Yahoo, we won!, we won!

Dame Warrigal said:
If nobody minds me saying so, I think 2 year terms for House reps is much too short but I have heard that because of the boundaries there isn't a lot of turnover of candidates in each district. The same ones tend to keep getting elected. It that actually the case?
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I agree but its the long termer,do nothing and 75 years olds +that we need to get rid of.
It also depends how much $$$$$ the candidates have in their pockets.
 
The Republicans will definitely go for tax reform. If we can lower corporate taxes, which the U.S. has the highest in the world, then maybe U.S. companies will come back home, which is every country's worse nightmare that U.S. countries will take their businesses and jobs and go home. This will create a lot of jobs.

One of the issues that I have with Obama is that he did not use the TARP money for what it was intended. We disagree on that issue. As far as Obamacare, I have no opinion. The uninsured needed some kind of insurance, but I think a lot of them can't afford to buy it.
 

Time for some charts and numbers to show for real just how bad things were in the last 6 years.

Clinton took over with a real high debt left to him by his Democrat group. Clinton had a Republican Congress that helped him to reduce the debt to about 7 Trillion. Bush II then took over and with 2 wars he was able to keep the debt from rising so much higher that the amount he recieved from Clinton so by his last two years the debt was a bit higher but not much. Then in his last two years the Congress was taken over by the Democrats, Pelosi and Reed leading. The debt then started rising very fast for Bush II's last two years, up to about 10 trillion. Obama took over and the debt just kept on rising very fast till now we are at the Obama created near 20 trillion. Debdts are no problem for Obama and he never really had any budets either. Unfortunate for the people as we will now have to take control of Obama's wild ambitions and pay them down so the US can stay a good investment for the worlds wants and needs.

Obama was taking us up into the WWII debt level.

federal-debt-to-gdp-politics.gif
 
Dame Warrigal said:
If nobody minds me saying so, I think 2 year terms for House reps is much too short but I have heard that because of the boundaries there isn't a lot of turnover of candidates in each district. The same ones tend to keep getting elected. It that actually the case?
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I have been trying to find the answers to your questions. No luck so far but will include a link to our Constitution describing the Congress duties and who will do them.

My opinion is that the Representatives are the peoples contacts to the government. They are large in numbers and from various districts assigned to best show representation of all US citizens. Two years is to keep them current to the local regions wants and needs. That some keep coming back is likely some appreciation from the local voters for issues properly presented to the government and good decisions.

The Senate is just two from each state and they are elected for 6 years. I think this was to develop senior persons more aware of the legal things and who will be around to make sure the needs of the Representatives get good care and to make sure ther specific state they represent is also looked after.

I am sure that somewhere there is a history of what and why in the beginning. One thing I like to think of is the fact that they US has the oldest, continuous government operating in this world. Or maybe I need to add in oldest self running democracy or Republic. Which means to me we are doing quite OK for oursleves.
 
Yes, I understand all of that, Bobf. Our senators also have a fixed term of 6 years but we have half senate elections every three years. Our house of reps has three year terms but the PM can call an early election if it suits the government. In the event of deadlock, the Governor General can call for a full double dissolution of parliament at the request of the PM and the whole lot of them have to face the people all at once. There is no veto at executive level; whatever the parliament passes through both houses is automatically signed off by the GG.

It will be interesting to see whether the Congress and the Presidency can work together for the good of the nation. I assume that is what the people want.
 
Warrigal, I forgot to say the Senators are elected every two years for 6 years. So every two years we vote for one third of them.

I just watched part of Obama's talk with the press and was pretty disappointed with the part I heard. It was too much on Obama's own feelings about how good he has done and how he wants to continue to be doing those good things. One statement he made was he will work with the Congress to get things done as long as they do what he wishes or he will just do what he wants to do.

I don't think his fat ego allows him to hear what the general public has just said.
 
I haven't been on this forum that long, but I haven't noticed it being all that liberal. Anyway, I'm not overly pleased. But in the end I'm just glad to live in a free country.

