US POLITICS SPRING 2011: Let's just call off this country.

the GOP holds all the cards in the debt limit fight

Letting the US gov't go into effect, ending your US political career and causing your fortune to be worthless. Sure they are going to do that. Riiiiiight.

Letting the US gov't go into effect default

how 'permanent' is permanent in this case? I mean, you can always raise taxes later when you're no longer surrounding by crazy ppl

(making the gigantic leap that 'no longer surrounding by crazy ppl' is any kind of accurate predicition of the immediate, or distant, future of the U.S. political sphere)

we've been waiting for the crazy people to leave since 1980, morbz.

name's not morbz

also Adam it sounds like the way Bush-advisor-guy puts it, it will be Obama's veto that causes the debt ceiling, not the House's bill...dude proposes doing it in a way that could shift the blame onto Obama's shoulders

anyway, i've said it before i'm saying it now and i will say it again ... i worry more about the Blue Dogs, the gabbnebs and the apparatchiks w/n the party and the Beltway insiders/media outside always urging "moderation" than i worry about the crazy people/mad dogs (who don't know any better).

(sorry Drugs)

no prob, apologize to Dr. Morbius :D

Here's another meme that never seems to be challenged by anyone, ever:

"If we're going to resolve our differences and do something meaningful, raising taxes will not be part of that," House Speaker John Boehner declared shortly after his White House meeting.

The Bush tax cuts had sunset provisions that made them expire at the end of 2010. They were not, are not, fucking permanent until the end of time. I don't expect the profit sharing and bonuses my company handed out ten years ago to still be coming to me when the company's doing poorly. Billionaires somehow expect Christmas every day.

Bushco kinda deliberately booby-trapped the tax code 10 years ago, though. so even though they aren't technically permanent (no tax cut/hike really is since Congress can always raise/cut taxes as it sees fit), it's still gonna be a bitch to let the Bushco tax cuts expire (esp. during an election year).

x-post I was just joking about Lincoln. Yeah, a Republican, but totally different time. He's the rare example of a president that both Democrats and Republicans praise, Democrats (for what he did) and Republicans (for, um, because he was a Republican, and because they're too chickenshit to say anything bad about one of the few presidents most Americans can probably name). Did everyone else know that Lincoln is our only president who was also a patent holder?

I love that Obama said this in his speech today (but...)

The fact is, their vision is less about reducing the deficit than it is about changing the basic social compact in America. As Ronald Reagan’s own budget director said, there’s nothing “serious” or “courageous” about this plan. There’s nothing serious about a plan that claims to reduce the deficit by spending a trillion dollars on tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires. There’s nothing courageous about asking for sacrifice from those who can least afford it and don’t have any clout on Capitol Hill. And this is not a vision of the America I know.

When it comes time for Congress to negotiate the details, and Obama is calling for a May meeting of 16 congresspeople, this well-said statement will be weakened or destroyed.

Just catching up here:

http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/04/13/obama.deficits/index.html?hpt=T1&iref=BN1

here's one for the "unusual details" file:

Under the terms of the deal, roughly $20 billion would be taken from discretionary programs while nearly $18 billion would come from what are known as "changes in mandatory programs," or CHIMPS, which involve programs funded for multiyear blocks that don't require annual spending approval by Congress.

gotta love those government acronyms

Please read David Leonhardt's column today in the NYT regarding the considerable income the federal government would make when those Bush tax cuts expire in 2012.

Frum:

ut we must never deceive ourselves: We are arguing for policies with a lot of political negatives attached to them. Which means we have to take some basic political precautions.

In the current Republican mood, however, precautions are for girlie-men. Republicans have succumbed to a strange mood of simultaneous euphoria and paranoia. Republicans have convinced themselves both that: (1) American freedom stands in imminent danger of disappearing into totalitarian night; and (2) that the vast majority of the great and good American people are yearning for a mighty rollback of big government, even at considerable personal sacrifice.

