Shocking!

BREAKING: Reports say the president just offered to cut Social Security benefits, if Republicans agree not to let the U.S. default on its debts.¹

It’s his offering to the out-of-control Republicans, who are threatening to crash the economy in order to ram through savage cuts to crucial government programs.

 

It’s sickening to think that millions of seniors would have to sacrifice in order to appease Republican hostage-takers. 

 

Especially because every poll shows overwhelming majority of Americans support raising taxes on the rich and protecting Social Security and Medicare.²

 

But there’s still time to stop this “bargain” in its tracks. Whatever deal the president offers Republicans will need Democratic votes to pass Congress. So we need Democrats in Congress to stand strong and oppose any benefit cuts to Social Security and Medicare.

 

Can you sign our emergency petition to Democrats in Congress and tell them to stand up and tell the President they will not vote for Social Security and Medicare benefits cuts?

 

Add your name here.

 

President Obama is making a huge mistake that will cost our country dearly.

 

This is one of those moments where we either stand up and demand that the Democrats in Congress show a real spine. Or we sit back and watch the Republicans destroy decades’ worth of progress.

 

Will you help send a message demanding that Democrats draw a clear line in the sand: no cuts to Social Security and Medicare benefits? 

Click here to add your name:

http://pol.moveon.org/bad_debt_deal/

 

Thanks for all you do.

–Daniel, Wes, Elena, Julia, and the rest of the team

Source: 

1. “In Debt Talks, Obama Offers Social Security Cuts,” The Washington Post, July 6, 2011  
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=210871&id=28665-17654405-lAYvFTx&t=5

2. “Poll: To Reduce Deficit, Most Americans say Tax the Rich More,” CBS News, January 3, 2011 
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-503544_162-20027036-503544.html

Why I like the tax deal

I really like this tax deal for two reasons:

1. After running for 2 years on the platform of cutting the deficit, the absolute FIRST thing the Republicans did (just 30 days after the election) was to cut $100 billion in tax revenue with no corresponding cut in spending. (In fact, the same bill has an increase in spending).  Turns out they were full of crap – go figure.  Thanks for immediately showing us how you would add to the federal deficit by giving money to the richest among us!  $700 billion in TARP spending for wall street bankers and another $100 billion for the richest 2%?  (Many who probably also received massive paychecks and golden parachutes from TARP).  That’s getting up near a trillion dollars for bankers and the rich in just 24 months!  So much for “real America” and “Joe the plumber”. While the Republicans are saying their “top concern” for the next 2 years is to block Obama (not to cut deficits, or to faithfully represent the voters, but to continue being the party of “No”), Obama is keeping his door open and working with them.  Obama removed the Public Option at their demands (which now all my Republican friends are saying “Why can’t we buy the same insurance they get to buy. That’s a bunch of crap, we should be able to get what they can buy“.  Ahh, the uninformed Beck-heads who didn’t even know what “public option” meant…), and now he’s working with them on their tax demands. 
2. Obama’s decision to work with Republicans and meet their requests is being viewed very favorably by independents. By not taking a hard Democrat stance, he’s shown them he’s a centrist and a moderate who will represent the broader spectrum of voters even when he personally doesn’t agree. By meeting the Republicans, he’s disarming them and winning over the moderate independents. He’s already got the Democratic support (in terms of 2012), now he’s picking up independents. And who decides elections? Not Democrats or Republicans….it’s the independents!

This move is neither stimulating jobs, nor reducing the deficit.  It has almost no value. It only helps those who earn a million dollars or more every 4 years.  But that’s what I like about it – the fiscal irresponsibility moves independents to the left.  Good stuff for 2012!   

In September, the CBO found that those $100 billion in tax cuts on income above $250,000 would reduce unemployment in 2011 and 2012 by…somewhere between 0.1% and nothing at all.

 Clearly, $100 billion for somewhere between zero and 100,000 jobs is pretty poor performance. Giving more government money to rich people just isn’t a good way to get people working. http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2010/12/tax_cut_deal

  
The deal doesn’t include spending cuts to offset the expiration of lower tax rates. That means the government will have to borrow to pay for the plan. There are those who have doubts about how much the plan will boost the economy in the short term, especially if it adds to worries about bigger deficits and higher taxes in two years.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/40551543/ns/business-eye_on_the_economy/

  

 

“The top 2% of wage earners like me  are going to get their Bush tax cuts extended.
…I cannot wait for the tax rate to stay exactly the same, so I can create all those jobs.”
           — Stephen Colbert, 12/06/10



