# Fuck you Republicans and your bullshit economics. **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [January 11, 2009, 10:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841 "2009-01-11T22:14:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Fear\_Itself](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/fear_itself/32/19637_2.png) [@Fear\_Itself](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fear_Itself)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 1:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/21 "2009-01-12T01:58:41Z")
> [@Carol\_Stream](#): > > Did we not have troops there, and did he not push for a tax cut? We had more troops in Korea than we had in Vietnam. We were not in the middle of a war. ---
**Author:** ![furt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/439d5e/32.png) [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 2:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/22 "2009-01-12T02:07:31Z")
To expand: You won’t hear me offer a whisper of support of Bush on this issue. None. His big-government conservatism was part of the reason I did not vote for him. But acting as if democrats have anything remotely close to clean hands is simply idiotic. HHS has a larger budget than the defense department … you wanna name any democrats in Washington in favor of serious entitlement reform? Social Security is the biggest item in the federal budget. What’s the response _any_ politician – including Bush – gets when he says it needs reform? WE are the problem. WE have chosen to keep on electing presidents and congresspeople who are responsible for this, because we have been more willing to accrue debt than to see cuts to the things WE like. ---
**Author:** ![Voyager](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/voyager/32/133_2.png) [@Voyager](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Voyager)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 2:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/23 "2009-01-12T02:20:27Z")
> [@Carol\_Stream](#): > > Did we not have troops there, and did he not push for a tax cut? Having troops in a country does not make it a war. I was around then, and there were no casualties to speak of, and little attention paid. It certainly didn’t have any significant budget impact, unlike another war I can name. Which leads me to something the OP omitted from the rant - Republicans refuse to take responsibility for anything. They’re just like the little kid who says a bad man came in and broke the lamp. Grow some, assholes. Right now it is, wah wah, Carter, wah wah Clinton, wah wah Barney Frank. As Jon Steward said, the buck doesn’t stop anywhere near you guys, does it? ---
**Author:** ![Carol\_Stream](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/c2a13f/32.png) [@Carol\_Stream](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Carol_Stream)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 2:23am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/24 "2009-01-12T02:23:00Z")
Jon Steward? ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/25 "2009-01-12T02:36:27Z")
> [@furt](#): > > Obama is proposing to add a **trillion** dollars to the debt in one fell swoop. Sounds big when it’s not being used to bomb brown skinned people in mud huts, doesn’t it? ---
**Author:** ![Clothahump](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/51bf81/32.png) [@Clothahump](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Clothahump)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/26 "2009-01-12T03:03:30Z")
[QUOTE=Merkwurdigliebe] You had to continue to cut taxes (for the rich mind you) when we could have been paying that shit off. [/QUOTE] Oh, you betcha, Bucky. Only the rich got tax cuts. You betcha, sure, sure. Egads, it is annoying listening to braindead people like you who can’t think for themselves but can only squawk this kind of bullshit like parrots on crack. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/27 "2009-01-12T03:04:48Z")
Oh please, Republicans are aggressively and willfully stupid and will learn nothing from this except to move their next national economic ponzi scheme away from the derivatives market and to something else. Pointing out that outrageous deficit spending since the Nixon administration has always increased under Republicans by enormous percentages and decreased under Democrats is totally lost on Republicans. Under free market economic theory, Madoff’s scheme should be unregulated and stupid people left to hold the bag as the market will self-correct. And that’s what actually happens! What fun. Your OP, unfortunately, will not even start to convince even one Republican that they are wrong in their economic outlook. There are a lot of people who listen to the corporate media propaganda everyday who are politically in the center who will drift toward the Democrats for a few years, but not one of the 30 percenter die hard Republicans nationwide will wake up, say “I was wrong” to themselves and change the way they think. Not one. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Second\_Stone](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bbe5ce/32.png) [@The\_Second\_Stone](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Second_Stone)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/28 "2009-01-12T03:08:33Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > Oh, you betcha, Bucky. Only the rich got tax cuts. You betcha, sure, sure. > > Egads, it is annoying listening to braindead people like you who can’t think for themselves but can only squawk this kind of bullshit like parrots on crack. A one time $300 tax cut (even if later repeated) hardly makes up for the IOU the government gave me for my additional portion of the national debt. It’s a huge loss for me. But braindead Republicans can’t understand that it is a net loss for most Americans to be given a few hundred dollars now and saddled with tens of thousands of dollars of additional debt in the future. Only the top few percent are coming out ahead, everybody else is coming out behind by approximately the full amount of a public university education tuition for four years. WAY TO GO REPUBLICANS!!! ---
