Showing posts with label economics. Show all posts
Showing posts with label economics. Show all posts

Wednesday, October 16, 2013

Beleaguered Boehner Agrees to Senate Deal

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Previous Related Post:
Tea Party Pushes U.S. Towards Default Brink

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Tuesday, October 15, 2013

Tea Party Pushes U.S. Towards Default Brink

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Previous Related Posts:
Confederate Tea Party Storms the Washington Barricades
GOP Sinks to Historic Lows in Polls

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Epic Rant about Ted Cruz On Morning Joe 10-15-2013
Mika Brzezinski: Later this morning Senator Mitch McConnell will present a bipartisan plan to fellow Republicans that could end the shutdown and extend the nation's borrowing limit for at least a couple of months.

Joe Scarborough: Yay! (laughter)

Mika: Haven't we heard this before? . . . The Senate could vote on the bill as soon as tomorrow, however the deal does not include any language to dismantle Obamacare, nor would it include a repeal of the medical device tax - two sticking points for the Tea Party Caucus.

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Mika: Senator Ted Cruz says he is still unsure whether or not he'd block a vote on the bill - come on.

Joe: Lots of Luck, Pal. You go ahead and do that.

Mika: It's unbelievable.

Joe: Just try it, Buddy. Go ahead ... (laughter) Go ahead, Big Shot. You put the full faith and credit of the United States of America on your shoulders. Have fun with that. Good luck. Do it. Do it. I dare you. I'm daring you right now. Go ahead and do it, Hot Shot.

Or are you gonna just sit in the back? And when people are responsible and actually give a damn about this country, and give a damn about the full faith and credit of the United States, and actually care about the people who are working day in and day out hoping to keep their job. You're going to keep posing and hurt those people? I don't really get it -

It's kinda like - it's great for you, I know. I know it's really great for you politically, but it's just like the Veteran's Memorial that you used as a political backdrop. It's a great backdrop until the next day, the Vets who actually organized the rally came out and were really upset that you had used their rally for your own political points.

So you guys go ahead. Just go ahead. Just keep using America as your political backdrop. And hurt all the people you want to hurt. Hurt, by the way, small government conservatives. Republicans. Working class Americans that actually used to support our party, but are now wondering what in the world - keep doing it. And I hope it really helps you out because it's sure not helping the conservative movement. It's not helping the Republican Party, and it's not helping this country, but go ahead, go ahead.

. . . This isn't about conservatism. This is about tactics. What makes me so angry is some Republicans are going to have to step up and they see that 24% conservative approval rating and they know it's going to go lower. They know the Senate's now in jeopardy. They know that the White House could be in jeopardy down the road. ...Independents who broke for Romney last time have even moved away from him (Cruz).
. . . So now a few Republicans are going to save the full faith and credit of the nation either on the day of the Default or a few weeks later, and a few guys are going to sit in the back and throw potshots at them because they know they have to do it. And they don't have the guts to stand up and say 'You know, we're the ones who screwed this up. We're the ones who screwed up the Republican Party's ability to do well during this time.'

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. . . we’re watching now, what might be called the Koch Brothers’ “Samson Option,” pulling down the temple to destroy their enemies even if doing so is also destructive to them and their fortunes.
~ Robert Parry on TruthOut

We face a mutated GOP. Ted Cruz is the leader of the dominant faction in this amalgam of what I call totalitarian Christians (their interpretation of the Bible supersedes the US Constitution), racist white Southerners (whose DNA contains the slavery gene), Ayn Rand dystopian ideologues...and plutocrats.
~ Shockwave on Daily Kos

. . . you know at every stage, my prayer to God is that His will be done. As it will be.
~ Senator Ted Cruz, R-TX, Tea Party architect of the Government Shutdown

What planet are you living on here?!
~ Reporter Chuck Todd on MSNBC's Morning Joe speaking of Senator Ted Cruz

We are now five days away from a very dangerous moment.
The closer we get to the deadline the greater the impact will be for the developing world.
Inaction could result in interest rates rising, confidence falling and growth slowing.
If this (U.S. Default) comes to pass it could be a disastrous event for the developing world and that will in turn greatly hurt the developed economies as well.
~ World Bank President Jim Yong Kim via BBC News

There's an expectation that has to change and that sometimes takes attempting to do things that won't work. It's a tough vote, but the fact is all of us have to realize the reality of the situation, and that is that two months have been blown on the wrong subject.
~ Senator Bob Corker, R-Tennessee

