Shared Pain

Representative Ryan has released his budget plan.

It cuts -
Social Security
Medicare
Medicaid
Taxes for business
Taxes for the rich

Give him credit. He makes sure everyone takes their share of cuts.

What would you pay for?

In the current debate over the deficit and budgets, Republics want to take any tax increase off the table. Their current framing is, we don't have a revenue problem, we have a spending problem. That is, cut spending; do not raise taxes.

It is clear that Republics and Democrats have a different philosophy about the purpose of government and how to pay it. In general, Republics believe that less government is always better (at least that is what they say, if not always what they do). Government is the problem, not the solution. Republics want to decide how much they are willing to spend on government (which is always less than what we spend today) and then determine how to distribute that money. Preference is always given to the generators of wealth.

In general, Democrats believe that government is about creating a civil society. Democrats would rather first decide what is important to do and then decide how to pay for it (sometimes). Preference is given to the less fortunate. The Democratic position is obviously harder to sell.

While Democrats have certainly authorized new spending without determining how the additional expenditures would be paid for, they managed to live under the PAYGO rules of the 1990's. Had these rules been extended, the budget busting 2003 tax cut, the Medicare prescription program and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan might have had to have been paid for instead of just adding to the debt.

The two Bush era tax cuts added significantly to our debt. Let me state again, tax cuts when you are already running a deficit without the same dollar cuts in spending add to the long term debt! Republics constantly berate Democrats about spending more than we have revenue to pay far and passing that debt on to future generations. Fair enough. But cutting taxes without cutting spending has the same affect and is just as destructive. The math is simple. Revenue minus expenses equals surplus or debt. When you are already running a deficit, increasing spending without increasing revenue will increase the debt. Likewise, decreasing revenue without decreasing spending will increase the debt.

Contrary to popular belief, the Republics have actually been winning the deficit/debt debate. "Starve the Beast" has been Republic dogma since Ronald Reagan. This is the policy of always cutting taxes without concomitant cuts in spending in the belief that the eventual fiscal crisis will force drastic decreases in the size of government.

Republics have succeeded. The public believes we have a fiscal crisis generated by too much spending not a problem generated by a weak economy, tax cuts and spending. The discussion is how do we cut taxes, expenditures and the size of the government. Why aren't we also discussing what functions of government are worth paying taxes to support and how do we generate the revenue to pay for them?

Save My Marriage, Vote For Obama

Recently, to explain his infidelity and the failure of two previous marriages, Newt Gingrich basically said that his patriotism and love for this country caused him to work too hard for his country and not hard enough at maintaining his marriages.

What a novel explanation. What he is basically saying is, I'm so patriotic I was willing to sacrifice my marriages for the good of the country.

If Newt should win the Republican presidential nomination for 2012, do you think the current Mrs. Gingrich will vote for Newt or vote for President Obama and possibly save her marriage?

Chameleon Gingrich

Newt Gingrich has been making conflicting statements about Libya. He was emphatically for a no-fly zone before President Obama decided to support the UN resolution. Once President Obama expressed support for a non-fly zone, Newt was suddenly emphatically against it.

The argument's he uses to defend his flip-flop are tortuous. It is obvious his opinions are purely driven by a simple logic - I don't agree with Obama. A tactic he fully developed years ago when it was - I don't agree with Clinton. He should change his name from Newt to Chameleon. His opinions quickly change to match the current Republican political landscape.

Japan: 50Hz and 60Hz

I heard that Japan has lost 20% of its electrical generating capacity. This would be devastating in any country, but it is even worse in Japan. In the U.S., the electricity in our homes is standardized at 60Hz AC. That is, the polarity of the electricity alternates 60 times every second.

In Japan they use two different systems. In the south/west they use 60Hz. In the north/east (where the failed reactors are located) they use 50Hz. While 60Hz can be converted to 50Hz, Japan has a limited capacity to do this. So surplus energy in the south/west cannot easily be diverted to the north/east.

I've heard predictions that it will be months, possibly years, before full power is restored to Japan. It is sad that such bad public policy will make Japan's disaster even more painful.

There are some lessons to be learned from Japan's disaster that may be very important for the U.S.. There may be some things we should be doing right now to prevent large scale, long term power failures in the United States.

More later.

You didn't know that Japan has such an irrational power system? You aren't listening to National Public Radio! NPR is a national treasure. Don't let politicians damage it.

