Cont: The Biden Presidency (3)

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Solitaire said:
Biden Signs Debt Ceiling Bill

Well, it's a done deal.

I don't know why we have to borrow so much. It looks like you could cut a few programs,
like these.




I had to reject the "Imputed Rents On Impudent Economists" as unreal, but
I think one could argue for cutting out some of the other 1.5 trillion dollars
spent on these programs.

Hm. Where'd I put that list?
Click to expand...

Be careful. You are coming dangerously close to implying that tax cuts do not magically pay for themselves...
 
Yeah, Delvo, Biden won. This was basically the end of MAGA. Sure those goofy people will go to all the rallies and dress silly and government is bad. But all that is now irrelevant. We are on our way back to "taxes are bad."
 
From Delvo's extremely long rant n' rave re Biden and the ceiling debt deal:

If this stupid issue goes away for a year and comes back, nothing is really any different in the big picture. It just means Biden himself won't need to face it during re-election year. That's a grand total of one person in the entire country benefitting from this.
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One person? How about the entire country and the world not facing an economically catastrophic default because you think Biden and McCarthy should have stamped their feet and held their breath like a couple of two-year-olds and demanded they get everything they wanted?

In short, every single thing the Republicans (including Manchin) wanted when they went into this process, they got, and every single thing in the other direction that anybody might want, they didn't get.
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That is just plain false as discussed in this link I provided to you previously.

Here's another article that discusses who both Biden and McCarthy won and lost:
5 winners and 5 losers from the debt ceiling deal
 
i don't think biden can unilaterally get everything he wants. i think he's been fairly effective considering the state of the country.
 
dirtywick said:
i don't think biden can unilaterally get everything he wants. i think he's been fairly effective considering the state of the country.
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Of course he can't. All presidents have to deal with Congress and whether his/her own party controls both Houses. If they don't have a supermajority, they must compromise to get anything at all done.

I find claims that Biden and the Dems are basically gutless and Republicans get everything they want very unrealistic and naive.
 
dirtywick said:
i don't think biden can unilaterally get everything he wants. i think he's been fairly effective considering the state of the country.
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For the moment, let's skip the issue of Biden succeeding/winning or failing/losing, because that involves assessing what it even is that he wants, which is a separate issue from the actual results themselves. Let's just look at the actual policies that are in this thing. There is not a single one that Democrats wanted and Republicans didn't, or that's in there to help the American populace, or that's in there even to actually get the budget any closer to balance. Every single item of the bill's actual contents, what the bill actually does, goes the opposite way from that. It's an upward-wealth-transferring, budget-busting bill of things the Republicans wanted, every step of the way. Inferences about what that means about either Biden's competence or his motivations are a separate question from that fact.
 
Delvo said:
... There is not a single one that Democrats wanted and Republicans didn't, or that's in there to help the American populace, or that's in there even to actually get the budget any closer to balance. Every single item of the bill's actual contents, what the bill actually does, goes the opposite way from that. It's an upward-wealth-transferring, budget-busting bill of things the Republicans wanted, every step of the way. ...
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Not that many people agree with you here but I'm including analysts outside of the forum.

To only address things in the bill, you've cherry-picked, "in there to help the American populace". What about all the things Biden managed to keep out of the bill?

My Social Security is not decreasing, for example. Did you consider that?

https://www.npr.org/2023/06/04/1180...ct-social-safety-net-programs-and-the-climate
LUDDEN: Right, so it will be - the age of people who are subject to work requirements under this program known as SNAP is going to go up from 49 to 54. And we're talking able-bodied adults with no dependents, which, by the way, are a small share of the 42 million people who get food assistance. But these older adults will now have to spend 20 hours a week working or in job training. And for sure, plenty of people work well past age 54. But critics say, you know, it can be tough when you're talking about low-wage jobs. I spoke with Ed Bolen at the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. He says, you know, in fast food or retail, for example, the hours can be unpredictable, and older people might have more health problems.

ED BOLEN: Those folks might be unable to do the kind of work they used to do 20 years ago, right? They can't find a job in a warehouse because their back - or they're worn out from working. And it's not easy to switch at the age of 52 to a whole different kind of job.
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"With no dependents" so sans childcare issues. I'm just not seeing the tragedy here or the offending compromise.
 
Delvo said:
For the moment, let's skip the issue of Biden succeeding/winning or failing/losing, because that involves assessing what it even is that he wants, which is a separate issue from the actual results themselves. Let's just look at the actual policies that are in this thing. There is not a single one that Democrats wanted and Republicans didn't, or that's in there to help the American populace, or that's in there even to actually get the budget any closer to balance. Every single item of the bill's actual contents, what the bill actually does, goes the opposite way from that. It's an upward-wealth-transferring, budget-busting bill of things the Republicans wanted, every step of the way. Inferences about what that means about either Biden's competence or his motivations are a separate question from that fact.
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You've been given links discussing what the deal entails...some more than once...that do not support your claims. Are you not bothering to read them or are you just being willfully blind?

