
Obama, in brief remarks to reporters and a bank of cameras in the Old Executive Office Building, sent an unmistakable message down Pennsylvania Avenue that he understands their need for earmark spending.
“I recognize that Congress has the power of the purse,” he said in brief remarks in the Old Executive Office Building that were unmistakably aimed down Pennsylvania Avenue.
“As a former senator, I believe that individual members of Congress understand their districts best. And they should have the ability to respond to the needs of their communities.”
At times, he sounded more like a defender of the old ways than a critic.
“Done right, earmarks have given legislators the opportunity to direct federal money to worthy projects that benefit people in their districts, and that’s why I’ve opposed their outright elimination,” Obama said. “There are times where earmarks may be good on their own, but in the context of a tight budget might not be our highest priority.”
If you were wondering what was in the Fiscal Cliff bill here is a summary.
“Extension of the payroll-tax cut. A temporary, 2-percentage-point cut to the payroll tax expired at midnight on Dec. 31, 2012, and was not renewed. If you make $50,000, that’s an extra $1,000 in taxes you will be paying this year.”
http://www.nationaljournal.com/congress-legacy/here-s-what-s-in-the-fiscal-cliff-deal-20130101
More pork spending, sausage making and bringing home the good old bacon that was shelved last summer but was included in the “Fiscal Cliff” crises bill.
Just another bill that had to be passed without reading it before we could find out what’s in it.
“It’s unclear whether all lawmakers even knew what they were voting for as the Senate reportedly voted in favor of the cliff legislation just three minutes after receiving it.”
“The “fiscal cliff” legislation passed this week included $76 billion in special-interest tax credits for the likes of General Electric, Hollywood and even Captain Morgan. But these subsidies weren’t the fruit of eleventh-hour lobbying conducted on the cliff’s edge — they were crafted back in August in a Senate committee, and they sat dormant until the White House reportedly insisted on them this week.
The Family and Business Tax Cut Certainty Act of 2012, which passed through the Senate Finance Committee in August, was copied and pasted into the fiscal cliff legislation, yielding a victory for biotech companies, wind-turbine-makers, biodiesel producers, film studios — and their lobbyists.”
http://washingtonexaminer.com/tim-carney-how-corporate-tax-credits-got-in-the-cliff-deal/article/2517397#.UOUDsbb4-pG
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/billions-in-special-interest-tax-credits-snuck-into-must-pass-fiscal-cliff-bill/
“Government … the art of compromise … remember?”
How about you remember. What real compromise has come out of the Democrat Party recently? They agreed to raise the level of income to be taxed at a higher rate SLIGHTLY but on spending? Their piddling “compromise” was a sick joke. All of this took weeks to accomplish and still there was NOTHING SERIOUS coming from the progressice Democrat Party, Obama/Reid.
Libby, when compromise is akin to someone putting a gun to your head and asking if you want to be shot 6 times do you compromise and to be shot 3 times and call it a victory?
Yeah, but this is just hyperbolic and inexcusably superficial silliness.
We’re twelve years from Medicare’s insolvency. And it will take at least ten of them to finagle the kind of changes that are necessary.
What pisses me off about you TeaPartiers is … yer all for … “halve funding” … but you won’t get down in the mud and tell the seniors what you will and will not pay for. Come on … we’re talking “death panel” here.
Say how you want it to be.
And I will just sit back and enjoy the screeching and the howling in response … from your parents.
My parents are dead Libby. The one reform that has been sugested by conservatives is means testing so that wealthier medicare recipients pay more of their own expenses. It didn’t require robbing money from medicare to pay for medicaid or force more medicaid patients on the states without full funding or cut payments to docors like O’bummercare either.
Death panels? A definite no. Those decisions should be made freely between docs and their patients.
FREEDOM…WORKS EVERY TIME IT IS TRIED!
You are not answering the question. We cannot make any kind of headway at all until you do … and there is no blaming Congress for that.
Suck it up. Medicare must be restructured, benefits curtailed. Say how.
Actually, I should address the “means testing”. This will work fine for paring down SS. There will be no more living on your private pension and using the SS check to travel. (But prepare to withstand a great deal of squawking and snivelling about it. “Greatest generation”, my aunt fanny.)
