I’m torn between hoping that a shutdown doesn’t happen because I don’t want the economy and people’s lives to be fucked up and wishing that a motherfucker would shut the government down so we can make them pay the price.
Say it over and over, the Republicans are getting ready to shut down the government.
Sharl
I find it strangely comforting that you front pagers don’t coordinate your postings.
Studly Pantload, Vibrant Trollbot for Obama
Information Superhighway Traffic Alert: Front-pager pileup at the B-J off ramp!
patrick II
So, what changed your mind between 9:54 a.m. and 1:04 p.m.?
Amir_Khalid
“This video contains content from WMG, who has blocked it in your country on copyright grounds.”
Fuck you, Warner Music Group.
Sincerely,
Amir Khalid in Malaysia.
Elia Isquire
Hey, Doug,
Sully is tut-tutting the “liberal blogosphere” for “demagoguing” Ryan’s budget.
Seems to be one of the classic “if they’re saying you’re losing, you’re winning” situations, no?
Comrade DougJ
@Amir_Khalid:
Assholes.
ed
Not blocked are Rhymin’ & Stealin’ and Dread Zeppelin’s offering of the same.
Please replace the above unwatchable video clip forthwith.
trollhattan
They’re anarchists–employed anarchists. Instead of throwing Molotov cocktails at WTO conferences they’re throwing them at their fellow citizens. And yet, we tolerate them for whatever reason. It’s mind-bending, watching it unfold.
Also, too, I wonder what party she’s registered with?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-12966698
kdaug
@Sharl: Me too.
Catsy
I’m completely on board with making Republicans pay the price for the economic terrorism they’re planning to unleash on the people they’re supposed to represent, but I can’t go along with even remotely hoping that it’ll happen. My father just moved to Alaska with his wife, who got the kind of plum Park Services job you just can’t refuse. They’re entirely dependent on her income, and an extended shutdown could literally put them–and their cats–out in the cold.
4tehlulz
1. Paralyze government with shutdown.
2. Destroy it with default.
3. Remake it in your image.
Lenin would be so proud of the teabaggers.
JPL
It’s not a government shut down. Planes will still fly and congress will still get paid.
Comrade Javamanphil
@Elia Isquire: Nothing makes Sully happier than imagining poor people tightening their belts (but doing it with a smile and wink.)
trollhattan
@ed:
I loved Dread Zepplin. They used to play clubs here and were hilarious, and surprisingly good musicians. IIRC the guitarist was named Buttboy. Tortelvis should have gone on American Idol.
Studly Pantload, Vibrant Trollbot for Obama
@Elia Isquire:
Nice. This conveniently ignores the fact that Ryan’s numbers are based on unfiltered bullshit.
Jane2
So how would a shut-down affect you personally, other than giving you a grievance to post about? I can’t imagine anyone actually wanting such a thing to happen.
Matt in HB
Crying won’t help you, praying won’t do you no good
Crying won’t help you, praying won’t do you no good
When the levee breaks, mama, you got to go
All last night sat on the levee and moaned
All last night sat on the levee and moaned
Thinking about my baby and my happy home
Going – going to Chicago
Going to Chicago
Sorry, but I can’t take you
I know it’s a cliche and a symptom of “old white guy syndrome”, but damn I do love some Zeppelin. They really were best when they were doing straight blues covers and rip-offs. Levee might qualify as either, depending on your mood.
goblue72
Let them shut it down. Progressives can be unadulterated pussies. If we aren’t willing to endure some pain and take a punch in the face, then we will never win the long fight. The Republicans understand this – they relish going for the throat. Why our side doesn’t embrace it is beyond me.
And yes, it means that over the short haul, some people are going to suffer. But its not like people don’t suffer every day in this country due to decades of corporatist theft of the working class.
I work in the kind of inner city neighborhood that would make suburban housewives faint. Already today I’ve walked over two patches of human feces, past an open-air hand to hand heroin sale, and over some dude passed out on the sidewalk at 9 AM. A government shutdown can’t hurt us that much worse than we already do. Its time we start calling them on their shite and fight back.
RosiesDad
Today Bobo posted a column touting Paul Ryan for being a Very Serious Person whose budget proposal was the result of Really Serious Thinking. And how no one else is doing much to grasp reality with both hands. Or some such Republican doctrinaire bullshit. This comment was priceless:
You know what’s a real disruptive change? Revolution.
Might as well roll up the sleeves now. It’s going to be painful but it’s going to be painful now, or in a couple of weeks when the debt ceiling has to be raised or in a couple of months when they start fighting over next year’s budget.
Comrade DougJ
@patrick II:
I still think they’ll back down.
Kay Shawn
only slightly OT: David Cameron tells Pakistan to tax the rich:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/apr/05/david-cameron-pakistan-raise-taxes-rich
Elia Isquire
@Studly Pantload, Vibrant Trollbot for Obama: You’re right. Sadly, those like Sully on this austerity jihad are so overcome with magical thinking, I don’t think a criticism based on facts or empiricism has much of a chance of breaking through. I wrote him an email in an attempt to point out that calling for a civil and reasoned debate from one side of your mouth while saying those who disagree with you are demagogues from the other is, um, bullshit.
eemom
@Comrade DougJ:
The crazies won’t let ’em.
Studly Pantload, Vibrant Trollbot for Obama
@Elia Isquire:
:golfers clap:
When I read your post, my first thought was, “Let Sully try that line with the comments enabled, the chickenshit.” Glad you gave him a piece of your mind.
Failure, Inc.
@JPL: Thank you for injecting some truth into the discussion. Also, the military will still be getting paid.
This is a “selective cutting off of government serivces for people who our corporate paymasters have told us don’t count”, in other words, a rehearsal for what the Ryan budget will remold America as.
Oh yeah, speaking of Ryan, there’s your next President right there, if he can get his abomination of a budget passed.
Now might be a good time for the Dems to find their spines, if they have any.
Bruce S
They don’t give a flying f*** about the country. It’s as simple as that.
http://titanicsailsatdawn.blogspot.com/2011/04/shutdown-tea-party-gop-in-dangerous.html
Punchy
Fucking disgusting
The legacy of BushCo will stick with this country for many generations.
Comrade DougJ
@Matt in HB:
I agree. That’s even almost true of the Stones, their cover of “Love in Vain” is as good as it gets, even though their original songs were better than Zep’s.