From just one link I provided to you twice:

"Full funding for the medical care of military veterans would also increase, in line with what President Biden had sought."

While able-bodied people up to age 54 with no dependents will have to work at least part time (Oh, boo hoo!), Biden "gained exceptions to the food stamp requirements for veterans and people who are homeless."

A win for Democrats was securing $80bn for a decade to help the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to enforce the tax code in last year's Inflation Reduction Act on the richest.
Biden agreed to cut $20bn but divert that cash to other non-defence spending."

"Republicans had wanted to repeal key provisions of the Inflation Reduction Act's clean energy and climate provisions but it was unscathed."

Perhaps you should stop finding fault with whatever Biden and the Dems, especially the moderate Dems, do or don't do and start looking more realistically at what they have actually accomplished. You seem to forget that the highly partisan GOP controls the House and the Dems only hold the Senate majority due to VP Harris.
 
Skeptic Ginger said:
Not that many people agree with you here
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Yes, I noticed how the obedient script-reading about Biden's cosmic stupendousness switched on all over the web & TV overnight as soon as everybody got their copy of the script, but I also noticed the lack of actual content in it. That script didn't include any items from the bill to actually support what it told us we're supposed to think feel; it's just been an apparently catchy little mantra and a bunch vague starry-eyed feelingism about what a wondrous divine gift to the world Biden is and how the Republicans got humiliated & clobbered & cucked & stomped all over & torn to shreds & sodomized. What does the bill actually do to earn all that?

Skeptic Ginger said:
I'm including analysts outside of the forum.
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Replay that video with NotePad open or an actual notepad & pen ready or whatever, and record each specific item he specifies from the bill. (Just make sure not to give up while waiting through the pauses, lest you miss something when he comes back out of a pause.) Perhaps you thought there was a long list of the bill's details somewhere in there because you liked its "conclusion", but that's just not how it actually went. Its actual content on the substance of the bill is a grand total of one thing: the avoidance of the default until it can be some other President's problem. But neither party wanted to default, so that's just agreeing with each other from the start, not a win or a loss for either of them. He provided literally not one single other item of any substance. Gushing on & on & on & on & on about his favorite member of his favorite boy-band simply doesn't count. (...especially when it includes comments about the strategic need to avoid doing exactly that, while still doing it, thus proving that he doesn't even buy one part or another of his own story... and especially when it involves pretending the bill did other things that it had nothing at all to do with in any way like saving us from the danger of Greene's insanitweets that were obviously never going to materialize anyway.)
 
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Delvo said:
Yes, I noticed how the obedient script-reading about Biden's cosmic stupendousness switched on all over the web & TV overnight as soon as everybody got their copy of the script, but I also noticed the lack of actual content in it....
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Yeah, I think I'm done here. This is nonsense, not any kind of actual debate or discussion of facts.
 
Delvo said:
His list of what he calls good things resulting from this agreement is this:
  1. Debt ceiling suspended for remainder of this Presidential term
  2. Lauren Boebert doesn't like point 1
  3. Ralph Norman doesn't like point 1

...

  • "Pay-Go" (Pay As You Go)... is now extended to executive actions.
  • Cuts to all non-military discretionary spending
  • Work requirements for SNAP...
  • The IRS funding boost... got cut from 80 billion $ down to 60.
  • Retrieving federal money that was sent to states for COVID-19 expenses... needs to be something Republicans were against. But whey weren't...
  • The agreement makes approval processes for fossil fuel projects faster and easier by speeding up some steps and cutting out others.
  • ...student debt partial cancellation... interest has not been accumulating. Now it will because of this agreement.
  • Joe Manchin gets a gas pipeline that he's tried to get into some other bills before.
Click to expand...

Skeptic Ginger said:
This is nonsense, not any kind of actual debate or discussion of facts.
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One of us lists things that are in the bill which aren't good for the country and aren't things that Democrats wanted & Republicans didn't. The other shows zero such items in the bill pointing the other direction to show what that the alleged "big win" was, cherry-picks the least-bad single item she could find in the former's list, says it doesn't matter because it happens to a small enough number of other people instead of herself, pretends the other given details don't exist, and flounces about the lack of discussion of facts. :rolleyes:
 
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Delvo said:
One of us lists things that are in the bill which aren't good for the country and aren't things that Democrats wanted & Republicans didn't. The other shows zero such items in the bill pointing the other direction to show what that the alleged "big win" was, cherry-picks the least-bad single item she could find in the former's list, says it doesn't matter because it happens to a small enough number of other people instead of herself, pretends the other given details don't exist, and flounces about the lack of discussion of facts. :rolleyes:
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And more than one of us feels no need to tolerate your insulting generalizations and absurd unsupported hyperbolic claims.

Why should I? I'm not obligated to address your posts. I can just tell you clean up your act, especially your unsupported stereotypes or don't expect a discussion. Think about it, how is anyone supposed to have a discussion with you when your starting position is hyperbole?
 
