U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson urged Congress to raise the national debt limit, now at 8.965 trillion dollars, saying the country may be unable to pay its bills this fall.
“I am writing to request that Congress raise the statutory debt limit as soon as possible,” said Paulson in a letter to Congress. He estimated that the government is likely to bump into the statutory debt limit in early October.
The national debt limit has been boosted several times since President George W. Bush took office in 2001. The last time was in March 2006 when [rubberstamp] Congress agreed to raise the debt ceiling by 781 billion dollars.
In February last year, the Bush administration said it had begun to use a government employee pension fund to avoid hitting the then national debt limit of 8.184 trillion dollars.
This is getting lots of coverage abroad – especially in China where Paulson is handing out free advice on how to run their economy.
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Anyone have a good reference for the thinking behind having a “debt limit” in the first place?
Was it possibly put in place as a self regulating warning flag that internal measures need to be taken to avoid reaching it, or is it only a flagging mechanism to annouce our continual downfall?
Good job CONGRESS. Every one of them should be tossed out of office.
“NO—let ME be the one who lies to you, cheats, steals and tells you what you want to hear.” All pretty obvious.
um, haven’t this president, the previous house majority and the current senate majority clearly shown that republican rhetoric about wanting small unobtrusive government and balance budgets is a big fat lie?
i don’t know about you, but my taxes really aren’t any lower
so what’s new here? i’ll tell you instead of lots of americans getting no-bid welfare handouts, a small cadre of well connected executives get no-bid contracts that pay to ship their jobs overseas, leaving american workers behind.
yay.
Let’s import more goods from China! At least you’re having fun opening the wrappers while future generations can pay for it all. Fuck them… it’s all about me, me, me…
Quite frankly… you can hear the violins playing as the ship is sinking. At least there’s no panic… not yet.
#3
And when we’re at… let’s start another war.
Way to go fiscal conservatives!!
Oh wait, there are no more fiscal conservatives. Perhaps there are some on this blog and otherwise outside of government. But, not inside where it counts.
#2 If your taxes are not any lower now just wait until Billary and Obomba get elected.
My taxes have gone down every time we have had a tax cut so I must be one of those evil people making more than $30k a year, you know, the rich people.
#6.
I don’t want you to pay more – I want CEOs to pay more. You confuse a crumb for the 7 course meals they hand out to the rich.
It sounds like you can be bought quite cheaply & of course the neocons what it that way.
#7, and I just want the government to treat everybody equally, and require that we all pay the same proportional share.
Maybe it’s time to file for chapter 13 and sell off parts of the company, er, country.
#7 – Sounds The Alarm,
I’m with you on that. I think 15% is a lot of money to pay in taxes for someone making only $30,000/yr and not a lot for someone making $130,000/yr and next to nothing for someone making $13,000,000/yr.
Progressive tax recognizes this. Flat tax does not.
#8 – Sea Lawyer,
I strongly disagree, as stated above. It may make sense to have certain taxes, like AMT, be based on zip code or something that would take area into account. This would help account for the fact that $100,000/yr is barely middle class in Manhattan but is wealthy in East Bumfuck. Still though, flat tax is not the way to go as it does nothing to address anything except that rich people want to pay even less than they already do. (And, by that, I don’t mean a paltry $13,000,000/yr, I’m talking about the billionaires that already pay less in total taxes than the rest of do in FICA alone.)
Then, it’s always easy to laugh at wimmin and darkies, ain’t it.
I think we should give another tax break to the oil companies to further improve the performance of our economy. And while we are at it, let’s get rid of all them darn immigrants that are responsible for our national debt.
#13 – Awake,
The damn immigrants actually are responsible for all of our debt. The Native Americans probably didn’t have much in the way of debt before their conquest, slaughter, and genocide at the hands of European immigrants.
#11, funny how the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment always slips people’s minds when they are looking for ways to fund their big government programs.
