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All a balanced budget amendment says is that the congress has to run a country on a budget that uses 18% of GDP, they cannot just keep growing the size of government by adding endless expenditures that run up a debt.
If anything, its finally an incentive for congress to write legislation to promote greater prosperity and higher GDP. If they want to spend more, find ways to help grow our economy, instead of simply borrowing it, and handing off their debt to the next generation to worry about.
Then it's not a balanced budget amendment. It's a cap on government size amendment.
You're attempting to inject your ideology about what size the government should be into the Constitution to make it harder to raise it , should people desire to.
Then I take it that it is the morons who favor continuing tax cuts to the rich?
Offer some alternatives then; we have $14.5 trillion in debt, and soon 0bama will get his $2-3 trillion debt limit increase and we will have $18 trillion in debt.
Geez, is that all you have? No constructive comments, just sit back and shoot spitballs? I'd put you on ignore, but your one line, snarky posts are so insignificant I'll just skip over them for now on.
All a balanced budget amendment says is that the congress has to run a country on a budget that uses 18% of GDP...
Which has happened only four times in last fifty years... twice with LBJ as the President, and twice with Clinton as the President. But, more importantly, Clinton years had tax revenue at 19.5-20.6% of the GDP, compared to now (14.9%) which is the lowest since 1950.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Wapasha
Offer some alternatives then; we have $14.5 trillion in debt, and soon 0bama will get his $2-3 trillion debt limit increase and we will have $18 trillion in debt.
You've responded to a lot of my posts, much less read them. With this question I take it that you understood none of them? Debt ceiling will have to be raised unless the patriots want to push the nation into a Great Depression and blame Obama for it. In fact, they will lose, because there will be a fear of backlash against them. So, don't worry about debt ceiling, just worry about the time wasted by the drama queens on what could have been used to devise policies that would help the economy. Wait... that will be a terrible idea if the goal is to defeat Obama at any cost. I'm speaking of real, patriotic, Americans after all. They want "their country back".
Now, my solutions? Well, the list can be long but most obvious ones would be tax reform (closing loop holes, tax breaks only as an incentive while disincentives to outsourcing), helping small business cause (no, not lip service but real reforms and regulations that help small businesses), gradual withdrawal from all military fronts (or otherwise), reducing costs at major government programs (Medicare/Medicaid) and reform SS. It ain't quite as simple as "cut, cut, cut", much less the brain dead idea of turning around a ship on a dime.
Last edited by EinsteinsGhost; 07-22-2011 at 11:23 AM..
Balancing the budget is not about tax cuts, it about the congress spending a certain portion of our economy, the GDP, to run the government. The left brags about the Clinton balancing the budget and his budget surplus, and then screams bloody hell when we want to see a balanced budget now.
When we had a $7 trillion debt in 2007, the dems were furious, vowing not to raise the debt ceiling, now we are at $14.5 trillion in debt. It's clear that the congress, no matter which party runs it, cannot control spending, so we need a mechanism to control their spending.
To say that "Balancing the budget is not about tax cuts," is to subscribe to willful ignorance. Higher taxes are the reason there were balanced budgets under Clinton.
The nation's unnerving descent into debt began a decade ago with a choice, not a crisis.
In January 2001, with the budget balanced and clear sailing ahead, the Congressional Budget Office forecast ever-larger annual surpluses indefinitely. The outlook was so rosy, the CBO said, that Washington would have enough money by the end of the decade to pay off everything it owed.
Voices of caution were swept aside in the rush to take advantage of the apparent bounty. Political leaders chose to cut taxes, jack up spending and, for the first time in U.S. history, wage two wars solely with borrowed funds.
Let's not forget this famous chart which shows that the single largest factor for the debt was the Bush tax-cuts which added half of today's debt.
I am for a BBA...............but...........I am not worried that this once fine country is too far gone for it to do any good.
You see, if a BBA is put in place, I think the legislative branch can vote to override the BBA. The BBA would also have an emergency clause, wow.....I wonder how much monkeying around they would do to get around the BBA.......I think it would be breached on a regular basis.
I could just see it now, horrible scare tactics to whip up the votes to override the BBA...........would happen every year I bet.
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