"Don't raise Fed debt ceiling" means "Balance the Fed budget INSTANTLY"

[Little-Acorn]

A "balanced budget" is one where the money you take in (taxes, fees, "contributions" etc.) is equal to the money you spend (spending on govt, military, foreign aid, Social Security etc.), so that you don't need to borrow ANY money to make ends meet.

Congress has a debt limit set by law (that is, by Congress) that they may not exceed. The National Debt is not allowed to rise any higher than that limit. But every time they come close to it, they simply vote to raise it. This has been happening, often half a dozen times per year or more, for year after year, in administration after administration, for generations. It makes you wonder why they bother setting the limit, if all they are going to do is change it whenever they want to spend more.

Now we have calls to quit raising the debt limit. In a rich irony, those calls are coming from Democrats, which is like John Dillinger calling to end bank robberies. But regardless of whom it comes from, it's an idea worth looking at.

I don't know how close we are to the present debt ceiling, but we're probably pretty close (we always are). If we decide not to raise the debt ceiling any more, any further borrowing we do, will quickly raise our present debt to the existing limit. And once that happens, we cannot borrow a single dime more to make ends meet. Not even for a month, not even for a week. Any additional spending we do, must be paid for, right then and there, with additional revenue... or else we can't do that additional spending.

In other words, if we decide to stop raising the debt ceiling, that means we must write a completely balanced budget NOW. We can't borrow a single dollar, not even if we mean to pay it back tomorrow.

Even if Congress adopts a more forgiving version of "Don't raise the debt ceiling", turning it into "Our debt at the end of this year, cannot be higher than our debt at the end of last year, but if it goes a little higher in the middle of the year and gets quickly smacked backed down, that's OK".... it still means that we must adopt a balanced budget for every fiscal year... and stick to it.

A balanced Federal budget has never been achieved in living memory. Some people claim it was balanced for a few years in the 1990s after Congress cut the Capital Gains tax rate and CG activity (and tax revenues) soared as a result. But if you look at the National Debt at the end of every fiscal year in the 1990s (and in every other year), you'll see that the Natl Debt has gone up EVERY year, including those years where those people claim the budget was balanced. (For a hint of how this could be, look at funds for Social Security and other Fed trust funds. The govt takes in money as contributions, calls it revenue, puts it in the SS trust fund, then borrows it back out of the trust fund and calls it "revenue" again. Gee, we have twice as much "revenue" as we thought! But that borrowing must still be added into the National Debt, whose paper trail tells the real story).

But suffice to say, that balancing the Federal budget is a VERY difficult thing to do.

Those calling for an end to any further raises of the Debt Limit, are essentially calling for an immediate and permanent Balanced Federal Budget. Though such a thing will be painful, it can ultimately be beneficial for the country.

I've heard one report that the amount of the budget that goes for "discretionary" spending, is less than this year's deficit. If true, this means that we could stop ALL discretionary spending, and still not balance the budget-- we'd still have to violate the present debt ceiling by borrowing more to make ends meet.

What it means, is that if we are serious about not raising the debt ceiling, we're going to have to make some "non-discretionary spending", discretionary instead... and then cut it.

Careful what you wish for.

[logroller]

How distinctly non-partisan lil'acorn -- VERY REFRESHING!

[red states rule]

The party is OVER.

Hard choices have to made now since we are OUT OF MONEY. We are BROKE and the spending has to stop

The biggest budget buster is Obamacare and it has to be repealed

Of course the left is doing what they do best to counter this needed action.

The Victim Parade is about to begin

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and

Democrats Plan Attack on Republican Repeal Effort

Democratic leaders in Washington plan to spend the next week doing what they all but refused to do in the 2010 midterm elections: mount a vigorous defense of President Obama’s health care legislation.

The “all fronts” plan is a response to the decision by the new House speaker, John A. Boehner, to schedule a vote next Wednesday on a complete repeal of the health care law that Mr. Obama signed last March.

Senior Democratic officials said their effort would be managed by a rapid response operation modeled after the ones Mr. Obama used in his presidential campaign. That team will monitor Republican claims, send out fact-checks and deploy a team of surrogates to get their views on television.

Paid television advertisements will be run “as warrants,” said one senior Democrat, who asked not to be named because he was not authorized to speak publicly about the program. Organizing for America, the president’s chief political apparatus, will host phone banks and schedule events featuring people who would lose their benefits if the health care law were repealed.

“We will make clear to the American people that as their first order of business, Republicans have decided not to focus on jobs and deficit reduction, but on relitigating partisan battles — that, if successful, would eliminate help for our job-creating small business and explode the deficit,” said Hari Sevugan, a spokesman for the Democratic National Committee.

This week, Representative Eric Cantor of Virginia, the majority leader, vowed to pass what the Republicans have dubbed “Repealing the Job Killing Health Care Act.”

