Poor helpless Steve King, who can’t vote for less spending, says Mitt needs to make him vote for a Constitutional Amendment to make him vote for less spending:
“I think what it’s going to take is our presidential nominee must call for a mandate to demand that congress pass a constitutional amendment for a balanced budget, out of the House and Senate, to the states for ratification,” Rep. Steve King (R-IA) told TPM in the Capitol on Tuesday. “The rest of this isn’t going to get the job done.”
I have different suggestion: Gandalf the White, Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore and Katniss Everdeen need to apparate on the Capitol steps and cook up a special potion that all Republican members of the House and Senate will drink to get them to vote for less spending. It’s just as likely to happen as King’s proposal, and it would be more entertaining.
Suffern ACE
Confress won’t call it a budget if there’s a balanced budget amendement and business will proceed as normal.
General Stuck
Steve King is quite obviously insane, very much so, sir. His rubber duckies are not in a row.
Zandar
And Trogdor, and Buckaroo Banzai, and Mary Magdalene.
Hawes
Um, dude…
About Dumbledore?
I have some bad news…
Derelict
Amazing how the party of personal responsibility manages to completely avoid responsibility for anything.
Linda Featheringill
The Righties have recently displayed symptoms of running into that quaint legislative custom called “the number of vote you actually have to support your suggestion.”
A couple of days ago there was moaning that they didn’t have enough votes to impeach Obama and now they don’t have enough support to pass a constitutional amendment. Hmmmm.
jrg
Party of personal responsibility!
Edit: dammit, Derelict
cmorenc
What would truly cure excessive deficit spending by members of BOTH parties, from the most rabid teahadist on the right to the most liberal member on the left would be:
– a zero-base tax system whereby EVERY appropriation for whatever reason automatically caused a corresponding incremental increase in the tax rates. That way, a congresscritter winning an 80 million dollar pork-barrel project for his or her district would automatically be voting for an incremental (fractional) increase in income taxes, albeit for everyone in the U.S., not just his district. But nevertheless, congresscritters would no longer be able to de-couple the “benefits” of a given military appropriation or road project from its very specific tax consequences (and potential ammunition for an opponent come next election cycle).
Deficit spending could still be achieved, but it would have to be by general vote that ALL income tax rates get discounted e.g. 10% from expenditures for the given fiscal year; in other words, congresscritters would not, under this idea, be able to exempt any specific projects from causing automatic corresponding tax increase consequences.
This concept would clean up Congress’s act quite rapidly across the board.
kdaug
@Zandar:
You made me do it.
dmsilev
Steve King, perennial contender for “least sane member of Congress”. Which is saying something, considering how fierce the competition is these days.
redshirt
Deficitus, I COMMAND THEE!
Gin & Tonic
Apparate?
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
You know, King, we could just pay for the stuff we think we have to have.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
@Derelict:
Cliche tho it’s become but
IOKIYAR
My Repup neighbors across the street are poster children for that. Hypocritical bastards who’s double standards are legendary in the neighborhood. Hanging’s too good for em! Burning’s too good for em! They ought to be born into little, bitty pieces and buried alive!
Splitting Image
You forgot Getafix. He was a frequent winner of the druids’ potionmaking contest.
kdaug
King == Incitatus.
All about the nom-noms and shitting on the floor.
jon
How about those same Republicans just pass one of those so-called “balanced budgets”? No, how about they just vote on one?
If they are too afraid to do it, why make it a rule? It’s like a fat man saying he can’t diet unless he first sees a notary public to put a stamp on his grocery list. Want to make a balanced budget official? Fucking pass one, you cowards!
daveNYC
@Zandar: Trogdor makes everything better.
Face
Western Iowans at some point ought to be embarrassed by this POS.
danielx
Please, Master Mitt, I keep voting for these things! Help me resist temptation! I must be disciplined!
Perhaps we now know the secret as to exactly who Karl Rove’s leather slave is…
RalfW
Steve King is a poster boy for how morons can ruin a perfectly decent democracy.
