Bushes worst deficit is "better" than any of the Bastards deficits....
Posted on 01/18/2015 4:42:25 AM PST by Cincinatus' Wife
Conservatives in Congress are reviving the push for a balanced-budget amendment to the Constitution now that Republicans control both houses of Congress.
GOP lawmakers in both chambers have filed several amendment proposals in the early days of the congressional session, breathing new life into an issue that had faded somewhat from the agenda.
“I came here with a clear mission: work to get a balanced budget and do my best to reduce the size and scope of government, so that our small businesses and farm families can grow and create jobs,” said Freshman Rep. David Rouzer (R-N.C.) in a recent speech on the House floor.
Rouzer is among the more than 140 lawmakers who are co-sponsoring legislation from Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) that would bar Congress from spending more money than the government takes in. The plan would require a majority in the House and Senate to pass tax increases and a three-fifths majority to raise the debt limit.
The amendment has the backing of only one Democrat, Rep. Pete DeFazio (Ore.).
The proposal is identical to legislation that was brought up in the House and Senate in 2011 after Republicans made a vote on a balanced-budget amendment a condition for raising the debt ceiling.
That amendment failed in both chambers, falling short of the two-thirds majorities needed to send it to the states for ratification.
But now that the Senate has flipped to Republican control, conservatives say it’s time to try again.
Goodlatte, who has unveiled balanced-budget amendments in every Congress since 2007, said a balanced-budget amendment is needed to force the “tough decisions necessary for fiscal responsibility.”
“It is time for Congress to put an end to fiscal irresponsibility and stop saddling future generations with crushing debts to pay for our current spending. We must rise above partisanship and join together to send a balanced budget amendment to the states for ratification,” Goodlatte, the chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said in a statement.
Goodlatte has introduced a second amendment proposal that would require a balanced federal budget, place a spending cap on spending and impose a three-fifths supermajority vote in Congress for increasing the debt ceiling and raising taxes. That plan has more than 90 co-sponsors.
Reps. Leonard Lance (R-N.J.) and Bradley Byrne (R-Ala.) have also put forward balanced-budget amendments in the House.
“Many states, including New Jersey, are required to balance their state budgets, yet the federal government continues to spend more than it takes in,” said Lance, who is credited with pushing New Jersey’s constitutional amendment to balance the budget.
Across the Capitol, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) has filed his own balanced-budget amendment, and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) has one coming down the pike, his aides say.
Hatch has introduced such proposals in the past. President Ronald Reagan once referred to him as “Mr. Balanced Budget.”
It remains unclear whether GOP leaders will bring any of the new proposals up for a vote.
Aides to Speaker Boehner (R-Ohio) and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) didn’t respond to multiple requests for comment about the amendment push.
The procedural obstacles facing an amendment are high, because even if an amendment secures the two-thirds majority needed for passage — which is unlikely, given Democratic opposition — it would have to be ratified by 38 states to take effect.
Still, McConnell and then-Senate Minority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas) were building support in their conference for an amendment in February 2013, though the effort went nowhere with Democrats in control of the upper chamber.
Democrats have leveled multiple objections against a budget amendment, pointing to the surplus from the late 1990s under President Clinton to argue it isn’t necessary for cutting the deficit.
“It was Bill Clinton who balanced the budget. It was George W. Bush who unbalanced it, put two wars on a credit card, gave a tax cut to the rich, and we had terrible deficits. Barack Obama has now reduced this deficit by two-thirds,” Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) recently said on the Senate floor.
The federal deficit last year fell to $483 billion, a six-year low.
Democrats have objected strongly to language in the GOP proposals that would require a super-majority vote for tax increases, seeing it as an attempt to ensure that tax hikes are nearly impossible to pass.
Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Ohio), the GOP’s leading voice on fiscal issues, has strongly supported the tax provision, and voted against the 2011 amendment because it did not include it.
"Spending is the problem, yet this version of the [amendment] makes it more likely taxes will be raised, government will grow, and economic freedom will be diminished," Ryan said at the time. "Without a limit on government spending, I cannot support this amendment."
Since the 1930s, dozens of balanced-budget amendments have been introduced in Congress, according to the Congressional Research Service (CRS).
One proposal came within an inch of reaching the states in 1995, after Republicans swept to power in the midterm elections and sought to fulfill their “Contract With America.”
The House overwhelmingly passed the balanced budget amendment 300-132, only to see it fail by a single vote in the Senate.
Are we all prepared for the size of our military under a balanced budget?
Of all the high ground to die taking, that “balanced budget amendment” is a stupid place to begin.
Budgets can be balanced TWO ways — spending cuts AND higher taxes. Guess which will be the most popular with our overlords.
Let's see them come up with a proposed balanced budget today, without the amendment, and then I'll believe they're serious about it.
Yep. When 0 was elected it triggered a constitutional crisis the will culminate in civil war or the destruction of America. Either way, our kids won’t inherit the country we enjoyed: and this is what they’re fighting for?
