# I pit the republican party for incredibly hypocrisy regarding taxes **URL:** \ **Category:** The BBQ Pit\ **Created:** [August 22, 2011, 11:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639 "2011-08-22T11:08:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 7
**Author:** ![wevets](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/e9a140/32.png) [@wevets](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/wevets)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 6:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/121 "2011-08-23T18:04:51Z")
> [@El\_Kabong](#): > > Obama is personally responsible for every dollar of federal expenditure? Really? How does that work, exactly? Through studious ignorance of Congress’ power of the purse? ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/122 "2011-08-23T18:17:05Z")
Rekd, you do realize that using creative accounting and an “emergency” supplement, Bush was able to keep the cost of his wars out of the official budget, right? ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 6:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/123 "2011-08-23T18:34:16Z")
There is a development lurking that I fear. Not just loathe, and despise, but actively fear. And that is a Republican theme designed to turn the middle class against the poor, the active theme being those bums and their lucky-ducky benefits are what is dragging down the middle class. Suggesting to the middle class that they could remain middle class if they elect people who will stop giving away their money. Seems to me that a lot more people in this recession are down-grading, class wise, than in previous recessions. A lot more people who are used to middle and upper middle life styles are being deprived of that, and are angry. Angry in an unfocused way, angry at somebody, but they don’t know who yet. And that genuinely scares me. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/124 "2011-08-23T18:55:10Z")
Meh. You’re a liberal, and liberals are always scared of something. If you weren’t scared of these largely erroneous perceptions you’d be scared of something else. ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 6:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/125 "2011-08-23T18:59:38Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > Meh. You’re a liberal, and liberals are always scared of something. If it wasn’t this you’d be scared of something else. Uh, what? Conservatives are afraid of Muslims, Communists, Socalism, Kenyans, Death Panels, Re-Education Camps, Obama’s Private Army, Czars, Brown People, Gay Sex, and who knows what else? Liberalism is about pie-in-the-sky hope and optimism. Conservatism is about being a hysterical mewling pussy afraid of change. ---
**Author:** ![Algher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Algher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Algher)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 7:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/126 "2011-08-23T19:03:49Z")
> [@El\_Kabong](#): > > Obama is personally responsible for every dollar of federal expenditure? Really? How does that work, exactly? The same way it is Bush’s debt, or Reagan’s, or the Clinton surplus. We blame the President, regardless of who controls the House or the Senate. Foolish really, but we are simply folk who like to give credit to Quarterbacks and Pitchers, and ignore the rest of the team and even the opposition. Unless, of course, it fits into our personal flavor of blindered partisanship. ---
**Author:** ![treis](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/bc79bd/32.png) [@treis](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/treis)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/127 "2011-08-23T19:59:02Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > Then why should the Republicans have been the ones to step back? Why, in the interests of a stable government, shouldn’t the Democrats scale back on spending? > > What makes the Democrats right – not in a “it’s my opinion” but in absolute certainty? The downgrade wasn’t solely, or even a lot to do with the numbers. To be sure, S&P’s statement had a lot of numbers in it, but their analysis doesn’t make any sense based on numbers. Note the fact that after consulting with the Feds S&P modified the U.S. estimated future debt to the tune of, IIRC, 10% of GDP. No, the S&P couldn’t have been more clear on why the U.S. was downgraded: > [@S&P](#): > > “The political brinksmanship of recent months highlight what we see as America’s governance and policymaking becoming less stable, less effective, and less predictable than what we previously believed,” > > “ **The statutory debt ceiling and the threat of default have become political bargaining chips in the debate over fiscal policy**. Despite this year’s wide-ranging debate, in our view, the differences between political parties have proven to be extraordinarily difficult to bridge.” That right there is your reason for a default. For the first time in the history of our country elected politicians seriously mooted the idea of defaulting on our debt. Several of them contested that defaulting on the debt wouldn’t be that bad, and preferable to giving in on their demands. Really, the surprising thing here is that the other agencies didn’t downgrade as well. A AAA rating means that an investment is as safe as possible, and virtually risk free. Given the fact that defaulting was seriously considered by those in power, and it looked like a realistic possibility, how can you continue to call US debt risk free? ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/128 "2011-08-23T20:05:03Z")
> [@Lobohan](#): > > Uh, what? Conservatives are afraid of Muslims, Communists, Socalism, Kenyans, Death Panels, Re-Education Camps, Obama’s Private Army, Czars, Brown People, Gay Sex, and who knows what else? > > Liberalism is about pie-in-the-sky hope and optimism. Conservatism is about being a hysterical mewling pussy afraid of change. Nonsense. Conservatives are perfectly fine with change…if it doesn’t do more harm than good. Which of course is where they butt heads with liberals. Islamic terrorists are randomly murdering innocent people all over the globe. Communism is responsible for millions of deaths and hundreds of millions of lives lived out in abject misery and deprivation. Only an idiot would not be fearful of it. Conservatives don’t fear “brown people”, that is nonsense. “Death panels” is a euphemism for the decisions that get made when the government can’t (or won’t) pay for all the health care a person would have access to if privately insured, and again anyone with a brain should be fearful of them. I don’t know any conservatives who are afraid of re-education camps or Obama’s so-called private army. And while [del]they[/del] some aren’t really “fearful” of gay sex, they simply think it’s wrong and/or are turned off by the nature of it. You can be critical of that view if you want, but you cannot call it fear if you wish to be even remotely accurate in your use of words. Further, [Wiktionary](http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pie_in_the_sky) defines “pie-in-the-sky” as: \*“1.A fanciful notion; ludicrous concept; the illusory promise of a desired outcome that is unlikely to happen”. \*While I agree with you that this term is almost a textbook definition of what liberalism is all about, I’m at a loss as to why you seem to think that’s a good thing. ---
**Author:** ![Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/budget_player_cadet/32/205_2.png) [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Budget_Player_Cadet)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/129 "2011-08-23T20:08:27Z")
> [@Bookkeeper](#): > > While I agree with your points in general, I should point out that the amounts shown are in \*thousands \*of dollars, not dollars. Oh? I didn’t see that, thanks for correcting me (where does it state it on the page?). Then again, it probably should’ve been obvious; those amounts did seem ridiculously low. Still, even a few hundred thousand isn’t bank-breaking for Cali in such a situation. > [@Rekd](#): > > LoL @ the insults being flung around here like monkey’s flinging poo. > > Way to represent! 😃 I insult stupid people who make stupid posts because it’s fun. What’s your excuse for making stupid points? Also, am I just imagining things, or are you basically ignoring my points? > [@](#): > > Here’s some more for you to get mad about and call me names over… > > Our current national debt is $14,639,000,000,000.00 > > Our national debt in 2009 when Obama was sworn in to office was $10,626,000,000,000.00 > > That means the current POTUS has increased our national debt by a staggering $4,247,000,000,000.00 in just 945 days. That kind of spending has not been done in such a short time by any other President. > > Ever. Yes; also, no other president has had to deal with such a horrid economy or _keeping the banks alive_. I love how people bring this up and then ignore: -That we gave around _ **$1T** in one lump sum_ to the banks just to keep our _entire financial system_ afloat -That we spent around $700B on a stimulus to keep the economy running and stave off of one of the most brutal global crashes in history -That we are _still_ in two extremely expensive and deadly wars that Bush started Sure, maybe Obama ran the deficit up a little more than Bush did of his own volition. But not _that_ much more, and he certainly didn’t raise the debt by the record-breaking numbers you’re bringing up simply with social programs and welfare. He did it because it was either do that or watch America hit the Great Depression 2.0. > [@](#): > > Bush increased the national debt by $4,900,000,000,000.00 in his 8 years as POTUS. Obama will knock that out in 3. Yet Obama is still clinging to the Blame Bush mantra and refuses to take responsibility for his own spending. Time to man up, Mr. President. Actually, despite the fact that the crashes of the financial and industrial sectors can be blamed widely on deregulation that happened under Bush, Bush sr., Clinton, and Reagan, Obama has been very, very courteous about it, and hasn’t really blamed Bush (even though that would’ve been the easy way out). No, the people blaming Bush are exclusively Obama’s base, unless I’m missing something here. > [@](#): > > The Gross National Debt is at 97.6% of the nation’s Gross Domestic Product. We will never get out of this hole with Obama spending $4,247,000,000.00 every single day, even when he’s on vacation. Actually, we aren’t that bad, all things considered… > **[List of countries by government debt](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_public_debt)** > > This article contains a list of countries by government debt. Gross government debt is government financial liabilities that are debt instruments.: 81  A debt instrument is a financial claim that requires payment of interest and/or principal by the debtor to the creditor in the future. Examples include debt securities (such as bonds and bills), loans, and government employee pension obligations.: 207  Net debt equals gross debt minus financial assets that are debt instruments.: 208, s7.2 Change... We’re at 37th place if we go by Eurostat’s estimate with around 59% GDP. That’s actually not that bad, especially when compared to other first-world countries like Japan (225%), Greece (144%), Iceland (123.8%), Italy (118.1%)… You get the point. 