The Sequester is a Trojan Horse for the Radical Right Wing Agenda.

Getting the Tea Party into Congress was the Koch/Exxon/multinational dream, made possible by GOP leadership. The Tea Party arm of the Republican party is the voice of the worst of the corporations. Left to them, "small government" would comprise actual representatives of Corporations.

When GOP failed to get corporate Mitt Romney through the gate, they sought another way to get their Austerity plan underway: the Sequester is the beginnings of a pathway to privatize government, while securing more corporate funding to get re-elected.

This tactic causes tremendous suffering in the interests of capital. Do you think GOP cares about the millions who will lose their jobs? Or that jobs & income loss is counter-productive to deficit reduction?

When Congress proposed budget sequestration to resolve the debt ceiling crisis in 2011: Democrats knew the entitlements/defense cuts in the budget were onerous - but they believed GOP would have a conscience. Meanwhile, GOP saw the sequester as their chance to cut job creation, education, infrastructure development, basic research, Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security -- and start the process of privatizing them.

In the absence of a Romney to eviscerate the U.S. economy, the Sequester serves as a trojan horse for the Republican party's privatization agenda.

Speaker of the House:

The criteria for a good Speaker of the House is pretty much in the eye of the beholder. I know conservatives who become very uncomfortable when Congress is in session. Their criterion is the least that can get done, the better. The problem with this approach is that there are national problems that desperately need to be solved and kicking the can down the road is no solution and often makes these problems worse.

Since January, 1995 the House has had four Speakers: Newt Gingrich, Dennis Hastert, Nancy Pelosi, and John Boehner. Gingrich lasted four years before he was embroiled in ethics violations so there is a big black smudge on his reputation. Following Gingrich, Speaker Hastert held a low profile, but developed the "Hastert Rule" which essentially said that no bill would come before the House unless it had a Republican majority.

With Nancy Pelosi, a good number of bills were passed in the House, notably the Affordable Healthcare Act. She was the lightening rod for Republican attacks; primarily because she was politically shrewd and knew how to get things done. If the criteria for a great Speaker is accomplishments, then she is right up there with "Tip" O'Neill.

Now we have John Boehner and for me the criterion for a strong Speaker is leadership. Unfortunately for Republicans and the nation, John Boehner is a miserable failure: he is not smart enough to negotiate with the President; he has Tea Partiers on his right who intimidate him; he lacks the courage to stand up to the extreme right wing of the GOP; and now he says he will "consider" bills passed by the Senate. In his daily press conferences he says the Democrats have not presented him with a sequester plan, but it is included in the president's budget and can be found online on the internet; he blames the Democrats for initiating the sequester, but his Republican representatives voted for it.

Under John Boehner's leadership the House voted against the Affordable Healthcare Act over thirty times, knowing it is the law of the land. The 112 Congress was the least productive Congress in years, thus not addressing the ills of the country.

Some say that if Boehner caves in on increasing taxes, he will have difficulty retaining his speakership. Maybe it is time for the House to find a new speaker—one with leadership skills.

For all the complaints about the media - lame stream, mainstream, liberal, conservative, whatever - we seem to need them to give us talking points. Yes, talking points, along with catch phrases, cute sound bites, and in too many cases, propaganda and outright lies. The truth is buried; it's lost. Information is slanted, and we go our merry way, embracing only what we want to hear. Then we start talking at each other, past each other, over each other, but never TO each other. We don't need answers. We got 'em. Really?

What the hell is sequestration? We'd never heard the word before unless we were paying attention to climate change and carbon sequestration. But budget sequestration? What is it? Well boys and girls, it's just a new way of kicking the can down the road. (Thank you for that cute phrase, media folk.)

Budget sequestration was such a terrible solution to budget deficits and climbing national debt, that when the deadline hit, Congress would absolutely, definitely, positively have to deal with the problem. Not even. What we have is a Congress of children who promise to do their homework, then run away. They lied - to us and to themselves. They're nothing more than juvenile delinquents with very large incomes and more vacation time than most taxpayers get in 10 years.

John Boehner in a display of unrivaled cowardice has caved to the most ignorant faction of right-wingers in living memory - the Teabaggers. This relatively small group of dimwits is the tail wagging what's left of the Republican dog. They're happier than hell to see this country go down in flames.

Our Constitution demands that Boehner's House of Representatives solve this problem. Yet, Boehner says it's up to the Senate. Boehner! You lie! Boehner says the President is not showing leadership. Boehner! You lie! It is Boehner who is not showing leadership. He IS the Speaker of the House.

Democrats in the House have offered a solution. Here's one. Read this and understand how pervasive the lies are in this latest episode of "Kick the can down the Road". One provision is that anyone making more than two-million-dollars a year must pay at least 30% in income tax. Hold on there. Isn't the top rate already 39.6%? Yes, it is, but that's the nominal rate. Go look it up Republicans. They're screwing you and lying about it. The rich ARE NOT paying the nominal rate. They are paying far less than they want you to believe.

So, the rich, as always, have bought their Republicans, and no small number of Democrats, and that proposal is dead. It's so much easier to lie when you have media that don't understand what's going on either.

When the deadline hits this Friday, and nothing happens, and Congress goes on a mini-vacation AGAIN, citizens are going to start feeling consequences. Pity the Congress. Doing nothing demands incredible energy and dedication. Kicking a can down the road is hard work. You? Well, just continue working, if you haven't lost your job. Continue transferring your money to the rich, and a Congress that does nothing.

Things are not going to go well for the republicans and especially the republican leadership in future elections. It isn't just the tea party dragging them down it is those in the republican party that won't stand up to their extremist fascist views. To put the party, or even the evil agenda of the tea party ahead of what is good for the majority of people in this country will be their downfall and their demise. While there will always be a faction of the republican party that are extreme as there is with the democrats they must be brought under control by saner heads or they are done. Screwed without a kiss or a cuddle.

Every member of the Executive and Legislative branch needs to get a refresher course and book on contract negotiation. Most appeared to have lost this art, but there are a few on both sides of the aisle who haven't lost it yet.

The muggle

Since muggle refers to a person who is an igonrant member of the community .
muggle
a common person, esp. one who is ignorant or has no skills
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/muggle

That'd be the Tea Party and GOP. Last night it was so refreshing to see Congressman Keith Ellison call out the Republican Shrill, Sean Hannity. Being the angry troll so quick to bite the truth off of the WHite House and Presidebt Obama. Anyone with half brain or is comatose can Sean Hannity and FOX NOISE is very illogical, not upright, and has "NO"good" character.

On-air fireworks erupt between FNC’s Sean Hannity and Democratic Rep. Keith Ellison [VIDEO]

[Congressman-D]Ellison said:

Quite frankly, you are the worst excuse for a journalist I’ve ever seen. …What you just displayed was not journalism. It was yellow journalism. It wasn’t anything close to try to tell the American people what’s really going on. I mean it’s just shocking.

Every journalistic ethic I have ever heard of was just violated by you.

…You are a shill for the Republican party. …You alibi them 100% of the time.

http://dailycaller.com/2013/02/26/on-air-fireworks-erupt-between-fncs-sean-hannity-and-democratic-rep-keith-ellison-video/

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The right wing numb nuts are too meserrized to see any LIE coming from Hannity, Breibart. and TOXIC, POX, NEWS.

Finally, I loved someone finally standing up to that bully instead of trying to be congenial. Hannity is a yellow belly snake too.

Don't Think Twice, It's All Right

Tea party racism. No health care. No immigration reform. War on Women. Voter Suppression. Keep wars going forever. Make our president a failure. Cuts to programs important to hard working families so that the wealthy can have their tax breaks.

Now the sequester because they don’t know what else to do in order to make it not happen.

Imagine for a minute if we had no internet. Imagine for a minute if we couldn’t reach out to each other and you know, communicate with each other. We would just all be sitting there in front of the tv, taking in the msm news night after night and finally just asking ourselves – have the Republicans gone
completely insane? Or is it their goal to drive the rest of us insane?

Look at this from Mr. Benen:

Defense Secretary-designate Chuck Hagel will take the oath of office later today, which will likely be a satisfying resolution to a difficult confirmation process. But before he's sworn in, Senate Republicans issued one last challenge to their former colleague.

As Chuck Hagel proceeded toward confirmation Tuesday, several Republican senators said that he will have a lot of work ahead of him to prove himself and repair his relationships in the Senate after the Pentagon nominee's long and bruising confirmation battle. [...]

Several GOP senators who were directly involved in the Hagel fight ... said they were willing to work with Hagel but that it was Hagel's responsibility, not the Senate's, to mend fences and prove that he can do the job.

This has to be one of the more amusing things I've heard from Senate Republicans in quite a while. In effect, the line from the GOP minority is, "We smeared Chuck Hagel, we questioned his patriotism, we questioned his loyalties, and we accused him without proof of having ties to America's enemies. Now that he's confirmed, we expect Hagel to start mending the relationship we destroyed on purpose as part of our partisan scorched-earth campaign."

Even by Republican standards, this is pretty nutty.

_________________

The kicker is the Republican Party have no standards. Which is fine, but why continue to waste everyone’s time proving it? We already know. Not just here in America, but across the world, the word is out – The Republican Party is for old tired bitter jealous paranoid men.

The rest of us? Moving on without them. Democrats, Independents and a great many Republicans.

We all grew up here. We want to grow our Nation, not destroy it.

2014. Social media is here to stay. The GOP is not. Right now they have to watch Chuck Hagel closely. LoL.

WOW...I have never seen so many liberals coming out so strong in such great force in one cyber-place before. It's what GOP Sen. Joseph McCarthy calls 'a dream coming true' -so he can round all of us up in his political cyber witch-hunt.

Dew Drop Inn would be a good place to start Pig.

Austerity sounds good in principle and works well in running your household finances. Many of America's millionaires accumulated their wealth by controlling their spending and living well within their means.

Austerity does not always work as well when you are running a business. Short-term profits may increase, but if you don't invest in infrastructure or research & Development your business may falter in the long run. That is why almost all major businesses use debt financing to grow seize market opportunities and grow their businesses.

Austerity has not been sucessful when applied to governments, at least not in the midst of a recession or depression. There are exactly ZERO countries that experienced economic growth or any signs of iprovement after implementing austerity measures.

Austerity in these troubled times has proven to be a failure, and if we pursue this course we WILL end up like Europe - back in a deep recession.

laugh out loud..

1 cent out of every dollar spent by the US government is whats going to be cut.. and 1 cent will crash this country.. wow great place hope and change has taken us.. life depends upon the pennies now

(and libs scream victory)

Didn't President Obama promise "the sequester won't happen!"

Didn't he also promise unity in government?

Didn't he also promise to get rid of lobbyist?

No wonder his approval rating is dropping like a rock...

All politicians cater to the rich, he is just hypocritical about it, which makes him smell

A Holiday specifically dedicated to me is comong -

March 1, the National Pig Day.

Oink. I am so special!!!!!!!!!!!!!

TNSEVOL---I had a similar thought to yours. I wonder what the answer to the poll question about austerity would have been if the question was: do you favor budget cuts if their impact would be to cause another recession?

Revenge,

The $85 Billion in cuts is 2.4% of the entire budget however since the cuts only apply to 36% of the budget (Defense & Discretionary) the $85 Billion becomes a 6.6% cut to those areas. In addition, just like any company there are fixed costs that cannot be cut. The focus will then be on the labor portion of the budget that will result in layoffs, furloughs and reduced services.

The end result will feel like about an 11% cut.

Sequester is Nothing like a Government shutdown.

OK, ALL YOU LIBERALS AND PROGRESSIVES, THIS IS FOR YOU!!!!!!!!

In FY 2011, the federal government reported $115 billion in improper payments. This is only an estimate; the total amount of improper payments is unknown. Our own government doesn't know how much it actually overspends. I bet you know when you overspend, don't you?

http://oversight.house.gov/hearing/solutions-needed-improper-payments-total-115-billion-in-federal-misspending/

The Congressional Budget Office published a “Budget Options” series identifying more than $140 billion in potential spending cuts.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) regularly issues a compendium of budget options to help inform federal lawmakers about the implications of possible policy choices. This volume—one of several reports that CBO produces regularly for the House and Senate Committees on the Budget—presents more than 100 options for altering federal spending and revenues. Nearly all of the options would reduce federal budget deficits.

Federal budget deficits will total $7 trillion over the next decade if current laws remain unchanged, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects.

http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/ftpdocs/120xx/doc12085/03-10-reducingthedeficit.pdf

Washington spends $25 billion annually maintaining unused or vacant federal properties.

http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2009/10/50-examples-of-government-waste#_edn3

Examples from multiple Government Accountability Office (GAO) reports of wasteful duplication include 342 economic development programs; 130 programs serving the disabled; 130 programs serving at-risk youth; 90 early childhood development programs; 75 programs funding international education, cultural, and training exchange activities; and 72 safe water programs. This report identifies more than $100 billion to $200 billion in annual government spending on 1,500 different programs that are wasteful, duplicative, or inefficient.

http://www.gao.gov/assets/590/588818.pdf

A recent study by the Institute of Medicine shows health care fraud is estimated to cost taxpayers more than $750 billion annually. The committee calculated that about 30 percent of health spending was wasted on unnecessary services, excessive administrative costs, fraud, and other problems.

http://www8.nationalacademies.org/onpinews/newsitem.aspx?RecordID=13444

Now this is my favorite!

I’m sure most of you BIG GOVERNMENT loving Libbies will go apoplectic when you read this.

Read it slowly a few times so you truly understand what is being told to you.

Government auditors spent five years examining all federal programs and found that 22 percent of them–costing taxpayers a total of $123 billion annually–fail to show any positive impact on the populations they serve. (emphasis mine)

http://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/omb/expectmore/index.html

Now, read it again.

If any of you were so adventurous to go to this link you will see this program was created in 2003 and ended in 2008. Barrack Hussein did not continue this obvious exposure of our governments incompetence.

I wonder why?

Could it be that evidence of this type supports the massive ineffectiveness in our government? Could it be that Barrack Hussein doesn't want you to be exposed to this criminal waste of our hard earned tax dollars?

Of course it is. Even you Libbies should be able to comprehend this much.

Do you understand what it means? Probably not because it ELIMINATES any argument you may have about our criminal government being out of control.

Nearly 25% of your own sacrosanct and worshipped upon social programs DON’T DO ANYTHING FOR THE POPULATIONS THEY ARE INTENDED TO SERVE!!!!!!

Anyone with any common sense can see that we can easily cut these programs and save $123 BILLION ANNUALLY AND NO ONE WILL BE AFFECTED!!!!

Please notice I even provided links so you Libbies don’t think I made these numbers up. I also understand most of you are incapable of researching ANYTHING on your own, you just parrot whatever propaganda Barrack Hussein, Debbie Whatsername Slutz or Gay Carney tell you to.

Also notice that all of these come from reputable sources, YOUR OWN GOVERNEMNT!

Your own government is telling you, and the criminals in our government, where, how much and how to fix much of our massive WASTE, FRAUD, ABUSE AND CORRUPTION!

Yet you, Barrack Hussein, the complicit Liberal lamestream media are catatonic about cutting a mere $85 BILLION dollars from our bloated ineffective and unsustainable government in the sequester.

