Why We Have No Budget and Why It Can’t Be Balanced

“We receive wake up call after wake up call and all to no avail because our government is either economically illiterate and doesn’t understand the problem of spending other people's money even after other people run out of money, or is too ideologically committed.  The best, but radical, thing that we could/should do is to cut entitlements and foreign aid immediately, knowing full well that could start rioting. And even that would be just the beginning, it will be like chipping away at an iceberg (See the video below)”  …Gary the Rat

WHEN BROKE means BROKE

We Have A Budget That Can't Be Balanced

CLICK HERE

http://www.youtube-nocookie.com/embed/EW5IdwltaAc?rel=0

And yet…

Obama Ends Welfare Reform as We Know It, Calls for $12.7 Trillion in New Welfare Spending putting us even further into debt to try and garner votes for his re-election.  President Obama has also played the smoke and mirrors game pandering to students on the backs of seniors by hiding a provision in the transportation bill covering first year college loan fees with money from the already broke social security fund.

The people we have in the White House now and most that we have in Congress are not capable or not willing to do what needs to be done to fix the problems.  And many don’t even understand the problem and are ideologically blinded.

President Obama and the Senate under the leadership of Harry Reid purposely kept this from the American people by not passing a budget or bringing on to vote in years.

All issues other than fixing the economy and jobs are diversions and secondary at this point.

In November we must clean house from President Obama on down or our ship of state will sink!

I'll take Romney's business experience over the nightmare we're experiencing in Obama's America Any Day!

Related:

Economist Ron Hera really nails it. We are ALREADY in collapse

Technorati Tags: jobs,economics,economy,national budget,balancing the budget,Congress,Election 2012,2012 Election,welfare reform,Obamaland,Obama's agenda,destroying America,seniors,student loans,smoke and mirrors,Mitt Romney,one term Obama,Mitt Romney 2012,entitlements,stop spending,nanny state,Progressivism

Biden Spends $1 Million Annually for Weekend Trips

Tighten your belts America… just don’t expect Team Obama or Washington to do the same…

Newsweek:

Ronald Kessler reporting from Washington, D.C. — Last June, President Obama appointed Vice President Joe Biden to root out wasteful government spending. But behind the scenes, it’s a different matter.

Every Friday, Biden takes a helicopter designated as Marine Two from the vice president’s residence to Joint Base Andrews in Maryland and then hops on Air Force Two to fly back to his home in Delaware. At the end of the weekend, he returns on Air Force Two, usually a Boeing C-32.

Vice President Biden boards Air Force Two.
(AP Photo)

During warm weather, Biden regularly returns to Andrews on the airplane on Saturdays to play golf at the Air Force base with President Obama. After the golf game, he flies back to Delaware and returns to Washington on the plane on Sunday evening — all at taxpayer expense.

The cost of flying Air Force Two is $22,000 an hour, so each half-hour trip to or from Delaware costs about $10,000. Each golf game costs taxpayers $20,000. At that rate, the annual cost to taxpayers of Biden’s weekend trips is well over $1 million.

In addition, the Secret Service rents more than 20 condominiums in the Wilmington, Del. area for agents who must accompany Biden when he returns to his home state.

Biden’s press office had no immediate comment.

“Biden leaves every Friday from Joint Base Andrews, so he gets lifts from the observatory via Marine Two to Andrews Air Force Base, takes off via Air Force Two, lands in Delaware, and stays the weekend and then comes back on Sunday nights,” says a Secret Service agent familiar with the trips.

Biden has been a long-time proponent of train travel.
(AP Photo)

“Every three or four weeks when it’s warm, he gets up there on Saturday and then will fly back on Air Force Two,” the agent says. “While Air Force Two is sitting on the tarmac at Andrews, he goes and plays golf with the president at Andrews Air Force Base, gets back on the plane, and flies back to Delaware. Let me tell you something, that is egregious.”

Besides that, “The Secret Service rents condos in Wilmington because his schedule is so fluid and never concrete enough to properly prepare for his visits to Delaware,” the agent says. “So they keep a fully staffed Secret Service advance team in Delaware in condominiums that we lease so that when he does these things back and forth to D.C., they’re up there ready for him to arrive.”

The Boeing C-32 that usually flies as Air Force Two is a specially configured Boeing 757-200 commercial jet which typically requires a crew of 18.

As a U.S. senator, Biden was proud of the fact that he commuted daily by train from his home in Delaware to Washington during the week. Amtrak named the newly renovated Wilmington station the Joseph R. Biden, Jr. Railroad Station. But after taking office as vice president, a Secret Service agent says Biden began the pattern of commuting on Air Force Two on weekends, costing taxpayers close to $4 million so far.

As recently as May 12, Biden flew back to Andrews to play golf with Obama and with Biden’s second son Hunter and White House trip director Marvin Nicholson. They played 18 holes of golf for four and a half hours.

Biden also plays golf at a country club he belongs to in the Wilmington area. The Secret Service agent says that since Air Force Two parks at Andrews, Obama is obviously aware that Biden is running up a huge government tab for each game of golf he plays with him.

Asked if President Obama thinks these costs are appropriate, why he has not questioned Biden flying to play golf with him at a cost of $20,000 per game, and in view of these costs of $1 million a year for weekend trips, whether the vice president should no longer be in charge of cutting government waste, the president’s press office had no immediate comment.

In addition to his salary as vice president of $230,700, Biden has free use of the vice president’s residence at the Naval Observatory. The vice president’s residence is a handsome 9,150-square-foot, three-story mansion overlooking Massachusetts Avenue NW in Washington.

Complete with pool, pool house, and indoor gym, the white brick house was built in 1893 as the home of the superintendent of the U.S. Naval Observatory. Congress turned it into the official residence of the vice president in 1974 and gave it the address One Observatory Circle.

During the day, at least five Navy stewards attend to every personal need of the second family, including cleaning, cooking, shopping for food, and doing the laundry.

Biden has portrayed himself as a regular Joe, a product of a working class family who takes on millionaires and Republicans who are said to be out of touch with middle-class Americans.

Last June 13, Obama placed Biden in charge of a Campaign to Cut Waste, which will “hunt down and eliminate misspent tax dollars in every agency and department across the federal government,” according to the White House website.

In an email, Biden told supporters that he was the “new sheriff in town.” He said that “particularly at a time when we’re facing tough decisions about reducing our deficit, it’s a no-brainer to stop spending taxpayer dollars on things that benefit nobody.”

By Ronald Kessler - chief Washington correspondent of Newsmax.com. He is the New York Times bestselling author of books on the Secret Service - In the President's Secret Service, FBI - The Secrets of the FBI, and CIA - Inside the CIA.

The one thing you can bet on is that the Obama White House is not interested in sharing in your sacrifice!!  Make you mad?  It should!!  Remember this in November~

Technorati Tags: Joe Biden,White House,CIA,FBI,Secret Service,Air Force Two,national debt,stop spending,Obamaland,cut waste,wasteful spending

The Seven Most Disturbing Moments So Far in Barack Obama's Presidency

Tuesday, April 17, 2012 9:26:59 PM · by Typical_Whitey · 6 replies - townhall.com | 4/17/2012 | John Hawkins – h/t to MJ

Picking out the most disturbing moments of Barack Obama's presidency is kind of like trying to choose the wettest parts of the ocean. Other than his "Even a blind squirrel sometimes gets a nut" moment where he said "yes" when the SEALS asked if they were allowed to kill Osama Bin Laden, his entire presidency has been one long, slow motion bamboo shoot sliding under the country's fingernails. So, everyone reading will probably be able to think of a few national nightmares that aren't included.

7) Obama bows to a Saudi King: Had Obama spent his childhood entirely in the United States, he probably would have known that real Americans don't bow. Unfortunately, since that's a lesson Obama hasn't learned, Americans have had to endure their President humiliating himself and by extension, the rest of the country, by servilely bowing to foreign leaders. Perhaps the worst of these was the tyrannical, fanatical Saudi king. As Newt Gingrich has said, "I want America to become so energy independent that no American president ever again bows to the Saudi king." No American President should have ever bowed to him in the first place.

