New President Won't Have an Easy Time Paying for New Initiatives, Fiscal Experts Say

[That Guy]

On the presidential campaign trail, Democrat Barack Obama promises to "completely eliminate" income taxes for millions of Americans, from low-income working families to senior citizens who earn less than $50,000 a year.


Republican John McCain vows to double the exemption for dependents and slash the corporate income tax.


To which the folks who monitor the nation's financial situation can only say: Good luck. Because, back in Washington, tax collections are slowing, the budget deficit is rising, and the national debt is approaching $10 trillion. Whoever wins the White House this fall, fiscal experts say, is likely to have a tough time enacting expensive new initiatives, be they tax cuts or health care reform.

LINK:
washingtonpost.com



thought, with the policy threads, this is pretty relevant as far as putting a damper on initiatives.

spending on social security and medicare are slowly sucking up ever increasing funds and it's getting harder to pay for them along with everything else. of course, in the short term, bush's tax cuts and military spending have ballooned the deficit quite a bit too.

[70Chip]

Originally Posted by That Guy

On the presidential campaign trail, Democrat Barack Obama promises to "completely eliminate" income taxes for millions of Americans, from low-income working families to senior citizens who earn less than $50,000 a year.

He also promised to use the public financing system for the election. Everything Obama syas must be taken with a grain of salt. His word means nothing.

[724Skinsfan]

Originally Posted by 70Chip

He also promised to use the public financing system for the election. Everything [any political candidate] syas must be taken with a grain of salt. His word means nothing.

I see an error in your post. There, I fixed it for you.

[70Chip]

Originally Posted by 724Skinsfan

I see an error in your post. There, I fixed it for you.

You could have made your point without editing my text. That's a bad road to start heading down.

[That Guy]

Originally Posted by 70Chip

He also promised to use the public financing system for the election. Everything Obama syas must be taken with a grain of salt. His word means nothing.

that was before he thought he'd have a better chance to out fund his opponent.

anything to win though, right? i mean, who needs morals anyways?

[dmek25]

Originally Posted by 70Chip

He also promised to use the public financing system for the election. Everything Obama syas must be taken with a grain of salt. His word means nothing.

kind of like McCain saying he was against drilling, and now he is for it? its on now, and both will do/ say what they have to, to win

[saden1]

No shit, Bush and Co. really stunk up the joint. Taxes will have to be raised and belts will have to be tightened. Hopefully there will be fiscal discipline. I do love McCain's fuzzy plan though...continue the war, cut taxes, cut 100 billion dollars in pork even though 18 billion is spent on pork, and of course rely on American ingenuity to solve our problems.

[That Guy]

i think obama's deal was more of a promise between the candidates than a position change, but there's no doubt that mccain has changed a lot of his positions on issues over the last 8 years.

[70Chip]

I would point out that here is a huge difference between "I promise to..." and "I believe that...".

Furthermore, I think the Democrats will ultimately rue this decision. When the Soviets launched Sputnik, Eisenhower's advisors were all in a tizzy about what a public relations disaster it was and how it made us look weak. Eisenhower pointed out that the Soviets had established an overflight precedent that would work to our advantage over time. He knew that our technology was superior and that there was now nothing the Soviets could say as our intelligence satellites passed over their territory orbit after orbit. I think the Republican Party will soon regain its fundraising edge and the Democrats won't be able to say boo when the full power of that money machine is brought to bear on the election process. The cat is out of the bag thanks to Obama.

[onlydarksets]

Originally Posted by 70Chip

He also promised to use the public financing system for the election. Everything Obama syas must be taken with a grain of salt. His word means nothing.

You do realize that statements like this marginalize the good points you make in many of your posts, right?

I don't see this as a betrayal of trust. There were two things he simply didn't know in November that he knows now:

1. That he could raise almost half of his money in unbundled contributions of $200 or less.
2. That the primary would deeply fracture the Democrat party.

Public funding was instituted after the Watergate scandal (as was the FEC) to remove the appearance of corruption (or actual corruption) by minimizing the role of the big contributor. In the primary, Obama raised almost half of his funds from individual, non-bundled contributions of $200 or less. He didn't have "Rangers" grabbing $2300 from every CEO in Chicago and passing those on in a bundle to curry favor as his sole financial base. Accepting public funding doesn't do much to remove the appearance of a fat-cat pulling strings when you raise money this way.

