Originally Posted By gadzuux Katrina is not the cause of the half trillion dollar defict - bush is. I cannot imagine any valid dispute. The big "luxury item" in his budget is iraq, yet no one here (except me) has even mentioned that. It's as if it's unthinkable to even consider reducing our expenditures there. So tax increases are not an option, reducing the phenomenal expenses in iraq is not an option, forgoing the ADDITIONAL pending tax cuts is not an option, and we're going to spend another $200 billion on hurricane relief. When pressed on how this can be done, all the GOP can come up with are vague allusions to reductions in medicare and food stamps - directly impacting the very people they're (supposedly) trying to help. When does 'accountability day' happen in GOP washington? Simply stonewalling on the specifics doesn't make the problem go away. They're taking the deficit from horrendous to holy hell, and they're not even speaking about it. That's because "values voters" don't want to know. They want to be spoon-fed reassuring platitudes that are devoid of any sense of reality - but comforting nonetheless. And they eat it up too. Just this weekend bush was delivering his by now boilerplate 'stay the course' speech and he said ... >> "To leave Iraq now would be to repeat the costly mistakes of the past that led to the attacks of September the 11th, 2001". << ... trying to link 9/11 with his invasion of iraq. He's been doing this for four years now, so he must be fooling somebody.
Originally Posted By mnsharp When does "accountability" happen for individuals? When is it not the government's responsibility to bail you out of every situation you put yourself into? When is it the government's job to make sure you have money? When is it the governments job to pay for your babies? When is it the government's job to pay for you to get off drugs? When is it the governments job to make sure that you aren't smoking crack when you should be working to support your family? When is the accountablility for all of these FAILED government programs going to come?
Originally Posted By mnsharp Stop giving and giving and giving and hold people responsible for themselves. These social programs don't work and they can't work. The more responsiblity we give the government to take care of us, the worse off the deficit will be and the worse off our society will be. If we continue adding social program and free handouts, soon there will be no one left to tax, except for the politicians who will still only pay their 12%.
Originally Posted By gadzuux >> These social programs don't work and they can't work. << I disagree. Food stamps puts actual food in actual people. Medicare and medicaid provides healthcare for people who have no other insurance and cannot afford it. The alternatives are to let people starve and get sick and die. I know - that's the GOP "plan". So what's your alternative - putting people in jail for being poor and ignorant? So much for "compassionate conservative" huh.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <<I'll take the tax policy of the 90's (when we got rid of the deficit entirely) to that of today, thank you.>> <It wasn't the tax policy of the 90's that got rid of the deficit, it was the spending policy.> Economics 101 tells you it was the conjunction of the two of them. Revenues minus spending equals net surplus or deficit. Trying to pretend it was just one half of it won't wash. This is particularly true since government spending really didn't go down all that much in the 90's. There were some cuts in discretionary spending, but that's quite a small percentage of the budget. The budgets Clinton proposed and that congress eventually accepted were NOT radically different. Republicans try to take credit for the surplus due to their supposedly monmumental spending cuts, but that won't wash either. The real key to the 90's surplus was the good economy, which brought in lots of revenue. And that was done with the tax rates we had in place in the 90's, obviously. And as Gadzuux points out, it is with a GOP Congress and a GOP president that the deficit has ballooned. The GOP-controlled congress proposes huge deficit budgets larded with pork, and Bush signs them. You really can't explain away that one. <<And like I said, that's a conservative point of faith, but it's not always true.>> <When hasn't it been true?> Both Reagan and the first Bush were forced to agree to tax increases as a way to control the deficits, and they did close them somewhat. Meanwhile, great work Gadzuux on the Sloan stuff. Paticularly interesting I thought was "Just the interest on Katrina—call it 4 percent on $200 billion—is $8 billion a year. While $8 billion is trivial in a world of $2 trillion federal budgets, it's still $40 billion over five years. That's more than the aforementioned $35 billion of social-spending cuts would save." The interest on our debt alone is huge. I'd like to see some of the usual suspects address #77. Even Darkbeer (via Fox news!) posted something about a possible tax that seems to look favorably upon it (though as often happens, Darkbeer didn't comment on the article, so it's hard to know).