Fiscally Unsound, Part II

2003
Bush budget shows record deficit, billions in tax cuts

• Vowing to be a good steward of the public’s money, President Bush sent to Capitol Hill Monday a $2.2 trillion 2004 budget that calls for hundreds of billions in tax cuts and shows a record federal deficit of $304 billion
• The proposed military spending increase is 4.2 percent, or a $15 billion boost to $380 billion. But the budget does not provide any funding for a potential war with Iraq, which has been estimated at $60 billion or higher.
  http://www.cnn.com/2003/ALLPOLITICS/02/03/bush.budget/

2004
White House Predicts 2004 Deficit Of $445 Billion — the Biggest Ever

• The White House forecast yesterday that the U.S. budget deficit for this year will be a highest-ever $445 billion, lower than the administration previously predicted but nearly 20 percent larger than last year’s record shortfall.
  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A27211-2004Jul30.html
• The Congressional Budget Office predicted on Monday that the federal budget deficit would hit a record this year and that accumulated deficits over the next decade would total $1.9 trillion.
• ‘It is becoming clear that the Bush administration has no plan to eliminate these deficits,’ said John M. Spratt Jr. (House Budget Committee).
  http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9403E0DA1438F934A15752C0A9629C8B63

2005
Record ’05 Deficit Forecast

• Additional war spending this year will push the federal deficit to a record for fiscal 2005.
• Bush has pledged to cut the budget deficit in half by 2009.
• “Having racked up three of the largest deficits in history, the Bush administration is years away from reducing the deficit by half, or by any appreciable amount,” said Rep. John M. Spratt Jr. (S.C.)
• In a separate briefing, CBO Director Douglas Holtz-Eakin said tax cuts and spending enacted by Congress last year will contribute $504 billion to the government’s overall forecast debt between 2005 and 2014.
  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A35029-2005Jan25.html

2006
Record US trade deficit in 2006

• The US deficit jumped by 8.2% to a record $856.6 billion in 2006, official figures show.
• The rise is the fifth consecutive annual increase in the deficit.
• The deficit for 2006 meant the US was borrowing more than $2bn daily to finance its trade gap.
  http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/6450565.stm
• The United States ran a record trade deficit in 2006 for the fifth consecutive year, the Census Bureau reported Tuesday.
  http://www.iht.com/articles/2007/02/13/business/trade.php

2007
U.S. trade deficit declined in 2007 after setting records for five consecutive years.

• The trade deficit with China continued to rise, jumping by 10.2 percent to $256.3 billion. That was the largest gap ever recorded with a single country, as Chinese imports surged despite a string of high-profile recalls of tainted products.
• Even with the lower overall deficit, the imbalance is still nearly double what it was in 2001, the year Mr. Bush took office.
  http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/02/14/business/main3830222.shtml

2008
Bush Budget Could Shoot Government Spending to $3 Trillion

• Bush’s submission is already absorbing [criticism] castigating him for inheriting a government in surplus and leaving Washington with a budget deficit that is likely to break the record set four years ago, once war bills and the cost of tax rebate checks are factored in.
• “The next president is going to inherit a colossal mess because of the fiscal irresponsibility of this president,” Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., chairman of the Budget Committee said Saturday. http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,327887,00.html
• President Bush will present a budget tomorrow that would slow the growth of Medicare (in the face of retiring Baby Boomers) and cut or eliminate an array of domestic programs but still anticipates a flood of new red ink that will rival the record deficits of his first term, administration officials said.
• The more than $3 trillion federal budget for 2009 that Bush will unveil is his final opportunity to shape the priorities of the government before leaving office a year from now.
• The new budget underscores Bush’s inability to get control of spending over the course of his seven-year tenure.
• Bush inherited a very large surplus, but his legacy from a fiscal point of view is having blown an opportunity to ameliorate the long-run budget deficits.

 

Part I: https://goearth.wordpress.com/2008/05/27/fiscally-unsound/

 
 

Says GOP, “Balanced Budget? Psshh…that’s for Democrats!”

WASHINGTON – The Bush administration, moving to cope with soaring budget deficits, says it is bringing back the one-year Treasury bill that it stopped issuing seven years ago when the budget was in surplus. (7 years ago…budget surplus….Democrats…). 

The Repblicans have year after year spent more money than they have in their budget.  And borrowing from Commies?? These Republicans can’t say they’re “Reagan” followers – Ron would never have put us so far in debt to Communist governments and Arab dictators.  (He’d still put us deeply into debt with non-communist countries, of course).

The title “Fiscally Responsible” is now awarded to the Democrats. 

 
Source: http://zfacts.com/p/318.html