This perfectly sums up what the whole problem is with our government today.
We’re at a big turning point in America.
We have plenty of money. America is not broke. It’s how we’ve chosen to spend it that is causing so many problems. We have a big disconnect on what economics works and what fails.
There is the Republican/Tea Party faction that wants spending cuts, no new taxes, lower the taxes we have, and stopping America from doing great things. They don’t even want to put enough into the country to keep it a civilized society.
There are the progressives who are willing to dream big, to win World War II, to put men on the moon, to build an international space station, to rebuild Europe and Japan after World War II, to build the interstate highway system, to create the best public school system in the world, and to build the modern infrastructure we enjoyed for three generations.
Our greatness was hijacked by the Reagan administration, when he refused to continue investing in this country, over-spent on defense, and tripled the national debt.
I want pre-Reagan (Carter) America back. I want our greatness back. I want America to do great things again. We have a choice. We can do better. Let’s choose a greater American future.
November 2010 seems like a distant memory. If I recall correctly, the election of Nov. 2010 was supposed to be about jobs and the economy. Remember? Jobs, jobs, jobs?
After 187 days, 19 hours, (as of this writing) the Republican-controlled House of Representatives has presented absolutely no jobs bills. In fact, they’ve changed the conversation to completely exclude jobs, other than harping that tax increases of any kind will kill jobs growth, and if that happens “so be it”. Oy!
I wrote about tax cuts and the economy previously: If tax cuts work so well, why aren’t we rich? All they want to argue about are a bunch of social and ideological issues, tax cuts, the national debt, the budget deficit and national debt ceiling.
Republicans want us to be afraid of a lot of things that have nothing to do with our own bread and butter issues. They’ve changed the conversation away from jobs, wages, benefits and workers’ rights. Republicans were elected to deal directly with those issues. They have only harmed us. They’ve done nothing to help.
Republicans are succeeding at making us afraid of each other and for our Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid benefits, which we paid for through payroll taxes. Those programs had nothing to do with our current fiscal disaster and must be left alone.
The only current issues are increasing taxes on the rich and corporations, and increasing the debt ceiling. The House should pass a bill to increase the debt ceiling to a reasonable amount to keep America’s debt obligations paid while allowing for the federal government to spend, create jobs and grow the country out of this recession.
You can’t cut your way out of a recession. When you need more money, more money has to come in. At home, we call that getting a second job. In government, we call that raising tax revenue by several means (increasing taxes, ending subsidies and deductions, etc.). Taxes on millionaires and billionaires should be raised to at least the pre-Bush tax cut rates. They will expire at the end of 2012 anyway, and shouldn’t be renewed under any circumstances.
No deal should have to be struck to raise the debt ceiling. This tactic is holding the middle class, the country, and the world economy hostage so Republicans can get tax cuts for their fat-cat supporters. They are willing to flush the full faith and credit of the United States of America down the toilet for their corporate overlords.
Fortunately, if no reasonable deal can be made in time, the 4th section of the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution can be invoked by the president to meet all our debts:
The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned.
It shouldn’t take such a measure to get Congress to do its job, but it’s there if we need it.
The debt and deficit are not current issues. They eventually must be dealt with, but right now, today, we need to increase the debt ceiling and work on getting Americans back to work making middle class salaries so we can pay our middle class taxes, grow the economy, and make it possible to reduce the budget deficit and national debt in the near future.
The Democratic Progressive Caucus has the only budget plan that deals with today’s problems and sets the budget up to be balanced in about 7 years, and reduce the national debt from that point onward. I’ll write more about deficits and debt in another post. There is a lot to it.
Subsidies to large corporations need to be cut off completely. That would raise a fair amount of revenue immediately. High profit corporations don’t need the money, and the rest of the economy does. Those subsidies would make some great jobs programs.
It’s time to stop all the arguments about social issues, ideological issues, tax cuts and debt reduction. It’s time to work on jobs, jobs, jobs!!! I implore you, Americans, vote for the country’s fiscal well-being in 2011 and 2012.
I ask you again, Speaker Boehner, where is your jobs bill? Where are the jobs?
Anyone else have a question for Speaker Boehner? Write it here and I’ll forward a message to his office with all your questions and comments.
In the meantime, if you’re American, please write or call your Congressperson: 202-224-3121.
And I thought I was pissed off about the state of the economy!
Dylan Ratigan has been so angry about what's going on in America that he gained weight and started smoking. I hope writing this book will relieve the stress and get him off cigarettes and get his weight back to normal.
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