1. Republicans control all 3 branches of the federal government so stop trying to blame the dems for TSA agents not getting paid.
2. I've cited sources in the past but they're just ignored here, so why even bother? But bc you asked nicely, I'lll get you a few at the bottom.
3. Dissolve the DOE? WOW! You're even more liberal than I am. Even I don't advocate unilateral nuclear disarmament. You do realize that the Energy Department is in charge of the Nuke's right, via the Nat'l Nuclear Security Admin. Its more than half their budget in any given year. The DOE is also home to americas main research labs. As the US federal gov is the largest researcher in the world, I dont think that would bode well for our economy.
4. "If you own a business that has a number of employees who cost money to keep on payroll but have no substantial contribution to your businesses or are a liability to overall performance, you would fire them." If they weren't making money, than yes I would. My family has been in and out of self-employment since the 40s. But we don't fire people who make us money. My first job out of college was for a company that had recently been bought out by some private equity assholes. A few months later they laid-off three people in my department. The reason? They weren't making the company enough money. They were still profitable, but equity's net target return was between 15-17%, and their project was now below 10%. Not bc they were losing the Company money. P. Equity was so fucking greedy that 15% was their new minimum. In my grandfathers day a 9% net return would have been entirely reasonable. After I left, they raised their target to over 20%. These large multinational trillion dollar companies laying ppl off aren't loosing money buddy.
5. Government is also different. It's not about making money, its about providing services to its people. By your standards the military loses over $1.5 trillion a year. Ppl on the right don't seem to mind that. But the post office or Amtrak "loose" a couple hundred million, and they go ape-shit and demand layoffs.
6. You, like many seem to misunderstand where federal monies go. 85% of all federal dollars is Mandatory or Military discretionary spending. We could eliminate ALL non-defense discretionary spending and still have a deficit. These "bloated" programs and salaries and spending are mere rounding errors to other programs.
7. Democrats didnt bury this country in debt. Republicans did. Lets go through that then and we can save the medical discussion for later. Reagan takes over in 1981, the country is in 0.9 trillion in debt, after 10 years of Reaganomics the country is in 3.7 trillion in debt and climbing. Bush's daddy tries to reign in these uncontrollable deficits. His fellow republicans loose their mind about broken promises. But it wasnt enough, deficits continue. Until Clinton. One of the first bills they got passed in 1993 was a tax increase on the rich. Go watch old CSPAN videos of republicans coming to tears on the house floor talking about how bad these tax increase will be. And what happened? The largest, longest, continual economic expansion in the history of the republic. Tax increases on rich didn't hurt us at all. Within 5 years we had a balanced budget...due to increasing taxes on the rich. Enter the Bush administration. Bush got elected and immediately said that budget surplus were proof that the gov collected too much money (or maybe we should keep paying off debt with it), time for another tax cut for the rich...oh shit...here we go. He turned 100 billion+ surplus into a 100+ billion deficit within one year. Adjusted for inflation thats more that double in todays dollars.
8. The Reagan tax cuts were never paid for, the bush tax cuts were never paid for. And then he goes to war without paying for it. Remember why we had income taxes to begin with...TO PAY FOR OUR WAR EXPENSES! Previous presidents knew that, but somehow that escaped GW. So then he doubles down, and doubles down again. Another war in 2003 in Afghanistan not paid for, another round of tax cuts not paid for in 03, then another in 2005, and some more sprinkled throughout his admin. No child left behind, Medicare part D...etc. Then they crash the world economy with deregulation and dump a 1.4 trillion dollar budget deficit in Obama's lap. But somehow it's the Dems fault. Yeah ok. After 8 years the budget deficit under Obama is back down to $520 BIllion. Then Trump gets elected and in his first year doubles that to $1 trillion dollars. Why....because the 2017 tax cuts for the rich thats why!
And then things went downhill fast from there.
9. You see D and R are both financially irresponsible, but the Republicans are by an entire order of magnitude. Obama's big spending bill, the ACA? It actually Paid for itself through new taxes, even reduced the deficit by 15 billion per year. When Dems spend money they pay for it, when R's do it, its all deficit spending buddy. Remember what Dick Cheney once said..."Reagan proved that deficits don't matter"....well, they will soon enough.
