GOP outlines 2.5 Trillion in spending cuts (none to defense)

I would respectfully submit that a major reason the debt has increased is because the President has stopped using accounting tricks to hide how, we as a country, is spending money. You can't hide the expense of two wars, you can't hide the expense of massive tax breaks and loopholds to the rich.

But you are correct, the status quo is unsustainable.

 

Except the deficit didn't increase much due to anything Pelosi did. The only real unpaid spending that Pelosi did was the stimulus package, which is a one-time $700B charge. Everything else deficit-wise was caused by the GOP not paying for things in the past (Medicare expansion, tax cuts, wars) and a huge reduction in revenues due to the recession. It's not like Dems went on some kind of crazy unpaid spending spree.

Historically, Dems are tax & spend. GOPers are borrow & spend. Only one of those leads to massive deficits.

 

Which is why we should elect more people like Ron Paul and Ralph Nader.

 

I would rather elect people who don't have totally unreasonable ideas that go along with their reasonable ones.

 

No, but they are an example of how the left and right can focus on truly important issues when they are not completely focused on partisan political battles.

 

Yes, we spend more on "defense' than the rest of the world combined, or close to it. It is not America's job to be the world's police force, we have acted in that capacity for almost 70 years and all we have gotten out of it is more people resenting the US.

 

Then you'll continue to get the status quo of the last 40 years. Those guys aren't corporate sell outs. They'd only have support for the 'reasonable' ones anyway.

 

I agree that they aren't corporate sell outs but Paul's ideas on economics are disastrous, and Nader has numerous problems with his temperament, ego, etc. that would keep him from being a good candidate.

 

Vote out the incumbents who don't perform as demanded. Stupid voters and a moderately rigged game tend to make this difficult, so an alternative is term limits.

I honestly don't see another way outside of catastrophe-fueled reorganization.

 

For every dollar the government spends, the economy gains 40 to 70 cents. So every government employee is actually a drain on the economy. The more government employees cut, the more jobs will be created in the long run.

 

And you got your Humanities education from the Federal Government, right? Some people don't even think when they make comments. How are you, or anyone you know, effected by these cuts?

 

Do you even know what NEH/NEA does?

 

And I suppose you would be living proof?

 

Some money put into defense creates tech and research jobs. But this has always been a bogus argument. ANY money spent by government is spent less effectively than in the private sector. It would be better to let the private sector innovate on its own. Defense spending needs to be cut too.

 

We have given Egypt 50 Billion in aid over the last 30 years. What has been the pay off? Maybe you should learn some history or check basic facts.

 

Pay-off is an autocratic Egyptian ruler, Hosni Mubarak, who keeps the clamps on muslim extremists while stifiling dessent/freedom and the democratic process--I doubt you are worried about the latter as long as he takes care of the former--That is an assumption on my part. In either case, I am not defending economic aid to Egypt but there are results, like them or not...

 

So, you are libertarian? No govt except for diplomatic relations and common defense?

 

if you cut military spending, that would put people out of work also. just throwing that out there

 

Frankly, I'd rather run the risk of having a complete nutjob in the Oval Office than the risk of continuing the same dead-end bull**** that's been making up the status quo of the past 30 years.

 

The payoff has been one of the most stable Arab states, which given the current war on terror, can only be seen as a prized asset.

This is especially important since Egypt is one of the most populated states in the Arab hemisphere, and happens to hold crucial assets (i.e the Suez Canal) to international trade.

Cairo also has significant geopolitical gravitas in the region, and so having it friendly to the interests of the United States is crucial. It is a stabilizing influence in the often volatile region of North Africa. If you had consulted your history, you would also know that Egypt was the first Arab state to pursue diplomatic relations with Israel, and that Egypt has been a significant mediator in Israeli-Palestinian conflicts and disputes between other Arab nations, in accordance with stated American foreign policy objectives.

Compare this with, for example, the payoff from spending billions of dollars in Iraq and Afghanistan-a fresh source of propaganda for terrorists, worldwide condemnation, immense loss of life, complicity with corrupt drug-riddled government officials, and two Arab states on the verge of failure, with the possibility of hard-liners taking over.

Now, development aid has its`problems (namely government corruption and inefficiency), but comparing the utility of aid vs war just shows how laughable (once again) the idea that active war-making can solve any problem.