Can Democrats Read a Balance Sheet? Election Returns?
With deficits almost more than twice the total amount of the annual federal budget the year the president graduated from high school, you’d think Congress would get the message that it needs to hold the line on federal spending.
Not just that, voters across the country voted out big-spending Democrats and voted in Republicans who promised to cut the size and cost of the federal government. (Well, some Democrats won election sounding like Republicans.) Maybe Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Mount Crumpit) thinks this sentiment doesn’t apply to him because he survived an electoral challenge this year (guess he’s discounting the millions he and his union allies paid to demonize and discredit his opponent). The other day, he “dropped on his colleagues a 1,924-page, $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill for fiscal 2011 that no one but a few Appropriators have read, if even they have“:
The last-minute omnibus should also offend Senators who claim to have heard the voters on November 2. This jam-job is a substitute for the 12 individual spending bills that Congress was supposed to have passed during the summer. But for the first time in modern memory, Democrats never got around to passing a budget outline, much less specific spending bills. So now they want to rush one giant bill into law when no one is paying attention.
Larded up with pork, the bill reads more like a Leslie Nielsen movie* than a serious plan to fund the government. As the editors of the National Review put it:
Rather than pass a simple “continuing resolution” to fund government operations through early 2011, Harry Reid & Co. decided to ignore the backlash against fiscal profligacy and let their pork barons run wild. The result is an orgy of earmarks, rolled out two weeks after most Senate Republicans and seven Senate Democrats voted for a temporary earmark moratorium.
Mind you, the only reason we need new legislation to keep the government financed beyond December 18 is that the feckless Democrats in Congress failed to enact even a single appropriations bill for the current fiscal year, which began in October.
You mean, Congress hasn’t even acted to fund the government for the current fiscal year? Wonder if we’re seeing any outrage on the editorial pages of the nation’s major dailies. Guess the Reid-Pelosi Democrats were so busy not letting a crisis go to waste than they created another kind of crisis.
——–
*NB, WSJ editors used this title first.
UPDATE: Via Glenn Reynolds, looks like Reid pulled the bill. Chalk one up for the Tea Party — and Mitch McConnell (Mitch McConnell who once campaigned on all the pork he brought to Kentucky!!) acting in the spirit of this burgeoning movement:
The Appropriators Buckle. “Tonight may indeed may be a ’seminal moment,’ as McCain said. This was to be the appropriators’ last hurrah. In the end, they couldn’t see it through, and it’s not going to get any better for them next year. . . . Then, you had Mitch McConnell on the phone all day with Republican appropriators–Reid’s base of support on the bill–twisting their arms to come out against it. My understanding is that by the end he had all the appropriators committed against it, with the exception of two who were undecided. McConnell told the appropriators that passing this bill, and passing it this way, would represent a rejection of everything the mid-term election was about, and ultimately he prevailed.” Sometimes converts are the most fervent.
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I would be curious to hear any of the usual shills defend the Omnibus, but I guess the DNC failed to issue talking points.
Comment by V the K — December 16, 2010 @ 8:59 pm - December 16, 2010
There is no defense of this bill. Congress didn’t get the message apparently. This bill and the tax compromise both need to be reworked. Obama should come out against this but he won’t probably cuz he already pissed off liberals with the tax deal.
Comment by AJ — December 16, 2010 @ 9:08 pm - December 16, 2010
No! (this is my third one word answer in a row
)
Comment by Sonicfrog — December 16, 2010 @ 9:19 pm - December 16, 2010
Democrats don’t CARE about the message; they have a plan, and that plan is to create a country where a dependable, permanent majority are dependent on government, and thus them, for jobs, handouts, or healthcare. And they cant grow government and get people addicted to it if they cut spending.
They truly do want to turn the US into Venezuela, they dont CARE if Americans are impoverished, as long as they’re equally impoverished, and as long as they command and control it all.
Comment by American Elephant — December 16, 2010 @ 9:35 pm - December 16, 2010
Meh. With the tax cut deal, Republicans have forfeited all credibility when it comes to complaints about the deficit. And considering that you didn’t have any credibility in the first place, you’re now running a credibility deficit when it comes to the national deficit! All of your whines have been as hypocritical as they were insincere.
Comment by Levi — December 16, 2010 @ 9:59 pm - December 16, 2010
This is pretty gross. But all that PR work getting everyone obsessed about Lt. Choi and the lesbian Navy nurse who got fired under DADT paid off — the country strained at a gnat and swallowed a camel. Whuckenyudoo.
I think it was Lily Tomlin who said, no matter how cynical you get you can never keep up.
