Ask an Ideologue... or Better Yet, Don't
I thought it might be best to really get down to the nitty-gritty of our current political debate over increasing the national debt ceiling. So in order to this, I present to you this completely-fictional-but-rooted-somewhat-in-truth series of Q&A's between myself and a left-wing ideologue, a right-wing ideologue, and a normal everyday American.
Me: Thank you for joining me, Mr. Left-Wing Ideologue. As you know, we now have a national debt of over $14 trillion, which may soon affect our ability to borrow money and our overall economic standing. What do you want to see done to reduce our national debt?
Left-Wing Ideologue: Pull our troops out of Iraq, Libya, and Afghanistan NOW!!! Those wars cost $4 trillion and hundreds of thousands of innocent lives!
Me: Well, first of all, I'm with you on Libya. We never should have gotten involved in that. In fact, if you want to talk about defense measures that really cost us too much, why the hell do we still need NATO? Read George Will's recent piece on that. But as far as pulling out of Iraq, WE ARE. And this will be done in 6 months. Speeding it up doesn't help at all. Ditto Afghanistan. We already know that we're going to stay after the president's recent speech, but even if we were to pull out, it would take a while, and... oh yeah, it wouldn't unspend the $4 trillion we have spent on those conflicts. So what's your next idea?
LWI: First of all, George Will's a conservative, and therefore he's an idiot, so I won't be reading that column. And the point of those wars is we spent $4 trillion which could have been spent on other things, and it's all George W. Bush's fault!
Me: So what you're saying is you would have rather racked up $4 trillion in debt on other things. Debt is debt, regardless of what the money was spent on. Oh, and while you were blaming President Bush, our debt just went up another $25 million. So what do you actually want to see done to reduce the debt?
LWI: Tax the rich! Get rid of the Bush tax cuts... again, it's HIS fault that we're in this mess!
Me: And the debt just went up another $25 million... but I do think we should close tax loopholes and we should have revoked the Bush tax cuts on everyone last year. But it will take more than just that, so what spending would you like to see cut?
LWI: NONE! And you want taxes to go up on the shrinking middle class AND their entitlement programs cut? What kind of heartless, evil, Republican scum are you? If anything, we're not spending ENOUGH! We need another stimulus! The president has sold us out by proposing trillions in cuts!
Me: Okay, let me get this straight... you just want to tax and spend some more, and that will solve our $14 trillion national debt?
LWI: Well, nobody cares about the national debt anyway. Paul Krugman told me that. He's got a Nobel Prize in economics so he's never wrong.
Me: Uh, yeah... thank you, Mr. Left-Wing Ideologue. I am now joined by Mr. Right-Wing Ideologue. What is the first thing you would like to see done to fix the national debt?
Right-Wing Ideologue: Well, first of all, I just want to say your previous guest is a Socialist, Communist, Marxist pig of the lowest order. It's his boy Obama that is to blame for our large national debt.
Me: And as I told him, our national debt just went up another $25 million while you played the blame game. So what do you actually want to do about the debt?
RWI: CUT, CUT, CUT!!! Paul Ryan is the man! We need to approve his blueprint, cut $6 trillion from the federal budget, and that will get us going in the right direction.
Me: Well, he means well, but there is no way we can cut that deeply. The president is offering $4 trillion in cuts, and that should suffice, but raising revenues would also get the job done faster. So what changes in tax policy are you looking to make?
RWI: NONE! We cannot raise taxes at all! If anything, we should cut taxes even farther. Americans pay too much in taxes!
Me: Taxes are at their lowest level since 1950, and we're not really looking to raise taxes so much as close tax loopholes so that all these companies like GE actually PAY taxes like they are supposed to. So what do you say to that?
RWI: First of all, you, sir, are not a real Republican. Secondly, I, um... I signed that pledge to Grover Norquist not to raise any taxes ever, no matter how badly we need to, and technically... that's a tax increase... so, yeah, I'm stuck. Sorry.
Me: Thank you for your time, and for having absolutely no balls. Lastly, I turn to Mr. Regular American. What would you like to see done about our national debt?
Regular American: SOMETHING! ANYTHING! Approve the President's deal, he's giving Republicans exactly what they want on the spending side. Just take this as a victory and move on... ya know, to working on something that might actually get me a JOB!
Me: So you don't mind that your taxes may go up?
Regular American: I've learned to tighten my belt, why can't the government? I'll make do, but they're not going to get ANY taxes from me if I don't have a JOB. So yeah, take away those loopholes and tax shelters, and make it so some company will realize it costs them less to give ME a job than to outsource it.
