The Hard Reality of a Debt Ceiling Showdown: Jim Jordan eviscerates Biden for not negotiating with House Republicans

[busybee01]

TV is already warning of the evilz coming. The Democrats set a trap and the CHRISTOMAGAs are gleefully cartwheeling into it.

Republicans claim that Biden is senile. He is wiping the floor with them. McCarthy talked about cutting wokeism in the military. I was not aware of a budget line in the military called wokeism.

 

[Seymour Flops]

The debt limit issue seems like an effort by the GOP to go back and renegotiate spending that has already been approved. I think it makes more sense to fight new battles rather than ones already fought.

I am seeing this claim that the GOP is trying to avoid "paying their bills" so often that I have to wonder which posters are just lying and which are innocently repeating a lie that they read somewhere else.

Sure, the spending has been approved, on a party line vote following a process which the representatives of nearly half the country were shut out of.

Now, the representation has shifted, and those voters whose reps were shut out now have a voice. They aren't asking to repeal the spending already passed, and they are not saying that they will never raise the debt ceiling again. They are saying that before we keep rubber stamping debt ceiling increases so much that the ceiling becomes a joke, lets negotiate some kind of reasonable limits to future spending.

Ask youself this: before they voted on the most recent spending, who read the spending bill? The answer is of course that no one read it, no one could have. Congress were like the blind men feeling the elephant, with each one only knowing one part of it.

 

[busybee01]

Even if that is right, my analogy still stands. If I'm the finally sober spouse, I'm going to tell the lush that if they insist on spending us into bankruptcy, and not agreeing to an increase in the credit limit means bankruptcy, then we might as well go bankrupt now rather than pass debts onto our grandchildren we know they will be unable to pay.

If that threat forces Democrats to negotiate seriously over spending cuts, that will be a huge step toward fiscal responsibility.

Trump cut taxes not revenue. He increased revenue, just not fast enough to keep up with the drunken spending.

Go Figure: Federal Revenues Hit All-Time Highs Under Trump Tax Cuts​

• 06:30 PM ET 10/16/2018

Taxes: Critics of the Trump tax cuts said they would blow a hole in the deficit. Yet individual income taxes climbed 6% in the just-ended fiscal year 2018, as the economy grew faster and created more jobs than expected.

The Treasury Department reported this week that individual income tax collections for FY 2018 totaled $1.7 trillion. That's up $14 billion from fiscal 2017, and an all-time high. And that's despite the fact that individual income tax rates got a significant cut this year as part of President Donald Trump's tax reform plan.

Income Taxes After Trump Tax Cuts​

True, the first three months of the fiscal year were before the tax cuts kicked in. But if you limit the accounting to this calendar year, individual income tax revenues are up by 5% through September.
Other major sources of revenue climbed as well, as the overall economy revived. FICA tax collections rose by more than 3%. Excise taxes jumped 13%.

The only category that was down? Corporate income taxes, which dropped by 31%.

Overall, federal revenues came in slightly higher in FY 2018 — up 0.5%.

Spending, on the other hand, was $127 billion higher in fiscal 2018. As a result, deficits for 2018 climbed $113 billion.

Let's compare these results with Obama's last full fiscal year in office, 2016.

Individual income tax revenues went up by a mere 0.3%, Treasury data show. Fiscal 2016 also saw a 13% drop in corporate income taxes. FICA tax collections climbed by less than 1%. Excise tax collections dropped almost 3%.

Overall revenues increased by 0.5% — about the same as this year. The deficit? It climbed by $148 billion.

So, in other words, the government did better on revenues and deficits in the year after Trump's tax cuts went into effect than it did in Obama's last year in office.

Democrats' most consistent logical failing is static reasoning. That is an early childhood developmental level in which a person believes that a change will not affect anything except that one thing being changed. That reasoning goes like this with tax cuts: 'if taxes are cut, the government will get less money.'

In fact, tax cuts have consistenly preceded increases in revenue, for reasons that are obvious to some and an unfathomable mystery to others.

