We ought to give Clinton some credit for the surplus given his 13.1% cuts in defense spending in the 90’s. If we do the math by liberal standards, then factoring in inflation and the proposed increases thats like a 60% “cut” or something.
HG - 09:02am on 02/14/2008
SS runs a surplus which goes into the general fund.
$175 Billion? last year.
WOOF - 09:02am on 02/14/2008
Over Cheney’s four years as secretary of defense, encompassing budgets for fiscal years 1990-93, DoD’s total obligational authority in current dollars declined from $291.3 billion to $269.9 billion. Except for FY 1991, when the TOA budget increased by 1.7 percent, the Cheney budgets showed negative real growth: -2.9 percent in 1990, -9.8 percent in 1992, and -8.1 percent in 1993. During this same period total military personnel declined by 19.4 percent, from 2.202 million in FY 1989 to 1.776 million in FY 1993. The Army took the largest cut, from 770,000 to 572,000-25.8 percent of its strength
Woof, many republicans would privatize SS, not cut it. It is viewed as a retirement plan more than an entitlement. Social programs that redistribute earnings to non-earners are the real losers, except for securing a democrat voting block. I guess that makes democrats the real beneficiaries of such spending.
As for Cheney’s defense budgets, I trust the guy on military issues and spending. Liberal disdain for the military is what troubles us conservatives about a liberal commander-in-chief and defense budgets. Post cold-war defense spending was reduced and we’re fine with that.
HG - 09:02am on 02/14/2008
SS runs a surplus which goes into the general fund. $175 Billion? last year.
Nice disinformation, leftie. When the SS “bite” was increased in the late sixties(by Johnson), it was in anticipation of the coming demographic crisis, due to arrive in 2014, I believe. This “surplus”, instead of being invested, was frittered away by the political class, mostly Dems.
robert108 - 10:02am on 02/14/2008
Robert, there was also a large SS tax bump in the Reagan years to shore up Social Security.
That surplus is going to evaporate in the next few years. The general fund has no way of paying off the “debt” that it “owes” to Social Security.
If the Democrats would work with the Republicans we could fix this. But everytime a Republican proposes fixing the problem the Democrats demagogue the issue, scare the old people and block any reform.
The Whistler - 10:02am on 02/14/2008
But everytime a Republican proposes fixing the problem the Democrats demagogue the issue, scare the old people and block any reform.
Yep. The Dems would rather raise taxes to “save” a failed program. In fact, if a program needs ever increasing taxation to make it “work”, that’s the sign that the program is a mistake. A program that actually “pays for itself"(like the Dems always ask of tax rate cuts) would require lower taxes, not higher ones. If social spending worked, it would be paying for itself by now. Social spending has had 76 years to “work”, and we should know by now that it doesn’t. It’s just an ever-deepening hole into which our money disappears.
robert108 - 10:02am on 02/14/2008
If a Democrat president, Lyndon Johnson, and a Democrat congress had not instituted the theft of Social Security and other trust fund surpluses with the disingenuous gimmick known as “unified budgeting” to help hide the true cost of the Democrats’ “War on Poverty” (I believe the popular expression was “guns and butter"), there would have been no need to raise Social Security taxes during the 1980’s, no need to talk euphemistically about “lockboxes” during the 1990s, and no reason to concern ourselves with the coming Social Security bankruptcy now.
And now the appallingly ignorant Democrats want to raise taxes, choking off the very economic growth we will need to simply sustain or current level of affluence and our ability to deal with the economic problems we’ve created.
Bat One - 11:02am on 02/14/2008
Somehow we turned into a super power. Maybe it worked.
Social spending has had 76 years to “work”, and we should know by now that it doesn’t.
WOOF - 12:02pm on 02/14/2008
Somehow we turned into a super power. Maybe it worked.
So, according to you, social spending made us into a superpower? That’s ridiculous on its face, but you miss the real point: If social spending worked to improve social conditions, less of it would be necessary as time goes on. The reality is that it’s growing like a cancer on our economy. We are a superpower in spite of our wasteful social spending.
We ought to give Clinton some credit for the surplus given his 13.1% cuts in defense spending in the 90’s. If we do the math by liberal standards, then factoring in inflation and the proposed increases thats like a 60% “cut” or something.
SS runs a surplus which goes into the general fund.
$175 Billion? last year.
No, No, No, It Just can’t Be
Woof, many republicans would privatize SS, not cut it. It is viewed as a retirement plan more than an entitlement. Social programs that redistribute earnings to non-earners are the real losers, except for securing a democrat voting block. I guess that makes democrats the real beneficiaries of such spending.
As for Cheney’s defense budgets, I trust the guy on military issues and spending. Liberal disdain for the military is what troubles us conservatives about a liberal commander-in-chief and defense budgets. Post cold-war defense spending was reduced and we’re fine with that.
Nice disinformation, leftie. When the SS “bite” was increased in the late sixties(by Johnson), it was in anticipation of the coming demographic crisis, due to arrive in 2014, I believe. This “surplus”, instead of being invested, was frittered away by the political class, mostly Dems.
Robert, there was also a large SS tax bump in the Reagan years to shore up Social Security.
That surplus is going to evaporate in the next few years. The general fund has no way of paying off the “debt” that it “owes” to Social Security.
If the Democrats would work with the Republicans we could fix this. But everytime a Republican proposes fixing the problem the Democrats demagogue the issue, scare the old people and block any reform.
Yep. The Dems would rather raise taxes to “save” a failed program. In fact, if a program needs ever increasing taxation to make it “work”, that’s the sign that the program is a mistake. A program that actually “pays for itself"(like the Dems always ask of tax rate cuts) would require lower taxes, not higher ones. If social spending worked, it would be paying for itself by now. Social spending has had 76 years to “work”, and we should know by now that it doesn’t. It’s just an ever-deepening hole into which our money disappears.
If a Democrat president, Lyndon Johnson, and a Democrat congress had not instituted the theft of Social Security and other trust fund surpluses with the disingenuous gimmick known as “unified budgeting” to help hide the true cost of the Democrats’ “War on Poverty” (I believe the popular expression was “guns and butter"), there would have been no need to raise Social Security taxes during the 1980’s, no need to talk euphemistically about “lockboxes” during the 1990s, and no reason to concern ourselves with the coming Social Security bankruptcy now.
And now the appallingly ignorant Democrats want to raise taxes, choking off the very economic growth we will need to simply sustain or current level of affluence and our ability to deal with the economic problems we’ve created.
Somehow we turned into a super power. Maybe it worked.
So, according to you, social spending made us into a superpower? That’s ridiculous on its face, but you miss the real point: If social spending worked to improve social conditions, less of it would be necessary as time goes on. The reality is that it’s growing like a cancer on our economy. We are a superpower in spite of our wasteful social spending.