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Obama Delivers the Devastating Truth: Republicans are Intentionally Killing the Recovery
By: RmuseMar. 1st, 2013more from Rmuse
Anyone who has ever had to be the bearer of bad news knows there is no kind way to convey devastating information regardless the best intentions or amount of compassion the messenger feels for the victim. When a doctor reveals the results of a laboratory test indicating a person has cancer, they simply walk in and tell the patient “you have cancer” and offer treatment options or tell them how long they have left to live. Over the past few weeks, President Obama has had the unpleasant task of telling Americans the brutal truth that, without intervention, sequester cuts will adversely affect the economy and be painful to most Americans, and despite earlier admissions the cuts will be damaging, Republicans have made no attempt to find a less-painful replacement. Republicans are notorious for fear mongering on the basis of lies and misinformation, but now they are accusing the President of fear mongering based on truth about the sequester the GOP whole-heartedly supports.
Yesterday House Majority Leader and pathological liar Eric Cantor accused President Obama of touring around the country “scaring people, creating havoc telling Americans their food is going to go uninspected and that our borders will be less patrolled and unsafe” instead of working on a sequester replacement. What Cantor is saying, in effect, is that the sequester is “not that bad,” and it explains Republican intransigence to offer any replacement and why they continue trumpeting their plan from last year’s session of Congress that included only cuts to domestic programs. The President, Senate Democrats, House Democrats, and Progressive Democrats have all proposed sequester replacements Speaker John Boehner refused to allow to come up for a vote because they included revenue and would have passed.
Cantor and many Republicans claim President Obama is intentionally making sequester cuts painful, and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said “The President is ready to make it bite as hard as possible — all to send a simple message to the public: ‘You want to control Washington spending, America? Fine, let me show you much I can make it hurt.” The problem with McConnell’s remark is that Americans are not making devastating sequester cuts, Republicans are, and they are attempting to morph “the sequester is Obama’s fault” message to “Obama is purposely making sequester cuts to the federal government painful” while they refuse to even consider alternatives except voiding defense cuts and replacing them with more domestic and safety net cuts.
The underlying Republican message is that job-killing and safety net cuts are not painful, and they are cuts Americans controlling spending really want. The truth is Republicans are quietly applauding sequester domestic cuts and want much more, such as those in Paul Ryan’s Heritage Foundation budget, the Path to Prosperity (for the rich). The President has no control over the sequester because Congress is tasked to change the law to avoid across the board cuts. There is no department or program spared (by design), so education, first responders, safety nets, food inspectors, immigration, and aviation safety will all be subject to cuts. When the President says cuts affect the entire government, he is simply telling the truth and now it is what Republicans are revolting against because they have panted for deeper cuts under the guise of “reducing the deficit,” “strengthening the economy,” or “stopping Obama’s out of control record spending spree.” A spending spree, by the way, that is non-existent, and with spending growth at its lowest rates in 60 years, Americans recognize Republican’s are wrong and the nation needs more revenue, according to a recent poll.
Republicans unremittingly harp on one message that, under President Obama, Washington is spending too much money, and it needs to stop, but 67% of Americans reject the “way Republicans in Congress are handling federal spending” including 51% of self-identified Republicans. Republicans are unfazed by Americans’ opinion of their Draconian cuts and Cantor said next week Republicans will resolve to give flexibility to the Department of Defense (DOD) on spending for the rest of the year by letting the DOD start new programs. In another poll, 62% of Republicans and 82% of Democrats are against slashing social programs, and instead prefer cutting military spending to pay down the already rapidly declining deficit. It is typical of Republicans to oppose the will of the people and aid defense programs to survive the sequester while increasing social program cuts that kill jobs, reduce services, and impact hungry children, seniors, and poverty-level working poor Americans.
Republicans are losing the battle in the court of public opinion, even among their own base, and yet to cover their wont to punish 98% of the people to protect the wealthy, oil industry, military industrial complex, and corporations, they are resorting to accusing the President of fear mongering with the truth. However, now that they have abandoned any pretense of avoiding sequester cuts to domestic programs, and admitted the sequester was Paul Ryan and Eric Cantor’s plan, their goal of killing jobs and sending the economy into a recession is finally coming into focus and the President is right to tell Americans the devastating truth; Republicans are deliberately punishing people and reversing economic recovery.
