Expressions of outrage won't balance the budget.

[Parisle]

--- I had hoped that the sweeping democratic successes in the recent elections would result in the DU membership adjusting its focus accordingly. In my stodgy way of thinking, that would have meant dispensing with a portion of the myriad gratuitous expressions of outrage at the evils of the Bush administration, and getting down to some nuts & bolts brainstorming about how to do a better job,.. floating some ideas about how to solve the major problems confronting the US. After all, there are some pretty smart people here, eh?

--- But no. Didn't happen. At least not yet.

--- Here's another potential disillusionment. Iraq isn't the worst problem we're facing. Iraq was just the horse we rode into Washington (admittedly trumpeting the lies and ineptness of the neo-nazi junta of which Bush is but the fumbling figurehead) Iraq got people's attention, pissed people off... and exposed the neocons for what they really were. Now we have to repair the damage, and the first order of business is a daunting one,.. not nearly as much fun as inveighing against Bush outrages.

--- As Ross Perot once put it in connection to the budget and the overall economy, "We have to stop the hemmoraging of red ink." Perot chased Bush Sr out of office by decrying his record budget deficit,.. stated at the time as a mere $292 billion, though actually totalling $407 billion when pilfered Social Security revenues were added in. Bush Jr has gone way beyond that, thanks to his tax cuts for the rich, and his tactic of keeping war expenses off-budget. When unified budget deficits, borrowed Social Security funds and Iraq war expenses are combined, we find that we are looking at a budget shortfall of more than $600 billion.

--- How do you make that go away, and how soon can you get it done? Clinton took five years to erase Bush Sr's deficit, but I don't think we can afford to take that long this time around. A vastly-worsened trade imbalance and a plummeting currency make the problem more pronounced and more immediate. I think we have to do it in two years. If you don't believe that "death by debt" is real, take a look at the USSR, circa 1993. This is not routine business; we are in a lifeboat situation, folks.

--- So what's the call? Can you simply raise taxes by $600 billion? Can we knock $100B off Bush's projection of $170B for Iraq in 2007? Windfall taxes on the goddamned oil companies? Across-the-board spending cuts for government? A surtax on gasoline? Alter the playing field for Big Pharma and the satanically-inspired hospital management corporations? Can we say "No" to a few environmentalists and teachers? Tweak Social Security again? Draconian fees and taxes on job-exporting outsourcers? The same for the off-shore tax evading companies? And how do we corral the balance of trade shortfall? And one year from now, the Social Security "trust fund" should contain no less than $100 billion in unspent funds.

--- I could propose a program combining a few of the above elements, and which would accomplish the mathematical objective,... though some would view it as too draconian. There are surely people here who know more than I know, and who are more creative,.. and I'd like to hear from them. I'm tired of seeing us basking in Bush's misdeeds. We quite literally have to save this country, and the time to start doing it was when we took that last Senate seat. Anyone?

[whistle]

1. Roll back Bush tax cuts and freeze spending

[no_hypocrisy]

2. $53 trillion. Keep saying it. $53 trillion. Again.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x2978529

[moblsv]

3. never again

We will never again see the deficit cleared. History is showing that we do know what we need to do in order to balance the budget, and Democrats can do it. The problem is that whenever that happens there is too much money to be taken. That is when the Republicans will lie their way back into power to cash out on the nations wealth.

[Parisle]

5. Sounds pretty fatalistic...

--- You don't think there is any way to prevent the republicans from "lying their way back into power?" I'm hoping for further legislative gains and the White House in 2008 and, if the democrats can effect some significant improvements, then it may be a long time before the republicans ever see a legislative majority again. At least, that's what I'm hoping. But it would be nice to know that the democrats actually DO know what to do, and that they have the resolve to do it, over and above the influences of the "political industry,".. something I'm not so sure of.

[TheWraith]

4. Calculate it for yourself.

Check out the federal budget simulator.

http://www.nathannewman.org/nbs/

Go for the more realistic "long" version.

In the projection I did, I more or less balanced the budget by slashing and burning military operations and maintainence (cut by 50%), Iraq (70%), and DoD procurement (50%). Even so, we would still be militarily outspending Russia and China combined by a factor of two.

Also rolled back the 2001/2003 tax giveaway for everybody but those making under $77k per year. For those under $46k per year, I doubled their benefits. Also doubled the Earned Income Tax Credit and child tax credit, reinstated the estate tax, and eliminated virtually all tax breaks for corporations. Net result, a roughly $18 billion dollar budget surplus.

[Parisle]

6. That's an interesting little website

--- Though I would rather work with actual dollar amounts. I doubt that very many among the new congress would be open to the level of military cutbacks you've indicated, but I salute the intent of your effort. As suggested by the original post, it's this sort of exchange and discussion which I feel is often neglected on the DU, in favor of so many contentious political variations of "Gotcha." Bush has been sufficiently delineated,... and his deceit and incompetence now are agreed-upon by nearly everyone. He is finished, and now must be controlled. Endlessly rehashing his misdeeds is a bit like major leaguers playing against little leaguers.

--- In fact, there's another prime area for discussion. How do we rescind that Authority To Use Military Force (AUMF) that was so irresponsibly handed to him by Congress? What about some means of limiting his martial law-declaring power? Personally, I'd like to see a few states simply announce outright that they will not recognize, nor abide by any untoward executive directives issued by this president. That would shut him down, eh? In any event, Bush must be de-fanged and prevented from doing any further damage. And frankly, I AM worried about what he may be capable of during the next two years.

--- Thanks, Wraith

[HamdenRice]

7. It's extremely easy to balance the budget

I am infuriated every time I read a mainstream media analysis that says that our only choices are raising taxes or cutting entitlements. That's simply a way of framing the debate and excluding the most logical way of balancing the budget.

That way is: the war must be brought to a swift conclusion and then we have to pursue the demilitarization/demobilization that was supposed to occur after WWII, but was postponed by Korea, then was supposed to happen after Vietnam, but was reversed by Reagan's military buildup, and then was supposed to occur after the end of the cold war, but was prevented by Bush I's gulf war, and Clinton's incompetence on military politics.

During the 1990s, I used to watch a PBS show produced by former generals and admirals -- from the very top -- called America's Defense Monitor. The repeated over and over that with the end of the cold war, the defense budget should be in the range of $30 billion, not the $300 billion it was then. They said that everyone in the Pentagon knew this but that it is impossible to speak out until one retires.

Whether we should balance the budget is another story.

Paul Krugman wrote perhaps the saddest editorial in the New York Times last week I have ever read. He said that it would be a mistake to balance the budget and pay down the debt as Clinton had done, because it would only pave the way for another lunatic republican in the future to loot the treasury. This is how Clinton era treasury officials feel about the Bush administration.

[Parisle]

9. I'm not trying to be "anti-military" about it....

--- And I doubt that you will see a defense budget under $250 billion again,... but since we're currently closer to $500 billion, that would be a welcome relief, eh? As for Krugman's lament, I think it would be a mistake to fail to do the right thing simply because of the "boogey-man" status accorded to the GOP. True, they use public debt to enrich themselves,... but a congress acting in the best interests of We the People can pass legislation to make their avaricious ways a lot more difficult. That's just one of the things we have to do now.

[Guaranteed]

8. Nice post.

Pretty frustrated myself.

I'm starting to wonder if this was ever anything other than a complaint-fest.

[Javaman]

10. What no one on the right ever likes to mention is that

moron* never includes the cost of the war in his* yearly budget.

That is the nightmare that will come to bite us hard in the ass in 2 short years.