Why Libya?

I must admit that I wasn't watching the run-up to what seems to be a U.S. led military action against Libya. I think this was partly because the no-fly zone was being pushed by Great Britain and France. The U.S. seemed to be much less interested. China and Russia seemed ready to block any action in the UN. I thought enforcement of a no-fly zone, if it happened, would be led and possibly staffed primarily by other countries. I was surprised when the UN authorized the no fly zone and the U.S. took the lead.

I don't believe it is in the best interests of the U.S. to be participating in such a significant way in Libya. I'm surprised President Obama has allowed us to be drawn in and took the initial lead. I'm disappointed that he hasn't done a better job of explaining why he took these actions and I don't see indications that a successful outcome is likely.

I've always scoffed when opponents of military actions insist about a prediction of how it will end before we start. That's impossible. It is also a political stunt for opponents to insist on some clear statement of exactly why we shouldn't intervene in Bahrain or Syria since we have attacked Libya. Every situation is different.

It would be nice to hear the principles that guided President Obama's decision. I think they've given some: humanitarian support, the Libyan government was threatening mass reprisals against citizens, a chance to get rid of dictator who has caused problems around the world, there was support for action from other governments in the region, there was significant internal dissent and armed resistance, there was military assistance offered by other countries from within the region and outside, international bodies supported intervention and it was militarily feasible with acceptable risks.

I would like to hear, and probably won't, that the analysis for success is high, that there are groups and institutions in Libya ready to form a civil society, that whatever government comes after military success has a reasonable chance to be much better than the current government, that there is a chance for some form of democracy, that human rights and living conditions in the country will eventually improve and that the country will not be destabilizing in the region.

And, why is it in our national interests to remove Khadafi?

I think the President could have done a better job keeping us informed, but the fact is, he has made a decision and he will be responsible for the consequences.

Don't Listen

This morning Fox News Sunday had an interview with Margie Phelps, a member of and attorney for the Westboro Baptist Church. This is the small group that stages those obnoxious demonstrations near the funerals of American service men and women killed in action.

She recently won a Supreme Court case that affirmed the First Amendment rights of the Westboro Baptist Church to express opinions that most people find to be disgusting.

I agree with the Supreme Court, but Ms. Phelps has given us the antidote to her groups hateful speech. She said that the Supreme Court put a megaphone to the mouth of her tiny church. She is wrong. They didn't do that. They only said that governments could not silence them. Her group has a megaphone only if the news media gives them coverage and we listen.

The answer is to not give these people the attention they crave. They are irrational and delusional. Reason is not going to change them and attention only reinforces their delusions. If no one listens, if no one stages counter protests, if we all change the channel when they are given news coverage, then news organizations will stop covering them . This won't mute their hate or cure their ignorance or diminish their delusional view that they speak for God. They just go back to being a nameless group of kooks no one pays any attention to.

The beauty of our system is that our Constitution prevents governments from deciding which speech should be heard and which should be suppressed. It leaves it to people to listen or not listen and make our own decisions.

I've heard what the members of the Westboro Baptist Church believe and totally reject those ideas. From now on I choose not to listen.

Political Compromise

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Elephant Butts As Political Strategy

We need cooperation and compromise, butt this is what we get.

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Dilemma

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Created at ToonDoo.com

Global Warming Deniers

Global Warming Deniers by LogicalOne

National Security vs Politics

Senator Jon Kyle (R, AZ) and Republican Senators have put politics above our national interest by refusing to vote on the New START Treaty with Russia.

Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Admiral Mike Mullen, was on ABC's This Week this morning where he was questioned by host Christiane Amanpour. He unequivocally supported the START Treaty. When asked repeated questions about whether this treaty was good for the country and should be passed, he made clear that it was in the best interests of National Security that the START Treaty be passed ASAP. Even in a lame duck session. He emphatically said "ASAP".

When asked if the Republican opposition was based on politics or policy, Admiral Mullen obviously refused to comment. But it was clear from all his other comments that he saw no national security reasons for delaying ratification of the treaty.

Sometimes is hard to tell when Republican obstructionism is principled or political. In this case it is obvious.