Well, not that decent, but he is a spineless twit. We had PAYGO for 10 years and went from a moderate annual deficit to a very nice surplus.
What did the GOP do? They failed to renew PAYGO and they gave away the surplus to a combination of rich tax cheats and to defense contractors, two very key Republican constituencies.
So, now that his pals in the punditocracy are crying their oh noes about the deficit, he has to have his mommy set a house rule that he just can’t break. It’s pathetic.
Actual adults can and have run the Congress in a way that gets to a surplus. It does not require mucking about in the Constitution. It just requires Democratic majorities to actually create policy and take hard votes.
Villago Delenda Est
I have a better idea for the wizards.
Go into Severus Snape’s dark potions recipe book, and whip up some fabulous fizzy drink that will rid us of dipshits like Steve King permanently.
James Gary
Hanging’s too good for em! Burning’s too good for em! They ought to be torn into little, bitty pieces and buried alive!
OT: I saw Heavy Metal in a theater back in 1981 and completely forgot about it until about a year ago I realized what a huge influence that film had been on my 14-year-old self. What’s weird is that in the last few weeks I’ve been noticing references and allusions to the movie everywhere.
RalfW
@Face:
He’s been elected and re-elected since 2002. So I’d say a majority of western Iowans are as benighted and spittle-flecked as he is.
Or at least a majority of the western Iowans who are willing to fire up their 1996 Ford Crown Victorias and wander the gravel roads to a polling place.
Nylund
I think that as much as the GOP would love to take a hatchet to the safety net to stop the young bucks from getting their t-bones and deny the welfare queens their Cadillacs, some GOP Congress Critters are actually smart enough to know that those aren’t real problems except in the minds of Fox viewers. They might even know that taking a hatchet to aggregate demand during a recession will actually make things worse, not better.
What they’d love is a way to give their base and their corporate sponsors some red meat by slashing the safety net and gov’t regulations, but have an excuse as to why they shouldn’t be blamed for the consequences by the rest of America (ie, “The Constitution made us do it!)
Schlemizel
@cmorenc:
While I don’t for a minute believe it would actually work I like the way your proposal sounds. Need to think about it some more to find the pitfalls (besides the obvious, during economic down turns some deficit spending is needed).
BTW – I’d add Goodgulf Grayteeth to your list, his tie that lights up with an obscene image of an elf with the enchanted letters appearing “Would thee kiss me in the dark?” would complete the magic needed for this spell to work.
Villago Delenda Est
@Gin & Tonic:
Ah, we have a Potter noob amongst us.
Apparation, in the Potterverse, is the act of simply willing yourself to teleport from one place to another.
peach flavored shampoo
Steve King should be basking in the glory that was “Misery” and “Cujo”, and instead is making an ass of himself in politics.
rlrr
@Gin & Tonic:
I’m guessing you’re a muggle…
Roger Moore
@Villago Delenda Est:
Why don’t we just drip a few drops of Veritaserum into each candidate’s water glass at the next debate? It would be very amusing to see Romney telling the truth for a change.
Satanicpanic
@jon: Because if they ever got around to doing that, they wouldn’t be able to blame their inability to do it on Democrats anymore.
Chris
@Gin & Tonic:
In my day, you couldn’t apparate or disapparate inside the Capitol walls. I guess austerity measures did away with those spells too.
Culture of Truth
Corporations Are Not People, My Friends
April 18 — The Supreme Court limited the reach of a law that protects American citizens from torture in other countries, ruling that victims can sue only individuals, not governments or corporations.
Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor
If we’d had a Balanced Budget Amendment in 1941, we would be speaking German, Japanese, or Russian right now. (Sure, sounds like hyperbole. Also happens to be true).
Business runs on debt. Government runs on debt. Virtually any capital improvement worth making, public or private, requires debt. It all runs on debt, you GOP morons.