Turgidson
If this was an abstract exercise or a video game, and I knew the Democrats would win the goddamn argument for once, I’d be all for a shutdown.
But it’s neither of those things (I know federal workers, as most of us probably do, who are shitting bricks right now), and I have utter confidence that the Dems will once again manage to lose the argument, despite holding a full house vs. the GOP’s pair of 2s so to speak.
So, as unpleasant as any compromise will probably be, I’m still hoping for one.
Davis X. Machina
There’s fresh-water economics. There’s salt-water economics. This is holy-water economics….
Turgidson
@Matt in HB:
Agree. And the sound of Bonham’s drums on Levee is pretty much the awesomest thing ever. Now if only Jimmy Page and co. had, you know, credited the authors of the songs they were plagiarizing. :)
I am probably the only one in the world who thinks Presence was a damn good album. Mostly on the strength of Achilles Last Stand and Nobody’s Fault But Mine alone, but still – those two songs are fucking aces.
Culture of Truth
“We’ll Shut it Down!”
“Cause toonight’s gonna be a goood goood niiight…”
Amir_Khalid
@Turgidson: I really liked Royal Orleans as well. But Tea For One was uninspired British blooze at its dullest and stodgiest.
Mnemosyne
@Punchy:
And you know their parents are sitting at the police station saying, “Oh, we had no idea that talking about how Muslims were evil at the dinner table every night would influence them to do something bad!”
Shit like that doesn’t come from thin air. Those kids learned it from their parents.
Southern Beale
I’m torn between hoping that a shutdown doesn’t happen because I don’t want the economy and people’s lives to be fucked up and wishing that a motherfucker would shut the government down so we can make them pay the price.
Yeah but everything is always the Democrats’ fault. So no matter what happens, it’s going to be Obama and the evil Dems who just refused to be reasonable and that’s why everything hit the shitter.
I hope this David Prosser dude gets his ass handed to him in the election today because that might scare the pants off the GOP more than a government shutdown.
Joe Beese
@goblue72:
Speaking of which…
http://www.slate.com/id/2290359/
JGabriel
@Mnemosyne:
Or Fox News.
.
LGRooney
I just want it to shut down over the weekend so we can have our BJ picnic in the DC area. In other news on the government shutdown, McDonald’s is looking to hire another 50,000 people…
OzoneR
@Joe Beese: The hell does this have to do with the budget?
trollhattan
@Comrade DougJ:
I snagged “How the West Was Won” a couple years ago, which reminded me how freakishly good they were at their zenith. I can even forgive the overlong drum solo, it’s so good throughout.
Curiously, I didn’t fully appreciate Robert Plant’s level of professionalism until the “Raising Sand” album with Allison Krause. I can be slow that way.
agrippa
@Joe Beese:
Well played beese
You have trolled yourself
scandi
Who exactly is going to make them pay the price? Our congress-critters? The media? Nancy Reagan?
agrippa
@OzoneR:
Nothing
Beese is a bad comedian
Bubblegum Tate
“The people have utter contempt for the government right now…shutting it down will both be popular, as an event, and also be an excellent tool to beat up Democrats with. The story isn’t “oh, my, how will granny get her SS check” but, “goodness, what a bunch of creeps those Democrats are – shutting down the government to protect cowboy poetry/Planned Parenthood funding/insert idiotic spending measure here”. The people are on our side.”
–wingnut blogger Mark Noonan
Elizabelle
Great song. Thanks.
Tim Kaine will run for the Virginia Senate seat Jim Webb is vacating.
He’d be an excellent Senator. Resigning his DNC chair immediately.
Catsy
@OzoneR: Nothing. Beese is a one-note instrument whose ODS seems to cause him physical pain if he doesn’t attempt to derail every single thread in which he “participates” into a swipe at Obama, no matter how irrelevant the subject or laughable the premise.
OzoneR
already, the media is blaming Democrats.
jibeaux
@RosiesDad:
Doesn’t that Very Serious Plan predict an unemployment rate of something like 2.8%. Yes, Serious, Serious, Indeed. If we as a society stop tolerating out of wedlock births I’m sure that will happen. Somehow.
The Populist
We truly live in interesting times.
I will say this, the Wisconsing voting authority anticipates 20% turnout for the supreme court election. If Prosser wins and turnout is the same as always, I am done. People seem to talk the talk but never walk it at all.
I feel for everybody and if I was a rich man I’d fight for progressive ideas the way the Kochs do for their selfish con beliefs. I’m not a rich man, I can’t do it myself and you can have all the protests in the world but until people MOBILIZE and vote in big numbers these fucks on the right will continue to act as if they have some mandate.
Maybe I am having a bad day and it shows in this rant, but really…I want people to vote and send the message of all messages. Prosser win = more false mandates the right can hide behind.
If they shut down the government, I will just roll my eyes and shrug. If the dems get blamed, it’s expected but i hope people are smarter than that.
Matt in HB
@Turgidson:
I don’t know how much is historical whitewashing, but there is more credit than I expected on a lot of the songs (via wiki or more recent releases of the CDs). I think Memphis Minnie gets a credit on Levee (along with Page/Plant/Bonham). In hindsight, yeah it would have been better to give more full credit where due, but I also tend to agree with Page’s assessment that “borrowing” among blues artists was very common practice, so it probably didn’t seem like a big deal in 1970.
Nobody’s Fault but Mine and Achilles Last Stand are both absolutely top-shelf.
@Comrade DougJ — I would normally pick up the gauntlet in a Stones vs. Zeppelin debate, but this isn’t the time or the place. :)
Davis X. Machina
“The people are on our side.”
There were people in the Reichskanzlei bunker still saying that when the smart money was long since headed for the airstrip in the Tiergarten.
We’re not dealing with normal here….
Martin
@Comrade DougJ: I don’t think so. Seriously, you need to stop saying ‘GOP’ as some kind of single catch all. It’s nearly two parties now – the GOP and the tea partiers. It’s like one of those hook and ladder trucks where there’s a front and rear driver and the two are in disagreement over whether to turn left or right over the budget.
The tea partiers want to shut it down. The GOP doesn’t. And the demands of the tea partiers are getting higher and higher.
Elizabelle
@Davis X. Machina:
Skipping Sullivan at the Daily Beast for the rest of the week, and maybe for all of Lent.
