Did that CUT hurt? How bout this one?

Alright folks, let us talk some government cuts shall we? I would like everyone to think about what government cuts that could be done. The only thing I ask is if it calls it out in the Constitution, do not put those down.

I will start out opening bids.

What I would like, is for you to copy the list and add your cuts to it. That way we do not have too many overlaps.

In case of double postings and the like, I will fix the list.

If you do not agree with the item, speak up for your case and we will discuss it.

If it is a complete cut, just state the component. If it is partial, give us what part or percentage, whatever.

Here is a link to the index of US Government Departments-US Federal Government Departments


Time to makes some cuts

1-National Public Radio and Public TV
2-National Endowment for the Arts
3-US Military reduce bases in foreign countries by 90%. Redeploy one half to the Mexican border area. And build requisite bases necessary to redeploy to this region. Redeploy our bases so that we are protecting the US sovereign area and not other countries. Project power, but not globally. Non interventionism is the key.
4-IRS
5-Federal Reserve
6-National Education Agency
7-Administration Conference of the United States



The Top 6 were just off the top of my head. The 7th was the first on the list in the link provided, that I saw no reason for. It was shutdown before and Obama started it up again. CUT IT!

Like I overheard-It is just a mere flesh wound!

reply to post by saltheart foamfollower


How about, no thanks?

Typical typical to suggest cutting NPR, public TV and the NEA.

Leave it up to the poorly-educated to attack education. LOL.

reply to post by The Sword


Funny, I asked if anyone had a problem with anything on the list, to post your thoughts.

Since I should reply in kind, TYPICAL.

See, this is the problem with the liberal mindset. I put the military on the list, and some things that should never be funded by the federal government. Is there an education component in the Consitution? Funding the press? Funding art?

Your comment does what? Absolutely nothing. I say again, typical of the liberal mindset.

edit to add-I have to wonder, since you call me poorly edumacated, would you like to see the 3 honors list awards I got while in college? How bout you show me and I will show you mine.

Typical elitist attitude, assuming something without any facts.

RR paraphrased, it is not that our liberal friends are stupid, they just know so much that isn't so.

Originally posted by The Sword
reply to post by saltheart foamfollower

 

How about, no thanks?

Typical typical to suggest cutting NPR, public TV and the NEA.

Leave it up to the poorly-educated to attack education. LOL.

The US has a massive deficit and doesn't seem to want to deal with it. Here in the UK we are having the biggest cuts since the 2nd world war. The politicians tagline is " we are all in this together ". except the cuts here are targeting the poor and middle class's while leaving the rich free. The bankers will contribute least to paying back the deficit, which says it all really.

I will be interested to see how the US approaches it's deficit and what services get cut.

reply to post by woodwardjnr


Well, you can see the basic response that will come from the liberals.

They will fling feces just like monkeys.

Like I said, typical mindset of a liberal here in the US. Absolutely no civility when someone states something they do not like.

I would not be surprised if the commenter comes back with the other typical liberal response, after I returned them such a nice collection of flowers?

reply to post by saltheart foamfollower


Do you think its possible to cut a 10 trillion dollar deficit with the minimum cuts you have outlined. Do you think raising taxes could help bring down that deficit or are you against tax rises?

I dont understand how the conservatives intent to tackle the deficit. Smaller government will give more power to the multi national corporations who will look for the cheapest labour rather than staying in America.

reply to post by woodwardjnr


What are you talking about? I just started the list. I could of put together a package that would cut a trillion a year. But I kind of wanted to hear what others thought.

You know, get some input from people instead of just talking at them. That is what reasonable people do.

But I guess you wanted me to put everything together so I could get the standard response from the likes of "The Sword".

If the thread goes no where, no big deal.

edit to add-I currently pay 50-75% taxation. I think taxation is WAY too high as it is.

Who are you going to tax? The rich? They do not pay any taxes. Jeez what is the matter with people.

You ever hear the story of Warren Buffet, he once stated his secretary paid more taxes than him. Why do you think that is? Do you think he was lying?