As for the damage to the party during the primary, it's going to take a lot of money to right that ship.

I'm not sure either is sufficient by itself, but when considered together, I can't say I blame him. It also doesn't destroy his word.

[SmootSmack]

Originally Posted by onlydarksets

You do realize that statements like this marginalize the good points you make in many of your posts, right?

I don't see this as a betrayal of trust. There were two things he simply didn't know in November that he knows now:

1. That he could raise almost half of his money in unbundled contributions of $200 or less.
2. That the primary would deeply fracture the Democrat party.

Public funding was instituted after the Watergate scandal (as was the FEC) to remove the appearance of corruption (or actual corruption) by minimizing the role of the big contributor. In the primary, Obama raised almost half of his funds from individual, non-bundled contributions of $200 or less. He didn't have "Rangers" grabbing $2300 from every CEO in Chicago and passing those on in a bundle to curry favor as his sole financial base. Accepting public funding doesn't do much to remove the appearance of a fat-cat pulling strings when you raise money this way.

As for the damage to the party during the primary, it's going to take a lot of money to right that ship.

I'm not sure either is sufficient by itself, but when considered together, I can't say I blame him. It also doesn't destroy his word.

It doesn't destroy his word, but it doesn't necessarily help the cause of all those who defend him by simply saying "He says he's going to bring about change." That's great, but what has he actually done? When you ask the supporters that, too many are left with a blank expression. Which is a shame, because there actually is some stuff (in the brief time he's been in public office) he has done. Seems to me though that several of his supporters can't say much beyond "Well he said..." And I suspect that's in large part due to the fact that a lot of his supporters are young, first-time voters who are just now becoming interested in politics and elections.

[saden1]

There's a lot at stake in this election, f'ck the fair play b.s. Public financing is a joke considering you have 527 groups doing all the dirty work for the candidates. So long as Obama is taking money from small donors and PAC money I'm OK with it. Anywho, this isn't a policy decision, it's a tactical and a smart one at that. Raise money from 1.5 million donors and implement a 50 state startagy. Can't fault the man wanting to win without cost.

[70Chip]

Originally Posted by onlydarksets

You do realize that statements like this marginalize the good points you make in many of your posts, right?

I don't see this as a betrayal of trust. There were two things he simply didn't know in November that he knows now:

1. That he could raise almost half of his money in unbundled contributions of $200 or less.
2. That the primary would deeply fracture the Democrat party.

Public funding was instituted after the Watergate scandal (as was the FEC) to remove the appearance of corruption (or actual corruption) by minimizing the role of the big contributor. In the primary, Obama raised almost half of his funds from individual, non-bundled contributions of $200 or less. He didn't have "Rangers" grabbing $2300 from every CEO in Chicago and passing those on in a bundle to curry favor as his sole financial base. Accepting public funding doesn't do much to remove the appearance of a fat-cat pulling strings when you raise money this way.

As for the damage to the party during the primary, it's going to take a lot of money to right that ship.

I'm not sure either is sufficient by itself, but when considered together, I can't say I blame him. It also doesn't destroy his word.

The weakest argument is the one that says, "Whe he made the commitment to public financing he didn't know how much money he could raise." This is like saying, "When I married my wife, I didn't realize the twenty-two year old former cheerleader was going to move in next door".

I also find it interesting that everyone says that BHO will not be beholden to his contributors. I thought his contributors were all mom and pop salt of the earth types, so wouldn' he want to be beholden to them? The idea that Democratic givers are intrinsically more virtuous than Republican givers is an assumption the media is making that should probably be looked into.

In addition, Obama made the argument that he needs the money to head off GOP 527s at the pass. But the only 527 add I've seen, and I'm in a suppossed battleground area, is one run by AFSCME, the government workers union. So I guess Obama actually is using a form of "public financing". I pay taxes, which pay the buearacrats, which pays their union dues, which bought those adds. The add featured a woman with a baby and the woman telling McCain he couldn't have her baby for the war in Iraq. Apparently the consultants who wrote the add aren't aware that the draft was done away with in the early 70s. Totally over the top. Yet Obama will continue to play the victim.

[saden1]

The baby ad is from MoveOn.org and it's distasteful and stupid ad.

[saden1]

I would like to add that even though there are no serious 527 groups attaching Obama now it doesn't mean there won't be any in the future. Also, at the request of Obama MoveOn.org has announced that they are shutting down it's 527.