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We Need to CUT Spending!

COL Gene

Join Date 09/2004

We Need to CUT Spending!

This is the cry of most Republicans and some Democrats. It is time to stop making this generalized statement and take an HONEST look at the Federal Budget. To help with that please take a look at the following Web Site: www.thebudgetgraph.com . It will give you a very clear picture of just where the Federal Government is spending YOUR tax dollars.

I have looked at this issue as well at the major issues that face our country and will impact spending for the foreseeable future. The objective was to see just where the spending cuts can be made to solve the nation’s fiscal problems.

First we need to understand ALL Federal spending falls into one of two types. One is “mandatory spending” and the other is termed “discretionary spending”. Both types have been increasing at a fast pace. When we talk about cutting the budget we must understand the items which are mandatory are NOT subject to cutting without violating promises that have been made by the Government of the United States. The three biggest elements in this category are Interest on the National Debt, Medicare and Social Security. In round numbers that mandatory spending is about $2 Trillion Dollars per year.

The other category is discretionary spending and is made up of elements that CAN be cut without violating the promises made by our country. The amount of that type of spending is about $800 Billion per year. If you fail to look at what is included in that $800 Billion one can come to the conclusion we can solve our fiscal problems by simply cutting this discretionary spending. Now it is time to take a look at the budget graph I referenced.

You will see the largest element in that category which comprises more then half of discretionary spending is National Defense. Another large component is Homeland Security. Help for the poor for Food Stamps and Medicaid rounds out the major items. These three make up MOST of the discretionary spending.

Let’s take a look at the largest spending items within the budget and the prospect for cutting them in the future.

Mandatory Items:

Social Security- this will increase at a growing rate as the Baby Boomers retire which will start in February 2008.

Medicare – This will increase for the same reason as Social Security plus the addition of the Prescription Drug Program and the increasing cost of health care. This will increase far more then Social Security.

Interest – This will continue to increase so long as we add to the National Debt. The national debt on Sept 30, 2006 was $8.5 Trillion. The National Debt on September 30, 2007 was $9 Trillion. Despite the lie Bush told that the annual deficit was $168 Billion that actual amount we added to the total debt was $500 Billion in FY 2007. Go to the U.S. Treasury web site for the actual amounts to the penny.

Discretionary Items:

National Defense – That will increase substantially because of the increase in the Active Duty strength, pay increases and because of the replacement of most of the equipment for the ground forces.

VA- This will expand in a major way to pay for the injured veterans from the Iraq war.

Homeland Security - That will need to increase as we build the border fence and add the needed border guards. The new equipment and new ID cards and systems will also require added spending. The Coast Guard will see an increase in spending as will federal law enforcement and intelligence services.

Medicaid - As more and more people are becoming eligible and medical cost increase, the cost of this program will increase.

Pell Grants – The lower interest rates for student loans will increase the overall cost of this program.

Federal Road and Bridge maintenance – This will increase given the condition of the ageing roads and bridges.

The above are the areas that surely will require added spending. These items make up the BULK of the overall spending. When you look at the magnitude of these items it will not be a surprise that spending will continue to increase. I would like to have ANYONE provide specifics as to where and by how much the so called “spending cuts” can take place that will both balance the budget and then provide a REAL Surplus to be used to pay down the over $9 Trillion dollar national debt.

The time has passed for statements like - “the problem is our Spending”. We need to provide specifics areas and amounts where spending can be CUT to come up with the money needed to balance the budget and begin paying down the debt! I believe the chance of spending cuts solving our fiscal problems to be about the same as winning the Power Ball Lottery! Remember, mandatory spending is just that!

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Reply By: ParaTed2k Posted: Wednesday, October 31, 2007
Idiot!

By your "logic" if you have a mortgage you can't possibly have money in the bank?

I did a little checking around the net. In 2006, the total revenue of the US Treasury was 2,500,000,000,000, the highest since 2000. After 2000, when Clinton's tax increases and the recession affected the economy negatively, the total revenues dropped to just under 2,000,000,000,000. Since 2003 the total federal revenues has increased. Which proves that tax increases decrease revenues, tax cuts increase revenues. Check out the chart: Chart (wouldn't it be great if YOU learned how to use links instead of making anyone interested to cut and paste the URLs you cite?)

“Btw, Clinton NEVER actually Balance the budget, he merely stated that he did and idiots like you believed it. After all, Clinton wouldn't lie, right?” LIE We had a balanced Budget in 2000!!!!!!!!!!!

HOW can you be so DUMB? The bottom like is that the Federal Government is collecting in tax revenue about $500 Billion LESS then we are spending. LOOK at the National debt balance Sept 30, 2006 - It was 8.5 Trillion. The national debt Balance one year later was $9.0 Trillion or $500 Billion higher. That PROVES in FY 2007 we spent as a country 1/2 Trillion Dollars MORE then we Taxed. Since 1981 we have SPENT $8 Trillion more then we taxed. LOOK at the Treasury Web Site.