How bout just eliminate ALL taxes except one, sales tax. How bout that? Set it at 35% for EVERYTHING except food, clothes and primary residence. Include stocks with this.

That would eliminate all tax crime and all the problems with the stock market. Solve ALL kinds of problems. But no, people want to raise it on income taxation. This hits the small business and the slightly well off. You need the big money not to have to pay taxes. This is the game. It always has been.

Sometimes people just get me so flummoxed.

reply to post by saltheart foamfollower


It looks like a good start to me, but realistically, the GOP has only a minimal ability to pass their own agenda. Obama still controls the presidency and the veto, and his Democratic party still maintains a majority in the Senate. The only thing they're going to be able to do effectively is to provide a backstop to prevent any more of this left wing lunacy from passing.

Originally posted by saltheart foamfollower

Time to makes some cuts

1-National Public Radio and Public TV
2-National Endowment for the Arts
3-US Military reduce bases in foreign countries by 90%. Redeploy one half to the Mexican border area. And build requisite bases necessary to redeploy to this region. Redeploy our bases so that we are protecting the US sovereign area and not other countries. Project power, but not globally. Non interventionism is the key.
4-IRS
5-Federal Reserve
6-National Education Agency
7-Administration Conference of the United States

Planning on runnig for president ? you've got my vote lol

______________

Originally posted by woodwardjnr
reply to post by saltheart foamfollower

 

Do you think its possible to cut a 10 trillion dollar deficit with the minimum cuts you have outlined. Do you think raising taxes could help bring down that deficit or are you against tax rises?

I dont understand how the conservatives intent to tackle the deficit. Smaller government will give more power to the multi national corporations who will look for the cheapest labour rather than staying in America.

I wanted to point out that your thinking of national debt as opposed to trade deficit. America had a surplus in 2000, did this mean we didn't have a debt? No, we've always* had a debt.

The current debt of the US is in the $13.6 trillion area, whereas the deficit is in the $46.5 billion area.

Originally posted by saltheart foamfollower
You ever hear the story of Warren Buffet, he once stated his secretary paid more taxes than him. Why do you think that is? Do you think he was lying?

Warren Buffet is in a lower income bracket than his secretary. He also makes all of his 'big' money from stocks, which have a far lower tax rate. He can afford to play the system, so he does.

I don't understand why you want to make all these cuts, especially to places as important as education. Why is it whenever someone says 'cut', people immediately look to education?

Time to makes some cuts

1-National Public Radio and Public TV

Probably the most mainstream programming you'll ever get deserves to be cut...because private corporations (Fox and MSNBC) do a better job?

2-National Endowment for the Arts

What's wrong with art and self expression? Should a nation, a people, an intelligent species opress, ignore and deny free thought, will and ideas from creativity?

3-US Military reduce bases in foreign countries by 90%. Redeploy one half to the Mexican border area. And build requisite bases necessary to redeploy to this region. Redeploy our bases so that we are protecting the US sovereign area and not other countries. Project power, but not globally. Non interventionism is the key.

How would this make America any better? How would this make the remaining 10% of forces any safer in dangerous areas like South Korea and other 'undisclosed' locations? Our diplomatic promises to other nations are just thrown out the window because we changed our minds?

4-IRS

This is somehow unconstitutional in your eyes, so we just cut the whole thing out.

5-Federal Reserve

Cut the Federal Reserve in order to do what exactly? Isn't it a grouping of private businesses? Wouldn't that be somewhat totalitarian of us to say that only this select group of businesses be not allowed to operate?

6-National Education Agency

The National Education Association isn't even part of the federal government...it's a union that represents public school teachers. So we should just start union bashing then? Is that a cut to the government or to the people?

7-Administration Conference of the United States

An agency created whose purpose is to:

...promote improvements in the efficiency, adequacy, and fairness of the procedures by which federal agencies conduct regulatory programs, administer grants and benefits, and perform related governmental functions.

This is something you want to cut? Really?! You have so many complaints against the government that when presented with something even resembling a betterment of its operations you have an issue with it. Unbelievable.