Delvo said:
Yes, I noticed how the obedient script-reading about Biden's cosmic stupendousness switched on all over the web & TV overnight as soon as everybody got their copy of the script, but I also noticed the lack of actual content in it. That script didn't include any items from the bill to actually support what it told us we're supposed to think feel; it's just been an apparently catchy little mantra and a bunch vague starry-eyed feelingism about what a wondrous divine gift to the world Biden is and how the Republicans got humiliated & clobbered & cucked & stomped all over & torn to shreds & sodomized. What does the bill actually do to earn all that?

Replay that video with NotePad open or an actual notepad & pen ready or whatever, and record each specific item he specifies from the bill. (Just make sure not to give up while waiting through the pauses, lest you miss something when he comes back out of a pause.) Perhaps you thought there was a long list of the bill's details somewhere in there because you liked its "conclusion", but that's just not how it actually went. Its actual content on the substance of the bill is a grand total of one thing: the avoidance of the default until it can be some other President's problem. But neither party wanted to default, so that's just agreeing with each other from the start, not a win or a loss for either of them. He provided literally not one single other item of any substance. Gushing on & on & on & on & on about his favorite member of his favorite boy-band simply doesn't count. (...especially when it includes comments about the strategic need to avoid doing exactly that, while still doing it, thus proving that he doesn't even buy one part or another of his own story... and especially when it involves pretending the bill did other things that it had nothing at all to do with in any way like saving us from the danger of Greene's insanitweets that were obviously never going to materialize anyway.)
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'm with Skeptic Ginger on this:

Skeptic Ginger said:
Yeah, I think I'm done here. This is nonsense, not any kind of actual debate or discussion of facts.
Click to expand...

Skeptic Ginger said:
And more than one of us feels no need to tolerate your insulting generalizations and absurd unsupported hyperbolic claims.

Why should I? I'm not obligated to address your posts. I can just tell you clean up your act, especially your unsupported stereotypes or don't expect a discussion. Think about it, how is anyone supposed to have a discussion with you when your starting position is hyperbole?
Click to expand...
 
I'm looking at the Reuters article, What Is In The US Debt Ceiling Deal?

Losses for the democrats and the environment over energy permitting,
more CO2 in the atmosphere. The loss of covid funding another big loss.
Although, if a pandemic one hundred times more deadly sweeps through
the nation, the problem will cure itself. Smaller losses in student loans,
work permits, and the the increase in defense spending.

Caps on discretionary spending, pay as you go funding, and eight
billion in new IRS spending to get twenty billion in revenue, clear
wins for democrats. (Seriously, my suggestions on cutting tax cut
would've brought in one hundred times as much. But, oh, well.)
It'll take about six years, but the inflation in the economy eventually
catch up to the government spending resulting in a surplus.
 
Solitaire said:
I'm looking at the Reuters article, What Is In The US Debt Ceiling Deal?

Losses for the democrats and the environment over energy permitting,
more CO2 in the atmosphere.
The loss of covid funding another big loss.
Although, if a pandemic one hundred times more deadly sweeps through
the nation, the problem will cure itself. Smaller losses in student loans,
work permits, and the the increase in defense spending.
Caps on discretionary spending, pay as you go funding, and eight
billion in new IRS spending to get twenty billion in revenue, clear
wins for democrats. (Seriously, my suggestions on cutting tax cut
would've brought in one hundred times as much. But, oh, well.)
It'll take about six years, but the inflation in the economy eventually
catch up to the government spending resulting in a surplus.
Click to expand...
In no particular order:

Student loans is in reference to restarting payments which were due to restart anyway.

But it did not strike down Biden's plan to forgive $430 billion in student debt, which the Supreme Court is currently reviewing.
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IRS money shifted, not eliminated.

Work requirements for food stamp benefits only affects people from 50-54, under 50 already had the requirement. Lots of people are exempt.

COVID money applied to unspent funds.

Yeah, a lot of us want to see the tax cuts rescinded. Doesn't mean it had to happen with this legislation.

Defense department spending is going to be less than inflation so it's not an increase.

The PAYGO plan looks like it has no GOP teeth at all.

Solar and wind energy projects are still a go. There was easier permitting for oil and gas projects but it seems to me it wasn't blank check permitting so to speak.

Manchin got his way, I hope Biden is getting something in return for that. Seems to me that was the worst thing in the bill for the Democrats.

I'm not seeing the big Democratic Party losses here that the hyperbole suggests. I don't see much in the way of GOP gains, maybe I'm missing something.
 
5 million! The Republicans have been throwing around that number. Maybe Giuliani wrote it down in Ukraine.

“Let’s put an end to this once and for all. Biden Jr. and Biden Sr. do not appear in this particular proceeding,” Nazar Kholodnytsky, head of anti-corruption investigations at the prosecution service, told Saturday’s briefing.

The bribe related to a case of embezzling state money given to a bank, officials said. Some $5 million was offered to anti-corruption officials and a further $1 million was intended for an official acting as a middleman, Sytnyk said.
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https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...ribe-over-burisma-no-biden-link-idUSKBN23K0KI
 
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