We’ll need more than Ruby Red Slippers to get out of our current economic mess. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
The Washington Times reports in “White House ups rhetoric on dangers of sequester,” that:
“The Obama administration amped up its offensive Sunday with Republicans over the $85 billion in across-the-board federal spending cuts scheduled to kick in Friday, releasing fresh warnings of a ‘real impact on people’s lives’ . . . .”
The federal government is projected to spend about $3.54 trillion in 2013. The “sequester” laws scheduled to kick in this coming Friday will reduce that spending by $85 billion or about 2.4% of the entire budget. Apparently, if government spending is cut by 2.4%, the sky will fall.
There might be some truth in that warning. But if there is, how the heck did we degrade from the world’s strongest economy into an unstable mess that is so dependent on government growth that if government reduces spending by even 2.4%, the county might implode?
More, do you suppose that anyone in government “warned” of a “real impact on people’s lives” when they: 1) decided to reduce our former gold- and silver-backed money to a fiat currency? 2) refused to prevent the invasion of 20 million illegal aliens? and 3) decided to reduce our tariffs, export many of our industries and jobs to 3rd world nations, and force Americans to compete directly with cheap foreign labor? Did anyone in government worry about a “real impact on people’s lives” back then? I don’t think so.
“A new administration report shows the effects of the so-called sequester cuts seeping far beyond just nonessential government workers and programs. For example, the cuts would threaten 350 teaching jobs in Ohio, result in 4,180 fewer children in Georgia receiving vaccines, and cancel maintenance on 11 Navy ships docked in Norfolk, Va., says a new administration report.”
Apparently, government finds it shocking that we would threaten the jobs of nonessential workers.
I’m wondering why government should employ any “nonessential government workers and programs” in the first place. (I guarantee the day is coming when “nonessential government workers” and other government dependents will be looking for new jobs or new sources of income.)
“‘This will have macroeconomic consequences, cost hundreds of thousands of jobs across the country and jobs throughout the private sector from contractors,’ Jason Furman, principal deputy director of the White House’s National Economic Council, told reporters during a conference call. ‘This will have serious programmatic consequences for all 50 states and the District of Columbia.’”
OMG! Sequester will have “macroeconomic consequences”!!!!
I feel a little like Dorothy dancing down the yellow brick road when she was forced to face possibility of “lions and tigers and macroeconomic consequences!” Oh my!!
And, as if “macroeconomic consequences” weren’t bad enough, we will even have “serious programmatic consequences”? (Gasp!)
Now, I don’t actually know what “serious programmatic consequences” are, but they sound even worse than “macroeconomic consequences”—and you know how bad they are!
All of which tells me that if we don’t do exactly whatever our fearless leader Obama wants, well, the coming calamity will be entirely our fault rather than his.
“The administration says federal agencies are drafting plans ahead of Friday’s deadline on how to best carry out the cuts, such as stopping contracts with private-sector vendors, employee layoffs, cutting grants or scaling back programs — or some combination of these and other cost-saving measures.”
One week before the “deadline” (which has been known to exist since August of A.D. 2011), the government is “drafting plans” to deal with the sequester problem? One week?!
They’ve known the “sequester” problem was scheduled to start this Friday for 18 months, and they are finally “drafting plans” just one week before the crisis?
Is it just me, or does that procrastination sound incredibly stupid to you, too?
Actually, doing nothing until the last minute makes a lot of sense. Then, by virtue of having refused to plan and prepare for the “sequester,” the “sequester” becomes an emergency that must be somehow prevented.
But what was the sequester? It was an attempt in the Budget Control Act of A.D. 2011 to cause government to behave responsibly by cutting its spending and debt.
How has government responded to the proposed sequester? By acting irresponsibly to do nothing to prevent the problem from morphing from a two-year-opportunity-to-prepare into an “emergency” that will “suddenly” take place this Friday.
“But Republicans accused the president of hypocrisy, saying he has chosen to go on a nationwide public relations tour in an attempt to shame them instead of staying in Washington to work on a deal.”
Ohh, puleese—one of the requirements for being a modern politician is to have no conscience and therefore no capacity for shame. How could anyone possibly “shame” anyone in Washington DC?
“The White House needs to spend less time explaining to the press how bad the sequester will be and more time actually working to stop it,” said Michael Steel, a spokesman for House Speaker John A. Boehner, Ohio Republican.