*-There was a short period of about three months in the 1860's where America had a debt of $0.

reply to post by saltheart foamfollower

You asked, so I'm going to throw a few curve balls.

How about cutting all oil subsidies? I think it was on the cards anyway.
How about cutting subsidies for power?
You got billions right there. tonto.eia.doe.gov...
Big, big call though.


Get the US of its addiction to pharmaceuticals and you may like to cut subsidies and breaks to Companies.
You just got a few billion more.

Add new taxes on all fast foods and Advertising(Yes, tax the advertising, I know its a tax but here comes the CUT).......you just might cut nearly 50 billion in costs due to obesity.
www.cdc.gov...
Add to the fact that that 50 billion is what medicade and medicare covered, you also have another 50 billion is savings in the private funds that can now be injected elsewhere.
OR
Cut the medical aid eligibility to obese people, and smokers. If people are not going to look after their own health, why should US taxpayers?
Is that not a valid question?
usgovinfo.about.com...

Smoking costs in cut out of healthcare, you just scored nearly 100 billion.
Possible addition this cut would create less smokers with added bonus of a reduction in lost productivity.
Round that 100billion up to 170 billion.

The WAR on DRUGS.
Billions.
Legalize pot?
Hmmm....good for a bonus new tax, maybe.
Smoke away, but you fail on healthcare eligibility.
To bong on or not to bong on? Is that the question?

Cut all contracts with private military corporations.
Hundreds and hundreds of billions.
Touchy subject.
Especially for the companies that lobby Washington, and when I say lobby, I mean those that throw in 20 billion to fund political campaigns.

Cut out the loop holes in the tax code that allow companies to "income shift".
60 billion in tax revenue coming your way.
Another curly one for sure.


How does that sound?

Originally posted by The Sword
reply to post by saltheart foamfollower

 

How about, no thanks?

Typical typical to suggest cutting NPR, public TV and the NEA.

Leave it up to the poorly-educated to attack education. LOL.

I'm guessing that (by the "LOL"), this was sarcasm.

NPR,public TV, and NEA. Since when did propaganda and bs news equate to education?

reply to post by links234

Probably the most mainstream programming you'll ever get deserves to be cut...because private corporations (Fox and MSNBC) do a better job?

Mainstream, really. Is that what you are going with? Can you tell me where the Constitution states we should be funding the press? Just wondering what authorizes it. You know I am one of those sticklers about the law.

What's wrong with art and self expression? Should a nation, a people, an intelligent species opress, ignore and deny free thought, will and ideas from creativity?

Nothing wrong with art, there is a problem with the government deciding what is art and funding it. Again, Constitutional authority? Point me to it.

How would this make America any better? How would this make the remaining 10% of forces any safer in dangerous areas like South Korea and other 'undisclosed' locations? Our diplomatic promises to other nations are just thrown out the window because we changed our minds?

Diplomatic promises? Really now. So the US has to fund the protection of the world. Again, Constitutional authority? I never said pull out completely. I said to leave 10% in strategic locations for projection of power. We have currently 700+ military bases in 130+ foreign countries. Now think about this, we do not eliminate the military, we pull them back. A total of maybe 40% reduction maybe. But we build new bases or re vamp some of the mothballed ones. We do the major building in strategic locations along the southern border where we are being invaded. 3 birds with one stone. Money flows into OUR economy instead of foreign countries due to the bases being HERE! Protect the borders. Increase our view in the world. We are just an evil capitalist empire right? That is what the dems and the libertarians talk about all the time right? Well?

As for changing our minds, well hell yes. They want us to protect them, they can hire us a mercenaries. How bout that for a free market idea?

This is somehow unconstitutional in your eyes, so we just cut the whole thing out.

There was a fundamental law that has been completely destroyed by taxation on labor. Income derived by the trade of one's labor for money is not profit. Therefore it is not income as defined in the Constitution. When you trade your labor for money, you are trading two equally valuable things. Income was NEVER defined as that and has never been written into anything within the Constitution. So yes, it is unConstitutional. Why would you mind getting rid of that. The IRS code book is a monstrosity. Ever hear of KISS. How does fraud and corruption occur? Complexities. The more something is complex, the more chances for the fraud and corruption. Basically all the codes are their to create loopholes for the buddies in government. So would you argue against getting rid of it? Common sense is all it takes.