And so Republicans have united around Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-Wis.) proposal that for the first time in modern conservative history explicitly joins a big tax cut for the rich to big cuts in health care spending for virtually everybody else. If this were a tennis game, the Republicans would be placing the ball in exactly the spot on the court where it must never, ever go.

yup read that this morning

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/13/business/economy/13leonhardt.html?_r=1&ref=davidleonhardt

xp

We believe that low rates for high earners accelerate economic growth.

stopped reading

like you might as well tell me you believe the sun revolves around the earth

"Frum" is Greek for "trickle down"

i know a lot about tennis and i'm having trouble getting that reference xxp

he's saying that rallying behind Ryan's budget is the equivalent of lobbing directly to Nadal's backhand on clay

yeah that still makes no sense, needlessly vague lol

why not just say you're throwing pujols a fastball over the plate on a 3-1 count i guess

apparently the political commentariat can only express itself in arcane or worn sports metaphors.

maybe he was so disdainful of having to lower himself to a sports metaphor that he intentionally picked one that most ppl wouldn't care about?

xp lol

Here's a stat I don't think gets enough attention, from the comments in the Times article:

In our supposedly progressive tax system, the highest bracket is set at $370,000 taxable income. The ultra-rich have incomes as high as 2000 times this figure, but they are still at this same bracket.

re: gumming up the works, here's how you do it old school:

http://www.paywithpennies.com/

Greetings. This site is about my culture jamming involving large payments in pennies to organizations that are difficult to deal with. Banks, government agencies, and the occasional retailer have all fallen prey to "penny payments." In today's society, it is all too common to hassle the consumer or the taxpayer. More and more we are asked to "hold," "wait in line," "fill out complex or time consuming forms," or give up confidential information.

"the occasional retailer"

haha

are you joking?

wrng thread. twice! ignore.

watched Obama's deficit bit. pretty dece, if light on specifics. favorite part was when he basically pointed out that he would be one of the elite millionaires who will be getting tax cuts at the expense of meemaw's low medicare premiums. did lol.

wow this guy is fucking awesome: http://www.tbd.com/articles/2011/04/mayor-vincent-gray-protest-budget--58362.html

A day after D.C. mayor Vincent Gray, several councilmembers and several dozen protesters were arrested for staging a protest in front of the Senate, Gray said the arrest was just the beginning of a budget battle between federal lawmakers and the city.

During an appearance on CNN Tuesday, Gray said the city became a "political pawn" between Republicans, Democrats and the White House as they negotiated to avoid a federal government shutdown, the AP reports. He also said that "there's no other jurisdiction in America that would be told they cannot spend their own local tax dollars."

When asked if he would protest again, Gray said, "we will do whatever it takes to get issue in front of people."

Gray also said he was proud that he was arrested along with the other councilmembers.

"I was proud to stand up for my city,” he said. “I was proud to be there with council members, with 41 (protesters) who were detained during the protest.”

good editorial from the NYT this morning too - http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/13/opinion/13wed1.html?ref=global

re: budget

anyway, i've said it before i'm saying it now and i will say it again ... i worry more about the Blue Dogs, the gabbnebs and the apparatchiks w/n the party and the Beltway insiders/media outside always urging "moderation" than i worry about the crazy people/mad dogs (who don't know any better).
― It's Britney, bitch! (Eisbaer), Wednesday, 13 April 2011

funny to see gabbneb become a name for this!

well it hasn't caught on nationally yet

Don't know if Dan Savage is going to care enough and 'frothy mixture of compromise and concession to powerful interests' just doesn't have the same ring to it

you know it's weird, all that time and i still can't really think of what gabbneb believed one way or another on any issue.

maybe that's the point everyone is making, but i honestly can't remember him saying one thing about policy, either in a krugman/reich direction or a third way/clintonoid direction or anything. plenty about the game tho.

he was damn good on country music recommendations though!

huh? I completely missed that about him.

He was one of the guys who persuaded me to check out Strait and Paisley years ago.

he understands Flyover Country!

wow this guy is fucking awesome: http://www.tbd.com/articles/2011/04/mayor-vincent-gray-protest-budget--58362.html

A day after D.C. mayor Vincent Gray, several councilmembers and several dozen protesters were arrested...
― k3vin k., Wednesday, April 13, 2011 10:25 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark

he isn't awesome really but i do love that of the various campaign promises he's broken one of them is "i will not get arrested protesting for dc statehood'

yeah i don't know anything else about him but doing that was awesome

yeah no doubt that made me proud

/itechnicallyliveinvirginiabutstill

gabbneb was all about Dems winning elections by being Rethuglican Lite, that leads to policy in short order.

^^^ morbz is da winner.

Dunno if you guys already mentioned the imminent defeat of the Texas bill allowing concealed car on college campuses, but hoorah for the status quo for once? http://www.fairwarning.org/2011/04/guns-in-college-classrooms-not-in-texas-afer-campuses-fire-back/

lol @ "concealed car"