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Erin
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 7:58 pm
What recovery?
Shiva(Moderator)
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 8:19 pm
You are kidding right?
Erin
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 8:24 pm
PERSONAL INCOME AND OUTLAYS, JANUARY 2013
Personal income decreased $505.5 billion, or 3.6 percent, and disposable personal income (DPI)
decreased $491.4 billion, or 4.0 percent, in January, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis.
www.bea.gov/newsreleases/...
Erin
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 8:35 pm
Number of the day
35 percent
That’s the portion of student-loan borrowers under the age of 30 who didn’t have a deferral and were at least 90 days late on their payments at the end of 2012, according to the New York Federal Reserve Bank. That compares with a delinquency rate of 21 percent in 2004.
www.sfgate.com/business/a...
UncaJoe
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 8:36 pm
You forgot to include the next section of the report…
Cherry-pick your stats much?
Shiva(Moderator)
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 8:47 pm
One month?
Spending up. Manufacturing inventorys and orders up
Erin
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 8:45 pm
“Incomes rose more than 11 percent for the top 1 percent of earners during the economic recovery, but not at all for everybody else, according to new data.
The numbers, produced by Emmanuel Saez, an economist at the University of California, Berkeley, show overall income growing by just 1.7 percent over the period. But there was a wide gap between the top 1 percent, whose earnings rose by 11.2 percent, and the other 99 percent, whose earnings declined by 0.4 percent.”
www.nytimes.com/2013/02/1...
Shiva(Moderator)
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 8:49 pm
That wide gap has been there since reagan. Thats nothing new.
93% of new wages went to the 1% last year.
justthefactsplease
Mar. 4th, 2013 at 2:59 am
for Shiva, Really?
This shows what you say is not true. Take a look at the income gap over the years.
www.cbpp.org/cms/index.cf...
Erin
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 9:02 pm
The rich keep getting richer and everybody else falls behind. Yes, it’s been going on since Reagan. Doesn’t matter if a D or R sits in office. The rules are rigged in favor of the rich and Obama has done nothing to stop that. Same ol’ same ol’. Just a different year.
Shiva(Moderator)
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 9:04 pm
There is little he can do without the house and senate. Now, your point?
Erin
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 9:05 pm
Investigate the “special factors”.
www.zerohedge.com/news/20...
ibwilliamsi
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 10:20 pm
Erin, you seem very invested in cherry picked quotes and posting links that you hope people won’t actually look at to prove you wrong. Who’s paying you to do this? I could do that job.
Erin
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 9:10 pm
All those Wall St people Obama appointed to his administration. I knew right then nothing would change. Wall St got saved and bailed out while Main St is left twisting in the wind.
Shiva(Moderator)
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 9:12 pm
Who bailed out Wall Street? Hint, it was called TARP
Now I agree with you, and I think nothing will ever happen to wall street. and that is specifically if a republican is in office. We have miuch in common, I agree the gap between the rich and poor is terrible. But you cant stick it on Obama as the one source to fix it
Sally
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 11:28 pm
hey Erin, TARP was passed under Bush. Just sayin’. And the deficit is decreasing, my home assessment just went UP for the first time in 4 years, which means our city will have more revenue finally. My husband just got a raise, and our son a promotion at his job. Things ARE getting better, and if the do-nothing GOP would pass the Jobs Bill, the economy would come roaring back. So of course they will not do it.
robyn ryan
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 1:13 am
No, sweetie, we’ve seen this flea circus act before.
And we know how American government operates.
This one is on the House.
Erin
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 1:55 pm
There have been numerous stealth bank bailouts going on. Like the mortgage settlement for instance. Google “stealth bank bailouts” and see for yourself.
Gretchen Morgenson, respected financial journalist for the NY Times wrote an article just last month entitled, “Don’t Blink, or You’ll Miss Another Bailout.” I encourage you to read it. But here’s a snippet:
In an interview, Senator Sherrod Brown, Democrat of Ohio, who serves on the Banking Committee, said the New York Fed’s behavior in this case “underscores that the more we learn about these bailouts, gifts and advantages that Wall Street gets, the clearer it becomes that one set of rules applies to the largest megabanks and another set of rules to the smaller financial institutions and the rest of the country.”
www.nytimes.com/2013/02/1...