It won’t work for Medicare though. Unless you really are willing to tell the elders: “you can’t pay … you are “free” to die.”
We’re all waiting with baited breath here.
Tina: “What real compromise has come out of the Democrat Party recently?”
Well, shifting from a public option to the individual mandate in the healthcare bill was a pretty huge compromise. Not that Republicans cared; they just changed their position overnight, and pretended to have never heard of this unconstitutional individual mandate stuff, no siree, that’s socialism!
“They agreed to raise the level of income to be taxed at a higher rate SLIGHTLY”
“Slightly?” Tina, the level of yearly income for single earners the highest tax bracket is now DOUBLE what it was last week. That’s not “slighlty.” Learn to math.
Libby: “Medicare must be restructured, benefits curtailed. Say how/
We have no idea what might need to be done because there has been too much government interference in the market. I will make some suggestions.
First can Obamacare.
Means test and give individuals vouchers to buy private insurance. Each individual decides what kind of coverage they want/need…a contract between the individual and the insurer (rather than having government be the big expensive, unnecessary, disinterested, and uncaring middle man). That way the individual decides what his options will be from among many different plans and given his familial propensities. We also need to introduce competition by making it possible to keep our insurance wherever we are and purchase across state lines. These would bring costs for healthcare and insurance down and people would better be able to afford both healthcare and insurance. Doctors and hospitals would finally get paid for their services.
If after these reforms problems remain then we should address them INDIVIDUALLY using market forces.
Warren Buffet will always be able to afford more/better care than you and I will. That’s life. I’m not willing to pay the very high premium for government bureaucracy and my medicare and my supplemental and my RX drugs so we can all have the same limited, lousy care…and that’s where we’ve been headed since government stuck its controlling nose into the mix in 1965.
” “Greatest generation”, my aunt fanny.”
They have it all over our generation…a strong work ethic with a whole lot fewer dependent, drugged out and criminal types putting a huge drag on the economy and the system. They also could not see the future programs and bureaucracy that would come once this genie was out of the bottle…that’s on our generation with progressives cheering all the way…dumb sods. It’s one thing to not realize…it’s quite another to see the destruction you have wrought and push for more and more…and more of the same.
“… a contract between the individual and the insurer (rather than having government be the big expensive, unnecessary, disinterested, and uncaring middle man).”
Oh, I much prefer a contract between me and my government. I have some small control (via my elected representatives) over what the government does with my premiums … but nothing at all to say about Aetna’s ratio of services provided to investor return.
Under a single payer plan, I am the investor, and as long as I’m getting services, I’m getting all the “return” on my investment that I require.
Under a single payer plan, anything like “claims administration” becomes unnecesary … saving bundles of money.
Any notions of fiscal prudence require that the private equity is booted from the healthcare industry.
“Warren Buffet will always be able to afford more/better care than you and I will. That’s life.”
No … it needn’t be. And I really would like to hear from you … why you want it that way?
Libby: “Oh, I much prefer a contract between me and my government.”
Great! Good for you. Lets divide the country and make it voluntary and see who is left howling about the quality and availability of health care in 10 to 15 years.
“Under a single payer plan, anything like “claims administration” becomes unnecesary … saving bundles of money.”
What a joke! The big bureaucracy will make it both expensive and miserable.
“No … it needn’t be.”
And there you have it. Libby and her ilk believe that everyone will get the very best care…top notch under a single payer system. This is the ignorance that permeates our population. They believe in fairy tales. Suddenly every doctor will have the same ability and talent and every hospital will be classy with all the latest equipment…we’ll all live like millionaires, healthcare wise.
Libby this is beneath your normal cynical self; you are usually a person who at least has feet on the ground.
People actually believe all of the citizens in Cuba get the same care as Fidel too…you buy that?
“And I really would like to hear from you … why you want it that way?”
Want it that way. That is reality lady. You don’t live in heaven and you will never produce that utopian dream. You can produce a dictatorship and loss of freedom…all because you refuse to be personally responsible. Stupid trade off.