Tea Party day

[Jimmy Neutron]

JimmyN said a majority opposed. Can you read AND add?

 

Correction: A majority that had an opinion opposed. Better?

 

How about letting go of my little infraction and focusing on the big picture, huh? Tell us all how the debt we are incurring is OK, we'll overcome it and all live happily ever after. Tell us that Obama isn't downright dishonest when he says he'll cut the annual deficit in half, but submits a "10 year plan" that adds over 10 trillion in debt over those 10 years.

[TimC]

It's over....Richmond is on fire, Atlanta is burning, Lee has surrendered. Good night everyone.

 

 

Virgil Caine is my name and I drove on the Danville train

'til so much cavalry came and tore up the tracks again

In the winter of '65, we were hungry, just barely alive

I took the train to Richmond that fell

It was a time I remember, oh, so well

 

The night they drove old Dixie down

And all the bells were ringin'

The night they drove old Dixie down

And all the people were singin'

They went, "Na, na, na, na, na, na, .... "

 

Back with my wife in Tennessee

And one day she said to me,

"Virgil, Quick! Come see!

There goes Robert E. Lee."

Now I don't mind, I'm chopping wood

And I don't care if the money's no good

Just take what you need and leave the rest

But they should never have taken the very best

 

The night they drove old Dixie down

And all the bells were ringin'

The night they drove old Dixie down

And all the people were singin'

They went, "Na, na, na, na, na, na, ..... "

 

Like my father before me, I'm a working man

And like my brother before me, I took a rebel stand

Oh, he was just 18, proud and brave

But a yankee laid him in his grave

I swear by the blood below my feet

You can't raise a Cane back up when he's in defeat

 

The night they drove old Dixie down

And all the bells were ringin'

The night they drove old Dixie down

And all the people were singin'

They went, "Na, na, na, na, na, na, ..... "

 

:confederateflag:

[Jimmy Neutron]

It's over....Richmond is on fire, Atlanta is burning, Lee has surrendered. Good night everyone.

 

:confederateflag:

 

[cre8tiff]

It's over....Richmond is on fire, Atlanta is burning, Lee has surrendered. Good night everyone.

 

 

Virgil Caine is my name and I drove on the Danville train

'til so much cavalry came and tore up the tracks again

In the winter of '65, we were hungry, just barely alive

I took the train to Richmond that fell

It was a time I remember, oh, so well

 

The night they drove old Dixie down

And all the bells were ringin'

The night they drove old Dixie down

And all the people were singin'

They went, "Na, na, na, na, na, na, .... "

 

Back with my wife in Tennessee

And one day she said to me,

"Virgil, Quick! Come see!

There goes Robert E. Lee."

Now I don't mind, I'm chopping wood

And I don't care if the money's no good

Just take what you need and leave the rest

But they should never have taken the very best

 

The night they drove old Dixie down

And all the bells were ringin'

The night they drove old Dixie down

And all the people were singin'

They went, "Na, na, na, na, na, na, ..... "

 

Like my father before me, I'm a working man

And like my brother before me, I took a rebel stand

Oh, he was just 18, proud and brave

But a yankee laid him in his grave

I swear by the blood below my feet

You can't raise a Cane back up when he's in defeat

 

The night they drove old Dixie down

And all the bells were ringin'

The night they drove old Dixie down

And all the people were singin'

They went, "Na, na, na, na, na, na, ..... "

 

:confederateflag:

 

fiddle dee dee.

[Pope Flick]

Correction: A majority that had an opinion opposed. Better?

 

How about letting go of my little infraction and focusing on the big picture, huh? Tell us all how the debt we are incurring is OK, we'll overcome it and all live happily ever after. Tell us that Obama isn't downright dishonest when he says he'll cut the annual deficit in half, but submits a "10 year plan" that adds over 10 trillion in debt over those 10 years.

 

 

Jimmy - part of "your little infraction" isn't little: the "Have to agree here!!1!! crowd" continually busts you guys on flatout falsehoods that you don't bother checking and just expect to be accepted at face value. When they aren't (and they usually aren't) true there is -believe it or not- a sense of why bother taking you guys seriously at all when all you do is regurgitate what you've heard without checking on it, as in "how do you defend ______" when in fact, the fill in the blank art doesn't exist.

