Raising the US debt ceiling

punked · July 12, 2011

I'm not sure what you're talking about. America spends more money per student, and more money per patient than any other country in the world.

Only if you count private dollars with government dollars.

Shady · July 12, 2011

Only if you count private dollars with government dollars.

I know, I know, you'd prefer that private money be confiscated first by the government, and then sifted through a massive bureaucracy. I get it.

GH's assertion of there being "no money for anything else" is completely assinine. The current budget is 4 trillion dollars. Of which, only 600 billion is for defense. How can anyone with half a brain comment on a lack of money for anything else. Unbelievable. :rolleyes:

punked · July 12, 2011

I know, I know, you'd prefer that private money be confiscated first by the government, and then sifted through a massive bureaucracy. I get it.

GH's assertion of there being "no money for anything else" is completely assinine. The current budget is 4 trillion dollars. Of which, only 600 billion is for defense. How can anyone with half a brain comment on a lack of money for anything else. Unbelievable.

Just pointing out the US is the richest nation in the world until you ask someone to pay taxes then no one has any money "and will move out of the country if you make them pay 1-2% more." or so you claim.

BTW I like the 600 billion dollar number you pulled right out your butt it is always nice to see you make up numbers Shady. I also like how you inflated a 3.8 trillion dollar budget to a 4 trillion dollar one. Look everyone I found how save 200 billion right there.

Edited July 12, 2011 by punked

pinko · July 12, 2011

I know, I know, you'd prefer that private money be confiscated first by the government, and then sifted through a massive bureaucracy. I get it.

GH's assertion of there being "no money for anything else" is completely assinine. The current budget is 4 trillion dollars. Of which, only 600 billion is for defense. How can anyone with half a brain comment on a lack of money for anything else. Unbelievable.

What if the House sends a budget bill to the President and he vetoes it. What then?

punked · July 12, 2011

Grover Norquist just said he likes the idea Shady is pretending the Republicans wont use. That is just let Obama raise the ceiling with out getting anything. Guess what? The Republicans are falling in line I wonder when Shady starts defending it. Looks to me like he hasn't found the talking points. I bet he will though.

Shady I could give you talking points right now. "It isn't the Republicans who control the house who are raising the ceiling it is the minority Democrats and the devil who are doing it." got it Shady? Now just repeat it.

pinko · July 12, 2011

Surely Shady isn't suggesting that the Republicans want to create a worldwide crisis causing a devalued American dollar, increased interest rates and further devastation to the people of the United States.

bush_cheney2004 · July 12, 2011

Surely Shady isn't suggesting that the Republicans want to create a worldwide crisis causing a devalued American dollar, increased interest rates and further devastation to the people of the United States.

Increased interest rates would be welcomed by many, including seniors with savings instruments. The American dollar is already being devalued...by design.

pinko · July 12, 2011

Increased interest rates would be welcomed by many, including seniors with savings instruments. The American dollar is already being devalued...by design.

Perhaps some of the more affluent seniors. However many more seniors aren't in this category and have little or no savings.

punked · July 12, 2011

Spokesman for House leader says the house leader is support the Senate leader right now. Looks like Shady is way behind the times now.

pinko · July 12, 2011

Once interest rises credit will tighten. Small businesses relying on credit to keep their businesses from going under will collapse putting more people out of work. This will have a multiplier effect and will further exacerbate an already fragile situation.

Edited July 12, 2011 by pinko

punked · July 12, 2011

Once interest rises credit will tighten. Small businesses relying on credit to keep their businesses from going under will collapse putting more people out of work. This will have a multiplier effect and will further exacerbate an already fragile situation.

Tightening of credit markets is what caused the great depression.

pinko · July 12, 2011

Tightening of credit markets is what caused the great depression.

Yes and if you add what is going on in the Eurozone we could be headed in the same direction.

pinko · July 12, 2011

Obama Warns of Debt Stalemate

President Obama will not promise that Social Security checks will go out on August 3 unless a deficit-reduction deal is struck. "I cannot guarantee that those checks go out… There may simply not be enough money in the coffers to do it," he told Scott Pelley of CBS News on Tuesday. "This is not just a matter of Social Security checks," he explained. These are veterans' checks, these are folks on disability and their checks. There are about 70 million checks that go out." Meanwhile, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell said that he does not think a significant reduction deal can be reached as long as Obama is in power. He said, "After years of discussions and months of negotiations, I have little question that as long as this president is in the Oval Office, a real solution is probably unattainable."

Read it at CBS News

Topaz · July 12, 2011

How long can the US keep printing money they don't have. The Republicans don't want to have taxes raised because the the high unemployment but how about raising taxes on the very rich like the millionaires and billionaires who can stand to pay, for the sake of the country. Isn't that better than letting the whole country go down the tubes and the rest of the world with it?

pinko · July 12, 2011

July 12, 2011 at 5:01 PM EDT

McConnell Presents Plan to Put Debt Limit Hike Burden on Obama By: Quinn Bowman

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., laid out a surprise alternative in the debt limit negotiations Tuesday that would essentially leave it up to President Obama to raise the debt ceiling and allow Republicans to vote against the increase.

In a move intended to assure financial markets that the United States will not default on its debt, McConnell proposed that Congress pass a law that would authorize President Obama to increase the debt limit. McConnell said he was increasingly pessimistic about reaching any deal with the White House on a way to cut spending in exchange for raising the debt limit.