WTHWYT - Rep. Allen West

Representative Allen West (FL), recently elected Tea Party Republican, was on Meet The Press this morning. He was commenting about the uproar over the new TSA airport screening procedures which give passengers a choice between a revealing electronic scan or a thorough pat down search. He was complaining about the poor job of marketing for the new TSA rules when he said that the Obama administration should have had a better marketing plan and should have "put out some feelers" to airline passengers.

Really! What The Hell Were You Thinking?

If your marketing plan was to get your face on every late night comedy show, you succeeded.

Repeal tax cuts for rich

Republicans want to extend all the Bush tax cuts, including the tax cuts for people making over $250,000. This would be $250,000 of taxable income, after deductions, etc.

Their argument is that many of the people affected are small business owners and the extra tax burden would cause them not to grow their businesses.

Let's think about this.

First of all the, these high income people would still get the tax cut on the first $250,000 of their income. Assuming that the current tax rates on income under $250,000 are extended, the higher rate after January 1 would only be on any income over $250,000.

So if I understand the rates correctly, the rate for income over $250,000 will change on January 1, 2011 from 35% to 39.6%.

Let's say you are a small business owner, have $250,000 of taxable income and starting 01/01/2011 you have the opportunity to grow your business and raise your income from $250,000 to $350,000. At the end of the 2011, your tax bill will be $4,600 greater if the Bush tax cuts for the rich are not extended. The federal tax on that $100,000 would be $35,000 if the tax cuts are extended and $39,600 if they are not.

So Republicans think this business person would not grow their business by $100,000 and increase their after tax income by roughly $60,000 because they would have to pay an extra $4,600 a year in federal taxes. That doesn't make sense.

I know that $39,600 in taxes on $100,000 sounds like a lot, but these rates would be the rates that were in effect in 2000. Not exactly a bad year for business.

When the current lower tax rates were passed:
1) They were not paid for. These tax cuts were paid for by increasing the debt. The Chinese and others loaned us the money to cover the increased debt these tax cuts caused. Everybody got a tax cut that would have to be paid for by tax payers in the future when that debt (plus interest) was paid off.

2) The tax cuts were not made permanent when they were initially passed as part of a political ploy. The tax cuts were designed to expire in 2011 because they were so damaging to the debt. Republics used a gimmick based on how the actual cost of the cuts were calculated and reported at that time. Politicians made the total effect of these tax cuts look lower than they would actually be by making them expire in 2011 rather than making them permanent. Secretly they figured politicians in 2010 would be politically forced to extend them.

We can debate whether or not a tax rate of 39.6% on adjusted income over $250,000 is reasonable or excessive, but to argue that this change would hurt job creation is Elephant Shit.

This will be a fight. We need to balance the budget and not extending the tax cuts for income over $250,000 can help us get there. Democrats need to clearly explain why it makes sense that we do not extend the tax cuts for the rich.

Constitutional Scholar

Constitutional Scholar.

Click on comic strip to enlarge.

Are Republics Principled Or Just Political?

Senator McConnell has announced that one of the highest priorities of Republics is to repeal health care. I thought the number one priority was jobs. I guess I just haven't been listening over the last few months.

I've heard several Republics say that they favor complete repeal of the new health care law and then they would pass a series of common sense measures to replace it.

Bull. If they are really interested in making health care better, let's demand that they explain what they are going to replace the new health care law with before they try to repeal the current law.

Everyone agreed that we needed to reform health care. Well, almost everyone. Democrats finally got an imperfect bill passed. We all agree that the current health care law was not the best we can do. We knew this sausage would need some fixing. If Republicans have better ideas, I want to hear them. I really believe they have some ideas that would help. I just want to hear these ideas debated before they try to repeal the whole bill.

What we have is not perfect, but it is better than nothing. It is a starting point that we can modify and build on.

But just in case the Republicans have some ideas they have never told us about, let's hear what they propose to replace the current health bill with. Then we can decide if we agree before we throw out the current bill. Is that unreasonable?

This is a test for Republics. They will soon have control of the House. Republics in the House can propose and vote on any legislation they want.

If Republicans in the House and Senate show us their proposed legislation to reform health care before or when they propose legislation to repeal the Democrats health care plan, I will admit they are acting on their principles.

If Republicans propose legislation to repeal the Democrats health care plan without showing us legislation for how they will reform health care, their actions can rightly be labelled as purely political. This would prove they are more interested in scoring political points than helping people.

So we lost. Stay the course.

The voters have spoken. They've made it clear they are angry and are more interested in punishing someone rather than understanding the issues.

