dajafi wrote:

Philly the Kid wrote:

dajafi wrote:My point wasn't to discuss the merits of the categories of expenditure that comprise our budget problem, but rather that a very basic disconnect exists between our revenues and expenditures. While some pols are more realistic about this than others--Tim Pawlenty is a fast-rising hopeful for Dumbest of Them All--none of them have said anything approaching what I think we as a country need to hear, if indeed we're serious about this whole budget thing.

Surely you get the difference in orders of magnitude when it comes to Military spending?! It's not like, we earn this, we spend that, let's be more realistic. Obama said he wanted to freeze things except national security and military. Which is the bulk of the expense. Which the populace doesn't necessarily support at all, especially when they've been lied to and manipulated for years about scary bogeymen coming to take away their liberty.

It's outrageous.

Keep in mind, in the glory years of Clinton, we had supposedly a surplus?

Let's not get in to the messed up trade deficit or how China has prop'd the dollar...

I'm honestly no longer sure if it's a reading comprehension thing or something much more basic in terms of cognitive function.

dajafi wrote:I'd have tremendous respect for any politician, of any party, who basically said this:

Look, America: here's your problem. Your eyes are bigger than your stomachs. Your big mouths write checks your fat asses can't or won't cash. You want your government to spend more and more on entitlements, actual wars and preparation for wars that might or might not ever happen, subsidies for businesses, and big new social programs to help deliver goods such as education and health coverage. At the same time, you want to pay less and less in taxes, to the point where if anybody even suggests letting old tax cuts expire, some of you screech that they're reaching into your pocket so deeply they're grabbing your junk as well as your money.

Basically it's like this: you can pay more for more government, or less for less government. But what you're trying to do now--pay less for more government and make up the difference by borrowing from people who ultimately don't wish you well--isn't sustainable.

You need to set some priorities about both what's important to you from that wish list--entitlements, wars, other spending--and how much you're willing to pay both for the goodies you want and the goodies you might not personally want but that a majority of your fellow citizens wants. If you can start thinking clearly on those two questions, we can restore some rationality to our budgeting, and just doing that will yield some good economic results as the markets start to believe that you're collectively regaining your sanity.

Never gonna happen, I know.

pacino wrote:people are voting against their own co-sponsors. this is beyond politics. im not sure what this is, frankly, but it's absurd

Werthless wrote:This is all setting up for a Werthless 2028 run. Minus being rich.

UPDATE: A Democrat points out Rahm apologized to Shriver, but not to the liberals he called "retarded."

The major pattern that emerges is that even where only minorities or weak pluralities of Republicans hold to some extreme positions, there also exists a large bloc of undecideds.

• "Should Barack Obama be impeached, or not?" Yes 39%, No 32%, Not Sure 29%.

• "Do you believe Barack Obama was born in the United States, or not?" Yes 42%, No 36%, Not Sure 22%.

• "Do you believe Barack Obama wants the terrorists to win?" Yes 24%, No 43%, Not Sure 33%.

• "Do you believe ACORN stole the 2008 election?" Yes 21%, No 24%, Not Sure 55%.

• "Do you believe Barack Obama is a racist who hates White people?" Yes 31%, No 36%, Not Sure 33%.

• "Do you believe your state should secede from the United States?" The answer here is Yes 23%, No 58%, Not Sure 19%. On this basis, Kos declares: "42 percent of Republicans aren't really patriotic." Among Republicans in the South, secessionism is stronger at Yes 33%, No 52% Not Sure 15%.

dajafi wrote:So, uh, about that bipartisanship...

The major pattern that emerges is that even where only minorities or weak pluralities of Republicans hold to some extreme positions, there also exists a large bloc of undecideds.

• "Should Barack Obama be impeached, or not?" Yes 39%, No 32%, Not Sure 29%.

• "Do you believe Barack Obama was born in the United States, or not?" Yes 42%, No 36%, Not Sure 22%.

• "Do you believe Barack Obama wants the terrorists to win?" Yes 24%, No 43%, Not Sure 33%.

• "Do you believe ACORN stole the 2008 election?" Yes 21%, No 24%, Not Sure 55%.

• "Do you believe Barack Obama is a racist who hates White people?" Yes 31%, No 36%, Not Sure 33%.

• "Do you believe your state should secede from the United States?" The answer here is Yes 23%, No 58%, Not Sure 19%. On this basis, Kos declares: "42 percent of Republicans aren't really patriotic." Among Republicans in the South, secessionism is stronger at Yes 33%, No 52% Not Sure 15%.

jerseyhoya wrote:You're misreading the immigration question, and I wouldn't be surprised if a lot of these people don't know what contraceptives are. That's a big word. The one that jumped off the page for me was only like seven or eight percent said it was OK for a teacher to be openly gay.