But I suppose if your explicit goal is to destroy what we currently have in the hopes of rebooting into something you prefer, then this would be a feature and not a bug.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
@James Gary:
Somebody got the reference!
Watched the movie a gazillion times and had a bootleg VHS copy of it since the music rights delayed release for a gazillion years.
And yes, me and my friends use a crapload of lines from it in our everyday conversational shorthand.
And that line still applies to my neighbors and most Republicans.
And there’s tons of Iowans who are damn proud of Steve King. Remember, Appalachia Is A State Of Mind and it’s not bound by the original geography of Appalachia. Or as Les Nessman would say “Appalacheeeeee-ah”
rlrr
@Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor:
Also, Republicans are always harping about how families have to balance their budgets. How many families have no debt?
SenyorDave
@RalfW: Great point. PAYGO was rare good idea in Congress. The Democrats should have made a huge deal about the Republicans not renewing.
piratedan
@Linda Featheringill: if only we could arrest people for voting while being a Democrat……..
Forum Transmitted Disease
@Satanicpanic: Sure they would. Ask any of them which president added the most debt ever. They will forget about the years 2000-2008 with a dexterity that will amaze and confound you.
The answer they give will be “Obama”.
rlrr
@Linda Featheringill:
“I believe the Republicans have never thought that democracy was anything but a tribal myth.”
— Hunter S. Thompson
kdaug
@James Gary: Exact same age.
I dyed my hair silver after seeing it. (Parents were not amused).
Other one was Terminator 2. I was those kids, riding my scooter to the arcade.
No T-1000, but man I identified with it.
piratedan
@kdaug: it was worth doing imho……
EIGRP
Gandalf on a balanced budget amendment: “YOU. SHALL NOT. PASS!”
The Tragically Flip
It’s an interesting data point in the debate over the level of soft power that Presidents hold outside their explicit Constitutional powers. After all, the President’s approval is not required to amend the Constitution. Congress and the States do that all by themselves.
I’m a little surprised the Republicans haven’t already brought up a BBA for a vote in the House. It’s one of their classic “bad ideas that poll well and make Democrats look bad to vote against.” 49 states already have some version of this stuipid thing, the talking points write themselves.
I can only think that they don’t want a BBA, not really. The Bush tax cuts could never have passed under a BBA.
Linda Featheringill
@rlrr: #29
To Gin & Tonic
You beat me to it!
Chris
@rlrr:
Hence the oft-repeated “it’s a REPUBLIC not a DEMOCRACY” line. It’s not just fifth-grade grammar Nazism/look-how-smart-I-am-I-know-what-these-big-words-mean syndrome, although there’s a ton of that too. They also really don’t believe in government of the people, by the people and for the people, and it’s their dog-whistle way of saying it.
Satanicpanic
@Forum Transmitted Disease: You are correct. I forget that we are in the post-truth era.
Face
Because of course those torturers are giving their victims their full names, spelling and all. And cuz lawsuits between 2 individuals in different countries with diff laws are so effective.
Isn’t this pretty much SC-sponsored de facto immunity for all torture, past and future? (havent read the ruling, so maybe not)
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
What would happen anyway is that during Republican presidencies, every spending measure would be declared an emergency to avoid the amendment, and then during Democratic presidencies, Republicans would bemoan how the constitution had been violated during the Democratic term.
Veritas
So now even the NY Times poll admits this race is TOO CLOSE TO CALL with Obambi in a very weak position and Republicans consolidating! And how does it make you feel that Romney is going to give a prebuttal in Charlotte, right before Obambi’s big speech? Brilliant fucking move.
Legalize
Pfff. Gandalf can’t apparate. Stupid libs.
Veritas
What’s more, none other than Bob McDonnell is raising his visibility with Super PAC ads for the veepstakes. With McDonnell on the ticket, Virginia would be in the bag along with its senate seat (giving the seat back to George Allen, someone who drives liberals absolutely batshit!)