He’s got a picture of Paul Ryan up headlined with “Where Obama Feared to Tread”
Um. Because Obama is — how to put this — smart?
Sullivan’s got his full repentant Republican thing going. Cannot say enough about the courage of Mitch Daniels and Paul Ryan. Fellating is not too strong a description.
Not going to give him the page clicks.
Although will miss the beagle photos.
Ash Can
@Bubblegum Tate: Shows how narrow a definition of “people” these guys have.
4tehlulz
Like W went where his father feared to tread.
I guess Sully has a new mancrush.
The Populist
@Bubblegum Tate:
That is until people don’t have that precious social security check, they can’t get in to see a doctor because medicare is not working right and businesses that rely on payment for services aren’t getting their money.
Sometimes I just think it’s time we show people what the GOP dream for them looks like. We can agree to disagree on many things and we can strive to get government out of our lives where it doesn’t belong, but taking government away so some private crony corporation can run things is stupid and never seems to work.
OzoneR
@The Populist:
And one wonders why Democrats don’t fight for the working class. They don’t show up even when they do.
jwest
Obama administration moving forward with government shutdown plans
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/federal-eye/post/obama-administration-moving-forward-with-government-shutdown-plans/2011/04/04/AFodFdfC_blog.html?hpid=z1
Obama is trying to shut the government down while the republicans work hard to keep it operating…
You can’t really argue with the news.
Narcissus
Sullivan is the epitome of the abused in an abusive relationship. It’ll be different this time, the GOP swears. The GOP is serious now. Sullivan swallows hook, line and sinker.
Turgidson
@Matt in HB:
In any event, I’ll now have to listen to II when I go home tonight.
sherifffruitfly
The main thing that makes it sketchy this time is that “true progressives” are joined with teabaggers blaming Obama for all the country’s ills.
Tougher (but still completely possible) to win the war of rhetoric with them all aligned against Obama and Democrats.
jl
I listen to drive time CBS news radio, since its local affiliate has best traffic reports.
Most of the national reporting I heard on the new GOP Medicare scam was pretty straight: “end Medicare as we know it” “elderly will have to purchase private insurance” “will provide vouchers with no guarantee will cover a given percentage of the cost of care”
The coverage of the budget stalemate was more muddled. Most of it did indicate that the GOP wants another temporary deal with new demands for more cuts, and WH saying that the GOP was essentially practicing a kind of extortion.
So, I thought that was good enough coverage, and I hope the drive time radio audience took note.
I do not watch enough TV anymore to know what goes on there.
Cliff
I fucking love that song.
The Populist
@OzoneR:
Amen. When I hear fellow progressives and students whining about the issues that effect them, I ask did they vote and they tell me they didn’t out of some perverse idea they are sending a message.
I see, let the GOP get control and pretend to have a mandate while raising tuition, firing teachers and cutting things that help the poor and middle class while rewarding the richest of the rich.
They sure did send a message. If people want to send a message TURN OUT AND VOTE REGARDLESS. Obama won because we wanted it. Sure, he’s been a disappointment in some areas but he WON when people weren’t sure it would happen.
If people want to see Egypt happen here, vote. I would love to see the Kochs’ spend billions on elections and LOSE. That would be fun to watch.
Catsy
@Martin:
The distinction is academic at this point. There are Republicans who are misguided but relatively sane, Republicans who have batshit crazy or outright evil ideologies but who operate in the real world when it comes to electoral realities, and Republicans who are just flat-out batshit crazy. They are no more separate parties than people like Barney Frank are in a separate party from Ben Nelson.
Most of the true crazies may be teabaggers, and most of the relatively sane ones may not be, but in just about every meaningful way the crazies are in control. For all intents and purposes, the tea party caucus is driving the GOP agenda.
The problem–and this is where I differ from DougJ–is that our system is designed so that nihilists like the teabaggers can get their way simply by stomping their feet and refusing to act. The default outcome of inaction is that the government shuts down–and to them, that’s a feature, not a bug.
cmorenc
@Catsy:
I too could soon be directly, personally impacted by a federal government shutdown, though fortunately not in a manner threatening my financial stability or security. Five or six weeks from now, my wife and two young-adult daughters are scheduled to take a trip of a lifetime rafting down the Grand Canyon, probably the last opportunity for years where we’ll all be feasibly situated to take any sort of extended (i.e. more than a long weekend) family trip or vacation, before careers, kids, and other obstacles intervene. I DO retain my perspective that as pissed-off as I will be if this causes us a huge missed family opportunity, the impact on us will nevertheless be two or three orders of magnitude less severe than it will be on people whose businesses or livelihoods could fall into a badly damaging hole of financial insecurity. Take the rafting company and the guides and fixed expenses they’ve already incurred for just ONE example out of many thousands of diverse examples you could come up with.
Damn right I know who’s at fault, and I sure hope a substantial majority of American voters figure this one out correctly.
OzoneR
@The Populist:
I usually get one of those “I didn’t feel like waiting in line” or “I really don’t know anything about who’s running” or “That candidate looks weird, so I didn’t vote”
If you don’t vote, you do send a message, the message you send is that politicians shouldn’t bother paying attention to you.
JGabriel
OT, but just watched this Pawlenty commercial, and was wondering: When the fuck did Pawlenty decide to go for the Damien vote?
I just don’t think “Vote For Me, I’m The Anti-Christ!” is really a winning slogan. Even subliminally.
.
The Populist
I tell my professional friends this: If they think their accounting, legal and other professional degree jobs are safe? Think again, they are next on this cost cutting, outsourcing odyssey being overseen by the GOP.
If they think they have any legal ramifications, that will be gone thanks to allowing the GOP to be stack the supreme court with pro corporate shill judges.
When they think they will get unemployment (the very thing they get mad about OTHERS getting) they will find out that it will be so limited that only the fewest of the few will be able to qualify (if at all depending on state).
So you see, a side of me says just let it go to shit NOW so we can fix it soon. Letting it go to shit any longer means it will be more difficult to fix long term.
I am just despondent over how little people care about this stuff.
Chris
@jwest:
Did you just say “the media says it, so it must be true”?
spongeworthy
So I guess the hive-mind here at BJ has decided that leaving the budget as Obama desires and making no effort to put a dent in our massive deficit is defensible. How you guys get this worked up over cuts that amount to something like a tenth of one percent of our deficit, that defeats me.
No cuts ever, forever?