“The American people are expecting quick action from the Republican majority,” Mr. Cantor told reporters Tuesday. He played down predictions that the act would be stopped by the Democratic majority in the Senate, saying, “the important thing right now is to make sure we send a repeal bill across the floor.”

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2...er=rss&emc=rss

[Roadrunner]

Since the "Big Spender" and his Democratic cohorts now want to raise the debt ceiling to cover their extravagant spending since Obama has been president, thought you might get a kick out of what he had to say about raising the debt ceiling when he was Senator Obama in 2006:

"The fact that we are here today to debate raising America's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. Government can't pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government's reckless fiscal policies.

"Increasing America's debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that 'the buck stops here'. Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better."

What a difference a change in title and a few years can make! During his tenure as president (not two full years yet!), Obama has spent triple the amount of money GWB did in eight years and is robbing our children and grandchildren (by Obama's own admission) of the opportunities we have enjoyed as Americans, not to mention the fact that this outrageous spending is bankrupting the country. Talk about a lack of leadership and reckless fiscal policies!

If the American people don't send Obama packing at their earliest convenience, they deserve all the grief his tenure as president brings them.

[logroller]

In all fairness to Obama, the spending trend originated in the last congress. Interestingly enough, since 2009, the number of prime-award transactions in Texas has increased dramatically-- very peculiar, I'm trying to find out what is responsible for this; anybody know?

http://www.usaspending.gov/trends?ca...phview&Go.x=Go

I found thissite informative from a spending perspective; as it appears total spending reacts directly to economic health (and tax revenue accordingly); but the number transactions rebound indirectly. The balance between spending and revenue indicates our debt, but what of the increases in transactions, understanding that transactional costs increase relative inefficiency in government spending.
To use an analogy-- if you're cutting an already smaller pie into more pieces, you're gonna lose even more of the pie to the knife and cutting process.
I understand less taxes + less spending =
; but what is gained in the process when gov't cronies still get to clean the knife and the public gets less pie and more crumbs.

[Little-Acorn]

This year's deficit is about $1.3 trillion. Total "discretionary spending" is about $1.39 trillion.

"Discretionary spending" means the budget items whose spending is not (yet) mandated by Federal law. Sounds weird, but Defense spending is "Discretionary", while Social Security and other such programs are "Non-discretionary".

"Non-discretionary" doesn't mean we MUST spend this amount in this time. It just means that to change the amount we spend on this item, we have to change Federal law first. Well, we do that every year, many times a year, when we raise the Debt Ceiling. It's actually pretty easy to do. So why not do it to "Non-discretionary" spending as well?

So, in the event that we decide not to raise the Debt Ceiling any more, which "Non-discretionary" budget items should we change the law on, and then reduce? And which "Discretionary" items should we also reduce?

[gabosaurus]

In all fairness to Obama, the spending trend originated in the last congress. Interestingly enough, since 2009, the number of prime-award transactions in Texas has increased dramatically-- very peculiar, I'm trying to find out what is responsible for this; anybody know?

I find it intriguing that no one was worried about the federal deficit while Dubya was president. No one worried about how the effect of cutting taxes and increasing spending by starting a war would balloon the deficit. Not to mention the huge tax breaks given to corporations, oil companies and the wealthy.

The government could make huge strides toward balancing the budget by doing the following:
***Cut bloated waste in Pentagon and defense spending by 30 percent.
***End all military involvement in the Middle East by the end of 2011
***Cut of all foreign aid to terrorist states such as Saudi Arabia and Israel

[Trigg]

I find it intriguing that no one was worried about the federal deficit while Dubya was president. No one worried about how the effect of cutting taxes and increasing spending by starting a war would balloon the deficit. Not to mention the huge tax breaks given to corporations, oil companies and the wealthy.

Although I know you'll claim to "have a life", but just for the hell of it why don't you back that statement up.


Not that you care about the truth, but the whole Tea Party was started because of gov. waste and the debt getting out of control.

[Kathianne]

What is troubling to me is that so much of the 'discretionary spending' are often geared towards the 'general welfare' such as defense, boarders, CDC, etc.

The mandated programs are linked to specific segments of the population, often with unfunded mandates that fall to the states.

These issues need to be addressed.

[Little-Acorn]

A "balanced budget" is one where the money you take in (taxes, fees, "contributions" etc.) is equal to the money you spend (spending on govt, military, foreign aid, Social Security etc.), so that you don't need to borrow ANY money to make ends meet.

Congress has a debt limit set by law (that is, by Congress) that they may not exceed. The National Debt is not allowed to rise any higher than that limit. But every time they come close to it, they simply vote to raise it. This has been happening, often half a dozen times per year or more, for year after year, in administration after administration, for generations. It makes you wonder why they bother setting the limit, if all they are going to do is change it whenever they want to spend more.

