Republicans are afraid to propose spending cuts!

[bripat9643]

Medicare spending is currently a 5% of GDP. An increase by 5% of GDP would bring total Medicare spending to 10% of GDP, and it will continue to increase after that. If you think that kind of spending is sustainable, then you must be a Democrat.



It's not a lie. The government of Canada refuses treatment to people who are "too old to benefit." It also delays care for things like cancer until it's too late for the patient to benefit from treatment.

That is a lie. Repeating it won't make it true.

Indeed it is. Canadians have longer life-expectancy than Americans.

Their life expectancy has nothing to do wit the quality of their healthcare. For one thing, they don't count child deaths the way the USA does. IN the US, any child born alive is counted a death if it fails to survive past the age of one. In canada, premature babies are not counted in infant mortality statistics. For another thing, Canada isn't over run with illegal immigrants who have notoriously high rates of teenage pregnant, drug abuse, murder and host of other social issues that reduce life expectancy. The lifestyles of many blacks also reduces their life expectancy.

And finally, Americans are the fattest people on Earth, and that drastically reduces life expectancy. It also has nothing to do with the quality of our healthcare.

Life expectancy isn't a valid indicator of the quality of medical care provided. Survival rates for various medical conditions like cancer is a valid indicator, and all of those show that our system is vastly superior to Canada's.

 

[bripat9643]

The problem is quite simple. Government has promised too much to too many for too long.

No -- the government have not promised anything beyond any civilized country has been doing, which is caring for its seniors and disabled.

It was not "too much" it is simply underfunded by a few percentage of GDP. Nothing we can't afford.

You pay for it, asshole. I already pay too much in taxes.

 

[Oddball]

The problem is quite simple. Government has promised too much to too many for too long.

No -- the government have not promised anything beyond any civilized country has been doing, which is caring for its seniors and disabled.

Right...Because nothing says "caring for seniors and the disabled" like massive ETOH subsidies, "green energy" crony capitalism scams, 2 years of unemployment handouts, mass transit boondoggles, foreign aid welfare sent to prop up despots and/or to our nation's enemies, military bases in countries where the wars have been over for more than half a century, a domestic police/snoop state that makes Orwell look like an optimist, on and on...

It was not "too much" it is simply underfunded by a few percentage of GDP. Nothing we can't afford.

No, it's never much when you're spending everyone else's money.

 

[Koios]

That is a lie. Repeating it won't make it true.

Indeed it is. Canadians have longer life-expectancy than Americans.

Their life expectancy has nothing to do wit the quality of their healthcare. For one thing, they don't count child deaths the way the USA does. IN the US, any child born alive is counted a death if it fails to survive past the age of one. In canada, premature babies are not counted in infant mortality statistics. For another thing, Canada isn't over run with illegal immigrants who have notoriously high rates of teenage pregnant, drug abuse, murder and host of other social issues that reduce life expectancy. The lifestyles of many blacks also reduces their life expectancy.

And finally, Americans are the fattest people on Earth, and that drastically reduces life expectancy. It also has nothing to do with the quality of our healthcare.

Life expectancy isn't a valid indicator of the quality of medical care provided. Survival rates for various medical conditions like cancer is a valid indicator, and all of those show that our system is vastly superior to Canada's.

Yeah ; LE, and infant mortality are key indicators of a nation's health, which derives from health care. Check CIA World Facebook.

And we suck at it compared to Canada and other Western European countries that have national health care, even though we have way fewer smokers.

Spin it anyway you want. But the only thing we're number one in is cost per capita and as a percentage of GDP. We're way out in front when it comes to high cost. Health is where we suck.

 

[ilia25]

Survival rates for various medical conditions like cancer is a valid indicator, and all of those show that our system is vastly superior to Canada's.

Stop presenting your opinions as facts.
Comparison of the health care systems in Canada and the United States - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Oddball]

Indeed it is. Canadians have longer life-expectancy than Americans.

Their life expectancy has nothing to do wit the quality of their healthcare. For one thing, they don't count child deaths the way the USA does. IN the US, any child born alive is counted a death if it fails to survive past the age of one. In canada, premature babies are not counted in infant mortality statistics. For another thing, Canada isn't over run with illegal immigrants who have notoriously high rates of teenage pregnant, drug abuse, murder and host of other social issues that reduce life expectancy. The lifestyles of many blacks also reduces their life expectancy.