Originally Posted By cmpaley mnsharp, sometimes, your posts make me think that you may be Catholic...except when you post like this. Have you ever heard of the Papal Encyclical "Rerum Novarum?" If you're a Catholic and haven't read it, I highly recommend it. It's a veritable feast for the right and the left. It was written back in 1891 by Pope Leo XIII. There are four others that followed it up by successive popes. It is the Gold Standard upon which all Christians should base their social justice thought.
Originally Posted By mnsharp CM - I'm not Catholic, but if you would like to know, I'm Mormon. In these topics remember that Mormon's actually vary a lot when it comes to opinions on government and our church does everything it can to stay out of government issues, so don't think that my opinions are anything other than my opinions. I haven't read the Rerum Novarum, but I would like to say this much to cover my opinion. I do not believe that it is the governments job to take care of us, but I do believe that it is our responsibility to take care of the less fortunate. Churches and organizations and individuals do a much, much better job. I think that society has to take care of itself, but the government should not be the one to take on that role. The government should only be suplmentary in the role of caring for the less fortunate. I will let you know that many countries have studied the welfare progam of my church, because it is a very good program. There are no free handouts. Most people on our church program have to prove they are trying to get work or they help take care of the church grounds etc. Each case is judge on an individual basis. Also, if you need help with your bills, they will help, but they also require you to get rid of the unneccessaries, ie cable, extra cars, cell phones if not needed etc. We value our welfare funds as sacred funds and our leaders disperse them as such. Why should a poor widow woman in Brazil help pay for my cable? Why should the man next door who works two jobs to support his family, help pay for someone who is not willing to work? Like I said, governments have studied this program, but cannot implement it like our church can, because that is not how a government is set up. Can you imagine if the government's welfare actually treated it's money as if it were sacred money that others had sacrificed?
Originally Posted By cmpaley Just askin'. If you want to know what I think about these issues, read the following Papal documents and you'll have it. All are available from the Vatican web site: Rerum Novarum - Pope Leo XIII Quadragesimo Anno - Pope Piux XI Mater et Magistra - Pope John XXIII Octogesima Adveniens - Pope Paul VI Centesimus Annus - Pope John Paul II
Originally Posted By Beaumandy << Katrina is not the cause of the half trillion dollar defict - bush is. I cannot imagine any valid dispute. The big "luxury item" in his budget is iraq, yet no one here (except me) has even mentioned that. >> Gadzuux, this is wrong on so many levels. Can you tell me why Bush wanted this " luxury item " as you call it, the Iraq war? What was in it for him if you deny it is for the real reason, the global war on terror?
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh <The budgets Clinton proposed and that congress eventually accepted were NOT radically different.> Except that President Clinton's proposed budgets had deficits. <The real key to the 90's surplus was the good economy, which brought in lots of revenue.> The key to the good economy of the late 90's was the Republican proposed capital gains tax cut and restraint of government spending. <Both Reagan and the first Bush were forced to agree to tax increases as a way to control the deficits, and they did close them somewhat.> And in neither case did they cut taxes to see revenues fall. Revenues to the treasury increased after President Reagan's tax cuts, just like they did after JFK's tax cuts, and like they did under our current President. The first President Bush didn't cut taxes.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <<The budgets Clinton proposed and that congress eventually accepted were NOT radically different.>> <Except that President Clinton's proposed budgets had deficits.> Clinton in his early years was presented with a huge hole dug by Reagan and Bush. It took several years to dig out of that. Show me, if you can, Clinton's proposed budgets and Congress' accepted budgets of the same years. You'll see, I believe, relatively small differences. <<The real key to the 90's surplus was the good economy, which brought in lots of revenue.>> <The key to the good economy of the late 90's was the Republican proposed capital gains tax cut and restraint of government spending.> Hardly. And it's amazing, seeing what has happened once we got a GOP white house AND GOP congress in conjunction, that you can credit restraint of government spending to the GOP with a straight face. <<Both Reagan and the first Bush were forced to agree to tax increases as a way to control the deficits, and they did close them somewhat.>> <And in neither case did they cut taxes to see revenues fall. Revenues to the treasury increased after President Reagan's tax cuts, just like they did after JFK's tax cuts, and like they did under our current President. The first President Bush didn't cut taxes.> Under Reagan the deficit ballooned. This is simple fact. Revenues increasing somewhat doesn't mean that much when ultimately you're still running those huge deficits. And the first Bush was forced to raise taxes, even after the famous "read my lips" phrase, because of the huge amount of red ink Reagan left him. Even Reagan had to raise taxes in the late 80's to make up some of the shortfall.
