Watching the Democrats - it's Fun and Macabre!

[Adak]

At the same time. Like "Saw X in Washington" mashed up with a circus clown.

But the flim-flam political lies have come down to the "brass tacks", and with the fiscal cliff approaching, we can see how earnest the Democrats REALLY are about cutting the government spending.

Will Obama and the Democrats cut current spending by 10%? NO.

Will Obama and the Democrats cut current spending by 5%? NO.

Will Obama and the Democrats cut current spending by even 1%? NO.

What Obama and the Democrats WILL do is immediately raise taxes - on the rich most conspicuously, but also on the middle class - when you're not looking of course. And it won't be called a tax, it will be called a "fee", a "levy", or some other friendlier euphemism.

We have a new game: Catch the euphemisms for "new taxes"! I said it was going to be fun!

After taxes are raised, Obama and the Democrats will cut PROJECTED FUTURE SPENDING - which is so horridly out of balance with income that not one democrat will support it, and why Obama and the democrats have never passed a budget (except Bush's budget, in the first year of Obama's first term).

So our deficit will continue to climb - up, up, and away!

What fun!

We've gone from a nation that loves our freedom, to a nation that loves the free $TUFF, from our government.

Our childhood dreams are being realized, though - there IS a real Santa Clause who brings us all kinds of free gift$: The Democratic Party.

Fun! Fun! Fun!

[Griff]

Welcome back!

I would only suggest that the GOP also lacks credibility in the deficit department, so its in the interest of the stupidly criminal party to work with the criminally stupid party to get a balanced approach underway near-term.

[Sundae]

Adak - got any recipes you want to share?

[richlevy]

I'm waiting for you to explain the Mayan calender ending on Dec 21st as them knowing the world was coming to an end because Obama would be reelected.

We're in this mess because taxes were cut below any kind of sustainable level while we ran two wars for a decade. Now that the bill has come due, the only suggestions from the party that was mostly responsible is to double down on the unsustainable tax cuts.

There will be spending cuts, but there also needs to be revenue. The periods of US history with the highest tax rates also enjoyed the highest growth because tax policy encouraged tying up capital in enterprise. The 'trickle down' theory has not worked because tax savings trickle into offshore investments or exotic restructured financial products that are essentially financial masturbation - providing the illusion without actually producing anything.

Anyone who believes that American freedoms are being threatened because someones tax bracket is being adjusted up %4 is gullible. Anyone who states this without actually believing it is a lawyer, politician, or lobbyist.

[SamIam]

Originally Posted by Adak

At the same time. Like "Saw X in Washington" mashed up with a circus clown

Hey, Adak. Welcome back! We were worried we wouldn't see you again now that Obama won both the electoral college and the POPULAR vote for President.

OK, now that the civilities are over...

Originally Posted by Adak

But the flim-flam political lies have come down to the "brass tacks", and with the fiscal cliff approaching, we can see how earnest the Democrats REALLY are about cutting the government spending.

Also, we can see how earnest the Republicans REALLY are about not cutting the taxes for anyone but a prviiledged few. The upper 2% or else the hell with everyone else.

Originally Posted by Adak

Will Obama and the Democrats cut current spending by 10%? NO.

Will Grover Norquist and the Tea Party modify the tax code to bring in more revenue to help decrease the deficit by even so much as .000001% ? NO

Originally Posted by Adak

Will Obama and the Democrats cut current spending by 5%? NO.

Will Grover Norquist and the whacko Republican extremists modify the tax code to help reduce the deficit by even so much as .0000005%? NO

Originally Posted by Adak

Will Obama and the Democrats cut current spending by even 1%? NO.

Will Grover Norquist and his gang of Republicans feeding from the Corporate trough raise revenues by even .000000000000001% ? NO

Originally Posted by Adak

What Obama and the Democrats WILL do is immediately raise taxes - on the rich most conspicuously, but also on the middle class - when you're not looking of course. And it won't be called a tax, it will be called a "fee", a "levy", or some other friendlier euphemism.