And don’t worry about Dems being blamed for the shutdown. Even though Obama came out of the club locker room long enough to nix any cuts and kill a deal, you have the media to rely on once again.
The Populist
@OzoneR:
Agreed…then they ask me why the corporations have so much power and I just snicker and walk away.
Do what I do, if I don’t know the judges running for state office in California, I usually will just not pick any. It is allowed to skip areas one is unfamiliar with. Nobody requires every candidate and bill to be voted on.
Paul in KY
@Turgidson: Compared to their first 6 albums, it was pretty weak, IMO. I think they were partying too hard by then, Bonham close to dying, etc.
The Populist
@spongeworthy:
I love how you assume we are all of some magical hive mind. Ever been to a con blog dude? Sorry, everybody here has their own view of things and letting the government shut down is irresponsible.
I bet you are the kind of guy who gets worked up when deadbeats don’t pay their bills, right? Letting the USA shut down is tantamount to a deadbeat skipping out on their bills.
God, wanna debate, fine, but stay away from lame comments involving hive mind thought.
jl
@The Populist: thanks for that comment. You make an interesting point about another way the new GOP Medicare scam will not work (in addition to some of the ways Krugman mentioned in NYT his blog today).
Given the ferocious profit motive of the private insurers, and the lack of a mechanism to force cross subsidization between younger and older in the brave new world of HCR for the younger and the GOP Medicare scam for the older, there might be problems similar to those that occurred in the Great Depression that created the idea of comprehensive health care in the first place.
During the Great Depression, medical practices and hospitals were going broke because patients could not pay their bills, or were staying away because they knew that they could not pay enough to afford a visit or treatment.
So, docs thought up the idea of prepaid health insurance. The prepaid health insurance that worked on a fee for service basis became the private nonprofit Blue Cross and Blue Shields that existed up through the early 1990s.
Except for a few cases that managed to survive, the private non profits that used a managed care model were opposed by the AMA and most of them shut down.
Most of the discussion focuses on the fate of the elderly patients under the new GOP Medicare scam, which is proper because many of them will die prematurely under the miserable scheme.
But many of them will manage to receive some care, and then not pay the bills, until they are shut out. Docs may decide to not provide care to the elderly, but that will reduce their business far more than refusing to take on Medicare patients.
So, the new GOP Medciare scam will cause problems in the supply side of medical care that will affect all ages.
Martin
@Catsy:
I don’t think it is. It’s not just that there are a handful of crazies – they’ve always been there. It’s that there’s now a meaningful caucus of crazies, bolstered by holding several governorships and state legislatures, that has political motivations to fuck over traditional Republicans. This isn’t just them wanting their way – all of these moves – from the union busting to the radical privatization to the budget is a coup from within the GOP for control of the party. There’s more going on here than just some nutcases saying ‘no’.
maye
I don’t have any faith this shutdown will play out in the press the same way it did in ’94. The Republicans are so much better at spin these days. They can make people believe black is white. And conversely, the Dems and the White House can’t spin their way out of a paper bag.
The Populist
@spongeworthy:
Oh and nobody is saying no cuts forever, genius. Who is paying your salary to post such nonsense? Just curious since it seems people like you LOVE to make assumptions, so I will throw it back at you.
Dan
spongeworthy: who here said that? I haven’t seen that written anywhere on the BJ website.
I think posters and commenters are suspicious of a plan that would destroy medicare/aid as we know it under the guise of controlling costs, while at the same time conveniently cutting taxes for the wealthiest americans.
M-Pop
I’m really dreading the shutdown, not only because it’s going to screw so many of our citizens who are already running on fumes, but because the GOP is already framing this as the Dems fault; evidence M. Bachmann at the mini tea rally last week, repeating over and over how the budget negotiations are being halted because the Dems are not playing ball.
The Populist
@maye:
Then either the Dem base needs to turn out in droves to get the GOP stench out or we demand that our congress critters fight and spin like never before.
Shut down is the choice of the right. If the dems let them pin it on them, that is unfortunate.
A side of me feels a shut down, as unwanted as it can be, is the only way to wake up the sane people in this country and see what the tea baggers and extreme right have planned for them.
The Populist
@M-Pop:
Yes, but nobody I know who rides the middle thinks that woman is sane.
Amanda in the South Bay
I’m canceling my surgery later this month, cause whilst I think I’m still going to get my post 9/11 Gi Bill benefits, I think the GOP is going to pull this same horseshit later this summer/fall with next year’s budget, and the uncertainty is just eating me.
Catsy
@spongeworthy:
I sure am glad we have you to come in here and tell us what we all think. It saves everyone the trouble of reading through the thread and attempting to understand the widely differing opinions that actually exist.
Go ratfuck somewhere else. I have never seen you post a single thing here that isn’t composed of boilerplate conservative nonsense.
spongeworthy
Sorry, everybody here has their own view of things and letting the government shut down is irresponsible.
Is there anybody here who disagrees? I mean, I do if the alternative injects some fiscal reality into the debate. Anybody else?
Maybe “hive mind” is too harsh, but it does seem to me that you guys spend a lot of time reassuring yourselves that you are the good smart people. I just want to know how you reconcile being good and smart with lack of fiscal discipline. And if anybody here, even just one person besides myself, thinks maybe a shutdown would bring us to a realistic compromise.
We really are talking about very small cuts.
Chris
@Martin:
Is it actually two parties? The teabaggers have both the activist base, and the big money funding. Republican politicians either go along with what they say or will get primaried, and if 2010 showed us anything, it’s that the teabaggers are perfectly willing to lose a few elections if they get to maintain ideological purity.
What you call “the GOP” as opposed to the Tea Party Movement are a few strategists and politicians in Washington who realize it can’t just be all teabaggers all the time. But without the base, without the money and after 2010, how much power do they have?
Joe Beese
@jl:
Ian Welsh:
jl
@spongeworthy:
I try not to be rude, but you are either an ignorant dunce, or a sad excuse for a troll.
The economy is still recovering from a recession with lots of unemployment and a large amount of excess productive capacity. Short run budget deficits are needed now to increase economic activity and increase taxable income in the medium run.
The long term deficit problem is exactly Medicare and Medicaid and nothing else (assuming no more useless wars). The best shot at solving the long term deficit caused by Medicare and Medicaid is to improve the health care reform bill (like including a public option, and stronger rules that increase competition with higher quality standardized plans).