**Author:** ![Una\_Persson](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/una_persson/32/346_2.png) [@Una\_Persson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Una_Persson)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 3:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/29 "2009-01-12T03:39:00Z")
> [@The\_Second\_Stone](#): > > A one time $300 tax cut (even if later repeated) hardly makes up for the IOU the government gave me for my additional portion of the national debt. It’s a huge loss for me. But braindead Republicans can’t understand that it is a net loss for most Americans to be given a few hundred dollars now and saddled with tens of thousands of dollars of additional debt in the future. Only the top few percent are coming out ahead, everybody else is coming out behind by approximately the full amount of a public university education tuition for four years. WAY TO GO REPUBLICANS!!! So Democrats are _not_ pushing for the next tax “rebate”? :dubious: ---
**Author:** ![The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@The\_Tao\_s\_Revenge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Tao_s_Revenge)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 3:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/30 "2009-01-12T03:51:46Z")
Republicans? More like Republican’ts. ---
**Author:** ![wonky](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wonky/32/393_2.png) [@wonky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wonky)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/31 "2009-01-12T04:16:14Z")
> [@Voyager](#): > > As Jon Steward said, the buck doesn’t stop anywhere near you guys, does it? Sure it does. It ends up in a pocket eventually. ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Carrot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@Captain\_Carrot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Carrot)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 4:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/32 "2009-01-12T04:31:29Z")
> [@Clothahump](#): > > Oh, you betcha, Bucky. Only the rich got tax cuts. You betcha, sure, sure. Oh, come off it. Revenue lost to the government by the tax cuts went disproportionately to the wealthy. > [@furt](#): > > But acting as if democrats have anything remotely close to clean hands is simply idiotic. HHS has a larger budget than the defense department … you wanna name any democrats in Washington in favor of serious entitlement reform? Completely false. In 2007, Defense got 432 billion. HHS got 70.6. And I doubt that 432 billion counts either war currently going on. Cite (PDF): [http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2008/pdf/08msr.pdf](http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2008/pdf/08msr.pdf) > [@furt](#): > > Obama is proposing to add a **trillion** dollars to the debt in one fell swoop. Congress looks set to acquiesce. Obama is trying to avert the worst of another depression. The same was not true of Bush. ---
**Author:** ![furt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/439d5e/32.png) [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 4:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/33 "2009-01-12T04:33:21Z")
> [@Squink](#): > > Sounds big when it’s not being used to bomb brown skinned people in mud huts, doesn’t it? Way to combine missing the point, changing the subject, and impugning racism all in one fell swoop. Oh, and proving my point: that some shallow-minded people are less interested in actually addressing problems than they are in taking sides in pissing contests in which they are the good guys, and people who think differently are the bad guys. ---
**Author:** ![furt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/439d5e/32.png) [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 5:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/34 "2009-01-12T05:22:16Z")
> [@Captain\_Carrot](#): > > Completely false. In 2007, Defense got 432 billion. HHS got 70.6. And I doubt that 432 billion counts either war currently going on. Cite (PDF): [http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2008/pdf/08msr.pdf](http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2008/pdf/08msr.pdf) My bad. I was going off another figure – my guess is the site I was looking at was including verterans benefits in that. Dunno. Of course, since precious few Democrats are serious about massive defense cuts – let along in favor of both that AND also in favor of trimming social programs – I think I’ll stand by my contention that their hands are far from clean. > [@](#): > > Obama is trying to avert the worst of another depression. The same was not true of Bush. Bush would say he was trying to head off a global clash of civilizations. You can say he was wrong, but a lot of people would argue that Obama is wrong in what his plan will accomplish. And that is _exactly_ what I mean by partisanship being a huge part of the problem. Both sides say it’s okay when they want to spend money we don’t have, because their goals are laudable and just. When the other guy wants to spend money, well _he’s_ the irresponsible one. It’s like a married couple arguing over whether they want to buy a boat or redecorate the house, neither of which they can afford. And they go to bankruptcy court blaming each other the whole time. ---
