In the sparring over the issue of raising the debt ceiling BArack Obama weighed in with “harsh language.”
In some of his harshest language to date in the fight over the deficit, President Obama warned today that the debt ceiling should not be “used as a gun” against Americans to extract tax breaks for the wealthy.
Speaking at the Twitter Town Hall at the White House today, the president said Congress “shouldn’t be toying” with the debt ceiling and cautioned against risking the financial health of the country in order to protect the interests of the super wealthy.
“Never in our history has the United States defaulted on its debt. The debt ceiling should not be something that is used as a gun against the heads of the American people to extract tax breaks for corporate jet owners, for oil and gas companies that are making billions of dollars because the price of gasoline has gone up so high. I mean, I’m happy to have those debates. I think the American people are on my side on this,” Obama said.
Wasn’t so long ago that Obama felt differently about raising the debt ceiling.
The fact that we are here today to debate raising America’s debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the U.S. Government can’t pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government’s reckless fiscal policies.
Over the past 5 years, our federal debt has increased by $3.5 trillion to $8.6 trillion.That is “trillion” with a “T.” That is money that we have borrowed from the Social Security trust fund, borrowed from China and Japan, borrowed from American taxpayers. And over the next 5 years, between now and 2011, the President’s budget will increase the debt by almost another $3.5 trillion.
Numbers that large are sometimes hard to understand. Some people may wonder why they matter. Here is why: This year, the Federal Government will spend $220 billion on interest. That is more money to pay interest on our national debt than we’ll spend on Medicaid and the State Children’s Health Insurance Program. That is more money to pay interest on our debt this year than we will spend on education, homeland security, transportation, and veterans benefits combined. It is more money in one year than we are likely to spend to rebuild the devastated gulf coast in a way that honors the best of America.
And the cost of our debt is one of the fastest growing expenses in the Federal budget. This rising debt is a hidden domestic enemy, robbing our cities and States of critical investments in infrastructure like bridges, ports, and levees; robbing our families and our children of critical investments in education and health care reform; robbing our seniors of the retirement and health security they have counted on.
Every dollar we pay in interest is a dollar that is not going to investment in America’s priorities.
Senator Barack Obama
Senate Floor Speech on Public Debt
March 16, 2006
To call Obama a hypocrite gives hypocrisy a bad name.
But Obama is in good company. Both Steny Hoyer and Harry Reid voted against raising the debt ceiling. When asked for why he voted against raising the debt ceiling, Reid pleaded Alzheimer’s.
When asked about his 2006 vote against raising the debt ceiling this afternoon, Senate majority leader Harry Reid, speaking to a press gaggle in the Capitol after a meeting of the party caucus, told me to check the answer he gave to Meet the Press when he was asked a similar question. That appearance was in January of this year, and at the time Reid said he couldn’t remember the vote or his reasoning behind it.
Voting against raising the debt ceiling is good when a Republican is President, but bad when a democrat is President.
OK, I got it now.
And you still are an idiot to believe anything Obama says.
See author page
Used a GUN reference.
Awful hard to get away from that violent-imagery, huh?
Obama said in his weekly radio and Internet address Saturday that it will take a “balanced approach” that mixes limits on domestic programs and
the Pentagon,
curbs to Medicare and
elimination of some tax breaks for the wealthy.
Odd because Obama’s pet programs are the actual cause of our sky-rocket into the debt stratosphere.
Then on Medicare, Obama has double, maybe triple counted his ”savings” when he moves Medicare funds over to obama Care.
Now, he’s doing it again!
If we really cut all of Obama’s new spending we would not need to add taxes to the wealthy or anyone else!
@Nan G:
Yep. Gun to the head yet.
Out of respect for Gabby Giffords, no doubt. Nary a word from the lamestream media.
Opposition to raising the debt ceiling was reasonable as of March 2006, when the national economy still seemed strong and it appeared that we were in a position to make thoughtful adjustments that could gradually restore balance.
Not raising the debt ceiling is crazy when the economy is seriously ailing, and default could set off a chain reaction that might bring down the entire system.
he said he will be cutting in social security programs,
ON CNN today the democrat SHADOWSKI, put it on the back of the REPUBLICANS,
AND SAID THE REPUBLICANS want to do it, OBAMA MENTIONNED IT IN A WAY AGAIN TO PUT IT ON THE REPUBLICANS BACK, when he is the one who came up with it.
he is trying to shift the blame on the other to gain some votes
and make the REPUBLICAN LOOK LIKE THEY ARE THE VILAIN GUILTY, but the people are not being fooled a second time.
Republicans won’t budge when it comes to protecting historically low tax rates on the wealthiest people in the country, no matter how serious the debt problem is becoming. They’ll risk an economy-crashing default before they’ll see the richest paying a nickel more.
They won’t trade any degree of high-end tax increases for social spending cuts.