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ou are the stupid one. If you current income is not enough to pay all your bills and you have cut everything you can cut you likewise seek a higher paying job, try and work OT or get a second job to provide the money to meet you bills. The Tax increase to the wealthy is like the second job or getting a better paying job.

Col, you first have to eliminate the unnecessary before you can figure out if you need the part time job or not. What you are suggesting is to add more crap to the crap we already have and raise taxes to make up for it. That is stupid economy. You don't add more problems to the current problems we have and then try to compensate by finding another job. That's like fixing a leaky pipe with duck tape rather than replacing the pipe. Stupid economics, and I should now. I have plenty of experience with stupid economics.

I understand the wealthy are greedy and want to keep all their money even though they have everything and more then they need.

Are you wealthy Col? Cause if you are not, how can you understand anything about wealthy people. You have just stereotyped every single rich person into a greedy monster who only thinks about themselves. Well let me tell you something Col, if I worked my butt off and made a lot of money, don't expect me to be giving my money up to a bunch of freeloaders who refuse to look for work and instead chose to live off the tits of the Federal Gov't.

You know nothing about people in general, everyone wants to keep their money, rich or poor. I can not believe you have the nerve to single out a certain group of people who most have worked hard to earn what they have and all they get from the great people of this nation is put downs. I can not believe we have reached a point in life where we live in a country where people have all chances in the world to reach the American dream, the we strive to make this country better by pouring billions into the school system, that we do everything within our power to provide those less fortunate chances to improve their lives and for what? So jerks like Col can round them up, stereotype them and insult them because they achieved that which this country gave them the ability to do.

Is this what being American is all about? Being given all chances to better your life by people like the Democrats and once you achieve that goal they set for you they insult you for reaching that goal? This is so sickening I almost want to throw up. How can a political party care about a group of people and want to help them succeed but once they succeed they prize is insults because they make too much money.

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When people stop calling me names when they do not like the facts I provide I would be glad to.

That's OK Col. I would never expect a person like you to admit when you are wrong. Regardless of what you say you owe me and I will make sure you never forget that.

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Reply By: CharlesCS1 Posted: Wednesday, October 31, 2007
OK, I've had just about enough of your BS Col gene. You better be prepared to own up to your own words when I start throwing them in your face you hypocrite.

I have no idea nor do I support any new programs that we can not pay for and until we pay for what we are doing.

You lying Son of a (beep). Let me line up all your articles that disprove this BS reply of yours:

I thought you did not call me an SOB! What do you think "You lying Son of a (beep)." is?

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Daiwa

Join Date 07/2001

+351

Recent true story:

A couple with 7 children, on Medicaid, recently sold enough of their food stamps to buy an iPod. The iPod was then stolen so, as one of the kids said, "We didn't have any food or music." The state in its wisdom has since fostered out all 7 of the children. The parents are now free to party hearty & see the kids whenever. And Gene thinks these people need more of our money.

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The Tax increase to the wealthy is like the second job or getting a better paying job.

except that it will cost more to collect than what is collected.

havent you been paying attention. we are collecting more taxes now than we were in 1999.

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You know Gene, if I could just take money out of your paycheck to pay my bills, I could be out of debt too.

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You lying Son of a (beep). Let me line up all your articles that disprove this BS reply of yours:

I thought you did not call me an SOB! What do you think "You lying Son of a (beep)." is?

What do you think it is? All you can do is assume I said SOB but you can not prove I did. And just in case you think there is nothing else it could have been, try watching the movie Toy Story, close to the end where Mr PotatoHead clearly says "Son of a Building Block". There is also "Son of a Gun". So unless you can prove beyond a shadow of a doubt I said SOB, you still owe me an apology.

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You know Gene, if I could just take money out of your paycheck to pay my bills, I could be out of debt too.

Not unless you have no problem dealing with dirty money, cause any money made by this man can not be seen as anything other than dirty.

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Reply By: Daiwa Posted: Thursday, November 01, 2007
Recent true story:

“A couple with 7 children, on Medicaid, recently sold enough of their food stamps to buy an iPod. The iPod was then stolen so, as one of the kids said, "We didn't have any food or music." The state in its wisdom has since fostered out all 7 of the children. The parents are now free to party hearty & see the kids whenever. And Gene thinks these people need more of our money.”

I know there are examples just like you gave us. There are also MILLIONS who need the help and do not abuse the system. You and many of the so called Compassionate Conservatives want to treat all the poor like they are trying to abuse the system when the vast majority just need the help. No matter what you say, Bush and the GOP have shifted the wealth from the middle income to the rich and that is not healthy for our country. You talk about class warfare. Nothing contributes more to that then to have the poor and middle income working Americans who do work hard be unable to live watch the wealthy become more and more wealthy. I saw the incomes of the top 100 hedge Fund Managers and they are ridiculous. They do not deserve nor is their function worth anything like 100 Plus Million per year. I would have surtax for people in at that level much higher then the 4.5% proposed by the Ways and Means committee.