**Author:** ![Merkwurdigliebe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/74df32/32.png) [@Merkwurdigliebe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Merkwurdigliebe)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 6:27am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/35 "2009-01-12T06:27:32Z")
> [@furt](#): > > My bad. I was going off another figure – my guess is the site I was looking at was including verterans benefits in that. Dunno. > > Of course, since precious few Democrats are serious about massive defense cuts – let along in favor of both that AND also in favor of trimming social programs – I think I’ll stand by my contention that their hands are far from clean. > > Bush would say he was trying to head off a global clash of civilizations. You can say he was wrong, but a lot of people would argue that Obama is wrong in what his plan will accomplish. > > And that is _exactly_ what I mean by partisanship being a huge part of the problem. Both sides say it’s okay when they want to spend money we don’t have, because their goals are laudable and just. When the other guy wants to spend money, well _he’s_ the irresponsible one. > > It’s like a married couple arguing over whether they want to buy a boat or redecorate the house, neither of which they can afford. And they go to bankruptcy court blaming each other the whole time. Look, the Republicans and Democrats both like to spend money, it’s just the Republicans who think we can do so without paying. It’s their fucking fault for deciding not to pay. ---
**Author:** ![elfkin477](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/a9a28c/32.png) [@elfkin477](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elfkin477)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 6:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/36 "2009-01-12T06:52:28Z")
> [@Der\_Trihs](#): > > Doesn’t matter; they just kept giving Bush and his fellow Republicans anything he wanted. So is it the Republicans fault that you replaced Republican congresscritters with spineless Democrats who refused to stand up for themselves despite having a majority? ---
**Author:** ![furt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/439d5e/32.png) [@furt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/furt)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/37 "2009-01-12T07:32:31Z")
> [@Merkwurdigliebe](#): > > Look, the Republicans and Democrats both like to spend money, it’s just the Republicans who think we can do so without paying. It’s their fucking fault for deciding not to pay. Uh huh. Like no democrat has submitted an unbalanced budget. Like democrats are all about fixing the single biggest cause of our shortfall, Social Security. Twice in recent decades, Dems controlled both the WH and congress. They never balanced the budget. And no, just because dems support raising taxes doesn’t make them fiscally responsible, any more than a pub who advocates cutting one part of the budget (and growing three others) is. Obama said he wanted to raise taxes _even if it was stipulated that doing so would result in less actual income._ Sorry, but that ain’t a guy that’s motivated by balancing the books. Again: I ain’t absolving the pubs of anything. But this “it’s all the other guy’s fault” shit is childish. ---
**Author:** ![Sophistry\_and\_Illusion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b3f665/32.png) [@Sophistry\_and\_Illusion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sophistry_and_Illusion)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/38 "2009-01-12T07:32:39Z")
Meh. Representatives do what they are elected to do. The American people keep electing demagogues rather than statesmen, and hence get what they deserve. This is why every year, the Beast list of America’s most loathsome people always features…[you](http://buffalobeast.com/113/50_most_loathsome_2006.htm). > [@The Buffalo Beast](#): > > 1. You > > Charges: Your whole life has been a pitiful exercise in rote mimicry, a meek subjugation of individuality in exchange for herd approval. Your delusions of “common sense” wisdom stem from an unwillingness to seek information and an inability to critically analyze it. You never hesitate to offer strong opinions on subjects you don’t know a damn thing about. You’re willing to believe anything a guy in a suit says on TV, as long as it doesn’t hint at your culpability in the negligent homicide of your country and planet or otherwise cloud your streak-free conscience. You’re more worried about friction on the “Desperate Housewives” set than the lack of health coverage at your tedious, soul-destroying job. You have no idea what is going on in the world, and you’re fine with that. You are why democracy doesn’t work. > > Exhibit A: You’re Time magazine’s person of the year. So was Hitler. > > Sentence: More of the same. ---
**Author:** ![UncleBeer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/u/977dab/32.png) [@UncleBeer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/UncleBeer)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/39 "2009-01-12T17:24:22Z")
> [@furt](#): > > Twice in recent decades, Dems controlled both the WH and congress. They never balanced the budget. Actually, Clinton had a reasonbly sizable budget surplus one year - 2000. But that wasn’t brought about thru reduced spending or any other Clinton initiative; tax receipts were unexpectedly high - mostly due to capital gains during the internet bubble. ---
**Author:** ![Gangster\_Octopus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/a8b319/32.png) [@Gangster\_Octopus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gangster_Octopus)\ **Post date:** [January 12, 2009, 5:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841/40 "2009-01-12T17:30:32Z")
> [@NurseCarmen](#): > > To be fair, many of the responsible Republicans that I know are pretty pissed off how Bush handled the economy in the past 8 years. We wouldn’t be in nearly the dire situation we are now if he hadn’t spent like a drunken sailor. > > An interesting thing happened to the fiscal Republicans the last few cycles. They’ve been ousted by a group of religious right pandering fiscally irresponsible yahoos that only now, when a President from an opposing party is coming into power, are suddenly making an act of fiscal responsibility. The drunken whores are now trying to convince us of their wholesome and sober virginity. I wish I could put this on a bumper sticker. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/fuck-you-republicans-and-your-bullshit-economics/480841.md?page=3)