Sen. Gregg says Obama budget will bankrupt US

[Psephos]

Source: AP

WASHINGTON (AP) — The top Republican on the Senate Budget Committee says the Obama administration is on the right course to save the nation's financial system. But Sen. Judd Gregg of New Hampshire also says President Barack Obama's massive budget proposal will bankrupt the country.

Gregg says he has no regrets in withdrawing his nomination to become commerce secretary. He pulled out after deciding he could not fully back the administration's economic policies.

The senator said Obama's spending plan in the midst of a prolonged recession would leave the next generation with a country too expensive to live in.

Gregg appeared Sunday on CNN's "State of the Union."



Read more: http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iqzkNg_chNl5JQ8SmAFAQMeHDodQD97342RG0

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More on this story here:

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2009/03/22/gregg-this-country-will-go-bankrupt/

and here's a report of the Congressional Budget Office's revised forecast for the FY2009 deficit - $1.8 trillion

http://www.easybourse.com/bourse-actualite/marches/update-cbo-revises-fy0-us-budget-deficit-forecast-to-637890

[Demeter]

1. Bush Bankrupted Us

Obama will try to undo the damage--if he dumps Geithner, Summers and Goldman Sachs and liquidates the zombies.

[960]

4. Bush did, but Obama is in charge now. If Obama follows through on the 10 years of

massive deficits the WH has predicted, the US will not only be functionally bankrupt, we will fall apart.
Obama didn't cause the mess, but if he doesn't clean it up we will fail on his watch.

And if the Repubs think that the deficits are a great issue to run against, they're nuts. There won't be a US as we know it.

[Fovea]

16. John Maynard Keynes.

Cannot recommend him too highly.

Stimulus is the only thing that is going to work, and the only entity with the ability to invest is the Federal Government.
The US cannot go bankrupt as long as it can cut trees.

Whether the currency will be convertible on the world market is another thing.
So if that is the case, we will have a full economic growth package by virtue
of not being able to import much.

Actually, there are worse strategies. Ask Japan.

[tama]

29. "The US cannot go bankrupt as long as it can cut trees."

Ane when all the trees have been cut...?

All the proponents of obsessive growth (& monetarism) are the same. Lunatics.

You can't kick start growth to fight the limits of growth. Limits of growth (they've been hit) can only be adapted to. That's reality based thinking.

[Deja Q]

43. So every job depends on a tree being cut??!!

:rolleyes:

BTW: Want to talk population? I know enough to not add to it. How many children have you made?

You know, the hippies failed too... or are you eating another box of Ben & Jerry's ice cream with the crowd pleasing flavor names?

[tama]

54. What are hippies

supposed to succeed in? Preserving self-importance and the myth of superiority to rest of nature?

The story of agricultural civilization is a story of certain hay plants using people to cut down woods to create more lebensraum for their genes to spread... :)

[Fovea]

50. Growth is relative to preceding trend

and we have lost a lot of value.

Should we return to the old paradigm of consumption. No.
And I was not suggesting it. But if we are not to be killing each other
in the street over a potato or two, we better have a functioning economy based on some sort of domestic
value producing activity on a broader range if not scale than what is happening out there right now.

By cutting trees, of course I was referring not to clear cutting, but to monetarizing of debt.
I suspect before it gets better, the dollar may go from a world reserve currency, to a non-convertible one.

[tama]

52. What is value?

What produces "potato or two" is healthy land - together with sun's energy. So primary question of value is and will be access to products and blessings of land.

Yes, I did get the "money grows from trees" joke, but as we know, 90% of dollars are nothing but digital information. If you haven't seen the Zeitgeist-movies or money as debt or some other basic explanation of monetary system, I suggest you do so. "Money" as it is (=debt), is not value but a pyramid scam, enforcing the paradigm of growth (together with inevitable boom and bust). Functioning economy, in any sense of the word, cannot be built on money - as debt and interest and ruled by small groups of elite banksters. Functioning economy can be built only on sustainable ways of life in balance with rest of the nature.

What real value we have lost is healthy land, extinct species, extinct human languages, genocided native peoples, alianation from nature.