According to Barrack Hussein Armageddon will descend upon us on Friday.

Poor children, disabled children, ALL THE CHILDREN WILL DIE!!!!!

Schools will shut down! Teachers will be living in the streets! Schools will crumble from lack of maintenance! Police, firefighters and first responders will be powerless! Our borders will be invaded by more illegal’s! Ships won’t ever be built again! Our armed forces will be defenseless! Seniors will be forced to live under bridges and eat dog food! Social Security payments will be stopped. MILLIONS OF AMERICAN’S will lose their jobs! Women will lose their free contraceptives! Gays won’t be allowed to marry! Barrack Hussein and Moochelle may not be able to vacation, golf or be on the Oscars ever again!!!!!!!!

All because of $85 BILLION!!!

OHHHHHHH THE HUMANITY!!!!!!!!!!

The total for the above examples of waste, fraud, abuse and corruption adds up to $1.303 TRILLION ANNUALLY!!!!!

Assuming that half of these may be due to overlap ( a liberal assumption in our overgrown government), this still amounts to $651.5 BILLION ANNUALLY!!!!!

Even if you take HALF of this amount it still amounts to over $325.75 BILLION!!!!

This is $3.2575 TRILLION over 10 years!

But of course no one on the Democratic side can find a paltry $85 Billion, a mere 2.3% of our total unsustainable budget, to cut because YOU DON’T WANT TO!!!! You believe the incessant and irrational fear-mongering that he keeps campaigning on.

When will you demand that Barrack Hussein STOPS campaigning to keep you in squalor and start governing for the good of our great Republic.

You all have your heads so far up Barrack Husseins a$$ that you can see out his mouth. You believe anything this statist tells you because none of you contribute to our nations prosperity. You just want to leach off the successful and ambitious among us who still have some pride, self-esteem and honor.

You have all been so indoctrinated by your dysfunctional parents, peers and educators you no longer have any common sense. Everything you advocate is based on emotions rather than policy. You refuse to accept the fact that government is the problem because that makes YOU THE PROBLEM!!!!

Doesn’t it bother you that Barrack Hussein never tells you that you can be successful? Doesn’t it bother you that the best he promises you is to be middle class? Doesn’t it bother you that the leader of the most prosperous nation in history demands you be satisfied with mediocrity?

Doesn’t it bother you that he makes you insignificant?

It’s so sad for us real Americans to see so many of you submit so easily to his “Bread and Circuses”. His denigration of your ability to be what you want to be rather than what he wants you to be must be so difficult.

Barrack Hussein doesn’t want you to achieve the American Dream, he wants you to feel worthless so he can keep promising you the Shangri-La that no one person can guarantee anyone. This has been going on for decades. Liberals/Progressives keep pouring good money after bad with promises of hope and change, yet you never get there.

Tens of TRILLIONS OF DOLLARS have been spent on our “social wars” against crime, drugs, poverty and illiteracy yet we have more than ever today. That’s because it’s nothing more than an illusion. It’s propaganda to keep you chained to the Liberal/Progressive plantation that is only interested in your vote, not your welfare.

The worst thing is, none of these, or any other facts, will change your mind because you have been so brainwashed into believing that someone else can make you something only you can become by taking more money from those that have succeeded.

Class warfare, envy, self-pity and mediocrity has been so ingrained in you that you feel only some bureaucrat--who never met you, and you never met them—can help you. As he and all his cronies become wealthy, you just cling to the false notion of hope and change.

We real Americans will pray for you, but only you can become what you really are capable of becoming.

God Bless and help America, you may be our only real hope for change.

Jody, Iowa

Deficit Sequester Hysteria, Myth & Math.

Jody,

They are all a bunch of numb nuts. Correction: The Republican House are numb nuts.

Boehner Did Not Rule Out Tax Revenues to Prevent Sequestration

Sequester, Solved!!!

From the article above:

And two, it’s Wednesday -- just two days before the sequester cuts are supposed to go into effect -- and there isn’t a single meeting scheduled between the president and congressional Republicans.

The impending Sequester on Friday means there will be automatic spending cuts of $85 Billion.

I have a better idea.

Courtesy of Richest Families on The Forbes 400

Kerry A. Dolan, Forbes Staff, September 21, 2011

Some people create their own billion-dollar fortunes. Others are born into them. The inheritors are shrinking as a percentage of The Forbes 400 list—down to just 30% this year–but among that group is a large number of blood relatives. Eighteen families have multiple members among the ranks. We try whenever possible to list people individually; here, we’re lumping the individuals together to trace how dynasties fare. Altogether the families are worth slightly more than $346 billion.

That’s right. $346 Billion.

18 families have 4 times the amount of the Sequester.

18 families vs. 313 million people.

Since these eighteen families are trying to make the 313 million of us all poor, we freeze all their assets, pay-off the Sequester (and then some) and then we can turn our focus to creating jobs.

And as a show of good faith, we can get jobs for those 18 families first.

As John Hodgman of The Daily Show would say; “You’re Welcome.”

We now interrupt this program to bring you the following message:

“I have been thinking that I would make a proposition to my Republican friends... that if they will stop telling lies about the Democrats, we will stop telling the truth about them.”
Adlai E. Stevenson

P.S. Thank you, GOPisextinct and JT-456250.

Salud

“CPAC is like the all-star game for professional athletes; you get invited when you have had an outstanding year.” Umm, then why are Mitt Romney, Paul Ryan, Sarah Palin, Allen West, and even Mia Love all speaking at CPAC? Does losing elections = outstanding years?

They aren't known as the party of stupid without reason. Perhaps Rove can blow another 300billion conservative dollars on more losing candidates. I say run Paul Ryan as President and Mia Love as VP for 2016; up the stakes to 1trillion, and let's see what happens. I suspect it would be an outstanding election - one where 9/10th of the country votes against the crazy extremists.

As I watch the Republican Party slowly disappear into the sunset, I can't help but smile. These fools have become their own worst enemy. They are destroying their Party by their hatred of President Obama. They won't destroy our President but they will destroy their Party and all but their die heart followers. We see the Independents moving further Left and voting Liberal. Not a good sign for their Party. Oh, and Congratulations Mr. Hagel, our new Secretary of Defense. Nice try Republicans, but we gotcha (quote Reverend Al).

And Govenor Christy, come on over to the Democratic Party, we'll welcome you with open arms, now that Your Party has thrown you under the bus

dennis -- when i read your posts i, along with others, notice you have a great reliance on figures and statistics. it brought to mind this from a story i had read:

“Liars figure and figures lie.” Is an old economic axiom that over the years, I’ve found to be true. Related to this is the fact that the bigger the money involved, the more people will lie about the figures!

whether you want to call it 2.4%, or 6.6% or 11% it is still $85 billion.

if the question was: do you favor budget cuts if their impact would be to cause another recession?

Better question yet SF: do you fovor budget cuts if the impact would cut your job, your state or federal benefits, your children/grandchildren medical/social services?

Message to the Weeper: Where are the jobs?

One hundred years from now, historians and the general public will marvel at a party that resolutely determined to commit suicide. There will be movies much like today's Lincoln that reflect on the utter stupidity of a party that marched in lock-step off a cliff. Inevitably, comparisons will be made between Obama and a president who 150 years earlier freed the slaves. And for anyone so interested, these posts will be archived somewhere, a permanent record of posters like little Caesar, Albany Joe, Talk to the Hand, geo, etc. who blindly went down with the ship. Those future historians and the general public will scratch their heads in wonder at a slow-witted group of citizens who professed love of their country while trying to destroy it.

Dennis - who cant play in bowl games for cheating....

you better hope you can still edit that post there sally - i would try that "fuzzy math" again.. beauase in your public school math 65 education you turned 85 billion into 418 billion.

yikes!

FR:

The good news: A majority of Americans (53%) prefer that Congress move ahead with the current sequester cuts or a plan that contains even more cuts, suggesting the public’s general appetite for reducing spending.

The REALLY bad news, which First Read guys avoid mentioning is that another poll found that 60% of the public believes the federal deficit is increasing when in fact it is decreasing. Good job keeping the public misinformed, guys!

It's no wonder the economy is still screwed up when the public is misled at every turn by the media, by Republicans, and by the Democrats' inadequate response.

Jim Spence -- Why doesn't Boehner, the leader of the House, come up with a bill that targets waste, fraud and abuse? Perhaps he should put a halt to the vacations and get to work, yes?

-- due in part to his advocacy for Hurricane Sandy relief as well as his support for some gun-control measures."

=======

Really has to be one of the silliest CPAC/conservative talking points out there. Name me any historical Governor, let alone a Republican Governor whose State endured the kind of damage inflicted by Sandy and show me where that Governor snubbed their nose at Federal assistance, let alone whomever the President was at that time.

The best knocks you can come up with to not invite the man is because he sought billions in Federal money and is in favor of measures that will reduce the deaths in his State due to gun violence?

Wow.

You can pick anything out of this latest poll that floats your boat, but the single most telling is the fact that 69% feel the country is headed in the wrong direction. That is an indictment of the Obama policies and his failure to lead plain and simple. It is probably even more telling in that the nation has grown weary of the endless blame and excuses. Obama is running around the country crying wolf, screaming the sky is falling, and no one is listening. This nation has endured one crisis after another since Obama took office, and the country remains mired in the worst recovery in US history with massive debt and deficits as far as the eye can see. History is going to be very harsh to Obama, and when they write of this era his charisma, endless blame, and excuses will not be taken into account. Obama has failed as a leader, and his motivations are purely political and ideologically driven. Unfortunately Obama simply has no clue how the US economy works, and he will leave an enormous mess for the next person that sits in the Oval Office.

Bev: That clip in your first post made my blood boil. How can anyone watch that klan trash? It is an example of pure right wing propaganda. Thank God that congressman made him look the fool.

Please progressives get out and vote in '14, and take someone with you.

JimSpence

Waste fraud abuse BEST

OK, ALL YOU LIBERALS AND PROGRESSIVES, THIS IS FOR YOU!!!!!!!!

The Congressional Budget Office published a “Budget Options” series identifying more than $140 billion in potential spending cuts.

You do know where you can put that bullsh!t link; I hope? The CBO said if sequester takes place we'll go in recession.

there are way more Republicans than just Paul Ryan cheering it on. They can’t wait for sequester! They want it so badly they can taste it. They don’t care that the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office warn it could push our economy back into recession.

Here’s a round up of quotes from the DCCC, which will give you a good sense of the real reason Speaker John Boehner is not proposing a sequester replacement bill (hint: he doesn’t have the votes):

Republican Congressman Paul Broun (R-GA). “I want to see it go into place.” [Cherokee Tribune, 2/9]

http://www.politicususa.com/house-republicans-cheer-sequester-wait-impending-doom.html

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Put your skewed Jim DeMint Heritage Foundation some the sun doesn't shine. You are just like the fools over @ your right wing slimy site. 61% disagree c you

Chris Christie's unforgivable sin with the tea bag people is the same as former Florida governor Charlie Crist: embracing President Obama. But Obama must always get 50% of the blame (or more) from the corporate media for not bending over backwards far enough to compromise with people who's only goal in life is to destroy his presidency and to destroy any Republican who does try to compromise.

Jim Spence:

Here's a great idea. The next time you can document an instance of fraud, waste, abuse, or some such, write to your Congress person and tell them about it. As you conduct your investigation, remember that the Republican Party has systematically gutted enforcement and investigative arms of regulatory agencies, so you're doing their job.

After you have sent this letter, a staffer of your Congress person will call the offending, incompetent government bureau and say they've had a complaint and would they please respond. The agency that you know - probably quite correctly - is doing a terrible job will respond to the Congressional office and advise them that you are wrong, and they are doing a fabulous job.

One of your Congress person's staffers will send you a heartfelt letter thanking you for your concern, but there doesn't really seem to be a problem. But thanks Jim, we appreciate your effort and we'll send you a never ending stream of BS letters and e-mails telling you how wonderful we are. Please note where you can send your campaign contributions.

Based on your posts, I am absolutely certain you've never done this. I'm certain you've never dealt face to face with a Congress person. You don't go to board meetings. You vote a straight party ticket. You don't understand the process, such as it is. You don't have a shred of experience in the political world.

Get your nose bloodied a couple of times and you'll change your tune.

Rick-3416939

You can pick anything out of this latest poll that floats your boat, but the single most telling is the fact that 69% feel the country is headed in the wrong direction. That is an indictment of the Obama policies and his failure to lead plain and simple.

Despite the fact that the same poll shows a majority agrees with all of Obama's policies, you claim that the poll is an indictment of Obama's policies?. You're sure picking stuff you like out of these polls. Stuff that's not actually in them.

Rick -- That's right. The majority hate the path Republicans are trying DRAG the COUNTRY down by refusing to do their job and govern for the good of the country.

JimSpence

The solution to those problems in government is to force the agencies to do more with less, just like almost everyone else in this country has had to do. The sequester is just the start of that. In the GAO audit report you referenced, it was noted that the DOD's financial records were un-auditable due to lack of acceptable standards & processes. Taking money away would force these agencies to get control over their finances.

By the way, you weren't by chance a Company Comander in the Coast Guard boot camp were you? My CC was Jim Spence.

There will be movies much like today's Lincoln that reflect on the utter stupidity of a party that marched in lock-step off a cliff.

It will have to be in the genre of slap-stick comedy, and will contain several one-liners like:

'we don't need no stinkin' polls'

'is it twu what they say about your people's birth certificates'

'Republicans are the common clay of the of the new West - you know, morons'

'What will that @!$%# Rove think of next? Anyone got a dime? We need a @!$%#load of dimes'

http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Blazing_Saddles

It is called "an agreement". Obama wanted the debt ceiling raised. Conservatives demanded our spending problem be addressed. Obama demanded a debt ceiling raise and would agree to cuts in spending and, if Congress could not decide how and where to cut, then the cuts would be across the board.

This was an Obama proposal and both sides agree. Typical Obama not willing to keep his word but an agreement is an agreement. Enjoy the spending cuts.

1. Tea party racism. - Proven to be false.

2. No health care. - ACA is so riddled with issues such as

a. Lack of doctors

b. Doctors retiring or going to other careers

c. Adding 6.2 trillion to the deficit

d. Lowering the quality of healthcare for the middle class that actually pays for their healthcare (my wife and I spend $800 a month out of our paychecks)

e. Increasing the sense of entitlement to 100s of 1000s being added on to medicaid.

3. No immigration reform. - The majority of the left is against amnesty also, democrat presidents have failed to get it through because BOTH parties voted against it. So don't put this on the republicans.

4. War on Women. - I'm not really sure where this war on women came from. If you're talking wages/jobs, obama's administration itself has been proven to be paying women less. Also, depending on the scope you're talking, planned parenthood could be considered having a war on women and minorities through eugenics (proven through the history of the organization).

5. Voter Suppression. - Shall I quote the voting issues that came up this last election such as democrat poll personal physically throwing the republican personal out of the voting place? One woman admitted to voting SIX times for obama? Counties where obama had more than 100% of the vote? Besides, the republicans aren't trying to keep ANY one from the polls, they just want to make sure they can legally vote, and only vote once. I still don't understand why ANY american would be against this.