And finally, Americans are the fattest people on Earth, and that drastically reduces life expectancy. It also has nothing to do with the quality of our healthcare.

Life expectancy isn't a valid indicator of the quality of medical care provided. Survival rates for various medical conditions like cancer is a valid indicator, and all of those show that our system is vastly superior to Canada's.

Yeah ; LE, and infant mortality are key indicators of a nation's health, which derives from health care. Check CIA World Facebook.

No, no they don't.

They derive from a whole host of reasons ranging from lifestyle choices to murder rates.

Sorry to trip up you stale old socialist babbling point so abruptly, but that whole infant mortality and life expectancy memes have been debunked eight ways from Sunday....Best get back with the Ministry for some new material.

 

[Koios]

That is a lie. Repeating it won't make it true.

Indeed it is. Canadians have longer life-expectancy than Americans.

Their life expectancy has nothing to do wit the quality of their healthcare. For one thing, they don't count child deaths the way the USA does. IN the US, any child born alive is counted a death if it fails to survive past the age of one. In canada, premature babies are not counted in infant mortality statistics. For another thing, Canada isn't over run with illegal immigrants who have notoriously high rates of teenage pregnant, drug abuse, murder and host of other social issues that reduce life expectancy. The lifestyles of many blacks also reduces their life expectancy.

And finally, Americans are the fattest people on Earth, and that drastically reduces life expectancy. It also has nothing to do with the quality of our healthcare.

Life expectancy isn't a valid indicator of the quality of medical care provided. Survival rates for various medical conditions like cancer is a valid indicator, and all of those show that our system is vastly superior to Canada's.

Emphasis added.

We're fifth in the world in survival of all cancers. We're only number one in survivability of certain cancers that are causes celebre. Pink ribbon on products and more weekend marches than you can count, for breast cancer. For men, it's further south that's the hot cause: prostate cancer.

 

[Koios]

Their life expectancy has nothing to do wit the quality of their healthcare. For one thing, they don't count child deaths the way the USA does. IN the US, any child born alive is counted a death if it fails to survive past the age of one. In canada, premature babies are not counted in infant mortality statistics. For another thing, Canada isn't over run with illegal immigrants who have notoriously high rates of teenage pregnant, drug abuse, murder and host of other social issues that reduce life expectancy. The lifestyles of many blacks also reduces their life expectancy.

And finally, Americans are the fattest people on Earth, and that drastically reduces life expectancy. It also has nothing to do with the quality of our healthcare.

Life expectancy isn't a valid indicator of the quality of medical care provided. Survival rates for various medical conditions like cancer is a valid indicator, and all of those show that our system is vastly superior to Canada's.

Yeah ; LE, and infant mortality are key indicators of a nation's health, which derives from health care. Check CIA World Facebook.

No, no it doesn't.

It derives from a whole host of reasons ranging from lifestyle choices to murder rates.

Sorry to trip up you stale old socialist babbling point so abruptly, but that whole infant mortality meme has been debunked eight ways from Sunday.

Contact the CIA and let em know they're doing it wrong. Then let me know how it goes.

 

[ilia25]

The problem is quite simple. Government has promised too much to too many for too long.

No -- the government have not promised anything beyond any civilized country has been doing, which is caring for its seniors and disabled.

Right...Because nothing says "caring for seniors and the disabled" like massive ETOH subsidies, "green energy" crony capitalism scams, 2 years of unemployment handouts, mass transit boondoggles, foreign aid welfare sent to prop up despots and/or to our nation's enemies, military bases in countries where the wars have been over for more than half a century, a domestic police/snoop state that makes Orwell look like an optimist, on and on...

You have any big numbers, or just big words?

90% of what the US government spends goes to defense and entitlement programs. And everything else is just peanuts -- a 100 million waste would represent a whopping 0.002% of total spending.

 

[Oddball]

Survival rates for various medical conditions like cancer is a valid indicator, and all of those show that our system is vastly superior to Canada's.