What Grover Norquist and the Republicans will do is immediately cut Medicare and Medicaid, cut disability payments for vets injured in our on-going and numerous wars, and take food from the mouths of hungry children by eliminating the SNAP program. They'll do this when we're not looking of course by their continued refusal to make public their desired cuts to federally funded programs. And it won't be called destroying the social contract - it will be called encouraging the "job creators."

Originally Posted by ADAK

We have a new game: Catch the euphemisms for "new taxes"! I said it was going to be fun!

We have a new game: Catch the euphemisms for further enriching the wealthiest few and creating a more plutocratic society with the passing of each day.

Originally Posted by Adak

After taxes are raised, Obama and the Democrats will cut PROJECTED FUTURE SPENDING - which is so horridly out of balance with income that not one democrat will support it, and why Obama and the democrats have never passed a budget (except Bush's budget, in the first year of Obama's first term).

The Republicans will continue to assure that deficit remains so horridly out of balance by their continued refusal to NEVER give a nanometer and their view of "compromise" as a 4 letter word.

Originally Posted by Adak

Our childhood dreams are being realized, though - there IS a real Santa Clause who brings us all kinds of free gift$: The Democratic Party.

Fun! Fun! Fun!

Our childhood nightmares are coming true because, yes Virginia, there is a Scroodge. And he is embodied by the Republican party. The Republicans are quite willing to send us all over the fiscal cliff; increase taxes on EVERYONE; send the economy into a fresh tailspin; watch unemployment rise to new highs; turn children, low income seniors, and the disabled out on the streets - no sacrifice to great for the rest of us if only the upper 2% get their way.

Merry Christmas, everyone. And the Republicans also have a gift for us all - a stocking filled with coal.

BAH, HUMBUG!

[ZenGum]

COAL??? That's damn fossil carbon. Bloody eco-vandals.

Hiya Adak, post about some non-political interests sometimes ... if you have any.

[SamIam]

Originally Posted by ZenGum

COAL??? That's damn fossil carbon. Bloody eco-vandals.

But - but *sputters* the Republicans LOVE coal! The only thing they love more is oil. We should be honored that the Republicans want to make us gifts of coal. The only thing better than coal and oil is oil shale . It combines the best of both coal and oil with the added benefits of strip mining - coming soon to a National Forest or Park near you. Well, not YOU, Zen since you're an Aussie, but all the rest of us in the only real country in the world.

Gee, now I'm feeling really bad for everybody who doesn't live in the good old US of A and won't get the gift of oil shale or coal or anything. Tell you what since it's the $-mas season. Y'all can pm me with your shipping address and I'll send you a piece of oil shale for your stockings. I'm sure my local Forest Service Office won't mind if I shop early and beat the Robber Baron rush.

[Adak]

@Recipies? Might be a good distraction eh?

@Griff and @SamIam: Thanks for the welcome back.

@SamIam: In fracking, you bore a hole VERY deep (way past any ground water), and then you can bore horizontally, wherever you want to go, to get to the shale that has the oil, and fracture it.

There is NO strip mining!

It's like a hole for a water well, but much deeper. Everything else is hundreds to thousands of feet below the surface, and you see nothing of it.

Obama was bound to win - everybody loves $anta Claus! And he's "cool", and he's an idiot who can't run a lemonade stand in the hot Summer, with free lemons and water.

But he's cool, and he's got us on the dole - for jobs, for assistance of all types. Thanks to his economic policy duds, we've got more people on welfare than ever, in our history.

And he's promised us everything, if we just tax the rich.

What a load of horse shit! But we're going to call it FUN fertilizer, don't ya know!

Actual budget cuts offered by Obama and the Democrats so far: 0.00%

Will Grover Norquist and the Tea Party modify the tax code to bring in more revenue to help decrease the deficit by even so much as .000001% ? NO

The tax code can't be changed unless the democrats approve it (which they won't), so no, the tax code can't be changed, atm. Norquist is an influential lobbyist, and on the Council on Foreign Relations, but has no vote in Congress, for either party. So he's out of the picture for any actual bill writing.

