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You are here: Home / Give The People What They Want

Give The People What They Want

by $8 blue check mistermix|  January 21, 20118:22 am| 47 Comments

This post is in: Democratic Stupidity

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While Republicans are scrambling to find ways to gut non-defense discretionary spending, here’s what people really want to cut:

The poll that produced that graphic doesn’t ask about raising taxes on the rich, but if Democrats actually fought for cutting the defense budget and raising taxes on the top few percent, Washington, DC could still have a Metro, the federal government could still pay for birth control, and poor people could still have public defenders.

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47Comments

  1. 1.

    duck-billed placelot

    January 21, 2011 at 8:42 am

    Don’t be silly, that’s a sensible and responsible solution that would result in the IMMEDIATE EMASCULATION OF AMERICA.

  2. 2.

    cleek

    January 21, 2011 at 8:46 am

    people only support cutting the military in the abstract.

    specific proposals are demagogued.

  3. 3.

    cat48

    January 21, 2011 at 8:46 am

    The money is in SocSec and Medicare which will be/are going to have shortfalls and explode the deficit in the future, so “they” say.

    Anyway, the NYT asked what to do about shortfalls which was interesting:

    39. Currently, most Americans receive Medicare benefits once they turn 65. But the money Medicare takes in from taxpayers is not enough to pay for the program as it exists now. If you HAD to choose ONE in order to reduce the federal budget deficit, which would you prefer: reduce the future benefits of Medicare recipients or raise Medicare taxes on people paying into the system? Reduce benefits 24 Raise taxes 64 DK/NA 12

    40. (ASKED OF HALF SAMPLE)If you HAD to choose ONE, which of the following changes to Medicare benefits would you prefer in order to reduce the federal budget deficit: 1. raising the age people start receiving Medicare benefits, OR 2. raising the premiums all Medicare recipients have to pay, OR 3. covering fewer treatments? Raise age 46 Raise premiums 26 Cover fewer treatments 16 DK/NA 11

  4. 4.

    cathyx

    January 21, 2011 at 8:47 am

    But if we cut defense, the terrorists will win. Then all american women will have to wear burkas and I wouldn’t like that on a hot day.

  5. 5.

    duck-billed placelot

    January 21, 2011 at 8:51 am

    @cathyx – if all american women have to wear burkas, american men will be IMMEDIATELY EMASCULATED. How will the American Penis know its true worth if there are no women-in-tight-clothes-and-dead-afghanis by which to measure it?

  6. 6.

    MikeJ

    January 21, 2011 at 8:52 am

    @cleek: In Seattle people are all for cutting any part of the military except airplanes. I’d guess in Bath, Maine they’re all for cutting anything except ships.

  7. 7.

    cat48

    January 21, 2011 at 8:53 am

    Oh, also, Gates & Obama are attempting to cut $100B in Defense spending this budget and the House & Senate refuse to do it. I expected that from the House, but a lot of Dems in the Senate are against cutting the projects/equipment/programs, too. I doubt there will be any fighting abt this unless they refuse to raise the debt ceiling. This will probably be Obama’s “compromise.”

  8. 8.

    Ija

    January 21, 2011 at 8:53 am

    What, no option for cutting foreign aide? That graph is liberally biased. Doesn’t the NYT know that foreign aide is the biggest cash cow sucking on our collective teats?

    I’m interested in that 14% of Republicans who wants to cut Medicare but not Social Security. It’s okay if old people don’t have health insurance as long as they have that check from SS coming in every month. That’s totally enough to pay for that hospital bill when you break you hip.

  9. 9.

    bemused

    January 21, 2011 at 8:55 am

    According to Michael Medved on the Ed Schultz show last night, paraphrasing, americans are more concerned with the deficit, fiscal restraints than jobs and that’s what the republicans will be focusing on.

    MM: There’s not going to be a jobs plan from the Republicans. It’s not the House majority’s job to bring a jobs plan to the table.

    Joe Madison: America, are you hearing this?!