6. Keep wars going forever. - How many countries have we been in with drones, how many countries have we armed or given war time aid to during the obama adminstration?

7. Make our president a failure. - He doesn't need any help with that.

8. Cuts to programs important to hard working families so that the wealthy can have their tax breaks. - Oh, you mean like extending the tax breaks for GE, Citigroup and other corps while the middle class tax break expires? Or granting more money to failed green energy companies than oil companies get by a large a margin?

Once again, I'm NOT a supporter of the republican party, they have made more than their share of mistakes. All I want to see is the left holding their party responsible like some many of the x-right have done to the republicans.

While some of your points are true about the republicans, they are also VERY true about the democrats.

We see the Independents moving further Left and voting Liberal.

You don't see independents moving further left, that thought just shows your extreme ignorance as to what an independent is. I am still a fiscal and social conservative. I'm not a bible thumping gun totting republican though (don't go to church and don't own a gun). An independent doesn't side with a party, we vote for who we believe will fulfill what we want for our country. I thought obama was that his first term so I voted for him. I knew this last election that he wasn't, so I didn't vote for him.

The liberal ignorance of independents will hurt them, because we bow to no party ideology. This will hurt the democrats in the future, because the republican party created so many of us, do you think we'll fall for party bull@!$%# again? Least of all a party that lies as much as the democrats? The republican party is dying because the leadership strayed, it got greedy for power. They lied a bunch, but the republican party by nature has more ethics (or stupidity, call it what you want) to be a slick willy like the democrat party. The democrat party plays nothing but dirty chicago politics. Their campaigning is nothing but slandering, lying, and spinning.

billybob-6210632

“Liars figure and figures lie.” Is an old economic axiom that over the years, I’ve found to be true.

The actual quote is "figures don't lie but liars will figure". The etymology of the quote is interesting.

http://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/11/15/liars-figure/

Here is a direct quote for you Houston!, right from the article above you obviously did not read or didn't understand. "Per the poll, 32% believe the country is headed in the right direction, which is down three points from last month and nine points since the election." For their version they round the number up to 32% approve, when 31% would have been correct. That leaves 69% that feel the country is headed in the wrong direction, and yes that is an indictment of Obama's failed policies.

OK...I'm gonna admit it. As someone who isn't following the sequestration issue very closely...it is unbelievably confusing listening to both sides. I feel like we're reliving the Mayan apocalypse predictions of 2012 again. Each side seems to be spending all their time blaming the other and making this thing sound terrible to score political points. My main question is this: Is the sequestration truly a cut in spending? Or is it a "Washington cut", which means the actual spending still goes up, just by a smaller percentage. Because if it's a Washington cut, I really can't see how this is going to be "devastating".

Anyone wanna weigh in??? :-/

One of the better ways to emerge from out 4 year economic slump would be for our honorable legislators, those distinguished ladies and gentlemen, to call a moratorium on their idiotic posturing and brinksmanship for one freaking year, and give the private sector some time to grow without the quarterly

"Perils of Pauline"

Where one side or the other has our entire economy tied to the metaphorical train tracks...

The total for the above examples of waste, fraud, abuse and corruption adds up to $1.303 TRILLION ANNUALLY!!!!!

And yet Jim Spence supports sequester cuts to the very programs designed to eliminate waste, fraud, abuse, and corruption. DUH!!!!!!!

Reading through this morning's posts I see that I forgot to include ProBusiness and Jim Spence. The list is endless!

CHristie the most popular GOP party member in the land??? Yes he is, amongst liberals, as he is showing he is one of them more and more every day!!

Dangerfield...great post. Couldn't agree more. Although, I swear, about 1 out of every 3 of your posts sends me to Wikipedia to look something up. "Perils of Pauline"? LOL!

Wow,

The libs are patting each other on the back today. They seem to be warm and fuzzy all over with thier hatred towards others who do not agree with them. The left reminds me of a cat that takes a dump then tries to cover it up. To those who will respond in a hateful manner, Ouch you got me!

Great posts, liberal friends, too many to name you all--informative with logical thinking.

Then there's those "real Americans" or so they claim; I was born in the USA, and last I checked that makes this liberal a "real American" just as much as it makes JimSpence one--differing ideological views has nothing to do with patriotism. After all, our Founders had differing views, that didn't make Jefferson a "real American" and Madison not one.

Pat, Boston, loved the "we smeared Chuck Hagel...." now it's up to him to mend the relationship we (GOPers) destroyed! Talk about chutzpah!

TNSEVOL, great points. Hostess is a classic example, it refused to invest in new equipment, etc.; then wondered why things weren't going well. A good number of the profitable businesses that Mitt Romney's Bain Capital gobbled up weren't just "over-leveraged" by Bain to buy other companies, no money was invested in new equipment or Research and Development. Ultimately, those businesses were declared bankrupt by Bain and many closed--not because they weren't good products but because Bain refused to invest to keep up with market changes and technology.

Pigotry Haven't you read the first paragraph in the article that Obama's numbers are dipping. You got it backwards girl.

morgs74, 1.11, you do realize that rounding up liberals McCarthy style at a virtual bar would require Harry Potter magic, don't you? Never mind--those who see "commies" behind every light post and tree would not grasp the fantasy of their existence.

Rick-3416939

Here is a direct quote for you Houston!, right from the article above you obviously did not read or didn't understand. "Per the poll, 32% believe the country is headed in the right direction, which is down three points from last month and nine points since the election.

And there's nothing in that statement to suggest that the lack of confidence is an "indictment" of Obama's policies like you stupidly claimed. If anything, it's an indictment of the Republicans' government by hostage-taking, given the unpopularity of Republicans the same poll shows.

joe#'s, you're free to leave the USA or First Read anytime you choose. I, however, intend to remain living in the United States which is as much MY country as it is yours, and I intend to express MY views whether you like them or not. Have a nice day.

Reading through this morning's posts I see that I forgot to include ProBusiness and Jim Spence. The list is endless!

hey Jack Off, is that because ProBusiness and Spences posts dont have words like 'love for Obama' or 'Republicans suck'. With such astute dialog from you side i can see why you would find offense to common sense.

Jody, Iowa

morgs74, 1.11, you do realize that rounding up liberals McCarthy style at a virtual bar would require Harry Potter magic, don't you? Never mind--those who see "commies" behind every light post and tree would not grasp the fantasy of their existence.

not that i support rounding of citizens left or right or what have you (this isnt Germany), I will touch on the part of those seeing commies behind every corner. It really mirrors the lefts belief there is a Nazi and Racist in every word spoken that doesnt agree with the liberal left. I see commies and you see racists and Nazis.

These cuts will result in significant job losses in the defense industry. It will also result in a gutting of the regulatory bodies that are supposed to insure that the food you eat, the drugs you are prescribed, the banks with which you do business, are supposed to be ethical. Your food is supposed to be safe. The drugs are not supposed to kill you. Your banker is not supposed to steal your savings account. But those regulatory agencies have been repeatedly cut and this will cut them still more. Inspections of meat packing plants will cease. Inspections of coal mines will cease. Documentation of adequate research into the side effects of new drugs will not be read or examined for inaccuracies or cover-ups. Air traffic control will be cut and air safety will decline. Infrastructure repairs will be sidelined. Veterans' benefits will be reduced and essential services will be curtailed.

Anyone who believes that this will cut the fat is naive. Bureaucracies are self-perpetuating. Services will be cut before the fat cats at the top are dismissed. It will be the enforcement officers that are eliminated. Not the fat cats. The only way to streamline a bureaucracy is to specifically audit that agency, to identify those individuals who produce nothing, to figure out which jobs are redundant. Often, we discover that making the agency more effective involves chopping at the top, not the bottom. This won't happen with across the board cuts. We will be left with the fat cats at the top and be eliminating the producers at the bottom. It is exactly the opposite of what we need to accomplish.

Budget cuts are a great idea. But we need surgical precision, not ax wielding mayhem. Just eliminating a bunch of government funded jobs will only create more unemployment and a return to recession. It will not solve our financial issues at all.

Underemployed So a 3.2% spending increase and a 1.7% cut is actually a cut?? If 1% of the budget will cause all this disaster that would be amazing.. This propaganda you ate hook line and sinker is the same crap the school throws at us every time they want more taxes.. We will have to cut bussing if we don't get it!! Then they use all the tax increase for raises.....

I have to believe that Obamanomics which is spend spend spend and tax the rich is not right.. I also believe that all the money flowing from Washington at the hands of ALL the politicians there needs to be slowed dramatically.. It is hard to believer that such stupidity as in some of these posts by liberal trumpeters is real.. Since dear leader has not come up with a budget in 5 years now it is clear that he is incompetent.. Prices are rising and the value of the dollar keeps shrinking, here comes the crash.. The economy is doomed, Long live the crash..

JODY, try getting a job and contributing then. Better yet, try to find a cure for that dreaded disease called Liberalism. Approx. 18% of you suffer from it. Help keep it from spreading by not breeding.

Poor Caesar! I didn't leave you out--I listed you among the slow-witted.

BTW: What does "rounding of citizens" mean?

Jack in Portsmouth

Poor Caesar! I didn't leave you out--I listed you among the slow-witted.

Im sure you included me Jack Off, I find it an honor to be a Right Wing Knuckledragging, Constitution loving, gun toting nut. It could be far worse.. I could be you.

Very busy day today so I won't be here much but I see my liberal friends are keeping the righties in check.

JimSpence appears to think that if he posts a LOOOOONG post full of nonsense and his diatribe, it will go over well. Hint Jim, it's still just garbage.

I particularly love FR putting the Republicans in the same catagory as the Carnival Cruise lines - how appropriate!

AlexM - your entire post is a lie. Try again - no, wait - don't try again!

Jack in Portsmouth, #1.26, cheers; wish I would be around to see it.

Grimey, you're a smart guy, I doubt that you really need anyone to explain it to you but if you do, Google Ben Bernanke's testimony yesterday. He explained the facts about the sequester danger instead of the myth.

Frank "Grimey" Grimes -- Here's what the CBO and the FED says about these particular cuts in the sequester:

CBO Director Doug Elmendorf told lawmakers at a hearing earlier this month that his nonpartisan agency estimates the cuts would reduce annual gross domestic product growth by 0.6 percentage point this year, enough to eliminate 750,000 jobs.

Citing that estimate, Bernanke said, "given the still- moderate underlying pace of economic growth, this additional near-term burden on the recovery is significant. Besides having adverse effects on jobs and incomes, a slower recovery would lead to less actual deficit reduction in the short run."

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-02-26/bernanke-defends-asset-buying-as-benefits-outweigh-risks.html

The priority should be to do no harm to the fragile economy. Personally, I think the balanced approach of ending some of the corporate loopholes and gimme's to the rich along with targeted spending cuts that don't damage the economy is the better road to go down. It can be easily done if you had reasonable and committed members of the House willing to work for a change.

Roadrunner0

I have to believe that Obamanomics which is spend spend spend and tax the rich is not right.

That's a figment of the ultraconservatives diseased imaginations. The budget deficits have DECREASED since Obama's first year in office and the rich have been doing just fine.

Jack in Portsmouth writes:

"Poor Caesar! I didn't leave you out--I listed you among the slow-witted."

Slow? Did you write, "Slow?" Aren't you feeling kind today?

Accountability is an unpopular thing these days. In the end popularity doesn't mean squat...facts and accountability do.

Until Americans hold the government accountable for their lack of care in spending, the country is doomed. The wave of liberal drunken spending will only hurt our kids and grand kids. They will hold us responsible for their shattered hopes and opportunities...

Houston what are you drinking - I have to get some. Obama has almost DOUBLED the deficit since taking office...plain simple facts. Not an ideology...facts...

Oh hell kick the can down the road some more Obama!

I find it an honor to be a Right Wing Knuckledragging, Constitution loving, gun toting nut.

Whoa, Caesar, dude! Kudos for copping to it. You're one of a kind.

Slow? Did you write, "Slow?" Aren't you feeling kind today?

Why, yes, I am feeling kind today. He admits to his being a knuckle-dragger. Why pile on?

Hi Jody...

Yeah, I consider myself pretty smart, but this is my busiest time of year and I really just haven't been able to follow this story as much as I normally might. All I hear are sound bites during my commute. And trust me...that's not the best way to get my news. LOL

DCIA...

Perfect. That's the kinda thing I was looking for. Thanks!

Careful for what you wish for Miss Pig. Many believe opposition is a good thing. A government unchecked is a breeding ground for tyrrany.

Houston! says, "And there's nothing in that statement to suggest that the lack of confidence is an "indictment" of Obama's policies like you stupidly claimed. If anything, it's an indictment of the Republicans' government by hostage-taking, given the unpopularity of Republicans the same poll shows."

No surprise you are incapable of trying to prove your point without insults. This country is mired in the worst recovery in US history. We have had Obama, Biden, and a number of Democrats claim things like the summer of recovery to the nation is seeing steady improvement. How about unemployment will not go above 8%. According to this latest poll, almost 7 out of every 10 Americans would disagree with what Obama, Biden, and a number of Democrats have claimed about the economy over the past few years. I realize the buck never stops with Obama with you liberals, but many great presidents have worked with both sides of the isle to get things done. Obama seems incapable of doing the same.

joe#s, try grasping that I worked full time from age 19--even while attending college--until 62 when I retired to enjoy the fruits of my labor. I find it amusing that conservatives toss out the "get a job" line because we post on FR yet those same line-tossers are typing away at the keyboard doing the same.

I'm quite proud to be a liberal; used to be a conservative but gave it up with Reagan's first term. As a liberal, I understand that in 1776, if conservatives who fear change had their way, we'd still be flying the British flag. Lincoln was a liberal thinker as was T.R. Roosevelt, Eisenhower, Nixon and Ford. To be honest, I'm not sure that modern conservatives understand what conservatism really is; one thing is certain, it no longer exhibits its once proud values.

Chicken Little Obama, every month or so he creates some type of childish drama of which the media heightens the fear and runs with it, never looking over their shoulder at the untold number of other mythical dramas created by this flim flam artist. He's the great divider and the Repubs are more than happy to go along with the divisive arguments, neither party ever producing a meaningful solution.

The only answer is for the truth to be told and not cloaked in partisan sheets. We have no budget, no plan, no leadership and we're floating off into being irrelavant with a myopic focus on domestic differences while the rest of the world laughs at the childish rants and meaningless meetings that accomplish nothing. Each federal department equally needs to cut, not cut the increase, but actually 10 % per year across the board, then next year another 10% until we get some relief. Entitlements and real give aways without a responsibility to change underlying behavior will only beget more of the same behavior. The answer, no more rhetoric from Obama, Biden, Graham, McCain, McConnell, Reid and Pelosi. They're just tired old political hacks and based on the results to date, why would you ever expect them to actually solve anything, they've been at this for years and this is what we have to show for it. By the way dump Barbara Walters, Diane Sawyer, George Will and all of the other media hacks who actually just yap on and on about the same old stuff. Time to hit the refresh button America.

Rick -- Start putting your money where your mouth is. How about telling me your solutions for a change, eh? I'll be glad to argue with you then, M'kay?