59% of GDP in debt is completely realistic to make back, but not if our country is in an economic slump. Now, the IMF? They have us at 11th, with 92.9% GDP. That’s a good bit worse… But still better than Japan, Greece, Italy, Iceland, and Belgium, and not much worse than France or Canada. Again, debt of 92.9% GDP? Not a huge issue. An issue, to be sure, and something to deal with, but _not the end of the world_. > [@](#): > > Remember when he spent nearly $800 billion to keep jobless rates below 8%? They’re still above 9% (if you don’t count the underemployed and those that have been unemployed so long they’ve fallen off the radar, otherwise you’re up closer to 20%). I’m going to quote Paul Krugman here… > [@](#): > > Yet instead of indicting the economic policies and principles that had just eliminated 8 million jobs, in the most damaging of the tic-like gestures of compromise that have become the hallmark of his presidency – and against the advice of multiple Nobel-Prize-winning economists – he backed away from his advisers who proposed a big stimulus, and then diluted it with tax cuts that had already been shown to be inert. The result, as predicted in advance, was a half-stimulus that half-stimulated the economy. That, in turn, led the White House to feel rightly unappreciated for having saved the country from another Great Depression but in the unenviable position of having to argue a counterfactual – that something terrible might have happened had it not half-acted. ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/130 "2011-08-23T20:13:19Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > Nonsense. Conservatives are perfectly fine with change…if it doesn’t do more harm than good. > > Which of course is where they butt heads with liberals. Yes, I recall. When liberals invented blowjobs in the '60s it was downhill from there. > [@](#): > > Islamic terrorists are randomly murdering innocent people all over the globe. Randomly? > [@](#): > > Communism is responsible for millions of deaths and hundreds of millions of lives lived out in abject misery and deprivation. Sure. > [@](#): > > Only an idiot would not be fearful of it. I’m not afraid of Communism. Do you think China or Cuba is going to start a war here? > [@](#): > > Conservatives don’t fear “brown people”, that is nonsense. No, it’s true. Tea Partiers especially. > [@](#): > > “Death panels” is a euphemism for the decisions that get made when the government can’t (or won’t) pay for all the health care a person would have access to if privately insured, and again anyone with a brain should be fearful of them. It doesn’t exist. You’re afraid because of a lie told to you by conservative media. > [@](#): > > I don’t know any conservatives who are afraid of re-education camps or Obama’s so-called private army. Go to the freepers. They’re out there. Some conservatives are even more stupid than you are. > [@](#): > > And while [del]they[/del] some aren’t really “fearful” of gay sex, they simply think it’s wrong and/or are turned off by the nature of it. You can be critical of that view if you want, but you cannot call it fear if you wish to be even remotely accurate in your use of words. They fear a world where gays have all the rights of straights. Is that closer to the truth? > [@](#): > > Further, [Wiktionary](http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/pie_in_the_sky) defines “pie-in-the-sky” as: \*“1.A fanciful notion; ludicrous concept; the illusory promise of a desired outcome that is unlikely to happen”. \*While I agree with you that this term is almost a textbook definition of what liberalism is all about, I’m at a loss as to why you seem to think that’s a good thing. Because if you don’t shoot for the moon, you stay huddled in your cave. The failure of conservatism is to assume that what we have is good enough. It isn’t. Our society has advanced because of liberals. Conservatives are just a brake to slow change down. The trouble is, they want to stop us completely or like you, want to move us backward. ---
