[kabar]

We're not going to ever get ANY budget cuts unless we shut down the government. Not permanantly, but enough to cause riots. That's what I want.

Shutting down the government is counterproductive. We tried that once. It is cutting off your nose to spite your face.

43 cents of every federal dollar spent is borrowed. If we don't raise the debt limit, we will effectively shut down the government. Tens of millions of people will be hurt. If you think that will garner more public support for our position, you are crazy. In any event, it won't happen.

The Debt to the Penny and Who Holds It

[ClearCase_guy]

Reagan won the Cold War by building missiles. He went toe-to-toe with Gorbachev, rather than showing fear the way other presidents had. Reagan won the war without a shot -- although many people thought it was madness.

Look, on a political spectrum of extreme rightwing craziness to extreme leftwing craziness, if I take a position of dead-in-the-center-perfect-reasonableness and then negotiate with an extreme leftwing crazy, I know which way that conversation is going to go. It will drift to the Left. We've been doing that for decades. Our country is a right-of-center country, but our government is basically a socialist government. That's because Republicans start from a moderate position, and then negotiate with extreme Leftwing crazies.

I want to deliberately take a crazy rightwing position and start from there, and I think it's worth it. Gingrich blew it in 1995, because he blinked. Reagan won the Cold War because he made the other guy blink.

I'm not reasonable on the issue. I think being reasonable on this issue is stupid.