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GOP Fiscally Responsible Only with a Democrat in the White House
Republicans 2010: Elect us! We are the only true advocates of reducing federal spending and not raising the federal borrowing limit.
Republicans 2014: Elect us! The Republican-led House will enforce austerity measures against this free-spending President!
Republicans 2016: Elect us! We will be the voice of mounting public disgust against an irresponsible fiscal policy that has doubled the national debt in eight years!
Ahh, the halcyon days of Conservatism.
Last year the U.S borrowed $519 billion. Granted, this was a continuation of budgets created under Obama. This year, with the GOP running the whole danged show, the US will almost double it’s borrowing to just under a trillion dollars ($955 billion). The $4 trillion (plus) budget was reported by a breathless CNN:
The colossal bill, which lawmakers have been negotiating for months, is a game-changing piece of legislation, clearing the decks for Congress in dealing with major spending issues as well as doling out disaster relief money and hiking the debt ceiling which was set to be reached next month.
Trump tweeted that the bill, which gives the Pentagon an additional $165 billion, was a “big victory” for the US military. But he said Hill Republicans were “forced to increase spending” in order to attract Democratic votes.
So, this Republican President with a Republican House and Republican Senate increased the budget by the tune of $300 billion. It also allowed for no debt ceiling limit until March 2019. I’ll repeat that one: No debt ceiling limit!
Jennifer Grossman of the Atlas Society states:
This is like a credit card company agreeing to postpone the repossession of all that stuff you “bought” on credit and giving you the green light to keep using your card, and racking up more debt, while they happily debit your ledger with outrageous interest charges every month — charges, and principal, that you’ll someday be legally liable to repay.
“We can ignore reality,” Ayn Rand once famously observed, “but we cannot ignore the consequences of ignoring reality.’”
Here is the hard reality: In just over a half a decade, all government revenues will be entirely consumed by the costs of Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security and interest payments on our rapidly ballooning debt. Despite this glaring threat to our fiscal health, no one in Washington seems to be doing anything about it. In fact, they seem to be only adding to the problem, as the recent budget deal demonstrates.
Mr. McConnell, you obviously know the fiscal constraints that happen when interest rates increase, as they will. Mr. McConnell, why did you allow Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer to get everything he wanted?
The original budget proposal showed fiscal responsibility by committing to cut spending. Trump even included his promise to end federal funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. But the GOP establishment types that go along to get along forgot everything they promised on the campaign trail. In a whirlwind couple of days negotiating, Republicans sided with liberals. They sided with growing government bigger. They sided with the media. They sided with bankrupting not just our kids and grandkids, but ourselves.
There were 67 House Republicans who broke with leadership and voted against the budget deal. Most of whom are in the Freedom Caucus; Jim Jordan and this group should each be rewarded by being re-elected. All others who voted for this monstrosity double-crossed those who elected them. They cannot be trusted.
From a 30,000-foot overview, it appears “Conservative, Inc” only used the power of the purse to win elections and fight a Democrat President to appease their base. Now they have power, they showed a lack of courage in making tough choices. They showed a total disregard for those who voted for them to decrease the debt and reduce deficits. They did exactly what they campaigned against.
Conservative voters who voted for fiscal responsibility have no home.
Published in General
Actually, someone sent me an email requesting we get our episodes transcribed. I have looked into it, but to get anything more than a few minutes is cost prohibitive. @Kay do you have any suggestions?
That wasn’t me! Shhhhh . . .
What we do right now is, we have a committee (where have I heard that word used before?LOL) of “experts” guess an interest rate and then they force it down our throats. In my opinion all this does is create asset bubbles inflation and inequality. It makes people need government. The Austrians say we should just let the natural need for savings and investment set a market rate. This would create a more fair and prosperous economy over the long run. It also prevents the growth of government and government power. I agree with that. Central banks should just back up the banking system in a punitive way and add a little money to reflect population growth. Some Austrians say we shouldn’t have central banks at all and just have private money. The fact is legal tender laws (look it up) overly empower and enable the government and all kinds of bad stuff.
I think for practical purposes we probably should be on a ten commodity standard with one of the commodities being gold. I got that from King Banaian, who is a Ricochet contributor.
The one thing I love you to ask David Stockman if you get the chance is if he thinks libertarianism and conservatism can actually work without a central bank that has far less discretion. I just don’t think it’s possible. There a few in Congress that get this like Jason Lewis and Steve Scalese.
***one edit***
This is never going to happen for geopolitical reasons among others, but it’s an interesting question. Prior to modern central banking peoples lives improved because of comprehensively ever-increasing purchasing power from trade, specialization, inventions etc. The government would be way less powerful. There would be less corruption. Prosperity would be more dispersed.
Today we still have increases in purchasing power from progress, but then people get screwed on other stuff like health insurance, medical costs, education, asset bubbles, taxes, fines, jobs that are outsourced way too quickly due bad government policy etc. i.e. everything that Government is involved in. IMO, shelter is way overpriced in this country if you look at global labor costs. Of course the financial system and the political system requires high home prices.
I can not recommend this is enough. The guys from Bearing Asset Management are really good at explaining Austrian principles without sounding like kooks from the Mises Institute. Very positive and not all doom and gloom and etc.
Greenspan was also goosing the crap out of the economy. The NASDAQ bubble and everything that went with it generated tons of tax receipts. Now look at history since then. Neat system, isn’t it? Best country, ever, right?
Today’s interview with John Williams, interrupted briefly by an earthquake:
One other thing. In my opinion we aren’t really practicing capitalism since the central banks have so much discretion. 99% of the discussions about this stuff leave that out. It’s very important.
No, I don’t know enough about electronics/audio equipment to make suggestions. I’ve been looking into a type of telephone that has a screen that the computer puts up CC as the speaker is talking. But your audios are not phone accessed. I have some really good Sennheiser head phones, but it doesn’t decipher speech, but those sounds I do hear come through well. Amplifying the sound doesn’t help as I don’t hear any sounds above a certain DP. I’ve given up on most of the video musicals, the low tones come through as a “drum, drum, drum,” and the high tones vanish.
I have not used this service:
https://www.temi.com/?gclid=Cj0KCQiA2Y_UBRCGARIsALglqQ1bEYN_X9TJ0s7b-QFc91LhaR3hJRbp_cgzvn6IuhxHQaDPUs6STrIaApw7EALw_wcB
But there is a free trial. It might be quick solution for your transcription problem.
These products have been very disappointing. It still requires a lot of rework.
Out of my pay grade as well, .10 a minute is $6.00 an hour, one hour a day for 20 days a month is $120.00.