**Author:** ![crowmanyclouds](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/crowmanyclouds/32/19884_2.png) [@crowmanyclouds](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/crowmanyclouds)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/131 "2011-08-23T20:52:37Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > … “Death panels” is a euphemism for the decisions that get made when the government can’t (or won’t) pay for all the health care a person would have access to if privately insured, … Sadly, for you, we have the mighty power of the itrarweb and can find the [actual origins of the original use and meaning of the phrase](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_panel)\*. > [@](#): > > … Betsy McCaughey, a former lieutenant governor of New York who campaigned against the Clinton health care plan of 1993, began concerns over ‘death panels’ during the July 16th Fred Thompson Show. During the radio interview McCaughey addressed H.R. 3200 Section 1233, charging that the proposed legislation was a “a vicious assault on elderly people”. She charged that the legislation would mandate counseling sessions for Medicare patients every five years to “tell them how to end their life sooner, how to decline nutrition, how to decline being hydrated, how to go in to hospice care” in order to cut their lives short for their families or society’s best interest. She added that repeated sessions would be required every time a Medicare recipient got sick. … - Now it is true that after Betsy McCaughey got her ass handed to her on _The Daily Show_ of all places the phrase was recycled into something else that also was a lie. CMC fnord! ---
**Author:** ![fumster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9c0ed/32.png) [@fumster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fumster)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/132 "2011-08-23T21:00:23Z")
> [@Algher](#): > > The same way it is Bush’s debt, or Reagan’s, or the Clinton surplus. > > We blame the President, regardless of who controls the House or the Senate. Foolish really, but we are simply folk who like to give credit to Quarterbacks and Pitchers, and ignore the rest of the team and even the opposition. That is factually incorrect for pitchers. When a relief pitcher comes in, any existing base runners are the previous pitchers responsibility and count toward the previous pitchers ERA. Bush left us with the bases loaded, no outs, and a pitch count of 3-0. ---
**Author:** ![Algher](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Algher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Algher)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/133 "2011-08-23T21:14:54Z")
> [@sh1bu1](#): > > That is factually incorrect for pitchers. When a relief pitcher comes in, any existing base runners are the previous pitchers responsibility and count toward the previous pitchers ERA. > > Bush left us with the bases loaded, no outs, and a pitch count of 3-0. It might be factually incorrect, but it is how amateurs view the game. This is the same with politics. You want to give Bush all of the blame, ignoring any impact the Democrats might have had on some of the policies that got us here. That is fine - this is the pit. But it is pathetic, and shows an infantile understanding of the world. ---
**Author:** ![Robot\_Arm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/robot_arm/32/18280_2.png) [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/134 "2011-08-23T21:16:02Z")
> [@Budget\_Player\_Cadet](#): > > Also, am I just imagining things, or are you basically ignoring my points? You’re not imagining things. I’ll be checking back to see if **Rekd** ignores your new points, too. ---
**Author:** ![fumster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e9c0ed/32.png) [@fumster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fumster)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 9:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/135 "2011-08-23T21:50:50Z")
> [@Algher](#): > > It might be factually incorrect, but it is how amateurs view the game. This is the same with politics. You want to give Bush all of the blame, ignoring any impact the Democrats might have had on some of the policies that got us here. That is fine - this is the pit. But it is pathetic, and shows an infantile understanding of the world. Thank god we have mature people like you, because name calling and other juvenile behavior would suck. ---
**Author:** ![Bricker](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/977dab/32.png) [@Bricker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bricker)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 10:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/136 "2011-08-23T22:39:57Z")
> [@Lobohan](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > Conservatives don’t fear “brown people”, that is nonsense. > > No, it’s true. Tea Partiers especially. And what of me? ---
**Author:** ![AlienVessels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ba8739/32.png) [@AlienVessels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AlienVessels)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/137 "2011-08-23T23:16:10Z")
> [@Starving\_Artist](#): > > “Death panels” is a euphemism for the decisions that get made when the government can’t (or won’t) pay for all the health care a person would have access to if privately insured, and again anyone with a brain should be fearful of them. Yep, same old story. It’s Death Panels if the government defines the health benefits, but when insurance companies do it, it’s just good business sense. If I have to choose between a government bureaucrat making a decision about health benefits and an insurance company employee that is paid to avoid paying out benefits, I’ll take the poorly motivated government worker every single time. It’s kind of funny when conservatives lose confidence in capitalism. ---
