I think perhaps your perusal of all accounts is actually missing some accounts.
I am reminded of how “all the intelligence” told us that Saddam possesed WMD’s before we invaded, when in fact some of the intelligence told us no such thing.
This confusion of “some” with “all” certainly seems to be a very common cognitive defect in conservative circles. It’d be nice if they got over it, but if not, the nation can live without them.
Worked for Bush.
Please explain how “don’t spend money unless we can afford it” and “we need $1 trillion spending cuts” do not equal “balanced budget.”
$1.75 TRILLION?
$1.75 TRILLION?
$1.75 TRILLION?
$1.75 TRILLION?
Happy? Sure it is a big number - but only as big as the mess your buddies made.
If your brother incompetently almost cuts off your arm with a chainsaw, he had better not complain about you going into debt on the family credit card to get it fixed up. That’s true even if he ran up the debt already on (tax cut) hookers and (Iraqi) blow.
The fiscal discipline is cutting wasteful spending - and getting rid of tax cuts for the rich eventually.
As for the economy turning around next year with no stimulus, all accounts clearly does not include the head of the Fed. Herbert Hoover thought that, but at this point only economic illiterates (which appears to include the entire Republican delegation to the House) think that the economy will recover soon without a stimulus - maybe bigger than this one.
As long as your side’s primary rhetorical tool is to attempt to wave away the last eight years of incompetence and malfeasance and ask people to pretend that your boy wasn’t fucking the dog for two terms and to regard the current situation as a blank slate, sure, aggressively pointing out the failures of Bush will stay on the table.
I don’t deny that Jindal won his election by connecting with voters. I just find it highly opportunistic that of all the Republicans that could have given the response to Obama, they picked the guy who could relate to the Obama meme by starting off his speech with a reference to his dad and the streets of India. Convenient, that.
Incidentally, I had heard of him before. Most recently in regard to his ludicrous posturing about not accepting the bailout money related to unemployment insurance. Since he and the other idiots doing similar grandstanding understand full well that they won’t be able to “line item veto” bits and pieces of the bailout they don’t like, it really does amount to posturing. Much like the party as a whole is posturing by picking him for the response and Michael Steele as Chairman of the Republican party.
The good ol’ boy comments I posted reflect the argument that the Republicans, Jindal included, are willing to put up any superficial front necessary to appeal to the lowest common denominator of the American public, now that the public seems to currently approve of our new bi-racial president. Suppose Obama falls out of favor. How quickly will these new images of the Republican party fall by the wayside?
Bush is not my “boy”. I’m sure that he will go down in history as one of, if not the, worst Presidents in history. I’m not disputing that. I’m talking about how we proceed from this moment on. If you all have arguments besides “BUSH SUCKS!” I would like to hear them. All I see from Obama is raise taxes and raise spending even more than that.
Can anyone tell me something substantial that he wants to cut out of the budget? I hear Iraq, but he is building up in Afghanistan, so that is a wash. I keep hearing about this wasteful spending that will be cut. Can anyone put a number on something that Obama believes is not a proper function of the federal government which needs to be eliminated?
I know that at one time we were in possession of a lot of military aircraft that never flew and were never going to fly. I guess it was an oversized “just in case” thing that realistically would never ever be used. I would hope that we would eliminate that kind of spending.
We proceed from this moment on by looking with clear eyes at the Truth, which has been denied us for two terms. We analyze the situation, we give credit and blame where it’s due but we don’t obsess over finger pointing.
We say, “What has worked in the past?” and we do that. We look at the New Deal, which is our best barometer, and see that investment of government dollars to create infrastructure seems to have worked, despite what some revisionst Republicans would like us to believe. We look at the policy of doing nothing at all, which we have been trying for the last 8 years. Evidence suggests this is not the method.
We say, “How did we get into this mess?” and we don’t do that. Right now, it appears from all the available evidence that “tax cuts and war” is not the answer, so the Republican cries for more tax cuts and war will not be given too much credence — we may do either, but we will not hold up either as a solution to the mess we’re in. We look at Republican economic policy — as far as I know, no Republican President has balanced the budget since Eisenhower. Surely as long as Republicans keep suggesting the same economic solutions, we should look at them in their proper historical and fiscal context.
Marine One. There you go.
Nice qualification there: not only must we give an exact number, of what Obama says he wants to cut, but it must be something not a function of the federal government.
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Obama says he has identified $1 trillion of spending over the next five years which can be cut, but he is still combing through the federal budget. This is good. Anybody who rides into office on a white horse and waving a cowboy hat who says he can instinctively identify all the wasteful spending without reading the budget is not to be trusted.
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Obama hasn’t published actual figures on what he does plan to cut. I don’t know about you, but I trust him enough to give him time to come up with some kind of plan. I also trust him not to start unprovoked regime-change wars against sovereign nations in the meantime.
Well we could start here:
Congressional Budget Increased To Pay GOP Staffers
See, but they’ll probably argue that Democrats should simply maintain their previous staffing levels despite having gained roughly 20% amongst their ranks. That way it breaks even–and don’t you know that it’s too dangerous to change horse-staffs mid-stream?!?
Excellent post.
You say that like it is a bad thing.
It’s important not to limit this just to Bush. There was a solid majority Republican Congress for 6 years that was in lock step with the Bush administration, and majority public approval of Bush and his policies for at least 4 years.
It’s not just Bush that has been discredited. It’s Republicans in general.
In fact, DS, for 8 out of the last 10 years, Republicans have controlled Congress and the White House. Which President during that time balanced the budget?
What? Two years with just Congress, then six years with the White House and Congress, then two years with just the White House.
It’s but a minor mistake…I assumed there’s an “and” where there should be an “or”. Or, to better make the point, an “and/or”.
However it was meant, it just adds weight to the point that Republican politicians had a golden (and extended) opportunity to put their cherished “principles” into effect almost unimpeded, and failed epically.
Yeah, I guess I should’ve said, eight out of the last 10 years, Republicans have controlled Congress and/or the White House, just not all 8 years with both.
If you put it that way, it’s 10 out of the last 10 years. The Republicans controlled Congress in 1998. They took control in 1994, actually. So, really, 14 out of the last 14 years they controlled Congress and/or the White House.
And, heck, if you want to go way back, the Republicans controlled Congress and/or the White House for all but two years from Reagan’s inauguration to Obama’s.
But there were wars to invent and national security stuff that you’re not allowed to know about. Surely you can’t possibly expect them to balance the budget during such trying times, can you? Why oh why do you hate America?