the American Debt

  On 7/28/2011 at 11:52 PM, theSun said:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/obamas-and-bushs-effect-on-the-deficit-in-one-graph/2011/07/25/gIQAELOrYI_blog.html

 

 

so fucking pitiful and disgusting

liberals are getting dominated and shut down like little bitches. just like, 'Whoop whoop!' "hoot and holler" and the democrat is on the ground getting his ass penetrated by some big fat hillbilly Republican 'OWNED'

all economies function as a debt, its been happening for hundreds of years and is all good as long as more people are born cos the world and its resources are infinite.....er....hang on....its just a big ball isn't it?

convince a tea party to kill obama by poising his tea

and there is links tea party is to republicans

then a blog will report it was republicans to kill obama

and then the blog become president

  On 7/29/2011 at 12:48 AM, sup said:

convince a tea party to kill obama by poising his tea

 

and there is links tea party is to republicans

 

then a blog will report it was republicans to kill obama

 

and then the blog become president

either you're on to something, or you're on something.

i think black people should get 1.4x of a vote cuz to making up for when they got only 3/5 when they were slaves

that's a good idea, this is also good:

(no strings attached, which is exactly my thoughts, there should never be strings attached to whether or not it is raised, it's that fucking simple because it absolutely needs to happen. The budgetary stuff and the revenue stuff should be done on a completely different bill.)

we need to switch to a parliamentary/funkadelic system, cut defense spending way down and stop policing the world, reform campaign finance, end corporate personhood, tax churches, legalize all drugs, start an ambitious program to become the world leader in education, and explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace.

anarcho-socialist utopia time

or shit just gets more fucked

At this point the problem is more about politics than about the debt. An example is the first 10 minutes from the latest White House briefing. It looks like "politics" is blocking ANY bill. The strategy seems to be: do NOT allow the president to sign any bill whatsoever. Especially bills that might actually help the dire conditions the US is in.

As mentioned many times: it's a game of chicken. And it's not about the country. It's about power.

The debt is not the issue. It's about political will. If you look at the graph that's posted in this thread it's clear that it takes 3 to 4 decisions to solve this problem. Look at those friggin tax cuts...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bR_IB0HvlA8

too late to edit:

But the whole point about the White House briefing was Ray Lahood. A Republican which would make me a fan of republicans again. (if only...)

Although he didn't want to explicitly answer questions about his point of view on the whole debt-issue, there's plenty of information between the lines. It starts with a "C" and it ends with "oncessions", and how certain "forces" don't want to make them.

The Republicans would rather see the President fail than the country advance.

i just hope as many americans are nauseated over this as i am.

but i feel like corporate news is successfully making this another red vs blue battle where no one can possibly be empathetic to the other side.

  On 7/29/2011 at 2:56 PM, theSun said:

i just hope as many americans are nauseated over this as i am.

 

but i feel like corporate news is successfully making this another red vs blue battle where no one can possibly be empathetic to the other side.

Of course they will. As long as they can pit americans against americans is as long as the corporations behind the news and media outlets can do pretty much whatever they want to the country. This won't change until shit really hits the fan. Then MAYBE people will start to realize what is really going on.

here's for people that think obama is on their side

  On 7/29/2011 at 3:39 PM, patternoverlap said:

  On 7/29/2011 at 2:56 PM, theSun said:

i just hope as many americans are nauseated over this as i am.

 

but i feel like corporate news is successfully making this another red vs blue battle where no one can possibly be empathetic to the other side.

 

Of course they will. As long as they can pit americans against americans is as long as the corporations behind the news and media outlets can do pretty much whatever they want to the country. This won't change until shit really hits the fan. Then MAYBE people will start to realize what is really going on.

there's too many meetings behind closed doors for anyone but the privileged few to really know what's going on. they control the infrastructure, they control the information.

i really don't see any way out of the idiocracy storyline unless there's some incredible massacre or complete economic collapse followed by armed revolution.

even then, it would likely be squashed by those with the capital for tech.

  On 7/29/2011 at 4:59 AM, nene multiple assgasms said:

we need to switch to a parliamentary/funkadelic system, cut defense spending way down and stop policing the world, reform campaign finance, end corporate personhood, tax churches, legalize all drugs, start an ambitious program to become the world leader in education, and explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace.