Here are the main provisions of McConnell's proposal:

-President Obama would make three separate requests to increase the debt limit. Once now, once in the fall and once in summer 2012. The total would be the $2.5 trillion needed to increase the debt limit until the end of President Obama's first term. The first request would be for $700 billion, followed by two requests of $900 billion.

-Each request would have to be accompanied by spending reduction requests greater than the amount of the debt limit increase, but these would not be binding on Congress.

-Each request would also be subject to a "resolution of disapproval," which President Obama would presumably veto. McConnell said he thinks both chambers would pass resolution. A veto can only be overridden by two-thirds of both chambers of Congress.

McConnell said this option is not his first choice for how to deal with the debt limit debate.

"I had hoped all year long that the opportunities presented by his request of us to raise the debt ceiling would generate a bipartisan agreement that would begin to get our house in order by reducing spending. That may still happen, I hope it will. But we aren't going to send a signal to the markets and the American people that default is an option," McConnell said.

One Republican presidential hopeful immediately rejected McConnell's approach:

http://www.pbs.org/newshour/rundown/2011/07/mcconnell-presents-plan-to- put-debt-limit-hike-burden-on-obama.html

pinko · July 12, 2011

http://bipartisanpolicy.org/sites/default/files/Debt%20Ceiling%20Analysis%20report.pdf

Shady · July 12, 2011

That's pretty slimey of Obama to threathen social security recipients. Social security funds should be seperate from the rest of the budget, see as though only payroll taxes fund it. There's no reason those SS cheques shouldn't go out. Unless he just enjoys being a dick, and playing more politics with people's lives.

pinko · July 12, 2011

McConnell is attempting this to save face for he and his party. Read the bipartisanpolicy.org analysis.

See pages 13&14.

Edited July 12, 2011 by pinko

Shady · July 12, 2011

McConnell is attempting this to save face for he and his party. Read the bipartisanpolicy.org analysis.

That's because he's said as long as Obama's president, there won't be a substantial deal. I tend to agree. Obama's too addicted to spending to make any real concessions. But threatening social security recipients is about as low as one can go. What a scumbag. Especially when it has its own revenue stream.

pinko · July 12, 2011

That's because he's said as long as Obama's president, there won't be a substantial deal. I tend to agree. Obama's too addicted to spending to make any real concessions. But threatening social security recipients is about as low as one can go. What a scumbag. Especially when it has its own revenue stream.

Have you read the policy analysis yet?

bush_cheney2004 · July 13, 2011

How long can the US keep printing money they don't have. The Republicans don't want to have taxes raised because the the high unemployment but how about raising taxes on the very rich like the millionaires and billionaires who can stand to pay, for the sake of the country. Isn't that better than letting the whole country go down the tubes and the rest of the world with it?

Nope....the rest of the world goes down the tubes all the time without asking the United States!

punked · July 13, 2011

That's pretty slimey of Obama to threathen social security recipients. Social security funds should be seperate from the rest of the budget, see as though only payroll taxes fund it. There's no reason those SS cheques shouldn't go out. Unless he just enjoys being a dick, and playing more politics with people's lives.

Stop it. Stop being so dumb. If the debt limit isn't raised where do you think the money is going to come from to pay the US debts? Magic? There isn't enough money anywhere if you don't make swift cuts to SS and Medicare. That has been the point of this exercise the whole time. It is Obama being honest when he say SS can't go out not mean not under handed. Only someone who knows nothing about the Structure of US finances like you would make a statement as dumb as that.

Even if Obama wanted to send out SS checks with money that doesn't exist, there would be no structure to send them out, process them, etc, because the government would have no capacity to do it. Your statement proves just how delusional Republicans are about this whole process.

Oh BTW Nixon was the one who added SS to the general revenues so don't take it up with Obama you can take that one up with Nixon.

Shady · July 13, 2011

Have you read the policy analysis yet?

If the programs listed on page 13 were lessen by just half a percent each, you could easily fund everything on page 14. The only thing you'd have to halt is federal employee pay, and whatever "other" spending is. I don't see a problem doing that for a month or two if that's the time it takes to put together a proper deal.

Shady · July 13, 2011

Stop it. Stop being so dumb. If the debt limit isn't raised where do you think the money is going to come from to pay the US debts? Magic?

The billions of dollars in tax and other revenue that comes into the government on a weekly basis. :rolleyes:

I see you've bought into the hype and demagoguery. Pathetic. Especially social security. It has it's own revenue stream. Payroll taxes! YOu don't need to borrow anything for that! Barack Scumbag Obama's just trying to scare social security recipients. It's more than disgusting.

punked · July 13, 2011

That's because he's said as long as Obama's president, there won't be a substantial deal. I tend to agree. Obama's too addicted to spending to make any real concessions. But threatening social security recipients is about as low as one can go. What a scumbag. Especially when it has its own revenue stream.

OMG are you trying to be mislead or do you not know anything. You know what the SS revenue stream is? It is US debt Nixon in 72 passed The State and Local Fiscal Assistance Act which meant the government could borrow against SS. So the "revenue stream" as you call for SS is the US government which wont be able to pay for it if the debt ceiling is not raised. Get a clue.