WSJ.com: Key Tax Breaks at Risk as Panel Looks at Cuts .

[twa]

I have seen a lot of talking the talk, but not a lot of walking the walk. People keep pointing at "spending" and "waste" to justify tax cuts. Tax cuts are easy, spending and waste cuts are hard. If you cut taxes without cutting spending and waste, you are in a deeper hole. If you cut spending and waste without cutting taxes, your fiscal situation is even better.

(and hey, If somehow you end up with a surplus, how about paying of

f some debt)[/quote]

I certainly agree with the bolded part...show me they(both parties) are serious about being fiscally responsible and I will go along with raising taxes to reduce debt..

Till then I will attempt to starve em into it,and defer to my belief the govt already controls too much of the money(which is all revenue from taxes is....controlling where the money goes)

If your children are spending irresponsibly should you simply give them more?

[Larry]

How about, balance the budget before cutting taxes?

Actually, I'll point out, yet again, the reason that was given for W's tax cuts, way back when.

Focus your attention back to the days when W took office.

The nation had just gone through the greatest economic expansion in it's history. (Possibly in any nation's history.) Unprecedented growth, going back for decades. The government had actually run a surplus. (Actually, it ran a slight deficit. But the Social Security surplus was bigger than the general revenue deficit, so they were calling it a surplus.)

And, y'see, the Republicans had a forecast.

And this forecast said "Now, we've just had the greatest economic growth in history. Now, if we assume that things are gonna be even better, now that we're in charge, and if you assume that this period of even better lasts for the next 20 years, why, then the federal government will have so much money, and such big surpluses, that we will have paid off the entire national debt, by around 2015 or so."

And then, the sales pitch went, in 2015, we'll have all this money sitting around, and the debt will be paid off, and we won't have anything to do with all the money.

But, the sales pitch went, there's this problem. Those evil Democrats, who aren't as good as we are at managing the government and the economy, might be in charge when the national debt has been paid off. And we just know that if the Democrats are in charge on the day when the entire national debt gets paid off, then those Democrats will spend the money.

Therefore, they explained to us, it's absolutely essential that the government deal with this projected, future, estimated budget surpluses, by handing out tax cuts right now, so that we can prevent that day when the debt is paid off (and somebody might spend the surplus).

The Bush tax cuts were justified by pointing at forecasts of federal budget surpluses stretching as far as the eye could see, and were sold as the way of solving that problem.

----------

So see, the budget was balanced before those cuts. (Well, the first, temporary, ones.)

[Larry]

I certainly agree with the bolded part...show me they(both parties) are serious about being fiscally responsible and I will go along with raising taxes to reduce debt..

Maybe we can chug on over to Namby Pamby land, and maybe every politician in the Congress will agree with you. [OK, I had to work to get that line in. I like it.]

But until the heavens part, and an angelic choir magically transforms the entire federal budget, then you're going to demand more and more tax cuts?

Have I got your position down correctly?

[twa]

Have I got your position down correctly?

You betcha.....

totally ignore Congresscritters changing their ways don't ya?

[Thiebear]

Demand more?

I thought we were asking to keep it the same as it is now.. and work on some cuts during this year of kicking people out for overspending?

Seems Namby Pamby is working at the momment.

[Larry]

Demand more?

I thought we were asking to keep it the same as it is now.. and work on some cuts during this year of kicking people out for overspending?

Seems Namby Pamby is working at the momment.

Oh, sorry.

I thought this was a debate between "leave the law the way it is", and "pass more tax cuts".

(Actually, I thought it was a debate between "pass tax cuts for almost everybody" and "pass tax cuts for everybody".)

Sorry. I must have been thinking of another debate.

Edit:

Me, personally, I think the economy, right now, is recovering, but very fragile. My gut feeling is that leaving the law the way it is, runs too big a risk of triggering another heart attack in the patient.

So, while I can understand the desire to wean the patient off of the medication, and in fact, I can respect the honesty and courage of any person willing to take the outrageously unpopular position of leaving the law the way it is, I think that being that harsh and adamant with this patient is too risky.

Me, I think that extending some of the current, temporary, tax cuts, while it's undeniable that they will increase an already historic deficit, are, like the stimuli, a necessary evil.