Davis X. Machina
If you read one econ-blog post today, make it interfluidity.
What distinguished the polity from the country he gets into a bit later…
Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor
@rlrr:
Or businesses. There is no such thing as a ‘small business’ without a credit line, even if it’s just a corporate Amex card.
A big factor in the private sector collapse of 2008 was the banks cancelling or reducing small business’ credit lines (or calling loans).
Forum Transmitted Disease
@Veritas: MY ASS ITCHES. Be a dear and scratch it for me, K?
Shari
@Culture of Truth:
Do you have a cite for the ruling? SCOTUSblog doesn’t have it.
Gin & Tonic
@Villago Delenda Est: Thanks. Never read a single one. Don’t want to, either.
Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor
@Veritas:
Why do our “feelings” concern you so much?
Nice tell, troll.
Amir Khalid
@Veritas:
Gimme an O!
“O!”
Gimme a U!
“U!”
Gi1″mme a T!
“T!”
Gimme an L!
“L!”
Gimme an I!
“I!”
Gimme an E!
“E!”
Gimme an R!
“R!”
What does it spell?
“VICTORY!”
Satanicpanic
@Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor: Is predisposed to laughter a feeling?
Roger Moore
Also, too, the bullshit deficit is getting bigger all the time.
Culture of Truth
@Shari: It’s on Scotusblog now.
Legalize
@Veritas:
Congratulations, dip shit. The race, according to one poll, is too close to call in April right after Willard’s nomination-lock bounce. And yeah, “prebutting” Obama always works out well for GOPers.
Zifnab
@Amir Khalid: Republicans did this song and dance in the run up to ’08. Plenty of GOoPers were totally convinced McCain was going to win it. So convinced, in fact, that they mostly stayed home on election day. That’s how Obama trounced McCain in bright red North Carolina and Virginia. Conservatives got lulled into a false sense of security and just stayed home.
Meanwhile, come 2010, they got scared and actually turned out to campaign and vote.
I’m all for Veritas and his winger ilk embracing the ’08 mentality again.
RalfW
@Davis X. Machina:
Yep.
And I believe it’s why Bush & Co. so desperately wanted to privatize Social Security. Not for freedumb, but because the boomers are retiring and some suckers gotta be found ASAP to buy up all the shares and corporate bonds that the retirees need to sell to maintain their gated, golf-course lifestyles.
These pre-codgers know that the law of supply and demand works. An inverted pyramid working population toiling under depressed wages will not buy up much to keep the DJI and NASDAQ humming.
So we better get that guvmit that we hate to pour a few trillion into securities.
beltane
@Culture of Truth: Corporations enjoy the same rights as individuals (well, more rights than individuals really) but without bearing the same duties and responsibilities as individuals.
Villago Delenda Est
@beltane:
And this is why we have a problem. The fact that idiots like Scalia can’t see it is why they have no fucking business being on the Supreme Court.
The whole fucking Constitution is about checks and balances. Scalia, being a “constructionist” should be the very first person to recognize this fundamental principle. But he does not. He wants to put his thumb on the scale.
Fine. Take his entire arm off as punishment.
comrade scott's agenda of rage
Two things:
1) National polls don’t mean shit. Well, they help drive
2) The Villager’s desire to keep this a horse race until the end.
As Charlie Pierce put it, sooo many people who normally vote Repup are conservative ideologues, not Republican Party ideologues. Romney ain’t their guy. They’ll never vote for that black fella but they’re not voting for a Mormon either.
They’ll make sure the powder stays dry and wait for 2016. Plus, if the Repups have control of either/both chambers in Congress, they can afford to wait 4 years because Obama won’t get shit done if that happens.
Remember, these people always play the long game. Always. They lose the occasional battle here and there but they’re doing a fine job of winning the war.
RalfW
@beltane:
Which would be why corporations are so culturally Republican.
All the benefits & rights, none of the responsibility.
