Greenspan: We can't afford McCain's tax cuts

AP via MSNBC ^ | 9/14/2008 | Too ashamed to say

[PreciousLiberty]

WASHINGTON - Alan Greenspan says the country can't afford tax cuts of the magnitude proposed by Republican presidential contender John McCain — at least not without a corresponding reduction in government spending.

"Unless we cut spending, no," the former Federal Reserve chairman said Friday when asked McCain's proposed tax cuts, pegged in some estimates at $3.3 trillion.

"I'm not in favor of financing tax cuts with borrowed money," Greenspan said during an interview with Bloomberg Television. "I always have tied tax cuts to spending."

[PreciousLiberty]

Of course, the first criticism I have of this "news article" is that Greenspan never addresses the probable effect of NObama's policies and (lack of) leadership on the economy. Can you say " "Great Depression II"?

Why do you suppose Greenspan didn't opine regarding a NObama "presidency"?

Quite a ways into the article, AP did managet to give McCain's ideas a little airtime:

McCain has said that he would offset his proposed cuts — including reducing the corporate tax rate and eliminating the Alternative Minimum Tax that has plagued middle-class families — by ending congressional pork-barrel spending, unnecessary government programs and overhauling entitlement programs such as Medicare and Social Security.

It should also have been pointed out that tax cuts stimulate the economy, grow the pie, and ultimately grow revenues. That's certainly been the case with the Bush tax cuts.

[Carley]

This from the man that told millions of Americans that ARM’s were the best way to purchase a house.

[From The Deer Stand]

It’s a shame that the mind starts going as one ages.

[tips up]

Without spending cuts, gets barely a mention. I would hope McCain cuts spending.

Can the economy survive a huge tax increase by Barry? Greenspan doesn’t have an opinion on this?

[Dawn531]

Why do you suppose Greenspan didn't opine regarding a NObama "presidency"?

He didn't want to sleep on the couch???

[PreciousLiberty]

Forgot to mention that any _additional_ tax cuts from McCain’s ideas are about $600 billion, on top of the existing Bush cuts. Not $3.3 trillion.

[normy]

“Plus my wife wont quit bitching unless I try as hard as she is to get Obama elected. I’m old, let me live out my last years in peace”

[Jeff Head]

But McCain is indicating he will do exactly that...cut taxes and spending. Of course, the MSM wont put those two together.

I'M VOTING FOR SARAH

[pieceofthepuzzle]

Chairman of the fed for the major part of two debacles, the dot com bust and the run-up to the housing bust. IMHO the genius of Greenspan was a media creation that hurt us.

[neodad]

"Unless we cut spending, no," the former Federal Reserve chairman said Friday when asked McCain's proposed tax cuts, pegged in some estimates at $3.3 trillion.

I don't think any FReeper would disagree with this.

[HarleyD]

I feel like Greenspan knew what was happening in the financial markets and did nothing to stop it. He left right before everything went south.

[webschooner]

Greenspan to Andrea Mitchell: “Did I say it just like you told me to, honey?”

[kenmcg]

The truth be known Greenspan is probably the most responsible for the collapse of the investment banks along with Freddie & Fanny Mae.

[CRBDeuce]

Knee-Deep in Koolaid Andrea Mitchell's boy toy at it again...ya gotta wonder what part of ending congressional pork-barrel spending, unnecessary government programs and overhauling entitlement programs such as Medicare and Social Security she didn't show him! He is so easy, isn't he! As much a Pawn as the Black Pawn! White Queen checkmates the Black Pawn on a level chess board!...Nov 4 will simply show us if the board is level, or there are enough dead voters to solve 'the problem'!

[Camel Joe]

When you cut taxes the Gub’ment actually takes in more money, tell the old man to shut up and go back to his swing band, he has done enough to destroy this country’s economy.

[Tribune7]

Mr. Andrea Mitchell snipes at McCain.

Did you know they were married by Ruth Bader Ginsburg?

[Mikey_1962]

We can’t afford McCain’s tax cuts*

*Without corresponding budget cuts. Which is what McCain and all true Conservatives saidwhen Bush proposed them years ago.

[org.whodat]

LOL, with the zillions of bail out money headed to rich bankers and investors, and billions more insane wants to spend on illegals, where is the money coming from.

Stop drinking the cool aide.

[Leisler]

I don't believe Greenspan, nor any economist, left or right, would of said ARM are the “BEST” way to FINANCE a house. Use of the term, “BEST”, is way too subjective, and Greenspan being a libertarian, would not admit to ever knowing each and every unique situation that tens of millions of house financiers needed.

There is nothing particularly good, nor bad, about ARM's. They are an type, an instrument, an option. The use and or abuse of ARM have nothing to do with them, like handguns, it's the person that is important, not the inert instrument.

[paudio]

Greenspan probably said the right thing: tax-cut without decrease in spending might be dangerous. The MSM left out the second part.

[misterrob]

Bush’s biggest failure was to regin in spending. I understand the war on terror but he did it trying to buy votes. If he had declared that government spending would grow at a rate of no more than 1-2% per year on non-defense issues then he might have saved the country a hell of a lot of red ink.

[Netizen]

"Unless we cut spending, no," the former Federal Reserve chairman said Friday when asked McCain's proposed tax cuts, pegged in some estimates at $3.3 trillion.

Then let's cut some of the deadbeats on welfare and make them work for what they want like the rest of us.

[Leisler]

Bear Sterns, Lehman, the workers(Bankers), stockholders, owners have gotten zero. They are broke. Their pensions, zero, even the janitors and secretaries. Further, the higher ups are libel for law suits.

