Originally posted by Guru ZimLoans, which are repaid with interest, don't count as spending.
And what I find interesting is that alot of the deficit Obama is being saddled with was proposed by W and his administration. To be sure they are spending plenty but the fault lies on both sides.
And here we go turning it into a Democrats vs. Republicans issue, as though either party hasn't been complicit in turning this health care reform into a complete farce of a handout to the insurance industry.
. And the people who are opposing the current healthcare plans are from the party who over the last thirty years have run up more debt than all the other debt in the history of the world combined.
The GOP did that? When the Dems controlled both houses of Congress for most of the past 30 years, and Obama has spent more than every other president in the history of the United States COMBINES?
Yes, the GOP did that. The reason I know is that, right in the middle of all that, President Clinton managed to balance the budget. Why was he able to do it, yet the Republican presidents only managed to make the problem much, much worse? Including those times when the Republicans controlled one or both houses?
And any economist will tell you that you can't cut spending during an economic downturn without causing a depression. Apart from the points already made by others.
Originally posted by AlexAnd here we go turning it into a Democrats vs. Republicans issue, as though either party hasn't been complicit in turning this health care reform into a complete farce of a handout to the insurance industry.
Originally posted by Peter The HegemonYes, the GOP did that. The reason I know is that, right in the middle of all that, President Clinton managed to balance the budget. Why was he able to do it, yet the Republican presidents only managed to make the problem much, much worse? Including those times when the Republicans controlled one or both houses?
Are you really going to contend that it was Bill Clinton who balanced the budget by his lonesome AND blame the GOP making the problem worse when they controlled Congress, when it was Bill Clinton as President WITH a Republican Congress that balanced the budget??
Originally posted by Peter The HegemonAnd any economist will tell you that you can't cut spending during an economic downturn without causing a depression. Apart from the points already made by others.
Actually, what any economist will tell you is that increasing taxes and spending during a downturn is what will turn said downturn into a depression, not the other way around. Ask Hoover how increasing spending worked for him...
Originally posted by AlexAnd here we go turning it into a Democrats vs. Republicans issue, as though either party hasn't been complicit in turning this health care reform into a complete farce of a handout to the insurance industry.
Well, at least it took 4+ pages to get to that point, instead of the previous norm of 4 posts. And it's one of the more civil political discussions that have happened in this forum.
Everyone's feeling sentimental, I guess - it's the end of the year, there's a new Karate Kid movie coming out, it's Christmas time, it's StaggerLee's birthday... :)
I think it is pretty easy to agree that both political parties have acted like idiots on health care. Everyone wants to get the credit, no one wants the blame. It's a very complex subject that refuses to play nice and be a nice neat package one or the other can sell.
I don't have a good solution. Doctors shouldn't have so much debt for their schooling. Medical offices shouldn't have to hire full staffs of people just to deal with insurance companies so they can get paid. Insurance companies shouldn't be treating public health as a publicly traded commodity. I hate that there are any (let alone the thousands and thousands) people who will never reach their full potential because they can't get access to the people, medicine, or technology to be healthy enough to do so.
Health care is people. I wish we'd stop talking about it as an industry or an "issue". There are people who need it, people who provide it, and people who broker it. Somehow the whole deal lost its humanity and became numbers. Many people who need it can't get it, the people who provide it are under serious pressures that have nothing to do with providing health care (and seriously isn't that enough?), and the people who broker it have their own set of rules that have very little to do with making people or keeping people healthy. The system actively works against itself.
Hell, so does our political system though. I like to believe that people get into politics to make a difference, but it sure seems like a whole lotta strenuous, loud, blustery nothing recently. It's like watching a large asthmatic woman work her way off a vinyl chair in hot humid weather.
Originally posted by Lise Hell, so does our political system though. I like to believe that people get into politics to make a difference, but it sure seems like a whole lotta strenuous, loud, blustery nothing recently. It's like watching a large asthmatic woman work her way off a vinyl chair in hot humid weather.
Amen. And to offer another example (politico.com) it certainly looks like the giant rush to have a bill before Christmas was all for naught. I suspect there are some Democrats heading home for the holiday break wondering why they just got thrown under a very large bus by the President.
Tim
Vocatus atque non vocatus, Deus aderit. -- Erasmus
All others things being equal, the simplest solution is usually stupidity. -- Darwin Minor
Originally posted by Von Maestro Are you really going to contend that it was Bill Clinton who balanced the budget by his lonesome AND blame the GOP making the problem worse when they controlled Congress, when it was Bill Clinton as President WITH a Republican Congress that balanced the budget??
Since his successor managed to get right back to increasing deficits while still having a Republican Congress, you bet I will.
Originally posted by Von Maestro Actually, what any economist will tell you is that increasing taxes and spending during a downturn is what will turn said downturn into a depression, not the other way around. Ask Hoover how increasing spending worked for him...
Ask him how attempting to balance the budget during the crisis worked for him.
I agree that it's not the time to increase taxes (although it will have to be done at some point), but it's not the time to cut spending, either. I'll stick with Keynes and Krugman on this.
Originally posted by StaggerLeeI. Can't see how you only credit the Clinton for the balanced budget. That is just absurd. Not mention Bush had war time spending.
Much of that was off line wasn't it and didn't count toward the deficit.
I fault everyone involved for not funding the wars. They tried to give us a war with no pain and it doesn't work.
From the article: “What we’ve seen is a colossal manipulation” by Democrats “of the accounting scores of CBO”
I think it's highly deceptive of you to simply identify that quote as "From the article," without mentioning that it's a quote from a Republican Senator.
It's quite clear from the article that no one actually is accused of manipulating the CBO's findings; the claim is simply that Democrats are wrong about what those numbers mean for the future solvency of Medicare. Which is a fair point to make, but certainly doesn't justify Senator Sessions' statement above.
Originally posted by StaggerLeeSO, Senator A says this will be good and not cost a ton of money and uses CBO numbers to back his claim... and that's okay.
Senator B points out that Senator A was playing loose with the facts, and that's not right.
Got it.
Bottom line is, when the CBO says that what the Dems are claiming is false, it means that they are either ignorant of the facts, or lying.
Nnnnnnnnnnnno. What was wrong was quoting Senator B, who was quoted in the article, then saying "from the article" and not "from Senator B". That's just misrepresenting the accusations, putting those words in someone else's mouths.
You wanted the best, you got... the Out of Context Quote of the Week.
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Where in there do you read that I'm pretending that the NAACP is some all-inclusive group? Is there a post here where I spend paragraphs on end championing the NAACP? No. I have said only that I think it was a bad idea for Bush to ignore them.