AFV007
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 9:46 am
The one you’ve been sleeping through. Striving to be a tea-bagger on welfare is counter productive.
John J Kiernan
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 8:17 pm
Job cuts are unnecessary. Simply apply the sequester by effecting wage and salary reductions. Then it will truly be across the board and effect everyone. Then cease all imports. Produce and buy our own products. This will bring production jobs back to the USA and there will be a return to full employment. Pay all future Stimules $Dollars into the Soicial Security Trust Fund. Repay all of the borrowed money to the SS Trust plus 10% compound interest. Increase the old age pension by 50% and then by 10% each year following. Require all persons over age 55 to retire from their jobs to make way for youth employment.
Please read; www.Kiernan.blog.com/?p=9
Shiva(Moderator)
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 8:21 pm
I agree with some of what you say, but lets say wages are cut but nothing you buy, utilities, gas or nothing elese is cut accordingly?
Charlotte Propes
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 8:27 pm
Only Congress has the power to make laws and pass budgets. Boehner and McConnell should be impeached.
Just A Dumb Fireman
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 11:17 am
They should be impeached, brought to trial, found guilty, and hanged for treason.
Anne
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 8:31 pm
They tried and failed to make Barack Obama a one-term president. Now, they are trying to sabotage his legacy by working to negate what he has accomplished so far in getting us out of the proverbial economic ditch. And it’s about winning, not governing for them.
Victoria
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 8:53 pm
The republicans are punishing America for losing the election. The Prez should have NEVER signed on to this plan! I am ashamed of our government!
L3
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 11:22 pm
He only signed on to that plan to get those fuckers to raise the debt ceiling. Please PBO supporters you must remember the events that precede these debacles. They all lead straight to the GOP. Blaming the president for signing on to a plan that prevented economic disaster in 2011 is senseless and misplaced. The GOP bears all the responsibility and should receive all the blame.
503me
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 11:29 pm
Its a sad day, when your country is being destroyed by the very people we sent to DC to ‘work’ for ‘we the people’ We are fast becoming a ‘banana republic’(read an article out of South America that refereed to our country as a new ‘banana republic) with a fascist corporate overlord. Sure wish that what i just wrote was just a ‘fiction’ but sadly its not.
Sugarstalker
Mar. 1st, 2013 at 11:48 pm
What Republicans are doing is nothing new. Tricks, chicaneries, anything to make us believe that our interest lies in their ways. There is nothing they can say now that would remotely be credible. They say it, it’s crap, they do it, it’s criminal.
Paws
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 8:15 am
People want to lay the blame for this at the feet of the President, seemingly forgetting that he is not, as he said yesterday, a dictator. He cannot wave a magic wand and make all the world’s ills go away. Nor can he force the GOP to get back in the game of governing responsibly. Bills originate in Congress; Boehner can crow all he wants about passing two plans last year in the House but that’s really ridiculous. The plans did not include revenue, they weren’t balanced, and he knew – HE KNEW – they had no hope of getting through the Senate. Moreover, those two bills mean nothing in THIS Congress. If those two Houses do not work together to come up with a balanced approach that they can ALL agree on, then what exactly is the President supposed to do? Lock them up and start issuing decrees? It doesn’t work like that and anyone saying he could do this, that or the other thing, is ignoring how our government actually works.
The right thinks he is a dictator but if he were, he would have just thrown this law out and enacted his own policies without a thought to Congress. He doesn’t do that because he can’t. Instead, he tries to work with Congress but Congress is where this week? Not in DC. The President is in DC, but with the country in a crisis, Congress decided to adjourn.
Why aren’t they in DC working to help fix this mess?
Kimberly
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 8:31 am
Balanced? Please do tell me something the POTUS has done that is balanced. He takes and takes with the “Promise” of what ever later which never arrives, such as taxes… give me tax hikes now and i’ll give you cuts later, and here we are still waiting for the cuts while he yet again wants more taxes!
He has done nothing balanced and is nothing more than a thug trying to bully people into what he wants. He tells we the people to cut back and make sacrifices while he wastes money still on 2 vacations in a 2 month period, flying around campaigning still, you all might want to inform him that he won the election and can stop campaigning wasting OUR MONEY!!!
