***THE OFFICIAL FRIDAY SILLINESS THREAD***

It all started back in 2010 when the Tea Party swept into the House of Representatives. They argued that the stimulus measures – taken by the Obama administration to lessen the depth of the recession – created too much debt. To reduce this debt they were going to slash government spending...

Now, every so often Congress authorizes how much money the government can borrow. This is called the debt ceiling. Tea partiers rightly claimed that the debt ceiling was too damn high.

So they tried to use the debt ceiling as leverage to shrink government services and cut programs like Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid.

After the left took the U.S. economy to the brink of default, the right wing agreed to raise the debt ceiling, but only if they were guaranteed some sort of massive spending cuts.

The sequester was supposed to be so painful that Congress would have to come up with a plan. It was acclaimed by both Democrats and Republicans as a victory of bipartisanship.

So Congress formed a "Super Committee" to pass a “Grand Bargain” that would reduce the deficit by the same amount as the sequester, but with a more balanced mix of cuts and increased revenue.

Because the Tea Party held the line, and the Democrats refused to back down from their big government agenda, the Super Committee was not able to agree on a plan. The Tea Party refused to even consider raising any taxes or take from the rich to give to the poor. They believed the best thing to solve the debt problem, was to cut, cut, cut. So the can was kicked down the road until after the election.

Immediately following the election there were two deadlines. The Bush tax cuts were going to expire, raising taxes on most Americans in the middle of a weak economy. At the same time, sequestration was going to kick in, slashing spending indiscriminately. This combination of tax hikes on the middle class and devastating spending cuts was known as the FISCAL CLIFF.

Instead of jumping off the fiscal cliff, President Obama and Speaker of the House John Boehner decided it was time for a grand bargain. They would compromise by raising revenue and cutting spending at the same time. Thanks to caving from Progressive Republicans, the grand bargain ended up something like this:

Side note: although Obama is taking more money from wealthy Americans, many millionaires and billionaires still ignorantly support him.

After obstructing yet another compromise, Republicans decided the sequester was still a good idea. They would try to use it to force cuts to vital programs. The sequester was postponed until March 1. Meanwhile, we see the wolves dine with each other, deciding on what to eat for lunch.

Now March 1 is upon us. So the sequester is about to kick in. Obama is traveling the country, claiming the sky is going to fall.

Obama & Co. claim that by letting the automatic spending cuts go into effect the whole of government will be shut down, people will lose jobs everywhere, food will be scarce, police and fire fighters won't be able to protect citizens, medical services will be eviscerated...basically everything that makes the world go around, will come to a halt.

The sequester will eliminate jobs, but they'll be UNION and government jobs. It's a start in cutting back this over-grown and out-of-control, government.

I had lots of time on Saturday so I decided to weed the flower bed in front of the house. When I got out front I noticed one of those free newspapers that often clutters up my driveway. I decided it was best to just get it right then. When I got to the front of the driveway I noticed a problem spot that really needed some water.

I went into the garage and put the little Miracle-Gro sprayer on it and set it up to do the watering. The Miracle-Gro has one of those shut-off valves so you can start the water then go do the spraying. Well, when I got down to the sprayer and turned on the water I noticed the pressure was extremely low.

I’ve been here before. There’s an input filter in my house that gets clogged sometimes so I went down into the basement to clean that out. I got it cleaned out and turned the water back on, when I noticed some old plant pots that I had meant to take up to the attic the week before. Knowing I would just forget again if I didn’t take them right up I hiked up to the attic to put them away.

Wouldn’t you know, the last time I was up there I had found an old trunk from my Air Force days and had been looking through some of that stuff. Somehow I never put it all away so I put it all carefully back, closed the trunk, and put the trunk where it belonged. Then I headed downstairs.

It was lunch time so I made myself a nice sandwich and some lemonade and looked through the latest copy of World Magazine that had arrived the day before. I had a couple of cookies for dessert - my favorite chocolate chip recipe.

The doorbell rang as I was cleaning up and it was the mailman with a package I had ordered from Amazon. He also had brought me the letters he normally puts in the mailbox the trip. I thanked him with a cookie then took the mail back into the table. Most of it was junk, but there was a letter from my brother in China so I read that and put it in the mail pile. But the mail pile had been really piling up over the week so I sorted the pile into all the places I keep my mail.

By now it was 2:00. I’m getting older so I like to take a little nap in front of some game or other. When I woke up the game was actually pretty good, so I watched it until the end.

Suddenly it was 5:00 and time to get ready to meet my wife for dinner. I hadn’t accomplished anything. Not only was the flower bed not weeded, but the driveway was full of water and I had to move the hose before I could get the car out of the garage.

I wonder if this is how Alzheimer’s starts.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.

The True Story of Sequestration In Handy GIF Form