Stop presenting your opinions as facts.
Comparison of the health care systems in Canada and the United States - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

 

[Oddball]

No -- the government have not promised anything beyond any civilized country has been doing, which is caring for its seniors and disabled.

Right...Because nothing says "caring for seniors and the disabled" like massive ETOH subsidies, "green energy" crony capitalism scams, 2 years of unemployment handouts, mass transit boondoggles, foreign aid welfare sent to prop up despots and/or to our nation's enemies, military bases in countries where the wars have been over for more than half a century, a domestic police/snoop state that makes Orwell look like an optimist, on and on...

You have any big numbers, or just big words?

90% of what the US government spends goes to defense and entitlement programs. And everything else is just peanuts -- a 100 million waste would represent a whopping 0.002% of total spending.

Fact remains that the feds spend zillions of dollars on lots of stuff not anywhere near related to "caring for its seniors and disabled."

Sorry actual reality busted your bubble, tovarich.

 

[Bern80]

The problem is quite simple. Government has promised too much to too many for too long.

No -- the government have not promised anything beyond any civilized country has been doing, which is caring for its seniors and disabled.

It was not "too much" it is simply underfunded by a few percentage of GDP. Nothing we can't afford.

If we are so easily able to afford it, why do we have a deficit every year and an accumulated debt of 16 trillion dollars? People like you think what government is doing is compassionate and civilized. Creating a society of dependents is anything but civilized. Greece is where we will be soon if we keep on this road. Do those people who have had all their govenment stuff being taken away appear civilized to you?

 

[LeftCoastVoter]

No -- the government have not promised anything beyond any civilized country has been doing, which is caring for its seniors and disabled.

Right...Because nothing says "caring for seniors and the disabled" like massive ETOH subsidies, "green energy" crony capitalism scams, 2 years of unemployment handouts, mass transit boondoggles, foreign aid welfare sent to prop up despots and/or to our nation's enemies, military bases in countries where the wars have been over for more than half a century, a domestic police/snoop state that makes Orwell look like an optimist, on and on...

You have any big numbers, or just big words?

90% of what the US government spends goes to defense and entitlement programs. And everything else is just peanuts -- a 100 million waste would represent a whopping 0.002% of total spending.

to be more accurate 80% goes to the following:

Defense
SS
Medicare / Medicaid
Interest on the Debt.

the deficit is 1/3 of the total budget, so even if you cut every other government programs you would still need to cut another 16% from the above in order to balance the budget.

 

[auditor0007]

Agreed. Lets get rid of Evil-Bush's tax cuts for everybody and enjoy the ride.

I think everyone forgets the reasoning behind the Bush tax cuts. He didn't push for them as a stimulus to get the economy growing. He pushed for them because the CBO was anticipating large surpluses in the upcoming years, and Bush felt that the extra revenue should go back to the taxpayers. Had the CBO been projecting more deficits at the time, I don't believe Bush would have promoted the tax cuts. Even if he had, I don't think he would have gotten them.

How does that bit of Bush-apologist thinking fit within the context of Bush Tax Cuts 1 and 2?

Mind elaborating?

First of all it's not apologist thinking; it's fact. Secondly, my point was to show that there is no reason not to increase taxes back to the rates under Clinton. Get in the game please.

 

[Oddball]

Right...Because nothing says "caring for seniors and the disabled" like massive ETOH subsidies, "green energy" crony capitalism scams, 2 years of unemployment handouts, mass transit boondoggles, foreign aid welfare sent to prop up despots and/or to our nation's enemies, military bases in countries where the wars have been over for more than half a century, a domestic police/snoop state that makes Orwell look like an optimist, on and on...

You have any big numbers, or just big words?

90% of what the US government spends goes to defense and entitlement programs. And everything else is just peanuts -- a 100 million waste would represent a whopping 0.002% of total spending.

to be more accurate 80% goes to the following:

Defense
SS
Medicare / Medicaid
Interest on the Debt.

the deficit is 1/3 of the total budget, so even if you cut every other government programs you would still need to cut another 16% from the above in order to balance the budget.

So we'll just totally disregard the waste, fraud, duplication and outright graft in those areas of the budgetary mess....Gotcha.