In any case, you must be aware that there is a difference in how and when taxes are paid for earned income and for capital gains, correct? It’s usually the case that those evil billionaires possess wealth that has either already been taxed, or exists in the form of stocks and bonds which won’t be taxed until they are sold and a gain (or loss) is realized.
#15 – Sea Lawyer,
I thought it was the triple tax free munis.
Yes. I’m aware of the difference between income and capital gains.
What part of the 14th amendment do you think is violated by a progressive tax code?
Well Congress could refuse to extend the Debt Limit. Then the President would have to explain why his war is costing so much and how it has boosted the current national debt. In fact, Congress could refuse to pass any financial, budget, or tax measures until Bush starts to obey the Congressional Subpoenas. They could even attach riders to their requested bills that said bill would only become law after the appointment of a special prosecutor that answers to Congress.
Yup. We need a strong Democrat leader to reorganize our national finances. Someone like Bill Clinton.
QUOTE:
The national debt limit has been boosted several times since President George W. Bush took office in 2001. The last time was in March 2006 when [rubberstamp] Congress agreed to raise the debt ceiling by 781 billion dollars.
END quote…
I like this statement..
HOw to Ruin a country in 1 easy step.
said before…
there are many ways to take over a country.
War,
Money,
religion
And what did this president do when he FIRSt took office?
He gave MONEY away…
#6 i make decent cheese and the “tax cuts” might have saved me a couple hundred bucks per year (um, yay?)
however that is a pittance compared to the hype republicans gave it
how much did your taxes go down? did it let you buy a better car? bigger house — i rather doubt it.
i think you drank the kool-aid — republican economic policy, whatever their goals are, is going to destroy the middle class, leaving only super rich, kinda poor, and poor
the entire middle class in america right now is gonna be screwed when the bills we’re racking up with red china come due.
and it’s your boy gw who is selling america’ to them, lock, stock and barrel
let me ask you — how will g.w. bring down the debt? — oh, that’s right he CAN’T because he’s leaving office; how convenient.
#19 grog,
That’s a bit dire, don’t you think? However, I must say that Republican presidents do have a tendency to leave unimaginable sums of debt for Democrats to clean up.
It would appear that Republican strategy is to drain the treasury into the Military-Industrial Complex and the Petroleum industry then leave office, whereupon they snipe at tax-and-spend Democrats who are trying to clean up the mess.
Bush has no concern over BALANCE budget.
that is the way this office has worked, for to long…
He has stripped Money to every department and closed offices.
THE NEXT GUY, is going to have MAJOR headaches over,
Fixing the balance,
Paying BACK the loans,
Bring up the gov, so it can do its job.
FDA had to close 100 offices…
So who’s going to say they voted for Bush knowing that he would put the country in this much debt? Hell half this much! C’mon guys you were something close to half the voters, where are you?
Sea lawyer? More like a Philadelphia Lawyer – if you know the song.
Just out of idle curiousity – because I have little or nothing invested in Europe – but, anyone up on why it is the United States, this leading Western economic power, can’t do anything but bury itself deeper in debt on balance of trade with China – but, the Euros, from Germany (their #1) on down, generally have a positive balance of trade with China?
Do they know how to do something we don’t?
#11
You clearly never took economics. Raising taxes on the rich does not increase tax revenue. In fact, it generally does the opposite. The simple reason is that the rich can hire armies of lawyers that do nothing but help them avoid paying taxes. That’s why you have someone like Mrs. Kerry paying an effective tax rate of 12%. The problem is that people still do not understand the difference between wealth and income.You are only taxed on the later.
#23, I don’t know? How much of the German standard of living consists of having cheap plastic junk bought at the local equivalent of Wal-Mart? Please, don’t bother searching your imagination for an answer, it’s really not that important.
