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45436. concerned - 11/30/2012 6:41:45 PM Charles Krauthammer on budget 'negotiations' from 11/28:
CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER: Obama has never offered anything in public about entitlements. He always says he wants a discussion. And now he says, after the Republicans give up their one issue of taxes, I'll discuss a bargain next year. Of course he wants that because that'll be the time when the Republicans are defrocked, disrobed and disarmed. They have nothing to bargain with. Look, the Republicans started out, as Steve indicated, by offering a peace pipe, by saying we'll raise the revenues. And they just had a punch in the nose this afternoon. Any Republican who buys this is a fool.
The Republicans stood for one thing consistently. It's held them together ideologically, and generally speaking it's helped them electorally. They are the low-tax party. The other guys want to tax to match their reckless spending. If they give it up now in return for nothing, Obama wins and he wins big.
Now I understand why Democrats are doing this. They imagine that the Republicans have no bargaining power today. I say it's true that if Republicans resist, they'll take the blame. And that will help the Democrats in the Congress. But Obama is never running again. He doesn't care who gets the blame. He's going to be the president. He's a lame duck. He wants a successful second term. If it starts by going over the cliff, it starts with a second recession, two million unemployed, and a wrecked second term. That's the leverage that Republicans have over Obama, and they ought to use it and not cave in in the face of a demand that I think is utterly unacceptable.
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KRAUTHAMMER: The Republicans have one card. If we go over the cliff, Obama will have a failed second term. And that's the one thing he cares about and he's in charge. The idea that Republicans are here empty handed is a huge mistake. They assume it's so, they're going to cave. They will undermine their entire stance of the low-tax party, for a generation they're going to lose that issue. The same way that George Bush Sr., he made a promise on taxes, he went against it. It destroyed his career.
0bama will take the blame for this unless he changes his intransigent position.
45437. concerned - 11/30/2012 7:00:22 PM Re. 45433 -
Income inequality decreased under GWB and it is now increasing under 0bama. Plus the curve regarding tax rates shows the largest GDP growth after the top marginal rate tax cut of the early '60's.
What you need to do to have any credibility is to factor in the actual results of 0bama era policy which shows a nearly 5% reduction in middle class income, far worse than the increase during GWB's two terms - and until 2007, the economy was generally quite good, with unemployment averaging 5%.
After that, the Democrats crashed the economy when their subprime mortgage bubble popped.
You really need to give it up wrt your pretense that $30 billion dollars or less a year in revenue from top tax bracket increases is going to make a perceptible difference in the deficit. Nobody with even an ounce of brains believes that.
Spending has to decrease, something that 0bama and the Democrats have got away with opposing so far, and now the US has accrued over $200,000 in debt for each and every child in America with selfish, shortsighted Democrat deficit spending and government waste with trillion dollar deficits as far as the eye can see as long as Democrats call the shots.
You Lefties ought to be ashamed of yourselves. 45438. concerned - 11/30/2012 7:03:52 PM Keep in mind also that GWB was dealing with the bursting of the dot.com bubble at the beginning of his first term, as well as the $600 billion economic hit caused by the destruction of the Twin Towers during 9/11.
Laffer rules, Keynes drools.
45439. concerned - 11/30/2012 7:06:10 PM Btw, I did read the article and followed all the links with their selective and partial information. It all reminded me of the book 'How to Lie with Statistics'. 45440. concerned - 11/30/2012 7:07:28 PM Guess the presumption was that Lefties were too ignorant, stupid and/or biased to see through the omissions and unfounded interpretations. 45441. judithathome - 11/30/2012 8:06:36 PM 0bama will take the blame for this unless he changes his intransigent position.
Hide and watch...the blame is going smack dab where it belongs: on the obstructionists in the Republican party.
45442. concerned - 11/30/2012 8:12:00 PM JAH -
Only if you are hardcore Leftist. Do you realize that 0bama is not 'compromising' in any way, regardless of what he says? Are you ok with such power plays? 45443. concerned - 11/30/2012 8:12:54 PM The idea is supposed to be to fix the budget, not play partisan gotcha, JAH. I think you have totally lost sight of that. 45444. judithathome - 11/30/2012 8:12:59 PM Of course, you won't be able to grasp that because you're so far inside the bubble, you think you're seeing things in a realistic manner when actually, you're not seeing things at all.
This is all theatre...Boehner knows they are toast but he has to get in front of the cameras and play the wronged party side-by-side with the tough guy act...he is acting and not doing a very good job of it.
If he fouls this one up, which he will, he may lose his leadership role...and I can guarantee you, Eric Kantor will swoop right in and claim the empty space at the podium...he's been playing Iago forever and now his little game is going pay off handsomely. 45445. concerned - 11/30/2012 8:15:20 PM If you post something on the order that the Republicans are always at fault here, JAH, then you are definitely on the side of the game players.
Doesn't acting like a petulant child regarding politics ever get a little old for you, JAH? 45446. judithathome - 11/30/2012 8:16:28 PM Obama is only taking a page from the Boehner playbook of the last 4 years...you didn't seem too exercised when your guys did it, did you? I didn't hear any howling from YOU when the Build the Wall Against Any Progress gang decided to not let Obama have his way ONE TIME in 4 years...they blocked almost every single thing he tried.
So no, it isn't upsetting me that the Republicans are getting hoist on their own petards. Not at all.
Payback's a bitch. 45447. judithathome - 11/30/2012 8:17:46 PM And why should he compromise? HE WON. You seem to think you're dealing with the same guy who won 4 years ago...you're NOT. 45448. concerned - 11/30/2012 8:18:00 PM JAH -
I see that 0bama will not accept any immediate spending cuts whatsoever, but he's insisting on immediate tax increases.
That doesn't sound like any sort of compromise to me - just Democrats trying to stick it to Republicans.
If you are such a partisan bigot that that doesn't bother you, well then, that's too bad. 45449. concerned - 11/30/2012 8:20:16 PM Re. 45447 -
Maybe 0bama should compromise for the good of the country. You're hardly coming across as a tolerant open minded person here, JAH, with your Lord of the Flies act. 45450. iiibbb - 11/30/2012 8:44:28 PM I know what's wrong with the picture... it implies that Republicans, with their culture of stonewalling, is suddenly reaching out in compromise.
Their stated objective is that they want this president to fail. 45451. iiibbb - 11/30/2012 8:46:57 PM I solved the deficit years ago
Screw politicians... sit down... work this the fuck out. 45452. judithathome - 11/30/2012 10:43:35 PM 45449
Oh har....you actually believe the shit you post!!
Lord of the flies, indeed.
@@ 45453. Wombat - 12/1/2012 12:39:08 AM The Republicans have yet to specify what cuts they want to see. They actually want the Democrats to do it for them! Wonder why.... 45454. Wombat - 12/1/2012 12:40:13 AM Concerned certainly knows how to "lie with statistics." 45455. judithathome - 12/1/2012 12:47:54 AM Conn'd hasn't entered the "acceptance" stage of grief yet...he and the rest of the Republicans are still in the "denial" stage.
They don't realize the country has changed dramatically...even though we've all been trying to tell them that...they just can't believe the reality of the situation.
It's a new day, Conn'd, and you need to get on the bus or be left behind.
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