The new GOP Medicare scam (and Medicaid scam) promises to fix the long term debt problem (aka the US health care system with Medicare and Medicaid) by eliminating the benefits and increasing the rate of suffering and premature death among the poor, disabled and the elderly.
So, I reject your ‘hive mind’ insult.
I suggest you go read Krugman’s blog, and a good health economist, for example Uwe Reinhardt at Princeton, and inform yourself.
The Populist
@jl:
Yes, my thoughts exactly. When business realizes that even they get screwed they come out against their conservative instincts.
Look at the debate about the CFTC. Notice how the GOP aren’t crowing about the hearings? A trucker rep (former GOP GOVERNOR), a guy who reps gas station owners and some other fella who reps another group of businesses (farmers?) all stated that de-funding the CFTC will destroy this country.
Yep, I think small business may start looking askew at the party they once supported as being to cozy with mega corps.
spongeworthy
@Dan: We’re not talking about Ryan’s dream. This is the shutdown thread, right?
The House sent a bill up that barely scratches our incredible deficit and you guys are acting like they are evil for doing so. You’re assuming Obama and the Senate Dems are doing god’s work here holding the line, it seems.
Is that really the case? Do you guys actually feel like the cuts are so drastic that a shutdown must be blamed on the irrationality of House Republicans?
Martin
@spongeworthy:
I think if you actually bothered to read this blog comments you’d see that we’ve advocated with fairly strong agreement quite a significant amount of cuts. But I think you’ll also find that we don’t confuse short-term budget gains (like eliminating Medicare/Medicaid) with long-term economic gains. ACA is a deficit reduction plan. There was quite a lot of support for the deficit reduction aspects of ACA here. The opposition was to the mandate that would cost taxpayers fractionally more because some money would be going to for-profits – money which buys nothing and which could instead be used for deficit reduction.
But if you want to talk about eliminating or reducing corporate subsidies and tax credits, defense spending and the like, I’m sure you’ll find quite a lot of support here.
The Populist
@spongeworthy:
Nobody is doing that dude. Seriously, do you read what is said here or are you one of these partisans who THINKS you know what we are saying here.
Ever hang out at Freerep or any number of hard right blogs? Do you point out the scary hive mind thinking going on over there as well?
Sorry, any blog or board will have it’s share of like minded folks but NOBODY HERE seems to fully agree 100% on the majority of issues. We all have our views and they differ slightly. Maybe you should read deeper into what many say here and realize that calling us names isn’t gonna get us to debate the issues with you.
Wanna debate, start asking me questions, for example, and we can go from there. To sit here and act like we all think we’re superior is ridiculous. We believe in our point of view like anybody with an opinion, so how is that wrong?
spongeworthy
@Catsy: Really? Do you know what “boilerplate” means?
You go find me saying one thing here that I took from “boilerplate” and I’ll go away and never come back. Deal? Jeez, I’m not good enough at writing to be mistaken for anybody’s boilerplate!
But if you can’t, you retract and apologize, okay?
Culture of Truth
I just want to know how you reconcile being good and smart with lack of fiscal discipline.
Well, when you rephrase it so nicely….
The Populist
@spongeworthy:
Uhhh, until the party in power (the GOP) start to discuss serious things like, subsidies for oil companies, the pentagon budget and other SERIOUS expenses, you are kidding when you say the Dems haven’t trimmed much right?
The GOP control the house dude, or did you miss that memo?
The right won’t cut farm, oil or any other subsidy that is a bigger cut of GDP than any welfare program nor will they touchg the pentagon. Are you one of those folks who believe these things should be left alone?
Eric Cantor was on a show the other day when somebody brought up the oil subsidies. He wouldn’t even discuss it and his comment was “People are overtaxed, it’s not a revenue problem blah blah blah”.
Subsidies are not a tax. Until people like you admit this is something that needs to be taken away, we can’t have a fair debate.
The Populist
@spongeworthy:
Sponge, until you apologize for calling us hive thinkers, that poster doesn’t owe you anything, okay?
singfoom
@spongeworthy: I won’t call what you said boilerplate, but I’ll call it obtuse and full of shit. No one here has said no cuts, ever. You wrote those words, not us.
If that’s the message you take from reading this thread, well, there are remedial classes available in reading comprehension at your local community college.
People here have a lot of diverse opinions and aren’t a hive mind asshole, so how about you retract and apologize, okay?
Rock
Doug,
The Democrats and Obama will be blamed for the shutdown. They will be described in the media as being unwilling to compromise and unwilling to cut wasteful spending and produce a responsible budget. The stage is already set, because the White House today was offered another extension measure replete with anti-abortion measures and the demand for another$12B in cuts. Naturally, Obama could not accept but it sets the story as the White House being the ones who refused a compromise measure and insisted on the shutdown. There is no victory to be had here. The game is rigged and progressive positions cannot win in the media.
maye
@The Populist: Just the fact that the Dems have let the story be “cut the deficit!” in the middle of a recession shows how inept they are at framing anything.
The Populist
Oh and spongeworthy, show us where anybody here said no cuts forever LIKE YOU CLAIMED. Until YOU do, I expect an apology on that bunch of shit as well. Thanks.
Wanna debate? Do it with honesty please.
jl
@spongeworthy:
Give it up, you are making a fool of yourself.
Seriously, you are making yourself look ridiculous, as in like an ass.
Everyone here agrees with Obama? Always rallies around the Democrat leadership? Really? What nonsense.
spongeworthy
Populist: The RW sites I visit are Ace of Spades (very funny) and that’s about it. Ace has many dissenters on just about everything but they’re pretty much convinced we gotta cut sending pretty drastically. I agree, thus the hive-mind.
I think it is odd that nobody here thinks we’re in bad shape financially and maybe should work with the GOP on some meaningful cuts. A reality check would be, I think, more helpful than reassuring each other that those who believe we’re in trouble are the bad people (teabaggers) and those who whistle past the graveyard do so out of a spirit of generosity.
The Populist
@maye:
Hey you get no argument from me but the fact nobody showed up to vote and allowed the very party that put us in this mess to come in from the cold tells me the dems have no choice but to play that card.
Like a poster above said, if we can’t even show up to keep the GOP away from the reigns of power in a midterm, how can we be upset when they cower and run to the center-right?