I'd be down with that...except for the legalizing all drugs parts.

i know i know, I'm a crusty old reactionary but I don't think that drugs like crystal meth, pcp and crack should be legalized.

Also you need to add on a bunch of reforms like patent law reform (which is outdated and unsuited for modern IP issues), stronger regulation of big pharmaceutical, labeling for food products (like in Japan and Korea, even China has labeling for GMOs for fuck's sake), and a bunch more that I'd be able to think about if I wasn't so goddamned hungover tonight.

  On 7/29/2011 at 4:59 AM, nene multiple assgasms said:

we need to switch to a parliamentary/funkadelic system, cut defense spending way down and stop policing the world, reform campaign finance, end corporate personhood, tax churches, legalize all drugs, start an ambitious program to become the world leader in education, and explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace.

+1 billion

edit: Ok, yeah, I'd agree w/Chen that maybe legalizing all drugs might not be the best policy - but, ffs, legalize week and tax it and you'd probably be able to take care of 1/4 of the deficit right there.

  On 7/29/2011 at 4:59 AM, nene multiple assgasms said:

we need to switch to a parliamentary/funkadelic system, cut defense spending way down and stop policing the world, reform campaign finance, end corporate personhood, tax churches, legalize all drugs, start an ambitious program to become the world leader in education, and explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace.

This.

  On 7/29/2011 at 3:39 PM, patternoverlap said:

  On 7/29/2011 at 2:56 PM, theSun said:

i just hope as many americans are nauseated over this as i am. but i feel like corporate news is successfully making this another red vs blue battle where no one can possibly be empathetic to the other side.

Of course they will. As long as they can pit americans against americans is as long as the corporations behind the news and media outlets can do pretty much whatever they want to the country. This won't change until shit really hits the fan. Then MAYBE people will start to realize what is really going on.

Sadly, yeah. The partisan government system we have going on and peoples' blind allegiances to the two parties, combined with most people only voting for what's best for them as individuals rather than what's best for the country... things won't really change because nobody wants to be inconvenienced by higher taxes or whatever, and most people I've talked to think 'government is always corrupt so why bother trying to change it?'

  On 7/29/2011 at 4:59 AM, nene multiple assgasms said:

we need to switch to a parliamentary/funkadelic system, cut defense spending way down and stop policing the world, reform campaign finance, end corporate personhood, tax churches, legalize all drugs, start an ambitious program to become the world leader in education, and explore space, together, both inner and outer, forever, in peace.

abolishing private prisons is another important one

  On 7/29/2011 at 6:31 PM, chenGOD said:

I'd be down with that...except for the legalizing all drugs parts.

i know i know, I'm a crusty old reactionary but I don't think that drugs like crystal meth, pcp and crack should be legalized.

the practical argument for legalizing possession is pretty strong (easier to use treatment to reduce demand). Full legalization is hard to sell to Americans because they've isolated from most of the violence prohibition causes and don't know the effects of prohibition when they see it (patients getting acetaminophen poisoning, heroin users overdosing, etc.)

Heroin i would be fine with legalizing. Drugs like PCP, crack, crystal meth I believe would increase the strain on the medical resources more. I'd probably go with decriminalization for possession though.

On a non-drug related tangent, here's a 4 minute clip which nicely explains the current issues. And in a pretty neutral matter as well, for a difference.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lzcCoyJBMSU

Who's betting this whole situation will accumulate until it taxgasms in Dec 2012?

this whole debt ceiling debacle hurts more than any of obama's other horrible capitulations to the right.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/01/opinion/the-president-surrenders-on-debt-ceiling.html

every country has its problems, but the US doesn't even have a functioning government with which to even attempt to fix its myriad problems.

the US is a sinking ship and i want off.

I like how Obama ended up being pretty much a Republican after all the talk about "hope and change". What a milquetoast spineless politician he turned out to be. Hopefully the independents will have a hard think if it's worth giving their votes to Obama again. The Democratic Party is an absolutely worthless disorganized mess.

Am I imagining things or have the Democrats moved farther right trying to entice moderate Republicans who might not like that their party has been invaded by crazy Tea party people?

US is very close to losing it's AAA credit rating, and will cost an extra $100 billion each year in interest payments.