Didn't someone think of the children?
“I have never seen more senators express discontent with their jobs. … I
think the major cause is that, deep down in our hearts, we have been accomplices to doing something terrible and unforgivable to this wonderful
country. Deep down in our hearts, we know that we have bankrupted America and
that we have given our children a legacy of bankruptcy. … We have defrauded
our country to get ourselves elected.”
So said John C. Danforth, former Republican U.S. Senator from Missouri in an interview in The Arizona Republic on April 22, 1992.
More recently, Republican Senator from Arizona Tom Coburn has said that unless this Congress gets it right, there will be a “catastrophe.” But what are the chances of getting it right? The Republican trio, Speaker John Boehner, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, is convinced the tide is with them. The Republicans have the energy. Most of the young members of the House are conservative, Tea Party-backed Republicans. They also think they have the ideas.
But what are their ideas? Privatizing Social Security? That’s a non-starter. Abolishing Medicare and giving every American over sixty-five $50,000? Yes, that’s the idea of incoming Chairman of the House Budget Committee Paul Ryan. If the Republicans press ahead to abolish Medicare, they will all be thrown out unless the dumb Americans say, gee, fifty thousand dollars. That sounds great. Sure, we’ll give up our Medicare. Are they kidding? $50,000 can be gone in one shot with a serious illness. If you buy your own insurance and there are two of you, that could be $5,000 a year. In ten years it runs out and then what? Is Ryan suggesting that Americans over seventy-five be quietly done away with?
If you want to see how powerful Republicans in the Senate throw away money on defense,
A rocket to nowhere for the low-low price of $500,000,000.
consider Richard Shelby of Alabama. Thanks to Shelby, taxpayers are footing $500 million for a NASA Ares 1 canceled rocket that the agency has no plans or desire to continue developing. And while Coburn has trashed the Pentagon for wasting fortunes and for being unable to account for expenditures, most of the Republicans will vote to continue increasing the defense budget because they get campaign contributions from defense contractors like Lockheed Martin.
The Republican mantra, their one consistent idea, is to keep cutting taxes while cutting spending. This will never balance the budget. It will instead increase it, something that was learned during the Reagan administration. The recent Bush administration managed to cut taxes and increase spending, wiping out a surplus and creating a gigantic deficit. And under Obama, the deficit has increased dramatically as has the national debt. But at least he had a reason. It saved America from a deep depression and the stock market is back where it was in 2008, the day before the collapse of Lehman Brothers. But with America in this hole, is there any way out?
Democrats are for increasing taxes and spending. The Republicans are for decreasing taxes and spending. But the only way out of the hole is to increase taxes and cut spending. There should be a value-added tax just to pay down the debt. Without both of these measures, America is probably toast but don’t hold your breath, at least not in this political climate. The Republicans intend to keep enacting legislation overturning administrative regulations, something they can do in the Senate without sixty votes. They figure they can get some worried Democratic senators to go along. They will overturn regulations regarding health care, for instance. Then, the legislation will go up to Obama, who will either have to sign it or veto it. Their plan is to keep doing this on a daily basis so Obama will have to keep vetoing these measures. This will prevent him from moving forward with anything that’s left on his agenda.
Their only goals are to make him a one-term president and to take over the Senate as well. What do you think they will do then, once they have replaced Obama with Mitt Romney and Mike Huckabee? Or Sarah Palin? The odds are they will attack Iran, an insane move that Dick Cheney was trying to force Bush to make. At least Bush didn’t go for that. But now the Republicans will beat the war drums, a strategy that always works for them. This time, though, with no way to pay for it, they will drive up the deficit to monumental proportions so no country will buy American debt. Checkmate, unless, of course, the Fed buys it up, printing so much money that there will be runaway inflation.
When asked why America went to war against Iraq the first time, then Secretary of State James Baker famously replied that there were three reasons-“Jobs, jobs, jobs.” And while going to war in Iran may create some more jobs in America, there won’t be enough to offset the steep unemployment. America is in four wars right now and it hasn’t helped. This will be the worst stagflation in history.
If the American people don’t wake up from La La Land and take to the streets, there is no way to avert this scenario. It will absolutely be the end, with Lenin laughing in his tomb. Both Communism and Capitalism will be on the ash heap of history, with no one, absolutely no one, knowing what to do.
I find this hilarious.
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