First, as Hillary Clinton and Rahm Emanuel observed, “a crisis [real, manufactured or fictitious] is a terrible thing to waste.” So, why would Obama work to stop the sequester so long as a “crisis is a terrible thing to waste”? The object is not to stop the sequester, but to first milk the sequester (like Sandy Hook Elementary) for all the political leverage possible. Then, after the political potential is exhausted, gov-co can stop the sequester threats.
Second, comments from the Republican House Speaker’s office suggest that both Republicans and Democrats agree that sequestration (cuts in government spending) should not take place.
It’s almost as if we had only one political party—the BIG GOV’T Party—with Republicans (who only want to spend a little more) and Democrats (who want to spend a lot more)—rather than two political parties, at least one of which wanted to cut spending. In the “Big Gov’t Party,” the only question is how much more shall government spend. The question is never how much shall government cut.
All of this tells me that after some “drama,” sequestration will be stopped. The sequester “crisis” won’t be wasted. We may have several weeks or even a couple of months of “sequestration,” but sequestration will end quickly and government will soon resume spending like a drunken sailor.
“‘What we still don’t know is whether the president has a plan for smarter, more common-sense cuts to the waste and endless growth in Washington,’” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, Kentucky Republican, said Sunday. ‘Rather than issuing last-minute press releases on cuts to first responders or troop training or airport security, he should propose smarter ways to cut Washington spending.’
“The administration and Democrats counter that only a ‘balanced approach’ that includes tax increases has a chance of passing both chambers.”
Q: With Republicans so dedicated to “common sense” and Democrats so dedicated to “balance,” how’d we get into the mess we see today?
A: The references to “common sense” and “balance” are just more rhetoric from the professional liars we call politicians.
Insofar as a crisis is a terrible thing to waste, the sequester “crisis” is probably intended primarily as a pretext to raise taxes.
“Even before Sunday’s conference call, administration proxies had fanned out throughout the morning talk shows, warning of catastrophes that would result if $85 billion in spending cuts are imposed on a federal government . . . .”
Government views spending cuts with the same terror as a crack addict views quitting cold turkey. No addict wants to quit or even cut back until they finally hit rock bottom. Insofar as our government has not yet driven America to “rock bottom,” the government has no intention of cutting back on the “crack” they call spending. They will not truly address out economic problems until those problems first overwhelm and collapse the economy.
“Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood, for example, warned Sunday that furloughs — including for air-traffic controllers — will be imminent in his department if the spending cuts kick in Friday, as scheduled.
“‘We’re going to look at everything we possibly can to get to where we need to be, which is about $600 million in cuts. But we can’t do it without also furloughing people,’ Mr. LaHood told CNN’s ‘State of the Union.’”
Lions ‘n tigers ‘n furloughs . . . oh my.
Governments at the federal, state and local levels have hired too many people over the past 40 years. Their government jobs have created a fine class of “consumers” (“parasites”) to stimulate sales in our “consumer economy”. However, most of these government employees make little or no productive contribution to society and are often only a glorified—but unnecessary—form of welfare. More, those government jobs can only be paid for by taxing, impoverishing and discouraging those who make a genuine productive contribution to society.
Before our current economic problems are resolved, we won’t merely see many government dependents temporarily “furloughed”; we’ll see them permanently fired. If these government employees don’t know how to work—really work—in the private sector, they’re headed for enormous financial and personal trouble.
The simple truth is that we can’t afford the government we’ve got. We can’t raise taxes to continue to pay for all of the current government employees without further crippling the economy, reducing tax revenues, and forcing more firings.
If we don’t raise taxes, we’ll have to furlough/fire a significant percentage of government employees. If we do raise taxes, we’ll still have to furlough/fire a significant percentage of government employees–although the firings might be prevented for a year or two. In either case, some significant percentage of government employees will be fired over the next few years.
And, judging from punchline in the Washington Times’ story, why not fire ‘em? Get this:
“Education Secretary Arne Duncan said Sunday on CBS’s Face the Nation that he will be powerless to avoid the sequester’s harmful effects to programs ranging from preschool to college. ‘We don’t have any ability with dumb cuts like this to figure out what the right thing to do is, he said on CBS’ Face the Nation.”
Great. America is in good hands. Faced with trivial spending cuts, our bureaucrats “don’t have any ability . . . to figure out what the right thing to do is”. They can’t imagine a government that limits spending. They’re lost, in shock and have retreated into a kind of mental paralysis over the prospect of having to cut costs by even 2.4%.
The moment every American politician, welfare recipient, subsidy recipient and government employee has dreaded is finally in sight.
After decades of living like fools, we are about to “take our medicine”.
Government is not quite yet—but very nearly—broke.
Our future is assured.
Buckle up.