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh <Clinton in his early years was presented with a huge hole dug by Reagan and Bush. It took several years to dig out of that.> Deficits were declining during Reagans' second term. They increased during Bush's term because he went with the big spending of the Democrat congress. <And it's amazing, seeing what has happened once we got a GOP white house AND GOP congress in conjunction, that you can credit restraint of government spending to the GOP with a straight face.> I don't hear any Democrats calling for spending cuts. Mostly, they complain we're spending too little. <And the first Bush was forced to raise taxes, even after the famous "read my lips" phrase, because of the huge amount of red ink Reagan left him.> Revisionist history.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan >>They increased during Bush's term because he went with the big spending of the Democrat congress.<< So does the current President Bush & the Republican House & Senate get any blame from you for the amount of red ink currently flowing in Washington, or is that the Democrat's fault somehow?
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh No, the President and the Republicans in Congress definitely get a lot of the blame. In this case, however, they are the lesser of two evils. The Democrats would almost certainly raise taxes and spend more.
Originally Posted By Kar2oonMan >>No, the President and the Republicans in Congress definitely get a lot of the blame.<< Thank you. I'm not sure if the Democrats would have spent more because I doubt the Democrats would have launched the Iraq war. In any case, it throws a sizeable wrinkle in the whole "smaller government, less spending" mantra of Republicans when the president and the House & Senate, all controlled by Republicans, are spending like crazy and making government larger. Fiscal conservatives within the Republican party have to be losing sleep over this uncomfortable fact. I doubt "well, the Democrats would have spent more" is any real comfort for them.
Originally Posted By inlandemporer " Fiscal conservatives within the Republican party have to be losing sleep over this uncomfortable fact." Fiscally conservative Democrats too. "I doubt "well, the Democrats would have spent more" is any real comfort for them." Or anything other than a weak rejoinder.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <<Clinton in his early years was presented with a huge hole dug by Reagan and Bush. It took several years to dig out of that.>> <Deficits were declining during Reagans' second term.> After he raised taxes in '86 in order to close the deficits, yeah. <They increased during Bush's term because he went with the big spending of the Democrat congress.> Again, check the difference between Bush's proposed budgets and the eventual adopted budgets. They don't differ by much. Your attempt to glom all this on to one party just won't wash. <<And it's amazing, seeing what has happened once we got a GOP white house AND GOP congress in conjunction, that you can credit restraint of government spending to the GOP with a straight face.>> <I don't hear any Democrats calling for spending cuts. Mostly, they complain we're spending too little.> No, they complain that the priorities should be different. <<And the first Bush was forced to raise taxes, even after the famous "read my lips" phrase, because of the huge amount of red ink Reagan left him.>> <Revisionist history.> Nope, that's what you do. Mine's just plain history. Bush DID raise taxes, did he not? And he did so because the deficits were too high, did he not? That's what I said.