BTW: What does "rounding of citizens" mean?

here since you see racism, that means if one citizen is 3/5's you round up..if less, you round down.

Rounding up of Citizens, guess you were too smart to figure that out by reading further

AlexM - your entire post is a lie. Try again - no, wait - don't try again!

If your pea sized liberal brain can compute at all, you're always welcome to snark your nasty name calling racist challenges against my so called lies. Mostly because I'm sincerely curious about what I supposedly lied about, and also because I don't mind wallowing in the gutter with useless skin bag like you :)

Get Real...

Accountability is an unpopular thing these days. In the end popularity doesn't mean squat...facts and accountability do.

Then why are Republicans always trying to worm their way out of taking responsibility for wrecking the economy in 2007 and lying the country into the disastrous and unnecessary Iraq debacle?

Houston what are you drinking - I have to get some.

I'm drinking coffee. What are you eating? Magic mushrooms?

Obama has almost DOUBLED the deficit since taking office...plain simple facts. Not an ideology...facts...

Plain and simple lies and delusions is what you're blathering. HERE are the plain and simple facts on Obama's budget deficits since he took office:

http://news.investors.com/blogs-capital-hill/021213-644063-chart-should-embarrass-deficit-hawks.htm

CBO expects the deficit to shrink from 8.7% of GDP in fiscal 2011 to 5.3% in fiscal 2013 if the sequester takes effect and to 5.5% if it doesn't. Either way, the two-year deficit reduction — equal to 3.4% of the economy if automatic budget cuts are triggered and 3.2% if not — would stand far above any other fiscal tightening since World War II.

The GOP, which according to this NBC article, is about as popular as Carnival Cruise Lines right now.

Maybe in NBC's world (and the world of the flaming liberals). Those who are able to look past Obama's rhetoric understand that the real problem is with our divider-in-chief. Even top democrats admit that they have never seen a Congress so divided as it is today. This is an Obama failure. The dems can try to place blame on the tea party, but remember that the tea party was a fall-out by the American citizens to Obama's efforts his first two years not to address our economy, but rather to ram health care down our throats. So if you are angry at the tea party, place your anger where it belongs - Obama.

Nevertheless, how does NBC post crap like this and expect to be taken as a serious unbiased news network?

Just one more reason why NBC finished last (tied with the Comedy Channel) when people were asked what is the most trusted news network. And why NBC finished last in February sweeps.

I think I just heard a flush. NBC are you there? NBC? NBC???

Jody, just keep drinking the kool-aid

Jody, Iowa - Virtual? Tell that to the people of LaSalle. And how did you know that the Dew Drop Inn was a bar? Time to find a new clubhouse.

Rick-3416939

No surprise you are incapable of trying to prove your point without insults

I didn't just try to prove it. I did prove that your assertion that the poll was an "indictment of Obama's policies" is total garbage. If you don't like being insulted, then stop acting like an idiot.

Oh yeah, the Libbies are in fine voice this morning. GM Pigotry and Feisty.

Let us all face reality. Friday morning the sequester will come and go with little notice.

The country is completely divided 50/50 and it seems this was Barry's goal. That is not leadership.

All hail the great Divider in chief.............you were right Pigotry, mission accomplished.

32% believe the country is headed in the right direction, which is down three points from last month.

More people 56% strongly beleive Obama is taking us to the wrong direction.

Sequester is the first step in the right direction... Stop spending before the debt is 20 trillion. This is what it will be at the end of President Obama's term and with the history of the past 12 years of spending we don't see any change yet. Our government and its spending habits are out of control. Anyone with any common sense sees this. It has nothing to do with the poor, the rich or the middle class and everything to do with corruption in our government and their appetite to spend, spend, spend.

SCREW THE POLLSTERS ....... This country needs genuine leadership! ...

this country can't move forward by governing by consensus .... the overall population has absolutely no idea what to do to move us forward ... and the deceit of politics is what got us here; the tell em what they want to hear and spend money we haven't got ... a economic Ponzi scheme .... let the future generations pay for it ... idea.

Both parties are wrong as well as being right ... it's time they got their dead arse s off the dime ... if you cant fix it ... GET OUT .. before you send this country down the toilet!

Grimey, work does take priority; sorry. I think common sense guides the best understanding because it makes no sense to remove money from an economy that is still sluggish; the end result is that the lost of jobs means loss of revenues which means the deficit reductions gained by the sequester are cancelled by the lost revenues. DCIA posted some of Bernanke's testimony. He's a pretty conservative guy.

Morgs74, LOL, there are probably a hundred Dew Drop Inns across this country, and there's a high probably as the name implies that they're mostly bars. The Friday First Read DDI is a virtual reflection of those many Dew Drops that dot the landscape from sea to shining sea.

Oh..., the drama... Yawn...

dartatak

Oh yeah, the Libbies are in fine voice this morning. GM Pigotry and Feisty.

Let us all face reality. Friday morning the sequester will come and go with little notice.

The country is completely divided 50/50 and it seems this was Barry's goal. That is not leadership.

All hail the great Divider in chief.............you were right Pigotry, mission accomplished.

I love how 1 man can get the credit/blame for dividing 535 people, let alone close to 320 million.

Ahhh, and civil war is imminent. Bye, Bye USA!

Dartatak: Good summation.

Having a rational debate with a liberal is like trying to wax a moving car. Ain't gonna happen.

End result is our politicians (both parties) bend us over the counter and don't give us the common courtesy of a "thank you". And the people continue to reelect this scum in D.C. So you get what you voted for.

But a liberal won't convince me that the Obama policy is correct. It isn't for a number of reasons but the easiest reason is to just look at the last 4 years:

1) Borrowed and added $6 Trillion in debt in 4 years with no plans to even slow that down over the next decade.

2) AFTER borrowing $6 Trillion STILL can't show a positive GDP in the last quarter of 2012 as we enter another recession (although we never LEFT the recession of 2008 but that is for another discussion)

3) During the last 4 years we had more people LEAVE the workforce than jobs created

4) On that point we have the lowest labor participation rate in nearly 40 years

5) We have increased those on Food Stamps in the last 4 years by about 40% (now the highest percent on Food Stamps since the program was started)

6) We have the highest percent on Welfare since the 70's

7) We have the highest percent of the population out of work 6 months or more since the Great Depression

8) The Fed is printing (and lending to ourselves) $1 Trillion a year JUST to keep us from an economic collapse (that is unsustainable and when the printing stops so does our economy)

But I have realized arguing the point doesn't matter anymore. The liberals have been able to reelect a president who is the proud title holder as the president responsible for the WORST economic recovery in history and those above STILL are not smart enough to realize what danger this country is in.

But pointing fingers don't work anymore and not worth my time. This country deserves what it votes for and just like Greece, Portugal, Italy, and others we are paying the price.

"Something for nothing" is the goal of liberals and they are succeeding but as Margaret Thatcher once said "Socialism works fine until you run out of other people's money". Sad to see the massive decline of this country over the last decade or so. Very sad. But you get what you voted for. Now enjoy the consequences.

Caesar,

Rounding up of Citizens, guess you were too smart to figure that out by reading further

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: You're careless and lazy with the written word--and that carelessness and laziness is reflected in your thinking (resulting in a lack of it).

Pro,

"Something for nothing" . . .

and the chicks for freeeee! Yeah, that ain't working, that's the way to do it, money for nothing . . . .

Our country is screwed if we can't even remove a small percentage of cuts (5% or less) and start paying down the debt. Interest rates will go up... then what? It will make no difference what we tax, because there will be no way to pay even the interest on the debt, let alone invest in America. Let's spend, spend, spend makes total sense

We ALL may be suffering from the sequester effects but the Obama's continuing decline in approval ratings are a direct result from his unwillingness and inability to effectively lead as POTUS.

It's has become obvious to most that he is more interested in campaigning and gaining in popularity than meeting with Congress and others to avoid the sequester, which will likely happen as a result.

The only salvation this president has is the continued backing of the liberal media and their faithful followers.

joe#s, the minute a conservative throws out the "kool aid" line after first throwing out the "get a job" line, it means they have no counter argument. You lose, I win. Enjoy your day.

kkwilson, the GOPTP's approval ratings have declined, too; they can't go much lower because they're under water. Republicans go home every week to campaign, just spent 10 days on vacation, got a problem with that?

ProBusiness -- You write:

Borrowed and added $6 Trillion in debt

Most of which can be traced to tax cuts, war and unfunded programs the Republicans put in place.

Republicans stood around marveling at the HOUSE OF CARDS they built with leverage, then it came crashing down, harming real people, forcing them to take assistance. Why are you so blind to that? You act as if this President caused that crash. GROW UP, girlie.

Chase bank just announced it is reducing it's workforce by 7% by 2014. Amazing our government can't find one and a quarter % to cut without still doing it's job. They must be the most efficient organization in the history of man.

billybob,

According to you the impact has little to do with what timeframe the cuts are made.

85$ billion has the same impact if it is applied over 6 months or 6 years.

You also imply that it has the same impact if it is across the entire budget or just one department

Seriously?? … no critical thinking there!!

Revenge,

OSU was undefeated in 2012, how did your team do?

Not sure about your math but it will FEEL LIKE much more than $85 Billion.

ProBusiness

Dartatak: Good summation.

Having a rational debate with a liberal is like trying to wax a moving car. Ain't gonna happen.

Wonderful use of ad hominem for an opposing group. As someone who truly appreciates logical fallacies, this one is one of my favorites. Let's just label all of one group as unable to have a rational conversation. Perhaps the other group will respond with something in kind. Perhaps someone on the left can come and call you one of their favorite terms, like racist or crony plutocrat.

Do you ever wonder when you make these statements why 90% of the reaction is either negative and without substance or wholly supportive but lacking substance? Reminds me of kids in a school yard gathering after the last bell and egging 2 kids on to fight.

Can't we just go back to the good old days and judge people by their skin color rather than their politics?

The Obama lower education supporters are typing away like mad this morning trying to distract everyone from the fact that this whole sequestor idea belongs to thier savior himself. This idea came from the Whitehouse, had by-partisen support and is now being used as a boogy man by Obama to scare people and make them think that cutting a lousy $1 Trillion Dollars IN INCREASED DEBT over the next 10 years is a big flippin deal. If they weren't math challenged and knew how little a drop in the bucket this amount is they might have a clue to how full of crap Obama is with all the doomsday BS he and his comrades are spreading around. Let the sequestor happen, then take a look and wake up people it is all bull crap to keep from their having to ADD LESS to thier overblown spending next year and new programs as Obama calls his handouts won't get to be as big. It never ceases to amaze me how dumb some people are and how willing to lie through their teeth others are.

CA, if you are so concerned about what liberals say about conservatives, you should go back over the thread above and read what conservatives had to say about liberals. You should read the names they called the President.

But pointing fingers don't work anymore and not worth my time. This country deserves what it votes for and just like Greece, Portugal, Italy, and others we are paying the price.

And good riddance. It gets very old when you have pro business advocates that view Americans through one narrow prism - that of consumers, and to that end, needing business to tell them what to buy, tell them what type of government that must have, and tell them what morals/values they must live by. Perhaps one day, these pro business types will learn a lesson in humility and realize business is secondary to a nation of citizens, and exists solely to serve the needs of the public - not the other way around.

I still find it funny how uninformed people are and how the English language is being slaughtered. First of all, THERE ARE NOT BUDGET CUTS happening as a result of the so-called sequester. Even with the sequester, we are planning on spending more this year than we did last year. So, all of the hoopla about the catastrophe that would occur is a bunch of BS! When the language is so skewered that an increase is called a cut and the ignorant don't know that or don't care, then we are in a heap of trouble.

And, what we are talking about ($44 billion in cuts of a planned increase in spending this year) is a pittance of the entire federal budget. Heck, just have Obama spend a couple of months without going golfing and it will take care of that! So, the reduction in the increase will take affect and the dems will kick, scream, whine and complain yet again that the sky is falling. And then they will do the same for the next 30 days as Congress addresses the debt limit, which they kicked down the road yet again. The good thing for the dems is that the repubs will roll over on this point. The bad thing for the country is that the repubs will roll over on this one.

Wouldn't it be More Productive if Our Elected Leaders Started Working Together as AMERICANS for AMERICANS and AMERICA, instead of just bickering, stalling and posturing for the next election as democrats and republicans! The American People have had it with this unproductive BS! The way that both parties having been operating for years just stinks! Neither party has really been looking out for the best interests of the US Citizens who elect them and who they're supposed to represent.

Both parties have sold out the bulk of the American citizens, who they're supposed to represent, by allowing the "out-sourcing" floodgates to open wider and wider without taking any sensible measures to stem the tide.

It shouldn't be all about Democrats or Republicans! It should be about Americans, especially our elected officials, doing the right thing for our country and its citizens. All the single-minded, left versus right, ideological one dimensional bull has got to go!

Both parties need to start working together and actually start doing something to fix the real problems in our country like "out-sourcing", illegal immigration, the out of control costs of health care insurance and our reliance on foreign fuel. If they don't start working together and actually start making progress by the next election, then American citizens should run a nation-wide campaign to vote out all incumbents regardless of party to send the message.

The ONLY REAL FIX is to Raise Revenue, by Bringing Back Jobs to US Citizens who Pay Income Tax.

Massive cutting just puts more people on unemployment, which just depresses the economy even further.

Returning private sector jobs to American Citizens will provide income tax revenue to OUR Government versus our government having to pay unemployment benefits to those who would be jobless instead. We need our elected officials to Start Protecting American Jobs and do whatever it takes to bring back the jobs they let go. We need leaders who will actually stand up for the American people.

The bottom line is that “Our Government” has to protect domestic industry and the jobs that those industries provide. If they do that, the rest will take care of itself.

We may have to pay a bit more for products made here in the USA by US citizens, but at least we'll still have jobs and a future for our children.

And yes - I'm Angry - As are most American Citizens right now!

fielden

CA, if you are so concerned about what liberals say about conservatives, you should go back over the thread above and read what conservatives had to say about liberals. You should read the names they called the President.

Nothing quite like the "Billy started it!" and "Johnny is doing it too!" argument.

What are we, five years old again?

Suggesting that because you were insulted and you should return an insult doesn't work when you attempting to hold the high ground in an adult discussion.

CA at the very least is pretty open about attacking those he disagrees with... sometimes hilariously.

Beverly in chi town...

I see you are on the obama fear mongering team.

The consensus amongst analysts, economists and business leaders interviewed on bloombergTV is that maybe, just maybe GDP will drop by 1/2% with the sequester. A 1/2% drop in GDP hardly suggests a recession. However, if you are saying that under the all knowing tutelage of obamas economic growth plan since 2009 that our current GDP growth is 1/2% or less, then we may see a recession.

So bev, sounds like you are implying that obama doesn't know jack, but being the chi town spokeswoman you still grasp at straws trying to blame someone else.

LMAO!

