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The Coming Age of Austerity
Townhall.com ^ | November 6, 2012 | Pat Buchanan

Posted on 11/06/2012 6:12:17 AM PST by Kaslin

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1 posted on 11/06/2012 6:12:18 AM PST by Kaslin
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To: Kaslin
I watched the “Grapes of Wrath” last night...a poignant treatise on abject poverty and hope peppered with a Hollywood attitude against capitalism portraying farm owners and their overseer workers as thugs and union busters.

However, in our culture of today, the people who like to portray themselves as the Tom Joad of today aren't really interested in work of any form. They aren't even interested in relocating. They are only interested in locating the government check that they all feel (demand) they are entitled to.

2 posted on 11/06/2012 6:18:43 AM PST by Gaffer
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To: Kaslin

If Romney wins, and we all stay involved, the boot of Government will be removed from the necks of Americans. If we have an energy boom in the whole country as they are having in North Dakota, then there will be enough revenue to pay off the debt and phase out Social Security.


3 posted on 11/06/2012 6:19:00 AM PST by SubMareener (Save us from Quarterly Freepathons! Become a MONTHLY DONOR!)
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To: Kaslin

Pretty much says it all. Buchannan gets it right again. Western Civilization is doomed; actually, it has been for quite some time. We are in the twilight time, soon to enter the great, long night of decline.


4 posted on 11/06/2012 6:19:10 AM PST by Rich21IE
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To: SubMareener

No, it won’t.

This is what I keep hammering on here at FR: The numbers are such that we’re passing (or have just passed) the point of no fiscal return without real, substantial pain.

The GOP has been buying into this idiotic meme that we can “grow our way out of our deficits” for years - over a decade now. A decade ago, it might have been possible if the GOP had manned up and made the right cuts and the right trade policy changes.

Now, the spending numbers are overwhelming the economy’s ability to generate growth (and therefore new tax revenue).

Ryan’s spending plan is a farce - it takes far too long to get to a state where we have only a $400B deficit - never a balanced budget. If we want to turn this around and avoid a EU-style implosion, we need to be talking about cutting at least $500B in real spending cuts this year, next year and the year after that. The GOP stupidly says “no defense cuts,” when the DOD budget is bloated beyond it’s mission, the DNC says “no entitlement cuts” when there’s at least $60B of fraud in Medicare alone per year, and who knows how much other fraud.

The only way to get out of the situation we’re in now is to tell the truth: There will be pain. Much as happened in Iceland, someone needs to have the balls to come forward and say “We’re not going to backstop the bankers. Banks will fail.”

Romney will do none of these things. He’ll be an improvement over the village idiot we have in office now, but these milquetoast Ivy League dandies who the GOP keeps running for office never have the balls to tell people “There will be real cuts. There will be pain. In the end, to clean up this mess, some people who have been living off the taxpayer are going to go broke.”


5 posted on 11/06/2012 6:29:42 AM PST by NVDave
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To: NVDave

Well stated post. Of course I happen to agree with your analysis, but I also enjoyed your description. It’s useful for me to explain the points to others.


6 posted on 11/06/2012 6:35:10 AM PST by Stat-boy
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To: Rich21IE

There is a season.... Seems these things have all been done before. What one learns from history is that no one learns from history.

“It should be known that at the beginning of a dynasty, taxation yields a large revenue from small assessments. At the end of the dynasty, taxation yields a small revenue from large assessments”.
‘Abd-ar-Rah.mân Abû Zayd ibn Khaldûn (1332-1406),


7 posted on 11/06/2012 6:40:59 AM PST by griswold3 (Big Government does not tolerate rivals.)
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To: NVDave

Well said.

All indications is it’s going to be a President Romney, but the GOP celebration is going to be short lived. Reality is coming and the election isn’t going to change that


8 posted on 11/06/2012 6:42:53 AM PST by LMAO ("Begging hands and Bleeding hearts will only cry out for more"...Anthem from Rush)
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To: griswold3

Ever thus.


9 posted on 11/06/2012 6:43:52 AM PST by Rich21IE
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To: NVDave

We could have let the banks fail in 2008 and been in a roaring recovery by now. Except for two problems: McCain and Obama (and their enablers). The cost of bank failure would have been trillions, but instead we watched Obama spend trillions digging union made holes. Now the tab is higher and the economy is weaker.