Cut the Federal Reserve in order to do what exactly? Isn't it a grouping of private businesses? Wouldn't that be somewhat totalitarian of us to say that only this select group of businesses be not allowed to operate?

This is to big to get into. I suggest you give mnemeth a U2U and have him explain it. Me, I will just say fiat currency and fractional reserve banking steals more from the people than anything else in government. Think, who cares who writes the laws if I control the currency. Paraphrased.

The National Education Association isn't even part of the federal government...it's a union that represents public school teachers. So we should just start union bashing then? Is that a cut to the government or to the people?

Sorry, I meant the Education Administration. Not in the Constitution and is in the purview of the states.

This is something you want to cut? Really?! You have so many complaints against the government that when presented with something even resembling a betterment of its operations you have an issue with it. Unbelievable.

How many redundant systems do you need in the darn government? Hell, why not have 15,000 different agencies watching each other. This was shut down and now open again. I could name an agency something nice and dump money into it also, does not mean anything.

Sorry, do you really want to destroy the US? Just wondering.

Made a mistake in my list, I said National Education Agency, it is actually just called the Education Department.

1-National Public Radio and Public TV
2-National Endowment for the Arts
3-US Military reduce bases in foreign countries by 90%. Redeploy one half to the Mexican border area. And build requisite bases necessary to redeploy to this region. Redeploy our bases so that we are protecting the US sovereign area and not other countries. Project power, but not globally. Non interventionism is the key.
4-IRS
5-Federal Reserve
6-Education Department
7-Administration Conference of the United States
8-

reply to post by atlasastro


1-National Public Radio and Public TV
2-National Endowment for the Arts
3-US Military reduce bases in foreign countries by 90%. Redeploy one half to the Mexican border area. And build requisite bases necessary to redeploy to this region. Redeploy our bases so that we are protecting the US sovereign area and not other countries. Project power, but not globally. Non interventionism is the key.
4-IRS
5-Federal Reserve
6-National Education Agency
7-Administration Conference of the United States
8-Subsidies on oil and other energy
9-DEA

Added your energy subsidies component.

This is NOT a tax thread. If it was, I would tell you to shove your behavioral taxation ideas. Can you point to a part of the Constitution that allows such a crazy thing anyway? To tax one thing more than another ,based only upon what it is, is wrong. I have looked for this in the Constitution and I cannot find it. Name something you do and I will tax that at 1 million percent, or I will tax you specifically at 100% of your income. See how that works. You call out subsidies in one breath and then call for specific taxation on something. See the hypocrisy?

$250 Million per day of taxes on cigarettes. That is $91.25 Billion per year. Where does that money go?

How bout not trying to control people. If you do not like the cost to medicare, how bout eliminating medicare? You are addressing a symptom, not the problem. That is why the Obama Care tax bill is over 2000 pages long. It is an aspirin for a thousand symptoms and nothing addresses the disease.

Drugs, now this is radical. How bout just eliminating all federal laws in regards to personal use of drugs. Let the state decide how it wants to handle that. I am all for it. Added to the list, the DEA. This has Consitutional authority by the way. There is precedent, if it took a Constitutional amendment to both prohibit and to reenact the legality of one drug, would it not require it for any drug?

Expand on your military contracting. How are we going to defend ourselves if we do not have any weapons?

We would have to come up with some ideas on the multinationals. This is something I have wondered about. The Google fiasco is what you are talking about correct?

How about we make cuts to our actual political system? We have the technology where we could establish a direct democracy, enabling us to remove numerous highly paid political positions. Why do our leaders need to all receive $100+ grand a year in salary, a car, lavish offices, vacations, trips all over the world, expense accounts, giving their "friends" high salary political appointments, etc? All paid for by the taxpayer? I believe our leaders should be forced to take a vow of poverty in order to lead - it will separate the predators from those who actually want to serve humanity. We shower our leaders with so much wealth, power, etc, that I believe it breeds corruption from the start. They see all this "wealth" around them, just within their grasp, and they become to believe they are entitled to it.

