Budget Nuclear Option: Shut Down Obama Until the Election
The House Republican leadership needs to get over their paralyzing fear of a government shutdown, which is based on the liberal media narrative of the politics of the 1995 shutdown. That shutdown eventually transformed annual $200 billion deficits for more than a decade into $560 billion in budget surpluses over four years. That resulted because Clinton caved in to Republican budget cut demands, and even to Republican tax cuts that spurred the economy and long term revenue growth. The shutdown was followed by the first reelection of a Republican House majority in two thirds of a century, with the Republican Senate majority reelected as well.
Today the budget crisis is far worse. President Obama’s own budget admits that he will more than double the national debt in just one term of office, with an admitted budget deficit this year of $1.645 trillion, the highest anywhere in world history by several times over. Friday the Congressional Budget Office issued a report concluding that federal deficits over the next 10 years under President Obama’s budget would soar by nearly a third more than he estimated, totaling nearly $10 trillion over those 10 years, which would nearly double the national debt again to $21 billion by 2021.
And that assumes trillions in tax increases on the nation’s employers and investors and already overtaxed businesses that will never produce anywhere near the projected revenues. It also assumes no further recessions over the next 10 years, and stable interest rates on all those trillions in national debt.
Yet the position of President Obama and Congressional Democrats is that they will not agree to any budget cuts of any consequence. With a budget deficit this year of $1,645 billion, and total federal spending of $3,819 billion, the Democrats are insisting they could not accept more than $10 billion in spending cuts. CBO’s Friday report indicates that the president’s budget overall increases the deficit for this year by $26 billion.
The problem is, of course, and I’m sure the Republicans know this and the Democrats are enjoying it, if the government shuts down the Mainstream media is NOT going to blame Obama, Reid or the Democrats. They are going to blame Bohner and the Republicans… PERIOD!! Everything will come down on the Conservatives and the louder a conservative screams, the more they will be attacked by the media.
Yes, people who come to this site will know the truth, maybe the Tea Parties will know the truth but who will tell the rest of the country?
Rep. Boehner needs to follow the suggestions of Mr Ferrara and get tough. Talking tough is good only at the beginning; we are past that and being tough is the next step. Being tough does not mean waffling on the pledge to cut cut cut spending, or to be gentle. If it needs to be cut, then cut it! The Tea Party didn’t need a following of MSM reporters to get the word out, and there must be capable PR people in the Republican ranks. Getting the word out is nearly as important as being tough; if they can’t do it, they need to be replaced.
Dem0crats and the media (but I repeat myself) also blamed Sarah Palin for Tucson. How’d that work out for them?
It’s long past time to stop being afraid of the big, bad media.
Who will tell the rest of the country?
O.Reilly, Limbaugh and their like.
But, even then, myriads of ignorami will never hear the word; or will fail to understand it.
We must thin out the electorate. “One moron, one vote”, is not a practicable proposition.
But first, lets impeach the Imposter-In-Chief and hustle his backside off to a dungeon somewhere. If he is lonely, we can arrange for Reid, Biden, Pelosi and pals to join him. Or, we could just turn them all over to some Borneo headhunters and let nature take its course?
“The Communist Manifesto (1848) established that a communist revolution would occur only under specific conditions — including the pre-condition of an economically-exhausted industrialized nation.”
I found this quote on wikipedia. I still haven’t verified that it is actually in the Communist Manifesto.
The Republicans won a huge victory in 2010 because they said they were going to reduce the budget deficit and Federal spending. Plain and simple. If they go back on this promise, they will be toast in future elections and will open the way for a new third party, which nobody wants. So I don’t care how they do it, they need to start reducing the deficit in a big way. Anyway, it won’t really matter if they shut the government down or not. If they don’t keep their promise, nobody will trust them anymore anyway.
Libertyship is correct!
Now is the time for all good men to come to the aid of the party…
If the GOP votes to expand the national debt they are out of business. Either they eliminate deficit spending or they get replaced.
Like the demonrats the greedyoldpredators are stupid and selfish and will again break their contract/pledge to America.
The alcoholic Weeper-in-Chief will rain vodks-tinged crocodile tears on his teleprompter, and the demonrat responder will gloat with glee as our economy implodes, and our great great great grandchildren will find themselves enslaved to the international bankers and their moslem hordes.