What they apparently will trade are defense spending cuts.
Historically low tax rates for the richest are evidently not only more important than social programs; they’re also more important than national security.
Or, alternatively, republicans never actually believed that such high levels of defense spending were truly necessary for our national security to begin with.
I guess you can take your pick. There doesn’t seem to be a third choice.
GREG you can also turn your comment around toward the DEMOCRATS ,
WHO did not budge on the many warning they had to not allow more spending
that where astronomycle, weakening the economy until now they are facing
an ultimatum to cut and pay time for their extravagansa,
they should have known that they couldn’t hide it forever,
well it’s their doing, let them cut on their own goodies not on the people which have paid cash for it
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/frank-rich-blasts-obama-20110706
Socialist-in-Chief.
Yeah, right.
– Larry Weisenthal/Huntington Beach CA
@openid.aol.com/runnswim:
In return for a million dollars and the promise of a million more.
@Greg:
That’s what they were elected to do. After the Obamacare oppression I am not sympathetic to complaints of hardball.
@Greg:
So default is OK when the economy is good?
@Greg:
I have, of course, several points of contention with your statement, Greg.
-One, you continue to insist on using “wealthiest” as a descriptive of the high income earners. This is extremely misleading, as it implies that people who are worth millions, and even billions, also have income levels comparable to that. Now, while that may be true in some cases, that isn’t true in all cases. I work with, for example, two people who are worth well over a million dollars, and one worth over several million, and none of them has an income within the top 10% range. Wealth isn’t income, and vice versa, although one’s income can, and does, contribute to their wealth, and one’s wealth can lead to more income. Wealth is a total worth. Income is worth over a period of time, usually one year.
-Two, while it may be true that the highest income earners are paying historically low tax rates, that is also true of those within the “middle-class” and the “low-income” earners. Why do you insist on only focusing on the high-income earners? If your argument is that they have historically low taxes, and thus, can afford to pay higher amounts, as it has been done before, then why not extend that argument to ALL taxpayers?
-Three, and again, while it may be true that the highest income earners are paying historically low tax rates, what is also true is that their overall share of the total federal income tax revenues is higher than ever. And what’s more, that share increases as their income levels increase.
http://www.ntu.org/tax-basics/who-pays-income-taxes.html
Meanwhile, the bottom 50% of taxpayers in the country are seeing, and have seen, their share of that federal revenue stream drop to it’s lowest level, historically.
-Four, and again concerning misleading comments, you claim, “They’ll risk an economy-crashing default before they’ll see the richest paying a nickel more.” You relate tax rates to actual dollar amounts. The fact is, that when a person’s income level increases, they pay more in taxes, and the opposite is true as well, that when a person makes less, they pay less in taxes. And this works across the entire spectrum of taxpayers. You mislead people by essentially claiming that Republicans are against any rise in the amount the richest pay in taxes, no matter how much they actually make in income. Patently false.
-Five, you claim that not raising the debt ceiling will result in an economic crash. Any factual evidence of this? Or is it some “doom and gloom” apocalyptic prediction based on nothing but mere rhetoric? Just how much do you think a 5% tax increase on those high-income earners will bring in? Enough to get close to covering the $1.6Trillion projected deficit this year?
Let’s say the government isn’t allowed to spend beyond the debt limit(i.e., it isn’t raised). Exactly how much do you think that is? And out of that, how much do you think actually finds it’s way into our economy? How much discretionary spending by the government is needed to prevent an economic collapse? How much “aid” money to other countries is there within that amount that never helps our economy because it never finds it’s way back into our economy? That is but a few questions I can think of that need answering before the “doom and gloom” scenario can be accepted, Greg.
The 2007 deficit was around $350Billion dollars. The 2011 deficit is projected to be around $1.6 Trillion. There was some room for allowance of some deficit spending for this year, prior to us hitting the debt ceiling. The deficit amount is that amount spent by the government over and beyond the amount of revenue it took in. In 2010, the tax revenue was $2.16 Trillion, up $60 Billion or so from 2009. Assuming a similar increase in tax revenue, 2011 should be somewhere around $2.2 Trillion. That means that the government can spend up to that amount without getting any nearer to the debt ceiling. As of the end of 2010, the debt total was around $13.55Trillion, and the debt ceiling was $14.294Trillion. That means that deficit spending of $750Billion or so could be done prior to hitting the debt ceiling.
Essentially, then, you are claiming that a loss of $800Billion in spending for this fiscal year by the government will trash the economy. Keep in mind that $800Billion is only 5% of the US economy.
JOHNGALT, WHAT OBAMA said about the money already spent, but they are waiting to get from the raised debt ceiling, in order to realy pay it
meaning promissed money, do we know the amount of it ?
this will be deducted first thing, so what will be left might not be that much,
that’s probably why they want more on the debt ceiling.
am I making sense ?