[stillcool]

34. Fall apart? I guess that is what the Republicans..

want..no jobs, no innovation, no investing in education, no affordable health care, just more tax-cuts, and wars.

[MetaTrope]

35. Doesn't matter, they'll all be living in the Cayman Islands by then anyway

[Name removed]

48. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Vincardog]

2. And Ray Gun Omicks had nothing to do with it

[960]

3. We've been bankrupt since Bush's wars of aggression.... but Obama's

deficits are huge, and are a dangerously high percentage of the GDP.

It may be unavoidable to run up the debt to try to recover, but it also may be unavoidable that we collapse.

The budget projections out of the WH are SCARY (And the deficit will only be revised up).

[MarjorieG]

5. Ours are also more honest.

[960]

9. The budgets are, but the end result is the same.

We can't continue for another decade with multi-trillion dollar deficits. It is unsustainable.

[stillcool]

33. And we can't afford not too

we are 'unsustainable' if we continue to let our country erode. Instead of investing in wars and tax-cuts, this President wants to invest in education, healthcare, and energy independence. Wars and tax-cuts are fine and dandy, but don't dare invest in the nation or it's people, right?

[960]

40. The first step is to stop wasting our money on the wars.

Remember that Obama has increased war and defense spending in addition to all of his good spending.
The wars are going to bring us down.

[David_NSU]

25. True...

but the need to do this was unavoidable. We have to get credit moving again and the market going.

[tama]

30. "We have to get credit moving again and the market going."

Why?

[Sebastian Doyle]

6. Unbelievable that this tool came close to a cabinet position

Hey Judd... why don't you take a drive over to Kennebunkport next time you're on your way home and stand up to the bastards who REALLY bankrupted the country.

[msongs]

11. SOMEBODY musta thought Gregg was "new democrat" material nt

[Azteka]

7. So glad not to have him in the administration...

All one has to do to see that the line is nothing but garbage is look at debt as a percentage of GDP. We had much worse in WWII, and we paid it down. We'll be able to do so again provided we stop having Republican hacks become President.

[BlooInBloo]

8. It's funny because they wouldn't give him the census, so he said no to the Commerce job...

And now that Obama gave the census back to Commerce, he bitches like this.

:rofl:

[Mithreal]

27. Didn't know they gave it back, that is funny, thank you. nt

[MarjorieG]

10. Other forecasts not as dire; we have priority choices. Fear Congress will fund lobbyist same ol'

Then we're stuck. Love how they put Gregg out there as independent profile o courage.

[Deja Q]

12. Well, let's increase the GDP. Jobs are the answer. There are plenty of creative and capable people

here in America too.

[tama]

31. How about let's not

How about let's build a sustainable way of life, take care of each other and this planet we all belong to, get rid of all the banksters and other professional liers (advertizers, politicians etc.) - those kinds of jobs are not needed, they are harmfull.

How about, let's wake up?

[Deja Q]

42. Okay, you quit your job first and start taking care of people.

I'm already awake, thank you. Been awake for longer than you'd be able to contemplate too...

Sorry, but you hit a nerve. And, no, I am under no obligation to say anything in response.

[tama]

55. I've allready quite my job

and learning ways to take care to the best of my modest abilities, not despite but because of a broken heart - so what's there to compete about?

[Ikonoklast]

13. Not if we cut Defense to levels that are only 2/3 of what they are now.

And we would still have the largest defense budget on Earth, by far and away.

[Psephos]

14. If you eliminate the entire defense budget, that only knocks the deficit down to $1.2 trillion

this is a serious problem

[No Elephants]

22. And if you knock out the deficit, you'd still have the economy Obama inherited. THAT

is the devastating problem.

[Vidar]

15. Too late. We're 8 years beyond bankrupt.

[liberalmuse]

17. Bush and his accomplices (Gregg included) already have.

And I'll bet everything I have that this piece of shit never intended to take a position in the Obama administration.