No he did not. That was more of a reflection of the fact that the economy had a lot of momentum before the coronavirus pandemic.

 

[busybee01]

Brandon should honor his word and at least pretend to work in a bipartisan fashion. That would involve meetings, discussions and negotiations.

But Brandon (as we all know) is a compulsive liar and a stupid hack. So none of that will happen.

Republicans are compulsive liars. Santos is the prototypical Republican. Biden is eating the Republicans for lunch. Republicans never embraced bipartisanship and ran against it. There should be no negotiation on this.

 

[Seymour Flops]

No he did not. That was more of a reflection of the fact that the economy had a lot of momentum before the coronavirus pandemic.

If your point is that Trump was not responsible for the increases in revenue, you have a point. My response was to Coyote who claimed that Trump had cut revenue. That's impossible since revenue increased.

 

[Billiejeens]

If your point is that Trump was not responsible for the increases in revenue, you have a point. My response was to Coyote who claimed that Trump had cut revenue. That's impossible since revenue increased.

Their cult leaders adamantly deny that
Cult members don't think for themselves

 

[alang1216]

before we keep rubber stamping debt ceiling increases so much that the ceiling becomes a joke, lets negotiate some kind of reasonable limits to future spending.

Isn't that what the budgets are for. You want to limit spending, put those limits into the next budget. You're worried about voters that were shut out? Do I need to remind me that the GOP only recently captured the House by a slim majority and lost the Senate and the Presidency. Who is trying to shut out who?

 

[Seymour Flops]

Isn't that what the budgets are for. You want to limit spending, put those limits into the next budget. You're worried about voters that were shut out? Do I need to remind me that the GOP only recently captured the House by a slim majority and lost the Senate and the Presidency. Who is trying to shut out who?

GOP voters are shut out when the Dems have the mojority and Dem voters are shut out when the GOP has the majority. The system is broken.

So the GOP has no obligation to play along with what the Democrats did when they were in the majority. If the Dems want the debt ceiling raised so bad, let them come to the table and negotiate.

 

[busybee01]

Do you actually think you can tax yourself out of this? Haven't there been studies on massive taxation like you proposed that don't even make a dent in the reckless spending? Squeezing working people is not going to cover the blank check. The only solution is to get rid of the blank check. I don't care who does it, but for the love of holy, someone needs to do it. Democrats like you won't even admit that spending is a problem.

Discretionary spending totaled $1.6 trillion in fiscal year 2021. Defense spending totaled $795 billion. Non-defense spending includes welfare programs, federal law enforcement, air traffic controllers, meat inspections and other federal functions. The Republicans' first act in the House was to increase the deficit. Evasion of taxes by the rich is a growing problem in this country and costs the country hundreds of billions of dollars. The rest are mandatory spending programs such as SS and Medicare. The problem with these programs is that the tax in income capped and covers only wages. 7.5% is hardly onerous.

 

[busybee01]

GOP voters are shut out when the Dems have the mojority and Dem voters are shut out when the GOP has the majority. The system is broken.

So the GOP has no obligation to play along with what the Democrats did when they were in the majority. If the Dems want the debt ceiling raised so bad, let them come to the table and negotiate.

What do the Republicans want to do? Waiting for their proposal. There should be no negotiations.

 

[Seymour Flops]

What do the Republicans want to do? Waiting for their proposal. There should be no negotiations.

Negotiations are exactly what they are proposing. Why would you say there should be no negotiations now that the voters have put the Republicans in charge of the house? That makes zero sense.



At those negotiations the Republicans will demand spending reforms. The covid driven spending spree needs to end. The Democrats are free to explain to the Republicans and to the American people why the spending spree must continue at all costs.

But apparently that's exactly what Biden is afraid of. He insists on absolutely no negotiations even having his most trusted and important spokesperson Karine Jean-Claude or whatever the hell her name is say that the Republicans must pass a clean debt ceiling increase. I don't know why they don't just demand that the whole idea of the debt ceiling be jettison. Clearly the Democrats have no respect for it.