Martin
@Chris: It is two caucuses. I think the legacy Republicans (for lack of a better word) know that the tea party is fucking things up. They might agree with them from an ideological standpoint, but I think they know that politically this is suicide. The GOPs core base is the SS set, and they’re proposing to eliminate Medicare. And that’s after the disaster of Bush trying to eliminate SS. This is never going to play with independents or underrepresented populations, and the old guard of the GOP knows this. But personally, they’re trapped. 27% is enough to win a primary and enough to get slaughtered in a general. They’re fucked if they go with the tea party and fucked if they don’t.
But they’re definitely two caucuses.
Chris
@The Populist:
I have to say, I have yet to find a blog that’s less hive-mind-like than BJ. Just the Obot vs Firebagger wars I’ve seen on here can be freaking Battle-of-Endor-ish in scale.
You want a hive mind, try Pajamas Media. A week or two ago one of the authors there wrote something critical of Sarah Palin (to the effect of she’s a RINO): one day and one digital-lynch-mob later, he actually put up an article apologizing for hurting the audience’s precious fee-fees.
Comrade DougJ
@spongeworthy:
I have no doubt that I am right about almost everything. I don’t pretend otherwise.
Laertes
I don’t need to be lectured on “fiscal sanity” by people who absolutely refuse to consider raising taxes. GOP “solutions” to our fiscal problems are naked class warfare.
We don’t need to soak the poor to solve our problems. Slash defense, soak the rich, and we’re fine.
I’m sick of all these job-killing giveaways to the rich and job-killing cuts to the poor. It’s time to get serious about fixing our fiscal problems, and that begins with restoring sensible tax rates, and shifting the burden off of people who can’t bear it and onto those who can.
singfoom
@spongeworthy: If you had taken the remedial reading comprehension class I recommended, you might have noticed on the threads here about budgets that there is a large but amorphous consensus that we have to cut costs over the long term.
And one of the key points people will make here every time is that it can’t be just discretionary things, but mandatory spending cuts.
Let’s start with the military budget and corporate subsidies and farm subsidies. That would save us a lot of money.
Oh, but it’s the Democrats that aren’t being serious and blocking the budget. Go to class.
trollhattan
@spongeworthy:
Anybody who’s [ahem] paid any attention to actual events versus talking points knows the compromises have all come from but one side of the aisle. There’s no magic to be had here, Grasshopper.
Joe Beese
@maye:
“Just the fact that the Dems have let the story be “cut the deficit!” in the middle of a recession shows how
inept they are at framing anythingeager they are to cut social spending.”FTFY
The Populist
@spongeworthy:
Did I not say we were in bad shape?
I could easily point out to you that Bush was handed a surplus and he chose to blow it on a war in Iraq which cost us TRILLIONS. He then deregulated everything in sight and banks took advantage (as they always do when the fox guards the henhouse).
We are in a mess budgetwise, we are in a mess economy wise and the two are quite mutual. Revenue is down because jobs are being shipped overseas. We reward profitable companies with multi billion dollar subsidies while ignoring people who need help and small businesses that need capital that banks won’t give anymore.
Wanna talk about the budget, it starts with the wars, the pentagon and these subsidies. NPR is small potatoes as is most food stamp, education and programs for poor folks.
People pay into Social Security and it’s solvent, just that we let the congress dip into it to pay for wars and other nonsense. So I do not believe that needs to be killed.
I do not believe medicare needs to go either.
Wanna have an honest debate? Let’s start with the issues I submit to you.
How about starting with why Michelle Bachmann is so gung ho about taking away MY social security yet her family farm subsidies are off limits?
Why is it Darrell Issa is telling me Obama is corrupt yet he takes earmarks to expand roads near the HOOTERS he owns in his own district?
I can keep going if you like. Honest debate my friend is important to me.
harokin
@spongeworthy: The House bill is not an attempt to “scratch the deficit.” It is an attempt to gut EPA, CFTC, SEC, ACA, Planned Parenthood and other targets.
A L
Spongeworthy are you one of those Paul Ryan creeps
Martin
@spongeworthy: Well, in the last century we’ve NEVER come close to balancing a budget with less than 20% tax receipts. We’re at 14% right now. National debt interest alone is 20% higher than corporate taxes bring in. Defense spending is 250% higher than corporate taxes.
If you have a solution to cutting the national debt interest and defense spending, we’re all ears.
Chad N Freude
@jwest: Did you actually read the first two paragraphs of the article you linked to?
It’s called contingency planning.
The Populist
@harokin:
Amen, in California the only way the GOP will TALK about budget compromise is to ask that Brown gut environmental laws.
I don’t know about most Americans, but I like clean air and water and do NOT want to look at those ugly ass oil platforms off my shore.
Sorry, if the right want concessions my health is not for sale.
jwest
I blame this entire budget controversy on Obama’s privileged upbringing.
Had Barack been more a person of the “street”, he would be aware that republicans are playing out a prison rape sequence with him. As the new fish, he needed to be slapped around prior to being bent over. In time, he’ll learn to avoid the pain and embarrassment of the beating and just bare his ass whenever the right raises their hand.
Republicans aren’t doing this for pleasure, they just need to show who the bitch is in this relationship.
Redshift
We had a surplus. Then we had record-size tax cuts of which the vast majority went to the wealthy, and which completely failed to produce the economic growth which was their alleged purpose (weakest recovery from a recession since statistics have been kept), a prescription-drug benefit which was completely unfunded and whose true costs were deliberately concealed, two wars which were accompanied by no taxes to cover their costs for the first time in our history, and an economic crash. Presto, we had record deficits which are magically the incoming president’s fault!
If you actually want a “reality check”, admit that there hasn’t been an explosion of spending since Obama took office, and that’s not the cause of the deficits. People opposing all tax increases and proposing that the only way to solve the “deficit problem” is with drastic cuts only in “non-defense non-discretionary spending” that aren’t remotely the cause of the deficits in the first place aren’t dealing with “reality”, they’re using an economic crisis precipitated by their own disastrous economic policies to try to gut the programs they already wanted to gut before any of that happened.
The Populist
@Martin:
What we also won’t discuss honestly is that the middle class and small business now bears the burden in taxes.
Wrong, wrong, wrong.
I am both middle class (came from working class folks) and I own a couple small businesses. I pay more than my fair share and I do it with honor. I wish the rich and powerful had some honor and would demand the government tax them for their fair share since they use the majority of our roads, courts and other PUBLICLY funded functions.