I tend to agree with Richlevy: some tax increases will be needed, but spending cuts should be 100 X as much - it's totally out of whack with Obama.

Drunken sailors could learn how to spend their money faster, by watching Obama.

You can drain the rich until they're wearing rain barrels - it won't cut the deficit one penney - because our projected spending deficit exceeds every cent that all the rich guys in the country are worth, all together.

You flunked arithmetic?

THAT's the big elephant in our living room, and I agree completely with Richlevy - we've had two wars + the extensive air campaign over Libya - and you can't do that without raising taxes.

My other interests are programming and helping out with Folding@Home and other computer assisted efforts to help cure diseases.

I'm #19 on my team, and #389 on the entire Folding@Home project.
http://folding.extremeoverclocking.c...=169140#169140

Anybody read about the tax loophole that Starbucks and other multinationals are using to avoid ALL federal taxes in the UK?

Shows we don't have the only brain dead tax policies.

@SamIam: Trust me, you don't know what a "Scrooge" is, until you've seen a full on monetary crisis. It would make our fiscal cliff look like cheesecake, with our favorite ice cream. THAT is what the forced fiscal cliff, is meant to avoid - and it had better work, if it's needed.

[SamIam]

Originally Posted by Adak

@Recipies? Might be a good distraction eh?

@Griff and @SamIam: Thanks for the welcome back.

@SamIam: In fracking, you bore a hole VERY deep (way past any ground water), and then you can bore horizontally, wherever you want to go, to get to the shale that has the oil, and fracture it.

There is NO strip mining!

It's like a hole for a water well, but much deeper. Everything else is hundreds to thousands of feet below the surface, and you see nothing of it.

I don't mean to turn this thread into an expose' of environmental crimes now being committed in the American West, and I'll try not to turn my reply into something nobody else but tw can understand. But your statements are so completely wrong that I can't let them go unchallenged. I live here and it's happening to the mountains and back country plateaus that I love. It breaks my heart and I have VERY strong feelings about it.

You obviously know nothing about current oil shale and natural gas extraction methods in Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming. Fracking is used to extract natural gas, not oil shale. Fracking often leads to the pollution of ground water with methane. As a result of this contamination, some communities in my part of the world - Colorado's Western Slope - have tap water that can actually be set on fire:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEQMA0zwMM4



Out here, burning water is like burning $100 dollar bills. Water is a precious commodity in this land of little rain. It's bad enough that the energy companies come in and contaminate our water supplies, but the crime is compounded when outfits like Halliburten and Shell steal our water completely. Farmers and ranchers are being driven out of business because they can no longer afford the high costs of water rights - a price skyrocketing thanks to drought and energy exploitation methods.

That's just a few of the evils of fracking natural gas.

There is nothing responsible or sustainable about oil shale either. The process of extracting oil shale is similar to tar sands. The land is strip mined, then the oil is baked out of the rock by heating it to high temperatures. This is a process that destroys the land, uses massive amounts of water, and uses massive amounts of energy.

You'll be pleased to hear that this is one area where the Obama administration is in bed with the big oil and energy corporations. Obama's decision to allow big energy to pillage our public lands is worthy of Republicans like James Watt and Dick Cheney. While I supported Obama in the election, he was merely the lesser of two evils. I and other Western environmentalists are fighting a losing battle to keep our backyards from becoming slag pits.

The first two pix that follow are of my beloved Uncomphaghre Plateau - two hours drive to the north of me. It's spectacular and one of Colorado's best kept secrets. Few tourists venture up there and I usually have the entire Uncomphaghre to myself when I go there - or so it feels. The Uncomphaghre is also a rich source of oil shale and falls under the Bureau of Land mis-Management (BLM). Obama is turning BLM lands into national sacrifice areas in the quest for so-called alternative energy sources.

Pix three and four are of shale debris and a shale strip mine, respectively. Obama wants to delete pix one and two and replace them with pix three and four.