**Author:** ![AlienVessels](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ba8739/32.png) [@AlienVessels](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AlienVessels)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/138 "2011-08-23T23:22:14Z")
> [@Rekd](#): > > Our national debt in 2009 when Obama was sworn in to office was $10,626,000,000,000.00 > > That means the current POTUS has increased our national debt by a staggering $4,247,000,000,000.00 in just 945 days. That kind of spending has not been done in such a short time by any other President. > . For bonus points, which President’s budget was in effect when Obama took office? And whose 10 year tax cut program was in effect? And whose wars were in effect? You’re doing the math wrong. When someone hands you the wheel of a car headed downhill, you’re not responsible for the increased braking distance required. And most folks would give you credit for not hitting bottom. ---
**Author:** ![Lobohan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lobohan/32/79_2.png) [@Lobohan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lobohan)\ **Post date:** [August 23, 2011, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/139 "2011-08-23T23:24:06Z")
> [@Bricker](#): > > And what of me? Most of the Tea Party would probably think you’re\* one of the good ones\*. [ > [@](#): > > They are overwhelmingly white, but even compared to other white Republicans, they had a low regard for immigrants and blacks long before Barack Obama was president, and they still do. ]([http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/17/opinion/crashing-the-tea-party.html](http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/17/opinion/crashing-the-tea-party.html)) ---
**Author:** ![Lago\_Ys-Transform](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/a587f6/32.png) [@Lago\_Ys-Transform](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lago_Ys-Transform)\ **Post date:** [August 24, 2011, 4:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639/140 "2011-08-24T04:17:46Z")
> [@Algher](#): > > You want to give Bush all of the blame, ignoring any impact the Democrats might have had on some of the policies that got us here. Like… what? It’s not like there are two separate entities independently contributing to a disaster where the actions of one do not intersect with the other. Legislation goes through a stream with the President effectively at the top. Your statement might have some merit if the Democrats did something like attach a few stipulations that forced the GOP to compromise in such a way to get the wider project through. See debt ceiling negotiations. That would be something at least. If this is what you’re arguing, I’d A) love to hear what they were. and B) how this was worse than what the GOP counterparts wanted. If that’s too abstract, imagine you have two countries, Atlantis and Mu, who are allied and trying to put their resources together so that they can have a credible national defense against the invading forces of Lemuria, who have an army stronger than either of them but not as much as both. Military experts calculate that they need 20,000 gold pieces from the treasury to buy the equipment / mercenaries / food to win the needed battle and neither country has anything in the treasury right now. And this is the bare minimum needed to have a Pyrrhic Victory, not some curb stomping victory lap amount; meaning that if you go any lower than this no matter how close to the tipping point you may as well not spend any money, you’ll outright lose. After some Ubu Rui-style tragicomedic hilarity involving emergency taxes each country raises 15,000 gold. Atlantis immediately puts up 10k of the needed 15k for a credible national defense, the rest going towards things like, I dunno, trimmings on the king’s curtains. Mu however only puts up 3000 gold pieces towards national defense with the rest being buried in a field. Atlantis badgers the hell out of its ally to put up more of the money but Mu replies that if they really want national defense they should put up the whole amount. For whatever reason this doesn’t happen, not enough money is spend and both countries are ruthlessly underneath the heels of their Lemurian enemies and have to sign unequal treaties. Even if the calculus shifted so that Mu offered 6000 gold pieces of the 15k and Atlantis ‘only’ offered 13k (let’s call this Scenario B) the fall of the countries still aren’t equally their fault. Even though Atlantis could have put up the rest of the cash the fact remains that Mu has to take a greater share of the responsibility because Atlantis went a lot further than their buddy. Yes, even though in Scenario A Atlantis has no share of the responsibility (even if they paid the full amount it wouldn’t have been enough) the result is still not ‘equal shares of blame’ even though Atlantis could covered the gap in the financial burden. Hell, if Mu flat out said that there’s no way in hell they’re going to put up more than 3000 gold pieces (dumping the rest into the ocean to hold to the threat) Lemuria may as well have not spent anything on national defense and have spent the money however they pleased; it’d be ridiculous to say that Lemuria should’ve magically put up the 15k gold pieces anyway because it still wouldn’t have done any good. Savvy? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639.md?page=6) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/i-pit-the-republican-party-for-incredibly-hypocrisy-regarding-taxes/593639.md?page=8)