:zz: No, it doesn't.

And some members of Congress have to realize that slashing spending doesn't help balance the budget when they keep markedly cutting our income at the same time, too.

"Slashing spending with a chainsaw" means bridges are going to fall down and kill people, and highways will be filled with potholes, btw. Not to mention the old people dying homeless and ill in the streets.

Be careful what is wished for, because the reality and consequences counts, too.

I don't have to wish for it. It will happen as the spending is unsustainable by a wide margin.

....and you're the one calling the Reps "fearmongers"?

This Just In!
 

Treasury will raid govt employees pension funds to offset debt ceiling raise!

BOY...I guess it bites working for the gubamint!

We have already have had bridges fail and kill people due to infrastructure problems, and many more are still being used that shouldn't be. That is not manufactured lies.

If we eliminate Medicare and Social Security we certainly will go back to our previous reality, of old people dying of preventable problems on the street, homeless. That is not manufacture lies to scare people, either.

It's the truth.

We want a certain lifestyle in America, and it's expensive. We can either agree to pay for it, or give it up.

Gee, that can't be true - too many people have been saying there is no "real" consequences to not raising the debt ceiling.

You know, we'll just pay the interest, and pick and choose what to pay, or just pay interest, and the cash flow afforded by our credit (the debt ceiling) isn't needed ...

Welcome to the consequences.

I understand what you're saying, but the headlines are screaming otherwise

That was sarcasm ;)

Look - I am all for cutting wasteful spending. One of the things I especially like about the PPACA is that it cuts out 500 million in wasteful duplicate Medicare payments to help pay for itself.

But we are a country of 330+ million, and we want a first-world lifestyle. There is plenty to re-prioritize of course, and plenty we can cut, but we are caught in the basic political fights of demagoging societal needs and the involvement of the government (it would be far cheaper to all of us to have single payer healthcare for every single person in the country, for example)

You can't live within a society, yet want that society to keep entirely out of it's members lives. It simply is impossible by the definition of living within a society.

Look to what is happening in Greece, England, etc to see what happens when you demagogue political views over reality.

Those bridges were paid for to be maintained, and instead of doing it right, we had "5 guys watching one guy shovel" for those jobs. Patronage galore, with no incentive to get done sooner - since the jobs were paid a daily rate for as long as it took.

Medicare and Social Security are both Ponzi scheme time bombs. They will not be maintained over the long term because they cannot be. This is academic.

We want a certain lifestyle - but if we cannot afford it or have been using unlimited borrowing to sustain it, we do not have a right to it and it will not continue.

But the answer is not simply black and white: to eliminate fixing bridges, or completely eliminate Medicare or Social Security in my view.
Is that the answer in your view?

I'm certainly not trying to be black and white - but the decision to spend or not spend, is equally binary in nature. We must get to where the revenue exceeds the expenditures. I think we agree there. But I also agree with many who say that taxes simply cannot go any higher without hurting whatever feeble recovery is going on. Therefore, expenditures must be cut in order to get positive cash flow. Once we have that cash flow, the difference can be thrown against the debt.

The Medicare and Social Security Ponzi schemes are separate in that they should never have been enacted in their current forms in the first place. They also, independent of their systemic unsustainability, do contribute a major drag to our efforts to pay down the debt. If they can be fixed to truly be non-ponzian (not just delaying the inevitable, but making them solvent), fine. Otherwise, we should begin the phase out. We have to.

If the creditors no longer loan to us, the decision has been made for us, and the game is over.

You're right, I think we both agree on the result that is needed. I think we differ on the way of getting there.

I don't want "the decision to be made for us" by not raising the debt ceiling. I think the permanent ramifications of that (forever increasing our personal interest rates on homes, cars, federal debt, negative impacting our bond ratings, etc) will take us out of first world status.

I don't want my grandchildren to be paying 2 percentage points more in interest on their house loans because the GOP wouldn't vote to raise the debt ceiling in 2011 (which would be the case even if at that time our government was small and spending well within a budget)

We sure could use the Trillion dollars we have spend in Iraq.

Sigh. Yeah.

Or, it would have been nice to simply pay for it at the time, by raising our taxes a little to pay for it.

Also, we sure could use what we spent to fund the Medicare Prescription benefit that was passed into law, rather than not figuring out how to pay for it at the time.

Also, it was probably not a good idea to also, at the time, cut our income by giving a big tax cut to wealthy citizens, while we spent more money on those two things.

Sigh. Gee whiz, how did we get here, in this financial morass? :(

Wait! I know how to start fixing it! Let's take away our ability to have ready cash flow to pay our bills, and say we will no longer pay our compounding and ever-increasing interest on our debt! That will show our creditors we are serious.

Yea act like a crack addict and apply for more credit. That will show our creditors (China). Like a normal american family in financial trouble credit cards need to be cut in half and we need to make due with what we have. No more money for Fannie, Freddie or USPO or any of our other deadbeat relatives.

The debt ceiling is far more than just a credit card, Dell. That is certainly NOT what it's main purpose is. There seems to be some misunderstanding, that the debt ceiling is "that's all we can spend". No. That is NOT it's purpose.

Freezing it doesn't keep us only spending a certain amount, like some arbitrary limit to "paycheck" income - it makes us default on our loans because we can't pay, because we don't have the ebb and flow capability within our own financial systems and internationally to transfer money readily to meet our obligations. Can you understand the difference?

To do what you wish, we would need billions in cash literally sitting in a bank somewhere. You understand that doesn't exist, that's not how it works, right?

Aya, yup :D :tro:

Oh I know it will pass, freddie, fannie and the PO will be bailed out once again, Pakistan will get its aid etc etc etc. and the 60% of households who pay taxes will again argue who will pick up the tab!

Sickening

If the debt ceiling is raised then the Dems will spend more money that this country doesn't have. How could the debt be cut? Send the troops home from Iraq, Afghanistan, and quit this so-called fued with Libya. Ever time Nato or the UN cries for this country's help like they do all the time, help out a little bit but this county shouldn't be the country that is paying the most of the time for t
their causes.