Tuesday, July 26, 2011

Obama's Petulant Speech

If you missed President Obama's speech to the world, er nation last night. just download his last press conference or that speech at the University of Maryland a few days ago. Same message, same lines, same argument, same talking points.

Rather than lead the nation, bring us together, or suggest his own plan, you know, the plan he doesn't have, Obama once again ripped into the Republicans, pouted and played the class warfare game. You know that line about corporate jet owners? Yeah, he used it again. If only those millionaires and billionaires would pay a little more (their fair share), then we could do all these great things-like redistribute their wealth. Never mind that the top one percent pay some 40% of the federal tax revenue and that almost 50% of Americans don't pay federal income tax.

Obama is still pushing this line that to extend the Bush tax cuts to everybody (as Bush did), the government would lose out on 700 billion dollars (spread out over 10 years) that it desperately needs That's 70 billion a year when we have a deficit of what is it today-1.5 trillion?  You could confiscate all the wealth of every billionaire and millionaire in this country and you can't make up that total.

So what is Obama's plan other than deliberately bankrupting this country so he can rebuild it according to his own socialist vision? John Boehner has a plan. It's going nowhere, but he has a plan. Paul Ryan had a plan. The Gang of Six has a plan. Hell, even Harry Reid has a plan. Harry Reid, who couldn't run the Mustang Ranch without bankrupting it, has a plan. Obama? His plan is to make another speech. Last night, he tells the American people to flood Congress with phone calls and e-mails telling them to get their act together. Reports are the calls are flooding in, but not the way he wanted it.

In the end, you know the sad sack Republicans will make a deal to raise the debt limit. That means more taxes, more spending, more income redistribution. Spending cuts? It will all be smoke and mirrors.

This government, like the state government of California, does not have a revenue problem. It has a spending problem. The only way to stop it is to take the money away from them so they can't spend it.


Siarlys Jenkins said...

The Bush tax cuts, plus his penchant for running two wars by borrowing the money from the Peoples Republic of China, are directly responsible for the debt crisis.

He came into office with the federal budget running a surplus, and a national debt of $5 trillion. With childish enthusiasm, inspired by his puppet masters, he exclaimed that if there is a surplus we should "give it back to the people."

That would be quite right, if not for the fact that "the people" were already in hock for $5 trillion. Further, his tax cuts did not merely take us from surplus to balance, but back into deficit, with the result that the debt doubled to $10 trillion when he left office.

If a family budget was handled that way, it would come out "Honey, never mind paying off the mortgage. Let's take the money and take a vacation to Hawaii. We'll take out a second mortgage to pay the interest on the first mortgage."

It is indeed unfortunate that President Obama is too considerate to state the truth so bluntly. But the Republican leadership are, at best, a bunch of squabbling children, and have no call to complain when they are treated as such.

Ingrid said...

Which 50% of Americans don't pay taxes? I am on SS now so I don't have to pay taxes, I also can't live on what I get, but a few years ago I made about 20,000 and I had to pay over 1,500 in income tax. I also still pay salestaxes, hotel taxes, and taxes on everything else that is taxed. Gary, you are a heartless and clueless republican.

Gary Fouse said...

Excuse me Ingrid, but you are living in Germany. I can't control what they tax. If you are talking about any US taxes you may pay, you seem to agree with me.

I may be clueless, but I am not heartless. I know because I have to take cholesterol medication. And I am no Republican.

Gary Fouse said...


I am not defending Bush's economic policies, but at what point does Obama take responsibilty for HIS economy? Bush may have created a big deficit, but Obama has made him look like a piker. At what point do we turn off the spigot?

Ingrid said...

Gary, I may live in Germany but up until I turned 66 and started to collect SS I was paying taxes in the US. I don't pay taxes in Germany, but when I visit the States I pay all the other taxes I mentioned.
So who are the 50 percent that don't pay taxes?

Gary Fouse said...


We are talking about federal taxes, and obviously that includes children. It also includes unemployed, folks on welfare, or people making below a certain total. I guess it also includes illegal aliens. It's not a statistic that is disputed. When you come to the US, you are paying sales taxes.

Siarlys Jenkins said...

Gary, every time I get an unsolicited mailing from the Democratic National Committee, asking me for a donation, I write back (without a check) asking when they are going to flank the Republicans by offering a fiscally sound policy that will share the inevitable pain in a more sensible, humane, balanced way, with a good deal more thought than the Boehner crowd and the Bachman crowd seem capable of. I'm still waiting, and that's why they aren't getting any money from me.

I have SOME sympathy for the position President Obama is in, because, while Bush came in on the heels of good times, and after a modest dip, enjoyed several more years of prosperity, Obama watched the economy teeter on the edge of full-blown Depression between the time he was elected and the time he was inaugurated, and for some time after that. This is the sort of period when substantial deficit spending is called for. The problem is, as we get things moving again, it all needs to be paid back.

If he can't offer a coherent plan for when and how the debt is going to peak, and begin to be paid back, then he is going to fail. He could do that a lot more effectively if the Republicans were not playing a game of chicken, with the USA as one of the vehicles headed for a crash.

It is inevitable that it will take tax revenue to pay back the debt, and I have no qualms about most of that falling on tax brackets above $50,000 a year. I would even favor a special surtax dedicated specifically and exclusively to paying down the debt. Income under $50,000, 1%, income over $1,000,000, 5%, graduated in between, for five or ten years. It would be a start.