Rain in California please.
 
BobF----You are going to have to help me. I don't understand charts and graphs, so what i it that I am suppose to recognize?
 
911 said:
BobF----You are going to have to help me. I don't understand charts and graphs, so what i it that I am suppose to recognize?
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It was all in my words and the chart was just for visual impression as well. The Democrats took us into much greater debt than we needed to be in. My words below.

Time for some charts and numbers to show for real just how bad things were in the last 6 years.

Clinton took over with a real high debt left to him by his Democrat group. Clinton had a Republican Congress that helped him to reduce the debt to about 7 Trillion. Bush II then took over and with 2 wars he was able to keep the debt from rising so much higher than the amount he received from Clinton so by his last two years the debt was a bit higher but not much. Then in his last two years the Congress was taken over by the Democrats, Pelosi and Reed leading. The debt then started rising very fast for Bush II's last two years, up to about 10 trillion. Obama took over and the debt just kept on rising very fast till now we are at the Obama created near 20 trillion. Debdts are no problem for Obama and he never really had any budets either. Unfortunate for the people as we will now have to take control of Obama's wild ambitions and pay them down so the US can stay a good investment for the worlds wants and needs.

Obama was taking us up into the WWII debt level.

The difference between Bush II's high 7 trillions before the Democrats took over and up to 10 trillion and now Obama's on up to 20 trillion is pretty high debt.
 
I haven't been keeping up with the debt numbers and causes. Is this the debt we're talking about? Does this article explain anything in a clear way? http://zfacts.com/p/318.html

The National Debt: Voodoo from Wall Street

Oct 24, 2014. What if Reagan and the Bushes had balanced their budgets? How much lower would the debt be now? We’ll get to that shortly, but first, how did we get into this mess? This may just be the weirdest political tale you’ve every heard.

World War II cost a bundle, and the country started out in the Great Depression. It was flat broke. But Uncle Sam was popular and the country patriotic, and people were happy to lend him money. Compared to the size of the economy back then, the debt soon outstripped even today’s debt, and we won the war.



After the war, they started paying off the debt, and the economy (and its GDP) grew. And for 35 years the debt kept getting smaller compared to the GDP. When it was the smallest (as compared to GDP) than it had been in 50 years, Reagan was elected (1980) and vowed to shrink it even more drastically. But he had an odd theory: Cut taxes and the government would collect so much more money that he could spend more and still pay down the debt.

Even before he was elected, George H. W. Bush called this “Voodoo economics,” and so it was.The result, of course, was that the debt stopped decreasing and shot through the roof, as seen in the graph above. By 1987, even Ron Paul (who loved the tax-cut part) blurted out: “How is it that the party of balanced budgets, with control of the White House and Senate, accumulated red ink greater than all previous administrations put together?” And so it had.

Starting with a debt of $1 trillion, in eight years Reagan raised it to $2.8 trillion. Even relative to the bigger economy, this was as bad as it had been 28 years earlier. (And no, the House did not do it to him. The budgets Congress passed were almost identical to what he asked for and on average a tiny bit more balanced.)Why did he do it?

So how the heck did this happen to the guy that rode to office on complaints of an out-of-control debt that was as big as a stack of $1000 bills 67 miles high? How did he come to add another 128 miles to that stack?Reagan took some economics in college, and he really did want to reduce the debt. But he got snookered by some Wall Street “economists” (mostly political journalists) who told him he could have his cake and eat it too.

They came up with the brand-new theory, mentioned above, that said the government can collect more money by reducing taxes. Wouldn’t that be nice! That’s the supply-side economics that George H. W. Bush called Voodoo.

It was first tested by Reagan. Bush I tried and failed to undo the Voodoo, and Bush II reinstated it after Clinton. Altogether there were 20 Voodoo budgets. And every single time the debt not only went up, it went up faster than the economy grew — usually much faster. Before the Voodoo, 26 of the previous 35 budgets resulted in the debt shrinking relative to GDP. Reagan’s first budget was the turning point.​
Debt: Total owed from past and present borrowing. Deficit: This year’s borrowing.