Chris
@Zifnab:
And then they bawled that it was all McCain’s fault for making them stay home by not being a raging enough conservative to hold their interest. Because no matter what happens, it’s never their fault.
Veritas
@Legalize:
And he’s up five in the Gallup poll.
I thought being an incumbent President with zero primary opposition was supposed to make Obambi unstoppable? I thought the economy was improving? I thought Romney is a weak candidate who can in no way beat Obambi? So what happened “progressives”? What happened?
RalfW
Oh, and Vertias?
My prebuttal itches, be a dear and scratch it for me, okay?
Veritas
@Villago Delenda Est:
Scalia, Thomas, Roberts, and Alito are safely, securely on the Court for DECADES to come. Remember, SCOTUS justices often live well into their ’90s.
The Reagan Revolution rolls on in our courts system, even when liberals do manage to win elections. Suck. On. It.
kindness
OMG I just read that Levon Helm died. That is so sad.
Culture of Truth
To be fair, the statute uses the term “individual”, conveniently, so Congress is as responsible for this decision.
Gex
They are like major league sports owners. Always bitching about how much they pay in salaries, but they are the ones who sign the contracts. They can’t stop spending, so someone else (the players, the taxpayers) need to suffer so that they can be forced to control themselves.
Boo hoo. Don’t tell me you are a principled fiscal conservative if you need to be FORCED to do what you say you want to do.
catclub
@The Tragically Flip: “I’m a little surprised the Republicans haven’t already brought up a BBA for a vote in the House.”
They bring it up all the time, or at least it seems that way.
Legalize
@Veritas:
Willard. Got. His. Nomination-Lock. Bounce.
Dip-shit.
Davis X. Machina
@RalfW: Yep. “Pre-codgers” pretty much captures interfluidity’s ‘median influencer’…
Amir Khalid
@kindness:
I’m looking at a Google search for news on him right now: no sign of a death announcement. Where did you see the story?
Culture of Truth
They are like kindergarenters, except when real kindergarteners are out of control we handcuff them and take them to jail.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Veritas: What is happen is what was predicted by this blog and just about everyone; people like Veritas will vote Republican even if it means crawling across glass to do it. Yes, you know Romney is a lying weasel and his policies will be an utter disaster for this country but that don’t matter. Come November 11th of this year you will be putting a check next his name all because of weird form of tribal identity.
It really is quite funny when you think about it.
kindness
@Amir Khalid: Caught it first on Charles Pierce’s site then went to Wikipedia and looked at Levon’s page.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Veritas: Heck, I am not done laughing at your type. Electing Romney will make the countries problems worse; he has absolutely no energy policy, apparently isn’t even aware of the environment changes going on (which will be funny when his brand new California dream house washes away), he is so out of touch he thinks the Cold War is still going on, apparently blow Iran up because it sounds cool, no position on the trade deficit. Romney’s only policy is cut taxes for the top 1% at all costs, that’s it. He offers no solutions to any problems, nothing to move the country forward, even from a conservative stand point. Romney soul and only reason to be president is to do better than his father.
Yet you Veritas, as sure as the sun rises in the morning, will vote for him.
Tehanu
@Splitting Image:
I love Getafix, but why drag him into it? Just resurrect Jim Jones and a vat of Kool-aid.
rlrr
@Legalize:
Remember McCain’s post convention bounce which had him ahead in most of the polls?
rlrr
@Amir Khalid:
There was news yesterday that Levon Helm was in the final stages of cancer.
Amir Khalid
@kindness:
@rlrr:
Pierce and Wikpedia say only that Levon Helm is in the final stages of his illness, not that he has already passed away.
Surreal American
@Veritas:
Governor Vaginal Probe on the GOP ticket? You don’t say! Well that will certainly seal the deal.
Better trolls please.
Brachiator
@Veritas: So now even the NY Times poll admits this race is TOO CLOSE TO CALL with Obambi in a very weak position and Republicans consolidating! And how does it make you feel that Romney is going to give a prebuttal in Charlotte, right before Obambi’s big speech? Mittens is giving a speech?