[G.Mason]

Greenspan?

Alan Greenspan needs to blow more on that clarinet he use to play.

After 19 years of manipulating the economy as the chairman of the United States Federal Reserve Board, he needs to give US a rest.

Out damn spot!

[raybbr]

...

[PreciousLiberty]

“I don’t think any FReeper would disagree with this.”

True, and McCain has said he’ll cut spending and waste.

Sadly, if he were to eliminate welfare altogether, send the illegals home (tremendous leech on our economy), raise the full SS retirement age to 68 immediately, make provision for private SS accounts, reform the medical industry (not sure on best approach here myself - surely not universal/government health care), and so on, well we’d be mean-spirited Republicans again.

Americans really need to understand TANSTAAFL - There Ain’t No Such Thing As A Free Lunch.

[T. Buzzard Trueblood]

I know I'm the gazillionth freeper in the last 24 hours to say it, but cut taxes and spending. In fact, most of us have been saying that since...before we were freepers.

[verity]

"Unless we cut spending, no,"

Too many posters have ignored this salient point.

[Old Retired Army Guy]

Let’s not forget that Greenspan is married to Andrea Mitchell.

[econjack]

When you cut taxes the Gub’ment actually takes in more money...

A subtle point that almost everyone misses. If you Google the Laffer Curve, you see that current US tax policy has us on the portion of the curve where a cut in taxes actually brings in more revenues. The Bush tax cuts prove this, as does the experience of tax cuts in other countries (e.g., Britain and India).

[raybbr]

*Without corresponding budget cuts. Which is what McCain and all true Conservatives saidwhen Bush proposed them years ago.

Huh? Show me where Bush proposed budget cuts.

[Liberty Valance]

LOL - I like how you’ve identified the actual author of this hit piece as “too ashamed to say” - that covers a lot of ills at the AP. Thanks for posting. ;o)

[scooby321]

Bush's economy

No its the hits Greenspan put on the economy

Subprime = Alan Greenspan

Tech bust = Greenspan.

The worst person to say this.

[Leisler]

Ethanol.
Farm subsidies.
Payments to States.
Medicare.
Medicaid.
VA.
Social Security payments.

This is where more than half of all FedGov taxes go to.

I don't see the dems cutting them, and I do see the Repubs cutting some few taxes and leaving it for young people to pay off, a type of financial pedophilia.

[Mikey_1962]

Bush proposed the tax cuts without the corresponding budget cuts which is why McCain opposed the tax cuts originally.

[BooyahPower]

Mccain is going to cut taxes and reduce spending....way to show ignorance. Feel the tingle yet greenspan?

[clee1]

not without a corresponding reduction in government spending.

Alrighty then.....

AFAIC, every dollar of non-military federal spending should be cut in HALF, right now. All "foreign aid", all subsidies, all spending that is not explicitly provided for in the Constitution.

That should provide for a MASSIVE tax cut.

[F15Eagle]

Greenspan and co. made a financial mess the past 8 years.

[new cruelty]

at least not without a corresponding reduction in government spending.

And God forbid that we ever spend less than we pull in.

[BibChr]

Correction:

"Alan Greenspan, reading a statement the DNC handed him in 2000 with the name written as [GOP candidate], says...."

[PSYCHO-FREEP]

Who cares what that old has-been thinks? And, maybe 1 million saw that interview. Most Americans don’t have a clue who Greenspan is or could care less.

[Leisler]

In as much as he had power to, Greenspan kept the quality of the currency. That's his job.

Sub prime, of which I am a great fan of, and is one of the greatest innovations in the financial history of mankind.

Are guns abused? Yes. Should people freely have them? Yes.

Maybe we should go back to a percentage of the population as some new type of Royalty and regular people can on their knees shuffle up to them, hat in hand, and plead for some crumbs.

Everybody LOVED the flood of money into housing when their house value tripled. Now, not so much. Typical human behavior, nothing new under the sun.

[paddles]

...He proclaimed, as Little Miss Craterface sank her fingernails into his sack....

[andy58-in-nh]

Actually, I disagree with the premise of the question. Who is the "we" who can't "afford" tax cuts? The public? The government? Certainly not the people from whom that money is currently being taken - without reference, I might add, to whether they can "afford" to pay those taxes. Either way, the money in question does not belong to the government or the public. It is not the public's money to "afford". Rather, it belongs to those who earned it.

A better question would have been: "Can the American people afford the huge spending and tax increases that Barack Obama is now proposing?" Let old Alan chew on that for a while.

[Leisler]

Compassionate conservative. That's what you get. There's all sorts of high tax, big spending conservatives out there. Mitt Romney, McCain, et al.

Limousine liberals that throw people under the bus, and compassionate conservative that out spend Lyndon Johnson.

Fat Dennis Hastert anyone?

This is the GOP, and has been since Reagan was a bump in the road.

[afraidfortherepublic]

And, dear Alan, we can’t afford your wife. Why don’t you keep her home and happy?

[sportutegrl]

Isn’t 0bama promising tax cuts for the middle class, or 90% of the population? And isn’t he also promising all sorts of new federal spending? I wonder how that is going to effect the deficit, or will he use Greenspan to justify a tax increase instead?

[Netizen]

I know people on medicaid that could be off the system and working to pay their own darn bills.

[Netizen]

Oh and what really gets me is when people on the system use our hard earned money to pay for their cigarettes and booze.

[tiki]

What else would you expect from Andrea’s husband? Who is going to hire the person who changes his Depends? Duh.