They had the gun to our head because of Obamacare. They gave up on that, so why is the gun to our head still? Now it's like we have the gun to our head and we have to figure out why.
~ Bill Maher, Friday, 10/11/13

We'd better wake up. Defunding Obamacare is not achievable. So let's not delude our supporters by telling them that it is under the present circumstances, because elections have consequences.
~ Senator John McCain on Fox News



. . . there are some tactics that go too far, alienating even voters who are ideologically or politically sympathetic to the GOP. And, unfortunately for Republicans, one of those tactics was extortion. Going into the shutdown, more people opposed Obamacare than supported it. But the idea of shutting down the government or threatening a debt default to undo Obamacare was massively unpopular.
. . . The polls trickle in and they are horrific. The pragmatic wing of the party is completely demoralized. It lashes out more violently than before. The national media both encourages and adds to their derision of conservatives. Suddenly every Republican in town is shopping his own terms of surrender. The biggest challenge for Democrats isn’t getting their way. It’s that there are so many offers, it’s hard to know which one to take. Politico labeled the spectacle a “buyer’s market” for Barack Obama, massively understating the point. It is a buyer’s market in the sense that the day after the Super Bowl is a buyer’s market for pork rinds.
~ Noam Scheiber on New Republic

We gave the Democrats one incredibly early Christmas gift. I’m not going to fault Ted (Cruz). He believes what he was doing was going to be helpful. But at the end of the day, you look and you ask, ‘Are we any close to defunding Obamacare are ridding ourselves of it than we were?’ The answer is no.
~ Conservative Radio Host Mike Huckabee, possible 2016 GOP Primary contender against Cruz

So you have this neighbor who has been making your life hell. First he tied you up with a spurious lawsuit; you’re both suffering from huge legal bills. Then he threatened bodily harm to your family. Now, however, he says he’s willing to compromise: He’ll call off the lawsuit, which is to his advantage as well as yours. But in return you must give him your car. Oh, and he’ll stop threatening your family — but only for a week, after which the threats will resume.
Not much of an offer, is it? But here’s the kicker: Your neighbor’s relatives, who have been egging him on, are furious that he didn’t also demand that you kill your dog.
And now you understand the current state of budget negotiations.
~ Economist Paul Krugman in NYT

Representative Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, on Young Turks via Raw Story
The Young Turks caught up with the Texas Republican on Friday at the Values Voter Summit and asked him if he would vote on any deal to raise the debt ceiling.
“It just depends on what it is,” he replied. “The word ‘deal’ concerns me… if it’s good for America.”
“Would you allow us to default on our debt?” a reporter from The Young Turks wondered.
“No, that would be an impeachable offense by the president,” Gohmert declared.


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Tuesday, July 30, 2013

President Obama Visits Chattanooga Tennessee

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 Cross-posted on Life in the Snark Lane

































































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Chattanooga Mayor Andy Berke Describes Limo Ride with Obama
After being one of the first people to welcome President Barack Obama to Chattanooga, Mayor Andy Berke described his ride from the airport to the Amazon fulfillment center in the presidential limousine, known as "the beast."

"No big deal," Berke joked.
But although the ride may have been brief, Berke said the face time with the president was invaluable for the city. Berke said that during their transit from the Chattanooga Metropolitan Airport to Amazon, he shared stories of the city's success with Obama.

"The opportunity to spend a few minutes with the president of the United States comes only once in a lifetime," Berke said. "I certainly wanted to make sure that I portrayed Chattanooga in the best possible light because I think the president was genuinely curious about what we're doing here. It was a fantastic opportunity."

Berke said he and the president discussed items such as the city's record Internet speeds, efforts to reform education in the state and Chattanooga in general.

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Saturday, March 2, 2013

The Sequester Happens

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Full Transcript of President Obama's Sequester Speech
. . . let’s be clear. None of this is necessary. It’s happening because of a choice that Republicans in Congress have made. They’ve allowed these cuts to happen because they refuse to budge on closing a single wasteful loophole to help reduce the deficit. As recently as yesterday, they decided to protect special interest tax breaks for the well-off and well-connected, and they think that that’s apparently more important than protecting our military or middle-class families from the pain of these cuts.