So, interestingly enough, I managed to find this report with a simple google search.
http://italy.usembassy.gov/pdf/other/RL31403.pdf
According to it, in 2005, the EU had a deficit with China of $121 Billion (their numbers, China claims lower) compared to $201 Billion for the United States (our numbers, China claims lower). More interestingly, Germany’s deficit within the EU is the highest at $23 Billion. I know, I know, there is something to be said for scale – and we are obviously working with a debt much larger than that of paltry little Germany’s. Even if when you consider that Germany’s population is only about 28% the size of the United States, it still doesn’t look good for us and our love of all things cheap and plastic. Sadly again, it does look as though Europe, when taken as a whole, fares much better in comparison to poor old us if you account for population, than if you separate out the “big players” of their little federation (side note: I wonder what Hungary’s trade deficit with China was in 2005. I suppose I could look it up if I really cared…).
But, anyways, I would suggest to you that in the future, before you grace us with more of these rhetorical questions of yours, that you at least start from a valid premise, and perhaps having numbers that somewhat match your claims could help too.
Well, take it easy. 😀
25—Gee Whiz, arguing on point to the heart and basis of the argument using confirmable facts??? Doesn’t sound like much of a sea lawyer to me. ((aka – a statement)).
I’ll try to make it simpler for you #25 – Germany has a trade surplus in general and specifically with China. It’s growing. We don’t.
Check out Bloomberg, http://tinyurl.com/2j4s6b
True, the whole Euro crowd is dragged down by our 51st state. But, then, Blair imitates more than a few of Bush’s policies.
Your fear of “rhetorical” questions – I have no idea why you thought it was so – has pushed me into confirming what I would have guessed. Germany’s healthier relationship with Chinese trade is grounded in their technology exports. Remember those? http://tinyurl.com/396a82
In fact, there was quite a good segment on German Journal, just today, on German exports of diesel engines – not just in Volkswagens; but, 10,000 horsepower critters from M.A.N. – who has orders 2 years out.
I think its high time we enacted a:
WAR ON DEBT!!
not that it would do much good:
We’re losing the war on illegal immigration (aside from the mexican wall)
We’re losing the war on terrorism (despite what BushCo says)
We’ve lost the war on drugs (stupid idea anyway)
We’ve lost the war on crime (rat-ta-tat-tat in da hood)
Any others I’m forgetting?
Wow, what a lovely win-win situation Bush is in.
If they raise the debt ceiling, he continues his rampant spending and hands the problem off to the next president.
If they don’t raise the debt ceiling, he has the justification he needs to start cutting those nasty little (New Deal) social programs that rich people hate paying for.
What a fucking bastard.
#24 – Thomas,
Are you sure you read my post?
Anyway, I’m glad to see there are still some believers in Reaganomics. I assume then that you are one of the beneficiaries of Gush-Up-Economics? For the rest of us, Reagan really dramatically damaged the middle class of this country with such thinking. Anyway, it’s kind of childish to make the statements you’ve made. It implies that we should just say that anyone making over a certain amount, yes income over a certain amount, should not pay any taxes at all.
Perhaps you should consider writing articles for the Fox Street Post now.
#19 Actually I bought a new truck but that isn’t the point. I have been around long enough to know that I personally do better when a Republican (conservative type one each) president is in charge. I tried to buy my first home under Carter. What a nightmare that 4 years turned out to be.
I see taxes cut and incoming tax revenues go up but at the same time I see the deficit getting worse. Why? We have a Congress that still thinks all that money is theirs to do with as they please. It’s our money but people like Jack Murtha seem to think that it is his personal piggy bank with earmarks.
I get sick and tired of seeing my money go to bullshit like bridges and roads to nowhere or how to artificially inseminate a mosquito.
Don’t think the last few years with Bush haven’t pissed me off. I don’t like the Patriot Act (it isn’t) or FISA or the NSA (or ATT for that matter). It has pissed me off to the point where I voted against Republicans in the last local elections.
Now where’s that “new” kool aid????