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh <After he raised taxes in '86 in order to close the deficits, yeah.> Fiscal restraint was the greater cause. <Your attempt to glom all this on to one party just won't wash.> I'm not attempting to glom all this on one party. What I am showing is that Democrats consistantly raise taxes and spend more. Their record on fiscal restraint is worse than the Republicans. What you're supposed to be doing is proving your claim that tax cuts do not lead to increased revenues, but you haven't done that. <Bush DID raise taxes, did he not? And he did so because the deficits were too high, did he not?> Yes Bush raised taxes, but not because of the deficits that Reagan left him. That's why your statement is revisionist history.
Originally Posted By Dabob2 <<After he raised taxes in '86 in order to close the deficits, yeah.>> <Fiscal restraint was the greater cause.> I disagree. Once AGAIN, check the budgets Reagan proposed vs. the budgets Congress approved. If you can show me some great discrepancy, do it. I think I'll be waiting a long time for this one. <<Your attempt to glom all this on to one party just won't wash.>> <I'm not attempting to glom all this on one party. What I am showing is that Democrats consistantly raise taxes and spend more. Their record on fiscal restraint is worse than the Republicans.> Not at all. Fiscal restraint means not spending more than you bring in - or at least keeping the shortfall as close as you can. Democrats have often been accused of being "tax and spend" but that's better than "don't tax as much and still spend just as much or more anyway" - which is the recent GOP M.O. That's LESS fiscally responsible. <What you're supposed to be doing is proving your claim that tax cuts do not lead to increased revenues, but you haven't done that.> I said they don't always do so, which they don't. The only way you can claim they "always" do is to not be too particular how many years into the future you look after the tax cuts. If you can credit increased revenues to tax cuts x-number of years after the cut (even if there were reduced revenues in between) and then change the number that x represents as you look at different presidencies - well, that's an easy game to play. Take Reagan's tax cuts. They initially resulted in a loss of revenues. Of course, it's GOP mantra that the late 80's growth was due to the tax cuts, despite the fact that they took place years earlier, and of course Reagan was forced to raise taxes in '86. <a href="http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/L-taxcollections.htm" target="_blank">http://www.huppi.com/kangaroo/ L-taxcollections.htm</a> "There are a few notable exceptions to the above rule: those periods following large tax cuts. After Reagan's income tax cuts took effect in 1982, real income tax collections took a long fall, despite the fact our economy continued to grow. For the moment, let's ignore the fact that tax collections could have been expected to grow after 1981. Let's simply use 1981 as a baseline, multiplying it 8 times, and compare that to what was really collected over the next 8 years. Individual Income Tax Collections (millions) (1) Year Current Constant (87 dollars) ------------------------------------------- 1981 $285,917 $367,692 1982 297,744 356,366 1983 288,938 332,033 1984 298,415 328,470 1985 334,531 354,677 1986 348,959 359,307 1987 392,557 392,557 1988 401,181 387,128 1989 445,690 411,533 ----------------------------- 82-89 total: 2,922,691 1981 (times 8) -2,941,536 ----------------------------- Net 8-year loss -18,845 Corporate Income Taxes (millions) Year Current Constant (87 dollars) ------------------------------------------- 1981 $61,137 $78,623 1982 49,207 58,991 1983 37,022 42,544 1984 56,893 62,623 1985 61,331 65,024 1986 63,143 65,015 1987 83,926 83,926 1988 94,508 91,224 1989 103,291 98,092 ------------------------------ 82-89 total: 567,439 1981 (times 8) -628,984 ------------------------------ Net 8-year loss -69,545 Combined individual and corporate income tax loss: $88 billion. Keep in mind that this does not count the lost revenues that could be expected from a growing economy. " (Note how revenues fell in real terms from 1981-1984, and that the biggest jump was in 1987, after the '86 tax hike?) "The Kennedy tax cuts are another favorite supply-side myth; many claim that once the tax cuts went