6) Obama sides with a foreign leader against an American state: It's bad enough that Obama has been persecuting Arizona for enforcing illegal immigration laws when his administration won't do the job. However, in a despicable display Barack Obama held a joint press conference at the White House with Mexican President Felipe Calderon that featured both of them criticizing Arizona's immigration law. If only there had been someone there to represent America at that event.

5) Obama shoves through history's single most wasteful spending bill. The very first thing Barack Obama did after he was elected was push through the largest and most wasteful spending bill in human history. Most calculations of the cost of the bill came in somewhere between 800 billion and 1.2 trillion dollars. The whole purpose of the bill was supposed to be to create jobs and the Obama Administration claimed the bill would keep unemployment below 8%. Conservatives almost universally said the bill wouldn't work and it received no GOP votes in the House along with only 3 in the Senate (Snowe, Collins, and Specter -- before he changed parties). So, who turned out to be right about a bill that cost more than FDR’s New Deal AND the war in Vietnam combined in today's dollars? Not Obama. We've now had 38 straight months of above 8% unemployment, the longest streak since the Great Depression.

4) The manned space program comes to an end: Putting a man on the moon is one of America's greatest accomplishments and the catalyst for a wide range of scientific achievements. Under Obama, America's Space Shuttle program was ended and in a twist so bizarre you wouldn't buy it if you saw it in a movie, NASA's mission has been changed to getting children excited about math and science, expanding international relationships, and doing Muslim outreach.  As former Astronaut said yesterday, “Discovery’s Final Flight “Tugged on My Heartstrings”as it did for many people.

3) Paul Ryan alerts Tim Geithner that the economy ends in 2027: In one of the most amazing exchanges in the history of American government, after Tim Geithner presented the Obama Administration's stratospherically high long-term budget projections, Ryan showed off a chart created by the CBO estimating that America's economy will shut down in 2027 because of out-of-control government spending. In other words, in 15 years life as you know it in America is over because of the Obama Administration's spending and Obama has absolutely no intention of doing anything about it.

2) Obamacare passes: Never before in American history has one party been arrogant and paternalistic enough to push through a massive entitlement program that was wildly unpopular with the American people and had zero votes from the opposing party. If it isn't stopped, Obamacare will destroy America's health care system by dramatically driving up the cost of care, rationing care, instituting death panels, driving tens of millions of Americans off their health care policies, adding trillions to the debt, and dramatically reducing the number of doctors available to treat patients. Of course the future of medicine in this country could be worse....well, that is if any of those zombie movies turn out to be right. (Even retiring Progressive Barney Frank, who was very much part of the ObamaCare cram down, now admits it was a mistake… just not for the right reasons, but little by little everyone who understands what is in the Affordable Care Act bill and the consequences thereof realizes if it is not over turned it will be the death nail for America.)

1) America loses its AAA rating: Despite the fact that Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner assured Americans that there was "no risk" America would lose its AAA credit rating, America did indeed lose its rating for the first time since 1917 because of Barack Obama's adamant refusal to cut spending. It's worth noting that another credit rating company, Egan-Jones, downgraded the United States AGAIN just a couple of weeks ago from AA+ to AA. Unless something changes, historians will point to the Obama downgrade as the very moment when America started to come down like the Hindenburg.

Best Political Commercial – Barry Hinckley

Am I right? is this campaign ad the best ever? who is the star? Senate candidate Barry Hinckley’s son…. He is 5 years old

Video:  Best Political Commercial – Barry Hinckley

Hinckley for US Senate - Economics for five year olds -  A Rhode Island economics lesson with 5 year old Hudson Hinckley, son of Barry Hinckley.

h/t to Greta Van Susteren  -  Greta says, I am not telling you to vote for or against Barry Hinckley… but this is a cute commercial!!

Senator Scott Brown Endorses Barry Hinckley

The 2012 Check List for America’s Survival

Many people make resolutions to start the year, but I think a list of things that must be done to protect and preserve the Republic should be tallied…

1. President Obama must be defeated in 2012 and the obstructionist Democratic Party must lose power in the Senate to ensure both houses of Congress will be Republican and in a position to initiate real change.
2. The Environmental Protection Agency must be reined in with increased Congressional oversight and legislative limits on its rule-making capacity. Having fulfilled its 1970 mandate to clean the nation’s air and water, it should be scaled back to the maintenance of these functions.
3. Americans, despite the administration’s efforts to redefine and distract us, must keep clearly in mind the threat of Islam to the nation and the world. A Middle East in turmoil lays ahead for 2012.
4. To jump-start the economy, taxes and spending must be reduced across the board. A tax on consumption, rather than income would be a good start. Only 49% of Americans currently pay income taxes, the lowest in decades.
5. Obamacare must be repealed should the Supreme Court fail to rule that the Commerce Clause takes precedence over its requirement that Americans must purchase health insurance or be fined for not doing so.
6. A serious restructuring of Social Security and Medicare must be undertaken. Older Americans who have paid into the system—it is involuntary—must be ensured their benefits will be paid, but younger citizens should have the freedom and responsibility to structure their own retirement and health plans.
7. Access to the nation’s vast reserves of coal, natural gas, and oil should be increased and encouraged. Oil companies should be encouraged to build more refineries via tax credits and removal of “environmental” obstacles.
8. Congress needs to identify and fund the repair to the nation’s aging infrastructure.
9. Utilities should be encouraged via tax credits and other incentives to expand the national “grid” for the distribution of electricity.
10. Term limits for Senators and Representatives should be added to the U.S. Constitution in the same fashion the presidency is limited. Salaries, pensions, and perks should be capped. A permanent political class is a danger to citizens.
11. The Federal government should be downsized with the elimination of the Departments of Education, Labor, and Energy, along with the Environmental Protection Agency. These powers should be returned to the individual States. (10th Amendment)
12. The nation’s military which has been significantly reduced in size and structure should be expanded with attention to the upgrade and increase of its naval fleet and aircraft.
13. Congress should reject and rescind all legislation based on “global warming” or “climate change” as the former has been demonstrated to be a hoax and the latter is meaningless insofar as the climate is beyond the control of humans.
14. The United States should significantly reduce its contribution to the United Nations and refuse to ratify any of its treaties.
15. Tort reform should be instituted to reduce the costs of health care.
16. The corporate tax rate should be significantly reduced from its present rate, one of the highest in the world, to increase expansion, new jobs, and competitiveness.
17. Public service unions should be illegal. The federal government does not permit such unionization and neither should states.
18. National Public Radio should no longer be funded. The “government entities” of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac should be eliminated.
19. The federal government should be restricted or significantly limited from the acquisition of more of the nation’s landmass.
20. Strenuous efforts must be undertaken to reduce the national debt and deficit. A devalued dollar impoverishes everyone.

These are just a few changes which, if implemented, would go a long way to reducing the ills associated with a federal government grown too large, subject to crony capitalism, and corruption.

As John Adams said, “Let us disappoint the men who are raising themselves upon the ruin of this Country.”

© Alan Caruba, 2012

Alan Caruba  -  Most recent columns

Alan has a daily blog called Warning Signs. His latest book is Right Answers: Separating Fact from Fantasy.

Alan can be reached at acaruba@aol.com  -  Canada Free Press
Older articles by Alan Caruba

And prepare yourself for the worst and to help others!! – Preparedness and Survival

Jobs? Obama? Impeach Him!

By Alan Caruba

America is dying a death by a thousand cuts in the form of hidden and explicit taxation, the insane generation of new regulations, and the resulting massive unemployment. Obama just selected a new economic advisor who is known to favor a value-added tax that would drive up the cost of everything you purchase.

It’s not like solutions to our economic disaster are not known. They are and the Obama administration will not implement them. They do know what they are doing and it is deliberate.

On September 7, in the guise of a jobs speech Obama will offer massive new spending programs. The money for them would have to be borrowed. The interest on that borrowing would sink the nation further into debt.