Comment by R.O. Lopez — December 16, 2010 @ 10:03 pm - December 16, 2010
Actually it looks like Reid back away from the spending bill:
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1210/46523.html
Comment by R.O. Lopez — December 16, 2010 @ 10:10 pm - December 16, 2010
So, the shill’s defense of Harry Reid’ Omnibus spending monstrosity is…. attacking Republicans for wanting to maintain the current tax rates.
I am shaking my head and chuckling right now.
Comment by V the K — December 16, 2010 @ 10:32 pm - December 16, 2010
I mean, if raising taxes is the cure for deficits, shouldn’t California, New York, and Illinois be in great fiscal shape right now?
Comment by V the K — December 16, 2010 @ 11:16 pm - December 16, 2010
Hardly! They are the ONLY party to have balanced the budget in living memory, they briefly increased the budget deficit to pay for two wars, a “department of homeland security”, hurricane damage and recovery, and according to the CBO itself were SHRINKING the deficit again each year since 2003, with the deficit on track to be completely eliminated again by 2010 — that is until Democrats got power, and immediately tripled the deficit, then QUADRUPLED that new record the very next year.
Bush would have vetoed the first budget Democrats wrote, which tripled the deficit, but Nancy and Harry held it over until January so he COULDNT and because they knew Obama would gladly sign it, since he voted for it in the Senate.
Where does all your rage and hate come from Levi? Because they certainly aren’t grounded in the facts.
Comment by American Elephant — December 17, 2010 @ 12:10 am - December 17, 2010
AE, more and more, I am convinced that being a Democrat/liberal isn’t about being grounded in facts, it’s a tribal identity. Facts and reason don’t enter into the equation. They just defend their tribe – and attack the other tribe – no matter what.
Comment by V the K — December 17, 2010 @ 5:41 am - December 17, 2010
Here’s something interesting: The most recent vote to maintain the Bush Era tax rates in the House was 277 to 148. The tax cuts originally passed with only 230 votes.
Levi’s tribe has betrayed him. But he will continue to shill on their behalf. You don’t go against the tribe.
Comment by V the K — December 17, 2010 @ 5:46 am - December 17, 2010
Also, more Democrats than Republicans voted in favor of maintaining current tax rates (i.e. Against the Obama Tax Increase). 139-138.
Comment by V the K — December 17, 2010 @ 5:56 am - December 17, 2010
Who won last month? And you STILL have not explained how extending unemployment welfare can be done without paying for it.
Comment by ThatGayConservative — December 17, 2010 @ 6:01 am - December 17, 2010
TGC, Levi can’t explain anything. All he has is his old discredited talking points and bile.
Though it’s clear again where out little socialist stands. People work to give their capital to the state, not for themselves. To him, not raising taxes is making a deficit.
The proposed solution from Mitch McConnell (Mike, if you’re a clean, articulate black man without a discernable negro dialect) is shorter and simple than the porkubus.
Comment by The_Livewire — December 17, 2010 @ 6:33 am - December 17, 2010
[...] Patriot points out that this is happening because congress didn’t do its job: You mean, Congress hasn’t even acted to fund the government for the current fiscal year? Wonder [...]
Pingback by Yesterday’s votes demonstrate the power of the tea party « Da Techguy's Blog — December 17, 2010 @ 6:41 am - December 17, 2010
Ooooh gee, well if that ain’t the most convenient excuse I ever heard! Republicans were about to eliminate the deficit? Ya don’t say! It was right around the corner huh, and then the Democrats ruined it all, even though the Republicans had the veto and the Senate was almost 50/50?
The implied assertion that it was okay to increase the deficit to finance two wars is completely laughable – these are terribly unproductive burdens that will end up costing us trillions of dollars when all is said and done and there will be nothing to show for it. Conservative logic is a nightmare – it’s okay to commit to spending untold trillions on an unspecified time scale to invade countries based on lies and fear-mongering, but it isn’t okay to commit to spending on healthcare for American citizens when the private sector’s system has shown to be inefficient and overly expensive. If Bush hadn’t invaded those countries to cover his own ass after he failed to prevent 9-11 and if he hadn’t insanely handed out unnecessary tax cuts to rich people that didn’t need them and didn’t grow the economy an inch over the past decade, there would be no deficit.
Comment by Levi — December 17, 2010 @ 12:47 pm - December 17, 2010
Levi does not care about deficits in any manner or form. As long as money can be printed, borrowed, taxed away or seized by the state, there is no reckoning. When you can no longer pay, you foot the bill, declare insolvency, and start anew.