All political corruption should be dealt with harshly. The same with white collar thieves. They should be stuck in the cells right next to the murderers and rapists, their crimes, arguably, could be considered just as harmful to society in certain ways.

Very few actually get into politics to "lead", or "help" those they represent. The only one they help is themselves.. and possibly a few special interest groups that "donated" properly to their campaign. I believe we need to scrap the system we have now, and come up with something different. It will be hard, but if we keep going in the direction we are heading in, i believe things will eventually get even worse, and very quickly.

Originally posted by saltheart foamfollower
Time to makes some cuts

1-National Public Radio and Public TV
2-National Endowment for the Arts
3-US Military reduce bases in foreign countries by 90%. Redeploy one half to the Mexican border area. And build requisite bases necessary to redeploy to this region. Redeploy our bases so that we are protecting the US sovereign area and not other countries. Project power, but not globally. Non interventionism is the key.
4-IRS
5-Federal Reserve
6-National Education Agency
7-Administration Conference of the United States

Cuts are pretty worthless if they do not actually save any money. I would be greatly interested in reading what things people feel need to be cut but without seeing how much money that will actually save us, it does not matter.

There is also the matter of solutions. You cannot tell a shooting victim that the only solution to there problem would be getting the bullet removed and then call yourself a doctor. How do you propose to do it? Take the IRS for example. Great idea. Let's get rid of it. The problem is that I like my policemen to get paid and my roads to get paved so without showing us how much you are saving and how you plan to realistically cut anything this thread is little more than a troll fantasy.

I am sure you will show me up and make this thread a stellar example of how our government could better function from here on out and I eagerly look forward to reading that.

reply to post by Syyth007


Added to the list. I will call it the elected officials wage and benefits reduction.


1-National Public Radio and Public TV
2-National Endowment for the Arts
3-US Military reduce bases in foreign countries by 90%. Redeploy one half to the Mexican border area. And build requisite bases necessary to redeploy to this region. Redeploy our bases so that we are protecting the US sovereign area and not other countries. Project power, but not globally. Non interventionism is the key.
4-IRS
5-Federal Reserve
6-National Education Agency
7-Administration Conference of the United States
8-Subsidies on oil and other energy
9-DEA
10-Elected officials wage and benefit reduction

Cuts are pretty worthless if they do not actually save any money. I would be greatly interested in reading what things people feel need to be cut but without seeing how much money that will actually save us, it does not matter.

There is also the matter of solutions. You cannot tell a shooting victim that the only solution to there problem would be getting the bullet removed and then call yourself a doctor. How do you propose to do it? Take the IRS for example. Great idea. Let's get rid of it. The problem is that I like my policemen to get paid and my roads to get paved so without showing us how much you are saving and how you plan to realistically cut anything this thread is little more than a troll fantasy.

I am sure you will show me up and make this thread a stellar example of how our government could better function from here on out and I eagerly look forward to reading that.

Well, first off we have to look at what people think we do not need. You have to put the horse before the cart. You cannot say we need to cut $1 Trillion dollars and just say something like, we will just take say 12% out of everything. First attack the things people do not think we need or things that are actually a detriment.

Have a little look see at that link I provided. Imagine everyone that is in it is a darn Republican appointee bureaucrat. Sitting in his desk getting paid to look at the internet all day.

Originally posted by saltheart foamfollower
reply to post by woodwardjnr

 

".



How bout just eliminate ALL taxes except one, sales tax. How bout that? Set it at 35% for EVERYTHING except food, clothes and primary residence. Include stocks with this.

That would eliminate all tax crime and all the problems with the stock market. Solve ALL kinds of problems. But no, people want to raise it on income taxation. This hits the small business and the slightly well off. You need the big money not to have to pay taxes. This is the game. It always has been.

Sometimes people just get me so flummoxed.

edit on 3-11-2010 by saltheart foamfollower because: (no reason given)

then we can cut the IRS!!........YIPPEE