Y'all can go back to the budget thing now. I think I'll go outside and look at the mountains for a while.

[Adak]

[quote=SamIam;841615]I don't mean to turn this thread into an expose' of environmental crimes now being committed in the American West, and I'll try not to turn my reply into something nobody else but tw can understand. But your statements are so completely wrong that I can't let them go unchallenged. I live here and it's happening to the mountains and back country plateaus that I love. It breaks my heart and I have VERY strong feelings about it.

You obviously know nothing about current oil shale and natural gas extraction methods in Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming. Fracking is used to extract natural gas, not oil shale. [quote]


Stop! I live in the American Southwest, and fracking also allows access to oil that is in shale - it's not just natural gas (although there is a lot of that gas, as well, and natural gas burns VERY clean).

Your "burning water" was investigated (that was in Pennsylvania, btw), and found to be a contamination by above ground mishandling and contamination -- had NOTHING to do with fracking. You can't contaminate with fracking because they're working FAR deeper than ground water, UNLESS your well casings and pipes BOTH crack and leak, AND are passing through an area with groundwater.

The gov't has checked this out, (they wanted to stop it), and found that they could not, because there was NO evidence it contaminated ANYTHING. I will add that there is of course, SOME risk in doing ANYTHING - in the environment, or just crossing the street.

Fracking often leads to the pollution of ground water with methane. As a result of this contamination, some communities in my part of the world - Colorado's Western Slope - have tap water that can actually be set on fire:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VEQMA0zwMM4

Yes, this was checked out - above ground contamination, by poor handling of wastes. Had nothing to do with fracking.

Out here, burning water is like burning $100 dollar bills. Water is a precious commodity in this land of little rain. It's bad enough that the energy companies come in and contaminate our water supplies, but the crime is compounded when outfits like Halliburten and Shell steal our water completely. Farmers and ranchers are being driven out of business because they can no longer afford the high costs of water rights - a price skyrocketing thanks to drought and energy exploitation methods.

That's just a few of the evils of fracking natural gas.

So now companies are to blame because costs are rising in the marketplace, for a scarce supply of water?

I cringe at your lack of understanding of supply and demand. Do you believe these companies can help that? They would LOVE to pay low prices for the water they need.

There is nothing responsible or sustainable about oil shale either. The process of extracting oil shale is similar to tar sands. The land is strip mined, then the oil is baked out of the rock by heating it to high temperatures. This is a process that destroys the land, uses massive amounts of water, and uses massive amounts of energy.

Shale mining IS strip mining, AFAIK, but I'm not very knowledgeable about shale mining. It's completely wrong to group Fracking, with Shale Mining. The former is like drilling a well. The latter is like tearing the shit out of everything on the surface, and working with the shale, below it, directly, with huge mining equipment.

You'll be pleased to hear that this is one area where the Obama administration is in bed with the big oil and energy corporations. Obama's decision to allow big energy to pillage our public lands is worthy of Republicans like James Watt and Dick Cheney.

Actually, Obama has blocked a lot of oil projects, on Federal lands.

While I supported Obama in the election, he was merely the lesser of two evils. I and other Western environmentalists are fighting a losing battle to keep our backyards from becoming slag pits.

The first two pix that follow are of my beloved Uncomphaghre Plateau - two hours drive to the north of me. It's spectacular and one of Colorado's best kept secrets. Few tourists venture up there and I usually have the entire Uncomphaghre to myself when I go there - or so it feels. The Uncomphaghre is also a rich source of oil shale and falls under the Bureau of Land mis-Management (BLM). Obama is turning BLM lands into national sacrifice areas in the quest for so-called alternative energy sources.

What's so "alternative" about strip mining for oil, from shale? I don't get the "alternative" description here. Looks like same-ol' stuff to me.

Pix three and four are of shale debris and a shale strip mine, respectively. Obama wants to delete pix one and two and replace them with pix three and four.

Y'all can go back to the budget thing now. I think I'll go outside and look at the mountains for a while.