"A government of the people, by the people, and for the people shall not perish from the Earth". The great Man was thinking unique and noble? Couldn't He see the glaring ambiguity? A government by which people? Benefitting which people. What was to be left for those who did not belong to the 2 former groups? Well, thanks more to "Theodore Roosevelt" and later, the great "Franklin Delano Roosevelt" this unique government survived and actually thrived. Even greatly muscled up. After though, it became the meal for more and more of the capitalistic cannibals and carrion connoisseurs, who have not yet quite brought it to the state of "perish" but have suffered it to the state of severe emaciation, maybe soon to "perish from the Earth". The President attempts the administration of replenishment, if He can keep enough meat on the bones to sustain life long enough to find and supply the required nourishment.

witchrunner

I still find it funny how uninformed people are and how the English language is being slaughtered. First of all, THERE ARE NOT BUDGET CUTS happening as a result of the so-called sequester. Even with the sequester, we are planning on spending more this year than we did last year.

The immigration service has already released 1,000 illegal immigrants from custody in preparation for the sequester because they cannot afford to house them. There will be cuts in FDA food and drug inspectors and in the number of TSA agents at airports, increasing the time it takes to get through security and closing some airports. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that 750,000 jobs will be killed due to the sequester, starting with layoffs of federal workers that snowball into layoffs in the private sector. That sounds like budget cuts to me, and potentially devastating ones.

The sky is falling the sky is falling.

american-2051576

Beverly in chi town...

I see you are on the obama fear mongering team.

The consensus amongst analysts, economists and business leaders interviewed on bloombergTV is that maybe, just maybe GDP will drop by 1/2% with the sequester. A 1/2% drop in GDP hardly suggests a recession. However, if you are saying that under the all knowing tutelage of obamas economic growth plan since 2009 that our current GDP growth is 1/2% or less, then we may see a recession.

Recession:

Definition: The textbook definition of a recession is when GDP growth is negative for two consecutive quarters or more.

Was the GDP growth positive last quarter?

Democrats - Food stamps - Illinois - Obama - Jackson Jr - Blagoivich - Corruption - The Saga Continues

Just put your ususal Bush Band-Aid on it Barack

You can't spell Liberal - without - A Lie

Obama-Lie-A-Lot has gotten so old and so out of control - ooooo - scary

rocky-2318920

The sky is falling the sky is falling.

If you were one of the 750,000 workers who gets laid off because of the sequester, you'd think the sky was falling, too.

Why NO Leadership Obama?

Excuses and Blame? The old Bush Band-Aid to cover up your failure and incompetence?

Sad and Pathetic - for an American President - but - your wear both well

Barack - has gone over the edge America - face it

Leave it to this website to FOCUS on the "popularity" contest of politics. The writers of this thread should be ashamed of themselves. True journalism has been totally replaced with middle-school catchphrases and smarta$$ comparisons.

Carnival Cruise lines has NOITHING to do with the fact that Obama has never had the ball$ to see to it that a BUDGET was pa$$ed .... as REQUIRED by our Constitution !

Tax and spend. When you have spent too much, raise taxes a second time and make sure you "redistribute" a little more ... the "redistributees" appreciate that !!

Barack Obama is a financial clu$terf_ck and he is not keeping his promises made as part of the fiscal cliff deal ! But then again, has Obama EVER kept his promises to reduce government spending ? Hell no !!

Media darling Donna Brazil - is complaining that her Insurance Premium - is going up - yes that Donna Brazil

Can you say Obama-care Donna?

[CA, if you are so concerned about what liberals say about conservatives, you should go back over the thread above and read what conservatives had to say about liberals. You should read the names they called the President.]

Commodus can't answer you at the moment, he's in an "infrastructure" meeting...either that or he's over at the gun-nut thread making a total ass of himself...AGAIN.

Mrs. Piggy and Idiot Redhead... so what your cheering about today is even though the article clearly shows Obama has an issue with spending our money and clearly shows he sucks, your cheering because the GOP sucks more? Mediocrity is what we are cheering about here? Go figure, as long as your getting your share of free stuff we can live with a president, cabinet, senate and congress that we all agree sucks. Keep on cheering your left wing version of suck.... It's no wonder your a blogger by day and welfare recipient by day too. Willing to settle and cheer for a bunch of loser couldn't hold a day job politicians instead of calling them out, just because they are your party of choice. They all suck! Step up to the plate and call it for what it is. Pelosi is at the top of the stack, anybody lying directly to the public and trying to believe it.... "we don't have a spending problem" whatever.

[Media darling Donna Brazil - is complaining that her Insurance Premium - is going up - yes that Donna Brazil. Can you say Obama-care Donna?]

Can you say "insurance company gouging", Mucus?

Fixed it for you...

Oh, and it's Brazile...Donna Brazile.

Well Obama certainly did have a hand in the housing/economy crash.. He was on the team of liberal lawyers that sued and got the law about earning levels and loan security splattered like a cow patty on the road.. That opened the flood gate to a truck load of bad high risk loans that ended up defaulting..

Bring on the cuts, we need em now. They're merely interest cuts to the growing budgets... Make it worse, go beyond that because this debt is insane and I'm apart of the heading generation who's gonna eat it later.

Still lots of Republican lie. president has a plan google it White House Sequester Plan.

It is debt not as big a deal most people think.

Fact 1 Deficit is down 12% why because we are a good hard working county. In-spite of the people who do not believe in us. It will go down more this year if they cancel the sequester. Because it is the recession that is the problem.

Fact 2 People are are giving the government money for 30 year for free. Yield adjusted for inflation is negative.

Fact 3 The two stupid war we have waged are winding down. They 40million stupid people are still up in the mountains. They still believe we are the devil. Because they want girls not to go to school because it interferer with their cow dung gathering. If that is god plan then we are the devil. We left those very mountain to get away from those people 10,000 year ago. And the still hate us. It will never change.

TY, Probusiness

Being that I'm at WORK, I didn't have time to elaborate further, Lunchtime is over.....back to WORK.

Having a rational debate with a liberal is like trying to wax a moving car. Ain't gonna happen.

True, funny and yet sad.

When I get home from WORK tonight, I'll read your post fully and give it the thumbs up it deserves.

US Government Spending has increased - 75% since 2006 - fact - coincidence?

Democrat controlled Spend Crazy Congress from 2007-2010 - controlling America's purse strings

Lay blame on where we are at today - where it belongs - on the Bizzaro World Spend Happy and Often Democrats - fact

Beverly in Chicago

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

JimSpence

The Congressional Budget Office published a “Budget Options” series identifying more than $140 billion in potential spending cuts.

First you pick this out of my post from the CBO, and then you reply with this,,,

You do know where you can put that bullsh!t link; I hope? The CBO said if sequester takes place we'll go in recession.

Then you use the CBO to verify your point!

So, which is it Bevrly? Is the CBO a verifiable source of information? Or is it only when it supports our statist POTUS who flip-flopped on the sequester but now you try to fear-monger the unwashed masses with a recession?

Spooooooooooky, isn’t it?

Put your skewed Jim DeMint Heritage Foundation some the sun doesn't shine. You are just like the fools over @ your right wing slimy site. 61% disagree c you

BINGO!!!!!!!

Ding, Ding, Ding we have a WINNER!!!!

Good ole Bevrly in Cheecago was the first to single out the Heritage Foundation site I purposefully set in the list of waste, fraud, abuse and corruption I provided.

Of course in your pathetic Liberal/Progressive effort to protect our criminal bloated government you ignore all the other sights I provide because YOU CAN’T HANDLE THE TRUTH!!!!

ROTFLMAO!!!!!

You are the poster-child, along with your other Liberal/Progressive miscreants, that clings so pathetically to your hand-outs that you can’t see straight any longer. Of course it’s all based on your “emotional” concerns for the poor and disenfranchised.

As I have stated more often than I can remember, we have spent over $17 TRILLION DOLLARS on the criminal “war on poverty” and you still demand more. The only solution you Liberals/Progressives have been brainwashed into is to believe what a mob of 545 civil servants demand.

You honestly believe they actually care for you, don’t you? You poor lost little soul.

So, tell me Bev in Cheecago, just how many more TRILLIONS of our hard earned tax dollars will it take to please your gluttony for social and economic justice nonsense?

Your answer should be, NONE.

None, because that’s how much it will take for your sacrosanct “redistribution of wealth” to work. It has never worked before but you have been so deluded you think it will.

What I would like to know is if you Libbies are so much more intelligent, so much more informed, so much more “Progressive”, why aren’t you all getting educated in business, becoming CEO’s of all these bogeyman corporations you all despise so much and run them according to your convoluted social and economic justice propaganda?

Because you don’t want to. Because you can’t! You just want to wallow in your self-pity and insignificance and demand someone else do it for you.

This is the pitiful vision real Americans see in you.

So, Bev in Cheecago, go ahead and ignore the real facts I presented by the government you worship so sadly and focus on the Heritage Foundation report. By the way IF you had any self-esteem you would have researched and found that there is a BIPARTISAN effort to get rid of the $25 billion burden of all those vacant buildings our criminal government continues to waste our money on. But that would require someone from the DNC or maybe Barrack Hussein to tell you to do that as you are obviously incapable.

So go dwell on your mediocrity that Barrack Hussein wants you to achieve so he can keep manipulating you as he has for over 4 years.

Real Americans are ashamed of you and your Liberal/Progressive cabal.

But you wouldn’t understand that anyway.

Oh, just one more thing.

You do know where you can put that bullsh!t link; I hope? The CBO said if sequester takes place we'll go in recession

Just when did we get out of the recession? Be careful how you answer that. The 23 million Americans who are still under/unemployed may take exception to your answer.

Liberals, so easy!

Its down over a 10 year plan you mean. Yet he wants to say he saved money so he can create this superb preschool plan he talked about? Do you really believe he's going after all he's stated in this "plan"?

Your facts 2 and 3 are so poorly put together I can't take you seriously. The wars are winding down but the debt's owed to them are not, welcome to reality.

The sequester is interest payment cuts, it says nothing about the actual budgets that programs have, you need to stop playing into the fear mongering of the media.

Can you say "insurance company gouging"

You do recognize how stupid that makes you appear Muckey? Right? Sure you're not a Jersey boy?

Krispy Kreme much?

What a bunch of spoiled little punks. All of them. All any of them care about is snapping it off in the other parties a$$. None of them care about what's best for the country, only that they can blame it on the other party. Bunch of drama queens, our country might as well be "lead by a group of 14 year old girls..

Jim Spence -- You write:

The 23 million Americans who are still under/unemployed may take exception to your answer.

The Republican prescriptions would create even more unemployed and their "Right to Work" policies are making sure the jobs that ONCE paid a decent wage now pay below standard.

Milton Friedman, the economist the right holds in esteem, was adamantly against "Right to Work" laws. Even he believed in UNIONS.

Mucus, there is NO REASON your or anyone elses health insurance goes up other than the insurance company is gouging...plain and simple. And the gravy train stops in 2014, and that is the reason they are gouging their customers. But don't let facts get in the way of your ideological and emotional reasoning on the issues.

Oh, and say "hello" to Rush for me...

Houston! says, "I didn't just try to prove it. I did prove that your assertion that the poll was an "indictment of Obama's policies" is total garbage. If you don't like being insulted, then stop acting like an idiot."

Proved what? That you act like a spoiled brat? What, born with a silver spoon in your mouth, still living at mommy and daddy's? Blame, excuses, and insults is all liberals bring to any table. True leaders rise above the obstacles, they don't make excuses for not getting past them. Obama is simply not a leader, and obviously community organizing wasn't a good resume for the job.

Marcus D-4300696

Lay blame on where we are at today - where it belongs - on the Bizzaro World Spend Happy and Often Democrats - fact

Here are the real facts, which I repeat now and then to counter the kind of crap you're spewing. Not that it makes any difference to people who make up their own facts:

http://news.investors.com/blogs-capital-hill/021213-644063-chart-should-embarrass-deficit-hawks.htm

CBO expects the deficit to shrink from 8.7% of GDP in fiscal 2011 to 5.3% in fiscal 2013 if the sequester takes effect and to 5.5% if it doesn't. Either way, the two-year deficit reduction — equal to 3.4% of the economy if automatic budget cuts are triggered and 3.2% if not — would stand far above any other fiscal tightening since World War II.

Marcus D,

The budget has increased by 32% not 75% since 2006

The budget increased by 50% from 2000 to 2006 and by 64% from 2000 to 2008

Also note that the budget increase from 2009 to 2012 is a whopping 8.1%

You can't spell Liberal - without - A Lie

Wow Marcus - aren't you clever. Did you know you can't spell Republican without pubic, epic, pelican, pecan?

Oh, and Marcus, did you know you can't spell Marcus without SCRAM or SCUM?

Can you say "insurance company gouging", Mucus?

But Obama promised us our premiums would go down by $2500. Are you suggesting that despite $2500 in savings from the Affordable Care Act that the insurance company has the audacity to RAISE their premiums to the extent that Ms. Brazile would complain about it? What a scandal! Why, it sounds like the plot of a Hollywood movie! -- Which btw, is what most of the liberal hyperbole sounds like on these boards...

Percentage increases no matter how small manipulate the actual results to seem less important then they really are... I could tell you deaths in drunk driving have increased only 4% since new safety measures were put in place, what I didn't tell you was that 4% was a whopping 3000 deaths.

Don't use percentage points, because there is no revealing what it's based on. Just use normal numbers so we can take into account the problem at hand.

David Walker

Jim Spence:

Here's a great idea. The next time you can document an instance of fraud, waste, abuse, or some such, write to your Congress person and tell them about it

Hmmmmm, funny you should mention that Davey.

You know, I have done that. I have sent my whole file of over 400 instances of waste, fraud, abuse and corruption (WFAC) to our 2 pathetic Democrat Senators here in the Great Lake state of Michigan. You know who I mean right? Good ole Debbie Stabmenow and the geriatric poster boy Carl Levin.

And guess what?

They never contacted the offending agencies or departments or offices or anyone else. I know because the polite “staffer” I spoke to in follow up told me they don’t have time to worry about WFAC and then hung up on me. I think they were too busy trying to find more ways to waste, abuse, defraud and corrupt our money.

But all was not lost, they did send me their typical boiler-plate e-mail about how hard they are working for me and ALL Americans to drive us into insolvency. I’m sure you get the same version, don’t you.

remember that the Republican Party has systematically gutted enforcement and investigative arms of regulatory agencies

OK, once again, I’ll play. Show me the legislation, with a link, of all these spooooky Republican efforts to gut enforcement and investigative arms with the Congressional vote records that had NO Democrats vote for it.

Don’t worry, I won’t hold my breath.

Based on your posts, I am absolutely certain you've never done this. I'm certain you've never dealt face to face with a Congress person. You don't go to board meetings. You vote a straight party ticket. You don't understand the process, such as it is. You don't have a shred of experience in the political world.

WOWWWWW Davey!!!!!

That’s a lotta absolute certainty. I’d love to get into a political debate with you but I don’t argue with unarmed Libbies.

You see, I have found over the decades that arguing with a Liberal/Progressive is very similar to shadow boxing.

After 15 minutes 2 undeniable truths emerge.

1. I’m tired.

2. I always win.

Come on Davey, you Teabaggee’s* should know that.

* Teabagee: (n) A liberal that likes to suck the testicles of Conservatives, Republicans or TEA Partiers. They usually ask for it by calling any of the above a "teabagger".

repojam...