In the August 31 edition of The Wall Street Journal, an editorial revealed that, when Speaker John Boehner asked the White House to disclose any “major” federal rules in the works with estimated economic costs of $1 billion or more, he was informed that the Obama regulatory agenda for 2011 contains 219 proposed such new regulatory initiatives.

In 2010 the administration had 191 proposed regulatory initiatives in the works which combined with those proposed in 2011 add up to a total of 410. By contrast the first two years of the Bush administration rulemaking accounted for only 103 new, major regulations.

Of seven pending major rules estimated to cost more than $1 billion one includes the Environmental Protection Agency’s ozone regulations, estimated to cost $90 billion if Congress does not step in and put a stop to it. The EPA is trying to eliminate one tenth of all the utilities that provide the electricity the nation needs to function.
The Competitive Enterprise Institute’s experts on regulation have concluded that the present cost of federal regulation to businesses that must comply with them is $1.75 trillion annually.

If you visit USA Action News.com, you will find an issues section devoted to the Cloward-Piven strategy named after two socialist academics who spelled out just what it would take to economically destroy the nation. It is being implemented by the Obama administration.

Posted by Alan Caruba on August 31, 2011 at 3:21pm

Posted at TPN

Appeals court rules against Obama healthcare law (ObamaCare)

For any one who hasn’t heard… this is a critical win!!

Every GOP Candidate in the debate last night has the full repeal at or near the top of their agenda for their first day office as President of the United States.

Appeals Court Rules Obamacare Unconstitutional!

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - An appeals court ruled Friday that President Barack Obama's healthcare law requiring Americans to buy healthcare insurance or face a penalty was unconstitutional, a blow to the White House.

The Appeals Court for the 11th Circuit, based in Atlanta, found that Congress exceeded its authority by requiring Americans to buy coverage, but also ruled that the rest of the wide-ranging law could remain in effect.

The legality of the so-called individual mandate, a cornerstone of the 2010 healthcare law, is widely expected to be decided by the Supreme Court. The Obama administration has defended the provision as constitutional.

The case stems from a challenge by 26 U.S. states which had argued the individual mandate, set to go into effect in 2014, was unconstitutional because Congress could not force Americans to buy health insurance or face the prospect of a penalty.

"This economic mandate represents a wholly novel and potentially unbounded assertion of congressional authority: the ability to compel Americans to purchase an expensive health insurance product they have elected not to buy, and to make them re-purchase that insurance product every month for their entire lives," a divided three-judge panel said.

Obama and his administration had pressed for the law to help halt the steep increases in healthcare costs and expand insurance coverage to the more than 30 million Americans who are without it.

It argued that the requirement was legal under the Commerce Clause of the Constitution. One of the three judges of the appeals court panel, Stanley Marcus, agreed with the administration in dissenting from the majority opinion.

The majority "has ignored the undeniable fact that Congress' commerce power has grown exponentially over the past two centuries and is now generally accepted as having afforded Congress the authority to create rules regulating large areas of our national economy," Marcus wrote.

Many other provisions of the healthcare law are already being implemented.

The decision contrasts with one by the U.S. Appeals Court for the 6th Circuit, based in Cincinnati, which had upheld the individual mandate as constitutional. That case has already been appealed to the Supreme Court.

The Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit, based in Richmond, has yet to rule on a separate challenge by the state of Virginia.

(Reporting by Jeremy Pelofsky and James Vicini; Editing by Eric Beech) 

Related:

Federal Appeals Court Rules":  Individual Mandate Is Unconstitutional

500 Billion New Reasons to Invalidate ObamaCare

Van Jones Group Uses Kid Video to Push Universal Health Care, Higher Taxes

Felonious Munk Presents: Stop It B! OBAMA PAY YOUR &*%$#% BILLS

Language Alert: This really is a must watch unless you are squeamish about bad language!!

Felonious Munk speaks on the economic state of America and why we shouldn't pay our bills.

When Glenn Beck heard the following rant by comedian Felonious Munk, he couldn’t believe it. You probably won’t either.

Munk is known for recording wild, profanity-laced YouTube rants as part of a series he calls “Stop It B!” Sometimes it’s hard to tell what he really believes and what is part of his routine. But we’ll let you make up your mind regarding his latest rant — a stern message to Obama about the debt ceiling and America paying its bills.

There’s no way to really sum it up, except for that it has a lot of GRAPHIC LANGUAGE and you’ll need headphones to watch if you are in public, at work or near kids. You also might need to cover your mouth from laughing — or gasping…

 

Video:  Felonious Munk Presents: Stop It B! OBAMA PAY YOUR &*%$#% BILLS

Source: The Blaze

Someone sent me this the other day and kept meaning to post it and send it out to my list.  I did send it to Beck, Rush, Greta and O’Reilly though. (…not that I’m taking credit for Beck getting it on the Blaze)  I laughed, gasped, and cheered!!  It is about time I thought!! It is a sad day when a foul mouthed comedian has more sense than the President and those who surround him in the White House (and I don’t want to hear about the Congress because as Democratic President Harry Truman said… the buck stops with the President!), and it is just as sad when a comedian has more guts than most Americans to speak up!!

Ask Marion~

Update:

FELONIOUS MUNK TALKS COMEDY, OBAMA, & WHY HE WOULD JOIN GBTV WITH THE BLAZE

A phone interview with Felonious Munk isn‘t what you’d expect from an energetic, foul-mouthed comedian. He swore once. Ranted just little. And explained how he used to be a finance director making six figures. It’s a job he gave up to do comedy (much to the chagrin of his mother). And now, it‘s a job that’s led him to grab the attention of Glenn Beck.

“I definitely appreciate that kind of exposure,” he said of his recent rant against Obama becoming a favorite on Beck’s radio show. Still, he included a caveat: “You got to keep in mind, it puts me in a unique position as a black guy who has questioned Obama.”

In the three-minute video posted on his YouTube channel recently, Munk berated the government and president Obama for not paying the country’s bills and racking up debt. All with a unique, profanity-laced flavor that left many laughing and gasping at the same time.

(Watch the original video)

For the most part, the reaction to those words from the black community “hasn’t been that bad.” But there are detractors who don’t like him speaking out against a black president. Munk had a message for them:

“It’s disingenuous to complain about a black man saying something about Obama, when, during President Bush’s reign [he made sure to point out he meant to say "reign"] if you spoke out against the government at that time it was kind of this, ‘oh, you‘re not patriotic’ thing. And black people thought that was ridiculous. Well, if that was ridiculous then, it‘s just as ridiculous for you to say that I can’t speak out against Obama.”

So where does the long-bearded comedian, not afraid to criticize Obama, stand politically?

“I hate partisan anything” he told The Blaze from Virginia Beach, VA. “I rant just as much about Republicans as I do Democrats. I rant just as much about the Tea Party as I do liberals.” In fact, he thinks the idea of loyalty to a party is “retarded.”

In fact, he said he supports the president — whether George W. Bush or Barack Obama. But he always retains “the constitutional right to say, ‘that’s ridiculous.’”

Still can’t pin him down? You probably won’t be able to put him in a simple partisan box. Consider this: he’s not a fan of the health care bill (he calls it the “ugliest quilted blanket of health care crap I’ve ever seen”), but has a soft spot for Canada’s single-payer health system.

That seems to lean liberal.

“I think our government has made everything they possible could more difficult, and that‘s just during Obama’s presidency,” he said, later adding, “I think [the health care bill] was one of those things where you made a promise and now you force yourself to keep that promise even though what you eventually came up with was crap.” In other words, “squash it.”

That seems to lean conservative.

He doesn’t think the country is headed for communism like some conservatives, but he believes some of the “socialist” programs put in place during the Great Depression weren’t meant to go on indefinitely, and now some people have become dependent on them.

Liberal and conservative?

The rant he delivered that caught Beck’s eye, he explained, was just one of many issues he has with the president.

“There are, oh my God, a million things.” For example, he’s opposed to foreign aid to Somalia and Israel alike.

Still, he admits some of the things he ranted about in the video were slightly exaggerated for comedic effect.