. . . the good thing about America is that sometimes we get to these bottlenecks and we get stuck, and you have these sharp, partisan fights, but the American people pretty steadily are common sense and practical, and eventually, that common-sense, practical approach wins out. And I think that's what will happen here as well.

And, in the meantime, just to make the final point about the sequester, we will get through this. This is not going to be a apocalypse, I think as some people have said. It's just dumb. And it's going to hurt. It's going to hurt individual people and it's going to hurt the economy overall.

Tea Party Republicans are crowing about the “sequestration” cuts beginning today (Friday). “This will be the first significant tea party victory in that we got what we set out to do in changing Washington,” says Rep. Tim Huelskamp (Kan.), a Tea Partier who was first elected in 2010.
Sequestration is only the start. What they set out to do was not simply change Washington but eviscerate the U.S. government — “drown it in the bathtub,” in the words of their guru Grover Norquist – slashing Social Security and Medicare, ending worker protections we’ve had since the 1930s, eroding civil rights and voting rights, terminating programs that have helped the poor for generations, and making it impossible for the government to invest in our future.
~ Robert Reich

This has to stop.
Ever since they took control of the House of Representatives in 2011, Republicans have made journeys to the fiscal brink as commonplace as summertime visits to the beach or the ballpark. The country has been put through a series of destructive showdowns over budget issues we once resolved through the normal give-and-take of negotiations.
The air of establishment Washington is filled with talk that Obama must “lead.” But Obama cannot force the House Republican majority to act if it doesn’t want to. He is (fortunately) not a dictator.
. . . What Obama can do is expose the cause of this madness, which is the dysfunction of the Republican Party.
Journalists don’t like saying this because it sounds partisan. But the truth is the truth, whether it sounds partisan or not.
~ E. J. Dionne

. . . it’s unpopular for Republicans to simply say they won’t agree to any compromise and there’s no deal to be had — particularly since taxing the wealthy is more popular than cutting entitlements, and so their position is less popular than Obama’s. That’s made it important for Republicans to prove that it’s the president who is somehow holding up a deal.
. . . There’s no deal even if Obama agrees to major Republican demands on entitlements. There’s no deal because Republicans don’t want to make a deal that includes taxes, no matter what they get in return for it.
. . . as long as the GOP’s position is they won’t compromise, there’s not going to be a compromise.
~ Ezra Klein on Washington Post

















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Wednesday, January 9, 2013

White House Plays Coy on Minting Platinum Coin

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Related Posts:
A Coin As Big as 89 Whales
Obama Should Mint Coin to Avoid Debt


Spokesman Jay Carney at Afternoon Press Briefing, 1-9-13
The option here is for Congress to pay its bills," Carney said repeatedly when asked about the prospect of Obama considering the $1 trillion coin approach. "There is no Plan B. There is no backup plan."
Pressed again later for a "yes" or "no" answer, Carney still wouldn't give one.
"I would refer you to Treasury for specifics of this question," he said. "I can tell you the president does not believe that there is a backup plan or a Plan B or an off-ramp. The only option here is for Congress to fulfill ... its responsibility and ensure the United States pays its bills."











Huffington Post Headline This Afternoon:

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source @brianbeutler on twitter

















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Mint the Coin

With the Debt Ceiling coming up soon, it
Is time (although some may impugn it)
For coining a halt
To a US default
With a really big monet'ry unit.

A one-trillion coin, it is said,
Could be minted and shipped to the Fed,
In order to pay
What the US of A
Might be forced to renege on instead.

This sizeable denomination
Would be kept out of mass circulation,
The better to sidestep
That such an untried step
Precipitates hyperinflation.

When Republicans finally come round
From running bond issuance aground,
It's back to the Mint
For the Coin, where its stint
Will be wound up with melting it down.

So let's mint The Coin out of platinum!
Though objections there be, we may flatten 'em.
There are ways besides cash
'Round the Debt Ceiling clash,
But there's nothing as clever as that in 'em.

~ By Dr. Goose on Limericks Économiques
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Wednesday, December 26, 2012

CNBC's Maria Bartiromo Shrieks at a Democrat and Traders Cheer


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Bartiromo: Are you guys just incompetent or what? I mean, if you can't do this, if you can't do what the American people pay you to do, why don't you just step aside and put somebody in there who can actually get a deal done?
. . . You're talking about $1.2 trillion in revenue, but you're not prepared to put anything on the table. People are not stupid.

. . . Cardin: The easiest way to get the revenues is to get the rates on the higher-income taxpayers.