Big deal.
He’ll deny every freakin’ word he says an hour after he says them.
kindness
@Amir Khalid: Ahhh, Wikipedia done caught me. This morning someone had added his death date of today to his page. It isn’t there now. Levon’s own web page doesn’t list his death yet either, just that he is in his final stages of cancer.
Sorry to have frightened anyone….be prepared though. Heaven’s rock band will be a little bit better all too soon.
The Tragically Flip
I don’t really understand the gloating by the troll. The rough consensus on the left for months was that Romney was probably the most dangerous Republican challenger of the actual candidates, and we were happy to see the process dragged out as long as possible to bring up Romney’s negatives and force him to take as many extreme right positions as possible.
I guess trolls just want any excuse to troll and demoralize potential Democratic activists but really I have seen few to no claims of Obama inevitability from left wing sources. So, way to prick our bubble there troll. Touché.
The Tragically Flip
@Veritas:
Yes, we dislike racists. It’s one of our silly quirks here on the left. Good plan picking candidates based on their capacity to annoy us though. It’s the level of high minded maturity and forethought that we’ve come to expect from conservative intellectuals like yourself.
RedKitten
I think it’s absolutely hilarious. Romney will get up on stage and lie and prevaricate with his usual lack of charisma. And then Obama will be able to address (and destroy) each and every one of Romney’s points, and will probably have some fun capitalizing upon one of Romney’s inevitable tone-deaf Thurston Howell III moments.
Romney is giving Obama the opportunity to have the last word. And you think that this is a GOOD thing? You’re a fool.
Hob
@Judas Escargot, Your Postmodern Neighbor: And not just credit from banks; a modern capitalist economy would drop dead in a day if not for credit extended from suppliers to manufacturers, wholesalers to retailers, contractors to everyone. Cash on the barrelhead, for anything other than buying stuff in stores, only exists in libertoonian daydreams. I ran a tiny bookselling outfit for a few years, I’m one of the least business-minded people you’ll ever meet, and the very first thing I learned was the meaning of “net 30.”
Denouncing the idea of borrowing money, for people who claim to revere capitalism, is the the boldest possible declaration that they don’t know or care what the fuck they’re talking about. It’s like if someone proclaims that sex is the most important thing in life and then says that breasts feel like bags of sand.
Villago Delenda Est
@Veritas:
“2nd Amendment Remedies” can take care of the unprincipled vermin that are Roberts, Alito, Thomas, and Scalia.
They can also take care of shitstains like you.
IM
@Hawes:
I dreamed of Albus Dumbledore last night,
alive as you and me…
FlipYrWhig
George Allen is also one of the dumbest human beings in the Commonwealth of Virginia. I realilze that intellect isn’t exactly a prerequisite for the Senate, but, you know, maybe there should be something of a quota on helmet-headed dimwits.
Catsy
@Veritas:
Yes, a brilliant fucking move to give his speech first, thus allowing Obama (as others have noted) to have the last word and adjust his message if needed. A brilliant fucking move to directly contrast his stiff delivery, tone-deafness and blind privilege with Obama’s rhetorical skill, personal likeability and grasp of what’s actually important to the 99%. That’s going to work out real well.
It’s a good thing you’re this stupid, Falsitas. If you were less of a broken record of failed predictions that you never acknowledge and a reliable touchstone for “Don’t Be That Guy”, you might actually worry someone with your feckless trolling.
catclub
@Villago Delenda Est: I continue to be surprised and moderately pleased that this has not occurred.
pseudonymous in nc
Be kind to paid troll Reality Chuck: his perk is to travel on the roof of the Romneybus, shitting himself all the way.
jefft452
@kdaug: “King == Incitatus”
FALSE!
The noble Incitatus was a Senator, Steve King is just a Representative
The noble Incitatus was a horse, Steve King is just a horses ass