The U.S. Courts report that 315 farm bankruptcies were filed in calendar year 2025, up 46% from 2024. While still down from recent highs, this is the second year in a row of increased filings.
farmpolicynews.illinois.edu
1. An easy Google search will provide you with numerous sources that nearly universally label the DHS Funding shutdown as a Democrat shutdown while they fight for ICE reform as part of the deal. Regardless of WHY they are doing it, it is undeniable THAT it is the Democrats doing it. --- Don't try to blame Republicans when that is clearly false.
1b. It is the Legislative branch only that dictates this funding issue. I'm not smart enough to know what options the Executive or Judicial Branches have to go around Legislative on this issue, but it would be extremely limited, if at all possible. So that leave the Republican majority Legislative branch. But, guess what? There are only 53 Republicans in the Senate, and 60 votes are needed to pass this DHS funding bill, which therefor allows a minority of Democrats to be able to hold up the progress.
As an aside, and why I mentioned in my previous post the entire Senate and House should be gutted and rebuilt with all new members, I take great issue with the fact that our Democrats and Republicans are so polarized that they largely refuse to work together. I honestly don't see how this country survives another 100 years without some sort of Civil War or major event that brings the two sides back together. Living in extreme divisive viewpoints cannot endure forever.
2. thanks, I will review.
3. As noted in separate post above, I meant Department of Education, not Energy. --- A good example how different interpretations of reading the same thing is possible.
4. You referenced Trump firing Federal Employees as Illegal. None of that deals with "These large multinational trillion dollar companies laying ppl off aren't loosing money buddy". Apples and Oranges conversations. ... We agree that useless employees being fired is beneficial: I see the employees he fired as, largely, useless employees. If you disagree, then we can discuss why.
5. I'm not sure what this section is in reference to, as it relates to either your original post or my reply to you. I have no problem with providing services to American Citizens. The services you mentioned: Post office, Amtrak, defense spending, all good. There are many more services and programs that are absolutely necessary and/or beneficial that require funding. There are also numerous services and programs that are completely useless and by every single metric considered a waste of money. More of this on point 6 next.
6. I have no
misunderstanding of where federal monies go. I have a
problem with where it goes. Do a google search for "useless government programs" and tell me with a straight face we don't have a spending problem. Tell me honestly that you don't think that gutting government waste (which can be whatever programs and services you want to acknowledge as wasteful) would not be beneficial to reigning in our massive debt.
I would love for you and every other person who would describe "bloated programs and salaries and spending" as mere rounding errors to send me $100 in rounding error each month. I'll retire and have one hell of a hunting budget living off your cumulative ignorance.
7. "Democrats didnt bury this country in debt. Republicans did." --
Bullshit... Both Democrats and Republicans buried us in debt.
You want to use Clinton as your example of how its not Democrats fault? Fair enough. I agree from 1993-2000 were easily the "Best" years of minimizing debt growth. Let's add some context: in those years, the debt grew most, and grew every year, between 1993-1996, when democrats had controlled congress (both chambers) from '87-'94. It was split chambers in '95-96 at its high. Then it reduced from '98-2001 while Republicans controlled both houses for the end of Clinton's years and to start Bush Jr's term. One could make an argument from that factual data that it was the Republicans in house/senate that were responsible for the balanced budget.
I could also provide you a chart that shows the 2 most massive debt increases under a presidents tenure happened under Democrats FDR & Wilson (and also under democrat controlled congress both times). Both of these were over right around 790% debt growth. The next closest is Regan at 161% (split or Democrat controlled congress), then Bush Jr at 73% (split or Republican congress), and Barry at 64% (all 3 variations of congress). Those are the only Presidents that had a % debt change over 43% during their terms. *I do not have data for Trumps 2nd term (since he's in office!!!) yet. ---- If we do it by actual dollar amount, for quicker summary, we have Biden highest over $8.4T, Trump 45 at $7.8T, Barry $7.66T, Bush Jr $4.2T as your top 4 in dollars.
Data can be manipulated. I'm not making the argument that Republicans are not to blame for the deficit, but you absolutely cannot argue that Democrats "didn't do it."
8. See above. You see the data how you want to shape it to fit your narrative. I see it differently. neither of us will convince the other they are "wrong" - I will encourage you to at least see that it's not 100% or even anywhere close to a majority one way or the other; I very much have acknowledged that.
9. Nope, I repeat #7 & #8.
This will be my last reply, I've more than proven my points. Anything more is just wasting breath to say the same thing in a round. I see why
@mdwest bowed out a couple pages back. he also proved his points, numerous times, and this discussion has advanced as much as the Senate has on a DHS funding bill.
www.bbc.com