into effect in 1964, income tax collections grew. But as you can see from the chart below, growth in income tax collections sharply dropped off: Federal Income Tax Collections (Constant dollars, CPI-U) (3) Year Receipts Percent change from previous year -------------------------------------------------- 1961 $138,069 --- 1962 150,567 + 9.0% 1963 155,375 + 3.2 1964 156,804 + 0.9 < tax cut takes effect 1965 154,475 - 1.5 In 1965, the economy was in the fifth year of a nine-year expansion, and for income tax collections to see negative growth was, again, most uncharacteristic. Income tax collections did rise in 1966, but by this time President Johnson was accelerating the economy with Keynesian deficit spending on the Vietnam War. (These deficits he hid by unifying the federal budget with Social Security.) The greater economic activity resulted in more tax collections, and to disentangle any alleged supply-side benefits from the Keynesian benefits is all but impossible." "However, Clinton's tax increases in 1993 occurred after the recession had passed, and the increase in tax collections is clearly visible: Individual Income Taxes (millions) (11) Year Current Constant (87 dollars) ------------------------------------------- 1990 $466,884 $413,355 1991 467,827 397,677 < recession year 1992 475,964 392,969 1993 509,680 411,032 < Clinton tax passes 1994 543,055 429,496 < takes effect 1995 590,244 458,300 Corporate Income Taxes (millions) Year Current Constant (87 dollars) -------------------------------------------- 1990 $93,507 $82,786 1991 98,086 83,378 < recession year 1992 100,270 82,786 1993 117,520 94,774 < Clinton tax passes 1994 140,385 111,029 < takes effect 1995 157,004 121,907 This is in marked contrast to the Reagan tax cuts, which saw tax collections fall, despite also occurring in a similar position in the business cycle, namely, the start of a recovery. In sum, supply-siders have no obvious success stories to point to. Indeed, almost all the historical evidence runs against them. " So the GOP mantra is just that - a point of faith, not always borne out by reality. <<Bush DID raise taxes, did he not? And he did so because the deficits were too high, did he not?>> <Yes Bush raised taxes, but not because of the deficits that Reagan left him. That's why your statement is revisionist history.> Of course that's why he raised them. He had to, because we were swimming in red ink. He knew he'd catch hell from the right wing if he did it (especially after his famous "read my lips" pledge), yet he did it anyway. Because he pretty much had to.
Originally Posted By DouglasDubh <Democrats have often been accused of being "tax and spend" but that's better than "don't tax as much and still spend just as much or more anyway" - which is the recent GOP M.O. That's LESS fiscally responsible.> If you measure them in terms of percentage of GDP, the deficits in the 10 years since the Republicans gained control of Congress are less than the deficits were the previous 10 years, when the Congress was controlled by Democrats. <He had to, because we were swimming in red ink.> Again, we were swimming in red ink because we greatly increased spending in 1989. Here's a paper that lays out the truth about Reagan's, Bush's, and Clinton's fiscal records. <a href="http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/pa-261.html" target="_blank">http://www.cato.org/pubs/pas/p a-261.html</a> Here's a relavant excerpt: "Even income tax revenues grew substantially in the 1980s. In 1981 income tax receipts totaled $347 billion; in 1989 they totaled $549 billion, a 58 percent increase. In fact, income tax collections grew only slightly slower in the 1980s than in the 1990s despite income tax rate reductions in the Reagan years and increases in the Bush-Clinton years. Real income tax revenues rose by 16.3 percent from 1982 to 1989 after the top income tax rate had been reduced from 70 percent to 50 percent in 1983, and then to 28 percent in 1986. According to the latest (August 1996) Congressional Budget Office (CBO) forecast, real income tax revenues will have grown by 17.9 percent from 1990 to 1997, following the raising of the top income tax rate from 28 percent to 31 percent in 1990 and then to 39.6 percent in 1993. [19] On a purely static basis, the 1990 tax increase raised $380 billion less in income tax revenues from 1991 to 1995 than had been predicted. [20]"