There are huge areas of states where industry died and the jobs died with them. So, what did the area do? Most of them moaned and groaned and demanded that new industries move in and bring jobs. They turned their empty downtowns into thrift stores and antique malls. And then they bitched when Wal-Mart lowered prices and put the mom and pop stores on the line. They further bitched when immigrants moved in and worked for lower wages. (Note: Lower prices and lower labor cost is classic competition and a free market staple. You chase scarce money with higher quality and/or lower cost.)
Meanwhile, the industries looked around for a place to produce and found that China and India have plentiful, willing labor and they could drastically cut their production costs and make a good profit even after having to ship the goods half way around the world to reach the market. That profit thing is what drives the stock market, the insurance companies, the endowment funds and the pension plans.
But Levi thinks the industry, which is inherently evil, should be held at gun point and made to keep people employed, even if they make no profit in doing so. The basic job of industry, by Levi’s view, is employment so the local economy can flourish.
What Levi can not understand is the service economy and the fact that the US is mostly a service economy. (The US morphed into becoming a service economy as a result of intense regulation and costly requirements placed on production of goods.) In the ideal service economy, everyone has a job doing some sort of service such as teaching, medical care, policing, road repair, selling stuff, fixing stuff, governing, entertaining, thinking, writing, musing, tending, directing, deciding, paper shuffling, erasing, copying, loafing, talking, theorizing, bluffing, blustering, leaking, reporting, blaming, suing, complaining, and more of the same.
They pay each other and the government taxes them and pays the public sectors and the public sector lets their money slip into the private sector pay stream and the money goes round and round and the government taxes and pays and on and on infinitum.
That is how the service economy works. Until some scheme like Freddie/Fannie burns a hole in it. And then people have to fall back on what they can produce that other people need and want. And there is the rub. You need clothing, food and shelter. Basic products. If you have shelter, then you need clothing and food. If you have enough clothing to last, you need food. If you have the capacity and skill to raise food, you can be poor, but proud.
If you live in a seventeenth floor apartment in an urban area, you have your closet of clothes and a long climb if the elevators go out. When the service economy craps out in the urban area all around you, you have major problems. Your first scream is for the government to come fix things. Garbage piles up, services get disrupted. People lose jobs. Food becomes scarce. Crime rises.
When the government balks, the hot heads riot. If the state dissolves, it does not go away. It runs on empty. But the “hardest hit” areas boil and seethe. And what are the “hardest hit” areas? Those that have depended on government services, food stamps, rent controls, welfare, etc. Also, people who have staked their lives and life-styles on pension plans, medicare, and entitlements. While life in the penthouse may not change much, the streets have turned mean.
Levi and the crowd he runs with spend other people’s money like no tomorrow, because they don’t give a simple thought to posterity. Huh-uh. Life after the money runs out is someone else’s problem.
The working poor are almost always conservative. Democrats hate them. They will do anything to force them into the entitlement concentration camp where they will become addicted and enabled by their government handlers.
This is Levi’s world.
Comment by Heliotrope — December 17, 2010 @ 12:49 pm - December 17, 2010
Helitrope,
We can just add that to the long list of things Levi fails to understand.
Amusing note about his tirade. He doesn’t try to argue that deficits were shrinking prior to 2007.
One might almost think that he realizes his normal brazen lies won’t cover that up.
Comment by The_Livewire — December 17, 2010 @ 1:36 pm - December 17, 2010
Hi everyone,
The military journals are all preparing for the repeal of DADT as if it’s a done deal. I worked to put together this list of things that the military and the gay community will both have to do, in order to make the transition smooth for everyone involved.
http://colorfulconservative.blogspot.com/2010/12/im-okay-with-repeal-heres-what-i-want.html
I hope you guys can forward the link around if you get the chance. I want gay servicemembers to thrive with the repeal lifted. Blessings, Bobby
Comment by Robert Oscar Lopez — December 17, 2010 @ 1:39 pm - December 17, 2010
For Levi’s cult, the facts of that matter are rather inconvenient.
Here’s another inconvenient fact: Harry Reid’s Omniporkubus contained $1 Billion in Republican earmarks and $52 Billion in Democrat earmarks.
This may explain why the deficit exploded after the Democrats took power in 2006.
Comment by V the K — December 17, 2010 @ 1:45 pm - December 17, 2010
V the K,
All that ‘proves’ to 11th century metalities like Levi is that they have the right idea, don’t have small (shrinking) deficits! Have HUGE deficits. Remember, that’s the entire argument of why the Porkulus failed.
Comment by The_Livewire — December 17, 2010 @ 1:55 pm - December 17, 2010
Just noticed that Levi wrapped a bunch of lies in his last tirade:
The lie that government health care is better than private insurance. Already shredded here.