Now we have calls to quit raising the debt limit. In a rich irony, those calls are coming from Democrats, which is like John Dillinger calling to end bank robberies. But regardless of whom it comes from, it's an idea worth looking at.

I don't know how close we are to the present debt ceiling, but we're probably pretty close (we always are). If we decide not to raise the debt ceiling any more, any further borrowing we do, will quickly raise our present debt to the existing limit. And once that happens, we cannot borrow a single dime more to make ends meet. Not even for a month, not even for a week. Any additional spending we do, must be paid for, right then and there, with additional revenue... or else we can't do that additional spending.

In other words, if we decide to stop raising the debt ceiling, that means we must write a completely balanced budget NOW. We can't borrow a single dollar, not even if we mean to pay it back tomorrow.

Even if Congress adopts a more forgiving version of "Don't raise the debt ceiling", turning it into "Our debt at the end of this year, cannot be higher than our debt at the end of last year, but if it goes a little higher in the middle of the year and gets quickly smacked backed down, that's OK".... it still means that we must adopt a balanced budget for every fiscal year... and stick to it.

A balanced Federal budget has never been achieved in living memory. Some people claim it was balanced for a few years in the 1990s after Congress cut the Capital Gains tax rate and CG activity (and tax revenues) soared as a result. But if you look at the National Debt at the end of every fiscal year in the 1990s (and in every other year), you'll see that the Natl Debt has gone up EVERY year, including those years where those people claim the budget was balanced. (For a hint of how this could be, look at funds for Social Security and other Fed trust funds. The govt takes in money as contributions, calls it revenue, puts it in the SS trust fund, then borrows it back out of the trust fund and calls it "revenue" again. Gee, we have twice as much "revenue" as we thought! But that borrowing must still be added into the National Debt, whose paper trail tells the real story).

But suffice to say, that balancing the Federal budget is a VERY difficult thing to do.

Those calling for an end to any further raises of the Debt Limit, are essentially calling for an immediate and permanent Balanced Federal Budget. Though such a thing will be painful, it can ultimately be beneficial for the country.

I've heard one report that the amount of the budget that goes for "discretionary" spending, is less than this year's deficit. If true, this means that we could stop ALL discretionary spending, and still not balance the budget-- we'd still have to violate the present debt ceiling by borrowing more to make ends meet.

What it means, is that if we are serious about not raising the debt ceiling, we're going to have to make some "non-discretionary spending", discretionary instead... and then cut it.

Careful what you wish for.

This year's deficit is about $1.3 trillion. Total "discretionary spending" is about $1.39 trillion.

"Discretionary spending" means the budget items whose spending is not (yet) mandated by Federal law. Sounds weird, but Defense spending is "Discretionary", while Social Security and other such programs are "Non-discretionary".

"Non-discretionary" doesn't mean we MUST spend this amount in this time. It just means that to change the amount we spend on this item, we have to change Federal law first. Well, we do that every year, many times a year, when we raise the Debt Ceiling. It's actually pretty easy to do. So why not do it to "Non-discretionary" spending as well?

So, in the event that we decide not to raise the Debt Ceiling any more, which "Non-discretionary" budget items should we change the law on, and then reduce? And which "Discretionary" items should we also reduce?

[logroller]

Increasing tax revenues could balance the budget too

[fj1200]

Increasing tax revenues could balance the budget too

That is true, increasing tax rates however will not. Revenues will rebound with a meaningful economic recovery as they are a function of GDP.

[DragonStryk72]

I find it intriguing that no one was worried about the federal deficit while Dubya was president. No one worried about how the effect of cutting taxes and increasing spending by starting a war would balloon the deficit. Not to mention the huge tax breaks given to corporations, oil companies and the wealthy.

The government could make huge strides toward balancing the budget by doing the following:
***Cut bloated waste in Pentagon and defense spending by 30 percent.
***End all military involvement in the Middle East by the end of 2011
***Cut of all foreign aid to terrorist states such as Saudi Arabia and Israel

Wow, well nice to know you don't count me as a person. thanks a bunch.

Does the military involvement in the Middle East cover Obama's run on Libya? Oh, and where do you propose we get our oil from, since basically, the ME would turn into the seventh ring of hell pretty quickly if we stopped all military involvement?

Do you really believe the Palestinians are any better? there's a ton of blood on both sides, but honestly, Iran would likely just swallow the whole thing pretty quickly.

Just cutting defense spending isn't going to cut it, and honestly, we could cut most of the foreign aid in its entirety if we just got proper reforms to immigration, making the process streamlined, and cheaper, while at the same time enforcing the immigration laws on the books against businesses that help proliferate illegal immigration by providing opportunity. All we would have to do is do what we've done in our own past, to open ourselves up to allowing in those who could start a better life here, and live as an example to other nations, as opposed to our general interfering with everyone.