[indepat]

18. 'nother effing 'puke hypocrite who didn't mind the several trillions of dollars of debt piled up

by junior whose last fiscal year debt has been estimated at $1.8 trillion. :P

[iamthebandfanman]

19. that already happened?

jesus christ, no wonder the last 8 years were so awful...

aparently nobody from the republican side of the isle was around!

lol

i love how they are acting like the last 8 years didnt even happen!

[bluestateguy]

20. Debt is still well below where we were were in WWII

Last time I checked, we got out of that era just fine.

[Mithreal]

26. How important were American manufacturing, free trade, and

progressive taxation at that time to our recovery?

Any other significant differences between our economy now and then?

[Deja Q]

44. Exactly. Times are different.

Recovery will take FAR longer without a real economy that has a strong middle class.

[Mithreal]

45. My thoughts precisely. nt

[Octafish]

21. Then raise taxes on the rich so-and-sos who made off like bandits for Bush.

I'm talking taxing the living greed out of the greedy mofos who got us in this mess.

[xxqqqzme]

23. OK juddster - here's a quiz for you

Did you vote to invade Iraq? Did you vote w/ dimson every time he 'needed' more money for his illegal occupation? How about those 8 years of b*sh budgets?

See, that was easy - you're really part of the problem.

[PSPS]

24. We're already bankrupt

Reagan's tax cuts turned us from the largest net creditor to the largest net debtor in the world.

The solution is easy: Rescind the Reagan tax cuts. The monied class (which includes those in the media and most in congress) will scream to high heaven that, after "earning" $3 million, anything beyond that will be taxed at 75%, but it will work. (The top marginal rate was 90% prior to Kennedy, so they'll still make out like bandits.) And, according to my memory, our economy was smokin' back then in the 50's and 60's.

[Vinca]

28. Well, Senator Gregg needs to clean his own house before he starts

criticizing Obama. His millions in earmarks to the former Pease Air Force Base have lined his own pockets. Maybe, for the sake of a near bankrupt nation, he might have pulled his earmarks.
http://www.seacoastonline.com/articles/20090315-OPINION-903150316

[soothsayer]

32. well we're going to have a trillion dollar deficit for the next ten years but I'd like to see anyone

do better

[mackerel]

36. There are so many countries that are too expensive to live

in and yet people live in them. France, Italy, England, Germany and Ireland come to mind and while they are very expensive countries they provide good health care and other good social policies that make it worth the trade off.

[Mithreal]

46. Thom Hartmann talked about how those economies paid

workers a wage that adjusted to the higher taxes. I don't know enough to talk intelligently about these other countries tax policies and social programs or I would.

The costs of higher education, catastrophic health care, let alone a good health insurance program, insufficient worker and labor protections, poor food and drug safety, bad energy policy, insufficient childcare, and a whole host of other problems like war and pay disparity make the true cost of living in the United States much MUCH higher than in the countries you cited. I think I am agreeing with you.

[ElsewheresDaughter]

37. oy...as if bush hadn't already accomplished that!

[AKing]

38. Note to Obama........

This is what happens when you reach out to a Repuke:mad:

[rpannier]

39. Ummm...yeah

Like I'm gonna listen to the spokesman of the group that caused this mess.

[Deja Q]

41. Wasn't he in favor of massive offshoring of jobs too? What a twit.

[TankLV]

47. Hmm - why did he agree to serve and then change his mind WITH MUCH PUBLICITY?!!! I smell a RAT...

But he is a repuke, so I repeat myself...

[Overseas]

49. Gregg says that as a Great Republican on the Revisionist History Team

They're racing around trying to pretend they can chatter enough to scramble our memories about what really happened, and make us forget that their Republican Bush Gang crashed our economy and left President Obama a heap of human rights nightmares to address.

Gregg was recruited onto the elite squad of Revisionist Historians, chosen to appear on TV because we remember his face from the feint at the cabinet post. Clever PR.

[truebrit71]

51. More "hard hitting journalism" from John King I see....

:eyes:

Seriously, why does he bother pretending to be anything OTHER than a fucking spokesperson for the gop?

[No Elephants]

53. Gregg who? Someone hand him a watch so he can see his 15 minutes were up a while ago.