Reply By: ParaTed2k
Posted: Thursday, November 01, 2007
You know Gene, if I could just take money out of your paycheck to pay my bills, I could be out of debt too.

That is BS. Returning to the higher tax rates for the wealthy would help this country and would not cause the wealthy any change in their lavish life style!

Reply By: danielost

The Tax increase to the wealthy is like the second job or getting a better paying job.

Except that it will cost more to collect than what is collected.

Haven’t you been paying attention? We are collecting more taxes now than we were in 1999. And we are spending far more, It is you that does not listed—WE SPENT $500 Billion more last year then we TAXED!

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Daiwa

Join Date 07/2001

+351

I know there are examples just like you gave us.

And there are more than you are willing to admit. Ignore the more extreme ones, a large percentage of the people you claim "need" help have made economic choices - they find cable TV, a family cell-phone plan, an HDTV, 2 computers, another car, you name it, more important than providing health insurance for the family, in no small part because they know there a suckers like you willing to give Robin Hood free reign. Why tighten your belt for what you call a "necessity" when you can have that new XBox, a new catback for your hot rod and someone else to pick up the tab for that "necessity?"

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in no small part because they know there a suckers like you willing to give Robin Hood free reign

So now Robin Hood was a bad guy?!? What has this crazy world come to??? If you're going to make fun of liberals please do so, but don't besmirch the good legend of Robin Hood!!!!!

Anywho.

In regards to the whole "goldarn poor people are takin' mah money!!!" I'm sure that pretty quickly there's gonna be an additional 12,000 families in need, who until recently were upstanding hardworking members of society. seeing as Chrysler is cutting 12,000 more jobs. No wait, don't tell me. All those former employees are going to have no trouble finding equally well paying jobs in another sector of the economy right? They won't need to go to re-train and go to college (which would mean a ton of debt and no real income while they were in school, which therefore removes it as an option as many of them have families to provide for)

It's been proven time and again that when manufacturing jobs are lost, on the whole most of the former employees do find work but at less pay than they were making before. Sure some of them move on to bigger and better things but not the majority. Does that make them leeches on society for having the audacity, the sheer stupidity to give decades of their labor to one company??

There are many, many reasons why people fall on hard times and need socialized assistance. EVEN IF you are doing all the right things, working hard, saving money, have health insurance etc. If your health provider decides that you are costing them too much money, they WILL try to find a way to weasel out of it and stick you with the bill, by saying that you had a pre-existing condition you didn't disclose or that you sought treatment without proper consultation of a representative of the HMO, etc. Or that ten years ago you filled out an application form improperly, the list of possible reasons is very long indeed.

So because of this, you can have a working class schmo who's doing all the right things, and he still ends up going broke because he ends up getting hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical bills. Or maybe he gets suckered in by a group called Baptist Foundation of Arizona who tells him that as a good Christian organization they'll take care of his money AND give him a decent return. Now that's stewardship baby! Oops, look we lied, joke's on you and now your life savings are gone cause you trusted us, sucker!!!

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WE SPENT $500 Billion more last year then we TAXED!

yes that is called a deficit. but you want to make it worse by raising taxes and collecting less in taxes.

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(which would mean a ton of debt and no real income while they were in school, which therefore removes it as an option as many of them have families to provide for)

Oh, really? So I'm not working 60 hours a week while going to school full time?

Go figure!

The truth is, many Americans can, and do, go to school full time while working full time, Arty. In my case, it only pushes me harder towards the prize.

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In regards to the whole "goldarn poor people are takin' mah money!!!" I'm sure that pretty quickly there's gonna be an additional 12,000 families in need, who until recently were upstanding hardworking members of society. seeing as Chrysler is cutting 12,000 more jobs.

maybe the union shouldn't have demanded more money from Chrysler. so that Chrysler wouldn't have to cut 12,000 more jobs. thus making them raise their prices even further out of reach of the poor and the lower middle class. oh thats right i am sorry not supposed to blame these things on liberals.

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That is BS. Returning to the higher tax rates for the wealthy would help this country and would not cause the wealthy any change in their lavish life style!

So, what you are saying is, somehow it is better to have the government take your money, then give it to me, than have me just take it directly from you?

Yeah, that makes sense.

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Well, pretty soon you're not going to be able to blame unions for anything because they won't be around anymore in your country. Unionized labor in the U.S accounts for a whopping 12.5 % of the workforce, so I find it very interesting that so many ills and problems get heaped onto this 12.5% of the mostly middle class labor scale. That's even less than the number of people who still support Bush, now that's saying a lot!

