Republicans Holding Economy Hostage

The fact that they are willing to bring the entire country down is no surprise. They've already had the country's credit rating lowered. Their behavior is clearly bordering on treason at this point and needs to be addressed as such in the next 4 years.

The Blackmail Caucus
By Paul Krugman

If President Obama is re-elected, health care coverage will expand dramatically, taxes on the wealthy will go up and Wall Street will face tougher regulation. If Mitt Romney wins instead, health coverage will shrink substantially, taxes on the wealthy will fall to levels not seen in 80 years and financial regulation will be rolled back.

Given the starkness of this difference, you might have expected to see people from both sides of the political divide urging voters to cast their ballots based on the issues. Lately, however, I’ve seen a growing number of Romney supporters making a quite different argument. Vote for Mr. Romney, they say, because if he loses, Republicans will destroy the economy.

O.K., they don’t quite put it that way. The argument is phrased in terms of “partisan gridlock,” as if both parties were equally extreme. But they aren’t. This is, in reality, all about appeasing the hard men of the Republican Party.

If you want an example of what I’m talking about, consider the remarkable — in a bad way — editorial in which The Des Moines Register endorsed Mr. Romney. The paper acknowledged that Mr. Obama’s signature economic policy, the 2009 stimulus, was the right thing to do. It also acknowledged that Mr. Obama tried hard to reach out across the partisan divide, but was rebuffed.

Yet it endorsed his opponent anyway, offering some half-hearted support for Romneynomics, but mainly asserting that Mr. Romney would be able to work with Democrats in a way that Mr. Obama has not been able to work with Republicans. Why? Well, the paper claims — as many of those making this argument do — that, in office, Mr. Romney would be far more centrist than anything he has said in the campaign would indicate. (And the notion that he has been lying all along is supposed to be a point in his favor?) But mostly it just takes it for granted that Democrats would be more reasonable.

Is this a good argument?

The starting point for many “vote for Romney or else” statements is the notion that a re-elected President Obama wouldn’t be able to accomplish anything in his second term. What this misses is the fact that he has already accomplished a great deal, in the form of health reform and financial reform — reforms that will go into effect if, and only if, he is re-elected.

But would Mr. Obama be able to negotiate a Grand Bargain on the budget? Probably not — but so what? America isn’t facing any kind of short-run fiscal crisis, except in the fevered imagination of a few Beltway insiders. If you’re worried about the long-run imbalance between spending and revenue, well, that’s an issue that will have to be resolved eventually, but not right away. Furthermore, I’d argue that any alleged Grand Bargain would be worthless as long as the G.O.P. remained as extreme as it is, because the next Republican president, following the lead of George W. Bush, would just squander the gains on tax cuts and unfunded wars.

So we shouldn’t worry about the ability of a re-elected Obama to get things done. On the other hand, it’s reasonable to worry that Republicans will do their best to make America ungovernable during a second Obama term. After all, they have been doing that ever since Mr. Obama took office.

During the first two years of Mr. Obama’s presidency, when Democrats controlled both houses of Congress, Republicans offered scorched-earth opposition to anything and everything he proposed. Among other things, they engaged in an unprecedented number of filibusters, turning the Senate — for the first time — into a chamber in which nothing can pass without 60 votes.

And, when Republicans took control of the House, they became even more extreme. The 2011 debt ceiling standoff was a first in American history: An opposition party declared itself willing to undermine the full faith and credit of the U.S. government, with incalculable economic effects, unless it got its way. And the looming fight over the “fiscal cliff” is more of the same. Once again, the G.O.P. is threatening to inflict large damage on the economy unless Mr. Obama gives it something — an extension of tax cuts for the wealthy — that it lacks the votes to pass through normal constitutional processes.

Would a Democratic Senate offer equally extreme opposition to a President Romney? No, it wouldn’t. So, yes, there is a case that “partisan gridlock” would be less damaging if Mr. Romney won.