10 posted on 11/06/2012 6:46:51 AM PST by palmer (Jim, please bill me 50 cents for this completely useless post)
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To: Gaffer
They are only interested in locating the government check that they all feel (demand) they are entitled to.

THAT is the problem. An honest, hard-working populace could handle the debt crisis. But that doesn't describe a large percentage of the population.

11 posted on 11/06/2012 6:55:39 AM PST by St_Thomas_Aquinas (Viva Christo Rey!)
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To: NVDave

This is not “growing our way” out of the deficit. This is “selling our Oil and using our Natural Gas” to pay off the debt. Then comes the hard work of dismantling 100 years of the Progressive Agenda to get us back to our Founding Principles. That means dismantling both the Democrat and Republican establishments because they are all Progressives of one temperature or another. But none of this will happen if We The People decide that our job is done.


12 posted on 11/06/2012 7:00:17 AM PST by SubMareener (Save us from Quarterly Freepathons! Become a MONTHLY DONOR!)
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To: Kaslin

The only silver lining would be the return of cheap energy.

That would get discretionary spending up and the multiplier would be high.


13 posted on 11/06/2012 7:04:20 AM PST by cicero2k
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To: NVDave
There comes a point in every system that does not have a strong enough negative feedback loop then it passes the point of recovery. The Progressives/Leftists have been picking away at the negative feedback loop (which was simply reality) since the beginning the 20th century. We see that today in Little League organizations that give trophies for participation and guaranteed loans for students/farmers/home buyers. The object of society has become equal outcome rather than equal opportunity. Anyone with a contrary point of view is driven off the public stage as being horribly uncaring.

The world does not care about Honey Boo Boo and the idiot society that makes such a show possible, let alone profitable. The rest of the world looks at us, and because they see how easy we have things, wants to steal some part of it. And they have found legal ways to do it, and laugh at us while they do so.

And Americans are too stupid to realize that decisions have consequences. We are like little kids that stick their fingers in their ears and yell so they cannot hear the adult voice in the room. The only hopeful part of this is that we know that chaos precedes the Second Coming. In the mean time, keep your powder dry, my friends.

14 posted on 11/06/2012 7:07:04 AM PST by Pecos (Double tap: the only acceptable gun control)
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To: Kaslin
Everyone talks about how we are going to raise test scores. But, despite record and rising investments in education per student, no one in decades has found a way to do this consistently.

The fix for education is fairly simple, in fact, it is inevitable. Making it happen doesn't take "finding" as much as it takes the guts to do it.

15 posted on 11/06/2012 7:34:30 AM PST by Carry_Okie (The Slave Party: advancing indenture since 1787.)
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To: NVDave
You are right.

There is no way out of this without serious cuts. SS will be cut. Medicare will be cut. Defense budget and pensions will cut. The space program will need to be cut. Places like northern Virgina and DC will see a collapse in property values and employment unprecedented.

That will (not might, will) mean great societal upheaval. Up to and including massive civil unrest and the nation breaking apart. There is no money. The Empire is broke, and we need to decide on how to transition to the next phase.

16 posted on 11/06/2012 7:59:40 AM PST by redgolum ("God is dead" -- Nietzsche. "Nietzsche is dead" -- God.)
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To: Kaslin

bookmark


17 posted on 11/06/2012 1:46:05 PM PST by ßuddaßudd (>> F U B O << "What the hell kind of country is this if I can only hate a man if he's white?")
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To: Gaffer
Weren't the Joads met at the California border with signs saying, "Okies, keep out"? Yet, now they welcome criminal Mexicans with open arms.
18 posted on 11/06/2012 1:56:02 PM PST by Holly_P
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To: Holly_P

Yep.


19 posted on 11/06/2012 2:01:40 PM PST by Gaffer
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To: LMAO
Reality is coming and the election isn’t going to change that

After 4 years of zero blaming Bush for everything imaginable, Romney could truthfully blame obama for the next four years but I don't look for it.

You're right, There has been enormous damage inflicted on our country by the liberal/marxists in the past 4 years and it won't go away quickly.

20 posted on 11/06/2012 2:17:58 PM PST by Holly_P
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