What is he, then? How about a comedic conundrum.

Who is Felonious Munk?

Felonious Munk isn’t really Felonious Munk. His real name is Dennis Banks. And he said this is the first time he’s admitted that to the media.

He has a surprisingly deep knowledge of history — he spouted off people (both politicians and comedians) and terms from days past like he was, well, a stand-up version of Beck. And his path to comedy wasn’t an ordinary one. He went to college for accounting but then switched to IT after being bored with the former. He then worked in finance for almost 12 years, specifically in the car sales business.

Then, he said, the economy “forced” him into comedy — which is a way of saying business wasn’t good so he chose to do what he loved.

Still, his brand of comedy is different. There are curse words. It can be crass. There are plenty of laughs. But he also wants his craft to make people think.

“I thought comedy was always, ‘make me laugh, but let me go home and think about it,’” he explained, which he says is the offspring of his humor and his different way of thinking about things. Now he’s traveling across the country sharing it with as many people as possible.

And now, because of Beck, he’s tapping an audience that might not have ever known about him. And he’s okay with that. He’s even going to work it into his routine.

“I’m sure Glenn Beck is going to be a part of a few of my shows coming up. As a matter of fact, he’ll probably get a tribute video,” he said chuckling. Which is ironic, he added, because he’s made videos bashing Fox News in the past.

Almost twenty minutes into the interview, he finally started cracking jokes: “I think it’s kind of cool that Glenn Beck sees this video and goes, ‘Wow, this guy who kind of looks like bin Laden makes a point that I agree with.’” He‘s even thinking about donning a turban and Photoshopping himself shaking Beck’s hand.

And what about Beck’s own joke at the end of his radio show Thursday, wondering if Munk (or Banks) would be willing to join GBTV as a comedian?

“Truthfully, the only way you could get me to shave my beard is if I had that opportunity,” he said while laughing. “If Glenn Beck wanted to make me the Lewis Black of his new TV show, tell him I’m all over it, I’ve got material for months, and I’ve got a couple of really nice suits.”

“We could be like the Run DMC of the new politics.”

Now that’s a funny image!

Collapse: “It Will Be Sudden and Very Painful”

Ruins of houses in Fredericksburg, Virginia Circa Civil War. Are we preparing for another?

While it’s too early to tell whether or not the destruction in stock markets will continue as it did in 2008, one thing is for sure – when the bottom finally falls out of this economy it’s going to come as a surprise to tens of millions of people who have been bamboozled by their trusted politicians and corporate elite.

Today’s Dow Jones collapse of 350 points is but an indicator of the severe volatility and unmitigated destruction we can expect as this crisis enters the next phase. Former comptroller general of the Government Accountability Office (GAO) David Walker warns that it’s going to hurt:

“Here’s the bottom line. If you take the total liabilities of the United States – public debt, unfunded pensions, retiree health care, under funding with regard to social security, with regard to Medicare, a range of commitments and contingencies – as of September 30 2010 we would have had to have had $61.6 trillion dollars in the bank in order to be able to cover those obligations.” Walker explained.

“The fact of the matter is that government has grown too big, promised too much and waited too long to restructure. Our problem is overwhelmingly a spending problem.” Walker, now the head of the fiscal advocacy group the Comeback America Initiative, told viewers.

“Lets understand something very simple. If you have escalating deficits and mounting debt, that means you have to increase the debt ceiling limit at some point and it means absent structural reforms in entitlement programs, defense and other spending, those represent deferred tax increases.”

“We are not exempt from a debt crisis,” he said. “We’re never going to default, because we can print money. At the same point in time, we have serious interest rate risk, we have serious currency risk, we have serious inflation risk over time. If it happens, it will be sudden and it will be very painful.”

It’s not a matter of if, but when. The course is mathematically unsustainable, and a few hundred billion in cuts, as ridiculous as it sounds, is simply not going to be enough.

As Charlie McGrath pointed out in his August 3 video report, the US government will have to take extreme measures, like Greece is being forced to take now, to keep the system alive, albeit on life support:

We are in the leagues of nations such as Greece and Italy, these other nations who their national debt far outpaces their GDP, and reality is these nations are going through austerity.

And, here comes your crisis of reality.

The austerity measures that are about to come our way are going to be like nothing we’ve ever seen or even dreamt about in this country – certainly worse than any of the politicians getting before the cameras will tell you is coming. They’re telling you if you go further into debt everything’s going to be OK.

…President Obama and Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke are out of bullets. They have nothing left…they’ve tried everything: QE1, QE2, Stimulus 1, Stimulus 2, there’s just nothing left that can be done to help create jobs in this country.

Video:  WARNING ...Real Crisis Ahead

Many don’t believe it will happen here. But make no mistake, it’s coming (in fact, it’s happening right here and now!).

They’re going to print more money and erode your savings. They’re going to borrow more money from foreign creditors, until such time that they won’t lend to us anymore. Prices for essentials like food, energy and clothing are going to increase exponentially over the next few years. At the same time we will see forced cuts to programs like social security, Medicaid, Medicare and a host of other entitlement programs. Millions of Americans are going to feel like they’ve been hit with a sledgehammer.

The United States of America is embroiled in the next Great Depression – and there is no way out. The economy will not, contrary to the opinion of our government and the presstitutes who promote their agendas, recover in a few months. We’re in this for the long haul, as in years and decades not weeks or months, and all of us will soon learn what TEOTWAWKI means.

Source:  ShiftPlan - Mac Slavo - August 4th, 2011

Obama says we're only "halfway" to where he wants to take us as Dow drops 512 Points!

Obama says we're only "halfway" to where he wants to take us as Dow drops 512 Points!

Money/CNN is reporting it is the worst financial crisis since 2008.

"The conventional wisdom on Wall Street was that the economy was growing -- that the worst was behind us," said Peter Schiff, president of Euro Pacific Capital. "Now what people are realizing is the stimulus didn't work, and we may be headed back to recession."

There's "total fear" in the market, said Bob Doll, chief equity strategist at the world's largest money manager, BlackRock.

"In the last two weeks, we've been through the ringer," said Rich Ilczyszyn, market strategist with futures broker Lind-Waldock. "When we start looking at the recovery, there's nothing to hang our hats on anymore."

Earlier today, I read a transcript from Obama's fundraiser on Real Clear Politics where he said we weren't even "halfway there" to where he wants us to be.

When I said 'change we can believe in' I didn't say 'change we can believe in tomorrow.' Not change we can believe in next week. We knew this was going to take time because we've got this big, messy, tough democracy," President Obama said at a campaign fundraiser in Chicago on Wednesday night.

Sounds like this darned democracy thing is impeding Obama's progress. If we are only "halfway" to wherever it is he's trying to take us, all I can do is pray God helps us survive until January 2013.

Sherry Phillips at Tea Party Nation - August 4, 2011 at 5:43pm

Related:

Drunken Ben Bernanke Tells Everyone How Screwed U.S. Economy Really Is

Romney Video: Obama Isn’t Working: Chicago

Globalist Imperial Network

The Smoking Gun:  Preparation for War on the People

Send This Letter to Your Congressman and Senator: 9,000,000,000,000 Ways to Balance the Budget

This is a letter that Dr. Coburn sent to all of his Senate colleagues on the 27th:

9,000,000,000,000
Ways to Balance the Budget

July 27, 2011

Dear Colleague,

Nearly everyone in Washington agrees we must reduce the deficit, but few offer any specifics as to how to do it. Last week, I released a report, BACK IN BLACK, outlining thousands of detailed budget options within every federal department and nearly every major program that, if taken together, would result in savings of more than $9 trillion over the next decade.

I do not expect anyone to agree with everything recommended in this report, but I expect everyone will find things with which they agree. With negotiations stalemated, I wanted to bring your attention to some very simple commonsense ideas I believe most of us—and most Americans—regardless of party or ideology could support that would save at least $355 billion.

End Unemployment Payments to Millionaires
Savings: $186 million over ten years
Nearly 3,000 households with incomes of $1 million or more were paid a total of $18.6 million in unemployment insurance benefits in 2008. Those earning $1 million a year do not need and should not qualify for unemployment compensation.