Me: That's the first sensible thing I've heard all day...
Me: Thank you for joining me, Mr. Left-Wing Ideologue. As you know, we now have a national debt of over $14 trillion, which may soon affect our ability to borrow money and our overall economic standing. What do you want to see done to reduce our national debt?
Left-Wing Ideologue: Pull our troops out of Iraq, Libya, and Afghanistan NOW!!! Those wars cost $4 trillion and hundreds of thousands of innocent lives!
Me: Well, first of all, I'm with you on Libya. We never should have gotten involved in that. In fact, if you want to talk about defense measures that really cost us too much, why the hell do we still need NATO? Read George Will's recent piece on that. But as far as pulling out of Iraq, WE ARE. And this will be done in 6 months. Speeding it up doesn't help at all. Ditto Afghanistan. We already know that we're going to stay after the president's recent speech, but even if we were to pull out, it would take a while, and... oh yeah, it wouldn't unspend the $4 trillion we have spent on those conflicts. So what's your next idea?
LWI: First of all, George Will's a conservative, and therefore he's an idiot, so I won't be reading that column. And the point of those wars is we spent $4 trillion which could have been spent on other things, and it's all George W. Bush's fault!
Me: So what you're saying is you would have rather racked up $4 trillion in debt on other things. Debt is debt, regardless of what the money was spent on. Oh, and while you were blaming President Bush, our debt just went up another $25 million. So what do you actually want to see done to reduce the debt?
LWI: Tax the rich! Get rid of the Bush tax cuts... again, it's HIS fault that we're in this mess!
Me: And the debt just went up another $25 million... but I do think we should close tax loopholes and we should have revoked the Bush tax cuts on everyone last year. But it will take more than just that, so what spending would you like to see cut?
LWI: NONE! And you want taxes to go up on the shrinking middle class AND their entitlement programs cut? What kind of heartless, evil, Republican scum are you? If anything, we're not spending ENOUGH! We need another stimulus! The president has sold us out by proposing trillions in cuts!
Me: Okay, let me get this straight... you just want to tax and spend some more, and that will solve our $14 trillion national debt?
LWI: Well, nobody cares about the national debt anyway. Paul Krugman told me that. He's got a Nobel Prize in economics so he's never wrong.
Me: Uh, yeah... thank you, Mr. Left-Wing Ideologue. I am now joined by Mr. Right-Wing Ideologue. What is the first thing you would like to see done to fix the national debt?
Right-Wing Ideologue: Well, first of all, I just want to say your previous guest is a Socialist, Communist, Marxist pig of the lowest order. It's his boy Obama that is to blame for our large national debt.
Me: And as I told him, our national debt just went up another $25 million while you played the blame game. So what do you actually want to do about the debt?
RWI: CUT, CUT, CUT!!! Paul Ryan is the man! We need to approve his blueprint, cut $6 trillion from the federal budget, and that will get us going in the right direction.
Me: Well, he means well, but there is no way we can cut that deeply. The president is offering $4 trillion in cuts, and that should suffice, but raising revenues would also get the job done faster. So what changes in tax policy are you looking to make?
RWI: NONE! We cannot raise taxes at all! If anything, we should cut taxes even farther. Americans pay too much in taxes!
Me: Taxes are at their lowest level since 1950, and we're not really looking to raise taxes so much as close tax loopholes so that all these companies like GE actually PAY taxes like they are supposed to. So what do you say to that?
RWI: First of all, you, sir, are not a real Republican. Secondly, I, um... I signed that pledge to Grover Norquist not to raise any taxes ever, no matter how badly we need to, and technically... that's a tax increase... so, yeah, I'm stuck. Sorry.
Me: Thank you for your time, and for having absolutely no balls. Lastly, I turn to Mr. Regular American. What would you like to see done about our national debt?
Regular American: SOMETHING! ANYTHING! Approve the President's deal, he's giving Republicans exactly what they want on the spending side. Just take this as a victory and move on... ya know, to working on something that might actually get me a JOB!
Me: So you don't mind that your taxes may go up?
Regular American: I've learned to tighten my belt, why can't the government? I'll make do, but they're not going to get ANY taxes from me if I don't have a JOB. So yeah, take away those loopholes and tax shelters, and make it so some company will realize it costs them less to give ME a job than to outsource it.
Me: That's the first sensible thing I've heard all day...
posted by Dave | 1:28 PM
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