    MM:It’s not the government’s job to create jobs. The government’s job to to get out of the way for the private sector to do what they do best.

  10. 10.

    duck-billed placelot

    January 21, 2011 at 8:59 am

    @cleek – isn’t that true for all the cuts? I mean, you know demagoguery is going to happen for the actual proposals; Democrats won’t just sit by while Republicans offload federal land at rock-bottom prices or slash all NEA funding, right?…right?

  11. 11.

    Ija

    January 21, 2011 at 9:00 am

    @bemused:

    It’s not the government’s job to create jobs.

    Oh yeah? Then why have they been blaming Obama for the high unemployment rate?

  12. 12.

    Steeplejack

    January 21, 2011 at 9:02 am

    @bemused:

    MM:It’s not the government’s job to create jobs. The government’s job to to get out of the way for the private sector to do what they do best.

    Too bad he didn’t have enough time to explain exactly how the government has been “in the way” as the job market has cratered over the last five years or so. Absent that, he’d have to explain how and why the private sector hasn’t been getting the job done on “what they do best.”

  13. 13.

    comrade scott's agenda of rage

    January 21, 2011 at 9:10 am

    could still have a Metro, the federal government could still pay for birth control, and poor people could still have public defenders.

    That’s what Repups want to kill, they look at such outcomes as a feature, not a bug.

  14. 14.

    chopper

    January 21, 2011 at 9:13 am

    @Steeplejack:

    all i know is, all the private sector has done in the last 2 years is crash america’s economy into a ditch.

  15. 15.

    bemused

    January 21, 2011 at 9:19 am

    @Ija:
    That’s how they roll.

    Medved also said that the Republicans would listen to what the Obama says in the SOTU and will respond to that.

    I think this is exactly what will happen. No jobs plan from GOP. ‘Hell no, that’s not our job. Bring your plan on, Obama, and we get to eviscerate it’.

    I was somewhat shocked that Medved straight out said there was going to be no jobs plan from the Republicans. Considering that the GOP and their media support system usually have their talking points coordinated, are we going to be hearing variations of the same ‘not our job to bring a jobs plan’ from R legislators? If so, are the unemployed republican saps going to finally notice that republicans are salivating to cut their SS and Medicare and don’t give a rats ass about jobs for them?

  16. 16.

    Southern Beale

    January 21, 2011 at 9:22 am

    Here in Tennessee, now under complete Republican control (and our Republicans are major wackadoodles), the legislature is planning to do away with the Hall Tax, a 6% tax on dividend and investment income. Naturally it’s primarily a rich person’s tax, it’s the state’s ONLY income tax, and of course the rich assholes now in charge are eager to get rid of it.

    What’s hilarious is that they claim it will be paid for by making the state a haven for senior citizens and somehow their spending will trickle down on the rest of us. I’m dubious that the fixed-income, Senior Discount all-you-can-eat-buffet crowd will generate $186 million in income but I think it’s hilarious they are making that argument.

  17. 17.

    cleek

    January 21, 2011 at 9:24 am

    @Ija:

    Then why have they been blaming Obama for the high unemployment rate?

    because they’re Republicans.

  18. 18.

    Ija

    January 21, 2011 at 9:28 am

    @bemused:

    If so, are the unemployed republican saps going to finally notice that republicans are salivating to cut their SS and Medicare and don’t give a rats ass about jobs for them?

    Nope, because of the three G’s. That’s more important to them. After all, god will provide for you and your family and guns will keep you save from the evil horde of gays roaming the countryside trying to turn your son into one of them. What more do you need in life, really? You’re covered.

  19. 19.

    Punchy

    January 21, 2011 at 9:30 am

    Everyone wants the military spending slashed until it’s their community’s B-Whatever C-kret Bomah gets cut. Then suddenly, military cuts are wrong.

    Pretty much the textbook example of NIMBY.

  20. 20.

    RinaX

    January 21, 2011 at 10:00 am

    Republicans who fought tooth and nail against a state aid package last year now want to help states out. By letting them declare bankruptcy which, coincidentally, would also wipe out the pension of state workers…

    http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/41188877/ns/business-the_new_york_times/

  21. 21.