Stop Payments to Dead People
Savings: Over $1 billion over ten years.
Washington sent over $1 billion to more than 250,000 deceased individuals over the past decade. The federal government paid for dead people’s prescriptions and wheelchairs, subsidized their farms, helped pay their rent, and even chipped in for their heating and air conditioning bills. Some of these payments were fraud, some were incompetence, and some were intentionally required by law. Congress should end payments to the dead and federal agencies should ensure beneficiaries and participants of government payments are, in fact, alive.

Eliminate Duplication
Savings: At least $50 billion over ten years
In March, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) released a report examining just 34 missions of the federal government and identified hundreds of duplicative and overlapping programs costing more than $215 billion a year. These included 47 separate job training programs, 88 economic development programs, 82 teacher quality programs, and 56 financial literacy programs. “Reducing or eliminating duplication, overlap, or fragmentation could potentially save billions of taxpayer dollars annually and help agencies provide more efficient and effective services,” GAO concluded. Another independent study identified at least 180 economic development programs within more than a dozen different agencies costing taxpayers about $17.9 billion annually. Duplication within the federal bureaucracy should be consolidated.

Eliminate Sweet Heart Deals for Government Contractors
Savings: At least $2 billion over ten years
The federal government pays over $500 billion annually to contractors. In 2009, $170 billion worth of contracts were awarded without competition. Competitive bidding for government contracts helps ensure the highest-quality services for the lowest cost, while no-bid contracts waste billions of dollars with little apparent benefit to anyone other than contractors. No bid contracts should be eliminated.

Collect Unpaid Taxes Owed by Federal Employees
Savings: $1 billion over ten years
Nearly 100,000 civilian federal employees were delinquent on their federal income taxes in 2008. These federal employees owe a total of $962 million in unpaid federal income taxes. The IRS should collect these overdue taxes.

Reduce Congress’ Spending on Itself
Savings: $3.82 billion over ten years
Since 2001, Congress has boosted its own budget by 55 percent. At the same time, the average American wage increased by only 23 percent. In real dollars, the budget of the House and Senate has grown by more than $1 billion over the last decade. Congress must lead by example and do more with less. Congress’ spending on itself should be reduced by at least 15 percent.

Stop Overpaying Drug Companies
Savings: $480 million over ten years
The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) overpays pharmaceutical companies nearly a million dollars a week. According to the Government Accountability Office, drug companies were overpaid $3.9 million in a single month! HRSA should be required to routinely monitor prices to ensure taxpayers are not being overcharged and take immediate corrective action to recoup any excess payments.

Reduce Unnecessary Government Printing
Savings: $4.9 billion over ten years
Federal agencies – excluding the Department of Defense – spend nearly $1.3 billion a year on routine office printing. A third of this printing is unnecessary, according to an independent analysis. Agencies should put an end to this wasteful habit and administrative accounts of each department should be reduced accordingly.

Eliminate Unnecessary Printing of Congressional Documents
Savings: $312.2 million
In the digital age, printed copies of Congressional reports and other documents are as likely to grace a landfill as a bookshelf. In 2010, nearly $100 million was allocated for Congressional Printing and Binding account. A representative of the Government Printing Office (GPO) recently testified, “70 percent of the GPO’s funds are used to digitize legislation, schedules and other federal records, while 30 percent is used to print hard copies.” Reducing the Congressional Printing account by 30 percent would put an end to the wasteful practice of printing and distributing congressional documents that are almost immediately thrown away. The documents would still be available online and users could decide whether or not to print hard copies.

Get Rid of Unneeded Federal Properties
Savings: $15 billion over ten years
The federal government has over 63,000 buildings that are underutilized and not utilized at all. This number has increased by more than 12,000 from only two years ago. It costs over $1.2 billion every year to operate these properties. The federal government should dispose of all excess properties within five years. According to the Obama Administration, at least $15 billion could be saved if the federal government gets rid of its unneeded properties.

End Subsidy for Ethanol Blending
Savings: $2 billion one time savings
Ethanol producers reap the benefits of a vast array of government assistance, including tax credits, grants, loans, loan guarantees, federally-directed markets, and a federal minimum usage mandate. The Volumetric Ethanol Excise Tax Credit provides a 45-cent-per-gallon federal tax credit to producers who blend ethanol with gasoline. Ethanol-blended fuel is nearly a third less efficient than gasoline, has contributed to the increased price of corn, and can cause engine damage. Ethanol subsidies are outdated, duplicative, and have failed to meet the intended goals of greater energy independence with a cleaner fuel alternative. The ethanol tax credit should be eliminated immediately.

Reduce the Number of Limousines Owned by the Government
Savings: $115.5 million over ten years
In the past two years, the federal government’s limousine fleet has grown by 73 percent. The federal government had 238 limos in 2008 and that number reached 412 last year. The number of limos owned by the federal government should be reduced to its previous level.

Reduce Federal Vehicle Fleet
Savings: $5.6 billion over ten years
Federal agencies own or lease over 662,000 cars, vans, sport-utility vehicles, trucks, buses and other vehicles. Since 2006, the federal vehicle fleet has grown by five percent and the cost of maintaining and servicing those vehicles has grown over 25 percent, to $4.6 billion. These vehicles consume about a million gallons of fuel per day. The General Services Administration will purchase more than 100 more vehicles this year. Instead, the number of vehicles in the federal fleet should be reduced by at least 20 percent.

Reduce Junkets and Unnecessary Travel
Savings: $43.3 billion over ten years
The federal government spends $15 billion on travel every year. All travel that is not mission-critical should be ended.

Reduce Advertising by the Federal Government
Savings: $5.6 billion over ten years
The federal government spent almost $1 billion on advertising last year. While some advertising may be needed, much of it is wasteful and unnecessary and this amount should be cut in half.

Limit the Amount Spent to Host Government Conferences
Savings: $1 billion over ten years
The federal government spent at least $2 billion on conferences between 2000 and 2006. Some conferences may provide important venues for exchanging ideas or providing training. Others appear to be little more than government funded vacations at beachside resorts and other exotic destinations. Traveling to meetings and hosting conferences are, in large part, no longer necessary with the availability of teleconferencing. Total spending on conferences should not exceed $100 million annually and conferences should only be held when other options are not feasible.

Use Better Measure of Inflation to Determine Increases in Benefit Payments
Savings: Approximately $180 billion over ten years
Many government benefits are automatically increased for inflation every year, based on the consumer price index (CPI). For more than 15 years, many budget experts have agreed the current CPI mechanism outpaces actual inflationary growth, causing the cost of government programs to rise rapidly. The Bureau of Labor Statistics developed a more accurate measure of inflation, known as Chained CPI, which over the last ten years has grown at a slightly slower rate than the current measure for CPI. Congress should adopt the recommendation of the President’s National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform to transition to Chained-CPI government wide to ensure this automatic spending increase is as accurate as possible to avoid uncontrolled automatic spending increases in federal programs.

Eliminate Hollywood Liaisons
Savings: $34.4 million over ten years
Many federal agencies have offices and programs to assist Hollywood movie producers and television execs, often with the goal of ensuring a positive portrayal of the federal government. The agencies have at least 14 employees costing $1.2 million. These should be eliminated.

Stop Purchasing Excess Land
Savings: $4.1 billion over ten years
The federal government has spent more than $430 million to purchase additional land since the start of the recent recession and more than $2.3 billion over the past decade. At the same time, the Department of the Interior maintenance backlog on public lands has surged to as high as $19.9 billion, resulting in serious risk to visitors and deteriorating conditions of important national treasures. The National Mall, for example, has been so neglected it has been called a national disgrace. Until the federal government can afford to take care of the land it already owns, it should be prohibited from purchasing additional land.

End Payments for Coal Cleanup When Projects Have Been Certified as Being Completed
Savings: $1.23 billion over ten years
The federal government continues to send funds intended for the cleanup up abandoned coal mines to several states and tribes that have already been certified as completing their work. The funds are unrestricted and have essentially become slush funds. These dollars should be used only for their intended purpose and directed to states with abandoned sites, with excess amounts should be returned.