 Bartiromo: That's all you want to do. That's it. It's your way or the highway. Raise the rates on the rich. No other way. Your way or the highway. That's it.. That's where we are. Thank you, Senator.

Cardin: Next time, let me answer the questions --

Bartiromo: Oh, you've answered them. Clearly.


I'll give her one cheer for clearly exposing Democrats' "my way of the highway" approach. She missed the opportunity to get to three cheers because it seems that she's just now recognizing after all these months that Democrats, including President Obama, won't accept any kind of a solution that doesn't involve raising the top rates -- even though they've been saying that very thing all along. ~ Tom Blumer on Newsbusters  . . . from time to time, you just have to give credit where credit's absolutely, positively due. Because if this thing hasn't gone viral yet, it damn well should. Yesterday on CNBC, host Maria Bartiromo schooled a United States senator. I won't even mention his name. After what happened to him, he's not worthy, and he probably would prefer I just leave him out of this whole thing. He would prefer you don't even watch the video. ~ The Street She is a yammering magpie trying to be relevant! ~ comment by B. L. on The Street As a journalist, she sucked. She let her own frustrations and point of view get in the way of an honest interview. There is a difference between hard-nosed questioning and badgering; she clearly crossed that line. ~ comment by Rick G. on The Street  . . . I think she unloaded on the wrong person. The agreement is not merely about getting the dollar number to be the same. It is important what is changed and what is not changed. Certainly a Democratic Senator whose party just won the election gets to have a say in what happens. ~ comment by disqus_lCwrk6cnV1 on The Street ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Quotes from the CNBC Facebook Page  Go Maria!!! Bite their heads off!! she's my hero
~ Heather M.

I thought she was rude,,,,,
~ Jay T.

I Love her but I really thought she was just a Bully and did nothing but trivialize what is going on. Boehner is jerking us all around. He doesn't have the votes nor the Intestinal Fortitude to go against those who have bought Congress. He can't control his caucus. We had an election we voted for taxes being raised on those over 250K and Obama has given even more. We knew what we were voting for. The Republicans have to face reality They LOST. The Senator could not get a word in edge wise. It reminded me of Hard Ball with Chris Matthews.
~ Jackie S.

She never treats Republicans in such a contemptuous way, she's becoming all that's bad on cable, look for her to move to Fox soon where she'll fit in perfectly!
~ John M.

Raise those mean nasty rich people's taxes don't raise mine I want my gubmint check to come on time lol welcome to Rome 700 A.D. All empires come to an end.
~ Gary E.

love it. I don't care which party or politician she's interviewing, every one of them is ruining Christmas.
~ George P.

Great job Maria !!! this guys need to be push for a "yes" or "no" answer, other-way they only say "bla-bla-bla".
~ Diego S.

CNBC might consider that Democrats are their viewers too. We do not need CNBC commentators to spread Republican lies and deceit; they already have Fox News for that. Why does Maria not ask Boehner or Republican guests what spending cuts they would support that does not entail throwing Grandma from the train. Maria needs to take some time off, a lot of time off. Perhaps, she would be happier over at Fox News.
~ Connie V.

The Cliff Diving has begun ... Maria is going to be much poorer as Wisdom Tree Funds lose a billion dollars by the close of tomorrow's market. Karma for the house of Steinberg from all the Frank B. Hall people they screwed in the 1980's.
~ Fred C.

hahahaha,,, Maria is among the 1% of filthy rich American, who are against raising the taxes for the 1% and will pick-on and corner any Democrat politician, while giggling and flirting with the republican politicians she gets to interview... hahaha,, great way for CNBC to glamorize her,,,,, she must be getting desperate and scared like the rest of the 1%, thinking about the tax hike she is going to have to pay up... :))))
~ Vin da V.

Always thought CNBC was bipartisan.... Neutral..... This is sad. CNBC is allowing right wing tantrums on air. So unprofessional..... The last straw was Maria acting like a little school girl giggling over the attention she got on the floor. I will be watching Bloomberg from now on.
~ Andrea L.

Itsy bitsy spider going over the cliff, watch out Maria your going to get bit, Ranting, ranting ranting is not impressing most, we all know your really should quit. Terrible, me bad. Please Faux Fox, hire Maria.
~ Shirley M-D

Great. Just wish the guy had been next to her so she could grab him by the collar and shake sh#t out of him. Loved the applause at the end.
~ Stephen S.