    Chris

    January 21, 2011 at 10:19 am

    It’s incredible that even among Republicans, a plurality thinks the military is what should be cut. Hell of a message to send to the political class.

  22. 22.

    daveNYC

    January 21, 2011 at 10:28 am

    Republicans who fought tooth and nail against a state aid package last year now want to help states out. By letting them declare bankruptcy which, coincidentally, would also wipe out the pension of state workers…

    Oh yeah, a haircut on state and muni bonds. I can’t see anything bad happening because of that.

  23. 23.

    Kirk Spencer

    January 21, 2011 at 10:28 am

    @RinaX: Oh, good, we’ve got more people who have no clue of what they’re speaking.

    The term for a state declaring bankruptcy is “sovereign default”, and it’s been done in the past in the United States.

    I believe you when you’re saying they want to remove the pensions, mind you. It’s just the claim that there is no route for states to declare bankruptcy is completely wrong.

  24. 24.

    sparky

    January 21, 2011 at 10:46 am

    the post is kinda misleading because it doesn’t consider all of the findings related to these issues. here are two more “findings” from the same poll:

    If you had to choose one, which would you prefer — raising taxes on people like you or reducing spending on government programs that benefit people like you?

    reducing spending was the preferred answer for independents, Rs AND Ds.

    In order to reduce the federal budget deficit, do you think it will be necessary or not necessary to increase taxes on people like you?

    again, all groups chose the “not necessary” option.

    what, if anything can be drawn from this morass? two things, perhaps: (1) as usual, if you are not directly affected you don’t care if spending is cut, so as a stratergy [sic] it is highly effective for the Rs to dismantle programs individually.

    second, a bit of good news:the general public apparently still believes in the notion of progressive taxation. thus, what might be a more effective strategy might be to reinforce that idea rather than fight battles on specifics.once the underpinning rationale has been destroyed it is much easier to destroy the actual program because if redistribution is destroyed as a concept then the other, selfishness, must necessarily have the upper hand.

    flaming attraction ps: it also gives the lie to the notion that Obama did anything else but cave to the oligarchs when he embraced continuing the Bush tax cuts. why? because a majority of voters believe in progressive taxation, so when the sides are the general public v. the oligarchy, the latter always wins, at least in an Obama administration (it should go without saying that this would be true of a McCain admin, and was true under Jr as well).

  25. 25.

    sparky

    January 21, 2011 at 10:51 am

    note to big bosses here: no permission to edit :(

  26. 26.

    Mnemosyne

    January 21, 2011 at 10:51 am

    @Steeplejack:

    Absent that, he’d have to explain how and why the private sector hasn’t been getting the job done on “what they do best.”

    Actually, the private sector is making a decent comeback. What’s dragging the economy down right now is the layoffs of government workers like teachers, cops and firefighters. There just aren’t enough private-sector jobs to absorb them all, not to mention the costs associated with cutting services so drastically.

    Of course, as far as Republicans are concerned, that’s unpossible since apparently teachers, cops and firefighters don’t buy food or clothing or other consumer goods that make the economy run.

  27. 27.

    Chris

    January 21, 2011 at 11:01 am

    @Mnemosyne:

    I imagine public sector wage freezes aren’t helping on that front either.

  28. 28.

    Lee

    January 21, 2011 at 11:32 am

    @Kirk Spencer:

    Actually the article states

    …the states are barred from seeking protection in federal bankruptcy court.

  29. 29.

    Bill Murray

    January 21, 2011 at 11:32 am

    @Mnemosyne: 763,000 private sector jobs in a year is not really a decent comeback, although it is better than the what ~8.5 million jobs lost total in the previous two years. 763,000 covers about half a year’s worth of new entrants to the job force

  30. 30.

    Mike in NC

    January 21, 2011 at 11:39 am

    An actual GOP jobs program? Surely you jest. I read that Boehner’s next priority is redundant legislation to prevent any federal funding for abortion services, because that’s what “the American people” have demanded.

