On Aug 26, 3:09*pm, "Robert Green" wrote:
"Kurt Ullman" wrote in message
*"Robert Green" wrote:
As you've made clear, when the lines are very closely drawn, having the
numbers doesn't mean there won't be cross-overs, defections, back-door
deals
and more. *I think it's sad that we've come down to arguing about "which
side has the right to ram something down the other's throat."
* * * * This has always been an interesting philosophical discussion. I
am not a fan of either the tyranny of the majority or tyranny of the
minority.

I believe the system is inherently good in that it allows for "passion" - if
someone feels they've got real heartache with a bill, they can filibuster..
However, it depends on good intentions to function correctly.
*When it
becomes a tool to "ratf&ck" the majority time and time again, then it's
being seriously abused.

You;re the guy calling Tea Party Congressmen terrorists
because they stood up and tried to stop out of control
spending. If that was not good intentions, then I don't
know what was. All they wanted was some reasonable
reductions in out of control spending that has increased
40% in just the last 4 years. And a balanced budget
ammendment to save the country from more reckless
spending. And recognizing that out of control spending
is the real problem, they refused to raise taxes and give
the govt more money to waste. All very reasonable and
with the best of intentions. For that, you and the libs call
them terrorists. And you have the nerve to talk about
good intentions?






I used to enjoy watching debates on CSpan. *I don't anymore for exactly the
reasons you mention. *There is very little substantive discussion about the
issues. *It's just everyone issuing "position statements" and remaining deaf
*to anyone's position but their own. *It happens on both sides of the aisle
but I've also noticed it's the young turks who are the worst and the least
collegial.


Thank God for that. It's the collegial nonsense that got
us to where we are today.





This last budget showdown was a mockery of our form of consensus based
government. *I liken it to a head of household going around the neighbor
telling all the merchants how deeply in debt he is. *It's stupid and
it's
part of a dangerous trend of creating crises for hopeful political gain.

I gave you the correct analogy in a prior post. It's like
a husband discovering that the household is borrowing
40% of what they are spending. His proposal is to
reduce spending in a reasonable fashion. The wife?
She wants to spend more and refuses to cut anything
unless the husband agrees to find more income.
According to you, the husband is the one that is
stupid?





* * *But this is a crisis that has been building literally for decades.
SS has been an unfunded pension plan since it's inception, always using
the income from currently employed to pay those who are retired. In the
80s (in a rather impressive episode of bipartisanship), they increased
taxes, put the "surplus" into non-marketable Treasury securities, and
sorta forgot to find a way to actually payback the securities. They also
tried to rewrite the laws of financial physics by disregarding what
happens when you don't get inputs from outside of a system. *Oh, and t
hey took SS off budget so as to hide the effective debt, what is on the
books AND what is owed to SS, Mcare, etc.

This is like the flooding that occurs months after the snows fell in the
mountains. *We got into this mess in a very bi-partisan way, day by day, and
it's not going to be solved in a partisan way overnight. *That's my
complaint.

The rising debt could have been addressed in a more thoughtful manner that
didn't result in a downgrade of our credit rating. *How is that a good thing
for us? * A lot of special interests on boths sides of the aisle will have
to cave-in to reality if things are to improve. *That's not going to happen
in only a few weeks in a divided Congress.

Yes, the Democrats could have agreed to bring spending
that has grown 40% in just 4 years under control. But
they didn't.


What it will really take is serious analysis. *A top-down AND bottom-up
review of all the items in the budget. *Cutting willy-nilly will only throw
more people out of work and deepen the crisis. *The Feds should be HIRING
investigators, auditors and CPA's to cut fraud and to cut expenditures that
no longer serve the purpose they were intended to.

But your friends the Democrats had 2 years to do that
and they have not done a thing. Why, they couldn't
even pass a budget. They could agree to do that
tomorrow and the Republicans would join them.





There are plenty of out-of-work people in those categories that have
tremendous experience to bring to bear. *I remember a long time ago when a
large number of Humvees went missing from the National Guard inventory a
very seasoned investigator from DoDIG found them in very short order.
That's because he had seen almost every trick ever pulled by quartermasters
on HQ and could literally smell something amiss.

He was like a narcotics detective I once knew who told me that you can tell
what pocket a junkie who's just scored keeps his dope in because he will pat
that pocket upon leaving the dealer's place. *Same thing about executing a
search warrant. *The person being searched can't help but cast furtive
glances at the place their "stuff" is hidden. *I enjoy watching Cops just
because time and time again it proves those guys right.


Yes, you do like to ramble on about nonsense.


Sunsetting, an idea that was popular some 30 years ago, seems to have fallen
out of favor. *Instead, we have what you've aptly named "fire and forget"
legislation that has no followup or shut-down provisions. *We have a
Congress that writes laws like MicroSoft writes code. *Bloatedly with the
caveat "we'll fix that in the NEXT release" when a new horde of bugs will
appear to replace it.

Is Obama in favor of that? Pelosi? Reid? The libs?
Not a Democrat to be found.




* * *Neither side is anywhere near blameless

But perpetuating the blame game serves both sides well because it keeps
people's eyes off the problem with the entire system. *They get tricked into
believing "if only you run those *******s out of office things will be
fine!" *They never are. *Tweedledee and Tweedledum.


It has never been clearer who is to blame than
over the last two months. The Democrats refuse
to just start cutting spending that has grown 40%
in the last 4 years. Has your household spending
gone up like that? And if it did, would your answer
be, hell no, I'm not gonna cut spending unless I
can also raise my income?