The president inherited the worst economy in decades and voters blame him and Democrats for not fixing it in 2 years. Do they really believe if it were at all in the president's power or Democrat's power to turn the economy around they wouldn't have done it? Instead, voters decided to give control back to the party that led us into this mess. Remember, Republicans and the Tea Party only got serious about budget deficits when it became a good way to attack the president.

Back in the early days of the last presidential campaign, before the economy tanked, I had a letter published in the local paper explaining to Senator McCain that you can't really cut taxes when you are running a deficit as he promised to do if elected. You can't really cut taxes when you are running a deficit, you are just deferring payment until some time in the future. Your tax reduction plus interest will be paid by someone later. Where were the Tea Partiers back then?

Were voters watching while the Republicans did everything to block the president for the last 2 years? Where were all the great ideas from Republicans to turn the economy around? Republicans didn't have any ideas or at least not any they would make public. By the way, if they had or have any great ideas, why didn't they offer them when they did have power in the first six years of the Bush administration?

Republicans have had no incentive to help make the economy better. If they had worked with Democrat's the past two years to make the economy better and they were successful, would Republicans have made such large gains in this week's election? Not likely.

Republicans have no incentive to help make the economy better over the next two years. They rightly believe that if the economy stays bad for the next two years, President Obama will be a one term president. Pay attention over the next two years. Are Republicans trying to help or just stalling for two more years?

The Republicans goals for the past two years have been to make things look as bad as they could and they lied whenever they needed. Remember death panels? A total lie. And either Republicans knew it was a lie or they are just stupid. Would you really vote for someone that stupid?

Republicans railed against the bail out of banks, automobile companies and the stimulus bill. A large number of voters believed the bail out was Obama's. Of course the bailout was passed under President Bush. People are crying about losing jobs, especially good paying manufacturing jobs. How much worse would the economy be if we had lost the automobile industry? Republicans act like helping the automobile companies was complete folly. Why?

All we hear from Republicans is how worthless the stimulus bill was. Of course economist tell a different story. And most people are unaware that many Republicans actively worked to get stimulus money to their states or districts. They never said it out loud, but there is a paper trail of letters they wrote asking for money and saying how many jobs that money would generate. We are not talking about a few Republicans. We are talking about dozens and dozens. The list is very long. The stimulus bill generated or saved millions of jobs. Republicans have been lying about it for political gain.

Republicans brag that they stopped “cap and trade”. Of course, many of these Republicans were for cap and trade until it became politically advantageous to be against it. We need to address global warming. It is real. The Department of Defense identified global warming as a national security threat years ago.

The Republican goal for the next two years will be to look like they are doing something, but hoping Democrat's will block them so they can get even more power in 2012. Be are smart voter. Pay attention. Whenever either party obstructs or is uncooperative, are they doing it for principle or political gain? Voters want jobs. Let us see who is working to make jobs and help the economy and who is not.

Republicans are saying the the President and Democrats need to heed the election results and cave into all Republican ideas. Do you remember the Republicans acknowledging the election the President and Democrat's won in 2008? Did they cooperate with the new president even a little? Not hardly. Hell, many of them still won't admit he is the president.

President Obama is too smart to think that Republicans will do anything that will make him look better. It is not in their self interests.

Republicans act like the entire country is behind them. But there are millions of people who want the president to stand up for his and our principles. We should stay true to our beliefs. If we lose again in 2012 so be it. I would rather lose defending my principles than lose trying to work with a party that has no incentive to cooperate.

Rotten Apple

The salty old man who lives next door and I were talking about a kid down the street who had been causing problems in the neighborhood.

The old guy commented that, knowing what a jerk the kid's dad was, it wouldn't do any good to talk to him.

I wisely noted that "the apple doesn't fall far from the tree."

To which my neighbor replied "or a turd from an asshole."

New York City Mosque II

The debate about building an Islamic center in New York City close to ground zero is really very simple.

You either accept the concepts embodied in the First Amendment or you don't.

The driving force that caused those guys to fly planes into the WTC was intolerance. We are better than that. Or at least we should strive to be.

You don't honor the people killed by intolerance and hatred by being intolerant.

New York City Mosque

Too many people want to memorialize any tragic death. If a drunk driver kills someone, should we ban bars and alcohol within a 1/4 mile of the site?