Oh there's no doubt that strip mining is about the only thing worse than clear cutting a huge forest - it destroys everything. What's the plan to restore the area's being mined, when they're done working with the shale? That's what I'd like to see. I don't believe you can stop strip mining, in area's rich in deposits. You CAN and SHOULD insist that the area be returned to something akin to it's former state though, when they are done.

We do need the energy - that's critical, but we don't need to strip mine and then leave the area a slag dump.

Yes, it will not be the same for a hundred years, but it should be enjoyable, and be slowly returned to it's former beauty, as large trees grow in, etc. That will only happen if it gets worked into shape with the slag put back below the level of supporting top and secondary soil. If the slag stays at or very close to the surface, then nothing good will ever grow there. All plants depend on the micro organisms and micro nutrients in soil - and that is not present in slag.

All Good Medicine.

[Big Sarge]

well said adak. well said

[infinite monkey]

I'm #19 on my team, and #389 on the entire Folding@Home project.
http://folding.extremeoverclocking.c...=169140#169140

What is that I don't even

[Spexxvet]

Adak, here's reality

[glatt]

How to lie with statistics.

Obama has increased spending less than other presidents, and way less than Republican presidents. True

Obama is spending more than any other president in history. True

These statements seem contrary, and a partisan will look only at the one that supports their team. But they are both true. If Bush spent x, and Obama increased spending even very slightly, then Obama is spending x + y, which is greater than x.

My way of thinking is to look at a household for an analogy. You are supposed to save money during the good times so you have a nest egg to get you through the bad times. We had good times under Clinton and were starting to save money, but Bush came in and stopped the saving of money and spent money like crazy instead. Then bad times came. And now Obama needs to spend money to get us through the bad times, but there is no money to spend because Bush already spent it during the good times. So Obama needs to spend money that doesn't exist. Not a very good situation to be in. But if you don't spend the money in bad times, the bad times will get even worse. And if you spend money that you don't have for too long, then the bad times will also get worse. Deficits do matter. I place the current problems directly at the feet of Bush. But so what? What do we do now? I'm not sure, but I am pretty sure that we need to get money into the hands of consumers. Consumers drive the economy. Rich people do NOT drive the economy. Consumer demand created jobs. Small business monetary holdings do not create jobs.

[Stormieweather]

Originally Posted by glatt

What do we do now? I'm not sure, but I am pretty sure that we need to get money into the hands of consumers. Consumers drive the economy. Rich people do NOT drive the economy. Consumer demand created jobs. Small business monetary holdings do not create jobs.

Can I get an AMEN?!

All those senior citizens with their social security spend that money...on food and medicine and doctors and travel, etc.

Get money into people's pockets and they will spend it. On food, travel, housing, clothing, entertainment, investments, houses, cars, etc.

That spending increases demand on businesses, which allows them to expand and create jobs to hire more people.

This, then, inflates the value of the businesses and translates to increased dividend and stock values. More revenue/net income = more taxes to the government. Not necessarily a higher tax rate, more OF the current taxes.

Everyone benefits. All the way to the top. And sideways through the federal and state government(s).

If you're playing fair and not being greedy and near-sighted, that is.

However, if your purpose is to milk as much cash from whomever and stash that money overseas in a tax haven, or run shady/shaky investment deals and get it done before anyone catches on or regulates it, then doing it the slow way, from the ground up won't work for you.

Corporate profits are at an all time high. If you are one of those people reaping the benefits of this, you sure as hell don't want that to change. Paying employees more or giving better benefits would cut into your profits! OMG! (Dumbasses don't even think beyond the end of their pointed little noses...err...wallets).

So go for the spending cuts on the backs of the poor people, the disabled, the elderly, our children...because they have no power or influence and there are no instant profits to be had from helping them survive. Plenty of long term benefits, but too many people have bought the fairy tale that we must CUT CUT CUT NOW NOW NOW or tomorrow the world will end. They aren't even willing to consider that they might be wrong.

And maybe more people should research how the economy actually works before they start bleating about what should be done with it.