Two things, let's wait for the governments revised figures on 4th quarter growth shall we? Seems that no one expected negative growth 4Q.

Secondly, since the sequester will not have an immediate impact Mar 1, 2013, but rather over a period of time, shall we wait to see what 1Q GDP is? Based on econ 101, negative GDP growth in 1Q 2013 cannot be blamed on the sequester, just not enough time and $80 billion for the rest of FY 2012 is just not large enough. Besides obama said the private sector is doing just fine.

Do you wish to claim clairvoyance on the sequester causing more than a 1/2% drop in GDP, 1Q 2013? Doesn't the obama administration think that GDP is stronger than 1/2%?

american,

Actually it can since surveys have shown that many people have cut back spending already due to the unknown.

Nice try !

Let me let you in on a little secret, why is Obama fighting this spending cut so much? Because nobody will notice.

And if we can cut nearly $100 Billion and nobody notice then the uninformed voters will say "I thought we would notice and we didn't? I wonder if we could cut ANOTHER $100 Billion?".

That would be a catastrophe to the Obama and Democrat Party if the people realized that we DON'T need government as much as they SAY we do.

So let's cut and cut away. Cut $85 Billion (of course it is actually not a cut. It is a reduction in the base line increase. But I digress).

The worst thing that can happen to Obama is this cut take place and all the "sky is falling" rhetoric is recognized as just that - rhetoric. And it has such a minimal effect that nobody notices.

Before we can cut $200 Billion we have to cut $85 Billion first. Then in order to cut $400 Billion we must cut $200 Billion. Then in order to cut $800 Billion we must cut $400 Billion. If we were to cut just $85 Billion a year from our budget then, in theory, in 10 years we will have a close to balanced budget.

Sometimes the family budgets that get saved start out with simply cutting out the daily cup of coffee at Starbucks. That is what we are doing with this sequester.

Jody, Iowa

TNSEVOL, great points. Hostess is a classic example, it refused to invest in new equipment, etc.; then wondered why things weren't going well.

Yet, as I remember, you Libbies were apoplectic for Romney to do SOMETHING, TO DO ANYTHING TO SAVE HOSTESS!!!

You see, this is why Mitt Romney and millions of other businesspeople are successful. They understand that in a true free-market system sometimes you have to let some bad rubbish go.

Unlike our criminal government that just continues to force their dysfunctional Keynesian nonsense and continue with hundreds of programs that waste hundreds of billions of our hard earned tax dollars. Then Barrack Hussein has the cojones to try and intimidate the unwashed masses with doom and gloom.

Yet you Libbies want more and more government.

You should be ashamed.

ProBusiness

Let me let you in on a little secret, why is Obama fighting this spending cut so much? Because nobody will notice.

ABSOLUTELY!!!!

Especially since only about half of the $85 billion will be felt this year.

While the sequester orders the White House to withdraw $85 billion in spending authority from affected agencies in the fiscal year that ends in September, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office predicts that agencies will reduce actual spending by only about $44 billion, with the remaining cuts carried over into future years.

http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-02-23/politics/37257686_1_cuts-obama-budget-president-obama

Less than 1.2% of our bloated budget and of course the Lamestream Liberal media will continue to allow Barrack Hussein to fear-monger the illiterate masses that voted for him.

Of course the miscreants here at PMSNBC will NEVER report this!

The limp-wristed Libbies should be dancing in the streets as most of the sequester will affect that which they hate the most, the military. Of course we all know they hate our troops and the fact that the Constitution mandates that we support our military but not their social programs they all need to live on because they are incapable of supporting themselves.

Liberals/Progressives, truly a pathetic party!

Pigotry: I have read many of your posts on this article and others. You got one thing right: your screen name. You are such a liberal pig, eating the white-house-run-media's swill and drinking O-bow-to-me's koolaid.

The white-house-run-liberal-media keeps spewing the lie that the sequester is a Republican idea when it actually came from the white house and O-bow-to-me threatened to veto any legislation to change it. The brain-dead liberals need to watch those video clips...oh, wait...they are only on Fox News; another example of the state-run media in the tank for the divider-in-chief.

Another reason why, I too, am now ashamed of my country.

"It's hard to put your hand over your heart when it's extended waiting for a handout." - veteran55

Wow Marcus - aren't you clever!

Yes I am - made your lazy - non-thinking mind - get busy

You know that's anti-Obama to do that though - right?

there is NO REASONyour or anyone elses health insurance goes up other than the insurance company is gouging...plain and simple

You have been misled Muckey Muck! The unions are already upset at the increase they will be forced to pay - but - "Don't Stop Believing" Have another Jelly filled with Krispy Kreme - maybe he'll go Dem soon!

Jim Spence,

[Less than 1.2% of our bloated budget and of course the Lamestream Liberal media will continue to allow Barrack Hussein to fear-monger the illiterate masses that voted for him.]

Actually it is 2.4% of the entire budget but since only the Defense Department and Discretionary spending are affected (36% of the budget) by the sequester it is actually more like a 6.6% cut to those areas (6% Disc. & 8% Defense) … this year … not future spending.

All right Spence:

Right here, right now, I'm calling you a liar. If you can document 400 cases you have more than enough to take your case to a local prosecutorial office. You know damned good and well what I'm talking about. Take those 400 cases to your local D.A., your A.G., or even a federal prosecutor. Four-hundred cases, my dyin' ass.

Congressional staffers may be into boiler plate and BS, but they don't hang up on constituents. However, given your demeanor here, if you did actually place a call, which I doubt, you were abusive and the staffer was right to hang up on you. But before the staffer hung up, you say you were told they didn't have time to worry about waste, fraud, abuse, and corruption. BS!

As for gutting enforcement, I'll give you a great example you don't have the guts or brains to address. When it became clear that the feds under President Bush were not going to prosecute financial irregularities, state authorities began to wade in. Legislation forbidding their intervention went through a Republican-controlled federal government. That's a fact.

For more, you could, but you won't, check staffing levels at federal regulatory agencies.

As far as your debating me. Please. As always, you mistake fifth-grade playground insults for facts. You have the intellectual depth of Saran Wrap.

Marcus D,

US Government Spending has increased - 75% since 2006 - fact - coincidence? Democrat controlled Spend Crazy Congress from 2007-2010 - controlling America's purse strings Lay blame on where we are at today - where it belongs - on the Bizzaro World Spend Happy and Often Democrats - fact

Total Bullsh!t!! No need for me to correct this stupid fool, Dennis already took care of that. People like Marcus D is why we look at these Obama haters as a bunch of clueless nutjobs..

Obama stepped up to the microphone and said "I ain't never done nothing" "It Ain't my fault" "I didn't know" turned around - and headed back to the golf course

"I will not rest until -" oh yeah, right

Sad and pathetic example - but proof of incompetence and failure

Chase bank just announced it is reducing it's workforce by 7% by 2014. Amazing our government can't find one and a quarter % to cut without still doing it's job. They must be the most efficient organization in the history of man.

I remember when is was considered a failure to lay off people. Times have really changed. Now you get a bonus for doing it. Why look for more customers when you can just lay people off. Heck, you might even be able to saddle current employees with the work of those you just fired and never hire them back. Who cares anymore, as long as the bottom line increases. We have now come to expect that companies really have no social responsibility and exist only to make profits for shareholders.

Thankfully there are still some company owners who look more at the long term and do care about their responsibility to the communities in which they operate (I just can't think of any of them right now).

People like Marcus D is why we look at these Obama haters as a bunch of clueless nutjobs.

Nice! People like Jason I suppose then are why our children and grandchildren will never see the prosperity they should have an opportunity to - weak, uninformed sheep of the Flock of Obama

Oh, and say "hello" to Rush for me...

Muckey Muck - your Rachel Maddow and Chris Matthews addiction - is legendary - don't go bashful now

Dennis, Columbus, Ohio

Jim Spence,

Actually it is 2.4% of the entire budget but since only the Defense Department and Discretionary spending are affected by the sequester it is actually more like a 6.6% cut to those areas … this year … not future spending.

Then you Libbies should be ecstatic as it will cripple your biggest bogeyman, the military and our brave troops. We all know you hate the military and your mythical "military industrial complex".

I know our Democrat Senators are having a party as the military bases here in Michigan are being crippled by what Barrack Hussein originally proposed and has finally gotten.

I'm just waiting to see which children Barrack Hussein will allow to suffer more, the "poor children" or the "disabled children".

“There’s no smart way to do that,” he said. “Do I close funds for disabled kids or poor kids?

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2013/02/26/white-house-denies-republican-charges-of-scare-tactics-around-sequester.html

You Liberals have no shame!

Rick-3416939

Houston! says, "I didn't just try to prove it. I did prove that your assertion that the poll was an "indictment of Obama's policies" is total garbage. If you don't like being insulted, then stop acting like an idiot."

Proved what?

I said what I proved in what you just quoted, and then you asked "proved what?" You just proved you really are an idiot, as if more proof were really needed.

Marcus D,

When I 4 years old our National Debt was 125% of our GDP. Government with high taxes and smart investment in our nation's infrastructure was able to reduce that to 33% of GDP by 1980.
However along came Reagan who decided it would be a very good thing to cut taxes sharply while increasing spending dramatically causing our National Debt to climb to 69% of GDP in just 12 years.
The point is that we were deeper in debt in the mid-40's than we are today (as a percent of GDP – the only measure that accounts for inflation) I most of my age/generation did better than ok, on average.

Marcus D,

You can say what you want about me on FR but guess what buddy. Obama is still the President and will remain so until Jan 20 2017. I know that makes your little right wing ass mad as hell, Oh well. You can't do nothing about it besides taking up time and space on your "Keyboard". Have fun with that...

Jim Spence,

If you read many of my comments over the last 5 years on First Read you would know that I am ex-military … that I served from 1963 to 69.

Here are five facts that should be considered regarding the sequester.

1. The Cuts Are Tiny!

The actual cuts in fiscal year 2013 are only $44 billion, according to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). The rest don’t even take place until 2014 or later. Whether you use $44 billion or $85 billion we’re talking about 1 or 2 percent of total government spending.

2. Spending is Still Going Up!

Even with the sequester, the federal government is expected to spend more this year than it did last year. The government spent $3.5 trillion in 2012 and i expected to spend $3.6 trillion in 2013

3. The Pentagon Won't Starve!

The largest chunk of cuts will come out of the defense budget, which has doubled over the past decade. The Pentagon will still have about $500 billion at its disposal, not counting war-related and emergency appropriations.

4. You Can't Cut Nonexistent Programs!

The White House’s Office of Management and Budget says the sequester will cut a whopping $2 million from the $20 million budget for the National Drug Intelligence Center. That sounds pretty bad - until you realize the Drug Intelligence Center closed its door in June 2012.

5. It Was All Obama's Idea!

The whole damn sequester was the Obama administration’s idea. As the Washington Post’s Bob Woodward has reported, despite Obama’s denials to the contrary, “the automatic spending cuts were initiated by the White House” as part of the deal to raise the debt limit back in August 2011.

Then you Libbies should be ecstatic as it will cripple your biggest bogeyman, the military and our brave troops. We all know you hate the military and your mythical "military industrial complex".

Jim, you are really a character. Talk about shame.

Why do you always leave out the brave police, fire fighters, EMT's, the first responders, the coast guard, and even the teachers?

Why do you have so much disdain for them, while you only elevate soldiers and the military? Are they not good enough for you? I hear Republicans all the time. They always hold the military up, but never mention all the others that come to our defense and do it without any fanfare.

It seems you're trying to make some point about the military budget (because of those brave soldiers), but don't give a damn about budgets stateside. Is that because you really don't care sh*t about the soldiers but you know someone won't cut a military budget if you can tie that to hurting military personnel?

You know someone trying to make an impression is only doing that (making an impression).

Dennis: First, thank you for your service but I want to clarify a few comments you made and where there are some errors.

When you were 4 (I assume prior to WWII) debt was indeed 125% of GDP and was the reason we were in a Depression. It was not until the tax cuts AFTER WWII that the economy turned around. Our debt didn't decrease it was just the tax cuts grew the economy to where debt was a smaller percentage of the higher GDP.

But during that time Social Security, Medicare, Income Security, and Interest on the Debt wasn't over 60% of our annual spending either like it is now. So cutting spending was much easier as well. We have so much locked into spending for entitlements now that there is no mathematical way to pay for it. We are broke. We are bankrupt.

And then you mention Reagan. Sorry to hear your mind is wavering and I hope our new ObamaCare can help fix that.

There is a difference between tax revenue and spending. The Reagan tax cuts led to INCREASED tax revenues and started an economic expansion that lasted over 20 years. That's right - tax revenues went UP after the tax cuts.

But how come our debt went up? That is a separate issue. Doesn't excuse Reagan for allowing it but spending has nothing to do with tax revenues.

That is like a husband who makes $50,000 a year and the family owes $25,000 (50% debt to income for example). Say the husband get a pay raise to $80,000 - that is certainly an INCREASE!! But now the wife is ecstatic and buys a $35,000 BMW. Now their debt is $60,000 which is 75% debt to income.

Are you going to say the husband's pay increase to $80,000 was the CAUSE of the higher debt? Of course not. The increased income is SEPARATE from the debt.

And just like Reagan tax revenues rose significantly. The problem is Congress not only spent the increased tax revenues but spent more on top of that.

David Walker

All right Spence:

Right here, right now, I'm calling you a liar. If you can document 400 cases you have more than enough to take your case to a local prosecutorial office.

1. The federal government made at least $115 billion in improper payments in 2011.
2. Washington spends $92 billion on corporate welfare (excluding TARP) versus $71 billion on homeland security.
3. Washington spends $25 billion annually maintaining unused or vacant federal properties.
4. Government auditors spent the past five years examining all federal programs and found that 22 percent of them–costing taxpayers a total of $123 billion annually–fail to show any positive impact on the populations they serve.
5. The Congressional Budget Office published a “Budget Options” series identifying more than $100 billion in potential spending cuts.
6. Examples from multiple Government Accountability Office (GAO) reports of wasteful duplication include 342 economic development programs; 130 programs serving the disabled; 130 programs serving at-risk youth; 90 early childhood development programs; 75 programs funding international education, cultural, and training exchange activities; and 72 safe water programs.
7. Washington will spend $2.6 million training Chinese prostitutes to drink more responsibly on the job.
8. A GAO audit classified nearly half of all purchases on government credit cards as improper, fraudulent, or embezzled. Examples of taxpayer-funded purchases include gambling, mortgage payments, liquor, lingerie, iPods, Xboxes, jewelry, Internet dating services, and Hawaiian vacations. In one extraordinary example, the Postal Service spent $13,500 on one dinner at a Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse, including “over 200 appetizers and over $3,000 of alcohol, including more than 40 bottles of wine costing more than $50 each and brand-name liquor such as Courvoisier, Belvedere and Johnny Walker Gold.” The 81 guests consumed an average of $167 worth of food and drink apiece.
9. Federal agencies are delinquent on nearly 20 percent of employee travel charge cards, costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars annually.

10. The Securities and Exchange Commission spent $3.9 million rearranging desks and offices at its Washington, D.C., headquarters.

11. The Pentagon recently spent $998,798 shipping two 19-cent washers from South Carolina to Texas and $293,451 sending an 89-cent washer from South Carolina to Florida.