Suspend the Automatic Pay Raise for Members of Congress
Savings: $6 million over three years
Members of Congress typically receive an automatic pay raise every year. Congress voted to freeze the salary of its member for the past two years at $174,000. The pay for members of Congress should be frozen for at least three more years.

Get the Department of Defense Out of Education and the Grocery Store Business
Savings: $19 billion over ten years
The Department of Defense currently operates hundreds of grocery stores and dozens of elementary schools in the United States. These grocery stores are in the same communities that have Wal-Mart, Costco, Safeway, and other choices for military personnel. Instead of paying our soldiers more money and allowing them to choose where to shop, we subsidize thousands of federal employees to work in grocery stores around the country. Similarly, the Department of Defense employs thousands of teachers in a unique school district called the Department of Defense Education Activity. Under the Pentagon’s management, taxpayers are spending more than $50,000 per student enrolled in these schools. The Pentagon should shut down its education bureaucracy, send much of this money to bolster local public schools, and return the rest for debt reduction.

Terminate HHS’s Community Economic Development Program
Savings: $38 million over ten years.
The mission of the Community Economic Development program (CED) duplicates 180 other government development programs, has a very low success rate, and does not fit within the mission or expertise of the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). According to HHS’s most recent report to the Congress, only one out of five funded projects within the CED program were successful. Due to its lack of success, duplicative nature, and inappropriate placement within HHS, CED should be eliminated.

End Federal Subsidies to Wealthy Doctors and Hospitals for Health Information Technology
Savings: $15.6 billion over ten years.
The federal government mandates and subsidizes the use health information technology (IT) for doctors and hospitals, despite scant evidence doing so will lower costs. Taxpayers should not be forced to subsidize the purchase of health IT by doctors and hospitals.

Stop Medicare Payments for Uncovered Services
Savings: $1.97 billion over ten years.
Medicare currently only pays for medically necessary chiropractic services, but a HHS Inspector General report found the program improperly spent $178 million on chiropractic services in 2006. Implementing and enforcing current policies, along with more careful reviews of documentation, could save taxpayers nearly $2 billion over a decade.

This list is just a handful of the savings options contained within BACK IN BLACK. I would encourage you to review the thousands of other recommendations. I would also be interested in hearing other debt reduction ideas you might have.

Sincerely,
Tom A. Coburn, M.D.
U.S. Senator

The Latest on the Debt Crisis Deal and Some Input From Marco Rubio

Rubio on the Senate floor regarding our debt crisis (the ease with which he delivers a smackdown to John Kerry is a nice added bonus):

Rubio: 07.30.11

YouTube Video | Senator Marco Rubio | Sen. Rubio: “Save The Whole House or It Will All Burn Down”

I would love nothing more than compromise. But I would say to you that compromise that’s not a solution is a waste of time. If my house was on fire, I can’t compromise about which part of the house I’m going to save. You save the whole house or it will all burn down. We either save this country or we do not. And to save it, we must seek solutions.

That, my friends, is what hitting it out of the park looks like. Here is the complete text of Sen. Rubio’s remarks (as provided by Rubio’s press office):

Senator Marco Rubio

U.S. Senate Floor Speech

July 30, 2011

Sen. Rubio: “Thank you, Mr. President.

“I rise here on the Senate floor today to speak on the tremendous issue that’s captivated, and rightfully so, the attention of our country.

“Let me start by saying that I do not enjoy nor relish the partisan role of attack dog. I never found any fun in that. I don’t think it’s constructive. I don’t intend to become that here in the Senate.

“I also have only been here for seven months, which means I haven’t been here long enough to think any of the stuff that’s going on is normal. And I certainly don’t think any of the stuff that goes on around here too often is normal. So I think the fact that I’ve been here seven months has served me well in that regard.

“Let me begin if I can. One of the things that I’ve noticed this week is that Washington is full of people from all over the world and all over the country that have traveled here this week to come and watch their government at work and see the monuments of the city and found themselves in the middle of this debate.

“So I think it’s important to remind people what we’re debating because although it is a difficult and important issue, it is not a complicated one to understand. It’s pretty straight forward.

“And here’s the way I would describe it the United States of America more or less — these are rough numbers but they’re accurate – spends about $300 billion a month. It has $180 billion a month that comes to the federal government through taxes and other sources of revenue and that means that in order to meet its bills at the end of every month it needs to borrow $120 billion.

“Now, for much of the history of this country, there have been increases in the debt limit and the ability to borrow money. But what has happened over the last few years is that it’s no longer a routine vote because the people who give us our credit rating are saying too much of the money that you spend every month is borrowed and we want you to show us how over the next ten years you are going to borrow less as a percentage of what you spend.

“And so that’s why, for years, where the debt limit was routine vote, it no longer can be. It’s not something that was made up in some conservative think tank. But the reality that we cannot continue to borrow 40% to 41% of every penny that the government spends has brought us to this point.

“So you would think that seeing that, our government and our leaders here in both parties would react to that immediately and work on it.

“And I’ve heard lot of talk today about delaying tactics and delaying votes. I would argue to you that this issue has been delayed at least for the last two and a half years.

“In the two years before I even came here, this chamber neither proposed nor passed a budget. It is a startling figure that for the last two years this government has operated without a budget. So think about that. Two years have gone by without a budget. The first two years that the President was the president, no budgets.

“Some people would say, well, that’s because of partisanship in Washington. Well, that’s not true. In the two years before I got here, both the House and Senate were controlled by members of the Democratic Party, which are the President’s party. In fact, in this chamber for at least one of those two years, 60 votes, 60 out of the 100 members here caucused with the Democrats. And as you recall, on Christmas Eve of the year 2009, they were able to pass a health care bill that was very controversial because they had the 60 votes in the President’s party.

“Over two years, no budget. In fact you know how long it has been since this chamber proposed a budget? Forget passed a budget, proposed a budget? 822 days. That’s a long time. A lot of things have happened in the last 822 days, but proposing a budget is not one of them out of this chamber.

“So then I got here – and we got here in January, seven months have passed, still no budget. Again, not budget passed, proposed, offered. Here’s our budget. Still no budget. 822 Days and every single day that I’ve been here.

“Now, in the last seven days on this debt debate, we have finally seen a proposal from the esteemed senator from Nevada, the majority leader. You would think, has he brought it to the floor to vote? Not until last night. So, again, offered a proposal over the weekend and still for six days we sat around and what did we do around here? Nothing. It was never brought to a vote.

“You would think these issues would have been worked on in January, February, March — nothing. This chamber has done nothing. You talk about delay tactics? They’ve been delaying for two and a half years.

“Now the President doesn’t have the luxury of some of these things. He has to propose a budget by law, and he did. Let me tell you how ridiculous the budget was. Not a single member of this Senate voted for it, including the Democrats. It is a budget that didn’t lead with the debt limit; in fact, it increased the debt. That’s how absurd the budget was.

“Where is the President plan? We haven’t seen it. We haven’t seen it. Here’s the President’s plan: a blank sheet of paper. He doesn’t have a plan. He hasn’t offered a plan. Again, if this were a Republican president, I would say the same thing.

“I do not understand how an issue of this magnitude, of generational importance, the President of the United States has not offered a plan. If someone has seen the president’s plan, please send it to me because no one else has seen it. It does not exist.

“So this has been the plan all along, by the way. The plan all along was not to take a position, to let the days count down until we got to this point with 72 hours to go and then force a vote on something that they wanted. I believe that that has been the plan the entire time. And you can see it carrying itself out.

“You want to know why people all across America get grossed out about politics? It’s by watching this kind of stuff happen.

“And instead let me tell you what we’ve seen for the last few days. First of all, for today and for much of this time I have heard all these attacks and name-calling. If we had $1 billion for every time I heard the words “tea party extremist,” we could solve this debt problem.

“So all this name-calling, so I said let me read some quotes about this debt limit and I found some pretty extremist quotes.