But I'll truly admire anybody with the courage to support leaving them along. Takes serious guts and discipline.

[Thiebear]

Yes i forget how technical you get in that crazy we need it to survive but i wish to SHOW you how wrong you are while agreeing .

It is true: I wish the amount i pay to remain the same as previously and thus "extending" something to keep it that way.

I listed on both sides of the isles cuts needed... and yes if they had the intestinal fortitude to do 1/2 of them we wouldnt be discussing this tax credit or

Mortgage tax credits or child tax credits.

At this point i'd take the promised IRAQ/Afghanistan/Gitmo..

[Larry]

As to Iraq/Afghan, I have to admit that I'm not real confident that withdrawing from those places won't result in big messes, relatively quickly. But I'll also admit that I don't know enough to really have strong opinions.

As to GTMO, my opinion has always been that it's s symbol. My problem isn't the place, or the money. It's the rules, lack thereof.

Pass some rules. Publicly. Create the policies. Then follow them.

Frankly, I don't much care where you follow them. (I simply have a big problem with this concept of "well, if we ship Prisoner X to some other place, then the rules don't apply to him, any more.") (Which, as far as I'm concerned, is the only reason we sent them to GTMO in the first place.)

(And as to this topic, let's face it: While there are lots of reasons to complain about GTMO and similar places, the money isn't one of them. It's such a small amount of money that it's not worth getting worked up about.)

[December90]

First - define waste.

Easy, If the private sector can do it, it should. If the government is doing something that the Private Sector can do, that is waste.

Second - quibble over the definition. Because your definition of waste is someone's good program. Especially when it props up their local economy.

My stealing from your house surely would be good for me. Does not mean that it is good, does not mean that you couldn't have done something better with your money than I could do with your money.

Third - look at private sector on how not to have waste.

Waste in the private sector causes companies to become uncompetitive. When companies cannot compete they go out of business, then when they go out of business, if there is a market for the goods or services they used to provide, someone else will step up and do it.

Fourth - Take a few aspirin because the private sector is equal (or in some cases, worse) when it comes to wasteful spending.

The private sector has competition, if they are too stupid spending their money they go out of business. The Government cannot go out of business, when they waste your money they just steals more

Fifth - Keep the status quo. It's easier and as an fellow American, you know we prefer easy.

:evilg:

This very idea is one of the biggest parts of the problem. Re-electing people you know will continue to screw things up is just insane.

[Larry]

Easy, If the private sector can do it, it should. If the government is doing something that the Private Sector can do, that is waste.

Ah, and there you have it. Eliminate all government, and throw trillions of dollars at giant mega-corporations. Because everybody knows that the government is always bad, and corporations are always good.

[The Evil Genius]

Private companies more than likely could handle national defense. Should we contract that out?

BTW - why is it always assumed that contracting out these services is cheaper and/or more efficient?

[Larry]

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/shortstack/2009/11/top_10_most_destructive_govern.html

Eliminating earmarks - such as $107,000 to study the sex life of the Japanese Quail - would, since 1991, have saved $27l billion in useless pork.

Eliminating earmarks would have saved exactly zero.

Earmarks do not in any way increase spending. They simply force already-existing spending to be spent in certain ways.

(Hypothetical example: Congress passes a bill allocating $10B on highway maintenance and improvements. Congressman Lardbutt inserts language mandating that $100K of that $10B must be spent paving the road that runs in front of a campaign donor's house. The earmark did not increase spending by one penny. It simply mandated that part of that $10B had to be spent a certain way.)

[HOF44]

The private sector has competition, if they are too stupid spending their money they go out of business.

.

Really??? So what happened with the bail outs for the financial sector?? What about GM??

[The Evil Genius]

Really??? So what happened with the bail outs for the financial sector?? What about GM??

Not to mention companies like Apple.

Lisa.

Newton.

Mac Tv.

Pippin.

That sure is a lot of waste there. When did they fold again?

[alexey]

Easy, If the private sector can do it, it should. If the government is doing something that the Private Sector can do, that is waste.

In some cases it makes more sense for the government to hire people and do the work internally rather than to contract things out.