  31. 31.

    El Cid

    January 21, 2011 at 11:42 am

    Democrats always get blamed for what Republicans do. Including when the policies in question are the correct policies.

    George Bush Sr. followed his own Secretary of Defense’s recommandation to phase out old and unnecessary bases and consolidating other units and cutting down recruitment in certain services at certain times.

    In 1988 the Secretary of Defense recognized the requirement to close excess bases to save money and therefore chartered the Commission on Base Realignment and Closure in 1988 to recommend military bases within the United States for realignment and closure.
    __
    Congress has enacted two laws since 1988 that provide for the closure, in part or in whole, and the realignment of facilities. Since 1988, there have been four successive bipartisan Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commissions (BRAC) that recommended the closure of 125 major military facilities and 225 minor military bases and installations, and the realignment in operations and functions of 145 others. By another accounting, the four BRAC rounds achieved 97 base closings and 55 major realignments. This resulted in net savings to taxpayers of over $16 billion through 2001, and over $6 billion in additional savings annually…
    __
    …During the decade of the 1980’s, no major military bases were closed, largely because of procedural requirements established by Congress. After several legislative efforts to break the deadlock failed, Congress introduced a new base closure procedure in P.L. 100-526, enacted October 24, 1988. The original base-closing law was designed to minimize political interference. The statute established a bipartisan commission to make recommendations to Congress and the Secretary of Defense on closures and realignments. Lawmakers had to accept or reject the commission´s report in its entirety. On December 28, 1988, the commission issued its report, recommending closure of 86 installations, partial closure of 5, and realignment of 54 others. The Secretary of Defense approved its recommendation on January 5, 1989.

    There were other commission recommendations in 1991, 1993, and 1995.

    So, of course, Bill Clinton got blamed for “hollowing out the military”.

    If we begin cutting defense spending, it would take a PR miracle to not have Democrats be blamed for inviting Al Qa’ida to kill babies by beating them to death with puppies.

  32. 32.

    jayjaybear

    January 21, 2011 at 11:49 am

    Re Michael Medved: I liked him a lot better when he was a movie reviewer and not a pundit. Of course, I didn’t like him much even then, but I liked him a lot better than I do now.

  33. 33.

    Davis X. Machina

    January 21, 2011 at 11:51 am

    @El Cid: That ‘hollow army’ went through Iraq like a dose of salts in ’03, didn’t it?

  34. 34.

    Davis X. Machina

    January 21, 2011 at 11:54 am

    If so, are the unemployed republican saps going to finally notice that republicans are salivating to cut their SS and Medicare and don’t give a rats ass about jobs for them?

    No. We’ve reached the Saipan Banzai Cliffs/Masada stage of the cold Civil War. They’ll sacrifice their own children to the Cause at this point.

    Deus lo vult and all that.

  35. 35.

    El Cid

    January 21, 2011 at 12:12 pm

    @Davis X. Machina: That’s because Bush Jr. fixed it. Just ask Republicans.

  36. 36.

    Davis X. Machina

    January 21, 2011 at 12:16 pm

    @El Cid: In 18 months. I remember — it was a miracle.

  37. 37.

    ThatLeftTurnInABQ

    January 21, 2011 at 12:21 pm

    @Davis X. Machina:

    No. We’ve reached the Saipan Banzai Cliffs/Masada stage of the cold Civil War. They’ll sacrifice their own children to the Cause at this point.

    Agreed.

    Can we find a domestic analogy that will fit on a bumper sticker and which most Americans would instantly recognize? I would propose: “GOP = The Donner Party, and YOU are on the menu”, but the teaching of American history has been in such a shambles for so long that I doubt if even one person in ten would get the reference.

    Anybody got any better ideas?

  38. 38.

    joe from Lowell

    January 21, 2011 at 12:26 pm

    @Ija:

    I’m interested in that 14% of Republicans who wants to cut Medicare but not Social Security.

    There’s actually some sense there, in that Medicare has a real, large, oncoming budget problem, and Social Security does not.