12. Over half of all farm subsidies go to commercial farms, which report average household incomes of $200,000.

13. Health care fraud is estimated to cost taxpayers more than $750 billion annually.

14. A GAO audit found that 95 Pentagon weapons systems suffered from a combined $295 billion in cost overruns.

15. The refusal of many federal employees to fly coach costs taxpayers $146 million annually in flight upgrades.

16. Washington will spend $126 million in 2009 to enhance the Kennedy family legacy in Massachusetts. Additionally, Senator John Kerry (D-MA) diverted $20 million from the 2010 defense budget to subsidize a new Edward M. Kennedy Institute.

17. Federal investigators have launched more than 20 criminal fraud investigations related to the TARP financial bailout.

18. Despite trillion-dollar deficits, last year’s 10,160 earmarks included $200,000 for a tattoo removal program in Mission Hills, California; $190,000 for the Buffalo Bill Historical Center in Cody, Wyoming; and $75,000 for the Totally Teen Zone in Albany, Georgia.

19. The federal government owns more than 50,000 vacant homes.

20. The Federal Communications Commission spent $350,000 to sponsor NASCAR driver David Gilliland.

21. Members of Congress have spent hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars supplying their offices with popcorn machines, plasma televisions, DVD equipment, ionic air fresheners, camcorders, and signature machines–plus $24,730 leasing a Lexus, $1,434 on a digital camera, and $84,000 on personalized calendars.

22. More than $13 billion in Iraq aid has been classified as wasted or stolen. Another $7.8 billion cannot be accounted for.

23. Fraud related to Hurricane Katrina spending is estimated to top $2 billion. In addition, debit cards provided to hurricane victims were used to pay for Caribbean vacations, NFL tickets, Dom Perignon champagne, “Girls Gone Wild” videos, and at least one sex change operation.

24. Auditors discovered that 900,000 of the 2.5 million recipients of emergency Katrina assistance provided false names, addresses, or Social Security numbers or submitted multiple applications.

25. Congress recently gave Alaska Airlines $500,000 to paint a Chinook salmon on a Boeing 737.

26. The Transportation Department will subsidize up to $2,000 per flight for direct flights between Washington, D.C., and the small hometown of Congressman Hal Rogers (R-KY)–but only on Monday mornings and Friday evenings, when lawmakers, staff, and lobbyists usually fly. Rogers is a member of the Appropriations Committee, which writes the Transportation Department’s budget.

27. Washington has spent $3 billion re-sanding beaches–even as this new sand washes back into the ocean.

28. A Department of Agriculture report concedes that much of the $2.5 billion in “stimulus” funding for broadband Internet will be wasted.

29. The Defense Department wasted $100 million on unused flight tickets and never bothered to collect refunds even though the tickets were refundable.

30. Washington spends $60,000 per hour shooting Air Force One photo-ops in front of national landmarks

31. Over one recent 18-month period, Air Force and Navy personnel used government-funded credit cards to charge at least $102,400 on admission to entertainment events, $48,250 on gambling, $69,300 on cruises, and $73,950 on exotic dance clubs and prostitutes.

32. Members of Congress are set to pay themselves $90 million to increase their franked mailings for the 2010 election year.

33. Congress has ignored efficiency recommendations from the Department of Health and Human Services that would save $9 billion annually.

34. Taxpayers are funding paintings of high-ranking government officials at a cost of up to $50,000 apiece.

35. The state of Washington sent $1 food stamp checks to 250,000 households in order to raise state caseload figures and trigger $43 million in additional federal funds.

36. Suburban families are receiving large farm subsidies for the grass in their backyards–subsidies that many of these families never requested and do not want.

37. Congress appropriated $20 million for “commemoration of success” celebrations related to Iraq and Afghanistan.

38. Homeland Security employee purchases include 63-inch plasma TVs, iPods, and $230 for a beer brewing kit.

39. Two drafting errors in the 2005 Deficit Reduction Act resulted in a $2 billion taxpayer cost.

40. North Ridgeville, Ohio, received $800,000 in “stimulus” funds for a project that its mayor described as “a long way from the top priority.”

41. The National Institutes of Health spends $1.3 million per month to rent a lab that it cannot use.

42. Congress recently spent $2.4 billion on 10 new jets that the Pentagon insists it does not need and will not use.

43. Lawmakers diverted $13 million from Hurricane Katrina relief spending to build a museum celebrating the Army Corps of Engineers–the agency partially responsible for the failed levees that flooded New Orleans.

44. Medicare officials recently mailed $50 million in erroneous refunds to 230,000 Medicare recipients.

45. Audits showed $34 billion worth of Department of Homeland Security contracts contained significant waste, fraud, and abuse.

46. Washington recently spent $1.8 million to help build a private golf course in Atlanta, Georgia.

47. The Advanced Technology Program spends $150 million annually subsidizing private businesses; 40 percent of this funding goes to Fortune 500 companies.

48. Congressional investigators were able to receive $55,000 in federal student loan funding for a fictional college they created to test the Department of Education.

49. The Conservation Reserve program pays farmers $2 billion annually not to farm their land.

50. The Commerce Department has lost 1,137 computers since 2001, many containing Americans’ personal data.

51. Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton, Florida used $15,551 in stimulus money to pay two researchers to study how alcohol affects a mouse's motor functions.

52. The U.S. government handed over a staggering $54 million in "stimulus cash" to Connecticut's politically-connected Mohegan Indian tribe, which runs one of the highest grossing casinos in the country.

53. Syracuse professor of psychology Michael Carey received $219,000 in federal stimulus money for a study that examines the sex patterns of college women.

54. $1.15 million in stimulus funds was allocated for the installation of a new guard rail around the non-existent Optima Lake in Oklahoma.

55. Researchers at the State University of New York at Buffalo received $389,000 to pay 100 residents of Buffalo $45 each to record how much malt liquor they drink and how much pot they smoke each day. Instead of spending nearly $400,000, the U.S. government could have achieved the same goal by having a couple of scientists join a fraternity.

56. *$100,000 in federal stimulus funds were used for a martini bar and a brazilian steakhouse.

57. A dinner cruise company in Chicago got nearly $1 million in stimulus funds to combat terrorism.

58. $233,000 in stimulus money went to the University of California at San Diego to study why Africans vote.

59. The Cactus Bug Project at the University Of Florida was allocated $325,394 in stimulus funds to study the mating decisions of cactus bugs. According to the project proposal, one of the questions that will be answered by the study is this: "Whether males with large weapons are more or less attractive to females."

60. One Denver developer received $13 million in tax credits to construct a senior housing complex despite that fact that the same developer is being sued as a slumlord for running rodent-infested apartment buildings in the city of San Francisco.

61. Sheltering Arms Senior Services was awarded a contract worth $22.3 million in stimulus money to weatherize homes for poor families in Houston, Texas - but a new report from Texas Watchdog says that the weatherization work was performed so badly that 33 of the 53 homes will need to be completely redone.

62. A liberal theater in Minnesota named "In the Heart of the Beast" (in reference to a well known quote by communist radical Che Guevara) received $100,000 for socially conscious puppet shows.

63. California's inspector general found that $1 million in stimulus funds for a program to give summer jobs to young people was improperly used for overhead expenses such as rent and utility bills.

64. Landon Cox, a Duke University assistant professor of computer science, was awarded $498,000 in stimulus money to study Facebook.

65. The town of Union, New York is being urged to spend $578,000 in stimulus money that it did not request for a homelessness problem that it claims it does not have.

66. Who could forget the $3.4 million "ecopassage" to help turtles cross a highway in Tallahassee, Florida?

67. A total of $3 million has been granted to researchers at the University of California at Irvine so that they can play video games such as World of Warcraft. The goal of this "video game research" is reportedly to study how "emerging forms of communication, including multiplayer computer games and online virtual worlds such as World of Warcraft and Second Life can help organizations collaborate and compete more effectively in the global marketplace."

68. The U.S. Department of Agriculture gave the University of New Hampshire $700,000 this year to study methane gas emissions from dairy cows.

69. $615,000 was given to the University of California at Santa Cruz to digitize photos, T-shirts and concert tickets belonging to the Grateful Dead.

70. A professor at Stanford University received $239,100 to study how Americans use the Internet to find love. So far one of the key findings of this "research" is that the Internet is a safer and more discreet way to find same-sex partners.

71. The National Science Foundation spent $216,000 to study whether or not politicians "gain or lose support by taking ambiguous positions."

72. The National Institutes of Health spent approximately $442,340 to study the behavior of male prostitutes in Vietnam.

73. Approximately $1 million of U.S. taxpayer money was used to create poetry for the Little Rock, New Orleans, Milwaukee and Chicago zoos. The goal of the "poetry" is to help raise awareness on environmental issues.

74. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs spent $175 million during 2010 to maintain hundreds of buildings that it does not even use. This includes a pink, octagonal monkey house in the city of Dayton, Ohio.

75. $1.8 million of U.S. taxpayer dollars went for a "museum of neon signs" in Las Vegas, Nevada.

You sure you wanna play this game Spanky?

Prudence dictates that I stop here because the Loony Left will censor me anyway. That’s how you limp-wristed Libbies deal with everything.

IT IS NOT my place to bring this to a local prosecutorial office, D.A., A.G. or federal prosecutor. If I can find all this evidence of WFAC why can’t the criminals in our government? Our government is under oath to protect us and our Constitution. NOWHERE does it say it can waste so much of our money for their political gain.

Why can’t all you highly gifted Libbies find all this WFAC???

Because they and you don’t want to admit the rampant WFAC in our government as you whine about a paltry $85 billion of sequester.

You Liberals/Progressives live in your little delusional world of social and economic justice driven by emotions rather than policy and then you refuse to admit you are responsible for the state our great Republic is in.

Legislation forbidding their intervention went through a Republican-controlled federal government. That's a fact.

Link? Of course not, just your pathetic word, right?

Go away Sparky, you’re starting to irritate me.

I'm calling you a liar.

BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!

Recess is over Davey, go eat your PBJ mommy made you for lunch and talk to the Saran Wrap she used so it doesn’t get all over your Barrack Hussein lunch box.

You people really are simpletons.

Spence - you are utterly shameless. You wrote:

"Then you Libbies should be ecstatic as it will cripple your biggest bogeyman, the military and our brave troops. We all know you hate the military and your mythical "military industrial complex"."

It was a Republican President, Dwight Eisenhower, who coined the term military-industrial complex. It is not a myth.

About those bogeymen, "our brave troops"? Dennis has already told you he was one of those bogeymen, one of those "brave troops". So was Jack, so was I. FY.

Why rich guys want to raise the retirement age

Posted by Ezra Klein

If you’re the CEO of Goldman Sachs – if you have a job that you love, a job that makes you so much money you can literally build a Scrooge McDuck room where you can swim through a pile of gold coins wearing only a topcoat – then you should perhaps think twice before saying this:

You can look at the history of these things, and Social Security wasn’t devised to be a system that supported you for a 30-year retirement after a 25-year career. … So there will be things that, you know, the retirement age has to be changed. Maybe some of the benefits have to be affected, maybe some of the inflation adjustments have to be revised. But in general, entitlements have to be slowed down and contained.

That’s Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of Goldman Sachs, talking to CBS. And he’s not saying anything that people, particularly wealthier people with desk jobs, don’t say all the time in Washington and New York. So I don’t want to just pick on him. But the cavalier endorsement of raising the retirement age by people who really love their jobs, who make so much money they barely pay Social Security taxes, and who are, actuarially speaking, are ensured a long and healthy life, drives me nuts.

If you want talk about cutting Social Security, talk about cutting it. It’s a reasonable point of view. You’re allowed to hold it.

But “cutting” Social Security is unpopular and people don’t like to talk about it. So folks who want to cut the program have instead settled on an elliptical argument about life expectancy. Social Security, they say, was designed at a time when Americans didn’t live quite so long. And so raising the retirement age isn’t a “cut.” It’s a restoration of the program’s original purpose. It doesn’t hurt anything or anyone.

The first point worth making here is that the country’s economy has grown 15-fold since Social Security was passed into law. One of the things the richest society the world has ever known can buy is a decent retirement for people who don’t have jobs they love and who don’t want to work forever.

The second point worth making is that Social Security was overhauled in the ’80s. So the promises the program is carrying out today were made then. And, since the ’80s, the idea that we’ve all gained so many years of life simply isn’t true.

Some of us have gained in life expectancy, of course. As you can see on this graph, since 1977, the life expectancy of male workers retiring at age 65 has risen six years in the top half of the income distribution. But if you’re in the bottom half of the income distribution? Then you’ve only gained 1.3 years.

If you’re wealthy, you do have many more years to enjoy Social Security. But if you’re not, you don’t. And so making it so people who aren’t wealthy have to wait longer to use Social Security is a particularly cruel and regressive way to cut the program.

It’s also a cut that’s particularly tough on people who spend their lives in jobs they don’t enjoy.

You know what age most people actually begin taking Social Security? Sixty-five is what most people think. That’s the law’s standard retirement age. But that’s wrong. Most people begin taking Social Security benefits at 62, which is as early as the law allows you to take them.

When they do that, it means they get smaller benefits over their lifetime. We penalize for taking it early. But they do it anyway. They do it because they don’t want to spend their whole lives at that job. Unlike many folks in finance or in the U.S. Senate or writing for the nation’s op-ed pages, they don’t want to work till they drop.

As Peter Diamond, the Nobel laureate economist and Social Security expert, told Dylan Matthews:

What do we know about the people who retire at 62? On average, shorter life expectancy and lower earnings than people retiring at later ages. If anyone stood up and said, “Instead of doing uniform across the board cuts, let’s make them a little worse for people who have shorter life expectancies and lower earnings,” they’d be laughed at. Anything that reduces benefits is going to hurt everybody. It’s going to hit people with short life expectancies, it’s going to hit people with high life expectancies. But we should not make it worse for those retiring earliest.

That’s what’s galling about this easy argument. The people who make it, the pundits and the senators and the CEOs, they’ll never feel it. They don’t want to retire at age 65, and they don’t have short life expectancies, and they’re not mainly relying on Social Security for their retirement income. They’re bravely advocating a cut they’ll never feel.

But you know what they would feel? Social Security taxes don’t apply to income over $110,000. In 2011, Lloyd Blankfein’s total compensation was $16.1 million. That means he paid Social Security taxes on less than 1 percent of his compensation.

If we lifted that cap, if we made all income subject to payroll taxes, the Congressional Budget Office estimates that it would do three times as much to solve Social Security’s shortfall as raising the retirement age to 70. In fact, it would, in one fell swoop, close Social Security’s solvency gap for the next 75 years. That may or may not be the right way to close Social Security’s shortfall, but somehow, it rarely gets mentioned by the folks who think they’re being courageous when they talk about raising a retirement age they’ll never notice.

Again, I don’t mean to pick on Blankfein here. He’s not saying anything unusual, and he’s one of the CEOs who’s pretty straightforward about the fact that his taxes are going to need to go up. But he and all these folks who like to talk about raising the Social Security retirement age as if it’s a no-brainer need to think harder about why they’ve settled on the cut to Social Security that will concentrate its pain on people who haven’t fully shared in the remarkable increase in life expectancy, who don’t make much money and who don’t love going to their jobs every day.