The Populist
I noticed Spongeworthy went away without discussing any of the un-hive like facts we’ve presented. Hmmmm.
OzoneR
@Joe Beese:
I kinda liked the Republican plan in the 90s as a start.
Redshift
@spongeworthy:
I see. You do understand that telling us the right-wing site you frequent is a hive-mind where everyone agrees doesn’t do anything to support to your accusation that we are one here, right?
Judas Escargot
@spongeworthy:
We really are talking about very small cuts.
Small to you, maybe. But I’m sure those who will suffer will be glad to know your thirst for ‘fiscal discipline’ will be quenched, at least until you see the next undeserving recipient who needs to be cut off.
There was a way to cut the yearly deficit almost in half, without even having to hold a vote: Let the Bush tax cuts expire.
Ryan and his ilk opposed that. Which means they should not get to even utter the words ‘fiscal discipline’ ever again, much less presume to lecture anyone else on the topic.
Redshift
@jwest: Take your fantasies back to the Hustler letters page, you sick fuck.
Culture of Truth
@The Populist: I noticed Spongeworthy went away without discussing any of the un-hive like facts we’ve presented.
The jerk store must have called
Chris
@Martin:
Only if the Democrats prove them right instead of rolling over and playing dead.
I’ve read in several history books that the German high command in the 1930s thought Hitler was a freaking maniac who was going to get them all killed, and that some of them were prepared to depose him or at least publicly refuse to follow his orders if he provoked a war with France and Britain before Germany was ready. But then the unbelievable happened, Chamberlain and Blum caved at Munich, and the high command, stunned, had to admit that Hitler’s political instincts had been right.
Not that the political conflict right now is quite the same situation, but…
Chris
@spongeworthy:
Oh. Also,
And we really were talking about very small tax increases last fall, but the Goopers threw a tantrum and swore that nothing would get done until we guaranteed to the rich that they wouldn’t have to tighten their belts even one notch.
The Dems have offered to cut spending: the Repubs have refused to raise taxes even one cent, at a time when they’re at their lowest point in eighty or so years. You tell me which party’s for fiscal irresponsibility.
jwest
Redshift,
Writing political commentary is like painting word pictures. Sometimes you sooth with mauves and pastels, but other times you need vivid, primary colors.
I’m certain that given the opportunity, you would do an interpretive dance that would demonstrate how the image of Obama being raped in prison makes you sad. However, I can assure you that each time the budget is mentioned and republicans appear to be winning, that word picture will play through your mind.
My work is done here… at least on this thread.
jinxtigr
Just because most Americans now feel like “Oh shit, we are in very bad financial trouble and owe more than we can pay and have to cut back on our spending savagely” does not mean you can say, “therefore the government and the rich are in desperate financial trouble, and we need to cut back on taxing the rich and have the government spend nothing”.
It’s easy to trick people by getting them to compare their experience with grossly, unrecognizably dissimilar experiences.
Look past the trick and it’s extremely obvious that the very rich and the corporations have cashed in like bandits and are anything but hurtin’. A lot of the very rich have become complete assholes- as for the corporations, unless the rules by which they think are set in place, they are compelled to be sociopaths by fiduciary duty.
The ONLY moral check on corporate monstrosity is simple, boring, ordinary regulation and the rule of law. When you throw away all the rules, the only thing that can happen is corporate rape and pillage. They MUST take advantage to the extent allowed, they are legal entities with responsibilities.
To think “gee, corporations must be hurtin’ because every human I know is in money trouble” is a really bad mistake… and to think, “government must tighten its belt a lot, just like us!” is another.
Ash Can
Does anyone have any idea WTF jwest is talking about?
Joe Beese
@Redshift:
Now it’s time to re-elect the person who made those tax cuts effectively permanent, cut a backroom sweetheart deal with Big Pharm, escalated one of those two wars before starting a third, and who will never prosecute the banksters who caused that crash because he’s too busy playing golf with them and installing them in his cabinet.
singfoom
@Joe Beese: Hey Joe, on the off change that you’re sentient, I’ve got a question.
Who would you rather elect? That has a chance of being elected? Would one of the Republican contenders suit you better?
I get your gripes, but what’s the point? Aren’t you just banging your head against reality here?
Svensker
@jwest:
Ha ha hah hahhahha. You really are silly.
Chris
@jinxtigr:
That, and actually enforcing said regulation and rule of law. A ton of the union-busting of the last thirty years has happened simply because the laws weren’t being enforced.
Midnight Marauder
@Martin:
And those “traditional Republicans,” like Dick Lugar and Scott Brown, are more than willing to vote lockstep with the demands of the Crazies. Until that changes in a substantial manner, we are talking about a distinction without a difference.
Midnight Marauder
@spongeworthy:
Fact: The elimination of Medicare is not a cut.
Svensker
@jwest:
OK, now I know you’re DougJ. Not even the most obtuse winger is THAT obtuse.
NonyNony
I’ve come to the conclusion that Joe Beese is a paid Republican ratfucker.
Because the alternative is that he’s a sad, sad individual. And I’m going to give him a bit more credit and figure he’s less pathetic than he looks and he’s actually being paid to look this sad.
Midnight Marauder
@jwest:
Why don’t you take it down a notch with the latent racism, champ?
I think your standard issue ignorant, untethered-from-reality trolling will do just fine.
Julie Raffety
They will still deposit my social security in my bank, right?
Joe Beese
@singfoom:
As surely as the sun rises in the east, there comes a moment in these political arguments when the President’s sorely tired defenders find themselves unable to keep their gloves up a moment longer and they are reduced to some version of “So what’s your plan?”
Now that we have reached that moment, I will tell you what I have told all the others: It’s not my job to manufacture illusory hope for you. America will continue its evolution into a nakedly fascist banana republic and what you can do about it is precisely dick.
But in the meantime, you can at least stop supporting one of the competing skulks of jackals ripping the flesh from your bones in the deluded belief that they’re a “lesser evil” than the other jackals.
singfoom
@Joe Beese: So, you’ve got nothing? Ok then. I didn’t ask you to manufacture shit for me, I asked you to tell me who you’d rather attempt to elect. I need none of your “illusory hope”.
Since you can’t answer the question, it means one of two things to me. Either you’re like spongeworthy and need to go to a remedial reading comprehension class, or you had no intention of actually answering the question and you’re not commenting in good faith.