But are we ready to become a country in which “Nice country you got here. Shame if something were to happen to it” becomes a winning political argument? I hope not. By all means, vote for Mr. Romney if you think he offers the better policies. But arguing for Mr. Romney on the grounds that he could get things done veers dangerously close to accepting protection-racket politics, which have no place in American life.

 

You know if you start off with the wrong assumptions, you can conclude anything your little heart desires.

 

Yes, I've seen you at work before.

 

Paul Krugman, huh?
Didn't he also write that Obamacare wasn't sustainable without massive tax increases?

 

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With all this 'gridlock', it is amazing that we are able to keep spending 3.6 trillion dollars a year.

 

You can thank Bush for the vast majority of that. Obama has increased spending less than like the last 6 presidents. He can't do anything about the increases due to the unfunded Medicare Part D, two enormous tax cuts he only can be credited for the last two years of, nor two costly foreign adventures he inherited. If you want to say that Obama care has raised spending, you'll have to show me how much because there are no hard numbers yet, just wild guesses.

 

They have lowered Americas credit rating? Please tell me when under a GOP president has our credit rating been downgraded? I wont hold my breath on this one.

 

It might help if they would have bothered to pass a budget, but I guess obeying the laws don't count for them

 

I wonder how come I haven;t seen that as a campaign ad? "The last guy spent like a drunken sailor...I am just spending that much and a little bit more." I can see the bumper stickers now: Vote for Obama...He's just a little bit worse than the last guy.

Besides, we all know that we should really blame Washington. He started it all. Every cent that had been spent since then has been unavoidable. No President who has taken office since could have possibly stopped it.

 

Presidents don't pass budgets. Congress does.

 

Not a very sexy message when explained is it? If nobody was president, we'd have still spent roughly about the same amount in the last four years. The vast majority of the budget is set in place while they argue over the tiny slice that actually is discretionary. Republicans will continue to try and starve the government out of existence so that the only real power will reside with their Plutocrat masters. You know, the Sheldon Adelsons of this country.

 

Funny, when our debt was at 9 Trillion, BO called it irresponsible and unpatriotic.........what is our debt now?

 

Again, Obama, as far as money his initiated programs added to the deficit/debt are smaller than any modern president and he has had to accomplish that feat during the worst economic recession since 1929. The guy has been thrifty by comparison but low-information critics insist on attributing spending to Obama that he has zero power to change. The argument works on less intelligent people but falls completely apart when you actually know how government spending really works. I'm not defending out of control government spending which includes the spending we call "tax cuts", but I know better than to blame one guy or one party for decades of irresponsibility from pretty much every elected official. Government is only part of the problem. Focussing solely on just one political party as the problem without considering all the other factors like corporate influence through out of control lobbying, the corruptive influence of money in politics, legislation and regulations written by and for the very institutions affected by the resulting laws, and an apathetic to disenfranchised electorate all contribute to a broken system that only works for those at the very top. We continue to squabble about the minutiae while Rome burns.

 

Under BO, our debt has grown from $10T to $16T - more that any single president and more than most modern combined. Yet somehow you are going to blame that on someone else and call him "thrifty". I cannot even you and you mantras really could possibly believe that line of bull.

 

That is only because you have little to no understanding of how government spending works. Your knowledge comes from conservative sources that intentionally dumb down the real process for low-information voters like you. Your understanding of government spending is far more partisan than it is an accurate reflection of the process. Put simply, you would rather indulge in the partisan argument rather than acquire an accurate understanding of the process. Thus we reach an impass because you are unwilling to bother learning anything about the subject of which you are speaking and I am uninterested in arguing with you for no other reason than having an argument. Perhaps we should just ignore each other? It works for me.

 

I do not understand your partisan position, but I do have one up on you. I understand the math involved. I also understand that the house has passed several budgets, but the Democrats and your god have yet to serious even consider passing one.

 

Do you also understand that the job of the U.S. House of Representatives is to come up with a budget and not the president's job? Your talking point becomes kind of absurd when one understands how the process actually works.

 

And every other one has passed a budget - several budgets, in fact.

 

Again, what does a budget request have to do with passing a budget? Do you even have a clue?