February 2009
02/27/09:
DOUBLE-SPEAK, CODE-SPEAK AND LIES, OH MY! All that was missing in Tuesday night's speech was whatever they spoke in "A Clockwork Orange"!
You'll excuse me if you think this post is condescending—I'm only reacting to what I perceive is the angle the administration (and the Dems in Congress) are using to spin this "cut the deficit in half by the end of the first term" crap.
The deficit is an annual measurement, do you know that? It starts FRESH with each budget, and only exists in relation to that budget. Just as it would in your own household, if you spend more than you take in, you have a "deficit" so if you cut that in half, all you've done is reduced the amount you are OVERSPENDING your budget.
Each year, whatever deficit you have at the end of the year gets added to the NATIONAL DEBT (much as it would in your own household if you had to borrow to pay the difference between what you earn and what you spend, using a credit card for example).
And of course other things add to the National DEBT besides each year's deficit amount. Any large spending agenda (like a war, or a stimulus package, etc...) for which there is no money in the treasury to pay.
So when you heard the President last night braggin' on how "Fiscally responsible" he wants to be by "cutting the deficit in half," do not be fooled (as I wager MANY Americans were, especially since our "elegant" President has schooled us in the knowledge that our population lacks the "savvy" —which is code for "is too stupid"—to understand accounting and basic personal finance and should therefore be forgiven their use of their homes as ATM machines) into believing that this means he plans to rein in our nation's DEBT, or that he has a way to increase our GDP or some such, because he doesn't, not by a long shot.
In fact, having a balanced budget only means that you spent no more than you took in, period. It ought not be such a massive accomplishment, but sadly, it is.
To cut the deficit in a year in which we are spending hand-over-fist bailing everyone in the world OUT, you have only two choices: Cut spending drastically, or raise taxes, or BOTH. And even if he pulls it off using some combination of the two, it's really a worthless measurement because it's still saying we're willing to spend 50% MORE than we take in and call it a high-five for ourselves (which it is NOT), and it will still re-set the following year. Not to mention, someone somewhere gets hurt by the cuts, and who—with an OVERWHELMINGLY Dem. administration—do you think it will be? Will it be welfare programs and entitlements, wasteful earmarks (indeed, even the budget they just put out today has "only" (as one Dem. Congressman put it) $10 BILLION with a B in "earmarks" (gee, I thought there were to be NONE! In a $400Bil budget, that's still a hefty amount of bacon when you're deficit spending already)? Or will it be bye bye to the Bush tax cuts and hello to a higher cap gains tax (that's the buzz so far, even from the WH)?
The main point is, the deficit is not the debt, and while one contributes annually to the other, cutting the former does NOTHING to the latter except reduce the amount by which it might GROW BIGGER.
I have long suspected that people were walking around ASSUMING that Clinton's so-called "surplus" meant we were debt-free as a nation (HAHAHAHA!) and that Bush took us away from that (when what he really did was take the budget surplus and say "Hey, we have some cash here we could be GIVING BACK TO THE PEOPLE WHO GAVE IT TO US, i.e., YOU, the citizenry" because that's what tax cuts DO) and since HE TOO INHERITED A RECESSION, he was doing NOTHING DIFFERENT than what Obama is doing—oh yeah, except he used money we HAD at the time to avert a deeper crisis, and to go after the assholes who took down the towers who helped deepen it! He also gave it out to EVERYONE EQUALLY who actually PAID TAXES, not just some people, many of whom did NOT.
The only reason Clinton didn't spend that surplus was that he had a GOP Congress who really WERE GOP guys and they didn't let him, otherwise I can assure you he'd have happily spent it on some spending program or other. Let's face it, if HillaryCare had passed, we'd be in debt up to our eyeballs right now just from THAT *and* we'd have permanent deficit spending unless we raised taxes like crazy (i.e., we'd already be France, not just slowly working our way in that direction).
Can't blame people for thinking the debt and the deficit are the same thing, politicians on both sides would like you to believe that's the case, if and when it suits their needs. A Republican might push that perception when he or she is in office (heck, Bush did it, several times, and he actually DID reduce the "deficit" by a larger chunk than expected faster than expected) so he can justify steep budget cuts, Dems do it when they're about to propose spending increases and want to squash GOP rhetoric about them being profligate spenders—they don't care if they add to the national DEBT, they'll just "balance the budget" and make sure all other spending comes through in these "EMERGENCY" or "CRISIS" bills like the one we just had, but really it's just moving line items from one balance sheet to another. If they have to hold us hostage or scare us enough that we crap our pants, they'll get the money out of us one way or the other, but they'll hold their precious "budget" aside and call it "balanced" and the average American never bothers to parse what's happened (kinda like THIS WEEK).