He has lied at every turn, every turn from obamacare to taxes & immigration reform.. he’s nothing but a thug and a liar!!
djchefron(Moderator)
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 8:36 am
I see you don’t pay attention so here is a cliff notes version
Quick summary of the Budget Control Act
keithhennessey.com/2011/0...
For the rest of your rant the only it proves is you are just plain ignorant
Betsy
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 10:04 am
Wow, you must watch all the lies on Faux News. None of what you say is true and you would know that if you did some research.
Just A Dumb Fireman
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 11:38 am
Hey, Kim – not EVERY n-n-nnn-nene-n-n-nNEGRO is a thug, you know.
Michael Soule
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 2:45 pm
Are You Seriously that Stupid Kimberly?
Paws
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 4:53 pm
You are seriously deluded, Kimberly.
Get thee a clue!
Doris~
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 7:27 pm
Kimberly…you should take your chit and decrepit mind on over to fox (fake) news..
Joseph
Mar. 4th, 2013 at 2:37 am
I would say you have the finite wit of a rock.
Mary James
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 12:04 pm
quote of the day “we will never hear the truth if we do not shut up and listen”.
PSzymeczek
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 1:15 pm
Here’s an excellent article by Robert Reich I found over at Nation of Change:
www.nationofchange.org/se...
Erin
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 2:02 pm
The economy is so excellent, here’s a list of stores closing in 2013:
Best Buy
Forecast store closings: 200 to 250
Sears Holding Corp.
Forecast store closings: Kmart 175 to 225, Sears 100 to 125
J.C. Penney
Forecast store closings: 300 to 350
Office Depot
Forecast store closings: 125 to 150
Barnes & Noble
Forecast store closings: 190 to 240, per company comments
Gamestop
Forecast store closings: 500 to 600
OfficeMax
Forecast store closings: 150 to 175
RadioShack
Forecast store closings: 450 to 550
finance.yahoo.com/news/ei...
This is the new normal. All those jobs we lost during the financial crisis? They aren’t coming back. Everything is getting scaled back, just like your paycheck and buying power.
Doris~
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 7:31 pm
The Koch led teathugs,what are they good for? absolutely nothing! they are aliens here to obstruct and bring down the country and in order to save our country,this country called America we must oust the tgop or we are doomed.
Inez
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 11:06 pm
The GOPers don’t want their assets touched, but they are on the entitlement bandwagon when it comes to LOOPHOLES, 28 corporations and banks could have brought 28 billion to the Treasury, When they talk about entitlements, let’s talk about loopholes. The tax code needs revision!!!!!If, as they say, an increase in their taxes would lose jobs,,,,well….where are those jobs with the staus quo for those earning BIG$$$$$$??? Outsourcing has killed the middle class, with manufacTuring done with cheap labor and very little oversight on those companies, Many of whom YOU AND I subsidize, despite theirSOARING PROFITS AND BIG SALARIES FOR THE CEOs.
draven
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 11:28 pm
obama himself is putting all these places out of business because they cant afford obamacare.
djchefron(Moderator)
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 11:37 pm
You have no idea on how you are getting ripped off by the private health industry
“Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity, and I am not sure about the universe.” — Albert Einstein
Shiva(Moderator)
Mar. 2nd, 2013 at 11:52 pm
Bullshit- nice try
Scott Schindler
Mar. 3rd, 2013 at 12:14 am
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it's our fault
Mar. 3rd, 2013 at 8:03 am
You waste your time blogging and bantering about with each other. Get out and do something about it. Our, your Constitution demands you to. Or do you all not believe in that either? Your key strokes are as worthless as your will. Do something that actually makes a difference.
djchefron(Moderator)
Mar. 3rd, 2013 at 8:19 am
We did.We elected Barack Hussein Obama as President of the United States.Not bad huh?
Shiva(Moderator)
Mar. 3rd, 2013 at 8:43 am
Well, we just threw our right to free speech out da winder
Brenda Johnson
Mar. 3rd, 2013 at 6:22 pm
The first thing that needs to be cut is all the benefits that the elected officials get after they are no longer in office. These life long benefits have got to stop. I don’t get benefits from jobs I have had in the past. If they have to start living like the rest of us Americans then they wouldn’t be so high and mighty.