“Here’s one.

“It says, “The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better. I, therefore, intend to oppose the effort to increase America’s debt.” A quote from a tea party extremist, right? No. This is a quote from March 16 of 2006 from Senator Barack Obama of Illinois.

“I found another extremist quote. This one says, “Because this massive of accumulation of debt was predicted, because it was foreseeable, because it was unnecessary, because it was the result of willful and reckless disregard for the warnings that were given and for the fundamentals of economic management, I am voting against a debt limit increase.” Well, that must be from a tea party extremist member of the House, right? No. This is March 16, 2006, from Senator Joe Biden of Delaware.

“And last but not least, here’s a quote from September 27 of 2007. It says, “I find it distasteful and disturbing to increase the debt limit yet again. Clearly we need to change course and this debt limit bill is just another reminder of that.” And that is from the distinguished Senator from Nevada, the majority leader. On that date in 2007.

“And yet now these same quotes in this context, what we’re talking about raising the debt limit more than has ever been raised in one vote, is extremism? This name-calling is absurd and it sets this process back.

“The other thing I hear — oh, it is not reasonable. This is a waste of time. This bill can’t pass the Senate when they talk about the House bill. So now it disqualifies the bill the fact that it can’t pass in the Senate.

“Well, guess what? The Senate bill can’t pass in the Senate — the Senate bill can’t pass in the Senate.”

Sen. John Kerry (D-MA): “Will the Senator yield for a question?”

Sen. Rubio: “Yes, I’ll yield.”

Sen. John Kerry: “I thank the Senator for doing that. That’s become somewhat unusual in the Senate today. So I truly appreciate it.

“I would ask the Senator, as ironic as it may be that on occasion people in the past have indeed voted against a debt limit — both Republicans and Democrats alike — is it not true that in those situations those votes did not hold the nation hostage, did not come at a moment of enormous economic fragility as we are in today, and did not run the risk of default because it was going to pass overwhelmingly every time?

“Is that not true?”

Sen. Rubio: “To the Senator from Massachusetts, I would say two things.

“The first is that those votes — put it to you this way. If the Senator from Illinois at the time, Senator Obama, had had his way, we’d be in the same position we are in now. Because he had voted against the debt – and I recognize the President has now said that the debt limit is — he made a mistake and he wouldn’t have said that were he here today.

“My point, I would say to the Senator from Massachusetts, is that rhetoric two years ago was not considered extremist language and now that rhetoric, which by the way I have not found. I think it is a myth. There may be a handful of people in the building both in the House and Senate perhaps that believe that the nation doesn’t have to raise the debt limit. But by and large everyone recognizes that something must be done about the debt limit.

“What we have also said – I speak for myself. Let me not speak for any other member of this chamber or the next.

“What I have also said is that it would be a terrible mistake to lose this opportunity to do something meaningful about the debt. And that the debt limit gives us an opportunity to do something meaningful about the debt, because the crisis that America faces is not one that I have defined.

“But one that has been defined by the rating houses and rating agencies who have said if you do not get your spending in order, we don’t care whether you raise your debt limit or not, we will downgrade you.

“And what that means for every American is an increase in their interest payments.”

Sen. John Kerry: “Will the Senator further yield for a question?”

Sen. Rubio: “Yes.”

Sen. Kerry: “Mr. President I appreciate what the Senator is saying. I would just say first of all that everybody understands the danger of the rating agencies right now.

“The problem is, we got to reach across the aisle and negotiate. We’ve got to come to agreement. Right now there’s not a lot of negotiating going on.

“I would ask the Senator, if he doesn’t agree that there is an enormous difference between — the Senator a moment ago said if he had gotten his way. But the whole point is, everybody knew he wasn’t about to get his way. That was a truly symbolic vote.

“Today, however, is it not true we are on the brink of a default and the absence of negotiation or the absence of a settlement presents us with a far more serious consequence to the unwillingness to raise the debt ceiling today?”

Sen. Rubio: “To the Senator from Massachusetts I would say it’s impossible to negotiate with someone who doesn’t offer a plan. How do you negotiate with someone who will not offer a plan and will not put it on the table?

“But the finger pointing of who has a plan and who doesn’t have a plan is relevant, but it’s not the central issue here.

“I would also say that in March of this year, March 30 to be exact of this year, I wrote an op-ed piece that ran in The Wall Street Journal and it outlined the things I was looking for to be a part of this debate. And I was told on March of this year that we didn’t have enough time to do all those things. Although later on we found out perhaps we did, this grand bargain and I am prepared, as I stand here today, if there is a meeting going on right after this, I’d love to be a part of it.

“I am prepared to discuss the things that I believe we need to do not just to raise the debt limit. Raising the debt limit is the easiest thing. That’s one vote away. The hard thing is to show the world we are serious about putting our spending in order so we can show people we’ll able to pay our bills down the road.

“And that is a combination of things that I have outlined very clearly, not just on March of this year in The Wall Street Journal, but in repeated speeches on this floor.

“And those are the things, we need to do two things.

“Number one is we need to grow our economy because while the debt is the biggest issue in Washington, jobs are the biggest issue facing America. And if we could get more people back to work, we would have more people paying taxes, and if we had more people paying taxes, we’d have more revenue for government.

“And so that is the first thing we need to do, is figure out how to create jobs in America and I think there is bipartisan agreement on things we can do to do that.

“The President himself mentioned regulatory reform as a necessity in the State of the Union. Let’s do it.

“We’ve all talked about tax reform. Flattening and simplifying our tax code. And if there are things in that tax code that do not belong there because they are the product of good lobbying instead of good policy, then let’s go after those things. We’ve talked about that. Let’s talk about that.

“I think we all agree that there has to be some changes in discretionary spending, but we also agree that doesn’t solve the problem. That’s a small piece of our overall budget. That we have to save Medicare because it goes bankrupt if we leave it the way it is. That we have to save Medicaid because it goes bankrupt if we leave it the way it is.

“And I can tell you that history will back up what I’m about to say and that is that there is no government run by conservatives, Republicans, put whoever you want there, if you give government the opportunity to spend more money than it has, it will do it. It will do it every time.

“That’s why I believe there are at least 20 members of the Senate in the other party who have supported some version of the balanced budget amendment and yet it’s something we cannot even get a vote on much less discuss in the Senate.

“So I believe there can be compromise on those outlines but here’s the last thing I would say.

“I believe my time is about to expire so let me close with this.

“Compromise is fantastic.

“I would love nothing more than to leave this building tomorrow night having said the republic still works. I was able to stand shoulder to shoulder with people from states far from mine with views different from mine but who love their country so much that we were able to come together and save it when it faced this catastrophe.

“I would love nothing more than compromise. But I would say to you that compromise that’s not a solution is a waste of time.

“If my house was on fire, I can’t compromise about which part of the house I’m going to save. You save the whole house or it will all burn down.

“We either save this country or we do not.

“And to save it, we must seek solutions.”

Cross-posted at Sunshine State Sarah and the Minority Report

The latest deal, hyped as the great compromise, provides for exactly $4 billion in savings this year. That’s right, $4 billion… essentially nothing! It promises fantasy cuts in future years, which will never happen. It guts defense spending with budget cuts to be shared 50-50 between the Department of Defense and entitlement programs, though entitlement programs are close to three times the size of the defense budget.

There will be a ‘Super’ committee to propose more cuts down the road. The House side will have three Republicans and three Democrats. Earth to John Boehner. You have a majority in the House. Why the hell don’t you have a majority on that committee?

The debt ceiling deal provides for the immediate raising of the debt ceiling, thus fueling the continuing, endless increase in the size of government.