The lie that we were ‘lied’ into Iraq, debunked here.
and now he adds ‘handing out tax cuts to people who didn’t need them’ (the Socialist LIE that all income belongs to the government, and that the government ‘gives’ people their own money back) and ‘didn’t grow the economy’.
Someone want to change Levi’s diaper for him?
Comment by The_Livewire — December 17, 2010 @ 2:08 pm - December 17, 2010
robert,
I’ll take a gander when I get home, and flip the link to my little brother for his thoughts.
Comment by The_Livewire — December 17, 2010 @ 2:10 pm - December 17, 2010
Keep up the good work. I only wish you had been around when Bush went six years without a single spending veto and got us into a war with no purpose. Ten trillion in new and structural debt from his administration – we sure could have used you then.
Comment by cmb — December 17, 2010 @ 4:02 pm - December 17, 2010
More productive than trying to capture Mohammed Aidid, wouldn’t you say? And what was so productive about the deployments in the Balkans, Rwanda, Macedonia, Ecuador, East Timor, Liberia, Albania, Sierra Leon etc. Wagging the Dog to distract attention while you f*ck the snot out of interns doesn’t count as being productive.
Found those 400,000 massacred Albanian Muslims yet? How about the 225,000 to 100,000 we were also told were massacred? We bombed the ever loving shit out of Serbia and accomplished…..what, exactly?
No, it’s NOT ok to spend beau coup cash we DON’T HAVE on a new entitlement when the other two have been shown to be colossal failures and are in the red billions of dollars. And perhaps the private sector wouldn’t be so overly expensive if government (and their lawyer cronies) would get the f*ck out of the way and let people be treated.
Bush’s tax cuts for people who didn’t need them grew GDP by over 3%. Chairman Obama’s porkulous (union bailouts) grew the GDP by 0.2%. You’re telling me we don’t need a growth environment?
Comment by ThatGayConservative — December 17, 2010 @ 5:41 pm - December 17, 2010
amb, seems you’re reciting talking points rather than chiming in based on experience reading this blog as we did criticize W for not holding the line on spending and faulted him on not vetoing spending bills.
Only know the spending is of a whole different order of magnitude than it was under W. Until the Democratic Congress took over in 2007, we actually saw deficits declining after an initial spike early in his term.
Comment by B. Daniel Blatt — December 17, 2010 @ 6:26 pm - December 17, 2010
[...] Can Democrats Read a Balance Sheet? Election Returns? [...]
Pingback by GayPatriot » More and more calls for Joe (Solmonese) to go — December 17, 2010 @ 6:46 pm - December 17, 2010
And remind me again who it was that kept America in a depression for about two and half decades while transforming citizens into dependents of the State.
Comment by ThatGayConservative — December 18, 2010 @ 12:09 am - December 18, 2010
And speaking of credibility,
Two words: Tonkin Gulf
And while you and cmd are making up numbers, let me remind you that that little foray cost us $10^(10^100.0000000000000).
Comment by ThatGayConservative — December 18, 2010 @ 3:41 am - December 18, 2010
Helio @ 19 –
I love these long-winded rants of yours where you deign to describe my position on something. There isn’t even a glimmer of accuracy in any of that mess.
Comment by Levi — December 18, 2010 @ 8:10 am - December 18, 2010
Levi -
Not that you would admit. How about you delivering a long-winded rant describing how your left of Obama world would work? You can’t do it. You Big Rock Candy Mountain people are 100% saprophytes who dream of flying while pooping wiser than anyone policy.
Comment by Heliotrope — December 18, 2010 @ 8:24 am - December 18, 2010
Isn;’t it funny how Levi can’t reply to posts that call out his lies?
Hush Levi,
Adults are speaking.
Comment by The_Livewire — December 18, 2010 @ 10:12 am - December 18, 2010
And then Evil gets angry at Heliotrope for daring to characterize Evil’s opinions based on what Evil posts and defends in this forum.
Comment by V the K — December 18, 2010 @ 11:15 am - December 18, 2010
Levi is like the theoretical hen who lays eggs in the probable when. He doesn’t lay eggs in the possible now, because he’s unable to postulate how. But of course he’s a rooster as everyone knows, so he forgoes the eggs and he gives only crows. He crows from the left about all that should be, and struts like a bantam whose views end at the knee. There’s no proof in his pudding, he’s all about shoulding and what ought to be which the enlightened can see. The earthbound others are twits one and all and hypocrites with minds that are narrow and small. Levi is so ahead of the curve that he has no instinct even to swerve. Utopia is waiting a ways down the road and Levi is here to get hold of the fold and goad the conservative toad into taking the path that is polled and boldly earthshaking.
Run, Levi, run. See Levi run.
Comment by Heliotrope — December 18, 2010 @ 11:46 am - December 18, 2010