I know exactly where the Devils are. Reasonable people can disagree on which devils are worse, but that’s not what I asked you. Good day, sir.
spongeworthy
I hope you people know that all of the cuts you are willing to make, defense, corporate welfare, wouldn’t even put a dent in our deficit. Unless you mean Defense = 0, which is foolhardy. Even then, you have a ways to go.
Same with tax increases. The only one you’ll consider is the top bracket, and there isn’t nearly enough there to get us out of this hole.
I would hope that, if the GOP is offered a deal for massive cuts, including entitlement reform, in exchange for tax increases, they’ll jump all over that. Which is why you won’t see that offer from the Democrats.
mofo
Zeppelin’s stolen more from Black folk than Ryan has (to date, that is).
Just Sayin’
Jack
@spongeworthy
But you said upthread that the cuts the democrats refused to touch were also very small and not a massive amount of the deficit. So why should the democrats agree with the small cuts that hurt poor people instead of the cuts that will ‘hurt’ rich people and defense contractors?
singfoom
@spongeworthy: I’m sorry, I think the Democrats are looking for honest deals, just like I’m looking for honest commentary.
The Republicans would never consider any of the cuts you mentioned. They wouldn’t even talk about it.
I would say, cut defense, eliminate all corporate subsidies, eliminate all corporate tax loopholes (GE, anybody), raise the tax rates on the richest tax bracket at least.
Raise the social security tax to deal with incomes up to $250K, repeal all the Bush taxcuts.
Stop giving any aid to Israel.
There’s a lot of things we could do. The House Republicans are concentrated on discretionary spending, which is the smallest part of the budget.
Balancing the budget on the backs of the middle class is a way to break the middle class, not save the economy. It will further doom us. Plenty more things we can talk about doing….
spongeworthy
Jack, you should ask Reid and Schumer that question. After all, why don’t they just present a proposal cutting $67 billion from corporate welfare and defense and then blame the GOP when they refuse to go along? Reid would have the high ground then, as 67 is more than the 66 the GOP is trying to cut.
Why don’t they do this? Who is really trying to shut down the governemnt after all?
Midnight Marauder
@spongeworthy:
Was that a serious question?
spongeworthy
In what way is anybody proposing to balance the budget on the backs of the middle class, singfoom?
Keep in mind that President Obama put forth a budget proposal with actual spending increases. Is that somebody looking for an honest deal? Why didn’t he propose a tax increase?
You guys are being played.
Bill Arnold
@Rock:
OK, but the shouted mantra of the Tea Party is “Cut It Or Shut It”. And Democrats (and many Republicans) are appalled by the idea of a shutdown of the government of the last remaining superpower on Earth.
Joe Beese
@singfoom:
Enjoy having your vote for them rewarded with a pitchfork up your ass.
singfoom
@Joe Beese: Is that an internet tough guy threat? You go, internet tough guy.
You still don’t have an alternative.
I’m sur bitching and voting for no one will work out really well for you. Good talk, champ.
Davis X. Machina
@OzoneR: Your intuition seems correct.
Candidate choice, or similar, doesn’t make the top three reasons non-voters give the Census Bureau, who asks them every two years why they don’t vote.
The Populist
@spongeworthy:
Actually the fact is the middle class bears all the tax brunt. Fact is the budget the right proposes spares rich corporations and fucks over the middle class even more.
Sorry bud, your lack of evidence backing your point of view proves you are astroturfing or you are very obtuse to the reality.
Try to put the partisanship AWAY. I laid out some examples I have yet to see you answer.
How about why we give subsidies to Exxon Mobil? Why, answer it or it should be axed.
How about money we give in earmarks to southern states? They are the KINGS of pork and earmarks. Prove me wrong there.
Thanks.
The Populist
@spongeworthy:
Link or please stop with the obfucation.
The subsidies and defense, the wars and other giveaways to big corporations total in the trillions. It’s been proven yet you sit here expecting me to believe that food stamps and NPR are breaking the budget?
The Populist
Hey everybody, Spongeworthy must be one of those people paid to create obfuscation on boards such as ours. He has yet to answer my questions about his beloved GOP and he parrots Koch Bros talking points about Defense and subsidies being so little it’s not going to make a difference.
Facts:
Cut defense
Cut Farm Subsidies
Cut corporate subsidies
Retreat from Iraq and Afghanistan
Remove the mortgage deduction on homes (sorry)
Remove the Bush tax cuts on millionaires and billionaires
Remove the ability of AMERICAN companies to move offshore for tax purposes and avoid paying taxes. If they want to pay less in taxes, they can hire more Americans and move some manufacturing and logistics back to the US.
Everybody suffers here. I am open to even cutting some waste out of welfare programs as has been suggested but not scrapping anything that helps American poor and middle class since those are a drop in the budget bucket.
Fellas like Spongeworthy need to understand that domestic welfare programs are minimal overall to the budget. Medicare and Soc Security should be untouchable with a commission to find waste and savings to make those programs better.
One conservative think tank mentioned that we should have a national health care program for all to help out business and help the blow that outsourcing has added to the economy. If I find the name of that group, I will provide it.
pattonbt
@spongeworthy: If you wanted to deal with the reality of this community, then do a quick search for the thread where the NY Times deficit reduction/budget balancing tool was discussed (among about a hundred other threads where budgets have been discussed). Everyone came up with different mixes of spending cuts and tax increases without destroying the fabric of the social safety net and were magically able to easily balance the budget AND reduce the deficit. And I stress the word EASILY.
I know there is no use actually trying to have an intelligent discussion with you because that is not why you are here. Or if you are here for that, my guess would be that you simply belong to the “I got mine fuck you” and “the best brown ‘other’ people are dead brown ‘other’ people from our bombs” contingent of society. And then, yes, what you view as “serious” will get little play here.
So until tax increases and military/subsidy cuts are on the board you and the other people who think Ryan’s plan is “serious” can pound sand on the subject. I’ll share the pain if the pain is spread fairly.
pattonbt
@spongeworthy: Wrong. See my post just above this one. With defence cuts and tax increases you can almost entirely solve the problem. Obviously cogent thought is not your forte.
Numbers! How do they work?
Stillwater
@spongeworthy: Why didn’t he propose a tax increase?
Uhhhh. Din’t he. Sunsetting the tax cuts for the wealthy?