Debt Reduction, If Progressive, Is Quite Doable (Barf Alert!!!

IBD Editorials ^ | July 7, 2011 | Left wing lunatic EUGENE ROBINSON

[Kaslin]

Do progressives care about reducing the national debt? Of course they do, no matter what the White House might believe.

"We think that obviously there are some Democrats who don't feel as strongly about deficit reduction as (President Obama) does," senior adviser David Plouffe said Wednesday at a breakfast with reporters and columnists.

But that's not obvious at all. It isn't even true.

There's no dispute about where we need to go. The question is what path to take.

Clearly, the federal government cannot continue spending at a rate of 25% of GDP while taking in revenues that equal less than 15% of GDP, as is the case this year. We would reach the point where debt service crowds out health care, education and other priorities dear to progressives' hearts.

Major investments the nation desperately needs to make — for infrastructure and energy research, for example — would be impossible. Decline would be inevitable.

The way to avoid this dystopian future is to bring spending and revenues more into balance.

Yes, there will be some pain and sacrifice. But it is not necessary — nor is it wise — to heap a disproportionate share of the burden onto the backs of the poor, the elderly and the battered middle class.

Raise Revenue

[darkwing104]

Besides raising taxes, what is the rats budget plan?

[Personal Responsibility]

“We think that obviously there are some Democrats who don’t feel as strongly about deficit reduction as (President Obama) does,”

---

Which is to say he cares that the deficit may cost him a vote or two and the other Democrats don’t care about it at all.

[appleharvey]

Bless his little pointed head, Eugene Robinson is the textbook definition of a brain stem.

[FlingWingFlyer]

I can’t believe how much this loon loves writing this crap everyday and embarrassing the hell out of himself for the white boys down at the DNC and in the state run “media”. Eugene really needs to grow up and start thinking on his own.

[Vendome]

If prgressively worse, sure.

And I don’t feel like spel chicken...

[Vendome]

If prgressively worse, sure.

And I don’t feel like spel chicken...

[HiTech RedNeck]

The golden goose is hacking, coughing, sputtering, and well nigh to shuffling off this mortal coil altogether. And these IDIOTS suggest this?

[Yardstick]

The drivers of out-of-control federal spending are medical costs and the Pentagon budget. Leave aside health care for the moment and reflect on the fact that military spending has roughly doubled since 2002. Are we twice as safe? Can we really afford to spend two-thirds of a trillion dollars on defense every year?

Naturally he fingers defense as a spending driver. It's his duty as a liberal columnist to do so (he gets an A for effort in trying to associate the word "trillion" with defense spending even though it's only in the hundreds of billions.) The problem is that defense spending is at near historic lows as a percentage of GDP and the overall trend is downward. He knows this good and well but hopes his readers don't. If he were honest he would acknowledge that the real drivers are social programs -- social security and that sort of thing. But he's an ideological hack, so we get the Big Lie.

[GeronL]

What is the effective tax rate in greece? Something like 80% with all of the taxes combined? Somehow high taxes did not save them from debt.

It’s the spending, duh

[yadent]

Mr.Whats-his-face is playing word games. The problem is overall debt. Like it or not the economy at present is being kept afloat via government spending which is based on debt. This can not continue indefinitely. The math won’t allow it. So contracting government spending will contract the overall economy. So too will increasing taxes as that removes productive dollars from the overall economy into that not productive. Until bad debt is cleared from the system the present economic conditions will remain and get worse. Both political parties have thwarted the work of a recession-to clear bad debt. They have chosen to protect those who made the bad bets instead of the taxpaying public.

[Minn]

The drivers of out-of-control federal spending are medical costs

So just imagine how much better things would be if the federal government had never gotten into the medicine business. It seemed like such a good idea at the time.

[andyk]

Clearly, the federal government cannot continue spending at a rate of 25% of GDP while taking in revenues that equal less than 15% of GDP

Considering that historically, tax revenue as a percent of GDP hovers around 18% regardless of the level of taxation (an interesting statistic, no doubt), it is clearly the spending level that is the problem.

[Blood of Tyrants]

Only to Rats would a revenue of $200 BILLION per month be considered too small.

[Oceander]

But it is not necessary — nor is it wise — to heap a disproportionate share of the burden onto the backs of the poor, the elderly and the battered middle class.

Funny thing that, most of them don't bear any sort of a burden now anyways, considering that most of them get net transfers from the government when all transfers are taken into account.