 

[Richard-H]

Republicans were stupid and added to the debt, now can you admit there is an actual spending problem and democrats need to help? You can't tax your way out of it. Somebody on either side needs to attack SPENDING. I'd love it if democrats did just that.

What makes you think that we can't tax our way out of it?

Each and every spending program is a result of a hard fought political battle. Both parties have their pet spending projects and both will fight to keep them.

What you cannot do is to cut spending to balance the budget. What you certainly CAN do is increase taxes on the wealthy.

The REAL reason that we have such huge debt is a historic failure to tax the wealthy. The basis for Keynesian economics is not just to increase government spending when there's an economic downturn, but to increase taxes and pay down the debt when the economic recovers.

Whenever our economy is going well, Republicans do not increase taxes and pay down the debt, instead they cut taxes on the wealthy while maintaining or increasing spending. That's what guarantees endless debt.

 

[busybee01]

I am sorry, to be more clear, I was responding to your post to balance the budget and offering an alternative method to help with that.

I personally think the budget deficit should be much lower: negative during recessionary periods and surplus in good years. To do so would likely require cuts, freezes, and tax increases.

The entire discretionary budget of the US is $1.7 trillion dollars. Please tell us where you would cut. We need to quit giving out tax cuts to the rich.

 

[busybee01]

Negotiations are exactly what they are proposing. Why would you say there should be no negotiations now that the voters have put the Republicans in charge of the house? That makes zero sense.



At those negotiations the Republicans will demand spending reforms. The covid driven spending spree needs to end. The Democrats are free to explain to the Republicans and to the American people why the spending spree must continue at all costs.

But apparently that's exactly what Biden is afraid of. He insists on absolutely no negotiations even having his most trusted and important spokesperson Karine Jean-Claude or whatever the hell her name is say that the Republicans must pass a clean debt ceiling increase. I don't know why they don't just demand that the whole idea of the debt ceiling be jettison. Clearly the Democrats have no respect for it.

Out of $1.7 trillion dollars where will you cut? Food inspections. Air traffic control. Law enforcement. Republicans just voted to increase the deficit by $114 billion.

 

[busybee01]

I am curious. I know you say discretionary is a drop in the bucket, but these huge bills where people want 3 trillion and then negotiate down to about 1.5 trillion seems to be a lot of non mandatory money. It appears much like spree spending and a lack of common sense. Thanks for the insight.

That money is spread out over 10 years.

 

[busybee01]

I am seeing this claim that the GOP is trying to avoid "paying their bills" so often that I have to wonder which posters are just lying and which are innocently repeating a lie that they read somewhere else.

Sure, the spending has been approved, on a party line vote following a process which the representatives of nearly half the country were shut out of.

Now, the representation has shifted, and those voters whose reps were shut out now have a voice. They aren't asking to repeal the spending already passed, and they are not saying that they will never raise the debt ceiling again. They are saying that before we keep rubber stamping debt ceiling increases so much that the ceiling becomes a joke, lets negotiate some kind of reasonable limits to future spending.

Ask youself this: before they voted on the most recent spending, who read the spending bill? The answer is of course that no one read it, no one could have. Congress were like the blind men feeling the elephant, with each one only knowing one part of it.

We could start out by not giving out tax cuts for the rich.

 

[Seymour Flops]

Out of $1.7 trillion dollars where will you cut? Food inspections. Air traffic control. Law enforcement. Republicans just voted to increase the deficit by $114 billion.

Start here:

1. The federal government made at least $72 billion in improper payments in 2008.[1]
2. Washington spends $92 billion on corporate welfare (excluding TARP) versus $71 billion on homeland security.[2]
3. Washington spends $25 billion annually maintaining unused or vacant federal properties.[3]
4. Government auditors spent the past five years examining all federal programs and found that 22 percent of them -- costing taxpayers a total of $123 billion annually -- fail to show any positive impact on the populations they serve.[4]
5. The Congressional Budget Office published a "Budget Options" series identifying more than $100 billion in potential spending cuts.[5]
6. Examples from multiple Government Accountability Office (GAO) reports of wasteful duplication include 342 economic development programs; 130 programs serving the disabled; 130 programs serving at-risk youth; 90 early childhood development programs; 75 programs funding international education, cultural, and training exchange activities; and 72 safe water programs.[6]
7. Washington will spend $2.6 million training Chinese prostitutes to drink more responsibly on the job.[7]
8. A GAO audit classified nearly half of all purchases on government credit cards as improper, fraudulent, or embezzled. Examples of taxpayer-funded purchases include gambling, mortgage payments, liquor, lingerie, iPods, Xboxes, jewelry, Internet dating services, and Hawaiian vacations. In one extraordinary example, the Postal Service spent $13,500 on one dinner at a Ruth's Chris Steakhouse, including "over 200 appetizers and over $3,000 of alcohol, including more than 40 bottles of wine costing more than $50 each and brand-name liquor such as Courvoisier, Belvedere and Johnny Walker Gold." The 81 guests consumed an average of $167 worth of food and drink apiece.[8]
9. Federal agencies are delinquent on nearly 20 percent of employee travel charge cards, costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars annually.[9]
10. The Securities and Exchange Commission spent $3.9 million rearranging desks and offices at its Washington, D.C., headquarters.[10]
11. The Pentagon recently spent $998,798 shipping two 19-cent washers from South Carolina to Texas and $293,451 sending an 89-cent washer from South Carolina to Florida.[11]
12. Over half of all farm subsidies go to commercial farms, which report average household incomes of $200,000.[12]
13. Health care fraud is estimated to cost taxpayers more than $60 billion annually.[13]
14. A GAO audit found that 95 Pentagon weapons systems suffered from a combined $295 billion in cost overruns.[14]
15. The refusal of many federal employees to fly coach costs taxpayers $146 million annually in flight upgrades.[15]
16. Washington will spend $126 million in 2009 to enhance the Kennedy family legacy in Massachusetts. Additionally, Senator John Kerry (D-MA) diverted $20 million from the 2010 defense budget to subsidize a new Edward M. Kennedy Institute.[16]
17. Federal investigators have launched more than 20 criminal fraud investigations related to the TARP financial bailout.[17]
18. Despite trillion-dollar deficits, last year's 10,160 earmarks included $200,000 for a tattoo removal program in Mission Hills, California; $190,000 for the Buffalo Bill Historical Center in Cody, Wyoming; and $75,000 for the Totally Teen Zone in Albany, Georgia.[18]
19. The federal government owns more than 50,000 vacant homes.[19]
20. The Federal Communications Commission spent $350,000 to sponsor NASCAR driver David Gilliland.[20]
21. Members of Congress have spent hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars supplying their offices with popcorn machines, plasma televisions, DVD equipment, ionic air fresheners, camcorders, and signature machines -- plus $24,730 leasing a Lexus, $1,434 on a digital camera, and $84,000 on personalized calendars.[21]
22. More than $13 billion in Iraq aid has been classified as wasted or stolen. Another $7.8 billion cannot be accounted for.[22]
23. Fraud related to Hurricane Katrina spending is estimated to top $2 billion. In addition, debit cards provided to hurricane victims were used to pay for Caribbean vacations, NFL tickets, Dom Perignon champagne, "Girls Gone Wild" videos, and at least one sex change operation.[23]
24. Auditors discovered that 900,000 of the 2.5 million recipients of emergency Katrina assistance provided false names, addresses, or Social Security numbers or submitted multiple applications.[24]
25. Congress recently gave Alaska Airlines $500,000 to paint a Chinook salmon on a Boeing 737.[25]
26. The Transportation Department will subsidize up to $2,000 per flight for direct flights between Washington, D.C., and the small hometown of Congressman Hal Rogers (R-KY) -- but only on Monday mornings and Friday evenings, when lawmakers, staff, and lobbyists usually fly. Rogers is a member of the Appropriations Committee, which writes the Transportation Department's budget.[26]