To paraphrase my hispanic friends:
“What Republican leadership? You don’ got no steenkin’ Republican leadership.”
Put the onus on the POTUSINO and let him veto or refuse to sign. If the media can ignore that then they ignore it and the country will have more wood to put on the fire to Impeach the impostor for high crimes and misdemeanors. That is if Boehner has the guts to start the proceedings and I am not sure he does. So far he has proven to be gooooood at crying but now good at trying to be a leader. There are enough crimes attributed to Obama at this time to take him to court but we just have leadership? that makes us continue to suck it up and roll over
Somewhere, somehow, a more persuasive case has to be forcefully stated to the American people on awareness of the debt and it’s dangers and links to jobs.
Your readers (us) and Republicans and tea party knows it but the public is not convinced. We need a sort of weekly fireplace chat to explain to the voters.
Ron Paul and company should take to the air weekly on Sunday evenings.
Start with the young generation how much debt at all levels they already owe PER PERSON! and SHOW them examples of what it’s going to do to their standard of living.
I would expect a large, nation-wide audience.
I’m fine with the short-term continuing resolution for one reason: stalling for time until we hit the debt ceiling. Once we hit the debt ceiling, it is the administration that will be forced to take drastic action. TARP? Liquidated. All those extra government buildings? On the auction block. Anything non-essential? Eliminated. And who gets the blame? Obama, because he’s the one who has to do it all.
This is advocating a long overdue and perhaps inevitable declaration of war against an administration that behaves like no one in the opposition has the guts for it and no one in the electorate has the IQ. The Republicans are losing the initiative, the fire in the belly that caused the political upheaval in 2010. To continue on their current course, refusing to take a stand, that victory may be reversed in 2012, an event that would be more disastrous than any pending government shutdown.
The Republican party is in desperate need of a leader, a fighter, an advocate capable of doing battle with the ever belligerent, venomous, left wing media and capable of capturing the attention and admiration of a majority of the electorate. At first blush, someone like Allen West. He certainly has the leadership experience, the intelligence and has demonstrated extraordinary courage in speaking out on the threat of political Islam, perhaps the most controversial, hot button issue of the 21st century. He’s certainly worth as close a look as the current crop of potential Presidential hopefuls.
I love this plan – I just wish The Stupid Party would man up and do it. If not we have more RINOs to get rid of in 2012 – if we still have a Republic.
I like Maxxx’s idea (#6)
There exists a Third Way. Continue the CRs, but let the Government shut down for a week at a time. On for a week, off for a week, bumping along the bottom. All the while, tell the American People during the off-period that this is the government they’re actually paying for. That the Obaminator is spending more than he has. That the people need to watch their credit cards, but the Government thinks it can raise its credit limit whenever it feels like it. The effect it would have on “non-essential” Government personnel would be devastating – they would soon find new (more productive) lines of work, and the deficit would partially fix itself.
And why do we have Government personnel doing “non-essential” work? What the heck is that?
I remember the 1995 shutdown, and I distinctly remember that the rest of the world went on just fine. I was living in downtown Seattle at the time and was consistently taunting my liberal friends with the shutdown, asking them if they’d noticed the sky falling or not… nobody noticed any change in their daily lives when the federal government was shut down. The only two thinks anybody I know gave a care about was whether they got their social security or veterans retirement checks, and whether passports got issued. Period, the end.
The media is distinctly scared that the same thing will happen, that people will wake up with a shut down federal government, notice no difference, and start asking again why they are wasting all this money on something that doesnt impact their lives in any way.
There is another, smarter way to skin this cat.
It was suggested last Fall by a blogger somewhere but is even more relevant now: the House should pass funding bills ONLY for those elements of the federal government that are deemed critical and necessary. Let those go up to the Senate to be voted on and then watch Reid & Co. squirm if they try to vote AGAINST funding, for example, social security or national defense.
The idea is to go about budgeting in the opposite direction. Instead of looking at all of the federal budget and trying to pass the whole thing with budget cuts that the Dems can whinge about endlessly and politicize, pass the budget piecemeal, funding those items that conservatives believe should be funded, at least for now. Everything else never gets a vote.