US-national-debt-GDP-graph.png




Of course some supply-siders noticed this too, and when Treasury Sect. Paul O’Neil complained that cutting taxes would increase the deficit, V.P. Cheney just replied “You know, Paul, Reagan proved that deficits don’t matter.” In fact, many seemed to like the deficits and complain about them only when Democrats were in power. They saw them as helping to “strangle the government.”So how big is this supply-side / Republican debt?
My answer is not entirely fair, because I calculate it by the Republican method, but it seems fair to hold them to their own standards. And it makes the calculation transparent and understandable. You be the judge.

So just what is the Republican approach? There should always be a balanced budget — they even want to put that into the constitution. As Ron Paul said, they are the party of balanced budgets.So we will ask, “What if Reagan and the Bushes had balanced their own budgets?” And what if Clinton and Obama had taxed the same and spent the same as they actually did?The answer is that the National Debt would now be lower by $13.5 trillion!

So that’s the Republican National Debt — according to their own standard of balanced budgets.It’s quite easy to check these calculations (see this spreadsheet). They go like this: When Reagan took office the debt was $1 trillion. When he left it was $2.86 trillion. So $1.86 trillion for him. Then Bush-I added $1.55 trillion. Total so far: $3.4 trillion.

Then Clinton took over. Now the national debt is like a mortgage, and so the bigger it is, the more interest must be paid on it. Without the extra Reagan-Bush $3.4 trillion, there would have been a few hundred billion less in interest on the debt every year under Clinton. That interest adds another $2.3 trillion to the Reagan-Bush debt. Then Bush II increased it by $6.1 trillion to $11.8 trillion. And interest on that has been increasing the debt under Obama. The total Reagan-Bushes debt is now $13.5 trillion.Why this matters

Supply-side economics is outrageously dishonest. The supply-siders didn’t even mind conning their own man Reagan. The tax-cut “theory” only actually applied to the rich. So the plan was to cut tax rates for the rich in half, which they did. To get this through they had to cut taxes for the middle class some too, but they counted on inflation pushing the middle class back into higher tax brackets.

But cutting the top bracket had a permanent effect because there is no higher bracket to get pushed into.So not only was cutting taxes to raise money crazy, it was just a deception to cut taxes for the richest and then use the deficits to force cuts in services for the middle class and the poor. The Republicans have almost all gone over to the supply side now, and many, like Reagan, have been brainwashed into believing it. G.W. Bush claimed he would “retire nearly $1 trillion in debt over the next four years.

This will be the largest debt reduction ever achieved by any nation at any time.” I think he actually believed that.When the Voodoo started, that’s exactly when the debt went out of control. And 20 out of 20 budgets can’t be an accident. Especially when you consider that Clinton was handed a Voodoo budget headed in the wrong direction, stopped that, turned it around and ended up with the debt reduced from 66% to 58% of GDP.

But I need your help on this. Can you email this to a friend? (It’s set up for you here.) Or could you share this with one of the sharing buttons? (Note the 37,000 facebook likes, below. —Thanks, those have helped!)There are a lot of lies in circulation. Blaming the Democrats for the debt is just one of them. See some others in this little slide show.
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I have read this article before and do agree with some of the arguments about debt and paybacks and our government going the wrong way far too often. Big problem with this particular article is the way they always blame the Republicans for the increased debts. That is not true as can be seen in the charts, the one I used crossed over with the Democrat or Republican controls. There you can see that, if you read the Congressional control along the bottom, you see that it was since 1980. controlled by Democrats or both Democrats and Republicans. While under Democrats full or partial control the debt went up rapidly. When Clinton came in he debt rise slowed. When Clintion lost the Congress in his second year to Republican control the started down on a nice curve. When Bush came on the down curve stopped and slowly started to rise but was trying to rise slower each year till Bush's 7th year when the Democrats took over the Congress. Since then the debt has just gone up and up and that is not the Republicans fault at all.