THAT IS WHERE IT NEEDS TO START!!!!! NOW!!!! NOT TOMORROW, NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!
TimD
Mar. 3rd, 2013 at 7:37 pm
We are talking 2 and a half percent of the federal budget. How many of you could cut your personal budget by %2.5 in ways you didn’t feel it. Well, the President could cut from wherever he chooses. It does not have to be defense. Many of these cuts could be done by giving employees early retirement buy-outs. Not filling vacant jobs and so on. He chooses the areas to inflict the most pain.
The fact is, he got his revenue increase a year and a half ago, now he says we need more. He could cut all foriegn aid and that would be one percent right there.
Shiva(Moderator)
Mar. 3rd, 2013 at 7:42 pm
The president chose them? He proposed them, the house and senate could have modified them. They didnt. Defense needs to be cut, its not like we have any enemies that could attack us
Cameron
Mar. 4th, 2013 at 11:07 am
LOL Erin those companies have been going under for a long time, many of them you listed started dying under Bush. Gamestop and Barnes and Noble along with several of those companies are dying because their products are obsolete, they didn’t stay ahead of the curve and that’s why they’re going under. It’s not the economy. Gamestop for instance sells video games correct? Anyone who plays video games knows that the trend is going the way of digital download directly from the companies, replacing the old model of discs, which are expensive to produce, which is why they’re being replaced. This cuts middle men like Gamestop and puts the money directly in the pockets of the developers. With no discs to sell, Gamestop no longer has a product, that’s due to their own shortsightedness. It’s the same reason Hollywood video and Blockbuster went under. If you want to blame anything for it, blame the internet. The same thing is true for Barnes and Noble. People read books on Kindles and smart phones now, they no longer have a product to sell, they didn’t adapt their business model in time. They go under. That’s the nature of the beast of technology, it makes things obsolete and the industries that support obsolete technology disappear.
The Platzner Post
Mar. 4th, 2013 at 1:42 pm
The GOP won’t be happy until they destroy our economy, so they can blame President Obama!!! Sharing on The Platzner Post Facebook www.facebook.com/ThePlatz..., and Twitter twitter.com/ThePlatznerPo....
TerryV
Mar. 6th, 2013 at 6:29 pm
Draven, ANOTHER cop-out excuse for why places are going out of business is to blame it on the ACA because YOU, like ALL uninformed who ave never read ONE thing in the actual law and are totally insurance illiterate because commercial health insurance costs businesses “dearly” and far more what covering employees under the provisions of the ACA EVER will if any of YOUR kind would stop listening to all the crap spread by the constant fascist RW propaganda spew about it and LEARN something for a change…Even Koch Industries was taking advantage of that “job-killing Obamacare” under the ERRP program that had 5 billion in funds but is tapped out. Last claim participating employers could file under under it was of 12/31/2011 and the program was to be in place until 2014 until the exchanges take up BOTH the benefits this program allowed participating employers to choose one of-(80% of insurance premiums the employer was covering for early retirees and the other 20% went to the retiree which would be those retirees who are not eligible for MC, or providing pymt on qualified health claims filed by early retirees that employers are obligated to provide through their health plans covering those individuals)….Many emnployers have not been able to meet those obligations to these people or have increased the employee contriubtions for the retiree to keep the health plan, reduced their benefits or both so much, many retirees have had no coice but to drop the insurance because they can’t afford it anymore, often after having worked for a very large, profitable multi-millionaire, billionaire company, corporation only to be royally screwed BY THEM. Look up this up for yourself and see what corporations have taken the benefits of ERRP while they sure were no supporters of Obama, democrats in either of the last 2 election cycles and openly supported the R’s, gave tons of money to the R’s and their super pacs and their lobbyists to lie about how horrible the ACA is. Obama is a socialist, a marxist and wants to kill jobs with all those “supposed regulations” when all of it pure LIES and BS.
LEARN something besides listening to your usual RW CRAP.
djchefron(Moderator)
Mar. 6th, 2013 at 6:45 pm
The ACA might be a tough read for them to understand.Now on the other hand they should understand what the private non-profit health industrial complex that they glorified is doing.And it ain’t pretty
Health Insurance
Bitter Pill: Why Medical Bills Are Killing Us
Read more: healthland.time.com/2013/...