Pro,

You seem to be clueless to the fact that revenues increased because unemployment dropped sharply (from over 10% to under 5% in 4 years), not because of tax reductions.

However cutting taxes and increasing spending does stimulate the economy (just as Pres Obama did) as long as the tax rates and spending levels are returned to normal after the recession is over and unemployment is reduced to normal levels.

Dennis, Columbus, Ohio

Jim Spence,

If you read many of my comments over the last 5 years on First Read you would know that I am ex-military … that I served from 1963 to 69.

And I thank you for your service.

However, it means nothing to me when you and all the other Liberals/Progressives denigrate the military every day here and on other Liberal sites.

Yet when I post hundreds of billions of dollars in waste, fraud, abuse and corruption in so many non-constitutionally mandated social programs and you just accept it as the status quo, and further justify it by demanding more money in taxes, your loytalties have been compromised.

Yes, our DoD is as dysfunctional as the social programs I listed but you Libbies defend them to the death as sacrosanct.

This is not only irrational, it is delusional.

Washington will spend $2.6 million training Chinese prostitutes to drink more responsibly on the job.

While we all dislike government waste, what is particularly disgusting is the waste (aka @!$%#) spewing from the likes of Jim Spence's mouth as he intentionally misleads people. A more rational description of the garbage being posted by Jim Spence is below. No doubt, this will cause Little Jimmy Spence to rush home, kick the dog and beat his wife, while blaming it on those damn liberals.

A $2.6 million grant will help a Wayne State University School of Medicine researcher establish and evaluate whether an alcohol and HIV intervention center can assist in reducing the spread of HIV/AIDS...

...to study the link between alcohol use and the spread of HIV/AIDS among female sex workers in a single southern province in China. The findings could have ramifications for at-risk populations throughout the world.

http://prognosis.med.wayne.edu/article/grant-allows-research-to-study-link-between-alcohol-abuse-and-spread-of-hiv

David Walker just got JimSpenced. New term, just coined it.

Now quit trying to Munson the US.

Jim,

The majority of the WFAC you site are not social programs. They are pork barrel spending by Congress. They have also been around for years, even decades. Why now, during a Democratic Administration, do you suddenly get religion?

I don't think anyone has a problem getting rid of pork barrel legislation, except those in Congress, both Republican and Democrats. But we've been saying that for years and nothing has been done. Cutting a budget isn't going to make that happen.

Jim Spence,

Why do you lump all Democrats as one-in-the-same? We do not all agree on everything.

As for me I believe in a smartly run military that doesn't consume too much of our budget. Ours consumes 1/4 of our budget and it should be loess than 1/6. Many of our allies have a Defense budget that is less than 10% of their National budget.

Just like all our social programs, if we want a larger DoD then the voters should agree to pay more in taxes to fund their desires.

ProBusiness - You also miss the fact that yes, Reagan lowered taxes, but then turned around and raised them again. He found he had dug himself a great big hole. He also raised the tax that pays for SS.

You write:

We have so much locked into spending for entitlements now that there is no mathematical way to pay for it.

Wow. How can you miss the FACT that the TAX that pays for Medicare hasn't increased in DECADES yet the COST OF HEALTHCARE had skyrocketed, leaving Medicare to pay out much more than it takes in?

How much has health care costs increased in the past 30 years? WHY has the Medicare TAX not kept up with the increase?

Boy Spence - You write:

If I can find all this evidence of WFAC why can’t the criminals in our government?

I'm all for HIRING more government comptrollers. You?

BTW -- You really need to GROW UP, Spanky!

$1.15 million in stimulus funds was allocated for the installation of a new guard rail around the non-existent Optima Lake in Oklahoma.

Aw shucks - another of Jim Spencies cute little list blown into oblivion. Gosh Jim, parrot much do you? Find that list in an email chain?

"Work on the Lake Optima guardrail project is not going forward as we explore other approaches to protecting public safety," said Mr. Gary A. Loew, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Chief of Programs Integration Division.

Ed DeSeve, a senior aide to Obama, said in a prepared statement: "With 20,000 projects approved, there are bound to be some mistakes -- when we find them, we have been transparent about it, and worked on a bipartisan basis to shut them down immediately. Sen. Coburn's report, however, is filled with inaccuracies, including criticisms of projects that have already been stopped, projects that never were approved, and some projects that are working quite well."

http://mediamatters.org/research/2009/06/17/parroting-gop-media-claim-stimulus-funding-guar/151265

20. The Federal Communications Commission spent $350,000 to sponsor NASCAR driver David Gilliland.

Oh my Gosh, the scandal of it all. Prosecute, I say, Prosecute!!!!! Don't forget to throw those scoundrels at AARP in prison, right Spencie Boy!! Oh, and when was that conversion to DTV?

The Federal Communications Commission will take the unusual step of sponsoring a NASCAR entry as part of its digital TV outreach.

FCC Chairman Kevin Martin announced today that the agency will sponsor the No. 38 car of driver David Gilliland for three Sprint Cup races. The NASCAR sponsorship will cost the FCC $350,000, which an FCC spokesman said represents a $100,000 government discount.

The car will have an "Is your TV ready for digital" logo on the front and back and a yellow diagonal banner saying "digital TV transition," and the three tracks will have DTV banners.
The FCC will also use some of the $20 million appropriated by Congress for DTV outreach to run ads in the AARP magazine. The ads will include applications for converter boxes. http://www.tvweek.com/news/2008/10/fcc_goes_nascar_racing_to_publ.php

StoptheCannibals-2908428

Jim,

The majority of the WFAC you site are not social programs. They are pork barrel spending by Congress.

Semantics!

Our Constitution doesn't grant uncontrolled cronyism.

You and everyone here knows it is simply bipartisan cronyism at the tax payers expense. Just like any service sector industry our government has a contract with us to provide what it is required to by the Constitution.

No more, no less.

One more thing BOY Spence --

REVENUE bills come from the House why did you contact the Senators? Just for you Boy Spence:

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/Why_must_all_revenue_bills_originate_in_the_house_of_representatives

Why don't you contact Boehner and other House Republicans including those from Michigan, like CAMP, ROGERS, MILLER, UPTON and get them on the JOB for you? That's if you can catch them at work! All those vacations they don't have much time for work these days, ya know what I mean? Have you given them your list??? What did they say? ARE they working on it?

Here's the link so you can contact the RIGHT people next time:

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/members/MI

Obama is still the President and will remain so until Jan 20 2017. I know that makes your little right wing ass mad as hell

Nope - what makes me mad as hell - his lack of focus on our economy and inability to move us to a prosperous one - total failure - going into his 5th year bubbah - that sucks and should make most anyone angry - you were pissed at Bush right?

It's not about him personally - get over it dude - it's how promises - fail to produce - easy enough for you?

You've been way to busy with Maddow and Matthews - give it a break Jay-sahn

Dennis Columbus Ohio - Wow! Mr. I know freakin' everything britches!

Dude - you consider yourself quite the book of facts or internet boss don't you?

Got to be a section in the comics for you - there has to be

Don't know who's more into their wisdom - Denny or "Bangs" Obama - wow!

RedDevPS

The car will have an "Is your TV ready for digital" logo on the front and back and a yellow diagonal banner saying "digital TV transition," and the three tracks will have DTV banners.
The FCC will also use some of the $20 million appropriated by Congress for DTV outreach to run ads in the AARP magazine. The ads will include applications for converter boxes

Good God Red, correlate, correlate.

28. A Department of Agriculture report concedes that much of the $2.5 billion in “stimulus” funding for broadband Internet will be wasted

A $2.6 million grant will help a Wayne State University School of Medicine researcher establish and evaluate whether an alcohol and HIV intervention center can assist in reducing the spread of HIV/AIDS...

...to study the link between alcohol use and the spread of HIV/AIDS among female sex workers in a single southern province in China. The findings could have ramifications for at-risk populations throughout the world

So, Red, a single researcher from Wayne State University School of Medicine, which is in Detroit.

I live 20 miles north of that hell-hole of Liberalism. I guarantee you this research could have been done right here in Michigan, more specifically right in Detroit, which is in Wayne County. We have plenty of alcoholic prostitutes with HIV right here. No need to travel half way around the world.

Just in case you’re not convinced.

How many people are HIV positive?
The Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that more than 1 million people living with HIV in the United States. Approximately 21% (1 in 5) are unaware of their infection. New infections occur at far too high a level - 56,300 Americans are infected annually.

African Americans account for 45% of all new infections.

Men who have sex with men (MSM) account for 53% of all new infections.

Males account for 73% of all new infections.

HIV/AIDS in Michigan

HIV/AIDS is plaguing communities across the nation and continues to be a significant health concern in Michigan. The Michigan Department of Community Health (MDCH) estimates that as of April 2011, there are 19,500 Michigan residents living with living with HIV/AIDS with the majority of cases (12,070) in the Detroit metropolitan area (DMA). Comprised of the Wayne, Macomb, Oakland, Monroe, Lapeer and St. Clair counties, this area is home to only 44% of the population, yet accounts for 65% of all HIV/AIDS cases in the state. Although the city of Detroit accounts for 9% of the total state population, the city accounts for 46% of all cases in the DMA and 39% of all HIV/AIDS cases within the state.

http://www.peds.med.wayne.edu/horizons/about.php

Focus Red, focus.

So, tell us all how that research turned out in China.

Go away, you bother me Spanky.

BTW, I would never kick my dog.

But I did have to kick your wife out, she was starting to get too clingy. But I did send her home satisfied, you don't need to embarass yourself for a while.

So Jim is now Spence for Studless Hire. How quaint!! The only reason anyone clings to you is because that one incher you sport slips out so easy. As to using Detroit prostitutes, they needed a Jim Spence free zone, which disqualified all prostitutes in Michigan.

Correlate what, Spence? High definition television to broadband internet service. You are aware they are two different things, right? Speaking of which, would love your link to this supposed Dept. of Agriculture report on some wasted $2.5B funds. Now of course, there is this, outlining how 2.5B will be used to extend broadband internet service to rural areas;

http://www.rurdev.usda.gov/Publications/BIPSatelliteFactSheet10-20-10.pdf

Odd, it doesn't say it will be wasted. Well Spence, Studless for Hire, that is zero in 4 for you and your list that can be loosely linked to publication from Heritage foundation, and that can be found posted on over 9000 right-wing freak zone sites, that thus far, have no substance, much like every single one of your posts.

Oh, and here is a little tidbit just for you and your supposed pretend Military Industrial Complex. While most of it will go over your puny little head (sorry, it isn't in chain email format), perhaps you might find something remotely interesting.

http://www.npr.org/2011/01/17/132942244/ikes-warning-of-military-expansion-50-years-later

ProBusiness

When you were 4 (I assume prior to WWII) debt was indeed 125% of GDP and was the reason we were in a Depression. It was not until the tax cuts AFTER WWII that the economy turned around. Our debt didn't decrease it was just the tax cuts grew the economy to where debt was a smaller percentage of the higher GDP.

Actually Probusiness, you are wrong. Now I'll admit that I didn't experience this first-hand (as I wasn't alive), but what I know is that tax rates after World War II remained stable (and actually increased to +90%), and debt fell to well below 100% of GDP. What I also know is that the economy took off after World War II, in part because of the lack of foreign industrial competition but also because of the New Deal and postwar policies like employer-provided health benefits and a heavily (or relatively heavily) unionized labor force. Tax cuts weren't a major part of the fiscal equation until the 1960s.

But during that time Social Security, Medicare, Income Security, and Interest on the Debt wasn't over 60% of our annual spending either like it is now. So cutting spending was much easier as well. We have so much locked into spending for entitlements now that there is no mathematical way to pay for it. We are broke. We are bankrupt.

Obviously entitlement programs and interest on the debt wasn't that expensive because (A) those programs were new, (B) the Baby Boomers were the ones paying for them instead of receiving them, and (C) our high tax rates and overall prosperity enabled us to afford those programs. You are wrong when you say that we are broke/bankrupt. We are not bankrupt; we are perhaps the most lightly-taxed industrial nations as a share of GDP. If we were to simply bite the damn bullet and repeal the Bush tax cuts in their entirety, the CBO estimates that that alone would have severely reduced the federal deficit by around $3 trillion. If were to go further and reform the tax code in a progressive manner (lower rates-broader base my ass), we could save trillions more by turning most deductions into credits and then trimming and capping them in order to reduce the size of these tax expenditures. America could easily pay for our entitlement programs; we just need to learn that this sugar-high of low tax and regulating levels is unsustainable, as is our obsolete healthcare system.

And then you mention Reagan. Sorry to hear your mind is wavering and I hope our new ObamaCare can help fix that.

There is a difference between tax revenue and spending. The Reagan tax cuts led to INCREASED tax revenues and started an economic expansion that lasted over 20 years. That's right - tax revenues went UP after the tax cuts.

Wrong again, mate. The Reagan tax cuts didn't raise revenues; hell,Richard Rahn, the member of the Chamber of Commerce under Reagan ADMITTED that the tax cuts lowered revenues. You fail to realize that revenues went up because of population growth and inflation, yet went down as a total share of the economy due to the fact that the amount taxed was reduced.

But how come our debt went up? That is a separate issue. Doesn't excuse Reagan for allowing it but spending has nothing to do with tax revenues.

Simple: the debt went up because spending increased, revenues decreased thanks to tax cuts, and overall entitlement spending increased because of our ridiculous healthcare system.

And just like Reagan tax revenues rose significantly. The problem is Congress not only spent the increased tax revenues but spent more on top of that.

Tax revenues did not increase as a share of GDP; they shrunk, in fact. They shrunk even after Reagan realized his mistake and raised taxes down the road. Congress did spend more, but that was in part due to Reagan's increased military spending, higher inflation levels, and the 1982 recession.

houston: You seem to have forgotten that the executive branch is headed by Obama. So, in case you've failed to realize it, Obama has the final say. And, that means that the fact that that many illegals were released has nothing to do with money, it has everything to do with making political hay. Unfortunately, there are way too many people who aren't smart enough to realize that Obama is a pathological liar. He has been talking about reducing the deficit, including cutting spending since he's taken office. Yet, whenever anyone talks about cutting spending, he takes to the airwaves as if the repubs want to kill everyone. The economy is in the tank and he blames the repubs. But, the fact is not disputable that he has gotten everything he's wanted. Well, except for a tax rate increase on those making between $250,000 and $450,000. And if you think that if he'd had gotten that then the budget would be balanced, then you are delusional. But, I guess there is no talking sense with people who think that spending more this year than last year is is cut in spending. The people who think that way are the ones who re-elected Obama. When you have an educational system that teaches the 2 + 2 = 3 or 4 or 5 or whatever you want it to equal, then you know that it has failed. But, please feel free to enlighten us on where Obama has compromised. And, while you are at it, please point out what Obama policies have been designed to help the economy. So far, the only thing that he has stated is that if you take money out of the hands of the employers so they will have less money to spend that the middle class (employees) and the economy will be better off for it.

Great post ... why you seem to have "left" the "lefties" speechless .......... LOL !