It’s how you spend it, not how much money you have - federal agencies are awash in money. They need to spend it on what is needed. Prioritize! There is astronomical waste and fraud in government, and money is being pushed into liberal, pet causes within every agency. Time to cut funding (usual means no INCREASES in budgets), expose fraud and prioritize where funds are spent.
Of course this goes hand in hand with tax cuts, wherein more money will flow to government coffers. Then the deficit will shrink and the Left’s steady push toward more and more dependency (wealth transfer) - to grow socialism and shrink free markets and private property - will be pushed back.
Note to the Republicans Party.
The very first issue you should address, is to bring back jobs to America.
Period.
I completely agree.
The GOP really needs to be the party for America’s people.
It has COMPLETELY lost sight of that.
GOP there are two words, you should focus on:
AMERICAN. JOBS.
Then cut corporate taxes.
A lot of companies have been pushed into global coziness.
Can they be brought home?
We need to bring industry, manufacturing, and mining and fishing and forestry and drilling - etc. etc. etc. back home.
Which means exposing the EPA - environmentalism — for the socialist, crony capitalism, job killing fraud that it is.
Look we have been saying those things now for years.
America needs to rebuild.
NOW.
China is now the largest exporter in the entire world. China has the second-largest military budget anywhere, and that is rapidly growing. Everything is every single store anymore, is MADE IN CHINA.
America needs to bring back our own jobs, our own businesses, and stop giving the future to a gigantic communist country which doesn’t even allow Americans to immigrate.
(unless they are of the Chinese race)
GOP support America.
“......And of course there is the third major crisis: the need to shrink the government, restore federalism and reduce the debt will be on the new president’s plate – assuming that he or she can, unlike Reagan, get past the first two crises. Which brings me to the second note of caution. It is impossible to restore America politically and economically if it is not restored culturally. Reagan understood this, I believe, as exhibited by the words in his farewell address. But he never seriously addressed the issue – either because he didn’t have time or perhaps he lacked the belief that he could make a difference. We can never know. But, the matter of the culture is critical to the success of the conservative restoration project. For in fact, culture trumps politics.
Twentieth century progressives – especially Antonio Gramsci — grasped this idea. They understood that in order to radically alter the politics of the United States, they had to first undermine bourgeois culture and replace it with a more libertine version. They understood that the flow of influence runs downhill from culture to politics. And so they set about changing America’s culture. They succeeded beyond their wildest dreams. Today, the left controls virtually all of the opinion-molding organs of American society: the media and the arts, public schools, foundations, seminaries, museums, libraries, higher education, the federal bureaucracy, the legal profession and so on. Classic American culture celebrated individual liberty, limited government, free market capitalism, strong morals grounded in religion, intact traditional families and vibrant cohesive communities, individual responsibility and the meritocracy, and American Exceptionalism in particular, the idea that America is a model and force for good in the world. That culture has been supplanted by one that values: group rights, big government and crony capitalism, loose morals and banishment of religion from the public square, global American weakness and disengagement, and an obscene focus on the warts in American history.”.....
Soul rebuilding is needed before any prosperity will be seen.
Few people have noticed that the quiet unofficial Christian segment of China has been quietly growing. But it has been, and is. Maybe God has been blessing China, at the expense of a country that is on the verge of dropping faith on the floor, in anticipation of them.
“Are we all prepared for the size of our military under a balanced budget?”
Sure. We would probably be able to get rid of boondoggle programs that cost too much, make no sense and will barely work.
I want to see what we do with the other 82% that gets wasted from social programs.
If that's the meme, then we might as well pack it in and watch as we go down the tubes.
In an interesting twist, if both houses of congress cannot muster a 2/3rds majority to send it to the states as a constitutional amendment, with a SIMPLE MAJORITY, both houses of congress could pass a joint resolution that enough states have resolved for an Article V convention so that congress will now call one, as it is required to do.
No real worry about an “out of control” constitutional convention, because enough states have now enacted protections, that their delegates can *only* vote on those amendments authorized by their states, under threat of criminal penalty, that the convention will be limited to just those subjects. Importantly, if another amendment arises that the state approves of, they can quickly resolve to allow votes on that one as well.
I scoffed then.
But she was right.
NO MORE PARTIES, CONFERENCES,ect. ect. ect. We have Skype, go to meeting.com, why the hell do these LOSERS need to be motivated WE are not in anyway motivated that this is ALL done on OUR dime with absolutely NO CONCERN for our money!!!!!!!
Ok a fat guy gains 300 pounds then loses 150. He is losing weighy at an astounding rate. Compared to what? His huge lard ass now or his previews weigh before becoming a glutton 6 years ago? So disingenuous.
Goebbelesque. In 2006 Bush had a balanced budget for all practical purposes. These Dems are evil evil evil.
Bushes worst deficit is "better" than any of the Bastards deficits....
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