Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
Western Chauvinist ·
Jul 18, 2011 at 2:27pm
The little I know about Cut, Cap and Balance seems to suggest it is a reasonable approach (links to any details would be appreciated). However, I'm skeptical of a balanced budget amendment because I think it places the emphasis on the wrong thing. I've been influenced in my thinking by Dan Mitchell at the Center for Freedom and Prosperity. See what you think.
You might also want to read Dan Mitchell's short post in which this video was embedded: We Need Shock Collars to Keep Republicans from Saying Stupid Things.
What say you? Yea or Nay on a balanced budget amendment?
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Dec '10
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
He sounds like a cartoon character. A very wise cartoon character. I agree completely that more government is the problem. Neither party stands for smaller government. Will simply balancing the budget solve that problem? I doubt it.
Jan '11
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
NAY!
It will be 2000 pages which no one will read and somewhere inside it will just force tax increases to offset the increased spending. We have enough laws.
Aug '10
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
Nay, because it is unenforceable. If they borrow money, who exactly is going to arrest them?
I'd prefer a Line Item Veto amendment, because no matter who is sitting in the Oval Office it is biased against spending.
Mar '11
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
Absolutely we need a balanced budget amendment that focuses on punishing congressmen who fail to limit spending to article I, section 8 of the Constitution. It would be worthless unless it is specifically designed to foster limited government and instead has an out clause for "emergencies." For this reason, we need to establish a very organized Article V convention, because congress will NEVER limit themselves.
Dec '10
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
I agree about his voice. I try not to get distracted from what he's saying, but sometimes it's difficult!
His presentations have helped me understand how borrowing is sometimes necessary and good. If Cut Cap and Balance prohibits all future borrowing, I'm against it. But, I don't know how we get Leviathan back under constitutional constraints without something severe.
In a previous presentation, Mitchell has recommended legislation which constrains increases in spending to something less than GDP growth. That seems a fine idea, but how do we ensure additional spending isn't allocated to destructive government programs? It isn't just the spending. It's how our money gets spent.
Dec '10
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
Paul DeRocco: Nay, because it is unenforceable. If they borrow money, who exactly is going to arrest them?
I'd prefer a Line Item Veto amendment, because no matter who is sitting in the Oval Office it is biased against spending. · Jul 18 at 8:18am
I think the bigger problem with the balanced budget idea is, it could end up encouraging more "revenue enhancement" (taxes) in support of a still ginormous government.
Don't you think the line item veto would just be a means of cutting spending the minority party wants to do, rather than cutting overall spending? Especially if a Democrat held the veto pen?
Edited on Jul 18, 2011 at 10:25amAug '10
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
It empowers the President's party, regardless of who is the majority in Congress. But it would cut overall spending because that's the only thing it would make easier--it wouldn't make it easier to spend more, or tax more, or borrow more. I might not like the particular line-item vetoes of a Democrat President, but overall I think it would be worth it.
Mar '11
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
When a balanced budget amendment is in place, the tax hikes will be fast and furious; they won't all get through, but too many will. What we need is a set tax rate which can't be changed except at super, super majority status.
Jun '10
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
Nay. An amendment is a dodge. It's like those base closing commissions that pop up from time to time. It's an effort by our elected officials to shift the burden of making tough decisions. Cut spending and just balance the #&%# budget already! It's a simple math problem.
Jan '11
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
Yeah...ok.: NAY!
It will be 2000 pages which no one will read and somewhere inside it will just force tax increases to offset the increased spending. We have enough laws. · Jul 18 at 7:24am
Yea.
I acknowledge your concern for ending up with a Swiss-cheese BBA, so that it has no relation to its original intentions. But it must be possible to craft a one page amendment that states unambiguously that expenditures cannot exceed a certain fraction of revenues.
Why is that not possible? (I don't mean probable, just possible?)
Dec '10
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
This is getting interesting. Obama has threatened to veto a BBA (is this CCB or a separate bill?) even if it gets passed in the Senate. Really? Even if Senate Democrats go along? Is this politically good or bad for Republicans?
May '11
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
You would think that a balanced budget amendment would be easy to put in a paragraph or two and I believe the one that got some traction two decades ago was simple. This current version that restricts spending to 18% of GDP will never be understood by the huddled masses of clueless voters.
Jul '10
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
In a nuclear age, the BBA is a bad idea. Stuff just happens too fast. The socialists and national greatness crowd just need to give up on grand plans for rapid rails to ruin or stand firm in the knowledge that the Tea Party will eventually get to them. Maybe not in 2012, maybe not in 2014, but eventually.
So many feckless crap weasels, so little time.
Jul '10
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
Tying a BBA to a GDP figure that includes a government spending component is brain dead. What genius came up with that one?
Edited on Jul 18, 2011 at 4:44pmOct '10
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
Nay. Politicians who want to hand out favors will find a way to spend your money. They'll just make a travesty of the BBA, as they have with the War Powers Resolution--and as they are about to do with the debt ceiling.
We need better reps, not dead letters.
Edited on Jul 18, 2011 at 5:03pmDec '10
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
"Since the President does not have a constitutional role in the amendment process, the joint resolution does not go to the White House for signature or approval." From here. Constitutional scholar my eye.
Jan '11
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
Well, you're right - the reality is that "s**t happens," and that has to be a component of prudent government budget planning - as it is in family budgeting. Easy credit, forgiveness of excess, and a sense of entitlement complicate what should be a simple resolution to the problem: spend within your means and set aside something for a rainy day - because s**t happens. Living above your means is easy; living beneath your means is hard.
It seems to me that the key to restraining debt accumulation is to relate it directly to revenues. As has been pointed out here, GDP is meaningless as a constraint on spending because it is part fact and part fiction - neither fraction easily determined as true values.
Obviously, politicians must have some excuse for acting prudently. Let's give them one - a BBA.
Jan '11
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
I suspect a BBA is one of those ideas that works better in theory than in practice: a sufficiently weaselly political class will always be able to find a way around it.
Jul '10
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
Nay.
Why hand budgetary control to the courts?
Jul '11
Re: Do You Support a Balanced Budget Amendment?
I have no problem with the Constitution as it stands.
You can't just pass a law, against murder, say, and think there'll be no more murder.