I'm a member of a labor union and damn proud of it, and am very sad that the unions in the States had their backs broken years ago. The Chrysler strike was a farce, and management was going to make those cuts regardless of the how the pay scale was adjusted- not that the union is greedy and simply wants their wages to rise in order to meet inflation (how dare they!)

And by the way, politics and union affiliation do not necessarily go hand in hand. Many of the members of my union are conservative and many are liberal, but we leave our politics at the door when it comes to work.

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Many of the members of my union are conservative and many are liberal, but we leave our politics at the door when it comes to work

i didn't say union members i said unions.

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Gideon, good for you for sticking it out. What you're doing is a testament to your determination to make things work and I applaud you for it. I'm not saying that the moment a factory closes everyone is screwed, but it does affect people's lives bigtime. Say you've got a factory, mill, industrial plant that shuts down and lays off thousands of workers. Yes, some of them will be able to do what you are doing and once again kudos to you. But most of them will be lucky just to get a full time job that pays more than 8 or 9 bucks an hour (way to feed a family, right!!), so, unless they can get good enough employment to look after their family they have no choice but to work two or three jobs. There goes school!

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this is just one cost of the new contract.

The company said the shedding of retiree health care costs will be a major step in its effort to close the competitiveness gap with nonunion automakers such as Toyota Motor (Charts) and Honda Motor (Charts).

But it will not come cheap for GM. The automaker will have to pay tens of billions of dollars of cash, stock and debt into the trust fund to cover those future costs.

WWW Link

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Daiwa

Join Date 07/2001

+351

So because of this, you can have a working class schmo who's doing all the right things, and he still ends up going broke because he ends up getting hundreds of thousands of dollars in medical bills. Or maybe he gets suckered in by a group called Baptist Foundation of Arizona who tells him that as a good Christian organization they'll take care of his money AND give him a decent return. Now that's stewardship baby! Oops, look we lied, joke's on you and now your life savings are gone cause you trusted us, sucker!!!

Life sucks. Then you die.

Our poorest are a damn site better off than a big chunk of the world's population. Why in the world would all all those people risk life and limb breaking into this country illegally if it sucked so harsh to be poor here? Does that mean folks here who fall on hard times through no fault of their own should be ignored? Hell, no. I wouldn't support the charities I favor or spend my Thanksgiving and Christmas cleaning tables at the Salvation Army Holiday meal if I felt that way. The point is should my money be confiscated to pay someone to clean those tables rather than me doing it gratis?

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Island Dog

Join Date 06/2003

+1048

You talk about class warfare. Nothing contributes more to that then to have the poor and middle income working Americans who do work hard be unable to live watch the wealthy become more and more wealthy.

Well comrade, this is America where anyone has the opportunity to succeed. However, we have socialists like you who want to punish people like that. The federal government has ABSOLUTELY NO responsibility to give handouts to people. It's so obvious you have an obsessive jealousy of the rich. End of story!

I saw the incomes of the top 100 hedge Fund Managers and they are ridiculous. They do not deserve nor is their function worth anything like 100 Plus Million per year.

So? Who are you to tell someone what they "deserve"?

You and many of the so called Compassionate Conservatives want to treat all the poor like they are trying to abuse the system when the vast majority just need the help.

As Brad has pointed out before, conservatives gives far more to charity than anyone else, so save that BS for someone else. The federal government has no responsibility to "help" anyone who can help themselves.

I told you to go take a ride over to your local welfare/food stamp office, and to tell me how many of those people are able to work for themselves.

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I saw the incomes of the top 100 hedge Fund Managers and they are ridiculous.

And I saw some completely worthless Field Grade Officers who couldn't make a rational decision or policy to save their lives getting paid far beyond their function or competence.

So what is your point?

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Reply By: danielost Posted: Thursday, November 01, 2007
WE SPENT $500 Billion more last year then we TAXED!

yes that is called a deficit. but you want to make it worse by raising taxes and collecting less in taxes.

Increasing taxes on the top 10% will increase tax revenue and reduce the deficit!

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Reply By: ParaTed2k Posted: Friday, November 02, 2007
I saw the incomes of the top 100 hedge Fund Managers and they are ridiculous.

And I saw some completely worthless Field Grade Officers who couldn't make a rational decision or policy to save their lives getting paid far beyond their function or competence.

So what is your point?

Field grade officers make $70,000 NOT $100 Million you IDIOT. NO ONE is worth $100 Million and if someone gets that amount of money it is taking it from a lot of others. Time to give that excess back by adding a new higher tax rate for those that are steeling the money from the masses to feather their own nest. When any corporate executives make excessive salaries or other compensation it come from the prices charged for their goods or services. Let’s recapture that money and give tax cuts to the middle income working families!!!!!!!

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