It makes me think that the article you post was not a fair person and definitly not a republican. It even looks like he is using the same curve that I posted earlier.

Here it is once again to help support what I have just posted above.

federal-debt-to-gdp-politics.gif
 
President Obama has refused to work with Republicans for six years. I don't expect him to now. Except now he won't have Harry Reid to block every thing that comes to the senate. Obama will have to veto bills himself to block progress. The best congress will be able to do is block funding for his executive orders.
 
Ralphy1 said:
Just the usual midterm shift, nothing to get too excited about...
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True... but I am looking forward to the show.. So many interesting things to watch. Like for example, How is McConnel going to deal with Boehner and the Teabaggers in the house? He has already said.. no repeal of Obamacare and NO government shutdowns.. Cruz on the other hand, has told McConnell otherwise. So how Mitchie will handle aHole Cruz should be interesting... I'll bet money they will waste more time fighting among themselves than they will be legislating.

The Senate already passed a bipartisan Immigration bill over 400 days ago, and Boner wouldn't even bring it up in the house.. because the baggers and Cruz had a hissyfit.. SO... I'm thinking that Obama will act on Immigration on his own and DARE the GOP to bring impeachment hearings up. THAT worked really really well for them in the past.. I say great.. bring it on.. keep them busy impeaching Obama and wasting time. That's less damage they can do to the rest of us.
 
rkunsaw said:
President Obama has refused to work with Republicans for six years. I don't expect him to now. Except now he won't have Harry Reid to block every thing that comes to the senate. Obama will have to veto bills himself to block progress. The best congress will be able to do is block funding for his executive orders.
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You've got that backwards. The repubs refused to work with him, even bragging that they'd block anything he wanted.
 
Ameriscot said:
You've got that backwards. The repubs refused to work with him, even bragging that they'd block anything he wanted.
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Republicans did not refuse to work with Obama. They had written over 300 bills that Reid stopped and held from Senate debate. This sounds more like the Democrats refused to work with the Republicans. I don't remember any comments from the Republicans that said they would refuse to work with Obama. None at all. Obama has not used the proper ways to run our government and the result has been our extreme debt since he and his cronies decided to forget the Constitution and just do things without debates in Congress. In his speech yesterday he insisted that is just the way he intends to continue. He will work with Congress as long as Congress agrees with him, but if not, he will just do things on his own. Total and public rejection of the US Constitution and the powers being where they should be, in the Congress.
 
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I think he will do something on immigration.... then ask them for a real bill from the next congress so he can end the executive order. If they don't offer up a bill.. then they can just deal with what he has done.. or they can start impeachment proceedings, which will just waste time and taxpayer money. I've got my popcorn and my front row seat..
It's going to be interesting.. lol!

Like we've said... they wanted to be in control.... NOW they are. Let's see what they can deliver.
 
QuickSilver said:
I think he will do something on immigration.... then ask them for a real bill from the next congress so he can end the executive order. If they don't offer up a bill.. then they can just deal with what he has done.. or they can start impeachment proceedings, which will just waste time and taxpayer money. I've got my popcorn and my front row seat..
It's going to be interesting.. lol!

Like we've said... they wanted to be in control.... NOW they are. Let's see what they can deliver.
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I can't even say I don't care because I don't live there any more. But I'm getting SS from there. And my entire family lives there.
 
Ameriscot said:
I can't even say I don't care because I don't live there any more. But I'm getting SS from there. And my entire family lives there.
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I don't imagine they will do much to those already collecting SS.... CAN you imagine if they took away the old white folks money now!? That's the bulk of their base! The ones that are going to get screwed are the ones in their 40's now. They will have their retirement ages raised and their benefits cut drastically, because they will be privatized, and Wall Street can skim some off the top!!
 

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