Conservative's ultimate agenda & reason for big deficits

[Poiuyt]

I think that the reason Bush has driven up the federal deficit to record levels is so that he can cut the social programs down to nothing. There's a story on the AP today about how HHS appointee Michael Leavitt wants to cut the programs for the poor and elderly because the budget is so big. I think their plan all along was to raise the deficit first so that the country would have no choice but to cut the social programs. Nobody felt the need to cut social programs when the country had a balanced budget.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=703&e=1&u=/ap/20041214/ap_on_go_pr_wh/bush_cabinet

[shoelace414]

1. it's the drown the budget in the bathtub thing

[Telly Savalas]

12. I don't buy it.

If they were truly following Grover Norquist's masterplan, they'd have drowned the government in the bathtub already. This is simply a case of them being too politically weak willed to exercise any fiscal responsibility. They pander with their tax cuts, but they realize it'd be political suicide to make the spending cuts. In short, they're wusses.

Creating a fiscal crisis to try to force the government to shrink is a double edged sword. The last time the GOP wrecked the economy, the Democrats held the White House for the next 20 years and government grew.

[Vincardog]

2. If we can cut the taxes on the rich. If we can finance the illegal immoral

war of aggression in Iraq. If we can have record deficits in order to give Billions in Corporate Welfare. Why do we have to cut social programs?

[LSparkle]

3. Grover Norquist called it "starving the beast" I think

It's despicable, whatever you call it. Truly shows the Regressives for the self-centered, memememememe party they are. Compassion? They wouldn't know it if it ... BIT THEM (and I wish it would).

[llpoperations]

7. I say, Let's help them

Who benefits most if the GOP controlled Federal government goes belly up? The BLUE States!!

Let the GOP destroy the IRS and give responsibility for revenue collection to the States. Let the fundies support one another, or not. Instead of using my tax dollars to fund schools to teach creationism, I want them to go toward stem-cell research, bio-tech, and alternative energy.

As just one example, let the Northeast develop its own high speed rail network, and let Texans fix their own highways.

If Progressives are so evil in the minds of the Right-wing, they ought to be happy to let us go.

[snippy]

8. That little Tax Cut Monkey also has talked about getting the federal

government "down to the size where we can drown it in the bathtub."

Grover is one of the most odious and loathsome little fucks in the history of the world. To be fair however, I have heard him describe the psychological abuse he was subjected to as a child by his father.

[KT2000]

4. Yep - that has been the plan

all along. Good thing the fundamentalists got their way in the election.

[whistle]

5. Exactly how much money (cash) does the federal government...

...have at its disposal at the moment? Does the government reveal how much it borrows and from what sources? Do we know how much has been borrowed from the Social Security and Medicare surplus fund?

I have the feeling that there is a loose change jar up in the U.S. Department of Revenue in which all the money that is not paid out in Social Security and Medicare each period is put into this change jar and then anyone who wants too from the executive branch, the military or special congressional committees can come along and take the cash they need out of the surplus jar and put an IOU note in its place. How many IOU notes are there?

[Mountainman]

6. back to the days of noblesse oblige?

Conservatives don't even believe in noblesse oblige. I am amazed at how uncaring some of the conservatives I know, are.

[w4rma]

9. The problem with their plan is it will destroy the military and our

infrastructure first.

Social security is the biggest social program and it is entirely supported by the payroll tax up until 2055 and Repugs haven't said one word about getting rid of the payroll tax (they seem to love that tax). The federal government has hardly any other social programs to gut. But there is a HUGE military budget that is going to be very hard hit if this debt keeps going up and up and up. Plus retailers get almost ALL their money from social security and other methods of transfering funds to the masses so retailers will be hit EXTREMELY hard, even Walmart.

[blondeatlast]

10. Grover Norquist (such a fun guy!) calls it "starving the beast."

And it is exactly what the Radicals want to do.

[youngred]

11. "Starve the Beast"

Of course it is. He openly talked about this in the 2000 campaign and has long been a major idea promoted by Grover Nordquist and his ilk.