 

So, part of the big picture is sorting out the truth from what you guys want to believe.

 

10 year projections are considered bunk by most economists, as in "the further out you project, the less accurate it becomes."

 

Am I happy about any of this? No, not really. But inside those HUGH projections are also things like reincorporating the cost fo Iraq (which if I am not mistaken are not included in any of the pretty 10 year graphs on Bush's side since the war wasn't on the budget) so it looks larger compared to Bush's but in part because Bush's was kept artificially small.

 

I am of the opinion that doing nothing at this moment is worse than what's being done. And as I said earlier: I'm watching and have my vote come 2012. I've never failed to vote in a general election and won't stop out of any satisfaction, real or imagined come that time.

[Jimmy Neutron]

Jimmy - part of "your little infraction" isn't little: the "Have to agree here!!1!! crowd" continually busts you guys on flatout falsehoods that you don't bother checking and just expect to be accepted at face value. When they aren't (and they usually aren't) true there is -believe it or not- a sense of why bother taking you guys seriously at all when all you do is regurgitate what you've heard without checking on it, as in "how do you defend ______" when in fact, the fill in the blank art doesn't exist.

 

So, part of the big picture is sorting out the truth from what you guys want to believe.

 

10 year projections are considered bunk by most economists, as in "the further out you project, the less accurate it becomes."

 

Am I happy about any of this? No, not really. But inside those HUGH projections are also things like reincorporating the cost fo Iraq (which if I am not mistaken are not included in any of the pretty 10 year graphs on Bush's side since the war wasn't on the budget) so it looks larger compared to Bush's but in part because Bush's was kept artificially small.

 

I am of the opinion that doing nothing at this moment is worse than what's being done. And as I said earlier: I'm watching and have my vote come 2012. I've never failed to vote in a general election and won't stop out of any satisfaction, real or imagined come that time.

 

Well, therein lies the great irony. That's exactly how some of us feel about the Have to agree here crowd. You guys chant the same party line BS and never actually defend the policies we're questioning. Saying that 10 year projections are not accurate is not a defense of the Obama budget. Obama's economic advisors and the CBO are arguably some of the brightest economists around. Their forecasts should scare the hell out of every American. Yes, Bush was a doushe for not including the cost of the war in his budgets. Even so, including the cost of the war is just a blip on the radar of the total spend of the proposed budget. This is HUGH deficit spending that puts our country on a path that will be exceptionally painful and make the current economic "crisis" look like a day at the park.

[cre8tiff]

Hmm, seems the plurality of Americans don't mind paying taxes...

 

Have to agree here!!!!

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

ok, a majority of those who expressed an opinion. I'll have to remember to try this lame gotcha BS charade next time one of you claims that 52% of the country voted for obama.

 

So if I say i'm not sure, I don't count?

[polksalet]

Headed out for the local tea party at the WWII memorial.

[Perchoutofwater]

Hmm, seems the plurality of Americans don't mind paying taxes...

 

Have to agree here!!!!

 

Yes, almost as many as right after the Bush tax cuts were enacted. But the fact your opinion piece fails to get, is those polls are on taxes right now, not the taxes Obama is going to impose upon us to pay for this out of control spending. And again, it isn't just taxes that these people are protesting, it is spending as much as anything that has people mad.

[Pope Flick]

Well, therein lies the great irony. That's exactly how some of us feel about the Have to agree here crowd. You guys chant the same party line BS and never actually defend the policies we're questioning. Saying that 10 year projections are not accurate is not a defense of the Obama budget. Obama's economic advisors and the CBO are arguably some of the brightest economists around. Their forecasts should scare the hell out of every American. Yes, Bush was a doushe for not including the cost of the war in his budgets. Even so, including the cost of the war is just a blip on the radar of the total spend of the proposed budget. This is HUGH deficit spending that puts our country on a path that will be exceptionally painful and make the current economic "crisis" look like a day at the park.

 

 

Becuase so many times the stuff that amounts to "JUMP THROUGH THIS HOOP WITH YOUR DEFENSE OF XXX" simply doesn't exist.

 

Sure, it does scare the hell out of me. But I have also been aware since I was 12 that I was going to have a big ol' debt hung on my ass. What scares the hell out of me even more is continuing the philosophic approach to cutting taxes across the board and hoping for the best. That's what has gotten us here.