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Friday, December 21, 2012

Boehner's Epic Fail in the House

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Previous Post:
Snark Amendment: Boehner Shambles: Plan B Fails in House - Tea Party Gloats - Stock Market Falls

The House did not take up the tax measure today because it did not have sufficient support from our members to pass. Now it is up to the president to work with Senator Reid on legislation to avert the fiscal cliff. The House has already passed legislation to stop all of the January 1 tax rate increases and replace the sequester with responsible spending cuts that will begin to address our nation's crippling debt. The Senate must now act.
~ Statement of House Speaker John Boehner, via Huffington Post

Inside the Meltdown
At a quarter to 8 p.m. on Thursday night, House Republicans gathered in the Capitol basement for an urgent, closed-door conference meeting. The scene was hushed and confused. Instead of huddling in a windowless room, members thought they’d spend the evening on the House floor, voting on “Plan B,” Speaker John Boehner’s fiscal-cliff proposal. But as they took their seats and looked at Boehner’s face, the reason for the gathering became clear: The speaker didn’t have the votes. The whipping was over. “Plan B” was dead.
. . . It was Boehner’s tone and body language that caught most Republicans off guard. The speaker looked defeated, unhappy, and exhausted after hours of wrangling. He didn’t want to fight. There was no name-calling. As a devout Roman Catholic, Boehner wanted to pray. “God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change,” he told the crowd, according to attendees.
. . . Boehner had spent weeks negotiating with his members and the president. But in this final hour, when he needed Republicans most, he had only a prayer.
~ Robert Costa on National Review

Boehner was trying to play chess and the caucus was playing checkers. Boehner is willing to lose a pawn for a queen. I’m not sure about the rest.
~ Senior Member of Congress quoted on National Review

Once again Obama's superior negotiating skills, which baffle those who mistake chess for checkers, has revealed to the world the true nature of the GOP: short-sighted, evil, predatory, beholden to the 0.01%.
In the end this was a battle b/t Obama and Boehner, and Boehner lost. Lost BIG! Lost because his own team stabbed him in the back. And all Obama had to do was consider Boehner's proposal for the GOP to reject it. Because the GOP will commit suicide rather than deal honestly with that Black guy in their White House.
~ OnlyWords on Daily Kos

I have to say that I didn't think the GOP would screw Boehner like this. That they would be so extreme. I thought they'd opt to preserve the Kabuki drama in which they play the part of an organized, determined, powerful force.
And I'm so relieved that they opened the door for President Obama to walk through, turn around, and say "thank you. Now chained CPI and SS cuts are off the table. Don't mind if I do."
~ comment by concernedamerican on Daily Kos

Huffington Post Headline 12-21-12

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The cliff is upon us. The end of fiscal days, or so House Republicans tell us. The House Republicans want you, the American people to know that they are serious about the fiscal cliff. They are so serious that they have decided to go home for Christmas.
. . . If House Republicans were serious about the fiscal cliff, they could earn some of those millions that we pay them every year and actually do what is expected of most Americans. They could work on a holiday.
~ Jason Easley on PoliticusUSA















If we go over the fiscal cliff, the president just comes back and says, 'Ok, we're going to give tax cuts to everybody under 250,000.' Who's going to vote against that? Everybody'll vote for that. Everybody. It will be just a fait accompli. You won't be voting on whether you're going to do away with a tax cut, you're going to be reimposing tax cuts for everybody under 250,000. So the Republicans are in an untenable situation.
~ Congressman Dan Burton, R-Indiana

It is now clear that to protect the middle class from the fiscal cliff, Speaker Boehner must allow a bill to pass with a combination of Democratic and Republican votes. Speaker Boehner’s partisan approach wasted an entire week and pushed middle-class families closer to the edge. The only way to avoid the cliff altogether is for Speaker Boehner to return to negotiations, and work with President Obama and the Senate to forge a bipartisan deal.
~ Adam Jentleson, spokesperson for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid

The reason we're here is because our Republican colleagues refuse to compromise. We are wasting the people's time.
~ Congressman Chris Van Hollen, D-Maryland

These conservatives — well-intentioned, perhaps, but tactically foolhardy — are steering the Republican party and the movement into an iceberg that’s been in plain sight for weeks. I’d say I’m in disbelief, but this clown show has been going on too long now to say that.
~ Scott Galupo on American Conservative

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