And do you realize that if we don’t repeal ObamaCare, every penny we are saving in this pathetic bill without the guarantee of a balanced budget. will be eaten up with those increases alone? Plus Moody’s wanted at $4 Trillion in spending cuts bill… and this one would only reach $3 Trillion if they really did everything they promised… so we might lose out AAA credit rating anyway. And maintaining our AAA credit rating was the only reason to even consider raising the debt level.  Also, the Dem’s keep saying there are no tax hikes in the latest “Grand Compromise”, but in reality, word is that Obama just plans ‘not’ to extend the Bush tax cuts next time around… to they’ll get their tax hike too.  So finally, if the American people are to get anything out this, the GOP needs to demand a yay vote on the separate Balanced Budget Amendment before passing any version of this… After all the Dems, including Obama, keep saying they are all for balancing the budget and that they would vote for a balanced budget amendment in a separate bill… so let’s do it now, FIRST!

Chances are that this bill will not pass both the House and Senate. Neither the right nor the left is happy. And again… they are asking congress to pass and the American people to accept a bill that nobody will time to read. Didn’t we learn our lesson on that trick?!?

As Rubio mentions, this plan of no plan, so the Dems and Obama could push through whatever they wanted at the last hour was always the plan!  And let us not forget the elephant in the room… Obama’s plan, in his own words has always been to fundamentally transform America.  He just left off the the words: into a second rate country!

Wow… a Palin-Rubio ticket is sure looking good to me… but he’d be a great addition to any ticket!!

Ask Marion~

“Hang On, Hang On!’: CNN Anchor Clashes with Senator Rand Paul Over Debt Ceiling

“Raising the Debt Ceiling” For Dummies

Lost in all the politics of raising the debt ceiling is a simple understanding of why it is so dangerous to do so.

The government-controlled media is trying to ensure that the public doesn’t have the facts, lacks a clear understanding of the problem and chooses sides based on emotion.

The fact is, at the end of 2008, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) reported, “At the end of 2008, that debt equaled 40 percent of the nation’s annual economic output (a little above the 40-year average of 37 percent). Since then, the figure has shot upward: By the end of fiscal year 2011, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects federal debt will reach roughly 70 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) — the highest percentage since shortly after World War II.”

The entire US Gross Domestic Product (GDP) for 2010 was $14.62 Trillion. The US debt ceiling currently stands at $14.294 Trillion, which was exceeded in May of 2011. Obama and Congress will be raising the debt ceiling well above our US GDP. Does this make America economically stronger or weaker?

To clarify what the rating agencies said, “Standard & Poor’s and Moody’s credit rating services issued warnings that United States could be downgraded because of the continued large deficits and increasing debt.”

To say that our government is simply spending more than it takes in is an understatement when it comes to the out-of-control spending we’ve experienced under President Obama; what he’s doing is dangerous. He has spent about $12.2 Trillion in just 3 years; that’s $5.15 Trillion more than the approximate $7.05 Trillion that was given to him by taxpayers.

Obama has made America the largest debtor-nation in the history of the world and fully intends to keep spending.

To put this into perspective, let’s look at it this way… It’s like a person spending $86,500 a year when they only bring home $50,000. How long will creditors keep loaning money to this person… especially if this person says they refuse to meaningfully cut their spending and instead expects to increase it every year?

Let’s look at it another way… It took roughly 220 years for our nation to accumulate $5.181 Trillion in debt which occurred in 1996. From 1996 to the end of 2008 (12 years), another $4.473 Trillion was added to our national debt, which is why we screamed for Bush to stop spending. Obama is adding $5.15 Trillion in just 3 years. What he’s doing is dangerous.

So, if you’re not screaming for Obama to stop spending, why not? Raising the debt ceiling without significant strings attached gives him the blank checks he needs to plunge us even further into debt. He refuses to cut spending and dishonestly threatens our creditors, seniors and others in hopes they’ll support him out of fear. He’s historic alright; no President in the history of our nation has ever threatened its citizens or its creditors in this way.

Obama isn’t spending our money to help improve the lives of America’s poor, seniors, veterans, homeless, minorities or others we care deeply about. Here’s just a taste of his real priorities… where he’s been spending our money and what our kids and grandkids will be expected to repay for decades to come:

OVERSEAS

· $63 billion – US Global Health Initiative.

· $665.7 million – International Family Planning & Reproductive Health Programs.

· $1 billion – to Mexico so that they can drill in the Gulf (while Obama caused 23,000 Americans to lose their jobs because of his ban on US drilling in the Gulf).

· $2 billion – to Brazil for OFFSHORE OIL DRILLING!!!!

· $147.3 million – US pays Brazil each year in cotton subsidies to keep its mouth shut.

· $30 billion – of the $100 billion per year for UN Climate Change Policy; the UN admitted global warming is about wealth redistribution, not climate change policy.

· $430 billion from TARP that Timothy Geithner stated will be recovered by January 2011 – of which the Fed spent $350 billion in taxpayer funds to save 35 foreign banks.

· $8 billion – US pays to IMF for Greece Bailout.

· $1.9 billion – International Agriculture Programs.

· $54.1 billion – USAID to other countries for FY 2011 – President Obama already sent $173.5 billion for international/foreign assistance ($90.6 billion in 2010 – a 60% increase compared to FY 2008; $82.9 billion in 2009 – a 47% increase compared toFY 2008).

· $5.96 million – U.S. Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation 2010 Awards (i.e. mosque restoration overseas). NOTE: Section 205.1(d) of title 22 of the Code of Federal Regulations prohibits USAID funds from being used for the rehabilitation of structures to the extent that those structures are used for “inherently religious activities.”

PROPAGANDA ORGANIZATIONS

· $80 billion to Apollo Alliance (socialist/communist George Soros group) to expand community agitation; see this video too.

· $422 million – Funding for Public Broadcasting/NPR – a private company that doesn’t need taxpayer funds.

· $161 million – NEH anti-American group which targets our military.

GROW GOVERNMENT

· $44 billion – This represents a 28% pay increase for Fed employees (Fed pay increased 36.9% since 2000 while private worker’s pay increased only 8.8%.)

· $148 billion – loaned to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac – these are government operated organizations that are taking control of 90%+ of U.S. home mortgages, and these are the organizations who contributed to the housing meltdown.

· $1.416 billion – Serve America Act FY 2011 to recruit our children at school and get them into “volunteerism” (i.e. recruit and train community agitators).

· $1 billion – Dead people to whom our Federal government sends our money.

· $1.4 billion – FDA to take over our food supply and hire 17,000 more taxpayer-funded government employees.

· $400 million – Michelle Obama’s Food Deserts to open government food stores that are closer to urban areas to save residents the 5 extra minutes of driving time that it takes to get to their existing, privately owned store.

GLOBAL WARMING

· $1.741 billion – INCREASE for “critical efficiency and renewables programs” – this is just the amount of increase to their existing budget.

· $2.4 billion – “clean tech” for energy efficiency and renewable energy programs, a $2.287 billion increase from $113 million in the previous budget [ID:nN01180827].

· $6 billion – clean energy technologies.

· $535 million – Global warming money for a politically-connected private company, Solyndra, to lay off workers and build a new plant (see video here).

· $611.4 million – Bureau of Labor Statistics to gather data on ‘green jobs.’

· $123 million – DoE’s wind program, a $43 million increase over current spending.

· $300 million – the Advanced Research Projects Agency-Energy, or ARPA-E.

$880 Billion is being spent on these items alone in 2011. Are these discretionary expenditures worthy of collapsing America’s economy at a time when we need to reign in spending? If Obama continues to refuse to cut spending, that’s just what will happen.

Don’t be fooled by the propaganda coming from Obama and his regime – to include his MoveOn.org pals. They’re doing George Soros’ bidding. If you haven’t heard, Soros wants a ‘managed decline’ of our dollar and an economic collapse is exactly what he wants. Obama’s actions are clearly leading to what Soros wants.

It’s dangerous to raise the debt ceiling without significant cuts and caps on Obama’s spending and a legislative balanced-budget amendment to prevent future Presidents from doing what Obama’s doing to America.

By: AJ – Posted at the NoisyRoom

Related:

NIA Exposes Debt Ceiling Truth

Next Round in the Debt Crisis (Updated)

The object of the game is to  destroy American capitalism  by having the government take over everything!!!!
                         Want to play?   No???

Too bad, you're already playing...  and just don't know it.              

And by the way?
   You're not winning.