So, for example, the Department of Education does not get funded. None of the bills brought up in the House will contain any funding for it.
This has the added advantage of forcing the Dems to argue the negative on popular programs. For instance, if the House approves a bill to fund the military for the balance of 2011, let the Dems try to argue that the military should NOT be funded. How will that go over?
In the end, the Dems will be grateful for getting anything for the Department of Education, or for the Environmental Protection Agency.
I am all for it. What we need in Washington evidently is an overwhelming number of “conservatives”, 218 of them is not enough. If we need 218 to pass legislation in Congress, we may need a “starting pool” of 300 or so,
so called conservative votes, that is just to be able to get 218 of them to agree on anything. And in the Senate we need 60 votes for cloture so we may need 67 or 68 so called conservatives because some will, almost always, it seems, defect. So while we increase our numbers let’s not lose the John Boehner’s because they are not “conservative enough” let’s just send in the reinforcements by increasing the number of conservatives, not their “quality” of conservatism. If we were to replace M.r Boehner with a new guy, we will have not gained anything, we still have the same number. Keep Boehner and add more numbers.
This isn’t fast enough to save us. We’re paying $200 billion a year to service our debt, and this best case scenario still adds over $1 trillion a year to our debt with no suggestions on how to eliminate that.
Efforts to balance the budget will bog down in group politics if specific programs are targeted. The only rational alternative that I can imagine is to insist on cutting the $1.6 trillion a year equally across all federal departments first, and fight over which programs to sacrifice for others later.
In my opinion, this has to be done this year or next, or servicing the dept will require too high a tax burdened for America to function with free markets. Our liberties be crushed by powers already given to the executive to prevent capital flight and insolvency of “too big to fail” businesses. Civil disobedience will prevent their recension, and persuade Congress to expand “safety nets” to increasingly economically distressed voters.
Why don’t I get invited to parties any more?
Just call BHO’s bluff.
Pass two bills: one that cuts programs, and one that raises everybody’s taxes. Tell the Ds to pass whichever one they wish. But, understand, there will be no reconciliation conferences, so it’s passage of the entire bill or nothing.
If the Ds pass the first, we win now. If the Ds pass the second, everybody’s taxes goes up for two years until 2012 when they get overwhelming thrown out due to the inevitable landslide victory if the Ds are stupid enough to swallow the poison pill.
And just to make sure that the poison pill is strong enough to make everybody miserable, remove the most cherished deductions: interest (including interest paid on mortgages), local & state income tax payments, child exemptions, and charitable giving. That will be felt by the even the bluest liberal. Oh, and raise the minimum tax bracket to 15% and halve the minimum earned income threshold so that even college students know what it feels like to pay their taxes. There will be howling so loud even the MSM wont be able to ignore it. America will be begging for the other proposal that the Rs float.
Problem solved.
I did a search on the Constitution for the term ‘budget.’ So since there’s no real requirement for such a thing, why have one this year either. Write individual appropriations to fund each of the govenment’s operation that Congress deems sufficiently meritorious. If you don’t like something, then don’t include it. Send the appropriations to the Senate to see how they vote. If they choose to shut the government down, so be it.
I actually like the approach they are taking. What folks keep missing, is that they are cutting money out of THIS year’s spending. Normally, this year’s budget would be untouchable by a new Congress. This is all gravy. $2 bil bucks per week. Yes, I know it is small compared to the overall budget, but everything they cut now gets cut out of future budgets, too.
Meanwhile, these baby steps prevent the Left from finding ANY effective narrative. Narratives are the only way Lefties gain and hold power. If they have to argue the actual issues, they lose. As long as the Right keeps submitting proposals every 2-3 weeks, cutting a bit out of the spending, there is NO narrative possible. Yes, it is a timid offense, but it is a rock-solid defense. We are slowly and carefully attacking the hill of spending addiction.
“Okay, Dems, what spending are you willing to give up THIS week?”
I like Marc’s (#18) idea. Let’s grind it out at 2 billion a week. In fact, why not do that for next year’s budget, too? We could start throwing other stuff in there, too, like – you want a continuing resolution? Ok, it will cost you raising the Social Security age to 68.