    I think it’s possible that 1/7 of Republicans are making up their minds based on actual facts.

  39. 39.

    NR

    January 21, 2011 at 12:28 pm

    The poll that produced that graphic doesn’t ask about raising taxes on the rich, but if Democrats actually fought for cutting the defense budget and raising taxes on the top few percent,

    You seem to be assuming that the Democrats want to do these things. They don’t.

  40. 40.

    Davis X. Machina

    January 21, 2011 at 12:36 pm

    @ThatLeftTurnInAB

    Too long. ‘God gays, guns’ is only eleven letters long, and there are 70 million Americans whose brains fill up just with that.

  41. 41.

    joe from Lowell

    January 21, 2011 at 12:36 pm

    @Bill Murray:

    763,000 private sector jobs in a year is not really a decent comeback

    297,000 private-sector jobs just in December, on the other hand, is a great comeback. Here’s hoping it keeps up.

    And, of course, that result could not have possible except as the culmination of the trend Mnemosyne was pointing out in that chart.

  42. 42.

    Oscar Leroy

    January 21, 2011 at 12:37 pm

    @Bill Murray:

    That’s for sure. 700,000 jobs a year doesn’t even cover new people entering the workforce. It sure isn’t enough to dig out of this depression.

    Give The People What They Want

    So if Obama proposes cutting Social Security so he can keep raising defense spending, who are we going to blame for that? Let’s start getting our story straight now, so it’s ready to go next week.

  43. 43.

    Mnemosyne

    January 21, 2011 at 12:39 pm

    @Bill Murray:

    763,000 private sector jobs in a year is not really a decent comeback, although it is better than the what ~8.5 million jobs lost total in the previous two years. 763,000 covers about half a year’s worth of new entrants to the job force

    It’s better than the massive layoffs in the public sector, and the number would almost certainly be better if not for those layoffs.

    But it’s an article of faith for Republicans that Government Is Bad so they don’t actually care that they’re damaging the overall economy by getting rid of public workers. They don’t care that there’s no way that the private sector is going to be able to recover as long as people are being laid off. It’s more important to them that they kill as many government jobs as possible than it is to fix the economy.

    Or, what Davis X. Machina said.

  44. 44.

    joe from Lowell

    January 21, 2011 at 12:43 pm

    @Oscar Leroy:

    So if Obama proposes cutting Social Security so he can keep raising defense spending

    The Obama administration just submitted $100 billion in annual cuts to the defense budget a week ago.

    Please note, this is actual, documented fact, as opposed to something that you’ve decided is true by checking it against your gut, so I’m not surprised you haven’t heard of it.

  45. 45.

    Mnemosyne

    January 21, 2011 at 12:44 pm

    @Oscar Leroy:

    So if Obama proposes cutting Social Security so he can keep raising defense spending, who are we going to blame for that? Let’s start getting our story straight now, so it’s ready to go next week.

    I see Oscar has bought a ticket on the “He’s Going To Kill Social Security in the State of the Union!” crazy train.

    Tell you what, Oscar — I’ll think of something to say if that actually does happen (as pigs do a flyover of the Capitol Building) if you can let us know what the next big event is where Obama Is Totally Going To Kill Social Security This Time, No, I Swear I’m Right This Time!

    You’re sounding like one of those apocalyptic cults that keeps having to push back the date for Armageddon because — surprise! — it was never going to happen.

  46. 46.

    Bill Murray

    January 21, 2011 at 2:41 pm

    @joe from Lowell: I think it’s more likely 1 in 7 confused Medicare with Medicaid

  47. 47.

    Tax Analyst

    January 21, 2011 at 7:07 pm

    @ThatLeftTurnInABQ:

    “GOP = The Donner Party, and YOU are on the menu”, but the teaching of American history has been in such a shambles for so long that I doubt if even one person in ten would get the reference.

    No, if you tell people there’s a “Donner Party” they’re going to think they’re going to get free eats and booze from the Republicans. Either that or they’re going to be expecting Quaaludes.

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