27. Washington has spent $3 billion re-sanding beaches -- even as this new sand washes back into the ocean.[27]
28. A Department of Agriculture report concedes that much of the $2.5 billion in "stimulus" funding for broadband Internet will be wasted.[28]
29. The Defense Department wasted $100 million on unused flight tickets and never bothered to collect refunds even though the tickets were refundable.[29]
30. Washington spends $60,000 per hour shooting Air Force One photo-ops in front of national landmarks.[30]
31. Over one recent 18-month period, Air Force and Navy personnel used government-funded credit cards to charge at least $102,400 on admission to entertainment events, $48,250 on gambling, $69,300 on cruises, and $73,950 on exotic dance clubs and prostitutes.[31]
32. Members of Congress are set to pay themselves $90 million to increase their franked mailings for the 2010 election year.[32]
33. Congress has ignored efficiency recommendations from the Department of Health and Human Services that would save $9 billion annually.[33]
34. Taxpayers are funding paintings of high-ranking government officials at a cost of up to $50,000 apiece.[34]
35. The state of Washington sent $1 food stamp checks to 250,000 households in order to raise state caseload figures and trigger $43 million in additional federal funds.[35]
36. Suburban families are receiving large farm subsidies for the grass in their backyards -- subsidies that many of these families never requested and do not want. [36]
37. Congress appropriated $20 million for "commemoration of success" celebrations related to Iraq and Afghanistan.[37]
38. Homeland Security employee purchases include 63-inch plasma TVs, iPods, and $230 for a beer brewing kit.[38]
39. Two drafting errors in the 2005 Deficit Reduction Act resulted in a $2 billion taxpayer cost.[39]
40. North Ridgeville, Ohio, received $800,000 in "stimulus" funds for a project that its mayor described as "a long way from the top priority."[40]
41. The National Institutes of Health spends $1.3 million per month to rent a lab that it cannot use.[41]
42. Congress recently spent $2.4 billion on 10 new jets that the Pentagon insists it does not need and will not use.[42]
43. Lawmakers diverted $13 million from Hurricane Katrina relief spending to build a museum celebrating the Army Corps of Engineers -- the agency partially responsible for the failed levees that flooded New Orleans.[43]
44. Medicare officials recently mailed $50 million in erroneous refunds to 230,000 Medicare recipients.[44]
45. Audits showed $34 billion worth of Department of Homeland Security contracts contained significant waste, fraud, and abuse.[45]
46. Washington recently spent $1.8 million to help build a private golf course in Atlanta, Georgia.[46]
47. The Advanced Technology Program spends $150 million annually subsidizing private businesses; 40 percent of this funding goes to Fortune 500 companies.[47]
48. Congressional investigators were able to receive $55,000 in federal student loan funding for a fictional college they created to test the Department of Education.[48]
49. The Conservation Reserve program pays farmers $2 billion annually not to farm their land.[49]
50. The Commerce Department has lost 1,137 computers since 2001, many containing Americans' personal data.[50]

50 Examples of Government Waste

Soaring government spending and trillion-dollar budget deficits have brought fiscal responsibility -- and reducing government waste -- back onto the national agenda. President Obama recently identified 0.004 of 1 percent of the federal budget as wasteful and proposed eliminating this $140...

www.heritage.org

 

[surada]

The debt ceiling shouldn't be a partisan issue. We need to pay our bills.

History of the United States debt ceiling - Wikipedia

en.m.wikipedia.org

 

[Doc7505]

The debt ceiling shouldn't be a partisan issue. We need to pay our bills.

Tell that to the Maoist/DSA Democrats that continue to line their pockets with the Pork they pass..

 

[BULLDOG]

Tell that to the Maoist/DSA Democrats that continue to line their pockets with the Pork they pass..

That is two different subjects. You're talking about the budget, where the spending level is determined. Think of it like Christmas shopping. The budget is where you decide what presents to put on the credit card, and the debt ceiling is a month after Christmas when the first payment is due. It's too late to spend less at that point. If you refuse to pay what is due, it will trash your credit rating, and cost additional penalties, and fees. (that's what happened in 2011) All you can do is pay the bill, and try to not spend as much next time.