“Basically the Republicans said we’ll blow up the world economy unless you give us exactly what we want, and the President said OK. That’s what happened. . . . We’re having a debate in Washington which is all about, ‘we’re going to make this economy worse, but are we going to make it worse on 90% of the Republican’s terms or 100% of the Republican’s terms?’ And the answer is 100%.”
—Paul Krugman: GOP Said We’ll Blow Up Economy Unless You Do What We Want And Obama Said OK - Electzu via ABC’s ‘This Week’- Salary of the US President…..$400,000
- Salary of retired US Presidents.…$180,000
- Salary of House/Senate….$174,000
- Salary of Speaker of the House….$223,500
- Salary of Majority/Minority Leaders….$193,400
- Average Salary of Soldier DEPLOYED IN IRAQ $38,000…
I think we found where the cuts should be made!
If you agree, REBLOG!
Clogged-up Texas education funding unclogged in budget deal
- $830 million in education funds will finally go to Texas source
» A federal vs. state fight: Last year, Texas Rep. Lloyd Doggett (a Democrat) pushed through a provision effectively barring the state from receiving any federal education money unless it promised to spend all of it on education — something that didn’t happen when Obama pushed through his stimulus in 2009. The intention of the amendment was to get Texas to spend the money on education — which they’ve cut in recent years to help close a large deficit. The result of the amendment was that the money was stalled entirely, putting a stranglehold on Texas schools for nine months. Now Doggett’s amendment will go away — and the money will go to schools.
What a Deal
So the government shutdown was averted. I know it could have been averted earlier but we have hacks for politicians.
I do not want to go into much detail about the deal. Just know planned parenthood is safe and that the president is saying this is historically some of the largest cuts ever made.
What I find unsettling is that the deal “requires yearly audits of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.” If you pay attention to politics (I hope you do) this may strike you as a little odd. It strikes me as odd since the job of the CFPB is to, you know, protect consumers. I guess you could argue that auditing it ensures that our money is being spent the right way to ensure we are protected as consumers. However knowing how much Republicans HATE the CFPB I see this more as a move of intimidation. The exact same way Ron Paul wants to intimidate the Federal Reserve by auditing it. So my wonder is over why can we audit something meant to protect the people but when Paul wants to audit the Federal Reserve it meats huge opposition?
House passes shutdown-averting budget deal easily
- 260-167 the yays over the nays source
At the Edge of a Cliff, Take a Bold Step Forward
Today’s column, “Feds Wreck Health Care — Quick! Call in More Feds!” is now online.
“If the lesson learned from this budget fight is that the way to go is compromise with the left, that's a disaster. The left is not going to compromise on their core beliefs. They have to be defeated politically. We're never gonna reverse this leviathan with compromise. We can only reverse it with defeat -- and by defeat I mean more and more massive shellacking election victories like we had in November.”
—Rush Limbaugh“The cuts that have been made so far don’t seem to us to have very significant consequences for short-term economic activity... so far I’ve not seen any fiscal changes that have really changed our near-term outlook.”
—Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke • Speaking at his press conference today, when asked by a reporter about the package of budget cuts congressional Democrats and Republicans agreed upon. Bernanke’s dim view of the package is very easy to understand, as the size of the cuts were incredibly overstated; taking the long-term value of the package (this year’s savings reportedly only amount to $353 million or so) as $38.5 billion, you’re still talking about chump change as far as the total deficit, estimated over $1.5 trillion, is concerned. Bernanke also said Standard & Poor’s downgrading America’s outlook rating isn’t surprising, because everyone knows the U.S. is on shaky fiscal ground, but that he hopes it will spur more action. source
this is how we pay for the war.
- $600 million in cuts to community health centers.
- $414 million in cuts to grants for state and local police departments.
- A whopping $1.6 billion cut in the Environmental Protection Agency’s budget, of which nearly $1 billion comes from grants for clean water and other projects by local governments and Indian tribes.
- Cuts to homeland security programs for the first time ever, though much of the agency’s two percent decrease stems from a $786 million cut in first responder grants to state and local governments.
- A $7 million cut to the Bureau of Public Debt, which accounts for and provides reports on the debt.
- A $1 billion cut to HIV and disease-prevention funds.
- A $3 billion cut to agriculture programs, the biggest portion of which comes from the Women Infants and Children fund, which loses $504 million.
- A $390 million cut to low-income heating assistance; Community Development Funds are cut by $942 million.
- Contributions to the United Nations and other international institutions are cut by $377 million.
- $45 million pulled from nuclear nonproliferation funds.
- A $650 million cut to federal highway investments.
- A rider tucked in by lawmakers from Western states that allows states to remove wolves from the endangered species list.
Wow, we are really down the rabbit hole
As if the White House couldn’t get any more dense, members of President Obama’s text message feed received the following today:
Join President Obama in calling on Congress for a balanced approach to reducing the deficit. Contact your House representative at 202-499-4009.