As for him cutting the deficit in half by pulling troops out of Iraq? They JUST SAID this morning (they being the Pentagon) that 50,000 troops will remain in Iraq, the rest (approx 100K, give or take) will be "leaving Iraq" by the END of NEXT YEAR, two months past the President's campaign deadline. That means for the first two years of his Presidency, we will still have just as many people in Iraq (costing us just as much money), and when we "pull out" we'll leave one third of them in place (that's a savings of two thirds right?) AND the Pentagon went on to say that "Many" of the soldiers removed from Iraq will be "redeployed" to Afghanistan. Not sure how many "Many" would be, but I'm gonna guess it's a large number representing a whole lot of that 2/3 savings.
Now perhaps one thinks that cutting out no-bid contracts will do the trick, save money, reduce "waste"....Really? When they are replaced by union-only contracts? HAHAHAHAHAHA!!! Yeah, ok, whatever. I'm so sure THAT will happen (not). I've lived too long in places dominated by unions like MA not to know that anytime you have to have union-only contractors, you are talking expenditures of at least 1/3 MORE than otherwise. Some may think this equates not to "waste" but rather to "decent wages" or whatever, and I'm not going to argue that point (not that I wouldn't argue it, just not arguing it *here*), but the point is, we will not see a SAVINGS to our bottom line by making these changes in Iraq.
But don't take my word for it, check back in two years and tell me I was wrong, I'll be happy to be!
The national debt is massive right now, and it just grew by about 2Trillion JUST LAST WEEK. Even if we reduce the deficit by half, we will *still* be adding to it this coming year just with regular day-to-day spending (never mind the "stimulus" bills we've passed and will likely pass again in the near future).
The talk about the "deficit" and its reduction is nothing more than cover, double-speak if you will, to distract us from massive increases in spending and the size of government—PERMANENT increases by the way.
I also heard a lot of code-speak in last night's speech. "Cold War Era Weapons We No Longer Need?" Translation: Missile defense. Think we don't need it? REALLY? Have you been paying attention to North Korea, Mr. President? How about Pakistan? So they don't have the capability of reaching us TODAY, but given how long it takes to ramp up such defenses when you've dismantled them or cut funding to them, you want to take that chance? NOT ME!
"No Earmarks" Translation: "No NEW earmarks other than the 9,000 that are already IN this budget we're currently trying to pass. Veto? What, me VETO? But we simply must "rebuild" America!" Translation: Campaign promises? Huh, what? Oh, I meant NEXT YEAR'S budget, I 'inherited' this one, even though I know we're supposed to be debating and retooling it NOW, I'm just gonna say this is the leftover budget because it gives me an out for all that PORK!"
Gang tattoo removal? Money to study the stars in Hawaii? Seriously? You can't make this shit up, 9,000 earmarks! They're debating the bill RIGHT NOW, the President will likely sign it NEXT WEEK, why? What happened to "No earmarks or I'll whip out my veto pen"???
Can we afford this shit?
What else...."The Nation that invented the automobile cannot lose it (paraphrase)..." Translation: We will be bailing out GERMANY? Newsflash Mr. President, we did NOT invent the car! A guy named BENZ did that, Henry Ford invented Detroit, the assembly line, and if our schools did a halfway decent job educating people, you and the rest of America would have caught that, but no, apparently the schools need more help than Detroit, how 'bout we give it to them? IOW, NO MORE MONEY FOR DETROIT! It is NOT OUR JOB TO SAVE THEM! We will not be without an auto industry if they go bankrupt! They will be restructured and come back smaller, but they won't disappear and you know it, stop trying to scare people into spending MORE that we don't have on propping up failure!
Oh, that's right, you plan to "fix" the schools. Not much info. on HOW you plan to hold them accountable or why they need MORE money when—next to the military, SS and Medicare/Medicaid they get the MOST money of anything in this country as-is (not saying they shouldn't, but at least with the military we get our money's worth, what the hell is wrong with the SCHOOLS?)
Every politician says they will fix schools and they get steadily WORSE. Maybe we should stop trying, see if that makes a diff? ;) What I mean is, maybe we just need to take a giant step backwards and realize that the problems are in the HOMES and with the VALUES of this nation and until we do something to change that, you can throw money at schools all day long and it won't matter. There are idiots who party and don't care in wealthy schools, the difference is usually the PARENTS. So I'd rather see us throw money at clamping down on bullshit advertising to kids and the people poisoning the food they eat and the parents who victimize their kids etc....than on the schools that can't do a damn thing about any of that.
But whatever. He talks pretty, so most people won't think to terribly much about the substance of what he said anyway. And even those of us who wanted to were awfully distracted by Nancy and her calisthenics. She really was like a Jack-in-the-Box last night, and her facial expressions were enough to make me homicidal. Did she sleep with a coat hanger in her mouth the night before or something? And Joe Biden looked downright put-upon to have to stand at all.
Klaus has it right, a funny farm INDEED.
Posted by Deb on