 

[Oddball]

I think everyone forgets the reasoning behind the Bush tax cuts. He didn't push for them as a stimulus to get the economy growing. He pushed for them because the CBO was anticipating large surpluses in the upcoming years, and Bush felt that the extra revenue should go back to the taxpayers. Had the CBO been projecting more deficits at the time, I don't believe Bush would have promoted the tax cuts. Even if he had, I don't think he would have gotten them.

How does that bit of Bush-apologist thinking fit within the context of Bush Tax Cuts 1 and 2?

Mind elaborating?

First of all it's not apologist thinking; it's fact. Secondly, my point was to show that there is no reason not to increase taxes back to the rates under Clinton. Get in the game please.

And there's also not one reason that we can't go back to the spending levels under Clintoon, either.

 

[auditor0007]

Not necessarily.

I just believe that if the Republicans bite the bullet and concede to cut defense spending along with raising taxes for the wealthy first, democrats won't have to compromise anything and we could avoid the fiscal cliff.

I also think you're right in the sense that them advocating to cut entitlements would open the door for the dems to continue painting them as selfish, greedy, un-caring, ect.. So proposals to cut entitlements would have to come from the Democrats. Plus, that's their bread and butter. Why shouldn't they get to decide how to cut spending to them?

Until voters agree, as a solid majority, that cuts must be made to SS and Medicare, it's not going to happen. The bad thing about it is that the longer we wait, the worse those cuts will need to be.

Well why even worry about it? It's for all intents and purposes too late already. The money is going to RUN OUT, and then cuts will be IRRELEVANT.

What part about UNSUSTAINABLE do people NOT UNDERSTAND?

The point too many of you miss is that current spending is not that big of a problem. Current revenue is a big problem because it is much too low. Some of both of those problems will fix themselves if we can get the economy rolling again and get people back to work. What nobody wants to discuss seriously is the long term costs of Medicare and SS, specifically Medicare. While Paul Ryan did have a plan, it was not a good plan. The real problem though, is that everyone is scared shitless to make any significant changes to these programs. Hell, we can't even get a reasonable discussion going about them.

 

[Oddball]

The point too many of you miss is that current spending is not that big of a problem. Current revenue is a big problem because it is much too low. Some of both of those problems will fix themselves if we can get the economy rolling again and get people back to work. What nobody wants to discuss seriously is the long term costs of Medicare and SS, specifically Medicare. While Paul Ryan did have a plan, it was not a good plan. The real problem though, is that everyone is scared shitless to make any significant changes to these programs. Hell, we can't even get a reasonable discussion going about them.

Bullshit.

If the feds can't get by $3+ trillion, they have a major spending problem.

 

[ilia25]

The problem is quite simple. Government has promised too much to too many for too long.

No -- the government have not promised anything beyond any civilized country has been doing, which is caring for its seniors and disabled.

It was not "too much" it is simply underfunded by a few percentage of GDP. Nothing we can't afford.

If we are so easily able to afford it, why do we have a deficit every year and an accumulated debt of 16 trillion dollars.

Because we do not collect enough taxes -- the US is collecting less taxes than most developed countries (% of GDP):

Japan -- 28%
Canada -- 32%
UK -- 39%
Germany -- 40%
France -- 44%
Sweden -- 47%
Denmark -- 49%

USA -- 27%

5% of the US GDP is $800 billion. If the US were collecting in taxes as much as Canada (forget Northern Europe), our budget would be firmly in the black.

Creating a society of dependents is anything but civilized.

The US entitlement programs are designed to help seniors and disabled.

Greece is where we will be soon if we keep on this road.

Greece has a small welfare state. It collects less taxes than Germany or even Canada.

 

[ilia25]

The point too many of you miss is that current spending is not that big of a problem. Current revenue is a big problem because it is much too low. Some of both of those problems will fix themselves if we can get the economy rolling again and get people back to work. What nobody wants to discuss seriously is the long term costs of Medicare and SS, specifically Medicare. While Paul Ryan did have a plan, it was not a good plan. The real problem though, is that everyone is scared shitless to make any significant changes to these programs. Hell, we can't even get a reasonable discussion going about them.

Bullshit.

If the feds can't get by $3+ trillion, they have a major spending problem.

The US government spends less percentage of GDP than most developed countries. It has deficits because it collects even less in taxes.