 

And trying to pin me down on the 10 year mark makes the "10 year projections are chit" argument relevant.

 

I could line up conservative economists who think enough isn't being spent as well. Would that make you feel less scared?

 

Jimmy - the train has pulled from the station. To those who want to grab their guns and jump off, you can head to Canada or Mexico. I'm sticking around and trying to make things better.

[Pope Flick]

ok, a majority of those who expressed an opinion. I'll have to remember to try this lame gotcha BS charade next time one of you claims that 52% of the country voted for obama.

 

 

You invented the BS gotcha semantics crapola here. You should be proud of me.

[Perchoutofwater]

Sure, it does scare the hell out of me. But I have also been aware since I was 12 that I was going to have a big ol' debt hung on my ass. What scares the hell out of me even more is continuing the philosophic approach to cutting taxes across the board and hoping for the best. That's what has gotten us here.

 

I don't think anyone seriously wants across the board tax cuts. That is part of the reason we have debt now, we have cut taxes so much across the board that we have a bunch of people now that don't even pay taxes. Even I who hate taxes think we need to raise taxes to get out of this mess, but I don't want to see a tax raise without a cut in spending. Most of the people at these rallies want to see spending cut a whole lot more than they want to see taxes cut. I think scrapping the capital gains tax and the death tax would be good. I don't think you can cut income taxes at this point, and if anything I would suggest you raise the lower brackets so that everyone is at least contributing something. I think a lot of us would like to see a more balanced tax code, but unlike Obama by balanced we are talking about a flat tax instead of redistribution. But honestly I wouldn't if you raise my taxes as long as you cut spending by the same percentage that you raise taxes, and that once the debt was paid off you cut taxes by twice as much as you increase spending.

[Azazello1313]

10 year projections are considered bunk by most economists, as in "the further out you project, the less accurate it becomes."

 

yeah, it could be better than the CBO estimates. or, just as likely, it could be even worse. the bottom line is that the best, non-partisan estimates we can come up with right now show a giant f'ing black hole of debt. hell, even if you look at the obama administration's OWN projections in that link, the deficits (even AFTER an anticipated recovery) are far bigger than anything under bush up until FY 2009 -- and obama is responsible for far more of the 2009 spending than bush is. you simply cannot justify what portends by any measure to be a massive hole of debt by saying, "hey, projections are unreliable".

 

But inside those HUGH projections are also things like reincorporating the cost fo Iraq (which if I am not mistaken are not included in any of the pretty 10 year graphs on Bush's side since the war wasn't on the budget) so it looks larger compared to Bush's but in part because Bush's was kept artificially small.

 

that is incorrect. the bush numbers represent ACTUAL spending for the past years. from the article in perch's link:

 

Many Obama defenders in the comments are claiming that the numbers above do not include spending on Iraq and Afghanistan during the Bush years. They most certainly do. While Bush did fund the wars through emergency supplementals (not the regular budget process), that spending did not simply vanish. It is included in the numbers above.

 

of course, obama just asked for an 80-something billion emergency supplemental himself. I'm not sure how much the budgets he is submitting for 2010 onward contain for iraq and afghanistan, but I'd be interested to see. in any case, the past numbers attributed to bush contain every penny actually spent. the future projections attributed to obama DO NOT contain, at the very least, the emergency supplemental he just requested. but hey, what's another 80 billion on top of 12 trillion.

Edited April 15, 2009 by Azazello1313

[cre8tiff]

Headed out for teabagging party at the WWII memorial.

 

Wow, I mean, wow.

[Perchoutofwater]

Wow, I mean, wow.

 

You sure are contributing a lot stalking Polk. Can't you find a more creative way of padding?

[Azazello1313]

So if I say i'm not sure, I don't count?

 

well you certainly don't count as a "supporter". here, you can pick your own true statement according to that poll:

 

1) more people oppose it than support it

2) 63% of those polled do not support it

[wiegie]

Everyone please remember that any projections that were made of the effects of the Bush budget were deliberately misleading because they were made under the assumption that Bush's tax-cuts would expire in 2010--even though the GOP in no way intended for the tax-cuts to end then.

