Debt and Loving It, Fiscal Year 2012 Edition

Trillion dollar budget deficit, here we come…again. According to a new report from the Congressional Budget Office, the federal government racked up a $780 billion deficit during the first half of the 2012 fiscal year—yet another reminder that the feds are well on the way to another fiscal gap that well exceeds the $1 trillion mark; CBO projects that this year the deficit will hit $1.2 trillion.

If there's good news, it's that the deficit during the same time-frame last year was slightly larger, by about $53 billion. This time around, the federal government spent slightly less on a few programs and took in slightly more in corporate tax revenues. But given the scale of the deficits Washington has been running for the last few years, and the trillions in debt that federal policymakers have piled on in the process, this hardly counts as a significant improvement. We moved an inch when we needed to move a mile. 

Comments

[R C Dean]

this hardly counts as a significant improvement.

The phrase you are looking for is "decimal dust".

[Pound. Head. On. Desk.]

I was thinking insignificant digits.

[Groovus Maximus]

Government partisan accounting practices (GPAP) allow for on the fly adjustment of significant figures, as needed.

[Copernicus]

"If there's good news, it's that the deficit during the same time-frame last year was slightly larger, by about $53 billion".

I realize you later poo-pooed the idea of this "good news" but it would be best if you didn't even use a sentence like this. It's just bad news, period.

[Hugh Akston]

Look Suderman, I don't know what kind of ice-hearted Social Darwinist you are, but the federal government is providing vital services to the people of the United States, and can't always be concerned about where every penny goes. Or, for that matter, where it comes from.

Those Afghani weddings aren't going to bomb themselves.

[Pound. Head. On. Desk.]

They just might. My experience in central asia says they're nuts.

[Groovus Maximus]

Social Darwinist

Hugh, could you shake up the Magic Meatball of The Typical Libertarian and tell me if this nebulous buzzword will be subjected to abuse worse than a Ginger Stepchild level of abuse granted to the word "access".

[Hugh Akston]

You'll have to ask him yourself, doc. He said he won't return my texts until I upgrade to at least an iPhone 4s.

[Groovus Maximus]

Sucks for me, I'm not an iGuy. I guess I will have to depend on the wiles of Dagny T. to elicit answers from TTL.

[Hugh Akston]

There's an option to ask TTL at the bottom of the sidebar. I'd do it, but I can't afford the service charge.

[Groovus Maximus]

We moved an inch when we needed to move a mile.

Like I've said often of John W. Bobbitt, Peter: You give a guy an inch...

Also, Dracula: Dead and Loving it? That was just absolutely awful. You can do much better than that! Major weaksauce, Suderman.

[Pro Libertate]

That reminded me that Leslie Nielsen had passed. Which still sucks.

[A Serious Man]

He certainly knew how to keep America safe.

[A Serious Man]

Unless he's suggesting that our deficit and Congress' handling of it sucks as much as that movie did.

[Hugh Akston]

It's actually a very sophisticated metaphor connecting the diminishing returns of both late Mel Brooks projects and every dollar spent in excess of revenues collected. Suderman's gift for literary technique is so brave and yet subtle that it brings me to tears.

Clearly they didn't teach you literature in butcher school.

[Groovus Maximus]

Suderman's gift for literary technique is so brave and yet subtle that it brings me to tears.

Usually, I would agree with you, WRT Suderman's unique talents. Alt-text aside, I got the association b'twixt the object d'art and premise of the article.

I merely toss tomatoes at this one: It was an awful movie and I see no need in reading epic levels existentialism into an alt-text. Besides, to paraphrase Saccharin Man: "Puns are the lowest form of humor." Diminish that!

[A Serious Man]

Funny, every time I bring this up a left-winger yells at me that debt and deficits don't matter because America is not run like a household. Which I suppose his true: no household I know of owns a printing machine that can print money.

[Brutus]

The Fed doesn't want you debasing the currency. That's their job.

[OC in DC]

Kill social security, kill medicare, kill all environmental regulations, kill all consumer safety regulations, and be done with it.

Will some people be hurt, sure, but who the hell cares? It's not right that I should have to deal with this mess just so someone's grandmother stays a live a few more years. Human life is not worth all that much.

[Hugh Akston]

You know, you actually weren't doing too bad in the other thread. You kinda sounded like a clueless Team Pink paleotarian. But that last line blew your cover.

Good satire should be indistinguishable from the real thing, which is why Michael Bay is the world's greatest comedian.

[OC in DC]

?

Human life isn't worth all that much. It's quality of life programs that are bankrupting us more than anything. We have to chose, are we going to tax people more to keep these programs, or are we going to cut them.

I'm for cutting them. But cutting them does mean people will die, there is no way around that. Frankly, I'm fine with that. The only alternative is more taxes, and honestly saving lives is just not worth that.

[Groovus Maximus]

Definitely McRibs.

[Hugh Akston]

Sorry, not gonna fall for the bait. You're either a bad spoofer or total idiot or both.

[OC in DC]

What? Why do you think so many rich conservatives support our movement? Sure legal pot and stuff are nice, and they help drag in young people, but the real goal is tax cutting and destroying the welfare state. Which is our main goal. No more social security and no more medicare. Public schools need to get the axe as well, and we also support removing child labor laws.

Honestly fuck em, if they can't pay for it why should we?

[Hugh Akston]

do do dooooooo, hey I think I'll go play video games until the Rockies game starts.

[Contrarian P]

The two major drivers of the deficit/debt that you cite, Social Security and Medicare, do need to be completely redone because they are insolvent. There is no evidence that doing so will cause anyone's grandmother to die, and I defy you to find some.

The other things you talk about, consumer and environmental protections, are extremely minor portions of the budget, and your lumping them in together with the first two is intellectual dishonesty on your part. Although there is a large portion of environmental and consumer protection that could easily be done at the state level rather than the federal, eliminating them entirely hasn't been proposed. In other words, your arguments are flaccid, to say the least.

The four areas that are causing our budget deficits and the resultant debt balloon are Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, and the military (including "off book" spending on overseas wars). The remainder of the federal budget is miniscule in comparison. It's not a question of wanting people to suffer or not wanting them to suffer. It's that our current level of spending cannot be sustained and pretending it can only guarantees a bigger crisis down the road. But you don't seem to be interested in talking about facts and things that might actually solve problems. Instead, you'd prefer to appeal to unfounded emotionalism. In other words, you aren't worth paying attention to. Come back when you're taller than the line to ride.

[Copernicus]

SS and Mcare need to be UNdone, not "REdone." Not overnight, maybe dismantled over a generation.

"The other things you talk about, consumer and environmental protections, are extremely minor portions of the budget, and your lumping them in together with the first two is intellectual dishonesty on your part. "

The significance of consumer and environmental protections is not their cost as found in the Federal Budget. It is their effect of retarding productivity. You know that was the point, so you are the one being dishonest.

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