 

It was a great bit of BS politics because now when Obama has decided not to re-enact the tax cuts for all taxpayers, he can now get attacked for "raising taxes".

 

Why isn't this point completely obvious to everyone?

[Perchoutofwater]

Everyone please remember that any projections that were made of the effects of the Bush budget were deliberately misleading because they were made under the assumption that Bush's tax-cuts would expire in 2010--even though the GOP in no way intended for the tax-cuts to end then.

 

It was a great bit of BS politics because now when Obama has decided not to re-enact the tax cuts for all taxpayers, he can now get attacked for "raising taxes".

 

Why isn't this point completely obvious to everyone?

 

Is it fair to say that it is the Democrats in congress that are responsible for the tax increase then, since they wouldn't allow it to pass without sunset provisions?

 

ETA: and I'm pretty sure that if Obama wanted to he could make the Bush tax cuts permanent, he just doesn't want to, so in a sense he is raising taxes by letting them sunset, when his party has the votes to make them permanent and the opposition party would go along with it.

Edited April 15, 2009 by Perchoutofwater

[Azazello1313]

Everyone please remember that any projections that were made of the effects of the Bush budget were deliberately misleading because they were made under the assumption that Bush's tax-cuts would expire in 2010--even though the GOP in no way intended for the tax-cuts to end then.

 

It was a great bit of BS politics because now when Obama has decided not to re-enact the tax cuts for all taxpayers, he can now get attacked for "raising taxes".

 

Why isn't this point completely obvious to everyone?

 

what does any of this have to do with projections under bush's budgets? the bush years are in the books, dude. the tax cuts are indeed projected to expire, and in the current political climate they certainly will expire, and that results in additional revenue which is factored into the projections for obama's budgets. yet he is proposing so much additional spending that the deficits will still go through the roof.

[cre8tiff]

Is it fair to say that it is the Democrats in congress that are responsible for the tax increase then, since they wouldn't allow it to pass without sunset provisions?

 

ETA: and I'm pretty sure that if Obama wanted to he could make the Bush tax cuts permanent, he just doesn't want to, so in a sense he is raising taxes by letting them sunset, when his party has the votes to make them permanent and the opposition party would go along with it.

 

Umm both of Bush's tax cuts were passed BEFORE the Dems got control of Congress there, Skippy. (2001 and 2003)

[gilthorp]

Darn. I missed the one in my area. Great idea, when the economy is down, let's not roll up our sleeves and work harder, let's waste time and money and complain about the reality we are all faced with right now.

[CaP'N GRuNGe]

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2009/...-house-protest/

[Big John]

Umm both of Bush's tax cuts were passed BEFORE the Dems got control of Congress there, Skippy. (2001 and 2003)

Perch is not Skippy.

[Jimmy Neutron]

Becuase so many times the stuff that amounts to "JUMP THROUGH THIS HOOP WITH YOUR DEFENSE OF XXX" simply doesn't exist.

 

Sure, it does scare the hell out of me. But I have also been aware since I was 12 that I was going to have a big ol' debt hung on my ass. What scares the hell out of me even more is continuing the philosophic approach to cutting taxes across the board and hoping for the best. That's what has gotten us here.

 

And trying to pin me down on the 10 year mark makes the "10 year projections are chit" argument relevant.

 

I could line up conservative economists who think enough isn't being spent as well. Would that make you feel less scared?

 

Jimmy - the train has pulled from the station. To those who want to grab their guns and jump off, you can head to Canada or Mexico. I'm sticking around and trying to make things better.

 

I really don't care what most economists say. Our "best and brightest" navigated the ship right into the reef. The likes of Geithner and Bernanke we're at the helm right up until the point water started gushing in.

 

The only economists that make any sense to me are the ones saying that we can't spend our way out of a recession and you can't borrow your way out of debt. It's time to pay the piper. Continuing to pump borrowed money into our house of cards is just going to make it more painful in the end. Even if the stimulus were to create jobs, it will fail in the end because those jobs are largely pre-paid. Unless we build an environment where businesses want to do business, we'll continue leaking jobs like a sieve.

 

Sticking with this deficit spending plan is suicide, not sticking around to make it better.

 

I'm not arguing that nothing should be done. The something that is being done is profoundly wrong-headed and will end in disaster.